Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to get connected with Nina del Rio, a weekly
conversation about fitness, health and happenings in our community on
one oh six point seven Light FM.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Welcome and thanks for listening to get connected. If you're
watching the news, you know thousands of workers in the
federal government are being laid off daily, but some are
leaving their jobs voluntarily, stepping down from responsibilities, often in
protest of specific policies and new rules being imposed upon them.
Whatever your job or role, what is the ethical red
(00:33):
line that might cause you to leave? What is the
balance between financial needs and moral considerations? We'll talk about
it with our guest, doctor Ann Clayson, Leader Emerita at
the New York Society for Ethical Culture. Doctor Ann Clayson,
thank you for being on.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
The show and thank you for inviting me.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
You can find out more about this New York Society
for Ethical Culture at ethical dot NYC. Doctor Ann Clayson
is a Leader Emerita of the New York Society for
Ethical Culture. She's also a Humanist chaplain at NYU and
ethical Humanist Religious Life Advisor at Columbia University. Let's talk
about the society to begin with, so a lot of
(01:12):
people me included see the signs for Ethical Culture in
our towns in the city. What is the New York
Society for Ethical Culture? What do you do?
Speaker 3 (01:20):
Great? Thanks for asking. So the New York Society for
Ethical Culture was founded in eighteen seventy six by Felix Adler,
who was only twenty four years old at the time.
And I say that because I'm looking to this younger
generation now and wondering, you know, in what ways we
can be more supportive of them and supportive of the
(01:42):
journeys that they're on, and how are they experiencing this
world that we're in. So Felix Adler was the son
of a reformed rabbi at Temple Emmanuel, and he went
through a kind of a philosophical growth, I guess you'd say,
when he realized that he was thinking of sort of
his existential questions were going beyond the theology that he
(02:06):
had been taught at his synagogue and where his father
had hoped that he would take over for him as
the rabbi. And when he gave his first and what
turned out to be his last sermon at Temple Emmanuel,
he referred to sort of a social justice agenda, which
was kind of perpolating at the nineteenth century. That's social gospel.
(02:26):
How can we put our beliefs into action? How can
we really you've heard the saying what would Jesus do?
This is kind of along those lines. If our theology
is telling us this, look around, in what ways are
we helping our neighbors? In what ways are we experiencing
ourselves as good people? In a very real way? And
(02:49):
so when the Board of Trustees spoke to him afterwards,
they said, it's all very interesting, but you didn't refer
to God. And he said, you know, I'm thinking I've
got in a different way now. I'm thinking that it
might be kind of a less personal nature and maybe
more of what is goodness? And how are we all
included in that? And so in May of eighteen seventy
(03:13):
six he held his first gathering, which is the founding
of ethical Culture, and it was really a call to
people to say, question what you believe if it's not
leading you to good behavior, and let's together decide what
that good behavior looks like, feels like, sounds like, how
can we be good role models for our children. I
(03:35):
came into ethicoculture having been raised Catholic. My husband Glenn
was raised Jewish. We found a place to raise our children.
Where As Felix Adler said, we should strive to teach
our children nothing they will need to unlearn, but rather
communicate to them, transmit to them the greatest values of
(03:55):
our age. And I think that's really what we're called
upon to do right now. I mean, we're always called
upon it to do that, but I think this moment
in our history is so tense and so fraught and
so dangerous for so many.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
Right now people are thinking about how to behave, how
to react to things, and what to do. We are
seeing real life cases in the news every day of
government agencies, people leaving, people trying to make that decision.
But doesn't have to be a government agency. What are
some everyday examples of moral quandary someone may face?
Speaker 3 (04:30):
You know, it's so interesting. I think everyone faces that
to a certain degree. One of the aphorisms that we
have in ethgoculture is that we strive to put deed
above creed, understanding that creeds and beliefs are important, But
how does your belief inform your behavior? So, you know,
I think this is nothing new. This is Felix Adler
(04:50):
talked about it in the nineteenth century that we tend
to compartmentalize our lives. We put up these boundaries about
around different things, like Okay, I'll behave this way from
nine to five, I'll behave that way when I'm home
with my family, and compartmentalize it in different ways so
that we can earn a living, put food on the table,
people roof over our heads, provide our families with health insurance, whatever.
(05:15):
But in that compartmentalization, we lose parts of ourself. And
one of the things I also appreciated about Felix Adler
is he said, how do we make our lives all
of a piece? In other words, how do we break
down those different compartments so our values are really being
lived out and everything that we do. And look, it's
(05:38):
a challenge. It was a challenge for him when he
started this in the nineteenth century. The big challenge for
them at that time was sort of industrialization. There were factories.
How do people work at a factory job and still
maintain their moral lives? Now with technology and now they
have so many people who are working on jobs that
(05:59):
they felt. I'm thinking particularly of Danielle Sassoon, the federal
former federal prosecutor. She had a dream job. She was
an attorney, and she felt that she was really doing
the good work, only to find out that her superiors
are telling her to do something that she knows us wrong,
that she knows as unethical and probably even illegal, And
(06:21):
so she stood up and she left. I always advise
people find your allies, who are your allies, what is
your support system? What she did was incredibly brave, and
she also made a public statement. I think that's asking
a lot of someone to not only make the decision
to leave, but to also make a public statement. But
I think in this environment right now, it's a kind
(06:44):
of an activism to say I'm leaving this job because
I can no longer maintain my values in this job,
and I'm going to let you know why. Incredibly brave.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
We're speaking with doctor Ann Clayson. She hold a Doctor
of Ministry degree in pastoral care from Hebrew Union College.
She is Leader Emerita of the New York Society for
Ethical Culture. You can find out more at ethical dot NYC.
You're listening to get connected on one oh six point
seven Light FM. I'mina del Rio. If you were to
leave your job on ethical grounds, let me ask first.
(07:19):
I'll ask two questions. As a rule, do you believe
there is an obligation to advocate for things we know
to be true or even believe to be true when
negative pressure is put upon those things? And there might
be a negative consequence to us for stepping forward.
Speaker 3 (07:37):
If someone were to come to me and ask for
some advice, is as my role as pastor? I think
my role there is to really listen deeply to what's
going on in that person's life. And people have an
obligation to their families, to those who depend upon them financially, emotionally,
(07:59):
and so to hold within oneself that kind of moral
tension is very difficult and very challenging. So is it
an obligation? Everyone needs to decide that for themselves. I
think it's important to exercise one's moral agency. But what
goes into that question are so many different aspects, and
(08:22):
I think the most that I could do is to
listen and to act as a sounding board to reflect
back to someone. I hear you saying these are your values.
How do you imagine activating those values, putting those values
into action?
Speaker 2 (08:37):
And there's many ways to activate them. Right now, you
can protest you can write letters, you can do things
that are a little more under the radar, above the radar,
But would you is there a question you might ask yourself,
particularly if it's something that is uncomfortable.
Speaker 3 (08:51):
I think myself, I'm very fortunate, one might say, morally
privileged in a way that I have allies and I
have support, also active in a field as clergy where
I can speak out, so I as a clergy person,
I can express my values in public. And since I'm
retired now, I also don't have the kinds of challenges
(09:15):
that folks who need to be employed have. I may not, however,
speak on behalf of an organization. I think that's an
interesting point and one that comes up for my congregation
here in Brooklyn, and also the congregation of the New
York Society for Ethical Culture. Last week I went to
a conference that was co hosted by the Interfaith Center
(09:35):
of New York and New York Law School. It was
called Law, Religion and Civil Society and Challenging Times. So
not only is this tension being felt by people who
hold jobs and wonder in what ways they can continue
to hold them and still pull on to their values,
but organizations are going through this as well, and the
(09:56):
head of the public policy director of the National Counciled
Nonprofits said, there is not a single sector of nonprofits
that isn't under attack right now, and so there you
have to ask yourself, do I risk losing my nonprofit
status if my organization is no longer able to exist.
(10:17):
So it's incredibly challenging, and fortunately people are When I
talk about allies and support, both individuals and organizations are
coming together to support one another and to say how
do we support one another to move through this. As
one of my clergy colleagues said, who are you in
(10:38):
this moment? And how can you live out your values?
Speaker 2 (10:41):
Doctor Clayson, how do you feel in general about the
ethical standards of the country. What are you concerned about
and what are you optimistic about?
Speaker 3 (10:50):
You know, I'm very concerned about this transactional nature attitude
that our young people are seeing acted out with this
administration to view life and relationships as transactional and to
talk about empathy as though it were a sin. I
(11:10):
mean to use an expression suicidal. Empathy is antithetical to
all religion and faith traditions and should be antithetical to
the way that we raise our children. We should be
raising them with empathy, indeed, a kind of a radical empathy.
So I'm very concerned that this generation young people are
(11:33):
seeing something played out in Washington, in the White House,
and if they see that as as ethics as morality,
I think it's just very dangerous. And it makes it
all the more important that congregations like the New York
(11:54):
Society for Ethical Culture other congregations really emphasize what their
values are and make sure that they are celebrating those
values in their communities and communicating it to their young people.
For example, one of the values that we started with
in eighteen seventy six with diversity. Why diversity because we
(12:18):
need each other, We need each other's perspective. Adler talked
about intellectual enemies, by which he meant those people that
if their worldview were to be predominant, we would find
it difficult to live in that world. Nonetheless, they too
have a perspective that is important and we need to
listen to it, we need to understand it. So we
(12:41):
have always made diversity for value, and to see that
being destroyed is I don't even have the words for it.
It requires an imagination that's just so difficult.
Speaker 2 (12:57):
I want to always try and leave to on a
you know, something to look forward to. So what are
you optimistic about when I think about empathy and ethics
and even younger people.
Speaker 3 (13:07):
I have to say that I know I have retired
as clergy and as chaplains at Columbia and NYU. However,
we do have a presence there and I'm always very
excited about that presence on our university campuses. What I'm
seeing happen, especially at Columbia right now, is very disturbing. However,
I know that the young people, the students, are meeting,
(13:29):
they're talking with each other, they're encouraging each other, and
so I do find hope in that. I truly do.
And I think I keep coming back to the concept
of empathy, and I think, you know, most people grow up,
I hope, grow up in families and communities and schools
where empathy is valued and is important. And so I'm
(13:50):
hopeful that that will still be true for us. We
still gather in communities, don't we. I mean, we still
have social gatherings. I think the pandemic channel to a
lot of young people because they weren't they didn't have
the social skills that they lost some of the social
skills they had, so young people are needing to regain
those social skills, but in doing so, I think they
(14:12):
really are experiencing themselves as empathetic beings. Also, every faith
tradition has what we call the golden rule. Do unto
others as you'd have them do on to you. I
think people who are not in a faith community would
understand what the golden rule is. What I appreciate about
humanism ethicoculture is that we sort of take the golden
(14:34):
rule as a foundation, and then we say and now
act in ways that bring out the goodness in others
and thereby in yourself. Other ways of putting that, as
Felix Sandler did, is act in ways that brings out
the distinctive difference in others. Again, getting back to that
notion of diversity, that we become richer and our experience
(14:56):
is deeper when we include people who think in feel
differently than we do.
Speaker 2 (15:02):
Doctor and Clayson is Leader Emerita at the New York
Society for Ethical Culture. You can find out more at
Ethical dot NYC. Doctor Clayson, thank you for being on
to get connected.
Speaker 3 (15:11):
Thank you so much for inviting me. I really ensured
our conversation.
Speaker 1 (15:15):
This has been get connected with Nina del Rio on
one oh six point seven light Fm. The views and
opinions of our guests do not necessarily reflect the views
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