A few comments on the news, which I continue to read with a mixture of amusement, disgust and amazement.
Louisiana is apparently calling for a day of prayer regarding the oil spill. I don't know the reality of this as opposed to the image portrayed by the press. Distressingly often, people try to use prayer as a way of influencing physical events, much like a cornucopia in the sky. God will not stop the spill. It was created by the efforts and failures of Man, and will be stopped the same way. It is reasonable and essential to pray (meditate, whatever) in seeking wisdom, calm, strength and other spiritual virtues to deal with a problem this severe. It is not reasonable to ask God to stop it. God didn't start it.
Mitch Daniels is being trashed for suggesting that our culture wars be stopped to unite in an effort to control debt. He is right, and is being attacked for his weakness and surrender on cultural issues by those on the far right.
I am not a fan of elective abortion. I vehemently oppose gay marriage, and its interpretation as a civil rights issue. I do not support openly gay clergy any more than I support openly bigamous clergy (any clergy that can be identified by its sexuality has lost the ability to lead spiritually). Coming from a church school, I think school prayer is essential, a spiritual centering at the start of the day from which any student may abstain (jewish students at EA did not participate in chapel, but they were required to attend). There is for me a complex relationship between social issues and national stability and prosperity.
I do feel we have lost our way as a nation, and that some 'return' to public virtue is needed. I don't see that so much as an issue about abortion or sexuality as about public responsibility and behavior. Arguing about the 'hardness' of someone's stance on social issues while this deep in debt and useless social programs is folly. Who argues about politics on a sinking ship? Jesus said that rain falls on the fields of the just and unjust alike. Financial disaster awaits the left and the right if we keep arguing about abortion and school prayer.
In the book 'Collapse', Jared Diamond looks at dominant cultures destroyed by ecological disasters mostly self-imposed, and a couple who saw the disasters coming, and avoided them. It is a terrific book, and very sobering in considering our current conditions. Most cultures do not avoid the disasters in front of them because they are a product of that culture's values and success. As I have written elsewhere, we fail not by our weaknesses but by our strengths. Diamond describes the stance of successful Viking farmers in Greenland as retaining the right to starve to death last.
That is what we are creating for ourselves. I don't have to participate in someone else's sexual lifestyle, nor do I stand in their shoes when they make the decision for unprotected sex or for an abortion. I have made enough of my own mistakes, and have enough private demons, to feel that I am not fit to judge their situation. Do the zealots of the right and left want to drive a social agenda so strong they prevent constructive solutions to our financial problems? That is simply asking for the right to starve, or go broke, righteously.
I would rather see the social right exercise their religious privileges and pray about solutions to our problems, rather than try to impose their values on others. Throughout history, there have been abortions, homosexuals, different religions and social practices. Most prosperous societies had significant shared values while being tolerant of others. We are failing in having neither significant shared values nor tolerance. If we cannot find shared values, we can find tolerance.
Arguing about politics as the Titanic sinks is insane. Everyone can launch and get into a life boat, and then argue all the longer about who deserved to be saved. In the end, that is a question for God, not Man.
Ted
Louisiana is apparently calling for a day of prayer regarding the oil spill. I don't know the reality of this as opposed to the image portrayed by the press. Distressingly often, people try to use prayer as a way of influencing physical events, much like a cornucopia in the sky. God will not stop the spill. It was created by the efforts and failures of Man, and will be stopped the same way. It is reasonable and essential to pray (meditate, whatever) in seeking wisdom, calm, strength and other spiritual virtues to deal with a problem this severe. It is not reasonable to ask God to stop it. God didn't start it.
Mitch Daniels is being trashed for suggesting that our culture wars be stopped to unite in an effort to control debt. He is right, and is being attacked for his weakness and surrender on cultural issues by those on the far right.
I am not a fan of elective abortion. I vehemently oppose gay marriage, and its interpretation as a civil rights issue. I do not support openly gay clergy any more than I support openly bigamous clergy (any clergy that can be identified by its sexuality has lost the ability to lead spiritually). Coming from a church school, I think school prayer is essential, a spiritual centering at the start of the day from which any student may abstain (jewish students at EA did not participate in chapel, but they were required to attend). There is for me a complex relationship between social issues and national stability and prosperity.
I do feel we have lost our way as a nation, and that some 'return' to public virtue is needed. I don't see that so much as an issue about abortion or sexuality as about public responsibility and behavior. Arguing about the 'hardness' of someone's stance on social issues while this deep in debt and useless social programs is folly. Who argues about politics on a sinking ship? Jesus said that rain falls on the fields of the just and unjust alike. Financial disaster awaits the left and the right if we keep arguing about abortion and school prayer.
In the book 'Collapse', Jared Diamond looks at dominant cultures destroyed by ecological disasters mostly self-imposed, and a couple who saw the disasters coming, and avoided them. It is a terrific book, and very sobering in considering our current conditions. Most cultures do not avoid the disasters in front of them because they are a product of that culture's values and success. As I have written elsewhere, we fail not by our weaknesses but by our strengths. Diamond describes the stance of successful Viking farmers in Greenland as retaining the right to starve to death last.
That is what we are creating for ourselves. I don't have to participate in someone else's sexual lifestyle, nor do I stand in their shoes when they make the decision for unprotected sex or for an abortion. I have made enough of my own mistakes, and have enough private demons, to feel that I am not fit to judge their situation. Do the zealots of the right and left want to drive a social agenda so strong they prevent constructive solutions to our financial problems? That is simply asking for the right to starve, or go broke, righteously.
I would rather see the social right exercise their religious privileges and pray about solutions to our problems, rather than try to impose their values on others. Throughout history, there have been abortions, homosexuals, different religions and social practices. Most prosperous societies had significant shared values while being tolerant of others. We are failing in having neither significant shared values nor tolerance. If we cannot find shared values, we can find tolerance.
Arguing about politics as the Titanic sinks is insane. Everyone can launch and get into a life boat, and then argue all the longer about who deserved to be saved. In the end, that is a question for God, not Man.
Ted
Comments
Post a Comment