How to Fail at Dialogue

Why we hate talking about politics

A few months ago, I wrote an encouragement to young Catholics not to give up on politics. We need all of God’s people involved when it comes to our work in the public square, which is one of the most important avenues for the proclamation of the Gospel in the world.

It seems like there are plenty of reasons to give up. One is the fact that very often we experience political engagement as a real threat. And it’s no wonder; we have all seen how expressing an opinion on certain issues is enough to put relationships, reputation, and even career in jeopardy. There are a few choice topics that act like a sort of litmus test to find out who is “one of us” and who is “one of them.” It seems more and more to be the case that we view political dialogue as a battle between good and evil, rather than as a task shared between people with different ideas.

Pope Francis knows that we tend to get all forms of dialogue wrong - not just political - and he knows that the stakes are high for getting it right again, which is why he made a point to emphasize the importance of authentic dialogue in his latest encyclical, Fratelli tutti. And what of this true dialogue? Turns out it will require young American Catholics like you and me to let go of pretty much everything we have become used to when it comes to political discourse.
 

False forms of dialogue

Fratelli tutti is written with the whole world in mind, so it is not easy to apply it neatly to American politics. But Pope Francis is also a wise and experienced priest with a gift for seeing right to the heart of things, and we should do our best to receive his words as fatherly counsel for the time and place in which we find ourselves. This is certainly true when it comes to issues surrounding our country’s approach to dialogue.  

What follows are three false forms of dialogue that are of concern to the Pope. This is important; Catholics and non-Catholics alike talk about “dialogue” all the time and have an intuitive sense that we need more of it. But clearly, our attempts to implement it are not working, and perhaps this is because the word does not mean what we think it means.

Before I jump in, let us remember that these are not just innocuous misunderstandings but harmful errors, sources of grave wounding in our communities, and they must be addressed if we are to find a way to live together fruitfully in this country. The first step is acknowledging we have a dialogue problem. Then, if we can identify these “anti-dialogues” - these “Horsemen of the Dialogue-calypse,” if you will (yes, I just did that, and I’m not sorry) - and understand where they show up in our own lives and in our society, we will be that much closer to accomplishing the great task before us of rebuilding our broken society together.

This one’s for all you keyboard warriors out there - and believe me, I’ve been there.

Pope Francis reminds us that this “feverish exchange of opinions on social networks” is “frequently based on media information that is not always reliable. These exchanges are merely parallel monologues. They may attract some attention by their sharp and aggressive tone. But monologues engage no one, and their content is frequently self-serving and contradictory” (FT, 200).

In other words, smugly pressing “send” on that argument you just agonized over for half an hour...and then endlessly and obsessively monitoring the blowback in your social media feed is not dialogue. In these instances, you might as well be talking to yourself - you would certainly be doing less harm if you were.

Like I said, I’ve been there. Actually, it was one of the reasons (though certainly not the only one) that I decided to make my exit from social media last summer. I saw the ugly tendency welling up in myself to label and categorize people as “one of us” or “one of them” based on what they posted on social media. I noticed that I would say things in the comments section that I would not have had the courage to say in-person, and that felt not only harsh, but dishonest. I struggled to resist the need to be right and to have the last word, to never concede the point or admit I was wrong.

These were manifestations of sin in my life that needed to be mercilessly rooted out. Last August was my Come-to-Jesus Moment that losing some old photos was a small price to pay to get a part of my own soul back. But I digress.

We engage in this way for a reason. Debate, especially over social media, is a low-cost, high-return way of doing politics. It requires no empathy and usually wins us the praise of those who agree with us. But because it is (or at least can become) adversarial in nature, it is very often no more than a “parallel monologue” in which no one is really heard, and no one is convinced, either. 
 

The Second Horseman: Dialogue as compromise 

When an unstoppable force meets an immovable object, what happens? Well, when it comes to disagreements we have with others, usually we compromise. Each side accommodates the other by accepting an outcome that is less-than-desirable for them. Nobody loses, but nobody wins either. 
 

Is this the goal of dialogue? Pope Francis addresses the question in his book, Let Us Dream (regarded by some to be a layman’s summary of Fratelli Tutti). It is worth quoting at length:
 

To enter into discernment is to resist the urge to seek the apparent relief of an immediate decision, and instead be willing to hold different options before the Lord, waiting on that overflow. You consider reasons for and against, knowing Jesus is with you and for you. You feel inside yourself the gentle pull of the Spirit, and its opposite. And over time, in prayer and patience, in dialogue with others, you reach a solution, which is not a compromise but something else altogether.

I want to be clear about this. In the Christian life, when you’re seeking God’s will, there are no compromise solutions. Does this mean a Christian can never compromise? Of course not; sometimes it’s the only thing you can do to avoid a war or some other calamity. But a compromise does not resolve a contradiction or a conflict. In other words, it’s a temporary solution, a holding pattern, that allows a situation to mature to the point where it can be resolved by a path of discernment at the right time, seeking God’s will.” (21-22)
 

Let’s start with the first paragraph. Did you catch some of the words Francis is using? Waiting, patience, time…all these the Pope sets over and against the need for the “relief” that we feel in making decisions. Relief, because decisions mean the conflict is over. Plus, they most often mean that someone has won, and someone else has lost, and we tend to be comfortable with the winner-loser paradigm.

What we are most certainly not comfortable with, however, is the tension and uncertainty created by waiting, patience, and time. But they are necessary growing pains, Pope Francis says, in the process of discernment; they force us to listen, to pray, and ultimately break open our hearts so they can be sensitive to the “gentle pull of the Spirit.” Yes, the Spirit of God is gentle. It is we who are harsh, demanding, and unyielding. 

And yet, “In the Christian life, when you are seeking God’s will, there are no compromise solutions.” Compromise, says Francis, is a last resort to avoid “calamity” - in our case this may mean a destroyed relationship, a schism in the workplace, or some such thing. But the fact of the compromise in no way implies an end to the discussion. Rather, it should be a constant reminder that more dialogue is needed, deeper unity must be sought, and the good work God has for us is still unfinished.

One final note: Francis has something interesting to say about values (another buzzword in our milieu). He says that it is impossible to negotiate (i.e. compromise) values; if something is of value, it cannot be negotiated. Thus the process of dialogue and discernment must involve our willingness to consider together what is truly of value, and what is not. And if we are honest, we will find that our “values” are not in full alignment with God’s.

This is one of the gifts of dialogue: the differences between us force us to put our own “values” in the dock and test them by prayer and discernment, through the grinding frustration of encountering someone who doesn’t see it just as we do (c.f. Fratelli Tutti, 203). Dialogue thus becomes a purifying fire capable of transforming us and making us more like Jesus (the only goal really worth pursuing).  
 

The Third Horseman: Dialogue as moral relativism

Perhaps the most subtle of the Three Horsemen is moral relativism disguised as dialogue. It is based on the idea that the process of listening to different and sometimes divergent points of view also amounts to an affirmation of all points of view as equally valid, equally worthy, equally true.

Yes, “dialogue involves the ability to respect the other’s point of view and to admit that it may include legitimate convictions and concerns,” (FT, 203) and this requires empathy and charity towards the person. But empathy does not require us to say that all ideas and beliefs are equivalent. It is possible - and necessary - that we delineate between points of view, choosing which we will accept as a society and which we will reject.

Here we can see that the stakes are high for successful dialogue. If we accept relativism, dialogue inevitably ceases and we end by throwing up our hands and saying “Who knows anyway? Better just let it be.” But the problem is that when we do this, abandoning the task of dialogue - our shared responsibility to discern together what is truly good and just - the tie goes to the person with the biggest guns. Those in power now make the rules, and by virtue of our collective forfeit they now are empowered to cram down their own interpretation of morality on everyone else, no matter how arbitrary or capricious it may be.

Says Pope Francis: “Under the guise of tolerance, relativism ultimately leaves the interpretation of moral values to those in power, to be defined as they see fit” (FT, 206). He reiterates a few paragraphs later: “Relativism always brings the risk that some or other alleged truth will be imposed by the powerful or the clever” (FT, 209).

Put positively, dialogue is more than just nice people sharing nice ideas, hugging, and going home. It is the antidote to tyranny, the precise opposite of relativism. 
 

Coming up next month: Dialogue as discernment

Congratulations, you are now an expert in what dialogue is not! [Insert nerdy apophatic theology joke here]. Next month, we’ll continue diving in to the thought of Pope Francis in Fratelli Tutti as to what civil dialogue is, how we can foster it in our own lives, and what kind of a future might be possible if we decide to commit to it. 

Sarah Carter lives in St. Paul with her husband, Will, and her son, Elijah. She and her family attend the Church of St. Mark and are members of the St. Mark Young Adult community. Sarah graduated from the University of St. Thomas in 2014, spent two years serving as a campus missionary for Saint Paul’s Outreach in Columbus, Ohio, and returned to St. Paul in 2016 to begin study for her master’s in theology at the St. Paul Seminary School of Divinity, which she completed in 2019. Now she teaches moral theology and Scripture at Hill-Murray School.