Contemplative in the Mud

In What Ways Are All Responsible For All?

3–4 minutes

Benjamin Embley

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2 comments on In What Ways Are All Responsible For All?

The Brothers KaramazovIn The Brothers Karamazov, book VI, chapter 3, the elder Zosima is recorded to say,

There is only one salvation for you: take yourself up, and make yourself responsible for all the sins of men. For indeed it is so, my friend, and the moment you make yourself sincerely responsible for everything and everyone, you will see at once that it is really so, that it is you who are guilty on behalf of all and for all. Whereas by shifting your own laziness and powerlessness onto others, you will end by sharing in Satan’s pride and murmuring against God.

I know that I am not the immediate cause of anyone else’s actions. From a purely philosophical or theological point of view, I know that. Even, you could say, I know it from common sense. A decision is a decision is a decision. I don’t make anyone else’s decisions. That’s what the word means.

But at some point, this theoretical observation can turn into a justification: no, no, no, I’m not responsible for my neighbour. Am I my brother’s keeper?

The last sentence is surely setting off alarm bells. It does for me, anyway. I know not to say it. If I want to prevent thinking it, I need to try to get some meaning out of Dostoevsky’s words.

In what ways are all responsible for all?

  • Have I sinned? By sinning, I and I alone make the final decision that this particular good that God wanted will not be here and now. That good may have at some point helped someone, which helped someone else… which helped any particular person in the world. Without that help, inspiration, joy, or truth, is it harder to do good? It could be as little as a spiteful thought or a sharp word; it could be a simple refusal to acknowledge forgetfulness or a small untruth. How did this “small” evil thing set off a chain of events that hindered someone else’s spiritual growth?
  • Have I not prayed as I ought? Does my prayer not centre enough on God and ask him to do what must be done in this world: “may your will be done… give us this day our daily bread”. Have I not cooperated with God’s plan of salvation and liberation?
  • In what ways am I silent, thus letting systemic issues go unchecked?
  • Even if my sins are small or venial, is my appearance, are my gestures, is my life bringing the Gospel to people in my actions, dispositions, and simple acts? Is my life transfigured like those of the saints, helping good to spread around me without noise and by simplicity? In the measure that it is, I have done (only) what God asked. In the measure that it isn’t, I have failed; I have failed anyone (or “everyone”).

None of this causes sin absolutely. None of this immediately causes the moral evil of other people. But it can condition it. And when, torn, beaten, wounded, and dragged through the mud of the world, we realize just how contingent so many human decisions are and just how frail they are, then we know that to withdraw support that everyone is entitled to – either by sinning or by not praying as we ought – then we have played a role. Badly.

Thank God, though, that good is stronger than evil. And God takes the little steps that we are capable of and makes them better. Get up and try again and remember – notice, be horrified by and be strong in the face of – what ways all are responsible for all.

(Can you think of any other ways that all are responsible for all?)

Benjamin Embley's avatar

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Benjamin Embley

With backgrounds in engineering (BSc PhD) and philosophy (MA), Ben has lived and worked in England, France, and Thailand and is now back home as a settler in the unceded traditional territory of the Wabanaki peoples in Canada. He is a Laudato Si’ Animator and currently studying an MTS Peace & Justice in Reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples.

2 responses to “In What Ways Are All Responsible For All?”

  1. B. Michael St. Jacques Avatar
    B. Michael St. Jacques

    St. Paul teaches elaborately about the one body of Christ, how if one member suffers all suffer and if one rejoices all rejoice. Try hitting your thumb with a hammer and telling the rest of your body not to react. If we are all members of one body, thnt what each of us does effects all the rest. What each of us chooses not to do, also effects everyone else. In that sense we are all responsible for all, in as much as we accept and live faithfully the responsibility of a member of the body or not…”All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God says the same St. Paul. The saints witness as did Jesus to accepting responsibility for all and to be willing to pay the full price. Our responsibility is not that we have caused the sin of others but rather that as members of one body we share responsibility for what happens in and to the one body. When this responsibility is lived in union with Jesus Crucified and Risen it is the Holy Spirt of God Himself who works in us to accomplish the works of salvation.
    l.b. Michael

    Reply
    1. Contemplative in the Mud Avatar
      Contemplative in the Mud

      I like this. =)

      My reply to Dostoevsky reads something like an examination of conscience, but yours is theology.

      Reply

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