It's In the Code Ep. 68: "Speaking the Truth in Love"
What’s going on when someone tells us they need to “speak the truth in love”? How is this similar to someone who assures us they’re being critical because “they’re our friend,” or “because they care for us”? How is the intention of these phrases changed when they take on a religious sense? Dan looks at these issues in this week’s episode.
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Hello and welcome to the series It's in the Code, part of the podcast Straight White American Jesus.
My name is Dan Miller.
I'm a professor of religion and social thought at Landmark College, your host, and glad to be with you, as always.
I want to begin, as always, by thanking those of you who listen, those of you who support us.
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And certainly this series comes from you.
This series comes from the insights and input and ideas and comments that you send me.
You can reach me at Daniel Miller Swaj, DanielMillerSWAJ at gmail.com.
I always apologize that I can't respond to enough emails quick enough.
I do try to catch up on them, but the start of the semester and Brad taking a few weeks of family time here means that things are pretty busy, so I'm doing what I can.
Keep the ideas coming.
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I do value them.
They often show up here, even if I don't get a chance to acknowledge everybody who might share them.
Great insights, and I want to dive into one today.
This is an idea that's been under my skin for a really long time, meaning not just in this series, but I'm going to hit on a phrase today that has driven me crazy for years, since my time as a pastor in a Christian church.
So, you know, decades we're talking about.
But again, I hear from it from a lot of you.
I've gotten a lot of emails about this.
I've had sort of just passing conversations with folks who will talk about this.
My clients, my trauma resolution clients, talk about this.
And it is the phrase or the idea of, quote, speaking the truth in love.
Now, if you haven't paused the episode at this point or just hit stop or got so angry when you heard that phrase that you wanted to just pull over because your parents or, I don't know, your college roommate at the small Christian college you went to or a sibling or somebody has said this to you one time too many and you're like, I'm done.
I can't believe you're going to talk about this.
It makes me so mad.
If you're still listening, right, let's dive in.
And that gets at the experience that some people have when they hear this phrase.
But if you've never heard it, right, if you're like, speaking the truth in love, what are we talking about?
Like, what do you mean by that?
And I hear from those folks as well, again, those who somebody comes into their life in whatever way, maybe it's a dating partner, maybe it's some, you know, often it's in-laws or the parents of a significant other who Let's talk a little bit about the context in which this would come up, right?
This is another one of those phrases that I think is typically going to be a Christian phrase, and it's something that a certain kind of Christian, not everybody talks this way, but a certain kind of Christian might say to preface something else.
It's like a preparatory statement, and it's usually something very critical or negative that comes after it.
And if you're not familiar with this, or even if you are familiar with it, There are some, let's just call them sort of secular parallels to this.
It's the person who prefaces something with, you know, I say this as a friend, comma, and then whatever they say after that is going to be something you don't want to hear, maybe something pretty awful.
Or, you know, I need to say this because I love you, comma, followed by something judgmental or maybe pretty, pretty awful.
We all know when we hear that setup that whatever comes next is something we're not going to like.
And we also know that, you know, sort of in the aftermath of that, when we look back, it's not clear that whatever was said was in fact coming from a place of friendship or loving care or concern.
We know that there are often other motives.
Harbored in there.
Speaking the truth in love represents the same idea with a kind of Christian overlay.
So the idea that we should speak the truth in love or somebody needs to speak the truth in love or whatever.
And it refers to the idea of sharing a hard truth, or what some kinds of Christians might call a word.
And I did an episode on that, on the idea of the word.
Somebody saying, you know, I just need to share a word, or God has given me a word to share with you.
Often what is spoken as truth in love is a word, understood in those terms.
Again, if you're like, what in the world are you talking about?
Take a listen to the other episode on the word.
But it's the idea of sharing a hard truth that someone needs to hear.
Something they likely don't want to hear, and something that typically we would receive as a negative or critical judgment of some kind.
So what I would say is, if you're not familiar with this, when somebody comes at you saying that they need to, quote, speak the truth in love to you, Look out, because it's the same thing as the person who's going to say something as a friend or because they care about you or whatever.
So, the phrase, speaking the truth in love, has a lot in common with, as I say, these more secular phrases.
But there's also a Christian code to it.
It is coded in a Christian way that I think makes it sort of heavier or more intense or more robust And I think this is why that particular phrase, speaking the truth in love, has a more sort of visceral effect on many people who hear it.
So let's start with that familiar example again.
Let's say that somebody comes at you or to you.
You can tell how I feel about this phrase.
I keep describing as somebody coming at you.
Somebody comes to you saying that they need to tell you something as a friend or because they care or whatever.
You're immediately on the defensive, or at least I am.
I'll make this about me.
We should do that, right?
Use I statements.
I am on the defensive when somebody does this, but I suspect that I am not alone in that.
I find myself on the defensive, and after they say whatever they say, you know, we got different options.
We might take it to heart.
We might find ourselves being defensive initially and then coming to the conclusion and saying, well, you know what?
Actually, if I'm being honest with myself, maybe there was something to that, right?
But we might also just sort of be like, you know, F you.
Maybe we'll say it to them in person.
Maybe we'll just think it.
But it's sort of a choice of how we respond.
There's like a range of responses open to us.
And probably all of us have had these experiences and maybe we have responded in all those different ways depending on who it was that's talking to us and what it was they said.
Okay?
But when someone, quote, speaks the truth in love, When they're coming to this with that Christian language and that Christian way of speaking, I think this is harder.
I don't think that that same range of options is as readily open to us.
And I think that that's by design.
I think that's part of the way that this works as a kind of social code.
I was talking with a client, one of my religious trauma clients the other day, and I said that, you know, what I think is that often what religion does is it sort of intensifies Or turns up the volume on issues or experiences and sometimes traumas that are pretty universal.
Everybody, probably every adult listener here probably has issues with their parents to some extent.
We've got issues with siblings to some extent.
We've all got issues with co-workers and so on.
Those are pretty universal things, but religion often sort of adds a layer to those that complicates them further or intensifies those issues or whatever.
And I think that this is a case of that, that you take this piece of language, this locution that we have, that we've all experienced.
Somebody's telling us something as a friend, or I only say this because I care about you, or whatever, and sort of intensifies it.
So there are some ways that I think the Christian spin on this makes it more intense, and here are a few of them.
So the first thing that I think is there, that's operative in this, And if you are not a Christian, or you didn't grow up in this kind of Christian context, and yet you have somebody in your life who speaks this way routinely, or you've heard them say this a lot, you're like, why do they do that?
Right?
One of the first things to understand is that for those who are going to talk this way, for Christians who are going to speak of speaking the truth in love, doing that, speaking the truth in love, is often understood as a Christian requirement.
For them, it is a kind of tenet or requirement of their faith that if they see something that concerns them, If they see someone, especially someone that they know personally or someone that they care about, they see them doing something that they think is a violation of God's will or it's immoral or it runs afoul of proper Christian practice or whatever, their faith requires them to say something.
They can't, in good conscience, sit idly by and watch somebody do something that goes against their faith.
They're not being a good Christian if they don't say something.
So they are going to say something, which is one of the reasons why I think for people on the receiving end of this, it feels like that's sort of all they ever hear from somebody.
It's coming out of a place of concern But the faith dimension turns it up so much that it can't sort of be turned off or moderated in any way, okay?
And because, I think tied in with this, because they're going to say something, because their faith demands that they say something, Whatever it is that's provoking them to say something is going to be negative.
It is going to be a judgment.
It's going to be something that you're doing or not doing or saying or whatever that is a problem for them from a Christian perspective and they feel compelled as an act of faith to say something.
So yeah, they're going to say it, and whenever you hear that I need to speak the truth and love for just a few minutes here, they're not going to say something encouraging and kind after that.
They're going to say something really, really critical, okay?
So that's, I think, one piece that sort of amps it up, that turns it up with that religious tonality.
The second one, and this is what I think ties it in with that notion of sharing a word, the second dimension that religion adds to this here is that when someone speaks the truth in love, this is cloaked in divine authority, right?
And you know that I talk about this a lot, and I think that this is one of the primary things that High-control religious articulations, high-control religious context, high-control religious practices do is they take things that might otherwise be mundane, this-worldly actions or beliefs or whatever,
And they cloak them in divine authority and a kind of transcendent authority that imbues them with a reason, a meaning, a reason, a significance that exceeds the merely human.
They become a sort of superlative reality.
And I think that that's part of what it does here.
And it's the same thing here.
When somebody quote-unquote speaks the truth in love, they're not just sharing their observations or their opinions or their impressions.
They are sharing what?
They're sharing the truth.
Not their truth, not a truth, not a possible truth, but the truth.
And how do they know that it's the truth?
Because it comes from God.
It is God's Word.
It's a message from the divine.
So that also adds a layer of intensity to this.
This is not just, I see what you're doing and this concerns me because I care about you blah blah blah blah blah.
No, this is a truth.
A truth that you're missing, that you need to accept, that I can see because it comes from God.
So when somebody speaks the truth in love, they are giving us a dose of the truth that they are compelled to give, right?
And that brings us to what I think is the biggest problem with this phrase, right?
This is the part that I think when, and I talk to lots of people, like it really drives me nuts when people say that, and I can't put my finger on exactly what it is.
I think that applies for what I'm calling these secular analogs as well.
But I think the biggest problem and the most important thing to decode is the fact that very often speaking the truth in love involves neither truth or love.
It involves neither one.
Like so many other things that we talk about in this series, I think the problem lies with the implicit and sometimes explicit claim to be speaking on behalf of God.
Because despite the way that Christians talk about having a personal relationship with God, I've talked about that in this series, about having, you know, sort of a direct encounter with the divine or whatever, when you get down to it, Those supposed direct encounters are pretty tough to come by.
Most of the time when people talk about encountering God, it is not an immediate exchange or interaction with God.
It is a very mediated experience, mediated through other people, mediated through the interpretation of a book like the Bible, mediated through the church, or whatever.
So, very often, we don't encounter God, we only encounter the people who assure us that they are speaking for God.
So when someone says, I'm come speaking the truth in love, Well, it's supposed to be the truth because it comes from God, they have a word from God, they have some insight into what that truth is, but we on the receiving end, we're not hearing from God, we're hearing from them.
And that, of course, is a formula that is ripe for somebody to come along and state what is merely their preference or their belief.
Or their interpretation of what they take to be the truth at best.
That's your best case scenario.
It's their understanding of what for them is the truth.
At worst, it gives them cover to say things that only express resentment or anger or jealousy or manipulation under the cover of being a word for God.
In other words, they get to express their anger or resentment or jealousy or manipulation without having to say that that's what it is.
They call it divine truth.
Why?
Because then you're not supposed to be able to respond to it.
It allows people to say terrible things, all the while assuring us that it's an expression of love or encouragement.
And I think we have all been on the receiving end of this, whether it's in the Christian form or those secular analogs, the so-called loving statement that is anything but.
And what, again, heightens this in the religious context is that because there is an implicit claim to religious authority, There's no legitimate way to reject what they're telling us.
Again, if they're speaking the truth, and if this truth comes from God, then if we challenge or question what they tell us, we're challenging or questioning God, not them.
So we can see that, again, we have a way of speaking that is ripe for manipulation and abuse by people who want to manipulate or coerce us or move us in some direction.
And the last piece of this that I think makes it so infuriating for people who hear it is that not only do you have all of this, I mean, let's take that worst case scenario.
Let's take it when you've got the person who's just judgmental or vindictive or resentful or whatever and uses the language of speaking the truth in love as a way of getting to tell us what they really think.
Not only do they get to tell us what they really think, not only do they get to claim a transcendent authority for doing so, not only do they get to be an a-hole and call it love, but even more, they can often act as if they're reluctant to tell us it's not.
It's something they're dying to tell us.
We have all had the experience of imagining what we would really say to somebody if we told them what we really thought.
Somebody gets to tell us what they really think, and then they get to say, you know, I didn't even want to say anything.
I didn't want to bring it up.
I was reluctant to tell you what I feel, but you know, it's just part of my Christian obligation and my faith told me that I needed to do this.
The Lord spoke to me and said that I needed to speak this truth to you in love.
They get to revel in telling you something, telling you what they really think, hurting you oftentimes.
All the while acting as if they're a reluctant participant, as if it isn't their sort of heart's deepest desire to tell you what they really think.
So we bring all of this together and what do we find?
Again, as we do so often in the series, what we find is the result is often control.
Right?
And again, this is similar to more secular analogs.
Are there people who care about us who have to tell us hard things?
Yes, there are.
Are there times, I'm a parent, I'm a partner, I'm a friend, I am all of those things, and I have had to tell people things before that I know they're not going to want to hear, and I got to tell them what I think, and that can be a real thing.
And I will say this, I always try to say, you can take this or leave it, this is an observation, but here are my thoughts for whatever they're worth.
That can be a real thing.
But I think that that religious overlay adds an intensity that doesn't create that openness, that eradicates it.
I think it is too ripe for abuse.
And this, by the way, is why lots of Christian people won't talk this way.
When I was a pastor, I, early on, moved away from this way of speaking.
I wasn't going to talk about telling people, you know, speaking the truth in love or whatever, because I knew how it was perceived and what it meant, and I was aware of some of these abuses, not least of which was because I encountered so many authoritarian persons in ministry, other pastors, people training to be pastors, people who were pastors, and honestly, typically, not universally, but typically, The bigger the church they pastored, the more this was true.
Authoritarian personalities who would use this way of speaking, of speaking the truth in love, whenever somebody questioned their authority or questioned their decisions or interpreted the Bible differently or whatever else.
I've seen that manipulation within a specifically Christian context.
Okay?
So I've got to wrap all this up.
I think all of these considerations are why this phrase infuriates so many people.
One of the things that I hear commonly, I hear it in emails, I hear it in conversations, I hear it from clients.
Is when people hear something, or somebody says something, or they experience something, and they will say, I don't know why this bothers me so much, but it drives me crazy, or it really makes me angry, or I burst into tears, or whatever it is.
These kind of intense, affective, emotional experiences, and they can't often articulate why, this is one of those phrases where I hear that from people.
This is why I think it has such an impact on people.
This is why I think well-meaning Christians and other people in our lives should just avoid this way of talking.
There are other ways to tell people that you care about, that you're concerned about them, without using these phrases that are, I think, going to trigger really problematic responses.
And in my view, we should be on guard whenever somebody says they're telling us something because they're our friend, or because they care about us, or because they need to speak a word in love.
I just think we should be on guard.
And that's the reaction it provokes in me.
Let me know what you think.
Maybe I'm too sensitive, maybe I'm carrying around my own baggage too much, and you use this phrase all the time and you think it's great.
I don't know.
Let me know what you think.
Daniel Miller Swag, Daniel Miller SWAJ.
Let me know what you think about this episode.
Let me know your experiences.
Keep the ideas coming for future and upcoming episodes, and I will keep the series going as long as we need to.
As always, friends, thank you for your support.
Please keep it coming.
We can't do it without you.
We do not take you for granted, and be well until we talk again.
