I once had a martial arts student who used this phrase as the answer every time something went wrong. It was the same when this person was my college student as well. Heck, Adam did it in the Garden. God: “Did you eat that fruit I told you not to eat?” Adam: “I didn’t do it, it was that woman you gave me”. Face it, much of the time all of us begin here, I didn’t do it.
The truth is often that “I didn’t do it!” is true, you or I did not do it. Instead, we let it happen. Consider that for a minute, we let it happen. On quote that I saw awhile back indicated that when we quit talking about religion and politics in family gatherings and other “polite” settings (read church here) it was the beginning of us letting institutions act any way they want.
In my own denomination, we have allowed LBGTQI persons to become second class citizens that are welcome to come to our churches but not be a part of them. And, we point to one group or the other as the culprit. WE let this happen. We are the same way with our government at all levels. There are homeless people, “I didn’t do it”; there are people going hungry, “I didn’t do it”; and, the traditional church is dying, “I didn’t do it”.
We as Contemplatives and Christians can say all we want that it isn’t my fault, I didn’t do it and we will always be lying to ourselves. We are called to speak for those who have no voice. We are called to help the “least of His children”. That is what the series of verses is about when we just blithely go ahead and let things happen. When we do not speak up and speak out, we are complicit with the sins of society. Scripture says we will hear, “I never knew you”.
Perhaps an active faith is one that says, “I am part of the problem, what can I do to make it better?” That is what we are called to do, to make it better in our society and in our churches. But, to do this we must speak up. It is not easy and it is what got Jesus killed after all.
TMM