Is Okay, But...

This is how the internet works for me:  I read things like this article by Francis Schaeffer, who is the son of a famous evangelical of the 20th century (same name, but not to be confused).  I really like the premise because of the very biblical condemnation of hardness of heart.  Jesus, in fact, uses our own hardness of heart as an explanation of why divorce is acceptable according to the Law of Moses, (Matthew 10: 1-12) basically because people are broken and sometimes that leads to the necessity of divorce, but in an ideal world, it is not what God intends.
In fact, this seems to be a general leaning in Jesus' approach to the law: the law is for our protection and well being, but is not an end in and of itself.  It is not a path to God unless the relationship of law and grace is apprehended, understood and worked out (Lutheran colleagues rejoice).  In other words good behavior and ritual observance just aren't going to get you right with God.  Sin manifests itself as legalism and perhaps over-wrought fundamentalism even among those who strive for a rigorous, even austere level of religious devotion.
Schaeffer has a lot of anger about fundamentalism of all sorts, which you see the fruit of in this writing.  You need to know that his parents were major players in the rise of the religious right and the moral majority, and they were also sort of borderline cult leaders who (barely) managed to stay within the bounds of Christian orthodoxy.  You also need to know that Francis Schaeffer the elder was a contradiction in many ways: an ultra-religious sort who devoted his life to creating Christian community and evangelism, and also an extreme authoritarian, who according to his son's later writings was abusive physically and emotionally towards his wife and family.
Frank has some reasons to be angry at fundamentalists, and he is one of the loudest voices telling us that fundamentalism, in all its forms, is dangerous and to be resisted by the Church, our society and indeed by the very Spirit of God.  To which I say, "Amen."
However, I am also a bit unnerved by the shotgun approach he takes to this mission.  I'm not sure everyone will read the article with the same eyes, but I feel like he's just blasting away, in an angry tirade, and not giving full consideration that he may be, as Dylan says, "fearing not I'd become my enemy in the instant that I preach."
It is undoubtedly a difficult task to be passionate and prophetic in this age of polarization without becoming exactly the sort of demagogue you set out to unmask.  Schaeffer does not always walk the line successfully, but if you know his story and the source of  his particular bias, it gets a little easier to forgive him when he gets cranky, but you still need to know that he's dealing cards from an emotionally charged deck.
That being said, hard hearts have been on my mind a lot lately, because it seems like there are an awful lot of them out there.  People who fail the basic empathy test, and don't even come close to the radical love mandated by Christ, when it comes to the other.  Frank shines some light on the real hot button topics, but it extends into almost every arena of our life: we just don't know how to treat each other decently.  Which is stupid because we've been practicing for our whole lives and we seem to be able to do it a thousand times a day during the course of normal daily events.  We just seem to fail when it comes to ideologically loaded topics like politics, race, economics, and religion.
There's even a "rule of thumb" about not discussing those things in a bar or other social situation.  Why?  Because they might lead to an argument, or maybe even a fight. Why? Because we have not learned how to apply our basic civility to these loaded subjects.  It is not because we lack intellectual capacity or even basic decency, it's because we have learned to lead too much with our emotions.
On Star Trek: The Next Generation, the ship's counselor is a part human, part Betazoid.  Counselor Troi, is what is called an "Empath" on the show, which means she can sense feelings extremely accurately.  Betazoids are telepathic, so Troi got the emotional part of that.  It comes in awfully handy to Picard, who is a thinking man, rather uncomfortable with emotions.  But Troi's ability to sense emotions has a weakness, if her own feelings are strong, she can't always read what someone else is feeling.
This is, I think, an accurate assessment.  The more you are dominated by an emotion, the less you are able to empathize, unless that particular person is feeling the same as you are.  People can grieve together, but the worst thing for someone who is grieving is to see another person in a super, happy, wonderful situation, it's just like salt in a wound, and shuts down empathy.
It has been hard for people who feel like progress is being made with regard to civil rights, to empathize with people who still feel like they are having their world shaken underneath them.  I think this applies to the issues of racial, gender, and sexual orientation.  In each one of these cases, each stride by the oppressed feels like a threat so some privilege that has been long assumed by straight, white males.  I know this because I am a straight, white male, and if I don't keep my channels open, it's all too easy for me to take my status for granted and lose empathy for people who aren't like me.
I can like most of what Schaeffer says, but his anger worries me because I know it creates a blind spot, not just in him, but in me.  The more I agree with him, and the more of his anger I internalize the more I lose the ability to read and analyze the situation and feel empathy, in short, the harder my heart becomes.
And hard hearts will eventually get broken as surely as open ones, it will just shatter into more pieces.