Posted on 09/09/2013 3:13:47 PM PDT by virgil283
If the “culture” was so strong why didn’t it tell the “media” and “educators” they were foolishly wrong and continue to enforce then current cultural norms?
It’s truly jaw-dropping what has happened to America. The culture has become such a poisonous, putrid cesspool. For many years, I used question what could be done to salvage the country. All the various options, from political to cultural. But over the past few years, amidst the backdrop of the media/social deification of Obama, versus the all-out savaging of an admirable Christian woman like Palin, I’ve become pretty convinced that America has dispensed with its historic greatness and basically embraced evil. All that was once good and decent is attacked and disparaged, and all that was once vile and debased is now celebrated and promoted.
Thus, my question nowadays tends to no longer be what can be done to salvage the country, but whether it’s indeed ‘worth’ salvaging.
Leftist incrementalism. One drip at a time.
We got fat and happy as all republics seem to do when life is good. We put our guard down and forgot (or never knew) what “evil lurks in the heart of man”. It won’t end well and it is a good time to be old.
You are correct, but do you think it can happen here?
Did you not grow up in this country during better days? You talk like an alien who's just been stranded on Earth.
civilization is a very thin veil
Conservatives can endlessly talk and philosophize about the problems all they want.
It doesn't mean they aren't surrendering when the left continues to wrack up victory after victory.
Individually through preaching God’s word (while Only The Holy Spirit) can truly influence someone’s soul; yes through witness of Christians, and the power of Christ through US, YES it can happen.
1 Tim Chapter 2:
I urge, then, first of all, that petitions, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for all people— 2 for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. 3 This is good, and pleases God our Savior, 4 who wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. 5 For there is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus, 6 who gave himself as a ransom for all people. This has now been witnessed to at the proper time. 7 And for this purpose I was appointed a herald and an apostle—I am telling the truth, I am not lying—and a true and faithful teacher of the Gentiles.
HE WANTS (longs for) all men to be saved!
re: “Has a culture ever become as depraved as ours...AND THEN TURNED IT AROUND?”
Good question. I know that many people thought the 1920’s was a period of great decadence, primarily in the cities. But, rural America, small-town America, I don’t think it was that way.
After the Civil War there was also great upheaval and change.
Usually, America would move back to it’s religious roots - called “revivals”, maybe not always on par with the “Great Awakening”, but enough that it actually move the culture toward more peaceable and moral behavior.
Something happened after WW2. What was the source of the “discontent” that came to fore during the 1960’s with the anti-establishment crowd? Just Communism? Just Madelyn Murray O’Hare?
There was tremendous prosperity following WW2 which began during the latter part of the 1950’s and going into the 1960’s. Did we become too self-reliant apart from God? Did we start presuming upon God’s grace toward us? I don’t know.
I do know it’s difficult to maintain proper focus on true priorities in life when most of our needs are not only met, but most of our wants as well. I think our nation began to think we didn’t really need God to take care of us - we can do it ourselves. We’ve got the greatest military power on earth - who can hurt us? Our economy runs the world (we thought), it’s always going to be growing up and up.
God is still in our national psyche, but He’s WAY down on the list of life priorities for most Americans.
I’m not pointing the finger, I’m just musing. I’m not against prosperity or economic growth, capitalism, free market - I’m all for that. I want our military to be the best - I think they are the best of our young adults and I thank God for their hard work and sacrifice.
But, I think we sometimes forget what Jesus once said, “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God.” Jesus was not against being wealthy. He was just observing the simple truth that if you think you are totally self-sufficient, many, many wealthy people often feel they have no need for God. I think a nation can make the same mistake.
It was not just baby boomers though.
The men who fought in the second world war for the most part participated.
Many actively so.
When I joined the Marine Corps during the Carter Administration I heard stories told uniformly of the often vitriolic rejection the men who came back from Korea and Vietnam recieved at VFW posts and Foreign Legion halls around the country. Veterans of those wars still serving told us of the hometown receptions they got from the WWII vets who had been greeted with parades at their own returns.
When I left the service in September of ninety one after the Soviet collapse,
the veterans organizations in the area where I grew up had deteriorated from the active social centers of my youth into booze filled bars for the most part. I don’t think there is a single one still sporting a cafeteria or hosting an annual BBQ for the comunity. But the old hangers on sheepishly admitted that the tales I had heard were an accurate description of the fifties through the seventies there too.
America changed for the worse and sadly those one would think most likely to have preserved what we had helped things along.
I guess we are now in one of those troughs between revivals, sort of like the 1920s or the Gilded Age.
Vatican II
I would have expected the Man in the Gray Flannel Suit and the Organization Man to stomp the bohemians and beatniks flat.
It is a terrible thing for the people to get what they want.
From Wikipedia: "The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit, by Sloan Wilson, is a 1955 novel about the American search for purpose in a world dominated by business."
I said you sounded like an alien who's been stranded on planet Earth. I'll bet you feel like one, too.
Amen...good post. It is no doubt a quandary that is in adversity that people are most aware of their need for God.
re: “Vatican II”
What is “Vatican II”? I know it has something to do with Catholicism, but I’m not sure what you’re getting at. Could you elaborate?
re: “ It is no doubt a quandary that is in adversity that people are most aware of their need for God.”
Agreed. What scares me is what God may do to wake us up. I guess that’s a positive if you think about it. If God were to turn us over to face some consequences, I guess that means that He would be disciplining us because of His love. You don’t discipline something that you don’t love.
On the other hand, He may just turn us over for judgement.
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