“The Roots of Violence:
Pleasure without conscience,
Knowledge without character,
Commerce without morality,
Science without humanity,
Worship without sacrifice,
Politics without principles”
Mahatma Ghandi
Barack Obama’s arrogance was never on greater display than when he infamously declared to Eric Cantor that “Elections have consequences, and at the end of the day, I won.” It may well be that at long last we have arrived at the oft heralded “end of the day”, and the consequences the President referenced are upon us.
Yes, elections do have consequences, but elections are the reflection of who we are as a people, and Ghandi’s list looks more than a little like the nation we have become. We are at the twilight of a secular revolution that dawned decades ago. The problem with revolutions is that things are lost that should have been treasured, trashed simply because of their association with the old order. When you burn down the house, it’s hard to save the furniture. The sixties brought us the sexual revolution, “free love”, sex without the constraints of religious or societal restrictions. Along side the sexual revolution, and certainly fueling it, came the unbridled use of hard core drugs. The death spiral we were on was slightly modified through the years as our friends died of overdoses and AIDS, but the first leg of Ghandi’s list was firmly established in our society, “Pleasure without conscience”.
The seventies saw the beginning of the idea that everyone needed a college education, and that careers that did not require one were without honor. Our universities expanded the role they were playing in molding the cultural revolution that began in the sixties in now reaching an ever broadening group of young students. What did they teach? That everything the students had learned from their parents was wrong, that morality was subjective and outdated, that America was evil, and that God was dead. “Knowledge without character”.
The eighties brought us somewhat of a rebellion against the minimalism of the hippie movement with the advent of the “yuppie”, as the college educated young adults of the seventies became upwardly mobile, turning their gaze toward the pleasures of money and materialism. These became the business leaders and CEO’s of our companies. Having abandoned character for knowledge, and ethics for greed, the Gordon Gekko archetype was established, as was the third leg of Ghandi’s list, “Commerce without morality”.
With the nineties came somewhat of a reaction to the greed of the eighties. Concern came as to what corporate greed was doing to our daily needs, our environment, our diet, the very air that we breath. Climate change first emerged as a political issue. Without the ethical foundation of objective morality to attack corporate greed, society instead turned to Science to condemn industry, and eventually individuals, in a simplistic cost/benefit analysis. As is often the case in using inadequate weapons for fighting demons, you become possessed by the monsters you once battled. Scientists fell prey to the greed they had risen against, and began tailoring their research to grant acquisition, falsifying data, and succumbing to societal pressures instead of pursuing knowledge. “Science without humanity”.
The first decade of the new millennium should have been one of great promise, perhaps even a renaissance of spirituality, especially after the wake-up call of 9/11. Instead, we witnessed the dawn of a new type of spirituality, seeker centered spirituality. A kind of ask not what you can do for God, but what God can do for you spirituality. Much of organized religion, fearing declining memberships in a secular society, tried to reinvent themselves more in keeping with a people that had lost their way. But instead of shining a light that a few might see to find their way home, they dimmed their lamps to fit in more comfortably with the multitudes in darkness. Preachers began to tell people the things they wanted to hear, positive messages about human potential and what great things are possible for those who believe in themselves and their destiny. More was made of what we could have than what we should do. Sin, especially the more popular ones, became taboo subjects, and the concept of giving your life to God was replaced with God giving you everything in life. Ghandi’s “Religion without sacrifice” was in full force.
That brings us to our own decade, and to our original proposition, that elections have consequences. Our elections today are the expression of who we have become. Elections are the dotted line where we at last sign on to the deal we have struck. We elect people today for all the wrong reasons. Ghandi’s virtues of character, conscience, humanity, morality, and sacrifice are considered quaint artifices of less sophisticated times. We look instead for the cool guy, the rock star, the greek god, the billionaire. We vote for a man because he is black, not because he is a good choice. We vote for a woman, simply because she’s a woman, and “Isn’t it time we had a woman for President?” Does it matter at all the character of that woman? We throw our support to a man because of his dubious skill at insulting people. Winning has become our only value, and elections have changed from an enlightened selection process to a popularity contest, a battle of gladiators, where the winner is no more fit to run our government than a gang leader, which is what they have become. Ghandi’s list is complete, “politics without principles”.
The body of three year old Aylan Kurdi washed ashore on a beach in Turkey about a week ago. His family were Turkish Kurds seeking to escape the violence of the Syrian civil war by paying $6,100 for their places on a smuggler’s dinghy. The boat was inadequate, as were the fake life jackets, and capsized in the rough seas. Aylan, his five year old brother, and his mother all perished while awaiting rescue. Now there is a cry for such refugees to be relocated, and I am not unsympathetic though it will undoubtedly lead to terrorist infiltration into Europe and the US; we will botch this, as we botch everything now. When our leaders fail, people die. Liberal calls for outreach to these suffering refugees are laudable, but a little like trying to close the barn door once the proverbial horse has already escaped. Good policy might have averted much of this suffering; a good President wouldn’t have brought such chaos to this region; good people wouldn’t have elected this bad president twice; a good nation wouldn’t let these things continue. We were once a force for goodness in the world, but it is hard to export goodness when it is so scarce at home.
IMHO: We have lost our way, and we have lost our way because we have lost our compass. If we have abandoned our faith, we ought to at least have retained our morality. Possibly they are inseparable. We have elected leaders based on our own sad value system. We have failed to learn the lesson Neville Chamberlin taught us about dealing with the devil, and are about to risk nuclear catastrophe to push through a nakedly political and unworkable solution to what will become a real world problem. We are obsessed with how much teenagers earn at McDonalds while we fund an organization that kills babies, sells their body parts, and then jokes about it. In the face of the unspeakable evil of what ISIS is doing, we have shown ourselves to be the J.V. team. We have our free cell phones and birth control while a toddler lies dead on a beach. As Edmund Burke instructed, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” Too many of our good men are staying home at election time, too many of our good men are remaining silent when they should lift their voices, too many of our good men are allowing cowardice to overcome courage; and our bad men run the country. It is the nature of all things to decay, and our global society will continue to do so unless we intervene. It is indeed time to return America’s greatness, but we will only find that in goodness. Good leaders, good people, a great country. If we fail in this, death waits at the door, and there will be more babies on beaches. I am reminded of another Syrian three year old from last year who finally succumbed to the injuries he incurred from the harsh reality of his existence and his flight from tyranny. As he was dying despite the valiant effort of the doctors and nurses trying to help him, it was reported that his last words were “I’m gonna tell God everything.” Oh little man, God already knows… and so I tremble.
“Therefore to him that knows to do good, and does not do it, to him it is sin.”
James 4:17
