“Noticing” is essential if we are to have community.  Do we “notice” when a neighbor is in need, or a family member is hurting, or a group of people is injured, insulted, or attacked?  We might see, but do we notice?

Take the Hans Christian Anderson “children’s” fable “The Emperor’s New Clothes.”  A façade is created that the Emperor is wearing majestic regalia woven just for him that only those who are important and intelligent can see.  The Emperor loves to parade in his magnificent finery and receive undulating praise for his sartorial splendor, until a child finally yells out that he is actually wearing nothing.

The child “notices” where others just “see.”  In faith-filled terms, the child “discerns.”

Thankfully, there has been a lot of discernment and noticing lately, sufficient to send one part of our Federal government, the Department of Homeland Security, with its now notorious Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency, into shutdown.  More and more people are noticing the cruelty of our Federal government against those who are weak, poor, vulnerable, or marginalized.

Government shutdowns are bad because they indicate that our body politic has failed in its fundamental responsibility to find common cause in the right ordering of society.  Catholic Social Teaching draws deeply on that concept – the right ordering of society.   In the Joy of the Gospel, the late Pope Francis, quoting his predecessor Pope Benedict XVI’s first Encyclical Letter in 2005, God is Love (Deus Caritas Est), wrote,

“If indeed ‘the just ordering of society and of the state is a central responsibility of politics,’ the Church, ‘cannot and must not remain on the sidelines in the fight for justice.’”

But what is the “right ordering of society?” If you listened to Stephen Miller, President Trump’s influential Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy and Homeland Security, in a recent CNN interview (5:40 minute mark) with Jake Tapper, this is his version:

“We live in a world in which you can talk all you want about international niceties and everything else, but we live in a world, in the real world, Jake, that is governed by strength, that is governed by force, that is governed by power.”

In an insightful NY Times Op-Ed entitled “The Pagan King”, columnist Leighton Woodhouse observed that the notion that the “weak and vanquished” have inherent moral rights derives from the Jewish God who cares for the poor and disadvantaged.  Christianity continued that view, a notion undoubtedly radical to Mr. Miller and his allies because, at its core, is the belief that the poor are closer to God than the rich and powerful.  Recall the parables about how hard it is for a rich man to enter heaven (like getting a camel through the eye of the needle – Matthew 19:23–24) or the many Scriptural verses about God’s love for the poor.

The question becomes: shall we let the Stephen Millers of the world define the right ordering of society?

In the final analysis, only we, the people, can determine that.  In articulating our preferences and desires to our elected officials, who, we must remember, govern at our consent, we first must seek guidance from our faith traditions and teachings, from our understanding of natural law and revealed law through our holy books¹, and from noticing.

We do not do this, or at least we should not do this, on the basis of the latest X post, a podcast rant, a TikTok video, whether fake or real, or an Internet meme, whether insulting, funny, or thoughtful.  This does not mean we ignore these.  Indeed, these are now part of the fabric of our lives, but they are not the totality – not even close!

Our responsibility is to create a “well-formed conscience,” taking into consideration all we notice.   In its seminal “Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship” document, the US Catholic Bishops remind us that:

“Conscience is not something that allows us to justify doing whatever we want, nor is it a mere ‘feeling’ about what we should or should not do. Rather, conscience is the voice of God resounding in the human heart, revealing the truth to us and calling us to do what is good while shunning what is evil. Conscience always requires serious attempts to make sound moral judgments based on the truths of our faith.”

Our national conscience is now being awakened, though clearly it is not yet fully alive.  Polls reveal that more and more people are finding our government’s actions toward the vulnerable as extreme. Simply put, our consciences are being bothered.

More and more voices, especially faith-filled ones, are speaking out and doing so forcefully and boldly against all manner of Federal Administration-sanctioned cruelty, hate-filled speech, personal indignities, and purposeful lies and deceptions.  Judges, notwithstanding unrelenting attacks on them from the White House and Cabinet members, are continuing to try to restrain abuses: for example, clandestine shipments of immigrants and asylum seekers to foreign countries; denial of due process rights; vengeful prosecutions of most anyone with any viewpoint not in lockstep with the President’s; flagrant flaunting of court orders; and the list goes on.  The voices (see this powerful one from 88 Jewish organizations) are coming from both secular and religious leaders, and not always from expected places.

Catholic Social Teaching² states that the “political community finds its authentic dimension in its reference to people” which it then further describes:

“People’ does not mean a shapeless multitude, an inert mass to be manipulated and exploited, but a group of persons, each of whom – at his proper place and in his own way – is able to form its opinions on public matters and has the freedom to express its own political sentiments and to bring them to bear positively on the common good.””

What positivity shall we bring to bear in the days ahead?

The government shutdown, which typically corrals our attention and focuses it intensely on a resolution before widespread damage is felt by all of us, may not even be noticed because it is partial and because the object of the shutdown, DHS and ICE, have already been amply funded with billions of extra dollars.  They will continue to operate as is for the foreseeable future, it appears.

“Pagan King” columnist Woodhouse paints an ominous picture.  The “Trump administration,” he writes, “appears unconstrained not only by the limits imposed by the Constitution but by the standards of an average American’s conscience.” What is happening to immigrants and U.S. citizens in Minneapolis, Woodhouse finds, is a “reflection of a government that has abandoned the moral instinct that it is wrong for the powerful to abuse the weak.”

In about six weeks, on March 28^th, we will all have an opportunity to notice and be noticed.  There will be more No Kings Rallies across the country – the third such set of rallies since January 2025.  Two friends of mine will likely be there carrying their “The Emperor Has No Clothes” protest sign.

¹ To some, natural law and revealed law are the same because they stem from the same source, God.
² From the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, “Foundation and Purpose of the Political Community (see Paragraph 385)

Tom Dwyer is the President and Executive Director of A Faith That Does Justice. He writes and speaks frequently about the imperatives of faith-filled social justice in building the common good and guiding our responses to political questions.