by John Kasich
I got a call just before midnight from a doctor telling me my father had been killed and that my mother was in critical condition. It knocked the wind right out of me and sent me reeling. I rode straight through the night with the woman I was seeing at the time (she did all the driving), and as we pulled into Pittsburgh we got behind a tar truck and the next thing we knew our windshield was covered in black tar. It was just about dawn, the sun inching over the horizon, and it didn’t occur to me at the time but I wonder now if that wasn’t some kind of sign. My world had gone black, and I couldn’t see my way clear to what might come next—and here, now, it had gone black in a very literal sense as well. Nothing like this had ever happened to me before, and nothing like this has ever happened since. Goodness, I’d never even heard of anybody getting stuck behind a tar truck and getting sprayed in just this way, but there it was. We actually had to pull over and use shampoo to cut through the tar, just to be able to see again, and every now and then I get to thinking about that long, frantic night and I get this weird image of me standing by the side of the road, just outside Pittsburgh, rubbing shampoo into this film of black tar on the windshield of the car in the bright orange of dawn.
I don’t really remember any other particulars of the trip, but we somehow made it. My mother was still alive when I got to the hospital, but I never got to talk to her, or tell her I loved her. She died later that morning, and when she did I sat for a while with a kind man named Stu Boehmig, the assistant pastor at my parents’ Episcopal church. Stu tried to comfort me, but I was beyond comforting. He tried to tell me he knew just how I felt, but I couldn’t hear it. In fact, I railed against it.
“How can you know how I feel?” I said heatedly. “No one can possibly know how I feel.”
I should never have spoken to Stu in such a harsh way, but I wasn’t myself, and to Stu’s great credit he understood. He let my anger slide. He said, “John, you’re right. No one can possibly know how you feel. But I do know that your mother would rather be with her Lord than anyplace else. She wouldn’t come back if she had the chance.”
Stu Boehmig’s good counsel was the first piece of comfort I could find in those dark, surreal hours just after the accident, and he wasn’t done yet. A couple days later, he went on to offer words of hope and a challenge I took very much to heart.
“John,” he said, “you’ve got to decide right now if you want to build a relationship with God. You have a window of opportunity now, you’re open to it, but in time that window will close. This pain will ease and you’ll go back to the rest of your life.”
TURNING BACK TO GOD
Right there, in just that moment, I knew Stu was right. I knew I had moved away from God in my life, and that I had no place else to turn to get through the days ahead. I knew intuitively that this was my one chance to reconnect with the faith of my growing up, in a lifelong and sustaining way. And from that moment forward, I changed. Really and fully and truly. They say people can’t change, but I became the argument against that truism, and my parents’ deaths started a long, ten-year journey not just to return to religion but to investigate the deep reality of it—to own it, once more. I was determined to spend the time questioning everything formal religion taught, and at the same time figure out if I could build a real relationship with God, if He could stand for me as a strength, a friend, a father, a direction. The real relationship was key. I wanted real, not learned. Not rote. Not symbols. Not dogma. Reality, that’s what I was after. Did Jesus really live? Why do we think he rose from the dead? Did he really get crucified? And what did all of this mean to me and my family and friends as we turned headlong into the twenty-first century? These became the burning questions of my days, and I’d find myself in Bible study groups back in Washington asking all kinds of off-the-wall questions. There are people out there who probably still think of me as a complete crackpot, because of the way I was so desperately searching in those days, but I was determined to get to the heart of what faith really meant.
I set out these circumstances to illustrate how keenly important it was for me to let religion back into my life. Now, with perspective and healing, I don’t know how people survive that kind of pain without faith. My parents’ deaths began a transformation for me, a journey to discover God and to rediscover myself that continues to this day, as it will continue for all my days. Religion became a source of strength and solace and balance.
With faith, I learned, comes peace. I also learned that it’s not an easy road that takes us to God, but with exercise, discipline, and prayer, I make strides. Every day, I make strides. Anyway, I mean to.
Okay, so that’s me. That’s where I’m at with this thing, and how committed I am to it, and how it sits front and center in regard to everything I do. Yes, I know full well that not everyone is cut the same way. Yes, I know that there’s room in this whole wide world for people of all different faiths, and all different religions, and all different forms and manner of worship. Yes, I might choose one path, but there are other paths. Yes, I know that you can roll a bowling ball in the great cathedrals of Europe on any given Sunday and not hit a soul, that’s how disconnected and disaffected the folks over there have come to be about religion. And yes, I know that even in the United States, a nation built on the back of Judeo-Christian ideals, you might need to look long and hard before finding a like-minded individual when it comes to matters of faith. Like I said, we’re all cut a little differently, and that will just have to be okay, but what troubles me is how far removed some of us have become from our own foundations. I don’t care what you believe, as long as you believe in something—something bigger than yourself and larger than life and greater than any good we can manage on our own. We can’t compare ourselves to each other on this one, only to the kind of people we meant to be when we were younger, the kind of people our parents meant us to be, the kind of people we hope to become, still.
“WHAT A GREAT GIG!”
I’ll illustrate my concern with a story. I was at the FOX News studios in New York one afternoon about a year or so after I left Congress, working with a group of mostly young producers. They were all well-educated and well-meaning media types, some fresh out of college and working their first or second jobs in television. I was in my new element, as a television commentator, and I loved working with these people. I tended to think of them as the gatekeepers of the future, because I knew that in ten or twenty years they’d be the ones running our network and cable news programs, deciding what gets on the air, how it gets reported, and where to place the emphasis on the news of the day. In all, a bright group of young people, with a strong respect for the power of television and the responsibility that came along with that power.
One of the lead news stories on this particular day was the shooting down of a small plane that had been carrying a family of missionaries in Peru. The mother and daughter had been killed in the crash, while the father and son had miraculously survived, and as I sat with these young producers discussing the segment for that night’s show I overheard the strangest, most unsettling comment from one of my young colleagues.
“What a great life these missionaries have,” noted one of the female producers in the room with us at the time. “They get to travel the world and go to all these great places!”
Understand, there was no irony in this young woman’s voice, no cool detachment and all kidding aside. She’d processed the missionary work of these good people as if they’d signed on for some exotic adventure tour, never once considering that it was a calling. I was absolutely stunned, not least because this was in every other respect a savvy, insightful person. I was so stunned, in fact, that at first I could not think of a single thing to say, and those who know me will allow that such as this doesn’t happen all that often. Of course, I did say something eventually, but it didn’t do any good. It just made me look like some crazy zealot. And still this poor young woman kept going on and on about what a great travel experience these missionaries were having—what a grea
t gig!—and how they were getting to see all these out-of-the-way places for free, and I thought, She just doesn’t get it. And then of course I realized it wasn’t just her. More and more, our young people are so far removed from the kind of calling that would compel an individual to take up missionary work that they can’t possibly understand it. It’s off the map of their experience, so they try to reduce it to what they know, and I started to think her tossed-off comment—however innocent, however ignorant—was emblematic of the deep chasm we face when it comes to matters of faith.
SHARING THE GIFT
I was reminded of a conversation I’d had with Father Tim Scully of Notre Dame, early on in the abuse scandal that continues to rock the Catholic Church. I was curious to know the church’s latest thoughts on celibacy in light of these developments, so I sought him out at a time when a lot of folks in the country were having a hard time reconciling all these allegations of sexual abuse at the hands of priests around the world. I wondered if he thought priests should be allowed to marry.
“John,” he said, “what people have a hard time conceiving is that I have dedicated my life to the love of God. I am married with my love and commitment to the service of God. And it’s a gift to me. It’s not a chore or a sacrifice. It’s a gift.”
I thought it was a fantastic answer to what Father Scully probably heard as a stupid question—a gift!—but even as I marveled at the devoutness of it I couldn’t shake thinking it was probably a tough concept for a lot of folks to truly understand. I mean, it’s the twenty-first century, and people just don’t get it. They get what it means to believe in God, and to pray, but they start to lose the signal when the talk turns to worship and devotion. Even some of our educated, media-savvy young people don’t get it, as evidenced by that poor FOX News producer, and yet we need to somehow ensure that enough people truly understand it in order to sustain it.
That’s the real challenge facing today’s religious leaders—how to remain rooted and relevant to the lives of our young people while at the same time holding fast to tradition—and I’m not always certain that they’re up to it. I’d felt for the longest time that the Catholic Church had been losing its moorings, and I think Pope John Paul II did a glorious job returning to Catholics a sense that the church was not about the culture of today so much as it was committed to a set of principles that were biblically founded. It’s classic, and timeless, and unshakable. The enormous outpouring of love and devotion upon his death on April 2, 2005, was vibrant testimony of his achievement in this all-important area, and this was especially so among our young people. I had the same feeling when he appeared before a large audience that I had when I was with Ronald Reagan on a stage at Ohio State University, in front of ten thousand screaming students. If I hadn’t known it was Reagan, I’d have thought it was Bono, and Pope John Paul II evoked the same kind of adulation. And, indeed, the numbers bore this out, as teens and young adults returned to the church in record numbers during his papacy—a great many of them devoting their lives to it.
Young people love to believe in things, wouldn’t you agree? They love it when people and institutions are exact and firm and principled. They love it when you stand for something. They’re drawn to stability, and strength, and they were drawn to this pope, without question. From the outset, they were drawn to him, a little known Polish cardinal, and he built on that as he went along. Really, his leadership qualities were astonishing. The humility he demonstrated whenever he got off a plane and kissed the tarmac. The compassion he showed when he visited the prison cell of Mehmet Ali Agca, the Turkish terrorist who tried to assassinate him in 1981, and forgave him his sins. The warm embrace he extended to leaders and followers of different faiths, and to Jews in particular. And, above all, and as a kind of exclamation point, the way he shouldered his suffering at the very end. In a world where our heroes are almost always discredited, Pope John Paul II was able to live a life without missteps, and to go out in a way that was graceful and dignified and inspiring. I don’t care if you’re Catholic or Muslim or atheist, it was impossible not to be moved by this man—and in the long sigh left by his passing, and the long lines of mourners that formed outside St. Peter’s Basilica to pay their respects, we could find the points of connection we’ll need to stand on firm religious ground once more.
His death called to mind one of the most indelible images of my growing up—my mother, crying. She was no longer alive to cry for this pope, but she cried for Pope John XXIII. It was 1963, and it was one of the few times I can recall seeing her moved to tears, which of course meant the sight moved me to same. As long as I’m on it, I’ll close out this reflection by mentioning one other time I saw my mother cry, upon the death of Pittsburgh Pirates legend Roberto Clemente, the Puerto Rican-born baseball great who was an icon in our part of the world, and one of my true boyhood heroes. Clemente died on a relief mission to Nicaragua in 1972, and news of his death hit our household hard—and I was surprised to see my mother so shaken by it.
She would have been shaken by the passing of Pope John Paul II as well, because of the light he managed to bring to the church and to the world around. See, Pope John Paul II may have been socially progressive, but he was a theological conservative, and in his hands the two were not mutually exclusive. He was able to create moorings through his love of mankind, and build bridges from who we are today to how we’ve been for centuries. Through his love of all individuals, he delivered the powerful message that if you truly love another person, then you will listen to that other person, even if you don’t agree with him. He threaded the needle and made the church relevant to a swelling mass of people who had drifted, while at the same time extolling the ideals upon which it was built. And it was critical, because as Jesus Christ once said in another context, if you’re not really salt then you’re not getting anybody’s attention. In other words, if the salt goes bad, then there’s no kick to it, no purpose, and if our religious leaders can’t figure this out we’ve all lost.
FALLS FROM GRACE
Sad to say, some of our most visible leaders give religion a bad name. Disgraced priests, rabbis, ministers . . . they preach one thing and do another and their duplicity is seized upon by skeptics or opponents of religion to discredit the faith. The troubling piece here is that the misdeeds of these few individuals have also damaged the reputations of others by association, and I’m reminded of that old philosophical puzzle: Just because I’m in a garage and say I’m a car doesn’t make it so. Just because these people claim to be holy and pious doesn’t make them holy and pious, but they’ve laid claim to some pretty significant territory here and stained it by their actions, again by association.
I also worry that when the central message of religion is fear and punishment, the true meaning of faith, hope, and grace is lost. I’ve stated earlier that the rules are a given in religion, but when they dominate center stage, and emphasize our failures, it ceases to have any appeal as a way of life. Those preachers and evangelists who kick up dust and yell and scream and condemn, who seek to shame us into following the path they’ve chosen for us, are off target. Grace, forgiveness, and an opportunity to improve your life is the essence of my Christian faith.
Philip Yancey, the best-selling writer of books like What’s So Amazing About Grace? and a former editor-at-large at Christian Today magazine, relates a compelling story that speaks to just this point. He tells of a woman whose daughter has strayed and become a prostitute; the mother reaches out everywhere she can for help until someone finally suggests she go to church. “That’s the last place I’ll ever go,” she says, and in the grace note to the tale there is an immutable truth that gets to just how disconnected some people feel when it comes to religion.
In my opinion, men of faith must be careful not to let politics creep into the pulpit, because you disenfranchise people who might disagree with you. It’s happened to me a number of times, in a number of churches, when I’ve caught myself disagreeing with the political message and wondering abou
t the credibility of the spiritual message. Absolutely, I understand the frustration people of faith have when the culture seems to move against them, but a preacher’s macro job is to change the hearts of the people in power and let the rest take care of itself. More than ever before, today’s preachers must be careful not to change platforms, and not to confuse their calling or the work of God with secular lawmaking.
Even the Reverend Billy Graham, another one of my personal heroes, was criticized early on in his ministry for his close ties to U.S. presidents and other elected officials. “I did take sides in some things, even in politics to an extent,” he admitted to USA Today on the eve of his 417th crusade in May 2005. “I didn’t mean to, but I did. But I don’t do that anymore. If I took sides in all these divisive areas, I would cut off a great part of the people that I really want to reach. So I’ve felt that the Lord would have me just present the Gospel.”
My own minister is sometimes guilty of this—albeit on a much smaller scale. He’s a guy I admire and respect, but when he talks politics he starts to lose me, and if he loses me with his politics he’s liable to lose me in other ways as well. Let’s face it, if he sees the world in one way politically, then how do I know that the way he interprets Scripture isn’t colored in some of those same ways? How do I know that he’s not just trying to bend the text to win some political argument? He happens to be a liberal, but that’s besides the point. I don’t go to church to hear a political sermon; I go to be moved, and lifted, and inspired; I go to reflect on the stuff of my life, considered against all these illuminating stories in the Old and New Testaments.