I’ve been reading a book by Jonathan Haidt, a cultural psychologist, The Righteous Mind. It is all about morality. Haidt argues that morality binds and blinds, and that this, at least partly, explains why good people can be divided by politics and religion.
One idea I am going to pick out may seem obvious, when we look around the world. It is that one of the most difficult challenges humanity has faced in its brief time on earth, has been how to live and work in groups that are bigger than kinship groups. Haidt shows that groups that believed in gods and used their beliefs to construct moral communities were the ones that prospered and endured. Is this still true? A modern-day study into the differences between religious and non-religious Americans found that:
By many different measures religiously observant Americans are better neighbours and better citizens than secular Americans.
The researchers wondered why this was the case, so they questioned the religiously observant about their beliefs and practices. They concluded that the only thing that was reliably and powerfully associated with the moral benefits of religion was how enmeshed people were in relationship with their co-religionists.
When the International group started, Richard asked for around 40 volunteers who would give up a Sunday afternoon once a month to help those with no recourse to public funds. I was staggered that he got all the volunteers on the first request. I had never been in a church where such a thing happened. More usually, several requests were needed, and often projects were reduced in size, because enough volunteers could not be found.
To use the psychological language, it is the strength of our enmeshment that makes St Martin’s such an attractive place. Or more simply, it is love that binds us. Long may it be so and may it never blind us to the stranger who joins us, however different.
Wendy Quill
