ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½

Available for over a year

In the past thirty-six hours, my news feeds have been full of emotive language: words like fury, outrage, shock, and dismay. There have been calls for calm and, troublingly, calls for revenge. Whatever one’s personal politics, the assassination of conservative influencer Charlie Kirk not only reveals the febrile state of US politics but reminds me that political violence is anathema. I have been especially shocked that the internet is now awash with videos of the horrifying moment when Kirk was killed. Though I have not seen them and nor do I wish to, I do not mind admitting that their very existence challenges my trust in the basic goodness of human nature. Are there things we should not see or, even, know? It seems almost absurd to ask that in an era when I, as much as anyone, am inclined to act as my own moral arbiter. Many of us, with good reason, talk in very individualistic ways about my social media feed, my life, my choice. John Stuart Mill said, ‘Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign.’ This, one might argue, is a guiding principle of the social media age. As an archdeacon, I have a role in clergy discipline and I must see the evidence before bringing an allegation of wrongdoing. Sometimes I have to see in order to know what has happened and the most graphic evidence always exacts a psychological cost. There are things which cannot readily be unseen but must be attended too. Jury members, among others, know this too and it is a measure of the cost of seeing unpleasant things that counselling is offered to help guard the heart from long term damage. The Bible suggests there are limits on what it is wise to know or see. Famously, God bans Adam and Eve from eating of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. When they disobey and eat the fruit, they find they can see with the eyes of God, but without his divine understanding, judgment, and love. The world is never the same again, and violence, death, and suffering enter in. I do not think that God wants adults to be like innocent children. Rather, the Bible invites trust in the belief that there is knowledge that is both too wonderful and, sometimes, too horrifying for us. It commends personal restraint. I recognise how difficult it is to do so, especially when anyone can use a smart phone to garner attention by providing shocking content. Nonetheless, I am convinced that living well sometimes requires choices about what not to see, most especially when I am struggling to judge what it is wise to know.