"The 'tyranny of the gift' is an artful term coined by the medical sociologists Renée C. Fox and Judith P. Swazey to capture the way immense gratitude at receiving a kidney can morph into a sense of constricting obligation. In their 1992 book, 'Spare Parts: Organ Replacement in American Society,' the authors write, 'The giver, the receiver and their families may find themselves locked in a creditor-debtor vise that binds them one to another in a mutually fettering way.'"
Continuing onto describe her inner struggle with the idea of receiving an organ donation, she writes:
"I ruminated constantly about what it would mean to be related to someone “by organ.” Would my future donor assume a proprietary interest in how I lived my life, since she had made it possible? Would she make sure I was taking proper care of “our” kidney or lord her sacrifice over me? Or would I hold it over my own head, constantly questioning whether I might have said or done anything that could offend or disappoint my donor, anything that might be taken as ingratitude? How could a relationship breathe under such stifling conditions? It was exhausting to think about; I wanted no part of a debtor-creditor relationship. I didn’t want a gift, I wanted a kidney."
As Christians around the world anticipate the celebration of the birth of Christ, God's gift to us, this description of a response of the recipient of a gift carries particular relevance. Satel's suggestion that just because someone donates an organ, the donor doesn't own or control her stands in stark contrast to God's gift of salvation.
The phrase "salvation is God's free gift to you" is often bandied about without much thought. While the phrase is true, in the sense that we could never afford (pay the price for) salvation, the cost of salvation is actually quite demanding. Satel's idea of the gift-giver gaining a "proprietary interest" in the life of the gift-receiver seems like a decent description of what is happening through salvation. Jesus said, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me and for the gospel will save it." Our relationship with God as gift-giver becomes far more invasive than debtor-creditor; it's slave-Lord. Yet, Satel's question remains:
How could a relationship breathe under such stifling conditions?
I can empathize with Satel's feeling of obligation to a gift-giver, but anecdotally, I find my relationship with God liberating rather than stifling. Why? My initial thought is that God's character makes the difference. Giving a "proprietary interest" to God is liberating only because we can trust his character. Giving a "proprietary interest" to ordinary Joe Schmo who happens to be walking around with an extra kidney would be understandably anxiety-inducing because who knows what he values. Do you readers have any thoughts on this?
Monday, December 17
The Tyranny of the Gift
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3 comments:
I wonder if most Christians, even those who feel "guilty" for not living up to the Biblical standard, are really feeling guilt because of receiving an overwhelming gift. For example, I might feel guilty for snapping at a stranger who cut me off in the parking lot, but it probably isn't because I'm thinking "Let's see, Christ had grace for my weakness, and died for me in spite of my weakness, so in order to pay him back with my life, I should be nicer to that person." No. I'm thinking that I should be nice because people like nice people, my parents told me to be nice to people, or because I should be the bigger person as some kind of personal triumph. That seems like the essence of modern Christian guilt in action to me.
Maybe this is because a metaphysical gift of "eternal life"- something we can barely understand given our conceptions of time- is simply too abstract for us to feel guilty about not repaying. Even if I could somehow die for Christ, I couldn't, in that act, give him any gift of eternal life - or any other gift for that matter.
In some way it is like when someone leaves a gift on your doorstep Christmas morning on their way out of town. You cannot get them a return gift at that point, and they know you can't, and do not expect it. There's something freeing in receiving those types of gifts.
The "essence of modern Christian guilt" sounds awfully similar to plain vanilla moralism. If that's what modern Christian guilt is like (which may be the case), it would seem that Christ's death is not affecting how we relate to God and others. There's something wrong with that picture. God's love supposedly demands a response (We love because He loved first...), if we're not responding, why aren't we responding?
Good point about unrepayable gifts. Satel also writes: "Maimonides, the 12th-century Jewish physician and philosopher, believed that anonymous giving was nobler than charity performed face to face because it protected the beneficiary from shame or a sense of indebtedness."
One thought that has left me thinking for a long time is whether we would worship God if we didn't need him. Because I think the answer is yes, even if we were left unredeemed he would still merit worshiping, I see the gift as another facet of the wonder that is God. So the gift isn't tyrannical because the gift isn't the basis of the relationship. For the kidney recipient, the kidney is the only basis for the relationship and I can see how that could be stifling.
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