The Sacred and the Profane
There’s a house in my neighborhood that’s all-out decorated each year for Christmas. From the low picket fence at the front of the yard all the way back to and up on the porch, there are lights and displays galore. The left side is all about Santa and elves, gifts, toys, and snowflakes. The right side is all about the birth of Jesus, the stable and manger, the magi, the shepherds and angels. Between the two sides is a broad brick walkway, firmly dividing the two scenes. There is no crossover. I call it the Garden of the Sacred and the Profane.* (please see note at end)
Like that yard, it seems to me there is a widespread tendency to see life as divided between the worldly and the spiritual, as though it’s an either/or situation rather than a both/and. We seem to expect people to be wholly one way or the other, and are surprised when they cross the boundary of our image of them. Accepting that both coexist in the same person at the same time is fairly easy on the intellectual, hypothetical level. But when someone in whose goodness we trust upends us with an act of cruelty or cheating or perfidy, it’s very hard to accept that both faces are the true face of that person (“How could he do that???!!!”). We experience cognitive dissonance, which causes all manner of psychic discomfort and reactivity. We often resolve it through one of the ego’s favorite maneuvers: we reduce the person to a simplistic judgment and label: “He’s a hypocrite!”
If you take a look at the range of (mostly political) outrage publicized over the last few weeks in the US, you’ll find that a great deal of it centers around the perception of hypocrisy. It’s in every part of the political spectrum, with people on every side pointing accusing fingers at the other. We may have a reaction to a particularly disturbing behavior; but couple that behavior with the actor’s perceived double standard or a conflicting posture of moral superiority, and we’re triggered far more.
We yell or type “He’s a hypocrite!” - as if to hammer the nail in the coffin of our judgment. Hey, I do it too. I’m astonished by the public figures who decry and judge someone or something when it’s to their political advantage to do so, and then embrace, cajole and excuse that same person or thing when it seems to serve their self-interest. I’m shaking my head at leaders who give a pass to violence in one context and act horrified by it in another. I’m snorting at politicians who routinely demonstrate disdain for people in need, but do a quick rotation handing out food to them so long as the video cameras roll. Hypocrisy! It can make the blood boil!
But why such strong, almost primal reaction against hypocrisy in others? We all take actions that would make our better angels blush. So why the outrage?
I’m thinking part of it is about trust: It’s clear that one quality that invites trustworthiness is congruence - that what you see is what you get, that the outer seems aligned with the inner and vice versa. When it’s not, when there’s incongruence, we experience doubt, uncertainty, maybe even fear about the other. We may well feel betrayed, even if we don’t verbalize it that way. The ability to trust brings a sense of security, predictability, knowing - and when that trust is taken away, all those senses of ease and well-being are likely jerked away too. So we’re angry at the loss and the uncertainty, and angry at what just simply seems unkind and unfair. We want to live in a world that’s reliable, consistent, congruent … even though we know it is not. We get attached to that image of how it should be, how others should be - and we don’t want to give it up.
Many politicians and leaders have risen to their roles by proclaiming their own moral superiority, and we want to believe them. It’s annoying, confounding, and even agonizing to see them, through their behavior, betray the very values they assert. Although we may feel betrayed by their actions, there’s a particular outrage that’s triggered by their pretense of being better than that … maybe better than us.
Somehow, we seem able to make space for a lot of bad behavior that’s not coupled with a veneer of moral superiority. Just look how our movies and TV shows are filled with “lovable scoundrels” - those characters who let you see their humanness while also showing you exactly the kind of scoundrel they are. What you see is what you get. They don’t pretend to be anyone else, so we don’t feel betrayed by them, we don’t get quite so angry at them - those stronger reactions are aimed at those who pretend otherwise.
Alas, the matter of pretense leads us, quite uncomfortably, to our old friend the mirror. If I see hypocrisy in another, does that not suggest there’s hypocrisy within me? Well, let’s see: Who among us has not betrayed our own moral code, our own self-image, through wayward actions? Who among us has never felt the shame of it, the fear of being found out, the questioning of who I am if I’m not who I pretend to be? Who has not felt lost, confused, ungrounded as a result? Turning inward to accept and heal all that incongruity within myself is neither comfortable nor easy. It’s far easier to look outward to see the incongruity, the hypocrisy in another; and it’s far more comfortable to judge them instead of judging myself.
But that begs the question: why judge myself, let alone another, when either of us fall short of my image of who we should be? Why not accept that the sacred and profane both exist in each of us, in all of us, as a part of the process of being very human beings in search of our spiritual being?
When I was a kid growing up in a church-centered community, there was sometimes talk among the grownups about the “Sunday Christians” who would piously show up for church services after a week of lying, cheating, and general nastiness. Even as a child, I understood there to be a lot of judgment coupled with those remarks, but somehow I also understood the underlying truth that there is something off if I’m separating my worldly path of living from my spiritual practice. There’s something off if I hold myself out as spiritual and loving, and then live my life as if I’m the only one who matters. There’s something off if I’m judging my “offense” rather than accepting it as a part of my self-learning, and then setting about healing it. And there’s something hypocritical about judging hypocrisy in another. Perhaps in the acceptance and healing of my own dissonance, I would feel far less need to judge the dissonance in others. Accepting that dissonance does not excuse or justify anything - it simply forms the foundation required to begin the healing, to bring myself into greater congruence, to start dissolving my own hypocrisy.
Can I do that without judgment? Can you? As far as I can tell, the spiritual and the profane are intertwined within me, within each of us, and life is a continuous balancing act between the two. When I look through the eyes of judgment, I see right or wrong, good or bad, beautiful or ugly, needing adjustments, dangerous, evil…or just not what I want or expect. When I look at that through spiritual eyes, the eyes of the heart, I see clearly that all things are spiritual, all things are beautiful, and all are interconnected. Can I accept that I have both sets of eyes, both perceptions - the profane and the sacred? Can I use that to bring me into greater congruence, greater loving? Into a greater sacredness?
I can. I believe there is always the opportunity - and it is always the heart’s invitation - to use whatever has triggered me as something that is for me, not against me. So when I catch myself moving toward that familiar “he’s a hypocrite!” reaction, I can use it as a reminder to adjust my vision, and move into my spiritual heart. I can expand my self-vision to include the sacredness of my journey - and each person’s journey - even through our own versions of the profane. I can accept my own incongruence (a loving person who sometimes judges), as part of my path toward knowing and expressing my spiritual being. I can encourage myself with the wisdom of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin: “We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience.” I can let my heart wrap its arms around both the sacred and profane in me, and bring myself into loving oneness.
PLEASE NOTE: I do not consider the secular celebrations of Christmas “profane” in the sense of bad/wrong/evil! I use the word “profane” somewhat similarly to Durkheim’s meaning: worldly, ordinary, individualistic — as opposed the mystical, reverent and unifying aspects of the sacred.