Culturally Speaking...

Just the other day, at yet another convo lecture, I caught my mind wandering off to an issue that has occupied my thoughts for some time now. I began to think about our culture and what it says about us, and in my pondering I found myself asking the foreboding question: “What does our culture say about us?”

What does our culture say about us? In a society where we pay more attention to a wardrobe malfunction than to a genocide that has killed upwards of 50,000 people; what does our culture say about us? In a world where Americans and Europeans spend $17 billion a year on pet food -- $4 billion more than the estimated annual additional total needed to provide basic health and nutrition for everyone in the world, what does our culture say about us?

Let’s face it, we are living in the days of fast food, one-stop shopping, homogenization, capitalism, globalization, instant gratification, conditioned responses, reality TV, and “infotainment”. We live in a society of people who will spend upwards of $300 on a tacky Luis Vuitton purse, but will throw a fit over minimal tax increases that would provide better education for their children. If, as a global community, we were to have a motto, it would certainly be: “What’s in it for me?”

Woody Allen believed in the power of distraction, C. S. Lewis said that we are far too easily pleased; but I think author Rebecca Pippert states it best by saying that “Our sociology reflects our theology.” Assuming this statement is true, what does our culture say about us? If the decisions we make as a culture truly reflect our value system, then I fear the message that we are portraying to others. I fear the legacy that we are leaving behind. How will we, as a generation be remembered? Which way will the pendulum swing next? Or is there even a pendulum at all? Could it be that we are merely sliding down a slow hill claiming “progress” in the name of being politically correct?

When most people think about the 60’s they think about war, pot, hippies, social reform, integration, assassinations, affirmative action..etc. Is our generation all that different? Have we really evolved , or will people simply think about our times and remember war, ecstasy, anti-war protestors, terrorism, scandals, etc?

I’ve grown used to being labeled as an idealist, a left-wing socialist who has no grasp on reality, in fact, often such remarks make me smile. (After all, I think Jesus was a liberal in his day.) Well I might be “liberal” and I am an idealist, but I haven’t completely lost touch with reality yet. Even Jesus admitted that as long as the world remained there would be suffering, and pain, and, from this one can only deduce that selfishness, and greed will always have a dominant place in society as well. However, this fact did not keep Jesus from being compassionate. Too often I hear people use the fact that suffering will always be around as an excuse to remain ignorant, or as a reason not to take action. Personally, I don’t think that Jesus believed in excuses, I know for a fact that he never used one. He simply came and said, this is how things are and this is how things will be, but this is how YOU are to be, this is the ideal…”be holy as I am holy.”

Our society is hardly “holy,” and it never will be, at least not 100%… but as Christians, we are called to holiness. We are to make a radical difference through our radical identification with the world. Some doubt the influence that we can have on a society as self-centered as ours, to these skeptics, I’d ask you to consider the gospels. Here were 12 men and leader whom many labeled as a heretic, and now more than 2000 years later, we are still studying their lives! Suppose they copped out with the excuse that the world would always be evil… where would we be today?
When we think about what our culture says about us, the conclusions that we come to are rarely pleasant. In fact, generally they are depressing, disheartening, and painful. But this should not keep us from being the example that God called us to be. Nor should it cause us to give up on the world all together. Imagine where we would be if God took that approach with us! His patience should be our example.
All of this to say that, at the end of the day, there is always hope. Just think…Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. lived in a time when the thought of an integrated society seemed impossible, even foolish. But now, not even 40 years later, thanks to the hard work of thousands and the cooperation of many, we have managed to make the impossible dream come to life. Unfortunately, all too often we sell ourselves short. Stereotyping “hope” as some childhood dream, rather than claiming it with all we have.

“Remember, Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.”
~The Shawshank Redemption…