The Mirror Test

December 11th, 2016  |   

Every man carries with him through life a mirror, as unique and impossible to get rid of as his shadow.”   W.H. Auden, The Dryer’s Hand.

John Kael Weston, who spent seven years in the midst of the ongoing war in Iraq and Afghanistan, has written a powerful new book, The Mirror Test: America at War in Iraq and Afghanistan. One of the wounded veterans he writes about, a Marine who suffered horrible facial disfigurement and the ordeal of 128 surgeries, and finally passed the “mirror test.” Reluctantly, he looked in the mirror to see his own face.

Weston goes on to write, “a disfigured veteran’s mirror test should become our own: individual American’s reflecting on what it means when a country, but not a nation, goes to war—and is still at war.” 

While our country continues to wage undeclared war in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Syria, we are at war, a political war, right here at home. This election has brought to the surface the harsh divisions that lie beneath the surface of our life together as a nation, a divided population that has been waiting for an advocate to justify them.

While a steady stream of refugees flee from Syria, and the entire war-torn Middle East, many Americans feel like displaced people in their very own country.

Since I awoke to election results on November ninth, I have attempted to listen to a wide variety of people talk about the election, people on both sides of this political wall that separates Americans. To name but a few:

·               A Trump supporter waiting beside me at the hospital for a blood test.

·               A married couple that split their vote.

·               A woman who is depressed over Hillary’s defeat.

·               A dedicated Democrat unwilling to vote for Hillary.

·               An American Muslim friend who worries about his children’s future.

·               A person who has ended a friendship with someone who cast a vote for Trump.

·               A diocesan employee who shared the contents of a note sent to her workplace: “To you homos, are you ready to have Donald Trump as your president? He is going to put marriage back where GOD wants it and were (sic) gonna kick your faggotity asses back where they belong. Your (sic) f—–!”

·               A working-class man who voted for Trump because he wanted to “stick a finger into the eyes of the politicians in Washington. Then, quite unexpectedly, he told me he was mourning the death of Leonard Cohen, whose music he discovered back when he identified with anti-Vietnam War protests.

·               A Hillary supporter who sat uneasily at her family’s Thanksgiving dinner with a brother who voted for Trump.

Folks who voted for Trump know very well how we got him for our next president, and they are celebrating his election. Hillary voters, on the other hand, are not elated. In a word, no, more than a word, they are depressed, in shock, disillusioned, angry and disquieted. Yes, disquieted. The Psalmist’s question probes the human soul: “Why art thou cast down, O my soul? And why art thou disquieted within me?” It’s because Donald Trump won this ugly election.

As there is a time to vote and a time to count votes, there is also a time to listen and a time to speak. In fact, we learn to speak because we listened. As babies, we were paying attention and began, with words, to speak with people around us. That’s how we built our storehouse of words, an ever-growing vocabulary. The focal point for learning is listening. Listening makes it possible for us to speak. Listening, in order to be able to speak, is a lifelong enterprise.

Next week I will go to Minneapolis for Christmas with daughter Katherine, and grandson Jesse and granddaughter Eva. I look forward to going to the church where Katherine is the priest. Between now and then, I will be sharing, from beneath my fig tree, a few of my own observations, based on what I have heard, about where we are as a nation, and how we might approach the upcoming presidency of Donald Trump.

I began this piece with John Kael Weston’s observation about the Marine who suffered horrible facial disfigurement and the ordeal of 128 surgeries, and who finally passed the “mirror test,” reluctantly looking in the mirror to see his own face. I take seriously Weston’s admonition that Americans should take the mirror test to see why our country is still at war, and I would add, at war with one another following the election.

I do believe that the mirror test may be the most difficult and challenging test we may ever have had to face. Taking a hard look at ourselves and our nation, in order to gain insight and direction, will not be an easy task. Between now and Christmas, I will do my best to invite my readers to peer into the mirror with me.

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