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Know this, my dear brothers: everyone should be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath, for the wrath of a man does not accomplish the righteousness of God. Therefore, put away all filth and evil excess and humbly welcome the word that has been planted in you and is able to save your souls. (James 1:19-21)
We humans are not created to remain in anger and this includes even anger that is righteous. All anger when it is held on to and nursed quickly becomes toxic and this toxicity deadens life whether that be the life of an individual, of a community and even the life of a people and nation. Christians are not immune to the toxicity of anger and it is exactly because of the faith and hope we hold and profess as well as the ideals we cling to, that I believe Christians are even more susceptible to the toxicity of righteous anger than the non-religious person.
We proclaim the coming Kingdom of God – a Kingdom where all tears will be wiped away and all injuries and injustices will be healed – yet we live in a world where there is grave injustice, violence and sin. We see it and we can even be the victims of it ourselves. Sometimes these injustices can be addressed and overcome on both the individual and societal levels in our world and history and these moments are to be celebrated and upheld (i.e. the end of slavery and segregation, the acknowledgment of the dignity and rights of women, the growing awareness of the rights and heritage of indigenous peoples, an abused woman gaining the strength to walk away from her abuser, a man caught in the mechanisms of addiction breaking free) but sometimes – for a variety of reasons – there cannot be full healing and restoration in this world. Our belief in the resurrection and final judgment gives us the sure hope and belief that God – in God’s way not ours – will indeed wipe away all tears and answer all injustices but what do we do with the anger that remains in the meantime?
This is the conundrum. All anger, even when righteous, becomes toxic.
To me, there seems to be three options when we are confronted with injustices inflicted upon us that cannot be fully answered and remedied in this world. The first option is to just lay down and die. This happens, both literally and figuratively. People do physically die from injustices endured. Sadly, we see and read this in the news all the time. But there is also figurative death that results from injustice endured. People give up; quiet resignation sets in and people just subsist through life. The hurt experienced overshadows everything and remains a constant shade in the background of the person’s life.
The second option is to hold on to the injustice experienced, ruminate upon it and therefore nurse the anger within. Here is where the wisdom and warning of James is worth heeding, …the wrath of a man does not accomplish the righteousness of God. We are not created to remain in anger. We are not made in the image of anger even when righteous but rather the image of God. If we nurse anger then we make anger an idol – we forget God and we devalue ourselves. All anger, when held on to, becomes toxic. The righteousness of God is not found in anger.
The third option is to – with God’s grace – stand up again, brush ourselves off, remember that we are a child of God and make the choice that – despite whatever may be thrown at us – we will live, walk and act always as a child of God. This third option gets to the advice given by St. James, …put away all filth and excess and humbly welcome the word that has been planted in you and is able to save your souls. Put away the filth of resentment and nursed anger and remember that the word we have been given, the word of salvation in Christ and our dignity as a child of God, goes deeper and is ever more enduring than any injustice inflicted. No injustice can take away this truth. If we focus on this truth and not the injustice and the anger that springs from it, we will move beyond the temptation to make an idol of our anger. …humbly welcome the word …
All anger becomes toxic. The good news is that we are not created to remain in anger. We are created in the image and likeness of God and saved through the sacrifice of the Son. This is the truth that endures and saves … humbly welcome it.