No Turn on Red

As a Catholic baby boomer, there were numerous non-negotiable rules.  All the parish students went to the Sunday 9:00 AM mass together dressed in your Sunday best, sports gear not permitted. Hands folded, NO TALKING!  In class the Baltimore Catechism questions and answers were memorized verbatim. There was no gray area for discussion. Ambivalence was not welcome. Red lights were everywhere.  No going beyond the set parameters.  Stop meant stop.

As decades traveled through time and society norms imploded, rules gradually eroded until they now often as not are interpreted as merely suggestions.  We are consciously or unconsciously avoiding the tried and true red lights and are meandering towards Right Turn on Red being our default when it comes to daily behavior.

In traffic navigation, a Right Turn on Red sign gives us the authority to judge the safety of the intersection. We stop, give a quick scan to the road to ensure no harm will ensue and then boom, make a right turn while the light is still red.  Always feels pretty good, doesn’t it?

When it comes to our moral navigation though, we may be making too many Right Turns on Red.  Our conscience is our red-light indicator. We stop and mentally scan our moral highway to see if the coast is somewhat clear and then before we even realize it, we have opted for salty language on our daily commute,  questionable content as entertainment or a quick chat becoming a gossipy runaway train. Our flawed judgement has made us turn that corner to do whatever we want when we should have just stayed where we were.

Though these Right Turns on Red may seem innocuous, each poorly judged one leaves a ding on our relationship with the Lord.  We may need to consider a full stop now and again.

So, for now, I am working on my Right Turn on Red mentality.  I need a few more of those No Turn on Red signs in my life.  Society might say it’s fine to make that turn, but my red-light conscience indicator is telling me stop means stop.