
On a frigid night in January 1973, Senator John Stennis was mugged in Washington, D.C.
He was accosted by two gun-wielding teenagers while walking between his car and the front door of his own house.
After the assailants took his money, they announced, “We’re going to shoot you anyways.”
One of the muggers fired twice. The 71-year-old chair of the Armed Services Committee went down, gravely wounded. For more than six hours, surgeons struggled to save the life of the Mississippi Democrat.
Another senator, while driving home that evening, heard the news on his radio.
“I had no skills to offer,” he later recalled. “But I knew there was something I must do – and that was to go to that hospital and be nearby where I could be helpful, if possible, to the family.” He drove towards Walter Reed Medical Center.
Because of Stennis’ stature – he was one of the Senate’s outspoken “hawks” who favored escalating the war in Vietnam – the hospital scene was chaotic. Calls were pouring in to the switchboard. Reporters were crowding the corridors.
The senator who had come to help surveyed the scene. He decided to sit down at the switchboard.
“I know how to work one of these,” he said to the hospital staff nearby. “Let me help you out.”
He fielded incoming calls until dawn. Then he stood up, stretched, pulled on his coat, and finally introduced himself. “My name is Hatfield. Happy to help out on behalf of a man I deeply respect.”
Mark Hatfield (pictured above) was a Republican senator from Oregon. As one of the Senate’s most outspoken “doves,” he strongly favored de-escalating the fighting in Southeast Asia.
The senators from Mississippi and Oregon had publicly confronted each other on numerous occasions. They rarely agreed on U.S. foreign policy issues. But Hatfield, who was overt about his Christian convictions, was entirely serious about showing “deep respect” to his political opponent.
In this case, respect meant showing up and doing a menial job for an entire night. He served anonymously, for no apparent personal or political gain.
It’s no secret that such displays of respect – affirming the humanity of one’s political opponents, and choosing to offer love in the midst of crisis – are rare in Washington these days. A poll a few years ago revealed that 55% of Democrats and 49% of Republicans openly fear the members of the opposite party. A prominent Republican recently declared that Democrats “are not even people.”
Twenty centuries ago, the apostle Paul cast a different vision:
“If you’ve gotten anything at all out of following Christ, if his love has made any difference in your life, if being in a community of the Spirit means anything to you, if you have a heart, if you care— then do me a favor: Agree with each other, love each other, be deep-spirited friends. Don’t push your way to the front; don’t sweet-talk your way to the top. Put yourself aside, and help others get ahead. Don’t be obsessed with getting your own advantage. Forget yourselves long enough to lend a helping hand” (Philippians 4:1-3, The Message).
Reaching across the canyons that separate us from each other is not easy. In fact, it’s startlingly rare.
As author and pastor Chuck Swindoll puts it, in his recollection of Hatfield’s actions 52 years ago, “As rare as a hawk and a dove in the same nest on a cold winter’s night.”
Why would we ever do such a thing?
It just so happens that’s the surest way to experience the warmth of God’s Spirit.
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