It’s never the answer, but ...

I have been fantasizing about committing vandalism lately. I know I won’t actually do it. But I really, really want to.

We face an inner conflict between our baser human reactions and our higher-minded intentional responses. Sometimes we kick when we should have caressed. That is the purview of spiritual practices. Little bits of advice on how to enhance our inner calm so that we may share that sense of calm with others.

I’d really love to think that as a religious and spiritual academic who works quite hard to practice what he preaches, I would be above things like fantasizing about vandalism. But I have to confess I am not.

The other day, I drove past a house in a town near mine. I pass by that house fairly frequently and have taken note of their political affiliations as displayed upon their front lawn. Their views are strongly different than mine. And while that is challenging, I certainly agree with their right to have their own viewpoint. However, their style of displaying it seems particularly targeted not for the purpose of promoting their candidate as much as attacking anyone who doesn’t agree.

Two days ago, I drove past that house to find a new addition to their display: a brand-new Confederate flag.

I couldn’t help but need to deliberately walk myself through the reasons why not to commit vandalism. I imagined everything from quietly taking it down during the night to setting it on fire. Not my finest moment. But it’s real. I’m certainly not the only otherwise nonviolent person who has felt this way.

Perhaps people think a minister should be above such thoughts. Bull. As much time as I spend on introspection and examining these ideas, I’m still very much human. I struggled with how I should respond to my feelings about seeing that flag newly displayed this week. Especially considering that we are in such a racially divisive time, their message is clear.

As I often like to do, I talked about it with my staff, three very wise women whose advice I am committed to following at all times. I confessed to them that I didn’t know how to respond, but that I wanted to do very unministerial things. I told them that I fantasized about vandalizing it. I told them that I wanted to take pictures of it and post it on online for everyone to ... what, exactly?

Even as I said it, I could already hear the advice they might give me and I was mostly right: What’s the point, especially if my goal would be to try to change the mind of the person who displayed the flag in the first place? My actions will not change their mind or heart.

Obviously, vandalism isn’t the answer, as supportive as I might be of the destruction and removal of public monuments intended to glorify racism in this country and elsewhere. This was a person’s private property, and they were exercising their First Amendment rights.

And publicly posting photos only creates more animosity, not less, which cannot be my goal. My goal is to unify, to find and highlight pathways of accomplishing it. What do we do with our rage about this time we are in? It’s not just about being disagreed with. It’s more than that. It’s that our deepest ideologies and principles are being contrasted and compared right now, and with grave consequences. Is this what the battle of light versus dark looks like?

When you look at the advice of spiritual teachers, you start to get a picture of what their overall goal might have been. It is always about getting along. It’s always about improving one of four relationships: with other people, with the Earth, with the self, with a higher power.

The point, ultimately, is that it’s all about relationship. Imagining it, creating it, fostering it, defending it. It is never about ending, destroying or preventing it. It is never about making a point to alienate.

So, ultimately, I decided against burning down that flagpole with the Confederate flag on it. Good call. I also decided against posting photos of it online. I openly state here that I defend their right to display it on their own private property, despite my intense personal disgust. I would hope for the same from them about their likely intense personal disgust for me.

The flag represents nothing more than an opinion. And I can tolerate that. Their opinion has no power of its own.

So I talk about it here with you. Because I don’t always know what to do either. And I sometimes wonder how to channel my discomfort. Oh, let’s just call it what it is. Rage. Yet we should never act from our rage. Better to maintain anger with integrity. Rage has no capacity for rational thought or action. It makes us do stupid things. Like vandalism. Or public shaming.

I know there are those who think these strategies are the only way they’ll ever hear. But then that becomes the constellation under which any forward growth occurs and will eventually need to be apologized for later. Better to stick to your principles even when it doesn’t feel like it gets us very far. That is, and has always only ever been, the surest way forward for all.

Pray for those who disagree with you. Wish well upon all who hate you. Wish them all a measure of peace and ease, and you will better know it for yourself.

Wil Darcangelo, M. Div., is the minister at First Parish UU Church of Fitchburg and of First Church of Christ Unitarian in Lancaster, and producer of The UU Virtual Church of Fitchburg and Lancaster on YouTube. Email wildarcangelo@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @wildarcangelo. His blog, Hopeful Thinking, can be found at www.hopefulthinkingworld.b logspot.com.