Questions

In everything do to others as you would have them do to you;

For this is the Law and the Prophets.

-Jesus of Nazareth, Matthew 7: 12

I know that the above quotation doesn't come as a surprise, even to folks who are entirely non-religious. The thing is you don't actually have to be a follower of Jesus to believe that, the Law and the prophets were binding to Jews regardless of their opinion on resurrection or the messianic identity of Jesus, and have become so to both Christians and Muslims.  Beyond even that though, do unto others as you would have done to you, is about as close to a universal ethical principle as we humans can get.  It's the first thing I remember trying to reason through with my kids when they did something wrong to another person: "how would you feel if someone did that to you?"  A three year old can get it, and be convicted by the negative corollary of what hopefully becomes a more positive moral and ethical guide as they get older. It doesn't actually need any theological backup.

As I observe the zeitgeist of our culture at the moment, I wonder if we are morally lapsed to the point where we don't get something that a toddler can usually hold in the earliest developmental stages of empathy and reason. 

I have some questions: 

1. If you were hungry, would you want someone to feed you; or better yet help you get what you needed to feed yourself?
2. If you were sick, would you want someone to help you get better; even if you didn't have the money to pay for it?
3. If you were on the run from a war or a catastrophe, would you want someone to open their borders and their doors to you?
4. If you were trapped in an abusive relationship, with a person or a substance, would you want someone to help you get out?
5. If you were homeless, would you want someone to give you shelter?
6. If you were oppressed and denied basic human dignity, would you want someone to come to your defense?

Do not run away from the basic moral task by writing these questions off as some sort of bleeding-heart liberal nonsense.  They are not, I'm not implying that any particular side has cornered the market on selfishness and meanness.  I acknowledge that in answering any and all of these you might have a whole host of rationalizations running through your brain.  My goal here is not to lay the guilt at the doorstep of any particular political platform or ideology.  If you feel guilty, you may want to take stock of why that is.

We all fail this test at some point. We all deny others the same basic things that we would hope for if the shoe was on the other foot. We all hedge our guilt away by applying a different standard: "do unto others as we suspect they would do to us," or even more cynical, "do unto others before they get the chance to do unto you."

The thing is that this is just the basic human part of the scheme.  This is the part that people should follow whether they want to follow Jesus or not.  Jesus actually shifts this into a higher gear: "do good unto others even though you know they will not do the same for you." "Do good unto others even though you know they will betray you and brutalize you and kill you."  But I don't expect everyone to be able to get there, I'm not climbing up on my preacher soapbox today, I'm trying to stick to my basic human platform at the moment.