The current issue of Comment magazine is on the theme of "gift logic." Drawing on the teaching of Jesus, wisdom from St. Basil, the book The Gift by Lewis Hyde, and others, the essays in this issue invite us to consider gift "as a way to engage with the world."
In the essay, "Subverting Two-Pocket Thinking with Public Joy," Tim Soerens introduces the concept of "public joy."
Public joy gets at the pulsing, hopeful, brimming-with-possibility kind of energy that by its very nature requires equity and justice, and celebrates both individual and collective agency. So what is the economy for? If we view our economic life through the lens of grace, then perhaps we could say the purpose is to maximize public joy.
If we remember that we are the creatures (not the Creator) and that all is gift, then of course we all need to orient ourselves toward this grand project of public joy, which necessarily includes everyone. To love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and strength and to love your neighbor as yourself means that all our many gifts should be oriented toward the mission of creating as much public joy as conceivably possible.
This essay offers much to think about. How does my life/my work contribute to public joy? Of course, the use of joy here doesn't mean temporary laughter or an hour or two of enjoyment but joy of the deep and abiding variety, peace, "a visceral pairing of words that taps deep into the biblical idea of shalom."
This month at my work, the team I'm part of has been given the assignment of coming up with our individual goals for the year ahead. I'm a medical writer and so am thinking about how my skills best serve the needs of medical providers and their patients, the needs of the company for whom I work, as well as my own personal needs and interests. This essay introduces the question, How does my work increase public joy, or the potential for public joy? It's an interesting and important question and one I hadn't thought about before. How does the manner in which any and all of us spend our days increase—or offer the potential for increasing—public joy?
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