Defusing Division

A recent Gallup poll showed that division among Americans has peaked to a high, leaving us to believe we are not united but deeply divided. With discord rampant, discourse between people seems futile as we no longer have shared principles or even a common understanding of reality. What seems obvious to one person is absurd to the next. From the Biblical perspective, this division has its ultimate source as a snake in a garden. The modern version of the serpent’s manipulation presents itself as an ideology with a similar style as the serpent - it sounds pleasing to the ears, but inevitably its teaching breaks people away from God and causes intense rivalry.

Dissension in society is nothing new and will always continue in a fallen world where God is freely rejected. But, when trying to heal division, wise thinkers have always fixated on a shared belief system. In the height of the civil rights clash, Dr. Martin Luther King wanted to unite the diversity of races and ethnic groups under our common creed. In his speech, he quoted the creed in the Declaration of Independence as a starting point to unify different groups. He announced: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” This common principle has led to prosperity in America and Western society. But, when this shared norm is ruptured and a society doesn’t have a unified starting point but competing ideologies, competing creeds, division will rear its ugly head. 

No longer can a variety of people be united under the preamble of the Constitution, as a new creed has surfaced in the societal vision. Woke ideology has crafted a creed of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion that stands in stark contrast to the common creed of the West - God, rationality, natural law, and a free market of ideas.  

This rewriting of our creed should arouse suspicion. As we come to the realization that our mutual vision has been retooled head-scratching questions now emerge. How and why was the creed re-written? How exactly is the new creed in opposition to the founder’s creed? The story unfolds by viewing competing ideologies at different stages of history.

Before this summer of ritiong, the summer of 2020 immerged as the launching point for our division. At the height of covid and the BLM riots a convergence of a series of radical ideologies (socialism, gender ideology, critical race theory, queer theory, and post-colonial theory.) caught most people by surprise. What was it, and where did they come from? All social movements that sound insightfully admirable but end up producing division and violence have for it a source that is eerily similar to the serpent in the garden - pleasing to the senses but deadly if consumed.

The phrases that have burst into our culture since 2020 are woke and D.E.I. In classical philosophical discourse, one first begins by defining the terms in question. Of course, in our postmodern world, the practice of defining basic terms is itself allusive as institutional influencers are working hard to re-define basic terms as a “woman” or a “man.” Be that as it may, the Merriam-Webster definition of “woke” is being aware of social or racial justice issues. Here, the word “woke” enters the social justice stratosphere and has garnered a cult-like following. The adherents of the woke movement have become so committed to its cause that many have classified the ideology as a religion.  

Catholic author Noelle Mering’s book, “Awake, Not Woke” does well to compare and contrast the culture’s view of these terms and the Church’s assessment. Mering defines “woke” as the making sacred of the historically marginalized groups based on race, gender, and sexual identity. This whole process of making sacred of marginalized groups is coined by the word “diversity.” Out of “woke” comes a belief system that we have to have equal outcomes by race, sex, and other factors. Today, we now see the woke movement immersed into everyday life with DEI policies planted in most organizations. One of the premises in woke is that we can’t have any race gaps or gender gaps in terms of pay, occupation, social status, etc. These gaps must be corrected through various government-based quotas and affirmative action programs. An example of the DEI policy in action is Harvard University. Harvard sees that 13% of the U.S. population is black, so according to the woke theory, they need to have 13% of black students enrolled at Harvard. To do this, Harvard needs to discriminate against whites and Asians who can get accepted based on academic achievement and allow black students acceptance even if their academic credentials don’t meet Harvard’s rigorous requirements. To achieve 13% black students at Harvard is called equity. However, when the tables are flipped and a minority group is predominant, DEI is silent. For example, according to racial equality activist Richard Lapchick, the NBA in 2023 was composed of 70.4 percent black players, 17.5 percent white players, 2.2 percent Latino players of any race, and 9.7 “other” or mixed race. Does the NBA promote DEI to make the racial levels more equal? No. Therefore, equity really means equal outcome for the sacred marginalized groups. Whereas Martin Luther King emphasized going colorblind and making judgments based on character and merit, DEI reverses this concept. DEI is hyper-focused on color while ignoring levels of merit.

While celebrating certain ethnic groups seems virtuous on the surface, the reality is that this whole process creates an atmosphere of tribalism as one group receives preferential treatment and praise while the other is stigmatized. Besides, our identity and worth doesn't come from our ancestors’ geographic origin; it comes from God. Catholicism teaches that in the end, our sex, country of origin, and social status are of minor significance. Rather, what matters is if we conform our lives to being created in God’s image (cf. Gal. 3:28).

Historian George Fredrickson first coined the phrase social equity and defined it as “an administered political economy in which shares are adjusted so that citizens are made equal.” Equity was typically understood as equal opportunity, but Fredrickson’s work moved equity from the starting blocks of opportunity to the finish line of outcome. However, a careful analysis will see that there is a large difference between having the same opportunity to then ensuring the same outcome. In this sense, equity now became a redistribution of merit-based outcomes. A sports analogy will help clarify. If two football teams match up against each other, the league rules would require an equal opportunity format. Both teams have the same number of players on the field and would play by the same rules, thus no team would have an unfair advantage. This is an obvious prerequisite before competition begins. But equal outcome is where lunacy would assert itself in our sports analogy. Suppose in a division, one team has a 10-6 record while the other team has a 6-10 record. It would not make sense for the league to come up with a policy that both teams' records should be “redistributed” to achieve an equal record of 8-8. Most rational people would see stealing two wins from one team while rewarding the under-performing team with those two wins as a gross violation of justice under a merit-based system. But, if meritocracy were removed from the creed and replaced with the vague concept of equity, eventually this scenario would become a reality.

In Catholicism, equity refers to equal opportunity, not equal outcome. Everyone gets the same opportunity in life because everyone is born in the image of God. But not everyone receives the same outcome - whether economically or socially. This concept is etched in passages such as, "To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability" (Matthew 25: 15, cf Galatians 6:7-9, 2 Tim 2:6). However, instead of the Biblical concept to "reap what you sow," socialism restates this to have the State “take what others sow” under the guise of justice.

The other part of this belief system is called Inclusion. So, D & E in DEI means discriminating against the majority to get the same outcomes for the “marginalized.” The “I” in inclusion does not mean what the word is intended to mean. In his book, Professor Eric Kaufman defines the woke ideology’s meaning of inclusion as a means to censor speech that goes against the woke narrative and that contains any suggestive language that might offend the most sensitive member of the marginalized group. By woke terms, “inclusion” really means to squash free speech when it doesn’t align with their creed. An example of “inclusion” can be seen in the exchange between Senator Josh Hawley and Cal law professor Khiara Bridges. Senator Hawley asserted the natural law fact that only women can become pregnant, to which Bridges accused Hawley of being transphobic and promoting violence for suggesting this. Notice how woke ideology trained Bridges to shut down the conversation as a form of “identity oppression” when an alternative idea cut in the opposite direction of the narrative.

Inclusion plays out by conducting a debate about whether a trans-woman is a real woman only to realize you just got censored, de-platformed, and eventually canceled for doing such a thing.

Many Christian-minded people are egged into the woke movement under the pretense of “justice.” As woke pulls Christians into it, it then diffuses the Christian concept of repentance and mercy. Moreover, whereas Catholicism focuses on forgiving your alleged oppressor, wokeism demands that you enact revenge against your aggressor. 

As we can witness, DEI ransacks unity and creates rampant divisions. Karl Marx wanted to take a marginalized group and elevate them to a victimhood class, infuriated at the “system.” In this way, people would view all aspects of human society through the category of the oppressed v. the oppressor while labeling each person belonging to one or the other. From the heavenly perspective, an environment of hyper division used as a battering ram against the Christian culture is the calling card of the devil. But, Christ comes as a unifier that takes natural differences and orientates them together as in His salvation “there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28).

When it comes to an ideology that ultimately creates unatural division let us recall  St. Paul’s assertion, “I appeal to you, brethren, to take not those who create dissensions and difficulties, in opposition to the doctrine you have been taught; avoid them.” (Romans 16: 17).

Let us not take the DEI bait. Rather, let us work to create a Christian civilization. Pope Leo XIV seeks to carry the work of Pope Leo XII on the correct order of justice while articulating authentic Catholic social teaching. In the years to come, division will likely not subside. But if we know that God wins in the end, we'll experience sanctity in the midst of mayhem - a peace that endures in our fallen world.