The inescapable karma of untruthfulness

The phrase, the karma of untruthfulness, is taken from a series of lectures by Rudolf Steiner, and it can be understood to mean that untruthfulness - lying, dishonesty, deliberate misleading - carries a 'karma'. 

This I mean in a Christian sense (and one different, in several important respects, from that implied by several of Steiner's metaphysical and empirical assumptions):

Sin necessarily carries a cost; and untruthfulness without repentance is a sin; and un-repented sin is the prime path of a soul, to self-chosen damnation. 

The karma of untruthfulness operates at the level of our Western civilization, at regional and national levels, for social institutions of all sizes; and, most importantly, for individual human beings. 

We already, and increasingly, live-by untruthfulness: untruthfulness structures the main aspects of our public life, policy, and discourse; and (ever-more-so) our private discourse - even within marriages, families, and among close friends.

And, at its core; untruthfulness structures the basic reality assumptions (metaphysics) and thinking of many or most Western people.  

The usefulness of the term karma is in its unavoidability; the idea that the costs are intrinsic. 

This is not a matter of costs coming if people 'don't get away with' their lies. It is that our 'world' of untruthfulness brings its own punishment immediately and necessarily - as well as cumulatively through time. 

A world in which people choose to believe and live-by that which is false is already a world that is self-damned; and self-damnation manifests at every level; because it is a choice of negation, of hostility to divine creation - a choice of meaninglessness, purposelessness, and chaos.  

Here and now - truthfulness is of supreme importance; a truthfulness that needs to extend down to the roots of our understanding of the world itself, as well as to the minutiae of everyday living. 

The spiritual consequences of truth-indifference

I have been contemplating again (albeit not yet re-reading) the highly suggestive series of World War I lectures by Rudolf Steiner entitled The Karma of Untruthfulness - which might be translated as "the spiritual consequences of truth-indifference".

One of Steiner's core ideas is that the Great War was a direct consequence (i.e. "karmic" outcome) of the preceding decades of "untruthfulness" - untruthfulness being a highly-useful term that encompasses deliberate misrepresentaions, distortion, cover-ups, and all forms of ignoring realities; as well as outright lies.   

Well, I suppose that there has never been a time in history when there have been so many, such large Untruthfulnesses, so widely believed as Now. And by Steiner's understanding (and my own) this must and shall have very large and negative "karmic" consequences - at every level at which untruthfulness is propagated and believed: from the global and national, down to institutional and individual. 

This is inescapable. Untruthfulness has been built-into so many civilizations, societies, institutions and lives; that its consequences are unavoidable; and are-being, will-be encountered for considerable time to come.

What this means - initially for each of us as individuals, but also for every form of organization, corporation, bureaucracy - is that the quest for truth; leading toward explicit repentance based-on understanding of untruthfulness; ought to be a primary and core activity of every life.

No matter how 'truthful' you currently regard yourself (e.g. by comparison with 'other people'); there is A Lot of work for you to do! 

In doing the work of truth, we not only benefit our-selves (spiritually), but (because right-thinking is a kind of power) we benefit every-body, and every-thing, else. 

Endeavour to understand! See through things! Thoughts are forces, and have effects! - Reflections on Rudolf Steiner's The Karma of Untruthfulness, by Terry Boardman

The role of the media is key - because it is through the media that people get their information and form their ideas; and it is ideas that determine human action. 

In The Philosophy of Freedom, Rudolf Steiner shows how vital it is that we combine the correct thought with the object; find the concept that truly corresponds to the percept - as distinct from illusory or sentimental abstractions. 

 

When our ideas about the world are full of untruth, empty phrases and dead abstractions; we cannot but create a deeply sick society; and catastrophes like the wars of the twentieth century are bound to recur. 

Meanwhile, the media go on distracting us from awakening to the realities of world events by presenting an endless circus of celebrity, sport, sex and shopping....

 

What can we do? Steiner's answer was simple and direct: endeavour to understand! See through things!

Thoughts are forces, and have effects.  

It is not supposed to be easy for humans to enter spiritual life. Crises are opportunities for change. 

Clear and proper understanding of what is going-on is the only way - "Nothing else is of any use". 

Excerpted and freely-edited from Terry Boardman's Introduction to Rudolf Steiner's lecture series The Karma of Untruthfulness - Volume 2 - Steiner's lectures are from 1916, Terry Boardman's Introduction from 2005. See also this 20 minute documentary. 

A century ago; in "The Karma of Untruthfulness" Steiner gave the first 'media studies' course in which he analysed the causes of the ongoing Great War. 

And he gave what I believe is the best advice for those and these times: our first duty is to understand, clearly and truly, what is happening: to See Through Things. 

And this is primarily a matter of having true ideas, true concepts - with which to understand the 'facts', observations and perceptions. 

'Evidence is a red-herring'. Everybody has, more or less, the same' data; and certainly enough data: 

It is having right ideas/ true concepts, that differentiates the rare wise man from the mass of fools.  

 

Understanding truth, and then recognising that Thoughts Are Forces - have general effects; so that thinking truth is a positive intervention in The World. 

Indeed, clearly to understand; to think, to know Truth - is the single most positive intervention we can make in the world. 

NOTE ADDED: The above imperative of understanding marks a cleavage point from a more mainstream spirituality of oneness, quietism, 'mindfulness', and Zennish, Hinduish-type New Age teachings - which assert the totality of the present moment, non-discrimination, non-judgmentalism, neither thinking nor choosing, reducing or eliminating the 'ego', 'consciousness' etc...

If, indeed, a person was genuinely to be utterly Unworldly - taking no notice At All of the mass media or officialdom, and deriving no information At All from media, official or any bureaucratic sources; having No Opinion on any of the issues of the day (especially the Litmus Test issues); and if he took No Part At All in any public discourse on such matters... 

- Then (but only then) there would, indeed, be no reason to understand the truth behind the mainstream media/ official/ bureaucratic Untruthfulness. 

Otherwise - which category embraces every single person of whom I am aware, because I know of nobody wholly-unworldly - we must discern lies from truth, evil from Good, the side-of-Satan from those (few?) affiliated with God. 

We must therefore follow Steiner's advice, this needs to be a conscious choice; and actually to do so in practice we must be convinced, in particular, that "Thoughts are forces, and have effects" - otherwise we would simply not take the daily mission seriously enough, nor give it sufficient priority against the many other distractions, temptations and compulsions of modern living.

Do Right - Right Now! The potential post-election movement to fight evil dishonesty must have positive Christian motivations - If it is to Do-Good

The present situation is that the world, and especially the rulers of the world, are extremely evil: more so than at any time in history, because their evil extends to the ultimate form of value-inversion. 

Up to now, the masses have been - passively, and for short-termist and selfish gains, unconstrained by their Godless hedonism - going-along-with this top-down imposition of evil. 

Consequently the masses are by-now also extremely evil; as is abundantly evident, apparently everywhere in the world, in 2020. 

 

So, is there a realistic possibility - starting from where we Actually are Now, that there could be a movement to fight this evil? 

It seems timely to ask this question because, as of two days ago - and for the first time in some decades; there does seem to be a powerful leader against-evil in the shape of the incumbent US president - who has made a strong statement of intent to fight the foundational Establishment evil of strategic, systematic untruthfulness, dishonesty and (ever Bigger) Big Lies. 

Is it conceivable that this might be the start of a genuine 'movement' against this modern, global evil of untruthfulness? - which (I have often argued) is perhaps the single underpinning and most-pervasive evil of the modern world. 

I feel that is so; this could be the start of something Good and Big.

And I am in no doubt about the rightness of the cause. 

 

However, the moral fact that untruthfulness really is an evil, an important and growing evil, and ought to be fought; is by-itself not sufficiently motivating. 

Experience tells us, without doubt, that to be effective in virtue; Men must have something to fight-for, as well as fight-against.  

At present, Men are (I think, implicitly when not explicitly) being asked to fight-for democracy; that is, a kind of voting; which I regard as itself intrinsically tending-to evil (since it denies personal responsibility - and personal responsibility is the only kind). 

In other words, I regard stealing an election as evil because it is dishonest; and not because it is 'undemocratic'. To fight against dishonesty but for democracy, is merely to exchange one evil motivation for another; and it would therefore be of little or no net value. 

Indeed, it may even lead to worse things. 

 

Other possibilities are equally unsuitable. For instance it would not be a good thing to fight-for US 'greatness' - since greatness is not a virtue; and the same applies to the varieties of peace, prosperity, comfort and convenience that might be proposed as positive goals. 

I am, of course, saying that, on the one hand, Men will only fight when motivated; and, on the other hand, I am clarifying that - for Christians - only Christian virtues are genuinely worth fighting-for

 

For this potential movement to fight the evil of untruthfulness, and for this fight really to work (and I really hope that it will work) requires that the movement very swiftly becomes Christianised in its core positive motivation/s and values - Christian both among the leadership, and among the masses (or some of them). 

I don't know if this will happen, but I do believe that it could happen. 

I believe that a window has been created where such a thing is possible - if the right people, and enough people in the right circumstances, Do The Right Thing. 

 

As always the responsibility lies with you and me - because nobody can know the consequences of their virtue. 

Indeed, we should not even be trying to guess the probabilities of me-doing-good leading to good outcomes! That is devil's work!

We can only do it right, right-now; and then see what happens - which itself further depends on what other-people do, which itself partly depends on what we ourselves have-done. 

 

In the end it is down to us each to Do Right - Right Now. 

Truth as a Christian virtue

Truth is a Christian value - indeed, without the historical influence of Christianity; then the seeking and speaking of truth would likely be a mere personal idiosyncrasy. 

It is therefore important that Christian theology explains why truth is a necessary virtue - absence of which is sinful, and needs to be repented. 

The dwindling strength and influence of institutional Christianity is a reason why truth has become perhaps the most neglected virtue. 

 

Probably also that churches have themselves failed to acknowledge and repent their own many and gross lapses from truthful values (lapsing almost invariably into expediency) - thereby destroying even surface credibility of their claims. 

For this reason; that truth is a Christian virtue is neglected in church teachings; and as institutions "Christian" churches have become almost indistinguishable from other social institutions in terms of the truthfulness of their public discourse. 

As usual with Christianity here-and-now; the Christian virtue of truth has become a matter for individual discernment and responsibility - and will often oppose the practice and statements of any particular Christian church.

 

(Also, to a lesser extent, the feminization of the West; since women are relatively more prone to untruthfulness, and less likely to be driven by truth as a value. Most, maybe all, virtues and sins differ in strength and frequency between the sexes. e.g. men are better at truth, while women are better at loving-kindness.)

Untruthfulness is therefore anti-Christian. However, untruthfulness is tolerated, even encouraged in some circumstances, in other religions - thus Christians should not assume that people of other religions or atheists/ materialists value truth as an ideal. 

Most such people don't even want personally to be truthful - their motives and goals are quite other. 

The PSYOPS are to make people Lie: because this is a spiritual war, and they want us self-damned, not merely killed

Just an observation that seems often to be missed...

For Christians, lying is a sin; yet great swathes of people in many walks of life (especially the ruling and middling classes) are required to lie for their living. 

Yet hardly any Christians even remember that lying is a sin; and even-fewer emphasize it -- much preferring to focus on the spectacular stuff like torture, murder, rape, arson and theft (i.e. sins of which, non-coincidentally, most Christians themselves are innocent). 

Therefore lying is surely (it must be!) by-far the commonest and least repented of all sins. 

This explains the massive PSYOPS of recent years, which are based on Big Lies; which require systematic dishonesty; and which require more-and-more people to believe, and speak, and act-upon, and defend untruth. 

Most of the PSYOPS are attempts (apparently successful) to normalize and render invisible untruthfulness - including getting 'everybody' to ignore or deny The Obvious; and to 'forget' the deliberate sins and horrors of Mainstream-approved and -implemented policies. 

In an ultimate sense - thanks to Jesus Christ - sinning 'does not matter' to salvation: so long as it is repented. 

It is because we do not recognize untruthfulness, deliberate misleading, and dishonesty as sins; that they are not repented - and therefore become a form of chosen self-damnation. 

This is a major reason why, and how, They are winning the spiritual war. 

How peer review trains scientists in untruthfulness - journal refereeing

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One of the many  flaws in peer review as applied in refereeing is that it trains scientists to become-comfortable-with untruthfulness, and to make excuses for (what they believe to be) wrong facts or ideas published under their own names.

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This has become an almost routine aspect of the journal peer review process. 

The original and proper function of a scientific paper was for an individual (or small group) to publish their views and observations under their own names, and to be responsible for these views - to defend these views against competent critique -  or, if they could not defend them, eventually to retract them.

But nowadays, in order to publish, authors are frequently - probably usually - compelled to alter their arguments and interpretations in line with what journal referees suggest.

*

The modern 'scientific' paper as it appears when published in a peer reviewed journal generally ends-up as a mosaic of some of the author's own best estimates of truth (although some things the authors consider to be important will probably have been deleted at the insistence of referees), along with the various opinions and interpretations  that originate from the journal referees.

In a nutshell, the modern editorial process changes what the author believes and considers important, to yield an incomplete and biased version of the authors best knowledge; but the result is published under the name of the authors, and these authors are supposed to take responsibility for it.

*

In my opinion, this is a corrupt and corrupting practice.

Except for the correction of accidental errors, articles submitted to journals ought not to be subjected to substantive changes.

The editor's role should be restricted to matters of presentation. By and large, papers should be accepted or rejected - not rebuilt.

As I used to express it when I was myself an editor; to preserve the integrity of science, the editor's role should be as a chooser, not a changer.

*

Is there a place where the Establishment speak truthfully to each other?

Many people realize that They lie to Us; but there is a residual belief that there are places, times or situations in which They tell the truth to each other. 

Such ideas have various levels. It used often to be said that the mainstream newspapers were dishonest; but the 'in house' media such as the Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, and Economist were basically honest - because (supposedly) in such places They were talking to each other - and the information exchanged need to be valid... 

This may have been true at some point in the past; but has certainly not been true since around the millennium; since when such journals are as deluded as, or even more so than, the rest. 

It seems clear that now there is just as much manipulation and brainwashing going-on among the Establishment; than there is of the masses by the Establishment. 

Yet there is a residual hope that we may discover "what They are really up-to" by examining off-the-record or internal communications; perhaps leaked, illicitly recorded or hacked memos, conversations, or accidental revelations... 

The image is of Machiavellian thinkers who, among themselves, deal with solid facts and reliably tested mechanisms; make explicit plans, and then objectively monitor their outcomes with rigour. 

And who only then invent lies in order to keep these secret and make them more effective.  

This leads to the assumption that when the secret communications are discovered and published, the resulting 'gotcha' will reveal the truth, will undeceive the masses, and thereby undermine and thwart wicked plans.  

But such excited hopes rest on the assumption that They are ever honest; when in reality liars nearly-always lie primarily to themselves - and indeed, self-deception is the basis of other-deception. 

(Furthermore - which is another matter - such hopes rest on an assumption that the masses care mainly about truth, are capable of recognizing the truth, and will adjust their evaluations accordingly.)  

I began to realize that this was a false model as a result of my own inner dealings with bureaucracies and those who head them. I worked in both Regional and District levels of the National Health Service Public Health services; and was a member of a university senior academic committee (Senate); and an editor in a multinational publishing corporation. 

In all of these, expedient untruthfulness was normal, expected, and insisted-upon. Everybody on the inside lied (but deniably - that was the skill of it) to each other, and they lied to their audience. They just lied All The Time!

I also had multiple experiences (and experiences of friends and colleagues) in relation to the conduct of science - which I know had once been a haven of honesty and truth seeking. 

Again, it was clear that - however things had been in the middle 20th century - by the millennium, the relationship between science and truth had been severed and discarded; and - exactly as with other bureaucracies - expedient and deniable untruthfulness was normal, expected and insisted-upon. 

Such experiences gave me the clue that nowadays - no matter how high-up and secret the level one is dealing-with in the Establishment; there is no place or occasion when it is the practice to be honest and where (which is necessary to this) honesty is enforced, and dishonesty exposed, repented explicitly, and sanctioned. 

We ought therefore to be wary of assuming that the latest revelations give us a window into how things really are - whether these come from leaks and hacks, private documents, recorded interactions or whatever. 

These covert sources may reveal Establishment attitudes that They would prefer to keep secret; but then again these attitudes may be faked inter-Establishment bragging, posing, virtue-signaling, or manipulations - rather than genuine revelations of motivations. 

In a world of pervasive dishonesty - truth is not available in public discourse, nor in private discourse among the Establishment. 

Truth is not Their currency. 

And whatever is connected bureaucratically to the System, shares System imperatives - of which one is that interactions must be untruthful in-line with the currently-dominant ideology. 

And this applies to all the major churches - including those institutional Christian churches that are employers, have workforces, gather in public spaces, have property, pay taxes (or claim exemptions) etc. - just as much as it does elsewhere. 

Necessity does not obviate the requirement for repentance

As Jesus apparently tried to make clear; following Him to resurrection ought to be about repentance of all sin; not the literal impossibility of ceasing from sin, nor even the (salvific) irrelevance of ceasing from some list of particular sins. 

Because they have the idea that Christians are supposed to stop sinning, or at lease reduce it considerably; self-identified Christians are too-often very concerned to explain that most of their sins are trivial, that it would be unreasonable to expect that they be ceased; or that this kind of sin is necessary - that it is unavoidable to sin in some particular way. 

(The subtext often seems to be that because sins are trivial, coerced, needed - then they are "not really" sins, and don't really count. Not so long as Big Sins - murder etc. - are avoided.) 

It's not that this is false (in a way) but that such arguments are essentially beside-the-point.  

The truth is that mortal beings on this earth, in the actual situations they/we find ourselves, just aren't aligned with God's will, with divine creation; and that is sin. 

We can't validly enumerate sins, because life isn't divided-up in that way - thoughts, speech, actions etc are linked, there aren't qualitative separations between sins, or between sin and virtue. 

This is because the underlying reality is motivation - motivation to be on God's side in the spiritual war - and nobody can be on God's side all of the time in all situations. 

What we are required to repent is "all the ways" in which we diverge from living wholly by love... The idea that we need to avoid (or strive to avoid) some particular list of sins is wrong. And the idea that someone who avoids the worst sins is set up for salvation is likewise a mistake. It doesn't matter how good we are relatively to others - in the ultimate and vital sense, we are all sinners. 

All that isn't fatal to salvation, because Jesus came "to save sinners" - which is another way of saying he came to save potentially all men who "follow" Jesus, acknowledge that they are sinners, and know what would be needful not to be sinners.  

But while we live, while God maintains us alive; we must have useful work to do. 

That work isn't stopping sinning; but part of it is discerning, acknowledging, and repenting sin - whenever possible. 

This is just a by-product of knowing what we ought to think, say, do - and knowing that we aren't doing it - and that we would do it it that were possible. 

This is particularly important when it comes to the sinning that we are incentivized, coerced or even compelled to do. For instance (my favourite example) untruthfulness - dishonesty, lying; deliberate misleading of others by repetition, hype and spin, and by selective omissions. 

Nearly everybody does this a lot of the time, and the leadership class and most professional class people (including priests, pastors, ministers and the like) do it for a living. They do it much of the time, and the must keep doing it if they want to get and keep their jobs. 

Indeed; calculated and systemic untruthfulness is essential to much modern work, mandatory for employment; necessary to obtain and retain one's position, and get prestige and promotion. A very large slice of the modern population therefore "lie for a living". 

These are sins that are active, purposive, obtrude into our consciousness many times every day. 

People do them, and have zero intentions of stopping doing them. Indeed, they could not stop doing them without abandoning their responsibilities. Without "giving up". 

And even then, they would still be sinning in innumerable other ways - and would very likely be required to commit more of other kinds of sin. 

(In practice, stopping one sin very often entails ramping up other sins - and the balance between decrease and increase is often unclear even when not negative.) 

The first thing to acknowledge is that there is no way out of this - as we actually are, on this mortal earth!

The second thing to realize that the many and various excuses of why we "have to do sins", do not make any difference to salvation even when they are perfectly true! 

What we should do about all this is quite simple, and described in the Fourth Gospel! 

We start with our commitment to follow Jesus to resurrected eternal Heavenly life. 

And recognize that this will require us to be remade and transformed into "beings of love"; which also (negatively) means becoming without sin. As Jesus explained to Nicodemus, is only possible on the other side of death: we must die and then be born-again.  

Therefore, one of the most significant things we can do, here-and-now, in this mortal life; is to notice and acknowledge when we are actually sinning.

This is important for our salvation, and the state of our souls, to acknowledge this actual sinning; much more more important than to focus and expend our finite efforts and attention in (Oh So Admirably!) diminishing one or a few selective sins - in what Jesus might have called the Pharisee Strategy. 

Showing off about one's (supposed) immunity to this or that temptation or sin may be an effective way of manipulating other people - it might (less often) even be a good thing for particular or overall social functioning. 

But is not the way to learn spiritually, to improve one's soul - and it has almost nothing to do with salvation. 

If the requirement for repentance is regarded in this way, then we will all find that there is no shortage of material for learning! 

If we are not much tempted by one kind of sin, there are plenty of other sins which we are doing some or most of the time - and which we have (for whatever reason, good or bad) have no intention of stopping. 

And there are sins that because of our nature, and/or circumstances; we cannot stop, we do not have the ability to stop. 

Jesus Christ did not ask the impossible of us; indeed he made salvation possible for anybody capable of love. 

Ultimately, those who attain resurrected eternal life need to desire themselves to be remade wholly good, without sin. 

We can't do this on this side of death; but can always and everywhere be learning what that will entail. 

This is time well spent. 

Each and every recognition and repentance of our sin is both an affirmation and strengthening of our ultimate commitment to follow Jesus after death; and also a (small but significant) proximate betterment of our souls as they now are, and shall be carried forward into eternal life.

This world of liars

It is the lying that I am so strongly aware of - and which so many people (most people) nowadays take completely for granted, and do not even notice. 

This is why I am sure that the world is more evil now than (say) 40 years ago: the prevalence of lying, the doubling down on lies, the suppression of truth. 

We don't need to know anything specific about what They are aiming-at, when we recognize their systematic untruthfulness. 

And when we recognize that the mass of people share in this, and do not regard untruthfulness as intrinsically evil. 

When this began in earnest in the middle 1960s, people used to tell themselves that the dishonesty was temporary, expedient, just a means to an end - the achieved revolution (class, sexual, race etc) - at which point the lies would be dropped... 

Now, they are quite contented that dishonesty be forever, since the state of revolution is permanent, the objectives of revolution perpetually redefined and open-ended... 

Now They have (apparently) 'got rid of Trump' by the biggest fraud in history (self-rationalized by the greater good) will they stop lying? 

Of course not! They now lie as-well/ instead about the birdemic, climate, sexuality, race etc etc. 

Satan is the Father of Lies; and by their lies we may recognize his children.*

* John 8:40-7 [Jesus speaking to the scribes and Pharisees:] But now ye seek to kill me, a man that hath told you the truth, which I have heard of God: this did not Abraham. Ye do the deeds of your father. Then said they to him, We be not born of fornication; we have one Father, even God. Jesus said unto them, If God were your Father, ye would love me: for I proceeded forth and came from God; neither came I of myself, but he sent me. Why do ye not understand my speech? even because ye cannot hear my word. Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it. And because I tell you the truth, ye believe me not. Which of you convinceth me of sin? And if I say the truth, why do ye not believe me? He that is of God heareth God's words: ye therefore hear them not, because ye are not of God. 

The paradox of so-called "science" in 2021

We lived in a constructed, 'virtual' world - a world of untruthfulness and inverted values; which the masses receive passively from the global mass-media-bureaucracy System (passively and mostly unconsciously in the form of structuring assumptions).  

Furthermore, The System by 2021 encompasses all the major social sub-systems - such as government, law, religion, military and police, health, arts... and 'science'. 

 

(Note: The System is not 'everywhere. It does, now, encompasses all of mainstream, big money, high status public discourse; but it does Not encompass all of interpersonal discourse, does Not encompass all marriage and family life; does Not encompass the real and divine Self of each individual person - in so far as that Self is active in a life.)

 

(Further note: The actual functionality of 'science' makes clear that it goes beyond the 'hard sciences' of mathematics, physics, chemistry and biology; and extends to the 'social sciences' and academia in general - especially history. The German term Wissenschaft (which refers to all systematically-organised knowledge) is better descriptive of this social function than is 'science'. Nonetheless, I will use 'science' here - dropping the 'scare quotes' henceforth.) 

 

Science is part of The System because it has become a career bureaucracy; and is connected hierarchically and horizontally with the other bureaucracies. Of course, hierarchically, science comes under all the many top-down government initiatives. In addition; science nowadays is almost-wholly based on research funding, and funding comes from government and corporations (especially Big Pharma). Science is subject to the mass media, like everything else. Science is tightly constrained by law - for example employment and workplace laws, racial laws etc. Science works through publishing, and publishing is an oligarchy of a few multinational corporations; who enforce the usual System globalist, leftist, imperatives on all high impact outputs - via their bureucracies which extend into the selectoral and editorial processes.  

 

I could go on - but this will suffice to indicate that science, as of 2021, is simply one component in The System+, and that System is now (since early 2020) revealed as a single, international one; that includes a covert totalitarian 'world government' able to enforce simultaneous changes in nearly-all nations.

OK, science is part of The System and The System is global. 

Because science is indeed a part of the The System - science serves The System. 

What this means is that, science cannot formally be separated-from The System: science is caused-by The System.  

This means that when we hear of some or other of the conclusions of science; these conclusions are generated by The System - the conclusions of science are downstream consequences of a web of influences that have led-up-to them. 

On top; the very fact that we hear about certain conclusions of science, rather than others; is also a consequence of The System.  

In simple terms The System both generates the scientific activity that leads to the conclusions; and then another aspect of The System - the mass media - makes sure that the masses are informed of those conclusions in a way which serve the interests of The System. 

Science, so-called- is merely a phase in the pathway leading from one part of The System to another. 

What this means is that science cannot lead The System; indeed, science cannot ever be a 'reason' for The System doing one thing rather than another. The System constructs, interprets, disseminates and enforces...

In so far as The System goes (and in 2021 The System is everywhere there is power/ money/ status/ influence); everything goes in cycles and epicycles - round and round The System.  

We cannot 'follow the science' - because that would be circular. 

All of which leads onto the Big Question. If the System is indeed a massive circularity; whence derives its purpose, its direction - which is so evident over the decades - with The System trending always towards atheist, materialist leftism? 

And the answer is that The System As-A-Whole is directed by those outside of The System - the powers of evil, Satan and other demons. These, being spirits, stand outside The System, but are able to influence it.* 

 

We can, as Christians, now perceive that the great Strategy of evil, has been to construct a System of intrinsic evil: that is a System characterised by untruthfulness, by lies; and by the inversion of values. 

Such a System is therefore, innately, against God, the Good and organised against divine creation. 

Mainstream, official, high status science is - here-and-now - just a sub-part of that evil strategy.

 *

+There still is such a thing as Real Science, but it is outside of The System, amateur and unofficial; and happens at the inter-personal, 'private' level; between those who are motivated diligently to seek and speak truth on a particular matter. 

*Note added: The spiritual war of these times is between those who stand outside The System: that is between those aligned with God/ Good/ Creation - and those aligned against these. Those who are inside The System are fighting on the side of evil, but are Not waging the the war. 

Why do They want so many opposite things? Because They are Evil - obviously! (And evil is negative.)

Rational and coherent people often comment on the incoherence of modern mainstream culture - perhaps expecting that this will lead to a recognition of error and reorganisation of priorities.  

But it never does. Oppositional-clashing continues and worsens. 

And very few recognise the underlying cause of all this incoherence.

 

Examples? 

On the one hand, in this Year of the Birdemic, mainstream modern culture has become mono-maniacally focused on health. Nothing in the world (human society, human culture, human survival) is more important than health; and every-thing must be sacrificed for (a little-bit) longer life for the extremely old and already-sick... 

On the other hand; the health services have been all-but destroyed. We have much, MUCH worse health care, and there is much less of it, than a year ago...

 

On the one hand; politicians are obsessed with increasing bureaucratic surveillance and control - which has reached unprecedented levels with the world living under house arrest, and almost everything banned (except for what is compulsory)... 

On the other hand; these same rulers have been encouraging riots, arson, violence; police told not to intervene, defunded, deleted... Gangsters, mobs and thug-rule are funded, defended and supported by the authorities. 

 

On the one hand; the Global Establishment strategy is to make every home a prison; stop mass travel - eliminate airlines, eliminate private cars; confine the masses within bicycle range of their residence - for limited, supervised 'exercise' periods... 

On the other hand that same Global Establishment want 'open borders'; fund and organise for vast tides of tens of millions of people ('refugees', 'asylum seekers', 'displaced persons') surging across the planet; mixing and stealing, raping and fighting; flooding already-crowded Western counties with immigrants and migrants; year upon year, with no control and no limit. 

 

On the one hand; They promote economic growth. The world economy is 'stimulated' with trillions of dollars. Vast sums are spent on improving transport 'infrastructure' with new motorways, faster railways, tunnels and bridges, space rockets and multiple-thousands of new satellites...

On the other hand; They have destroyed - what? - a third? A half? of the global economy by their 'lockdowns', massively inefficient birdemic restrictions, massively destructive racial and sex preferences, and endlessly growing bureaucratic red tape. The transport infrastructure is paralysed by pretend 'sustainable' projects. All businesses, corporations, institutions, organisations are in constant and escalating turmoil.

My point is that such gross, persisting, expanding incoherence and self-contradiction is not some kind of aberration or error - but is the very nature of mainstream modern public policy. 

Why? 

Quite simply because the underlying motivation of The Establishment is evil; and evil is oppositional. 

 

Evil is negative, not positive. 

Evil has no goal but the destruction of good, the inversion of values. It is not aiming at any alternative, stable, coherent plan for a 'better' world, or for any kind of 'civilization' or 'society'; it simply opposes God, creation and all-that-is-good - and it does so simultaneously, on many fronts.

 

The negativity and destructiveness of evil is disguised by lies. Satan is described as 'The Father of Lies' because lying and other forms of dishonesty - such as hype, spin, public relations, advertising, selective and distorted reporting, fake-news and monolithic news suppression, deletion of dissent, legalism, management-speak, empty rhetoric; and the proliferating sequential, rotating leftist ideologies such as socialism, feminism, antiracism, environmentalism, sexual and religious 'phobias'...etc. 

All are negative, oppositional, incoherent; all are based upon Untruthfulness: the inverson of Truth. 

And these systemic Big Lies are the necessary tools for motivating and excusing and explaining-away the underlying, strategic, progressive demonic agenda.

Incoherence and the clashing pursuit of incompatible goals is just business-as-usual for the architects and agents of evil...

 

Yet it is all invisible to most people, most of the time.  

Why? Simply because nearly the whole world has forgotten, denies or hates God; therefore has zero basis from which to discern incoherence; or recognise the negativity and destructiveness of the simultaneous-opposing trends which characterise 2020. 

Unless you yourself love God, creation and the Good - then you will never perceive that behind the oppositions and incoherences lies a single purpose, a single comprehensive plan. 

Nothing that ever happens will ever enlighten you to the core, fundamental reality of 2020: 

The plan to reduce divine creation to demonic chaos. 

Why not lie?

We live in what must surely be the most calculatedly untruthful society and civilization in world history - where dishonesty is expected and demanded of many people in their work - on a daily, hourly, basis. 

So, given that it is so expedient to do so - why not lie, since everybody else does? 

In a neatly composed post; blogger "Rev Matt" puts forward a coherent psychological argument against lying...

Which is that a life built on lies is like that of an undercover spy: the liar always needing to be vigilant, anxious; ever vulnerable to exposure. 

This may psychologically be true of most individual persons who have constructed their lives based on dishonesty*, but it does not apply to the prevalent form of untruthfulness here-and-now - which is to sustain and defend the social lies of our totalitarian civilization. 

This is actually less stress-inducing, than it is to think - and maybe - speak truth**!

The harm is thus primarily spiritual, rather than psychological. It is the harm from sustaining systematic dishonesty and calculated misleading, and from defending-it-as-good; and doing so for our innermost selves: in conscience.  

Such is to invite evil into one's heart - with inevitable adverse spiritual consequences; consequences that will not be repented for so long as the lie is self-excused. 

That is the real reason why not to lie. 

+++

* There are - however - some individuals who positively enjoy living-a-lie. Some spies seem to be of this sort. Such people experience a sense of their own superiority at deceiving people. And, if they are caught in the lie, they likewise enjoy either worming their way out of the situation - by whatever means is effective; or perhaps brazenly admitting they have fooled so many people for such a long time, and laughing at the gullibility of others. 

** The same applies to science and academia more widely: it is much less stressful, and more immediately gratifying, to go-along-with whatever current untruths are prevalent among the leadership class; than it is to pursue truth and to speak truth.  

Harry Potter illustrates that the sides of Good and evil are primary; and that personality and behaviour are secondary

The original Harry Potter series of seven books, completed by the superb "Deathly Hallows" volume, is probably the major Christian fantasy fiction since the Lord of the Rings; because (as well as its many incidental delights) it has a deep moral structure, and this deep plot concerns depicts matters of primary and transcendental importance for Christians.  

As such, the Harry Potter (HP) books can illustrate and clarify some of the most important questions of value that confront us in the world today. 

One such is that the single most important choice a person makes is which side to take: the side of Good or that of evil - and there are only two sides. 

In the HP books, Voldemort is a picture of Satan, and his side includes both a cadre of Death Eaters (analogous to demons), and a great mass of people who just go-along-with the agenda of evil for various motives - serving its overall goals, and passively absorbing and adopting its core beliefs and motivations. 

In life, as in Harry Potter, there is no value-neutral position, and sooner-or-later it seems that everybody (even the non-human magical 'creatures such as House Elves, Centaurs, Goblins and Giants) is compelled to pick his side, and choose one way or the other.

And also as in life; in the fictional world of HP - some nice people chose the side of evil; while (more or less) many of those on the side of Good are (more or less) nasty people   

This aspect of Harry Potter has particular value in these times, since our situation seems to be that most of the nice (decent, sensible, hard-working, intelligent, kind..) people are on the side of evil; while many of those on the side of Good are more-or-less nasty.

Perhaps the major nasty person on the side of Good is Severus Snape; who is represented throughout as a thoroughly nasty man - yet one who by his great courage and genuine love (for Lily Potter, Harry's mother) has heroically chosen the side of Good. 

Another less obvious example is Dumbledore; who emerges as a greatly flawed character, with a strong tendency towards deception and manipulation and who struggles with a temptation for power and an almost paralyzing sense of guilt for his past affiliation to evil and its consequences; yet who is more solidly on the side of Good, and working-for Good, than almost anyone. 

An even less obvious example are the Weasley Twins - Fred and George. These share a tendency to callous cruelty, indeed sadism, which is a serious character flaw. In general they are hedonistic and manipulative without regard for the consequences for others, although because they are charming and 'cool' they are generally well-liked. But Fred and George are always staunchly and courageously on the side of Good - because they are sustained by an indomitable fraternal and familial love, which is their bottom line. 

And while the Death Eaters are almost always very nasty people, there are several on the side of evil who would be regarded as 'good guys' in terms of everyday social behaviour. 

For instance, Cornelius Fudge, the Minister of Magic (in the earlier books) is a kindly and avuncular character, and his faults would seem to be mostly minor: cowardice and untruthfulness, unacknowledged incompetence, and wilful blindness to the reality of evil emergent. Yet these faults are unrepented such that that he ends-up working for the triumph of Voldemort and against those who oppose him; this despite believing himself to be motivated towards Good. Fudge is a type seen frequently these days - heading-up major social institutions of all kinds (including leaders of the self-described Christian churches).

The later Minister of Magic - Rufus Scrimgeour - also ends-up on the wrong side despite his admirable courage and staunch opposition to the Death Eaters; because he subscribes to various Big Lies, and becomes corrupted by the doctrine that the end justifies the means.  He wants Harry to participate in various official lies, tries to blackmail and bribe him; and attempts to make Harry subordinate his 'chosen one' mission to the current 'needs' of propaganda and the magical bureaucracy. He also dishonestly imprisons (with torment) the naïve and innocent Stan Shunpike, on the pretense that SS is a Death Eater, because Scrimgeour believes this will help the cause.  

Ludo Bagman - the Head of the Department of Magical Games and Sports - is another 'type' seen among the nominal leaders used by the Global Establishment nowadays (e.g. Boris Johnson). A charming, popular man - for whose incompetence and stupidity people are usually prepared to make excuses because they find him likeable. "Ludo" emerges as a self-interested gambling addict and defrauder; one who bought his position by providing secret insider information about the Ministry to a Death Eater; and who abuses his position for his own pleasure and profit. Bagman (the name implies a criminal go-between) overall, in many ways, aids the ascent of Voldemort.  

JK Rowling is clear that the determinant of a person's status of Good or evil is which side they take; and also that the two main virtues that most matter in this choice are love and courage. 

Love is, of course, the core Christian virtue which 'drives' all that is Good - while courage is necessary for that virtue to remain dominant, and to resist the insidious, pervasive and powerful forces of corruption when evil becomes dominant - when "The Ministry has fallen".   

Lack of courage - cowardice, represents a lack of faith in the cause of Good, and concern with the expediencies of this world rather than fundamental values; so that fear unrepented and unopposed is the root cause of a great deal of corruption. 

Self-sacrifice is required of all the Good characters at some point in the series; and this is not possible without the right motivation of love, and the key virtue of courage in that cause. 

Harry himself is naturally the greatest moral exemplar. A very flawed hero; throughout the books he comes to a clarity and conviction of what matters most - what must not be given-up; and eventually he makes the ultimate sacrifice by which the world is saved from evil. 

Why are the commonest sins neglected? Because they are socially-approved

The spiritual war is fought in public over whether the 'sins' of mainstream, totalitarian leftist-materialism ought to be regarded as primary (e.g. racism, sexism' climate- or peck-denialism...); or whether instead the traditional Christian sins such as adultery, fornication, drunkenness etc.) ought to be the major focus. 

(The mainstream has the advantage in this dispute because they deny that the Christian sins are sinful at all, but rather virtues; while the self-identified Christians usually agree with the totalitarian left that attitudes such as racism, sexism, and -denialism are indeed sins - and will, for example - routinely and officially exclude leaders who disagree with any of the mainstream leftist definitions of 'sin'.) 

My usual list of the most dominating sins of this time and place includes fear, resentment, dishonesty and despair. 

But these are - at best - almost completely neglected by Christian teaching - which continues to focus on more traditional (and spectacular!) sins of a sexual nature; or sins that are (at least officially) still against the law: things like murder, rape, theft etc. 

Such a focus has the unfortunate (but probably deliberate) effect of creating and sustaining "Pharisaism" among Christians, which I would here define as the belief that sin can be avoided - with enough effort. 

Well, yes! Spectacular sins can indeed be avoided. And avoiding these is made much easier by the fact that they are socially dis-approved, and if detected they will be punished. 

But my understanding is that Jesus said this was not only insufficient, but a harmful attitude to life. 

Sin, as such, is so pervasive in the human condition as to be unavoidable; and the belief that sin can be avoided leads to what Jesus termed 'hypocrisy' - that is, to assumptions of purity and authority on the basis of being (at least publicly) able to avoid a few extreme and spectacular sins; while neglecting the far more frequent, but equally in need of repentance, sins of everyday life - such as dishonesty.

Did you murder anyone yesterday? Probably not. And, if you did, you probably repent it. 

But were you dishonest yesterday? Yes You Were! And probably dozens, maybe hundreds of times; especially if you are a manager or a professional or any kind of leader. 

Indeed, most middle class people are dishonest as an essential (and growing) element of their job: they are strategically, calculatedly dishonest for-a-living.  

Did you repent these dishonesties - did you even notice them at all? Even worse - do you regard yourself as a truthful person, and deny that you were and are dishonest? 

Sins such as dishonesty are un-noticed and therefore un-repented because they are socially-approved, and often socially rewarded: 

Back in 2020-2021; we were all socially expected to fear the birdemic - and anyone who did not express sufficient fear was regarded as a danger to public health. 

Resentment is the motivational basis of antiracism, feminism, socialism and many other leftist ideologies (and several actually-left but supposedly-right ideologies such as nationalism); and nowadays such resentment (whether personal, or vicariously expressed 'on behalf of' the 'oppressed') is mandatory in public discourse. 

A manager and a politician is rewarded for dishonesty (e.g. calculated misleading, untruthfulness and indeed lying - if lies effective and deniable); and will be sacked if he refuses. Much the same applies to scientists, doctors, lawyers, church leaders, economists, the police and military... essentially it applies everybody in leadership or 'expert' positions in major social institutions. 

My point here - which I think was also Jesus's point in His teaching - is that we sin all the time, and deliberately - and we have no intention of ceasing to sin when those sins are socially-allowed/ mandatory; because to do so would put us out of a job, and exclude us from human society. 

Fortunately (!); Jesus came to save sinners, and not those (non-existent) persons who are sin-less.  

Jesus asks 'merely' that we acknowledge that we sin all the time, and cannot (indeed we do not wish to) stop sinning: and 'yet' these and we are exactly those who Jesus can and will save... So long as we are prepared to acknowledge and repent the fact.  

How does this fit with salvation? Well, in the Fourth Gospel ("John") the word "sin" is mostly used to mean "death" - that is, death without resurrection, death without salvation. 

Resurrection (i.e. eternal life, instead of death) depends on what we can call repentance, not on ceasing to sin. 

And repentance is necessary to salvation because resurrection requires that we are prepared to acknowledge sin as sin, and leave it behind us before we can proceed to eternal life in Heaven. After all, Heaven would not be Heaven if sin was still present - there can be no sin in Heaven; but we are all sinful, nearly all the time; therefore we must reject All sin before we can be resurrected into Heaven.

Repentance can therefore be thought of as the firm intent to leave-behind all sin (spectacular and unnoticed) when the choice and chance of resurrection comes to us (presumably, after death), and when all such sins shall be brought to our attention*. 

To "follow Jesus" means to repent all our sins. And it is those sins that are socially un-recognized, denied, or rewarded which are far less likely to be repented than the big and obvious sins on which nearly-everybody is agreed.   

*We cannot, of course, recognize all our individual sins during this mortal life - there are too many, and we lack sufficient discernment! But we can avoid falling into the damnation-trap of denying sin, especially when it is brought to our awareness. That way, when we come to the point of decision, we will not be held back from salvation by our habitual, ingrained and calculated unwillingness to let-go of 'the least of' our sins. For instance; someone who has spent forty years 'justifying' his own deliberate dishonesties in the workplace; may find it very difficult to acknowledge that dishonesty Must utterly and forever be repudiated in Heaven. 

The weight of tradition - our task

These extraordinary times are made the more so by the stunning inability to see what is plain. We are living through the end of a great tradition and long history of Western Civilization; rooted in Greek and Rome, and, for some 1700 years, the Christian church - in its various forms. 

Insofar as this reality is known at all; it is experienced as a weight; and that weight can be felt either as an astonishing (but intimidating!) litany of unsurpassed achievements in human endeavor - or as, just, an oppression. 

On the one hand, such a long and astonishing tradition is stunningly impressive; yet on the other hand it has been overcome. 

Has been... This overcoming of Western Christian Civilization has already happened, and we stand at a point when the implications are being worked-out. Our world has moved from a long phase of collapsing, into its current phase of active destruction. 

Western civilization has-been overcome; yet the ideology that overcame it, which hates that heritage (of Classicism, but even more so of Christianity) does not acknowledge this fact - and indeed, with the right hand, presents itself as both steward and patron of exactly that civilization which, with its left hand, it is destroying as fast as possible.  

If there is a dominant ideological mode by 2022; that mode is untruthfulness, dishonesty, misrepresentation, lies - our world is built from lies, and by lies. 

The spirit of negation has triumphed over the spirit of creation; and (such is this mortal life) negation has the purer and clearer motivation, feels itself the more justified. 

The long history of Western civilization has greatness of creative achievement; and also greatness of horror - its motives always mixed, its triumphs always disputed. (Such is mortal life.)

But the spirit of negation which has, as a matter of fact, brought-down Western civilization, operates from a baseline assumption of absolute purity and coherence of motive; it demands nothing less than absolute perfection - and when it fails to find this, it destroys. 

Such is the ideology of negation - it is able to be and demand purity and perfection exactly because its sanction is destruction. 

The world has changed sides; everybody with power, status, influence is (more-or-less so, but always) of the party of negation*; hence (most of the time) nobody is questioning where this is going, what the destruction is supposed to achieve. 

Recent attempts to describe the goal of the party of destruction - the nature of the world being-aimed-at - are risible, and largely ignored. Nobody asks the ultimate purpose, everybody is engaged in the proximate work of 'clearing the ground' under the (vague) assumption that something not just better but perfect will spontaneously grow to occupy the ruins of The West; will (presumably) grow from the pure seeds of motivation possessed by the destroyers...  

When such 'where?' questions are being-asked; the right hand briefly brings-forward and points-at some goal of the Old West - like science, education, art - and the powers of negation briefly masquerade as steward and patron, guardian and sustainers of all that is good. 

They have, after all, long since taken-over all institutions (bureaucracies, corporations, organizations), all the social functions. Whatever remains of the long tradition of Western Christian Civilization is in their 'care'...

Yet as soon as the discourse moves-on, the directionless work of destruction recommences.

The world now stands-within this ideology of negation. 

Looking outwards from it at the collapsing ruins of tradition; it sees nothing but oppression, hypocrisy, failure. Against such a litany of injustice and disaster, their task is obvious - the necessity of destruction is clear. 

And no matter how much has been destroyed, there is (so far) always more yet to do; the spirits of negation feel that little or no progress has been made, since so much of Western Civilization, of tradition, still stands.

Hence the raging impatience, the urgency that characterizes those on the side of negation!  

So this is the shape of our times. A defeated civilization, the achieved triumph of negation, the zeal of destruction. 

Our choice would seem to be a broken tradition versus nihilism. 

But neither will do. The one is terminally ill and living in a hospice administered by those who would murder it; the other, the mass majority, are destroyers - fuelled by a morality of opposition and inversion. 

Against such a world, each of us can bring the alliance of our-selves with God. 

We can oppose both senility of civilization and the nihilism of negation by taking the side of divine creation, and a providence that works from individual souls rather than from the crumbling sweep of history or the accumulations of negative, oppositional, destructive power.

This can happen only if the base of activity is withdrawn from the arena, and if the mode of operation is lifted above the material. 

Its 'effectiveness', as a life-strategy, depends on our capacity to align with the divine, which depends on our motivation to do so. 

Success (or failure) we must discern and evaluate for our-selves - mindful that this-world is on the one hand 'only' the means to an end; yet on the other hand, so long as we personally remain alive, we have something of potentially eternal value to achieve. 

Since God is the creator - maker of this world, and our loving Father; we need not seek for this personal task:

Life will bring our work to-us. 

Our job (yours, mine) is 'merely' to recognize that task; then to choose well.

*Note - 'The party of negation' is more commonly known as Leftism - but it must be understood that as of 2022 all parties are Leftist; including not just all socialist, liberal, progressive parties, but all centre, moderate, right-wing, libertarian and officially-religious (including 'Christian' church) parties. This because Leftism is rooted in the anti-spiritual/ anti-Christian metaphysics of materialism/ positivism/ scientism and reductionism - which assumptions pervade and dominate the entirety of public discourse. 

The point where lies take-over - but discourse continues...

My world of public discourse - or, at least large-ish sections of it - used to be mostly-honest; such that the lies could potentially be detected and worked-around. 

But from around the millennium, the lies took-over all public discourse - including those special areas that were especially supposed to be about truth: such as science, academia, education, medicine, law. 

And soon the lies took-over. What this means is that people were "not even trying" to be honest - but only, aimed not to be caught being-dishonest, and when they were caught - covering-up their lies.    

From then onward we were living in a discourse-of-lies - and yet the discourse continued...

I experienced this myself in science (especially medical science) as a scientist, editor, and teacher. 

The discourse of science continued - indeed it continued to grow very rapidly; yet the 'new' claims within the fields had zero validity since they were woven-from from material that included many lies, and woven-by people who were not primarily concerned with honesty. 

It became ever less possible to teach, research or write honestly; except using only (selected) historical or personally-validated information, and dedicated to historically important matters - utterly avoiding new work and current issues. 

And, in fact, such practice is not allowed; therefore honesty is excluded. 

In such a situation, truth is not discernable; because truth does not 'stand-out' when evaluations and evidence are dishonest - quite the opposite. 

Yet the discourse continues... Examples: We know that the mass media discourse is a tissue of lies; and yet people continue to take it seriously, discuss and analyze it as if the truth could be sifted-out. State and Corporate controlled research - wholly orientated towards the expediencies of the state and corporations - continues to claim special validity, and indeed increasingly demands and enforces unquestioning/ enthusiastic obedience. The law is become a weapon of leftist totalitarianism; and yet is taken to define 'justice'. 

In all the areas of public discourse - and increasingly in private, among friends and in the family - the lies have taken-over; yet the discourse continues as if the lies were rare and exceptional! 

The identification exposure of specific 'frauds' in 'science', or lies in journalism, or corruption in politics; all reinforce the assumption that these are exceptional; when in fact these whole-systems (science, media, politics - add law, military, universities etc.) are built-on lies and function dishonestly.  

The truth is that we cannot participate in dishonest discourse, without ourselves being corrupted by dishonesty - and this means that we then need to acknowledge and repent our own dishonesty, as often as it happens. 

...Which repentance rarely happens - and therefore the corruption remains and accumulates. 

This, I believe, is a major reason for the corruption of the Christian churches. By increasingly participating in the dishonest discourse of politics, economics, finance, law, the media, 'science', education etc - by therefore being dishonest but not acknowledging or repenting this dishonesty - churches have themselves become a part of the discourse of lies; the leadership lying to- and among-themselves, as well as to laity.   

Thus all institutions are corrupt; and aid in the corruption of each other, and of individual persons. 

The only possible escape from general and increasing corruption and untruthfulness, is to detach oneself to a situation which is sufficiently honest that dishonesty stands-out and can be repented; and this means either small (family-like) groupings (if we are fortunate); or else (if less fortunate) to escape to the discourse of one's own self (which is, after all, for a Christian not alone, never alone).

 

The asymmetry of Heavenly Good and hellish evil

Asymmetry is usual - especially when it comes to Good and evil; because Good is (roughly speaking) taking the side of God and creation - which is a positive commitment towards the divine destiny; while evil is to be opposed to these - which is negative, oppositional. 

So to become permanently Good is different from becoming permanently evil - in each case 'permanent' has a qualitatively different meaning. 

 

As I understand it; the choice to follow Jesus Christ leads through resurrection to Heaven. It is, therefore, a transformation - a transformation from this transitional, temporary, mortal embodied life, to a final, permanent, eternal embodied life.  

The resurrected life entails that we are prepared to make a permanent commitment to God's creation. 

 

The idea of eternity and permanence should not be thought to mean that Heavenly existence is some kind of unchanging stasis. I think it is better understood in the above terms as a final transformation. 

After resurrection there is no further transformation: the resurrected Man is qualitatively final in form - although he can develop further, towards creative divinity. 

 

In the resurrected condition this eternal commitment is possible in a way that is not possible on earth. 

Earthly life is 'entropic', change cannot be prevented, and change tends to be degenerative (towards chaos)...

But Heavenly life is eternally self-generating - there is no entropic tendency, but instead creation is the dominant reality. 

 

Anyway; the path to salvation is by following Jesus to Heaven; and once that has been accomplished, that situation is irrevocable. 

The resurrected man has made a free and conscious choice to make a permanent, positive commitment, and that commitment is - from then onwards - permanent! 

We could say (just as a model summary) that there is something like a special provision made that such a permanent commitment to Good is possible; or we could simply say that if permanent commitment to Good was not possible, then Heaven would be impossible - since (across eternity) members would all be prone to lapse and reverse; and Heaven might become hell...  

The situation for evil is different. There is no 'special provision' that enables any individual to make a permanent commitment to evil. Therefore, all commitment to evil is ultimately contingent; there is no 'philosophically principled' reason that actively prevents any individual (up to and including Satan) from repenting.

But it would be an error to infer from this that repentance is in practice possible for everyone. What prevents repentance is essentially Not Wanting to Repent. 

With evil, there is a kind of spiral of probabilities against wanting to repent. Unprepented sin leads to more unrepented sin (as we see from everyday observation); so that individuals get deeper then deeper into evil; and the desire to repent and live in Heavenly harmony with God's creation gets less and less - while opposition to God and creation gets more habitual and stronger. 

 

As a person becomes more evil; he develops stronger habits of untruthfulness (lying is intrinsic to evil); he practices moral inversion - such that all possible 'evidence' is understood as confirming his existing evil assumptions.

For example, other peoples' moral concern and forgiveness is interpreted as stupidity and weakness; the misery and pain of others leads to positively-reinforcing feelings of excitement, power, sexual arousal; successful dominance leads to despising those dominated; but defeat and failure leads to resentment and plans for revenge - etc. 

Whatever happens, it only serves to fuel the commitment to evil, the oppositional goals. 

 

We talk of an evil person 'selling his soul' to Satan - but this is a process, rather than a one-off transformation like salvation. 

A Man chooses to enter a path of evil; and every further choice to continue the path gets easier - while repentance (while still always theoretically possible) inflicts higher and higher costs in terms of unpleasant/ crippling feelings of remorse. 

It is always easier to become more evil, and it gets more and more difficult to repent.    

Thus, permanent Good is asymmetrical with permanent evil: the decision permanently to choose the side of Good being qualitatively irrevocable; while the decision to choose evil is a matter of becoming more-and-more quantitatively irrevocable - more-and-more permanent; in a positive feedback fashion: with each deviation leading to further deviation in the same direction. 

Divisive rhetoric... Is increasing divisiveness wrong? No, it is the value-inversion between the divisions that is characteristically evil

I see a lot of complaints (from both sides of the issues) against divisive rhetoric from those in power: the kind of rhetoric that demonizes those who oppose and disagree. 

This seems to be escalating over time; with any-and-all those who oppose whatever-is-today's mainstream plans of the birdemic-peck, antiracism, climate-warmism, trans-agenda... whatever; declared to be terroristic, conspiratorial, evil-motivated etc.

This is done to justify ever more extreme sanctions; and to compel spiritual compliance with the agenda of evil*.  

But - as so often - the Left are not wrong concerning the reality of division, demonism and strategic evil.

The division is real, but the Left are practicing that value-inversion which is characteristic of the most extreme version of genuine evil. 

The most extreme submission to evil is that which inverts Good and evil. Thus virtue and vice, beauty and ugliness, truth and lies, harmony and chaos are all swapped and relabeled. 

The division is real because the world is divided between those on the side of God, divine creation and The Good - and those who are on the side which opposes these. And these sides are indeed getting ever further apart   

So one thing the Leftist Totalitarian Establishment are absolutely 100 percent correct about is that this is a divided world. This is a major (perhaps The major) fact of these times. 

And the Establishment are also correct to demonize one of the sides of this division; because one of the sides is quite literally in service to actual demons. 

And the division is widening, with no grey area between the sides; exactly because evil is feeding-off itself and becoming more evil. 

So the Globalist Leftist Establishment are quite correct in their formal characterization of the situation in the world today - they are right to demonize one of the sides; and the 'only' big thing they get wrong is which side is which: which side is Good, and which side is demonic! 

And the only people who are completely wrong are 'moderate', decent, sensible folk who deny the reality of value division, deny the separation of Good and evil sides; and who preach for de-escalation of rhetoric, polite manners, compromise and reconciliation! 

Those who refuse to choose Good or evil sides, by denying that there are sides; by denying that there truly is purposive evil in this mortal world!

These are the self-blinded and the zombie-minded who have incrementally sleepwalked themselves into demonic servitude; and who are by-now so corrupted that they have not even noticed the fact!

*Note added. Of course I do not approve of the threatening aspect of the divisive rhetoric, directed at me and others on the side of God - but it is to be expected when the world is ruled by actively-evil beings. Such persons will naturally compound the primary evil of value-inversion with (as many as possible) further evils of untruthfulness, spite, sadism, fear-mongering, resentment-fomenting, despair-encouraging etc. 

Obedient clueless incompetence - mainstream modern mediocrity

Because of the systematic and coercive untruthfulness of our society, incompetence is more common than it used to be. It has also changed its form.

About 40 years ago, incompetence was mostly psychopathic - and therefore a matter of individuals. The incompetence of psychopathic individuals was short termist and selfish, they used their jobs to get money, steal, coerce sex, torment people or get whatever they wanted. In general incompetent psychopaths were impulsive, chaotic and tried to do as little as possible. In order to achieve and maintain this they would lie, cheat, threaten, punch, weep, beg... do whatever worked or seemed likely to achieve their goals.

There are still plenty of psychopaths around - and in high places; but modern incompetence is overwhelmingly systematic; hard-wired into the organisation by the infiltration of Leftist ideals - from mission statements, down through aims and objectives, to rules and regulations and the interpretation of laws.

The typical modern organisation demand obedience rather than effectiveness at the purported organisational function. This especially in the linked-bureaucracy - the public sector, major private corporations, NGOs, education, health care etc... all the most powerful and influential organisations.

Thus the typical modern incompetent is a mediocre middle manager: obedient, conscientious, methodical, eager... They are incompetent partly because they could not do better, and partly because incompetence is deeply so assimilated to the (politicised) organisational ethos, that it has become invisible.

The typical obedient, clueless incompetent is that-way in some respects because they don't know any better - nor do they care enough to find out what is better; but even if they did happen to know better, they would be too docile and timid for this to make any difference.

Another important difference is that whereas old-style psychopathic incompetence makes us angry and motivated to do something about it - so there is a negative-feedback-loop that tends to keep it in check... in contrast, the mainstream modern incompetence of over-promoted passive mediocrity fills us with a paralysing pity for its sad little personnel; and these bureaucratic drones are so ubiquitous, and so multi-layered, that the usual evoked-response is resignation and despair.

And so it persists, and expands, and will eventually kill us all...