Who Are We, America?

W ho are we as a nation? That’s a critical question in the backdrop of just about every controversial issue we face today in the United States. While the answer may lead to policy debates, a serious consideration of who we are and what we are about is critical to getting out of ideological silos and actually making coherent policy that helps with human flourishing.

That’s what Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky was prompting, as he asked in desperation for our help, speaking to Congress:

I remember your national memorial in Rushmore, the faces of your prominent presidents, those who laid the foundation of the United States of America as it is today — democracy, independence, freedom, and care for everyone, for every person, for everyone who works diligently, who lives honestly, who respects the law. We in Ukraine want the same for our people. All that is normal part of your own life.

It should be impossible to listen to Ukrainian president Zelenskyy and not be shaken. His nation faces an existential crisis in Russia’s unceasing attacks. In New York, we returned to the St. Patrick’s Day parade, rejoicing in “normal.” But people around the world have no hope of a life that involves peace and security anytime soon. In Iraq, Christians and other religious minorities know that no one really wants them there — or cares that they are there, relatively speaking.

That’s why Pope Francis’s visit to them a year ago this month was so important to them. It called them to a deeper courage to know that they are seen and loved by a significant religious leader — their pastor, their religious father. When ISIS was waging genocide on them, they had to beg to get us to notice. It wasn’t the nonstop coverage we’re seeing now for Ukraine. Perhaps the one mercy for Ukraine is that we are not looking away. But they need more than that. As have the Iraqis. A declaration of genocide often turned out to be words and not actions promised, by two different administrations. Our lack of follow-through is a bipartisan problem, as Ukraine can tell you, too.

Zelensky, in asking for our help — in English — is calling on our better angels, imploring us to help our neighbor, to help anyone who is “for human rights, for freedom, for the right to live decently, and the right to die when your time comes and not when it’s wanted by someone else, by your neighbor.”

Nancy Pelosi read a poem by U2’s Bono at the St. Patrick’s Day celebration at the U.S. Capitol. It called Zelensky our new St. Patrick, driving out the snakes currently attacking Ukraine. Here’s the interesting thing about that, something I doubt Bono had in mind: Zelensky, who is Jewish, was reminding many Christians about their duties to their neighbor. Christian duty may not necessarily mean a no-fly zone — that’s a matter of prudential debate. But it does mean doing more, caring more, pouring oneself out for your neighbor. As a nation, we obviously can’t do that for every nation on earth, but we can offer more than words. Are we a reliable friend to those who are in existential danger? We have been stingy in recent years about true refugees — the victims of ISIS have stories to tell.

In his book The Disappearing People: The Tragic Fate of Christians in the Middle East, Stephen R. Rasche, an American who works for the Archdiocese of Erbil, writes:

We had spent years of critical human and financial resources trying to bring help and positive change while there was still time, and everywhere, we were being undermined, mislead, or outmaneuvered. Most distressing was the growing realization that our fight for survival was increasingly being hit as collateral damage, seemingly without concern, from the nonstop barrage aimed at the Trump administration.

That was in 2018, and elsewhere in the book he talks about how people in government agencies undermined the Trump administration. There often paid only lip service.

During the Cold War years, people knew were we stood. I’m not sure we know where we stand now. We can’t have a coherent policy about Ukraine, refugees, or anything else without knowing who we are. Schools are teaching that America isn’t good. I just read that the Catholic high school from which I graduated has dropped AP European History. If we don’t understand where we came from, with both the good and the bad, how can we go forward?

William F. Buckley Jr. said in his speech “What Americanism Seeks to Be”:

The Constitution of the United States, and in particular the Bill of Rights, is essentially a list of prohibitions: but it is a list of things that the government cannot do to the people. What a huge distinction: a majestic distinction. It grew out of a long, empirical journey, the eternal spark of which, of course, traces to Bethlehem, to that star that magnified man beyond any power of the emperors and gold seekers and legions of soldiers and slaves: a star that implanted in each one of us that essence that separates us from the beasts, and tells us that we were made in the image of God and were meant to be free.

What we are watching in Ukraine or in the school-board meetings is not reality TV but a reality check. Do we still value true freedom and human rights? Are we still a beacon for others in that way?

This column is based on one available through Andrews McMeel Universal’s Newspaper Enterprise Association.