Wednesday, July 19, 2006 - Why the Lie?

One of my dearest friends lied to me the other day. Found himself in the midst of a tale that I was not supposed to know about, so he pulled a moot lie out of . . . (I’ll be kind). . .thin air and launched it straight into my heart. There it remains, cutting and writhing, an ugly thing, meant to spare him shame, but shaming us both, because he’s too stubborn to unspeak it.

He should know better, too. We go back a long time, and he’s seen first-hand how badly lies work on me. They set off my full array of alarms, and no matter how smooth or well-rehearsed they are, untruths arrive with a fanfare of wrongness that I cannot ignore. No matter how desperately I wish I could.

So, here we are. My friend blithely convinced that he pulled it off, that I am none the wiser to his cracked integrity. And I, left to deal with the refuse he dumped on me, wondering, truly, how good of a friend he can be when he so easily dishonors me by counting on my stupidity.

Sadly, we’re awash in a culture that has lost its regard for the truth. Varying degrees of lies ~ from TV commercials to State of the Union Addresses ~ are beamed through the ethers at hundreds of thousands of dollars a minute. And most Americans gobble them up, mentally paralyzed by either apathy or denial. Thus, ignorance is their bliss.

But not mine. I learned early on that our personal power is linked directly to our integrity. Or as my Wiccan friends say, “A witch is only as good as her word.” The Bible says it, too: “In the Beginning was the Word, the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” Accordingly, all of Creation was launched on the strength of divine integrity.

So, it truly boggles my mind that people so casually compromise honesty. At best, it buys a little breather from personal accountability. At worst, it launches wars.

As for my friend ~ his adversarial relationship with the truth is a relatively recent thing. And, as I said, we go way back, so I’ll cut him a little more slack. But if the lies and dishonor continue, then I suspect the love and trust that make us friends will dwindle away, and so will we.