Modern Culture
Reformulated for Disaster

It used to be a person sought to discover how to fit in to his society. In you place, time and according to your talents, how can you bring yourself to be a contributor to your society? And, part of living well in your space and time included a large dose of self-restraint and self discipline. Living life was not all about you but how your piece of the puzzle helped to formulate the common good for the community in which you lived. C.S. Lewis saw this as conforming your soul to reality. Boy, have things changed!

Today, modern man sees the task at hand in his/her life as molding reality to them. Out with restraint, finding place and discipline for the good of community. Now, the task is to change reality to meet my desires and wants. It is not about changing us for the common good, it is changing the world for us! So, we have You Tube, My Space and other such internet ventures where individuals can trumpet their beliefs, talents [or not] and physical bodies to the world. This can be done without place, time and community. You establish your community of one without restraint or discipline.

In the older pattern, as created beings we found meaning in the image of the Creator. That was all part of the order of time, space and matter. Now, in a culture where there is no Creator, we must create ourselves as special and worthwhile. When creation and our part in it was accepted, living in a community with a complex of responsibilities and obligations was paramount. History, institutions of society and orderly living was important. Today, self-seeking that is allowable because of wealth and technology dispense with the former order. In fact, history, structures, order and obligations are all seen today as stifling and oppressive.

So, we are busy creating ourselves. And, it is in a vacuum that this is done without concern for others, communities or institutions. This has lead to autonomy without responsibility. Can a society exist very long in such a situation? In the attempt to create a non-dependant culture what resulted is an epidemic of irresponsibility. The barricades have been broken and we are living in the light of Romans 1. Man has been turned over to his own depravity.

We now have a reformulated culture. It is no longer about how we fit in to the created order. It is all about how we create our own disorder. So, in the new culture, we have individual cultural monarchy. All the old convictions and standards have been jettisoned. Each of us is culturally sovereign. In this new world we can choose a Garmin or TomTom or we can choose hetero or homo-sexuality. And, no cultural institution, ideal or commonly held principle can countermand our autonomous decision. We are shaping the culture as each of us wants and desires it to be. This view of modern freedom cannot last long. It is a recipe for cultural disaster.