Can you see me? Can I see you? More often than not, the answer is "No."

   

In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds

and glorify your Father in heaven. (Matthew 5:16)

 

     A couple years ago, I wrote a series of poems about what the people we treat as invisible do for us. Most of the people involved fit into occupations and very likely, I could have written many, many more based on professions. Invisible seems to fascinate me. I am working on a story about a woman who desperately longs to be invisible but she ends up becoming a storyteller. Of course, she is based very closely on me. I want you to notice and to deal with what I say or what I do, not with the fact that I am saying or doing it. I want to do my job and slip away (who was that masked woman? Oh - for the courage to wear a mask while doing it!)
      The other day, I finished reading a book that talked about invisibility. Mr. Steele referred to what he called White Blindness. It is the idea that we (it is not actually limited to white people) don't tend to see the human being behind the stereotypes into which we've put them. He wrote about the damage done by those who have tried to take responsibility of fixing things for the Black community. A man who described himself as one of the architects of the movement Mr. Steele described confronted him and insisted that Mr. Steele acknowledge and show some gratitude for all that he and his associates had done for the Blacks. For Mr. Steele's part, he was equally enraged because the angry man could not see either him, or the Black community, apart from the stereotype he'd built for them.
      He tells of a staff meeting in which a fellow "enlightened" professor said that they didn't need to ask Mr. Steele to share his opinion on her plan for a course in minority literature because, of course, he would agree with her. When he voiced his resentment that his opinion was being assumed - and the assumption was wrong, she seemed to consider him a traitor.
       I've been in that sort of role as an invisible person many times. Family members have made decisions that deeply affected my life without consulting me because, "of course" there was no other choice that could be made. They may have been right about the choice being the only real choice, but that didn't change the feeling of having been stabbed in the back. People in a committee with which I was working have made independent choices about what they wanted to include in my workload. What they wanted to include was good, but they handed it to me after the program was put together, without consulting each other to see if it fit or if it could be accomplished. I have stood next to my choir director and listened as she praised the soloists and said absolutely nothing about the invisible choir or its member who was standing next to her. (Not my current choir director, by the way.) And yes, anger erupts.
       I have seen it in those who have defined themselves in terms they expect everyone to applaud, or in terms of the good they believe they are doing. When the goodness or worthiness of their self-definition has been questioned or rejected, they and their whole universe threatens to come apart at the seems. How could they not rage? I have spoken against their very hearts and souls without seeing them.
       Invisibility is a complex problem. Whenever we fail to see the individual human as a person, and see them as only a part of a virtual whole, we've sinned. If we are telling the truth, we must not tell "less truth" because they don't like what they're hearing, but we should remember that to them, we're attacking all that is holy in them or to them. We must expect anger and deal with it appropriately.
      On the other side, Christians have been told to let our lights shine in such a way that others see our good works and glorify our Father in heaven. We are supposed to be invisible. And when we are, it's going to hurt because others will either ignore or attack all that is "holy" in us. We must expect anger and responds with humility.

A prayer:

     "Father, who has been seen by no man, You are invisible. We are material, and fallen, and we are so desperate to be seen not as we are, but as we believe ourselves to be. The pain of not being seen that way is more than we can bear alone without lashing out in anger. At the same time, we fail to see others as they believe themselves to be and in their pain, they lash out at us. We are hurt in turn because they do not see that we are only trying to help them see the truth - perhaps the same truth we so desperately don't want to see.

     Heal our blindness first, Lord. Grant us eyes and hearts that can see them as they are. Grant us the strength and courage to speak truth in love - always truth and always love, even in our hurt. Grant us also the peace to accept our own invisibility. Let our lights so shine that they see our good works and glorify You. Help us accept the pain of our own invisibility and respond in love, speaking truth. "