Dear friends:
The other day I reported on Patrick J. Buchanan's new book,
"Suicide
of a Superpower." The following essay I wrote in the
1990s
supports Buchanan's thesis.
_______________________________________
Are we seeing the decline of our great
nation, the United
States of America?
Outwardly, we are prosperous and powerful. But like a
muscular athlete
with a terminal cancer, a disease is eating away at us
from the
inside.
Historian Will Durant once said that a great civilization
cannot be
destroyed from the outside until it falls first from the
inside.
No matter how well we might arm ourselves against enemies
outside our
borders, the greatest enemies are those who place
destructive devices
inside our strategic institutions, causing us to morally
implode, like an
imploding building.
The late, brilliant British broadcaster Malcolm Muggeridge
observed,
"Since the beginning of the Second World War, Western
Society has
experienced a complete abandonment of its sense of good
and evil. The
true crisis of our time has nothing to do with monetary
troubles,
unemployment, or nuclear weapons. The true crisis has to
do with the fact
that Western man has lost his way."
Muggeridge described the danger of subtle changes to
culture in his
famous "pot of frogs" illustration. If you drop a frog
into a
pot of boiling water, the frog will immediately jump out.
But if you
place the frog in a pot of lukewarm water and slowly turn
up the heat,
the relaxed frog will just swim around, growing accustomed
to the
increasing warmth until it eventually boils to death. This
is what
happens with cultural decay. It is a gradual process that
slowly dulls
our senses until what was once seen as unacceptable
somehow becomes
acceptable.
Since the 1940s, America has allowed sin to creep into our
nation as
never before. (That ancient word "sin" is not used much
today
but it is still a good and descriptive word. It means
missing God’s mark,
and encompasses all that is not godly.)
As a result, we have become desensitized to sin and our
moral judgment is
impaired. Even worse, at each step along the way, we
eliminated Jesus
Christ from our lives and culture. Like the word "sin,"
over
time, the gospel has become no longer politically correct,
and many
Americans are without a spiritual foundation. Dr. Charles
Malik, former
President of the United Nations General Assembly,
addressed this crisis
of faith:
- "I really do not know what will remain of
civilization and
history if the accumulated influence of Jesus Christ, both
direct and
indirect, is eradicated from literature, art, practical
dealings, moral
standards, and creativeness in the different activities of
mind and
spirit...The heart of the whole matter is faith in Jesus
Christ."
In the years following World War II, General Omar Bradley
warned
America, "We have grasped the mystery of the atom and rejected
the
Sermon on the Mount...The world has achieved brilliance
without
conscience." Though we had helped to win a great military and
moral
victory in Europe, we were becoming a world of "nuclear giants
and
ethical infants." Success and power blinded most Americans to
their
need for God.
One by one, all across America, the great institutions that
had been
fountains of righteousness began to fall away from God. Like
the frog, we
had begun to swim in a pan of lukewarm moral water and never
noticed the
temperature rising.
The result? A flood of immorality, corruption and violence, as
we have
become a culture of death, from the womb to the streets. Many
of our
young people have no concept of God, have no knowledge of His
revealed
Word, and many are tragically dying in this state, without
hope, some in
drug stupors, some by gunfire.
How did this happen?
Many speak of the moral degeneration and wring their hands,
but few
pinpoint the root of the matter.
Primarily during the past 40 years, militant anti-God forces
have been
successful not only in rejecting our nation’s biblical
heritage and our
traditional values, but in rewriting history and convincing
our people,
especially students, that we never had this wonderful
heritage.
Historians believe that the philosophical environment of the
French
Revolution spawned Karl Marx and his communistic and atheistic
ideas.
This in turn spawned Lenin and Soviet state atheism and
socialism,
turning Russia from its 900-year Christian tradition to 73
years of
bloody, godless totalitarianism, costing untold human
suffering and tens
of millions of lives.
Marx's and Lenin's ideas spread to America, taking root among
some labor
leaders, academia and people such as John Dewey and Roger
Baldwin,
founder of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). Dewey,
of course,
was the chief influence in modern American education. His
anti-God
emphasis has resulted in the present decadence and
disintegration of our
entire educational system.
Roger Baldwin wrote: "I am for Socialism . . . I seek the
social
ownership of property, the abolition of the propertied class .
. .
Communism is the goal." While communism may or may not still
be the
ACLU's goal, its history of attacks on religious expression is
legendary.
The influence of Dewey, Baldwin, their followers and other
kindred
spirits has changed the character and nature of America. Such
influence
began to reach the top levels of government in mid-century and
finally,
in 1962-63, resulted in official national (via the U.S.
Supreme Court)
decisions rejecting the God of our fathers in the public life
and schools
of America. In effect, America said, "Stay out, God. You are
no
longer wanted."
Scholars actually trace our current social decline
statistically to this
very time period! Who would deny a cause-and-effect
relationship?
America needs a great spiritual awakening, as she experienced
in times
past. Historically, because of the hardness of men’s hearts,
such
awakenings usually only come after Divine chastening. Let us
hope that
such will not be necessary. But whatever it takes.
On the other hand, there is evidence that we are we too far
along on
God’s prophetic time line of history for there to be a
turnaround. That
may be true nationally, but God always holds out His hand f
mercy to
those who sincerely turn to Him in repentance and faith.
Whichever, let us continue to proclaim the gospel of our Lord
Jesus
Christ and the truths of His Word.