The executive director of a
government agency took exception to the summary report I’d written for publication.
Saying there were misstatements in my account the woman wrote a
letter-to-the-editor with clarifications and corrections, which in essence calls
into question my work as a reporter. Fortunately, there were about 20 other
people in the room and the meeting was audio recorded. Rather than worrying
about defending myself, I can let the record speaks for itself. Jesus said, “When
you are brought before synagogues, rulers and authorities, do not worry about
how you will defend yourselves or what you will say, for
the Holy Spirit will teach you at that time what you should say” (Luke 12:11-12
NIV).
1 comment:
Gail;
-----It is good that about twenty people know you had your information correct. How many do not? We can only speculate how many people read the executive director’s letter-to-the-editor and believed it. The most realistic point for embarking on a speculative guess is the executive director’s confidants, her endearing family members, close friends, business and political associates, and her own personal penumbra - "followers" they’re called when of our own group; "lackeys" they’re called when they’re of an opponent’s group. These will believe the executive director in order to maintain faith in her.
-----Bias is a giant problem for humankind, although it is also a safeguard against error (since bias is an element of human nature, then by all means, bias yourself towards the truth.) If our minds are overburdened with information, mental chaos begins to emerge. Therefore, instead of always referring to a stick of painted wood with a hole drilled through its center being filled with graphite, we just use a word for all of that information: "pencil". Think of how that sentence would have sounded if all of the concepts of each word in it had to similarly be presented. Every word is a collection of information, some at the forefront with the rest in the background according to the context in which it is used. Everyone perceives the information a little bit differently according to their personal experiences.
-----An individual is also a collection of information, but vastly more. It is impossible for any person to know any other person thoroughly. Yet we are often required to assess another person’s stance on some issue, or collection of interrelated issues. By what criteria do we do this? We can simply pull a dictionary off the shelf and look up the information involved in a word, but there is no dictionary of all people for us to use similarly. The criteria by which we assess one another is only slightly less varied than is the number of us all. But one criteria that should be universal is going extinct: the product of facts and logic. It is far too difficult and time consuming to acquire information and check it for the truth. So we just acquire information. And logic is discipline requiring a great deal of self-control, somewhat technical learning, and a lot of practice. Therefore it is becoming a pariah.
-----Today’s public thought is made of icons who’ve become representations of ideas about issues. Al Gore/global warming, Barrak Obama/transform America, Red Skelton/humorous decency, if you happen to like these folks. There’s an opposite set of representations each stands for if you don’t. These representations are more or less learned from public discourse and are far overused in personal thought.
-----But it is God who has the dictionary of human souls. We can estimate people and ideas with some rather difficult investigative work. And the harder we work at it, the more accurate our estimations become. But that’s unfortunately becoming the fewer of us. For an indecency such as what you’ve experienced, the best you can do is live the truth and delight in the shelter of the Lord’s knowledge of you. “Talk no more so very proudly, let not arrogance come from your mouth; for the LORD is a God of knowledge, and by him actions are weighed.” (I Sam 2:3)
Love you all,
Steve Corey
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