It's time to admit we're addicted to outrage. Other people are just so darn wicked. Or liberal. Or racist. Or tacky. Our political leaders know how to channel this outrage into power for themselves. Our media and entertainment industry spins it into gold. The comboxes of motherhood forums are worse than the fifth circle of Dante's hell. And yet we eat it up.
If we're honest with ourselves, it's because moral outrage feels so good. When I'm riding that train, I can forget about my own failings for a while and take some real pleasure in being righteous and right. It's one of the devil's more successful tricks, perverting our very sense of right and wrong into an occasion for sin. For it leads us right into the deadly—yes, deadly—sins of wrath and pride. So how do we avoid this snare, especially when there is so much to be outraged about?
If you've ever read anything I've written before, you won't be surprised when I say that the answer lies in one of my favorite books: this time, it is Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. In a great scene in the novel, Huck encounters a couple of really bad guys, and responds in a startling way—by recognizing his own potential self in them. In the same way, Twain challenges us to see our own capacity for evil, and therefore to respond to others not with self-righteous outrage, but with mercy.
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