Wise persons look for meaning. Without meaning, individuals, even societies, do not find themselves. For those without meaning, life becomes something of a gamble (crap shoot). Chance (events), as it is cast, controls their lives. Chance offers sometimes good and sometimes ill, sometimes the joker and sometimes trumps. Sometimes things seem all aces. Sometimes there appear twos, three, and fours in various combinations or colors that will spell out losing perhaps at low level. So those persons may sink into addictions that will destroy them before their time. Some addictions may even add years to life because they are athletic or wholesome, without being too strenuous, or they may be helpful to others, so helpful they may simply reinforce poor behaviors without concern about the good they might give if they were directed to those open to change. So they become Jekyl/Hydes, or bores, or aid persons in ways to advance debilitating conducts, attitudes – even cursing spirits. At this writing I would focus on the current drug dealers in Mexico who have so lost their humanity and meaning that they kill innocents, threaten communities, disregard society and law, while dealing their drugs at unconscionable profits that in turn destroy meaning for families. Government monitoring and authority seem currently unable to defeat it.
The world of the future is tangled for the citizenry, and society lacks the will to meet and deal with the enemies of its children. That failure is in the lack of moral courage, in the escape from responsibility in the unending fight against evil. Virtue is not identified in the Church, or in Scripture, or prayer. It rests in persons guided by commitment, applied values – persons who learn and sense right and wrong, and have the courage to resist forces of evil, in self and society. Leaders lose the main focus for leadership – persons holding values for society. As I write, there is in construction, a super computer in Cheyenne, Wyoming. When completed that computer is believed to be able to predict the weather for individual communities for years ahead – the snow fall, the temperatures and all the rest. It is claimed that in one hour it can literally make as many calculations as there are sands on the seashore. It is named the Yellowstone, and will perform one and a half quadrillions (1,500,000,000,000) calculations a second – which is about 250,000 per second for every person on earth. The mathematicians believe the results will be liberating to the future and make life better. Others are doing some research that will more than boggle the minds of the population, and all designed for better things for mankind. The discoveries of space exploration have already taught us something about the uses of time, and ways of manufacture of things like better lenses for eyeglasses. Commercial space has now openly replaced other priorities related to human needs. None of this will mean benefit for society without upping quality performance in nations. Society will not be saved by technology. Solutions are in us, using that offered to us for the good society.
To what ends is mankind headed? If we are selfish, straying, corrupted, excessively competitive with neighbor persons or nations, avoiding the need for morality, ill tempered, improperly motivated, without meaning – what’s the use? Why have dreams of discovery and of man’s special place in the universe if there is nothing but nothingness at the end? Here is where informed Christians ought to be making directions and processes clear in the call to right (righteousness) in the ongoing management of society.
The problem of humanity is humanity. Everything else is stuff. Creation of earth was given of God as our life work/habitat carrying some requirements for equity and meaning as the creation of God. One limitation is that the tree of knowledge, rooted in moral ground, was and is God’s private option. God refused to permit mankind to get away with independent access to his nature. He made clear the planet was for mankind, that we should work (dress the garden), and educate ourselves (know it). The invitation remains even in our limited environment. Mankind could have done better, but violated the commission. Independence from God, pride and violation invited sin. We can form good persons in nature, but the sin distractions beckon. The story of God dependence needs to be reiterated in every generation. That gospel story dissemination is a commission of Christ for all persons. (Matthew 28:18-20) *Mark W. Lee, Sr. — 2016, 2020