Thursday 17 February 2022

The global anti-spirituality of existential self-negation

Sometimes the anti-spirituality of the powers of evil becomes apparent, as a vision; when I notice that all over the world, in a million ways - small and large - the message is being propagated that I am the problem. 

My-self is what stands in the path of the desirable world of justice, equity, environmentalism, peace, health, spirituality and all that is approved. 

All persons are being told - directly and indirectly - that each is an obstacle. We therefore cannot trust our-selves. Neither can we trust other people - who are as bad as we are. 


What then is good? Because there is no God in our world; instead the 'good' is vague, abstract... im-personal - indeed it is the 'system' that overcomes the person which is the only hope of goodness. 

Nobody says this, because it would be absurd to claim it; yet it is implicit in the faith in more-and-ever-more abstract-impersonal legislation, rules, monitoring, propaganda, control, coercion... 

Nobody asks who administers these - it is assumed that anything which reduces the autonomy of persons and increases systems will eliminate the major source of hazard: the problem of individual people. 


Consider what we are being told, again and again in a thousand ways: 

I and my activities am a source of environmentally-lethal CO2. 

By my very existence; I am in essence an eater of living beings, a consumer of energy, a polluter. 

I am the potential harbour and vector for a deadly pandemic. 


I am a racist - so deeply racist that I cannot know this nor control it: and racism is the worst of all sins. 

I am a hater of all kinds of disadvantaged persons - and so deeply that I cannot know or control it.

In a world of victims - I am the unconscious and incorrigible victimizer. 


In such a world, being the kind of people we are; our job is to stand-aside, step-down, allow the regulatory-system to do that good which I am preventing. 

We should strive to first minimize, then eliminate our 'footprints' on life, our 'impact', and our offspring - actual and potential. 

We are being propagandized and enforced with an ethic of self-loathing tending towards self-elimination. 

And the only approved form of spirituality are those of negation; those that emphasize the self as evil, an obstacle to the 'divine' will.  


But all this top-down, pervasive, approved and imposed negative-inverted-value-set constitutes the opposite of that which is Christian

As Christians - for each and every one of us - I am the potential means by which God works in this mortal world; and without-which that work will not be done. 

So, when I am following Jesus Christ; I am not an obstacle/ problem/ vector/ consumer/ polluter/ exploiter or hater; but instead - if I choose - an indispensable tool of providence, and a co-creator of Good. 

 

6 comments:

Todd said...

Dr. C.,
There is something so evil and so dark about convincing people as individuals or as a mass that they are a problem, and that the world would be better off without them.
Which reminds me that our local state rep is co-sponsoring a pro-euthanasia bill.
Little devil.
And so many people preen and boast on how they support policies to delete our sovereignty, and that target us as the problem.
I'm quite tired of articles, for example, that boast about not having children because of the environment.
Well, you'll own nothing, be nothing, be alone, and be happy!

jorgen said...

"I and my activities am a source of environmentally-lethal CO2."

So environmentally lethal it makes plants grow, which is required for all life.

Truth to Life said...

If you believe we are living in the end time, I'm curious to know your thoughts about whether starting a family would be a wise decision. Though I'm not concerned about the elitists' overpopulation claims, I'd still hesitate to bring a child into this post-birdemic world where governments are continuously threatening us with mask mandates, the peck, etc. People have accused me of being cynical for having this point of view, though.

Bruce Charlton said...

@j - "So environmentally lethal it makes plants grow, which is required for all life"

Inversions everywhere: good is now demonized; the demonic approved and rewarded.

@TtL - "thoughts about whether starting a family would be a wise decision." Surely this, above all things, is the business of each specific married couple? I presume there will also be divine guidance, if sought and requested, for each such decision.

Gary Bleasdale said...

I think your last paragraph brings to light the "why" so, so many people have adopted assumptions which are as incredibly SELF-destructive in theory as they have proven to be in practice.

If you reject your divine origin, it is natural to reach the conclusion at some point (usually buried in terror in the unconscious) that you may be "useless",
and this, because this world and life is not in fact an end-in-itself and any attempt to make it so leads to incoherence necessarily. And incoherence leads to "letting go" (because why would you "hold onto" something which you cannot see any sense in?) - and if we marry that with the power of the demonically inspired "power and principalities", especially via the mass media, to give that underlying passivity a "positive glow" (after all, even the biggest nihilist still has an ego, in fact!) then that can be extremely attractive - like a moth to a flame.

There are many who don't really buy into these assumptions, because they are not completely corrupted... BUT their lukewarmness means they will go along with it anyway, even internally, because the lack of awareness of their own (and other's) Divine Origin means that they don't see "what the big deal is, anyway". They say "I need to get on with life somehow and this is the hand we've been dealt so I only stand to lose from opposing it".

Ultimately, the bottom line is, if we reject the centrality of "Man being made in God's image" as an absolutely critical cornerstone of our metaphysics, we will tend towards self-destruction, either the quick route of active self-destruction or the slow route of self-destruction by omission.

THAT'S how important it is.

Bruce Charlton said...

@GB - I agree. And I would add that only Christianity (and only when properly understood - including as rooted in agency, and with a lively sense of the *positive* value of each mortal life) seems to have the resources to resist and overcome this self-destructive propaganda.

This is yet-another reason to suppose that these are the end times - as *viable* (not just theoretical) options boil down to either Christ or Satan.