Here we are, friends and readers, in the final year of Barack Obama’s quixotic quest to place égalité and fraternité on equal footing with liberté in this republic.  Yes, racism persists, Guantanamo remains open, and common ground in American politics has become a no man’s land.  But it has been refreshing to have even a modicum of sanity and concern for others restored to our domestic and foreign policy.  In 2016, that alone may be worthy of a Nobel Prize.

I have done plenty of complaining in this blog about man’s inhumanity to man, so much so that it surely deserves its own category.  I have deplored bullies, internet trolls, religious zealots and terrorists — mean and self-righteous people whose vileness infects our lives and poisons our culture.  I believe man’s capacity for cruelty is real; and I do not believe I have over-represented it in my writing.  It is more likely that I have under-represented human decency — perhaps a product of my not spending enough time with the nice people I call friends.

Along this line, you may have noted the new item I’ve added to the sidebar: The Humanity List.  This is my small way of acknowledging some of the wonderfully compassionate, other-centered people of my time who show what I (or anyone) might accomplish, if I (in my case) had the skills and character and made a more-than-modest effort to apply them.

People like these make our world more livable, by their example as much as by their works.  The Humanity List confers no honor to them — it just keeps their names close by.

My list is sure to grow with time as I add people and groups I’ve overlooked.  One person I have not overlooked is Donald Trump, a man who throws cheap insults at others to make himself look grand — and who encourages his supporters to do the same.  Mr. Trump will not be listed, nor will the temperate Mr. Cruz, the soft-spoken Mr. Christie or the genteel Ms. Fiorina, who recently used pre-school children as unwitting props for an anti-abortion fundraiser.  These people want power more than they want to do good, any and all pledges to restore American greatness notwithstanding.

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It may be uncharitable of me to continue in this vein, but another group I will not be adding to The Humanity List is the Scottsdale (Arizona) Bible Church.  I single them out because I stumbled upon them, not because they are unique.  Every year, Scottsdale Bible Church sends a team of medical professionals and other volunteers on a one-week sojourn to a “mission hospital” in Yucatan, Mexico.  The specific goals of the July 2015 mission were to provide medical/dental care, build a play area, and do outreach in the nearby villages.  (Their goals for 2016 are identical.)  Which of these goals do you think is most important to the members of the mission team?

I’ll give you a few hints.  First, this account from the 2014 mission: “Our medical team provided care for over 100 diabetic patients.  We provided all the supplies and medication needed for them for the next 12 months and the local pastors will be helping us do follow up, sharing the gospel with the patients on a personal level.” [Emphasis added.]

Next, one participant’s reflections on the 2015 mission: “Our group comprised many skill sets and avenues of ministry including children’s Bible school, sports camps, eyeglass fittings, a diabetes clinic, and, of course, the medical center, but the overarching goal was to share the good news of Jesus with the local population.”  [Likewise.]

The most revealing clue is this list of nine goals (Why We Go) on the Scottsdale Bible Church website (click image).  The objectives for the mission teams are described in 100-plus words.  Of those words, only three — heal the hurting — refer to doing good for others.  And this scant acknowledgement does not even show up until the end, almost as an aside.

It is not just poor taste to harbor hidden agendas (in this case, personal salvation) while making a show of helping others.  It is a deception to pretend to serve someone else when one’s real mission is to serve oneself.  People don’t like to be deceived, or used.

Most corporations are wise to this [1] and take considerably more care than Scottsdale Bible Church to conceal the baser motives for their social action, lest they alienate their customers.  But hold on — when did the idea of doing well by doing good become a sin, especially here in the Our Lady of Liberty Capitalist Church [2]?  Why should I question do-gooding by evangelists or by corporations, as long as the good gets done?  Why does motive matter?

ISIS, Hamas and Hezbollah also feed people and provide social services.  But those groups, because of their motives, will never be remembered as humanitarians.  Enough said?

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One other person who will not make the list is me: I sacrifice too little, moralize too much.  Can you imagine how intolerable my sermons would be if I were even a little religious?  (May God see to it that such misfortune never befalls us.)  In the meantime, it would not be beyond me to find creative ways to help others, instead of simply writing checks.

I probably heard it decades ago in some stone-walled Presbyterian church, the idea that a person should give a gift and then walk away — otherwise it is not a gift but a transaction.  This perspective has stuck with me.  If you want to exit this world with clean hands and a clear conscience, my concise advice is: do good and be done with it.

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[1] Consider these findings from a 2015 study by Alexander Chernev and Sean Blair, titled Doing Well by Doing Good: The Benevolent Halo of Corporate Social Responsibility:

“A product is perceived to perform better when it is made by a socially responsible firm.”

“The positive effect of social goodwill on product performance beliefs is inversely related to the extent to which social goodwill is associated with the product.  Thus, the positive impact of social goodwill is greatest when it is unrelated to the product (as in the case of monetary contributions to socially responsible causes).”

“The benevolent halo effect is a function of consumer beliefs about a firm’s motivation, such that it is attenuated when consumers suspect that the social goodwill is motivated by self-interest.”

Corporations surely take these findings into account when putting together their social-responsibility portfolios. Not surprisingly, it is in a company’s self-interest to conceal from its customers all evidence of its self-interest — otherwise, doing good may not lead to its doing well.

[2] “Trust in the Lord, and do good, and dwell in the land, and thou shalt be fed with its riches.” – Psalm 36:3 of the Douay–Rheims Bible (1586).  Another do-good-and-do-well deal is found in Matthew 6:3 (CEV, 1991):  “But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret.  And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.”   Sort of like getting cash back on the credit card you used to make a charitable donation.

Last October, the car of a Waynesville, North Carolina, man was tagged with the words DIE FAG in blue spray paint.  I know this because the story appeared on our local news.  Waynesville is 30 miles from here.

Last week, the exterior wall of the Living Word Spirited Baptist Church in Kannapolis, North Carolina, was tagged with SATAN ♥’s YOU! in blue spray paint.  I know this because the story appeared on our local news.  Kannapolis is 130 miles from here.

Over the weekend, the base of the Vance Monument in Asheville’s town square was tagged with BLACK LIVES MATTER in blue spray paint.  I know this because the story was featured prominently on our local news.  Zebulon Vance was a local lawyer and politician who became a Confederate army colonel and eventually governor of the state.

I happen to think that blue spray paint, like green money, is not speech.  But my opinion, that one person’s property is not the next person’s canvas, does not seem to be universally shared around here.  Take, for example, Leisa Rundquist, department chair of art and art history at UNC Asheville.  She maintains that “art needs an audience to be art” and views the graffiti debate issue as relative: “Artists are part of society, and their artistic practices may or may not conform to laws and customs.  What was shocking in the past is no longer shocking, and what is illegal today may be legal in the future.”

I would remind Ms. Rundquist that there are countless modes of artistic expression that do not invove appropriating another person’s property for one’s own use.  I also maintain that it is absurd for Ms. Rundquist to encourage illegal behavior on the premise that it may be legal in the future.  By her logic, should she not also discourage acts that are legal now because they may become illegal in the future?

When a person lives in a world of self-blurred lines, he can justify whatever he paints, whomever he hates, and anything he does.  That is not expression — it is contempt.