It is very interesting to me that many people could foresee, before it had actually become evident, that the millennium would be the end of one age of the world, and the beginning of another.
But it is not surprising that everybody who tried to describe what the new era would look like, got it very wrong. Indeed, it was usual to regard the post-millennium world with a diffuse (because dewy-eyed) optimism, as the dawning of an Age of Aquarius - peace and free-love, free drugs, constant rock music, and a great deal of singing and dancing.
Well... Not exactly. Indeed, sixties style "freedom" is nowadays regarded as evil in the mainstream, and as for dancing... People dance less often (and less joyfully) now than at any time in history (including during the decade of Puritan Commonwealth!) - and far, far less than during the pre-millennial decades.
Dancing aside; it is evident that we are now deeply, and it seems irrevocably, into the end of the present era of world civilization - and the end, too, of an age of the world.
I say "irrevocably" because it is primarily an act of self-destruction - a willed destruction.
Although most of those who will their own civilizational and (almost certainly) personal destruction would strenuously deny it; and will shrilly justify every single destructive policy and action of the vast and interlocking strategy of self-annihilation, by (what seems to them) reasons of values and necessity -- that this is mere shallow feel-good nonsense is almost instantly revealed when any honest attempt at understanding is embarked-upon.
The leadership class live in a bureaucratic world of untruth, dual-dedicated to careerism while feeling good about themselves. Which combination is why they must be so pervasively dishonest... One can only feel good about deliberately planning and escalating gratuitous wars, by lying to oneself and everybody else - All The Time.
Meanwhile, the masses have chosen deliberately not to understand what is happening; which means not-even-trying to understand - and squashing one's own personal capacity to think and learn from experience; by self-drugging with mass media, addictive socializing, and assorted intoxications - these being perceived as the only alternative to becoming crushed by fear and despair.
The combination of an utterly corrupt leadership class with an utterly self-neutered mind-numbed population has led to the truly astonishing spectacle of a world that is today literally on the threshold of escalating mega-death from international war; with economic and trade collapse and famine - with far less public reaction or response than to a sporting event or celebrity scandal.
There is, indeed, in England (who is currently closer to experiencing war than any other Western nation) no perceptible social awareness.
We may hope for someone, somewhere in The West to have the basic common sense and capacity for consecutive thinking to step back and reverse the ongoing trends. But there are a complete absence of any such persons in public life - or indeed anywhere At All.
Trends that have been advocated and celebrated for decades, driven by unified leadership and all major social institutions, would be very difficult to stop if there was a powerful and cohesive will to stop them - but there is not.
By my judgment; nobody has any coherent or plausible idea of what is coming after this era; probably because the roots of the coming collapse are so deep and extensive, that it is almost unimaginable what might grow once these root have destroyed themselves. (Which destruction is currently ongoing, and soon will be all-too-obvious.)
This is why we hear so many cyclical theories of civilizations - people simply can't imagine anything except a return to some previous situation.
Of course, what this inability to imagine a plausible and coherent future may amount to, is that this could be the end of civilization.
After all, in this entropic and increasingly-evil world, everything will have an end sooner or later, at some point - maybe this is what it is like to inhabit an end without prospect of a new beginning?
And this is all covered by the words and actions of Jesus, whose kingdom is Not of this-world, and whose work specifically enables all those who follow him to transcend the end of this world - when (not if) it comes.
So far as I can tell, this is the only antidote to becoming paralysed by fear and despair.
We each (I think) need to be able to envisage the end of everything (and I mean every thing) in this mortal world; and yet realize that even this need not be the end for us (unless we choose to make it so) - but a transformation and beginning of something far, far better - and eternal.
It is on this basis (from this basis) that we should live and "fight": not to save civilization, not even to save "the world" - because these cannot be saved (and our civilization as-it-is either wants nor deserves to be saved).
But we should live and fight in this world in ways that contribute to everlasting life beyond this mortal life, Heavenly society we may enter after this corrupt civilization, and the for eternal divine creation rather than this world: which derives-from and sustains good, but mixes-in so much of evil and entropy.
5 comments:
Sobering but true words.
This entry begs the question of whether we are entering the End Times as described in the book of Revelation and understood, expected, desired and feared by many Christians.
I wonder what are your thoughts on this. Have you written before above it?
Octavio - I have written about the End Times (the posts since about 2018 reflect my current understanding)
https://charltonteaching.blogspot.com/search?q=end+times
On the whole, I don't regard the Book of Revelation as valid in detail or reasoning - not as a blueprint of what we are experiencing and can expect. But the basic idea there and in a few other places, of an accumulation of evil through history, until this world ceases to be sustained by God, seems like a profound insight.
Your piece for some reason reminded me of something I experienced recently. I work a weekend shift in a big electronics firm. The cafeteria where I take my lunch is a large room with two whole walls of windows looking out onto a lawn and then woods. It is a pleasant place to sit and eat. There are also four large TV screens mounted throughout the space. They constantly play the "Home and Garden" channel which is all about people renovating their homes or shopping for new ones. It is vapid beyond belief full of effeminate men and women who constantly blurt out, "OH. MY. GOD!" over some triviality. There is also a boombox constantly playing 80s pop hits (like I didn't hear enough of that the first time). Because I am alone most often I began to go around and turn down the volume on each and every display so I could eat in peace. This would last the weekend but when I came back the following week the sound would always be turned up again and I'd just turn it back down. A week or so back I turned them all down but the sound kept playing. I realized they had started piping it through the PA system whose volume control is inaccessible. It is almost like stories out of North Korea about radios that blare government messages and have no volume or off switch. I think this is somehow germane to your topic here. Have you ever ridden in someone else's car and you have to shout over the radio, commercials and all? It seems most people have these broadcast media blasting away at all times. The only time off from the constant boodly-doo is for work. Work breaks, home time, travel – all must be accompanied by the inane, banal, sinister, endlessly repetitive and manipulative blah, blah, blah of the TV/radio. And whatever effluent the controllers of these media feel like pouring into the other end of the pipe the uncritical viewers at the receiving end will bathe in day after day, year after year. I now take my lunch in a small windowless break room. Well worth the sacrifice of the nice view to not have to sit under the propaganda box.
@Avro - I was reading something by the mystical Englishman John Michell, describing an ideal society that was "controlled" by music (sung by perpetual choirs, in rotation). It seems to perpetuate an ancient idea of music as a kind of social control - in ancient days, this control was assumed to be benign - in harmony with The Gods.
I suspect that some kind of inversion of this insight has been employed by the evil-affiliated leadership class since the advent of radio around a century ago - the idea that a continual background of either noise or anti-music will serve their purposes of encouraging various sins, inducing despair - etc.
I also noticed a long time ago, that the more musical a person is, the less they can tolerate the wrong kind of "background" music.
The most musical friend I had as a young man, would only tolerate what he regarded as superficial music as any kind of background (things like Satie, or Weill) - if, for example, Beethoven or Wagner was to be played, this Must be listened to with concentration and commitment. He was so musically sensitive and felt it so deeply, that he simply could not be present when the wrong kind of music was being played - and if it was Not right, he would leave - even in the middle of a meal!
The cuspidor of a New Era.
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