We have seen it, bubbling up from under the surface and then exploding in various ways over the last few months. In the early days of the virus, rage would erupt over toilet paper. There was Central Park Karen who went into a fury when someone asked her to leash her dog according to park rules. There have been hundreds of videos lately documenting the explosion of wrath in our world.
The call on responsible citizens to wear masks to help control the spread of Coronavirus has unleashed a fury out of proportion with the request. We have the red-shirted man in Costco, verbally attacking someone who dared to tell him to wear a mask. In mid-July in Michigan, Sean Ruis stabbed an elderly man after he was confronted for not wearing a mask in a store. Later Sean was killed by police after they pulled him over for arrest.
We know it is not about the mask itself. The reactions are coming from a deep place within which has become a pressure cooker over the long days and months of quarantine. People are experiencing anger and grief over many losses related to finances, freedom of movement, cancelled events, ability to see family and friends, and health. Additionally, factors such as racial injustices and inequities, political uncertainty, and wealth gaps have been added to the mix. Emotions have been pressed down and compacted as we attempt to navigate life. When these are not expressed or worked out in a healthy manner, they come out sideways. Our worlds have been upended. Spend five minutes on Twitter and it becomes obvious that we are angry.
I believe the anger of the black people of America and around the world is justified. The treatment they have received for centuries can never be undone and it seems they have reached the point where they can contain their deep feelings no longer. This I do not condemn; I pray it will be the catalyst for change and usher in a future of greater equality and justice.
Anger is a barometer to how we are feeling, it is our “response to a real or perceived wrong, inequity or injustice.”[i] Anger itself is not a sin but a helpful guide leading us to address problems and seek out what is right. However, if this anger is left unchecked, left to simmer below the surface, it can lead to underlying rage, which becomes a time bomb waiting to explode.
While anger and wrath can be related, wrath is more concerned with selfish ends, such as the impulse to harm another because of an offence, or seek revenge. It also manifests itself in denial and impatience, when our perceived “right way” has been thwarted. (for those who study the Enneagram, this is the vice of One’s).
Denial as a form of wrath is clearly evident in our world these days. Today, amidst a global pandemic, there are many who cry, “hoax” or blame other governments of conspiring to spread the virus. To prove there was no virus, a pastor in Arkansas boasted his parishioners were prepared to lick the floor of his church. The masses of people who continue to go about their lives, ignoring the concept of social distancing or the efficacy of wearing masks, deny the seriousness of our current situation, with potentially fatal results. Facing the truth requires introspection and change. Herein lies the appeal of denial. It allows us to carry on with living, ignoring our responsibility and the call of conscience and its demands. Denial is the path of psychological and moral least resistance.[ii]
We create fertile ground for wrath when we “stuff” our anger: when we attempt to sweep it under the rug rather than acknowledging it and working toward a solution to the problem it is highlighting. In psychology it is recognized that anger is only the tip of the iceberg. Underneath the surface are other emotions which are tender and vulnerable and instead of allowing them to come to the surface, we allow the stronger emotion of anger to erupt. It is a method we unconsciously use to protect ourselves which many of us are good at. All the hurts, harsh words, slights; we hang onto them by “stuffing”. We refuse to acknowledge our feelings and make space to work through the emotion. We often deal with pain and loss by shutting them away, not speaking of them, and trying to forget. The disappointments over not being able to go for coffee with friends, visit our aging parents, or celebrate graduation as planned have a way of building into something much bigger if we have not recognized the losses and grieved appropriately. If we continue to take in the apocalyptic news reports and fail to balance it with goodness and hope, then the emotions can pile up and turn destructive. Sue Monk Kidd tells about a story in a local newspaper with the caption “Roof gives way under weeks of accumulated snow”, with a picture of a caved in roof and the living room filled waist-high with snow.[iii] This is a great depiction of how, if we let things pile up, they can cause great damage.
There is a lot of pride all tangled up in our wrath. It is often about what we want, what we believe is right, and how things have to be done according to our timetable. Pride will act in selfish ways without concern for the welfare of anyone else. We see this in the ways in which individuals are being cavalier about the threat of the virus and insist on their right to gather in large groups without masks and without thought of the vulnerable among us. When we are feeling out of control, when nothing in our life is going the way we planned, this can be a trigger for unleashing the wrath which has been building inside.
There is much advice for overcoming anger such as counting to ten before reacting, or pausing to take deep breaths and these may help in the heat of the moment but they are inadequate to change us from the inside out. Only God by his Spirit working within us can penetrate the depths of our feelings and conquer the wrath within. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin tells us to “trust in the slow work of God”. If we think of how erosion works, we see the daily rhythms of wind and water transform physical spaces over time. This can be likened to the way that God slowly works in us. It is through the daily minutia that God does His transforming work in us as we remain open and willing to receive from Him.
The antidote for wrath is patience, which also has elements of humility, forgiveness, gratitude and diligence within it. The Bible speaks of patient endurance as “a confident waiting until God intervenes”.[iv] Acquiring the virtue of patience begins with an acknowledgement of our feelings and frustrations, our powerlessness, and our need for outside help. One of the best ways I have found to come to terms with this is the practise of Examen. Typically done at the end of the day, it is a way to take stock of all of the interactions and happenings of the day. It begins with gratitude, which turns our focus off ourselves and onto God. I acknowledge that all good gifts come from Him, and make the choice to be thankful in all things. Through gratitude we become aware of God as present in our daily life, able to provide and intervene, our faith is strengthened and we loosen our grip on those rights we have held onto so tightly. We can begin to take our eyes off of all that we have lost in the past months and focus instead of the abundance which we do have. This will take some of the air out of the balloon of our entitlement.
From this state of gratitude, we move on to recognizing and celebrating the consolations of the day – everything that went well - when we responded in humility and love rather than impatience and anger.
The next step is to acknowledge the desolations of the day – those times we failed to love God and others well. It is here that we see clearly the ways wrath has shown up (among other things), and we can repent. The secret thoughts wishing those who are careless would come down with the virus, or the ways we are tempted to deny some of what is happening in the world so as not to have to engage, can be excavated and released. This leads us toward an appreciation for the love and patience which God continues to show us daily, and deals a deadly blow to any pride or superiority we may have been harboring. That which we have so freely received can now overflow toward others.
We know that “human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires” (James 1:20) and that the Spirit works in us to produce fruit such as patience in our lives. There is no fast track formula to growing in patience. It is the work of God as we daily submit to His rule over our lives, each interaction, each hurt and disappointment. Knowing that He cares and is available to us at all times can lead us out of wrath into a more patient faith in His ability to bring good out of all things.
May our ever-patient Father free us from wrath and produce in us a confidence that He will act on our behalf. May we keep the soil of our hearts tilled and ready for the Spirit’s work of producing a harvest of patience.
Further resources on the Examen are found here
Photos from Unsplash
1. engin akyurt 2. Hannah Olinger
References
[i] (Travilla & Webb, 2002, p. 120)
[ii] https://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/09/29/the_odd_body_denial/
[iii] Kidd, Sue Monk, Firstlight: Early Inspirational writings
[iv] Allen, E. The Meaning of Patience Retrieved from Spectrum Magazine