Idealism vs. Realism

One thing I have been observing lately is that society seems to oscillate between focusing on the ideal and focusing on the real. One area this is readily apparent is in art and entertainment. Let’s look at two different paintings. The first is the famous picture of Washington crossing the Delaware river painted in 1851. The story being told here is of Washington crossing the river on Christmas night of 1776 prior to a surprise attack on enemy forces.

The second one is by Pablo Picasso. This painting was made in response to the bombing of Guernica, Spain in 1937 during the Spanish Civil War.

Notice that both paintings are depicting a scene of war, but the attitudes are completely different. The first one is idealistic. I have heard people poke fun of Washington’s pose many times. I mean, really, who rides in a boat like that? It is not meant to be realistic. His dignified stance shows him as this idealized, even demi-god-like hero. The American flag stands erect beside him glorifying our nation. The image is meant to arouse patriotic feelings. It glorifies the Revolution, suggesting that our cause was pure and noble, our leaders were great, etc.

Picasso shows a different side of war. It is realistic rather than idealistic. When I say realistic, I’m not talking about photo realistic. It is clear that this painting is nothing of the sort. The term Realism in art refers to art that seeks to show humanity in its raw form; warts and all. It is often quite ugly. In Guernica, Picasso shows the horrors of war. Innocent civilians are lying dead or writhing in pain. Other distorted figures bear little resemblance to real things, but are effective in stirring up emotions of disgust and terror.

We see the same thing in other art forms such as writing and music. 19^th century biographies tend to be more like eulogies as authors seemed to bring out the good in a person’s life almost exclusively. Now biographers tend to show the complexity of a person by spending some time writing about their personal demons as well. You may have experienced this shift in perspectives when you were taught an idealized narrative of the founding fathers in grade school and later found out that Thomas Jefferson owned slaves, and may have even had an affair with one.

Too often I think we interpret this shift in perspective as a sign that the world is becoming more and more wicked. After all, in 50s sitcoms everyone seemed so polite and cheerful and there was never any violence, immorality, or swearing. While there definitely have been some societal trends regarding morality in the last few decades, I think it is naïve to think that people in the 50s never cussed or had sex. Certain kinds of sin may be more prevalent now, such as sexual immorality, but I don’t think we can say that the world as a whole is more wicked now. After all, we have improved in many other ways. Although racism hasn’t been entirely eliminated, it is generally condemned in polite society. Child abuse is no longer tolerated. The abuse of the working class that occurred in the late 19^th and early 20^th century has been largely curbed. I’m not sure we can make the blanket statement that things are getting worse and worse; we just have a different set of problems to address. The question is how do we choose to address them?

The church seems to address them by holding to the ideal. More than half of all marriages end in divorce. Many other individuals never have the opportunity to marry. And yet the church focuses its teachings exclusively on the ideal that everyone should have a traditional family consisting of a mom and dad happily married with several children. To make that ideal even more lofty, they expect that both of the parents will be devout members of the church sealed in the temple, and that all of their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren will also be life-long devout members and marry in the temple so that they can be a ‘forever family’.  Let’s face it; this situation is a minority in the church. We still have lots of single and divorced members. Even parents who are faithful in their marriage and in the church are likely to have a child or two go astray and leave the fold. And let’s not forget those LGBT members whose sexual orientation leaves them feeling alienated from the church on pretty much all fronts. Instead of preaching this lofty ideal that only a handful will achieve, why don’t we meet people where they are and focus more conference talks on topics like how to make things work as a single parent?

Elder Holland made a good case for teaching the ideal in a leadership training a few years ago. He said that when he was growing up his mother often sewed clothing. He says that while she was good enough to eyeball a shirt and make something close to it, she preferred to have a pattern to work from. If she were to work from a shirt instead of a pattern, any flaws in the original would be reproduced in the new one, and perhaps even exaggerated. Now imagine what would happen if someone else were to come along and try to pattern a shirt after this one. It would be even further away from the original pattern. It would copy the mistakes of the original and even add a few of its own. However, if a pattern was used each time, each shirt might still have imperfections but these would not be exaggerated and added upon with each new iteration. When we are talking about family situations, I think this parable rings true. That being said, I think that if all we ever hear about in church is this perfect family that we may never have, many people may find the message to be irrelevant to their lives. Some may even feel alienated and uncomfortable at church. So the question I want to end with is how do we balance keeping the ideal in mind and still stay in touch with the reality of where people actually stand?