It was just a couple of weeks ago that President Clinton, in an effort to charge up his campaign bid for the next election, promised to lead Americans out of their "funk." Most Americans misunderstood that remark, certainly not the first time that has happened to Bill Clinton. For the last while Clinton has been back peddling, trying to undo the possible damage of an association between his view of America's funk and Jimmy Carter's assessment of America's malaise. Carter was going to lift us out of our malaise, and instead that remark sealed his political coffin. Americans don't elect leaders to change their psychological state; we elect officials to represent our personal self-interests.

I kind of like the term "funk," and agree that our nation is deeply entrenched in a funk, and that if anyone is going to liberate us from this debilitating funk, it will have to be a political leader, preferably our nation's president.

Funk is a good term, and probably the only term a president can use in describing the spiritual pulse of our nation without sounding too cynical or preachy. Linda Hirshman, a law professor out of Chicago, describes the current American spirit as a "self-seeking amorality." Now, a president may think that, but he can't say that.

Nor can a president say the stuff that Pope John Paul II has been stating in his masses about being open to immigrants and the poor--if I were Governor Pete Wilson, I'd take the papal remarks very personally and might even consider repenting. If I were Newt Gingrich, I'd figure the pope's remarks were another good reason to hate Catholics.

The religious admonitions to which the pope has called us have been clearly stated in secular lingo as well by David Price, a political science professor at Duke. Says Price, "Life in modern society requires us to extend the rules and obligations of civil society to people whom we will never personally know." Those words in fact define Price's requirements of a democracy.

So what did Clinton mean by "funk?" I think it is a kind of paralysis in society created by clashing views of morality. The conservative revolution proclaims morality as a way of tending the superficial: prayer in school, banning books, eliminating rights for those who are different in skin color, nationality, or sexual orientation.

Clinton declares morality a matter of how society treats its citizens. Issues of fairness and justice come into play, as well as answering the question: Is it safe to be different from the majority? What does a civilized society mean?

"American Funk" suggests to me an attempt to move our nation away from the liberal/conservative polarity, the left/right spectrum so divisive and attempt to redefine the challenge to our nation more neutrally, that our task is revitalizing civil society. That is, to stop feeling helpless and cynical as opposing ideologies clash on big government, states rights, taxes, deficit reduction, etc. and begin to own up to the fact that something is desperately wrong with our society. We need a renewal of national purpose and a renewal of values which will nurture a civil society.

Once we all thought naively that the universe was expanding outward from a note hit by Jimi Hendrix at Woodstock. Love beads would line the path to a utopian society. That was long before the World Trade Towers was bombed; long before Oklahoma City; long before the magnum-carrying camouflage-wearing right wing militias; long before the frightening voices of radio talk show hosts began to convince Americans that minorities and homosexuals and feminists and immigrants wanted to take away what they had worked so hard for. Hate became a legitimate politics and America's long quest for community came to a grinding halt because of the incessant demands of self-interest.

The white anger, the black jubilation at the OJ Simpson jury's verdict speaks of a deep-seated racism defying any rational system of justice. Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Chairman of the African American Studies at Harvard said, "Blacks were cheering against 100 years of lynch law."

I guess that is what is meant by the term, "playing the race card." Even Justice Clarence Thomas played that race card when facing an all white judiciary committee at his confirmation hearing. He used the word "lynching" which brought history right to the moment at hand.

The New York Times alluded to an ethic among black women: "You never go against your men. You don't want to give the whites any more ammunition." Did we know before OJ just how divided the races were?

Ben Stein, a Los Angeles lawyer, made a chilling comment: "When OJ gets off, the whites will riot the way whites do: leave the cities, go to Idaho or Arizona, vote for Gingrich, and punish blacks by closing their day care programs and cutting off their Medicaid."

What is the larger moral purpose of American life? A very simplified view reveals liberals trying to build an alliance between the middle class and the poor, while conservatives aim to forge a coalition between the middle class and the rich. Isn't it obvious why the conservatives are winning? Their appeal is great: we'll cut your taxes by cutting services to the poor.

But along come some Democrats every once in a while, like a Jimmy Carter who says we're in this malaise caused by excessive self-interest. Americans wanted to deny that and showed Carter the door. Then along comes Clinton who says we are in a funk--a dangerous assessment for any politician to make. But I think what Carter and Clinton were trying to articulate is that people have not only material needs, economic concerns, self-interests for acquiring more things...but these two leaders addressed the spiritual needs of people. Funk is a spiritual term. Isn't there a yearning to transcend self-interest and create a different kind of world?

The larger moral purpose of America which we are currently trying to define at the polls, revolves around either creating a community of caring, or perpetuating the growing love affair with individualism. In a world of shrinking resources and growing sense of apocalypse, the me-first ethic appeals to the immediate emotional concerns and biases of most Americans.

Thus we face an erosion of trust, an erosion on connectedness with others. I believe it was John Kennedy who was the last politician to get away with raising the specter of sacrifice: where individuals were asked what they were willing to sacrifice for the good of the community. Now there is so much terror of the other: the person of color, the immigrant, the homosexual, that we seek communities which preserve the narrow focus of ourselves.

The moral purpose of American life is honoring a commitment to a community larger than the specific community in which we live. It is a moral commitment to people we will never personally know.

Why make this commitment? In the lingo of conservative religion, to acknowledge the infinite preciousness of every human being created in the image of god. In the lingo of humanism and liberal religion: to affirm and promote the inherent dignity of every person, justice, equity, and compassion in human relations.

--Reverend Tom Goldsmith