The Growing Impossibility of Social Life

At various times throughout history Christians have struggled to function within society. The reasons for this vary as do the contexts. In some cases there's the threat of outright persecution from the state, a false religion, or even a dominant apostate ecclesiastical body. At other times the struggle is more subtle. Instead of acute danger there is a kind of wearisome grind that takes place – a slow breaking of the will that can (from another angle) be viewed as a kind of seduction. This would most accurately describe the situation in today's United States.

On the one hand it is becoming difficult to escape the Sodomite wave and the spectrum of antecedent and derivative ideologies associated with it. It is pervasive at times. You walk into a store or the library and there it is. It's on the news and is ubiquitous when it comes to television programmes and movies. If you work for a large company, you are sure to face some kind of official policy statement, mandated training, if not direct confrontation and contact with co-workers or clients. These waters are not easy to navigate and it's difficult for those who have invested their time, finances, and energies into these cultural endeavours to merely turn the cheek and walk away or meekly submit to punishment. Obviously today's Evangelical movement is not interested in this kind of cross-bearing obedience.

But there is another kind of oppression at work from the other side of the spectrum. The intensification of the largely phoney and misguided culture war means that both sides are ramping up their efforts. From the Right-wing side of the spectrum (which many have confused with being Christian) we have a relentless campaign of patriotism and the promotion of the military cult. With this we find a campaign of censorship every bit as vigorous and 'cancel'-ing as what we find coming from the left. Because the Left wants to erase slaveholders and bigots from places of historical honour and memory, the Right wants to whitewash this history and revise it. And they are just as much in your face about it.

Recently we took an evening drive out to Grove City College, hoping to enjoy their music program's fall concert performance. We were (I'm sorry to say) rather disappointed with the quality of the music – really more high school level it seemed to us.

But what really put me off was the insistence on the national anthem to open the concert. I know this became commonplace after 2001 and I would expect it for a July 4 performance or something along those lines – and I would of course stay away. But is it necessary to engage in patriotic expression for every single event? You can't even attend a small town parade anymore without it being turned into some kind of fascist devotional exercise.

Normally I won't even stand up for the America's fraudulent and idolatrous anthem or the wicked pledge but we were there in connection to someone's birthday and I didn't want to get into a confrontation and end up having to leave. I was kind of blindsided, relaxed, and at ease – not looking for yet another moment of tension and confrontation. I just wanted to hear some Dvorak and some Pops music and have a pleasant (and cheap) evening. Our area is already so culturally impoverished the evening was something I was rather looking forward to.

We stood but flipped through the programme handout and ignored what was happening. Our conduct would have offended any 'true patriots' but not as much as if I had kept with my normal principles and refused to stand at all. It irritated me a great deal and needless to say I won't go back – I wouldn't bother after hearing the rather sub-par musical performance anyway.

Driving home (perhaps a little disappointed with myself for not being more defiant in this instance, especially on that Right-wing Evangelical campus) – I was driven to reflect (in a little frustration) about how it's just getting to be that one doesn't want to go out and participate in things anymore. Everything is politicised, ramped up – and consequently ruined.

So be it. This isn't my home and given America's rotten and degenerate ideology I shouldn't expect any different. Maybe it's for the best. Maybe part of the problem today is that too many Christians have spent decades and even generations feeling very 'comfortable' with American culture and have been lulled to sleep – making endless little compromises to the point they don't realize just how far they've fallen and in some cases how far they've been handed over in terms of the judgment and discernment.

As I walked around the campus – I kept looking at the young people and wondering how many would go to work for political lobbyists in places like Harrisburg and Washington, how many would become aides and pages for GOP congressmen? How many would go on to take positions in an upcoming Trump administration or something akin to it? And then, I thought about how many would think it a terrible thing that my son is attending a state university in the same state and region. The state university has its problems to be sure and some are related to the issues at hand. And yet a solid Christian young man in such a setting is not going to be confused as the antithesis is acute. Grove City is (potentially) more dangerous as its errors are couched as Biblical and Christian when in many cases the political and economic theories, revisionist history, aesthetics, and ethics being taught there are in fact subversive – maybe not to the Babel of Right-wing America, but to the religion of the New Testament. I would rather have my son at the state college any day over a place like Grove City. In fact if Grove City were the only option, I would counsel him to do without a college degree.

Most of the time when the statue of Nebuchadnezzar is erected I refuse to bow – or in the context of this culture, to stand. I failed in a moment of confusion that resulted in weakness. The great irony to me is that in this battle with idolatry I was on the campus of one of the foremost and respected Christian colleges in the country. That alone is telling and requires a great deal more reflection.