I recently received a letter from a very troubled young woman struggling with the concept of "support." Her married sister is fooling around on her perfectly good husband despite the marital vows, despite the dependent children who love their dad and despite this young woman's oh-so-careful admonitions.
The errant sister, obviously no stranger to expedience in definitions, criticized this young woman for not being lovingly, sisterly supportive.I guess in this case supportive would mean giving alibis for the adulterous sister's where-abouts when she's having a roll in the hay, maybe even baby-sitting the children so more time would be available for trysts. It would also mean listening to the self-serving complaints that justify the adulterous behavior, going to lunch and being nice to the "other guy," not agonizing over the difficulties entailed by these complicated activities and generally maintaining a conspiracy of silence against the husband.
The young woman was torn between her values, her sense of loyalty to the husband, her fear for the welfare of the children (obviously neglected and now vulnerable to divorce) and her obligation of blood to her sister.
I have said many times that blood should not be thicker than values and morals.
One of the first dictionary definitions of "support" is "to sustain without giving way." Interesting. How might that apply here? How can this woman sustain her relationship with her sister without having her own values give way?
Perhaps it would be to affirm the familial love while outlining the devastation being synthesized from her sister's selfish behavior. Perhaps it would be to offer specific resources (religious and/or psychotherapeutic) for the errant sister to use to face her fears, disappointments, personal limitations, frustrations, etc., in a more productive way.
Perhaps it would be to inform her sister that without efforts in these more positive directions, she would be obligated to force the issue by speaking the truth in front of the married couple.
To stay by someone as they endure or struggle with difficult times in their lives is a blessing. To think that support necessarily means to accept, advocate or even cooperate in activities that are blatantly wrong is either weak or voyeuristic - and certainly not in the ultimate best interest of either person.
And this is where judgment must be brought in. Unfortunately, the term judgment has been distorted into an absolute negative by those who wish to espouse a life philosophy of "anything goes" - that is, until they are the loser in someone else's self-centered life scenario.
Making judgments is a necessary part of the life of a creature with free will and a wide range of options. We must discern between choices that are decent and fair and those that range from inappropriate to evil and self-serving. By our judgments we forge our own character; by the integrated judgments of a people we determine the level of decency of a society.
That some people can run amok with "evil judgment" does not make judgment evil. Judgment is about opinion, evaluation and discernment. It is an absolutely necessary quality for an individual who desires to live a decent, admirable, ethical life. Without a decision about right/wrong, noble/cowardly, charitable/selfish, we'd have no human civilization of merit.
Therefore, it is quite proper for parents to express disappointment and even disdain for their adult child's significant lifestyle choices (such as shacking up with a person with minor children) while keeping the door open for love, change and growth. However, the parents may justifiably choose not to participate as a "family" with those whose commitment level precludes that title.
Love does not mean you have to tolerate any behavior whatsoever. Love does mean that you have to offer direction, information and hope.
Love makes you responsible for conveying concepts such as "ethical," "right," "good," "moral," "decent" and "polite" because it demands of you that you take on the risks and challenges of supporting others in the very human struggle to be more than the animals.