Have you ever wondered what it looks like when a culture collapses? Have you ever wondered if past cultures that collapsed throughout history knew what was about to happen to them? Did they see it coming, or were they blindsided by it?
I’ve often asked myself those questions, but now I’m also asking myself a new one. Provided the Lord chooses not to return and culminate history, I’m now wondering if future generations will ask the same questions about us?
There are several telltale signs of a culture in decline, or on the brink of collapse. One of which is when a culture fails to safeguard its future and ceases to be good stewards of its next generation. Wanting our children to have a better future than we had is one of the most basic instincts of those who are image-bearers of the Creator. Even some of the most cunning and ruthless men in human history were doting fathers. It takes an especially toxic and potent mixture of narcissism and self-loathing to produce a culture that no longer places the needs of its offspring above its most carnal desires.
Such a culture we have sadly become.
And I’m not even talking about abortion, which is the gravest moral injustice of our time. Tragically, anthropologists will tell you every culture in human history has eventually practiced some form of child sacrifice. Ours is just the next in line. The only difference is we’re not sacrificing our kids to a pagan deity for a bountiful harvest or eternal salvation. We sacrifice our babies on the altar of personal convenience instead.
But you can’t expect a culture to protect its unborn when it has so little regard for its already-born, and there are two recent stories that indicate we could seemingly care less about our children.
ABC News just did a story on the “gospel of polyamory,” which means having multiple romantic and sexual partners in an open relationship together. Titled “the end of marriage,” the story said “more couples are opting to become triples or fourples, with live-in lovers spicing up the marital bed and helping to raise the children.”
The natural human family (i.e. one man and one woman living together in holy matrimony) is one of the cornerstones of a civilized society, for its how we’re intended to procreate the species while also passing along our value system to the next generation. What kind of value system is being passed on to the children of such relationships? What kind of value system do you think they’ll champion once they become adults?
Probably one that looks sadly similar to what we saw during this year’s Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade.
There was Snoopy, Spider-Man, SpongeBob, Hello Kitty, and cross-dressers. Wait? What? Were those actual cross-dressers? As in actual men dressed in drag?
You ain’t just whistling Robert Mapplethorpe.
It’s true. This year’s Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade featured a performance from the cast of the hit Broadway musical Kinky Boots, complete in all their risqué cross-dressing regalia. Kinky Boots is about the “heroic” exploits of a “fabulous drag queen performer” (and is there any other kind?) named Lola, who teaches her stodgy Northern England village a politically-correct lesson about acceptance all the while saving a family shoe business. Two of the memorable songs from Kinky Boots are titled “Sex is in the heel” and “I am not my father’s son.”
Probably not what most Americans had in mind when they turned on the TV to watch the parade with their kids, I would imagine. Drag queens are now “TV-G” according to NBC. Of course, if you disagree you’re just a “hater” and a “bigot.” Some liberals on Twitter were actually excited that parents at the parade or watching it on TV might have to explain “trannies” to their children.
Adults caught in the tangled web of immorality used to put on a false front if it meant protecting the innocence of our children. Now we shamelessly flaunt our impurities and condemn those who don’t want to rob their children of their innocence. And I say this as someone who is not a prude, and I’m sometimes criticized by some of my fellow Christians for my willingness to discuss sexuality honestly.
But there’s having an all-too-honest discussion about the world we live in and the struggles we all face within it among fellow adults, and then there’s targeting children with beliefs and behaviors even pagan and humanistic societies knew enough to shield their children from.
The “red light district” is becoming “Main Street, USA” in our day and age.
Who knows, maybe we’ll escape the cultural catastrophe that has been the result of all other historic examples of “human nature gone wild.” But I doubt it. Ironically, this is all happening as politically correct Hollywood is gearing up its publicity machine for a movie next spring with an A-list cast about the great flood and Noah’s Ark, which is the first example in history of what happens to a civilization when fallen human nature refuses to be restrained.
However, at least one early reviewer of the film’s script says the movie bypasses all of that to espouse environmentalist propaganda instead. In a blog titled “Darren Aronofsky’s Noah: Environmentalist Wacko,” filmmaker Brian Godawa says, “If you were expecting a biblically faithful retelling of the story of the greatest mariner in history and a tale of redemption and obedience to God, you’ll be sorely disappointed.”
So on one hand our culture shows contempt and disdain for its future generations. And then is so narcissistic that it thinks it can unilaterally revise the standard for judgment and accountability for such heinous actions on the other.
Unless revival happens, that is probably a culture living on borrowed time.