Universalist Unitarian Church Santa Paula, California

Survival of the Fittest?
by Reverend John Alexie Crane

That is, in any species of plant or animal, random variations occur in individuals. To take a simple example, one individual will be able to run faster than another. The ability to cover ground swiftly has, of course, survival value; so speedy individuals are more likely to survive and reproduce. The speedy genes are then passed along to the next generation. Slower individuals are less likely to survive, so their genetic characteristics will die out. Only the fittest survive in the struggle for existence.

We have taken this striking set of insights for granted for so long that we have forgotten the rippling thrill of excitement that it aroused when The Origin of Species was first published back in 1859. To be sure, enthusiasm was not the total response. Many individuals met the theory with resistance, with denial because it was sharply at variance with the centuries-old teachings of traditional religion, and because it called for radical revision of the prevailing view of humanity’s place in the scheme of things. All over the world, people set to work at integrating this striking new insight into their understanding of the world.

Though most of us see light in the notion of evolution, there are, even now, 140 years later, still pockets of resistance, as recent events in the state of Kansas testify. Evolution is a world-shaking conception. It has generated a vast amount of reflection, readjustment, exploration, speculation, and argument.

One strand of thought that developed before the end of the nineteenth century was the application of natural selection, the struggle for existence, and survival of the fittest, not only to plant and animal life, but to the life of humans in society. This school of thought has been called “Social Darwinism,” and it argued that it is important to the future development of humanity that the natural struggle for existence should be permitted to prevail in society as in nature. Through natural selection, the strongest competitors in society would survive and reproduce, in this way enabling the species to continue to advance in strength, vitality, and competitive powers.

The Social Darwinists argued further that all efforts to reform society through the intervention of government would weaken the species, as this would interfere with the natural process of evolution. So, it was a violation of natural law to help the poor, as they were clearly unfit in the competitive struggle for existence. Unrestricted competition, on the other hand, was seen by the Social Darwinists as being in harmony with the nature of things, as certain to produce, over time, a strong, vital, vigorous humanity. Unrestrained competition would, they agreed, cause deprivation and suffering on a fairly large scale over the short run; but in the long run, it would naturally enhance the evolution of humanity.

II. Individualism in UU Religion
There has been in recent years a growing awareness in UUs that their heavy emphasis on individualism has been not only a great strength, a high asset, but that, at the same time, a negative impact has evolved. It has begun to be clear to many of us that extreme individualism has become a limiting factor in achievement of the potential caught up in the unique nature of the movement.

You see this plainly reflected in a report published in 1997 by the denomination’s Commission on Appraisal. This is a nine member body elected by the annual meeting of delegates from all of our churches, called the General Assembly. The Commission on Appraisal functions independently, charged with the task of reviewing any aspect of the movement’s structure, activities, or orientation that would benefit from close examination; then later filing a report to an annual delegates meeting, detailing the Commission’s findings and proposing remedial action.

In 1997 the Commission filed a seminal report titled, Interdependence. which looked closely at the impact of our extreme individualism on the development of UU religion. It pointed out that our long and heavy emphasis on freedom of the individual (and the independence, the autonomy of each local congregation) has pressed us into largely ignoring the interdependence of individual, congregation, and the continental community of autonomous congregations of which we are each a part. The communal, the associational, the relational dimension has been neglected, and, the Commission contended, this is an error that has crippled our development. “We are calling for a new way of thinking,” the report said, “about who we Unitarian Universalists are and what we seek to become.” We need now to temper our passion for individualism with a heightened awareness, an affirmation of our interdependence.

“There is,” the report went on, “inherent tension between the concepts of community and autonomy, similar to the often expressed tension between responsibility and freedom. However, community and autonomy do not exclude one another, but enhance one another, for the essential function of the congregation is to link the individual to a religious community.” The function of the denomination is to link each autonomous congregation to a continental community of churches.

The Commission’s 1997 report created a considerable stir. It soon led to the generation of a task force charged with translating the insights of the report into action. The task force named itself, “Fulfilling the Promise:” that is, fulfilling in actuality the potential caught up in the nature of the movement. Counterbalancing our extreme emphasis on individualism and autonomy by laying heavy emphasis also on the high importance of connectedness, interdependence, and community.

IV. Origins of Individualism
Individualism was a highly creative innovation in human development. It emerged gradually during the 14th and 15th centuries in societies in the Western world as a reaction to the institutionalism that had come to dominate social life for centuries after large, complex, early societies came into being in the fertile river valleys of the world. The institutions of monarchy and the church developed as a central governing force. The monarch was related to God; the noble, land-owning class ranked a notch below the monarch, loyal and obedient to him or her; and there was a small middle class made up mostly of merchants. Then, lower still were the artisans, farmers, peasants, slaves. Almost invariably, individuals lived out their entire lives at the level of society into which they had been born. The institutional structure held individuals in its rigid grip.

This line of human development continued for centuries, reaching its peak during the Middle Ages. Then, in northern Italy in the fourteenth century, the stirrings of a revolution in human development began. A radical and lasting revolution. The Renaissance. This creative movement elevated the importance of individual expression, self-consciousness, and discovery. The arts, scholarship, literature, science, and commerce all flourished, and the Renaissance spread throughout Europe. Individualism began its emergence out of the age old rigidity of institutionalism.

These developments in turn led to the emergence in the sixteenth century of the Protestant Reformation of the medieval church; and it was during this century that the Unitarian movement first developed in Europe, continuing down to the present day. The Reformation added further impetus to the expansion of individualism, and it was a healthy development, generating energy and innovation in organized religion. Science flourished increasingly and in the eighteenth century democracy developed as an individualistic alternative to the institution of monarchy.

Democracy blossomed in the New World, in America, where it became possible to entirely reorganize the old, institutional social order, and here in this new world, the celebration, the practice of individualism became a primary force in shaping social, political, and economic life.

As is so often the case in human affairs, the reaction in time overshot the mark. In our justifiably high enthusiasm for individualism, we lost sight of the fact that we only become individuals through our interaction with others in society, in community. It is an inescapable fact that each of us is born utterly helpless, speechless, and totally dependent on the love, the caring of others to enable us to become ourselves, to generate our individuality.

Individualism is, was, and will continue to be a highly creative force in human life, but we are now beginning to see that, untempered by an awareness of our interdependence, it has a destructive dimension. It does not relate us to reality. The reality is that human nature emerges out of social interaction, out of caring and community. As the distinguished religious scholar, Robert Bellah of UC Berkeley put it to our annual General Assembly in 1998, “if you believe in ‘a free and responsible search for truth,’ the truth is that our nature is social.”

This is a truth that UUs are now moving to affirm. The Interdependence report of the Commission on Appraisal argues that what is now called for among us is “a paradigm shift from individualism to interdependence, from the autonomy of congregations to a community of autonomous congregations.” We must recognize that the “beloved community” lies at the heart of our pattern of convictions: beloved community in our congregations, in our association of churches; in our local community as well as in the world at large. We find this expressed in our Principles and Purposes, which read in part: we affirm and intend to promote “justice equity and compassion in human relations; acceptance of one another... in our congregations; the goal of world community, with peace, liberty and justice for all; respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part.”

Yes. We have begun to see that our strong commitment to individualism must be balanced by attention to the institutionalism with which it is in tension: that is, a persisting concern for organizational structures that facilitate the religious life of individuals and congregations, enable them to have a joint impact on their local, national, and international communities.

However, it has been difficult for institutionalism to gain much ground, either in the nation or in our religious movement. Individualism has been persistently dominant, is deeply rooted in both the US and UU world views.

IV. Biology, Culture, and Darwinism
The United States of America originated in radical dissent from the traditional, autocratic way of life in Europe. Our Founders rejected monarchy in favor of democracy. Unitarians and Universalists in America originated in dissent from mainline, traditional religion, the dominant, old Puritan churches in New England. These historic Puritan churches were, in turn, formed out of vigorous dissent from the Established Church of England. We UUs, you see, are doubly dissenting.

All of which reflects the fact that dissent is a prime mover in shaping life in both our nation and in our religious movement. What this means, oddly enough, is that where we are extreme dissenters in religion even in America, in our individualism, as Robert Bellah also pointed out, we are right in the middle of mainstream America.

Individual freedom of belief, freedom of conscience and freedom of enterprise are closely related. All three are an outcome of individualism. Just as our religious movement suffers from an excess of individualism, a neglect of the communal dimension, so does the US suffer from excessive individualism. Because of our nation’s celebration and long practice of individualism, the result is that we lead all North Atlantic societies in the percentage of our population that lives in poverty, as well as in recently downsizing what was already the weakest of all welfare states.

I began by outlining social Darwinism because it appears to me that this is a philosophy that underlies the convictions of a great many Americans in the arena of political and social life. This philosophy holds that an unrestrained struggle for existence should prevail in society as in nature, so that only those among us with the strongest competitive drive, the most aggressive thrust in life will survive and reproduce. In this way, the philosophy argues, we will most effectively enhance the higher evolution of our species. It is certainly true that a struggle for power and dominance is characteristic of animal species. Most animal groupings are dominated by the strongest, most aggressive, most fiercely competitive individuals among them, and this surely has survival value in the animal kingdom.

It is also true that human nature evolved out of earlier animal forms, that it still contains a substantial component of animality; but, on the other hand, our nature is shaped not only by biology but also in very large part by culture. Which greatly complicates the matter. Our individual nature emerges out of regular interaction with other humans as we grow up in a family, a community, a nation.

Any society has a clear need for individuals with competitive strengths. It has an even greater need for individuals with a high level of nurturing strengths, because this is how human beings are formed. Every child, from the beginning, desperately needs to be nurtured, loved by other individuals with a substantial capacity and intelligence for caring. Caring about the well-being of others. Any society needs a great many sensitive, creative, caring people: nursery school teachers, elementary and high school teachers, artists, scholars, nurses, doctors, musicians, thinkers and writers.

Yes. Culture adds another dimension to the animal nature in us. Power is the ability to get what you want from others. In animal species, as in humans, the level of ability in this regard, like the ability to run fast, varies from one individual to another. A few individuals in each grouping are so strongly driven, so well equipped physically and mentally to dominate others that they are able to get what they want, even though it may mean maiming or killing those who get in the way. The most aggressive, the most driven individuals reap the rewards of life in their animal group, namely, food, sex, and status.

This is no doubt how it was with humans until cultures developed to shape our shared lives in such a way as to reduce the suffering, violence, and abuse that arise out of the unchecked struggle for existence. Culture has added a human, a humane dimension to the animal component in ourselves; and humanity, for the past 3000 years now, has begun to celebrate cultural concepts like justice, equality, cooperation, and compassion. Caring about one’s own well-being, to be sure, and also about the well-being of others.

Given the fact that we are inescapably social in our nature, given that our individuality can only take form in a nurturing society, surely for creatures constructed as we are, caring has for our species at least as much survival value as competition.

Dr Alexie Crane
2880 Exeter Place
Santa Barbara, CA 93105
(805) 682-3476

Lex1304@aol.com

Return to Sermons Page