During the Olympics, I am always at my most patriotic. It really is pretty silly, but during the Games, even if it's a sport I know nothing about I will hoot and holler for the folks who fly the same flag as I do even if I have no real understanding of what is going on. Even my daughter, Katrina, got dolled up in red, white, and blue and joined me in cheers of "Hoooray, for the USA!" much to her two month old bewilderment.
So on this September 11th, I watch as American Flags big enough to cover football fields are trotted out... and I have a slightly different reaction. Because this isn't the Olympics anymore, and in this moment, the stars and stripes represent something a bit different than they did.
During the Olympics, the Flag represents passionate athletes coming together and competing to the best of their ability in a celebration of athletic achievement that, somehow, manages to transcend some (if not all) of the political difficulties that surround them. Those athletes are our champions, and the flag is lifted because in a way that I don't entirely understand, those athletes represent all of us. Their victory becomes our own, no matter who they are or where they come from.
The flag I saw today, as football kicked off, was different. It came at the start of the game, not in a time of victory, with participants and observers alike instructed to rise and honor it. This was done with additional edge to due the events being memorialized today, as well as a knowledge that several athletes had vowed not to do so. Suddenly this wasn't an act of celebration, but rather a litmus test on national TV. Do you respect the flag? Here you are, the cameras will be on you the second you don't. Do you?
That's not Patriotism. It's peer pressure.
I've attended many pro games live and I have always stood during the national anthem. Given certain prohibitions in my theology concerning idolatry, it has always been vaguely worrying, but I always figured that, like during the Olympics, the flag served as a symbol... by respecting it, I was showing respect to everyone it represented.
Today... I'm just not sure that is the case. Today we are informed by many that the flag, to them, represents something other than freedom. It has become a symbol of fear and oppression. And rather than deal with that head on, we have proceeded to shoot the messenger, to burn jerseys and lash out at people saying that they do not feel included under it's promise.
For a Flag that is supposed to represent Liberty and Justice for all, that is a pretty harsh condemnation in the form of what was supposed to be defense. Suddenly social media is full of those who leap to the defense of the piece of cloth, rather than seeking to understand why others might not feel that the piece of cloth is serving its purpose as being representative of them, as citizens of our nation.
Once that has happened, my idolatry detector is blaring full blast. Once the piece of cloth has been elevated above the people it is meant to represent, our values have gone fully out of whack, and the flag comes to represent injustice and conformity instead.
Now, context will always matter. When I am in a situation where the flag represents us as a nation, whole and without exception, celebrating our champions together in times of victory, I will respect it every time. But when it is used as a litmus test, demanding that we ignore the realities of our world in the name of jingo blinded patriotism, I won't.
Because the flag can be a symbol of both freedom and oppression. The former is a symbol worthy of respect. The latter is a symbol that MUST be rejected, if the true promise of the former is ever to be truly realized.
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