TRUST

                                                          

Sometimes I like to kid my significant other and consequently the level of trust she has for me has taken a toll. Maybe it’s the consequences I deserve for not always being genuine but yet, I have too much fun with it to abandon it. I know that she knows that it’s all in fun and I mean no harm.

There is however, a much more critical matter and a serious lack of trust in our society today that is no laughing matter and it is hurting our relationships with each other and in the case of our government, with other countries. Without trust you have nothing. Trust is most often lost when you don’t keep your word.  As when we asked Russia for proof that they aren’t breaking treaties, when we know they are, and they know that we know they are, and they still say they aren’t-- well where do you go from there? England doesn’t trust the European union and vice versa; we don’t trust China and right back at us. Our leaders say one thing to the voters and do another and then they say “just trust me on this.” We should say, “Fool me once shame on me. Fool me twice shame on you.”

As a member of the Catholic faith my trust in the very church I profess to believe in has been shaken by the allegations that young people were abused and cover-ups existed. A breach of trust that is very egregious. I think we all knew priests were human and those things could take place but to have their bosses cover it up?  Most of it happened seventy years ago so that part of it may have been largely stopped but the cover-ups are still coming out and so much hurt could have been prevented by being transparent a long time ago. Think also of the tobacco companies and their lies and cover-ups about their products.

There was a time when you trusted your scout leader, your neighbor guy, your teachers and your Sunday school teacher to mentor you, not harm you. There was no need back then to have another person shadowing them all day just to verify that they did nothing wrong. As a young man in my teens, I used to hitchhike to the river to go swimming with my buddy and we never thought once that anyone would harm us. There was a golf course right across the road from the river and strangers were more then happy to give us a ride and they never thought that we would harm them either. But now day’s little kids are made to feel like a fox pup coming out of the den for the first time, knowing there is danger around every corner.

There are a lot of people that can’t be trusted in our society and by all means be cautious and especially with your kids but when you have to draw lines in the sand involving innocent people, you change society in ways that tear us apart. Until the day comes around again, when you can seal a deal with a smile and a handshake, we will live and work in a world that doesn’t see anybody as truthful and honest and when we get down to that point, a whole lot of other things like integrity, honesty, respect and truthfulness will be just outmoded words without meaning. Then well meaning people who are still trying to live by those rules, become liars, cheaters and untrustworthy, guilty by association along with those who ruined it for everyone.