Friends don’t let friends fight for fascism

There’s an old, semi-sweet anecdote about George Orwell and Henry Miller that reminds me why I prefer reading Orwell to Miller.

Nancy Caldwell Sorel told this story years ago in, I think, The New Yorker, presenting it as a charming illustration of how friendship ought to transcend politics. I can’t find the original link, but I typed it in here years ago. The story is from December, 1936, and Orwell was visiting Miller in Paris on his way to fight in the Spanish Civil War:

Both men were dropouts from mainstream backgrounds. After Eton and five years with the Indian Imperial Police in Burma, Orwell had submerged himself in the underclass, had shared the lives of the poor and then surfaced to write Down and Out in London and Paris. But his actions were a means to inspire change, not, like Miller’s, an end in themselves, private forays into degradation and anarchy. The profoundly unpolitical Miller had no desire to change anything.

Certainly not in Spain. It was idiotic to go there out of a sense of obligation, he told Orwell, and this idea of defending democracy was plain stupid. Liberty was a personal thing; it allowed one to avoid public responsibility and live as one wished. Orwell, however, argued that liberty and democracy were important — think what fascism would do to the freedom of the artist. He confided his guilt at having aided imperialism in Burma. But had he not punished himself enough? Miller asked. Still, the earnestness of the younger man touched him. In later years they would disappoint each other — when Miller’s egoism surpassed his talents, when Orwell’s reviews were less flattering and Miller wrote him off as just another dumb English idealist. But that evening, in the studio lighted against the winter dark, Henry unearthed a warm corduroy jacket for George. It was his contribution to the Republican cause, he said, and he refrained from mentioning that he would have given Orwell the jacket no matter which side he had chosen to fight for.

Since this telling of the story includes the private thoughts Henry Miller “refrained from mentioning,” we can conclude it comes from him. That accounts for the flattering framing in which he presents himself as a kind of holy fool, like in the legend of the Fisher King, “I only knew that you were thirsty.” If your friend is going off to fight in a war between freedom and fascism, and it is winter and your friend lacks a warm coat, then you give him a coat. That is what it means to be a friend — what it means to love and to care for another person. And such friendship and friendliness cannot be conditioned on some political litmus test.

That’s a lovely sentiment, but it obscures more than it clarifies. The truth is that it really does matter a great deal — to your friend, whether he knows it or not — “which side he had chosen to fight for.”

Yes, by all means, if your friend is shivering, give him a warm jacket — because your friend is cold and he needs a warm jacket. But also, if your friend is on his way to fight for Generalissimo Franco and for fascism then what your friend needs, — more than anything else — is for you to convince him not to do that. Because doing that is bad, and shameful, and ultimately it is harmful and immiserating for him and for others through him.

If your friend is cold and you do not give him your extra coat, you are a bad friend. But if your friend is in grave moral peril and you “refrain from mentioning” it, you are a far worse friend. Friends don’t let friends shiver through the winter. And friends don’t let friends fight for fascism.

The distinction between giving the jacket unconditionally and preventing the grievous mistake is a false distinction. There is no “tension” or conflict between those two forms of looking out for the well-being of your friend. To neglect either obligation would be a betrayal of your friendship. To neglect either obligation would be unloving — a careless lack of concern for your supposed friend’s happiness, comfort, dignity, and health.

In seminary, this false distinction gets glorified and reinforced as the tension — or conflict, or even contradiction — between the “pastoral” and “prophetic” forms of spiritual leadership. The blogger rmj of Adventus ponders these supposedly conflicting obligations in this post, affirming an (unlinked) post from a seminarian that illustrates how reifying this false distinction turns pastors into, well, something like Henry Miller in 1936:

Next term I am taking a pastoral care class. I was thinking this weekend about what would I say to Mr. Thompson’s family if they belonged to my congregation. To behave in any way like commentators on the internet would make me a monster. On the other side, what would I say if the family of the accused killer, Luigi Mangione was in my congregation? If I don’t think I can provide comfort to both families in my future role as a pastor, then I should quit seminary right now. This is the requirement of caring, responsibility and love.

That word “comfort” here is elusively imprecise and requires a lot of unpacking. That’s also true in the famous line often repeated in both seminary and journalism school: “Comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.”*

Why would anyone want to afflict the comfortable? That makes it sound like you’re just creating problems where there weren’t any — like you were intent on unsettling good, happy, settled matters for no good reason. But the idea, of course, is that “the comfortable” refers to those who have become comfortable with things that are not true, not just, not real — and thus, ultimately, they have a false comfort which will prove to be an affliction to them, whether they realize it or not. Their apparent “comfort” is unsustainable and will lead to harm for them just as surely as it is already harming others.

Because, again, it matters a great deal — for their own well-being as well as for that of others — “what side” they have chosen to fight for.

Or, as the Gospel puts it, “For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?”

Is that a “prophetic” question or a “pastoral” one?

I think it’s both. And I think it’s another helpful illustration of why this is often a false and misleading distinction.

“He that hath two coats, let him impart to him that hath none,” John the Baptist said. Henry Miller did exactly that for his friend George Orwell, comforting the afflicted. That much was lovely.

Those words in Luke 3:11 come after John’s more ferocious call for repentance. This is a passage that always gets classified as emphatically “prophetic” rather than “pastoral.” It begins with John proclaiming the coming of God’s leveling justice. “Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain shall be brought low,” he preaches — a hopeful promise to the afflicted and a dire warning to the comfortable.

John continues:

You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? … The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.

This is obviously un-pastoral, right? It’s all angry and “prophetic,” right? I mean, it doesn’t sound terribly “comforting” does it?

But I think that warning is essentially pastoral. Because John isn’t the one holding the ax. He’s not making a threat here — “Repent or I will cut you down!” He is, rather, making a claim about what he believes is true and real, and thus inevitable. He isn’t warning “the comfortable” that he is intent on destroying them, but that they are on a path to destruction — that if they do not change, they will surely destroy themselves.

If John was right about that, then it would be “pastoral” malpractice to refrain from mentioning it.

If your friend is shivering from the cold as they are also running headlong into a giant ax then it is, indeed, a friendly, comforting gesture to offer them a warm jacket.

But it is also a friendly, comforting gesture to also perhaps add, “Look out for that giant ax!”

A friend who didn’t do both — or who insisted on some kind of either/or distinction between them — wouldn’t be a good friend at all.

* The earliest source for this that Quote Investigator could find was from humor columnist Finley Peter Dunne in 1902, applying it to newspapers. It seems it took another generation before it was embraced by church leaders as a description of their calling, with the earliest such uses in that arena coming in the 1940s.