This Thanksgiving weekend, hopefully, more than a few families will give thanks for all that God has done for us and given to us.
This is in accord with our traditional Judeo-Christian faith, heritage and world view to live as one nation under God. That is, giving thanks and worshiping God is considered tantamount to life itself, according to the faith that from God do all blessings flow.
Whereas our nation’s motto is still “In God We Trust,” we have fallen away from that truth in reality. Our nation has become nearly entirely secularized as humanism (having a human-centered world view), narcissism (being self-centered), hedonism (living for the pleasure of self), nihilism (the rejection of moral and religious principles) and materialism (the value of material possessions over spiritual values) have wrought devastation by way of an orgy of self, which has waged war against the spirit and soul of America.
There were two great works written nearly a century ago that speak to the underpinnings of Western Civilization that make for a stable and prosperous society.
First, the British anthropologist from Oxford, J.D. Unwin, studied some 86 societies and civilizations in his book “Sex and Culture.”
Mr. Unwin determined that society and culture either flourished or collapsed by way of sexual mores, which served to either promote or destroy the social, familial, moral and rational foundations of civilization, respectively.
When chastity, life-long monogamy, belief in God,and rational thinking disappeared from society, within three generations the culture collapsed.
Next, Harvard sociologist Carle Zimmerman’s “Family and Civilization” concluded that the monogamous nuclear family construct alone is the cornerstone of advanced civilizations. Mr. Zimmerman listed several signs of societal collapse, which has always followed people divorcing, foregoing marriage in the first place and child rearing altogether, along with numerous forms of debauchery, all of which indicated that as the nuclear family disintegrated, the civilization collapsed.
Let us now consider the British empire, the source of our lineage and a predictor of our fate, which declined shortly after World War 1, having missed similar warnings.
British pastor John Stuart Holden wrote in his book “The Confidence of Faith”, during World War 1, that British society “is marked by flippant folly and vain, empty, and worthless living.”
Because Britain’s national mission in the world (starting in the family!) “was to resist evil, protect the weak and to establish righteousness, that mission could not be accomplished until Britain’s soul was recovered. Nothing but God’s indwelling control can ensure unquenched hope, maintain unfailing inspiration, inspire undimmed faith and create unsullied holiness.”
Ditto for America!
I have likened all this to sailing through life with a broken compass. We no longer understand our calling, nor do we accept our responsibilities, including self-control, required to fulfill our destiny.
In the “Pirates of the Caribbean” movies, however, Captain Jack Sparrow possesses what could be considered the modern-day compass. It does not point to true north or to a just cause, instead it points to what Jack wants most. That may work for a pirate’s life, but it spells disaster for the rest of society.
This reminds me of a piece I wrote, “When Prophets Visited Harvard.” Alexander Solzhenitsyn and Charlton Heston respectively warned America about the coming catastrophe to our society and culture that came by way of forgetting God along with the commensurate duties to God and neighbor, along with the ensuing culture war that served to prevent us from separating truth from falsehood and right from wrong.
Unless we turn this ship around and remember what has been forgotten and agree with Mr. Solzhenitsyn’s plea to “live not by lies,” our impending destination will be far off from that of our pilgrim and puritan forefathers.
Andy Caldwell is the COLAB executive director and host of “The Andy Caldwell Show,” airing 3 to 5 p.m. weekdays on KZSB AM 1290, the News-Press radio station.
