From the Micro to the Macro, Every Level of Existence Needs Antibodies

Within a small organism, if there are ever any viruses, there needs to be healthy antibodies that know how to rise up and challenge the virus.

This is also true of the human body. Your body is more complex than a simple organism but it is true, nonetheless. If your body does not have healthy antibodies to challenge the viruses, then your physical well being is gravely at danger. You need antibodies.

This is also true of families. When one member of the family is acting in a manner that is unhealthy or immature, it is the responsibility of the healthier and mature people within the family to rise up and lovingly challenge that person to take responsibility and shape up. Families need antibodies.

This is also true of workplaces. When one member of the workforce is breaking the written protocol, acting out, crossing professional/financial/ethical boundaries, it is the responsibility of the healthier and mature people within the workplace to speak up through the proper channels so that there can be accountability and possibly a firing.

Of course, this is dependent upon the proper channels to do their job of holding accountable, but that is why those people need to be healthy and mature, themselves, or else they will not have the backbone to do what is necessary for the wellbeing of the workplace. Workplaces need antibodies.

This is also true of communities. When one member of the community is struggling deeply and is thereby starting to drag other people down with them, it is the loving responsibility of the healthier and more mature members of the community to reach out and provide the help, connection or correction that is needed for the overall health of the community. Communities need antibodies.

This is also true of government. When corruption and dishonesty start to become commonplace, alongside triangulating, silencing, scapegoating, isolating, etc… It is the ethical responsibility of the healthy and more mature people in government to respond, not react, to the unhealthy and immaturity of people that were put into places of leadership. Governments need antibodies.

This is also true of the whole globe. When disputes turn into war, when diplomacy has been replaced with detonators and missiles, it is the responsibility of the healthy and mature leaders to bridge the gaps and create space for healthy dialogue while also speaking truth and holding people accountable to their immaturity and unhealthy decisions that impact global welfare. The globe needs antibodies.

It Is as Antibodies that the World Needs Saints

Saints are antibodies within the world, and they can and need to exist at every level. Saints are the healthy and mature people that listen to Spirit and lovingly correct, speak truth, challenge systems (of families, workplaces, communities, governments and the global economy) for the overall health and wellbeing of the whole.

Brian Zahnd once said to me that, “For whatever reason, America has an incredibly difficult time producing saints.”

Well, the world desperately needs saints. The world needs you to be at your best and to be willing to speak up when you even see the smallest amount of decay, dishonesty, despair creep in. The world desperately needs you to work on yourself, to become as much of a self-aware, actualized, differentiated and integrated person as possible.

In fact, you could say that you have an ethical responsibility to those around you to learn how to speak up for the voiceless, to point out where things could be improved, to not bow down to unhealthy leaders or bullies, to not choose popularity of the group you are a part of at the expense of telling the truth or digging through the muck to get to the heart of what the real issue is.

Jesus, the Original Saint/Antibody

Think about Jesus, the prime example and model of what a Saint looks like. As a healthy and mature member of his faith community, he could not help but speak to the encouragement and building up of sinners, holding the pharisees accountable to not doing their job in a healthy and holy way, and empowering his own disciples to go out into the world as spiritual antibodies themselves.

GK Chesterton was famously asked what was wrong with the world, and his response was, “I am.”

What could go right in the world? You. You could become the most healthy, holy, and whole person you can be, and thereby be a wonderful and necessary antibody to all the communities and groups to which you belong.

There is no higher calling than to be a Saint. May you find your way of being one in the world.