JGS 13:2-7, 24-25A
PS 71:3-4A, 5-6AB, 16-17
LK 1:5-25
The Danger of Asking
Why?
The LCME remediation process for the medical school has been
a complex, time-consuming process that has pushed many students, staff, and
faculty to address the most basic elements of what we must do to more
effectively deliver, document, evaluate, and continuously improve undergraduate
medical education at SLU. While I firmly believe we will come out of this
stronger as a school and a university, the remediation process has not always
run smoothly. One of the early roadblocks to progress was our community’s
obsession with the why: Why did this happen? Why was the report so severe? Why
were programmatic problems at SLU not addressed? Why did our leaders respond
the way they did? The why’s were paralyzing. Although we needed to understand why
the areas of concern were cited by the LCME in order to address them, we needed
to move beyond wondering why did this happen to us. We needed to accept that
what is, is. We must address these issues. There are no alternatives.
Our biblical characters—and our biblical authors—had an
opportunity to asked lots of why’s in our readings today. Two couples who were stigmatized
for their infertility were visited by angels who told them they were to have
sons who were already special in the eyes of the Lord. This was not a back-and-forth
discussion; this was not a bargain or a debate. Samson’s mother, Manoah,
accepted the news without asking very basic questions and then passed the
announcement on to her husband. Even if some whys crept into the encounters,
the authors of the texts didn’t include them in the stories. In fact, I find it
interesting that these announcements are recorded at all, since they don’t add
much to the storylines of the sons. But what they do add is the demonstration
of the acceptance, the blessing, and the joy of the parents who were able to
not only shed stigma, but gain sons who would change the course of their
nation. They were startled with a responsibility they didn’t see coming, but
they got on to the business of pregnancy and parenting.
I’m not suggesting we blunt our intellectual curiosity or we
stop seeking root causes for areas of improvement in ourselves and our
communities. But whys can be dangerous if our questions become barriers to
doing. We should ask ourselves how many whys are truly helpful if and when they
delay us from work that must be done. Questioning should lead to action, not
hand-wringing. There are times for questions and times for work. Gustavo
Gutierrez may have been commenting on this when he ordered his day--What Hegel said about philosophy can be said
of theology: It rises only at sundown.
Fred Rottnek is Professor and Director of Community Medicine in the School of Medicine.
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