Secular World and God

With every passing year, month, week, day, I become more convinced the secular world believes it is god. Do not many in the secular world now believe that technology is that manifestation for the masses? Christians and Muslims offer the secular world’s only real competition. Jews talk a good game, but most often vote secular. So, from the world’s perspective, it makes perfect sense to play the Christians and Muslims against each other, and reduce both to  irrelevancy. And play the Christians and Muslims, they do, to secularism’s score.

The secular world’s only problem is…God really does exist, and He has made clear that He has other plans. True enough, the secular world’s god has said much the same. Jesus dealt with the issue while He sparred with the moralistic or religious leaders of His day. He reduced the issue to the state of being a father. “You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murder from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks in his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.” In other words, he was a fallen entity from the beginning and does not stand for veracity, because there is no truthfulness in him. When he speaks it is with the intention to mislead. He speaks what is natural to him, for he is a prevaricator himself and the father of deception and all that is false. For, is not the devil a fallen angel who exists to terrorize the world through evil? I contend, secularism is no more than philosophical naturalism that embraces human reason while rejecting religious dogma, thus I find it nefarious. 

So, your father is either God, or the devil. The secular world is, to paraphrase Einstein on what we call reality, “an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.” The secular world has a father, and it’s not God whom Jesus called Father. I would be somewhat surprised if the illusion of the secular world persists beyond this generation’s lifetime.

In Midst of Evil Comes Comfort

Following the Las Vegas massacre, the knifings in Marseille, France and the vehicular homicides in Great Britain and the many other acts of depravity occurring weekly, even daily throughout Europe and America, I was struck by how unwittingly we come into contact or rub elbows with malevolence. How we share the thoroughfares and roadways or pathways with hollowed-out men and ignoble or craven women whose capacity for debauchery knows no bounds. It would be expedient or convenient if such people all looked the same, but sadly, they don’t. They look just like us. And so, we dine and drink with them in eateries, cafes and pubs unknowingly. We walk by them in outlet malls, sit next to them in theaters, and maybe even hold the door for them as they smile and gesture in thanks.

I am aware these are not heartening words. The world is as uncertain as the people in it, and we share this world with some extremely indeterminate entities. But we also share it with existing evidence that expectation will never die.

Take comfort in unknown bystanders who shield others with themselves to save total strangers. Draw encouragement knowing Law Enforcement Officers sprint towards the shooter, the knife wielding terrorist, or the radical Islamist running down innocent pedestrians. Grasp the moment; these everyday people are no less real than the assassin(s).

Why The NFL is in Deep Kimchi

Need I ask if protesting the National Anthem is foolish politics? Do you suppose it’s foolish because that’s one of the symbols that unites us? It’s the equivalent of burning the American flag; has any successful American political movement ever built itself on flag-burning or Anthem-protesting? American history say's no. 

Protesting the National Anthem based on police brutality is for the most part ill-advised given the lack of statistical authentication or evidence of national law enforcement discrimination against innocent African Americans. Star Spangled Banner protest-initiator Colin Kaepernick is chiefly and appropriately seen as a halfwit who bifurcates or divides the nation. 

By turning the Anthem protests from a settled issue into a referendum on him, Trump pushed the Left’s buttons — and the Left responded in the most asinine imaginable way, by proposing, that everyone kneel for the Anthem. The Left thinks they’re protesting Trump’s overreach. The image that will (and did) hit the media airways, however, is Leftists supporting protesting the Anthem itself, which is deeply and properly unpopular. If the Left believes they’re going to win hearts and minds by kneeling for the National Anthem, they’re five beers short of a six-pack. Trump may have trodden in excrement, but he’s the one who will (and did) come out "smelling like a rose. "

So much for that rosy concept. The NFL, like their entertainment and late night late night TV cohorts/hosts has become ground zero for the traditionalist and social Liberal culture wars. Which means that we can’t see movies anymore, watch TV shows anymore, or even watch sports anymore without feeling that we’re being judged. That means our common spaces are disappearing. And we have so little political common space already that cultural common space was our last remnant of harmony.  

The NFL will lose most from this poppycock, and may even be ruined by this. They warrant it.  Multitudes of Americans were already tuning out due to traumatic brain injury/concussion coverage and confirmed domestic abuse issues. Now that will accelerate. That’s due in large measure to the NFL’s utterly inconsistent stance regarding political posturing. When St. Louis Rams players engaged in “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot” protests, the league did nothing; when Dallas Cowboys players wanted to wear Dallas police decals to honor the department after a massacre of officers by a black radical, the NFL turned their request down. When Kaepernick knelt for the Anthem, and other players followed, the NFL did nothing; when some players wanted to wear special football cleats in commemoration of September 11, honoring the fallen, the NFL threatened fines. Now, is it any wonder that fans feel like the NFL took a side here? Is there a bottom line? Yes! Here’s the return: this divergence is not good for America. Do we not need our shared symbols? Do we not need our shared spaces? In all actuality, we need them equally. Both of those components are being destroyed for political and ratings boost. If that doesn’t stop, we’re not going to have anything at all in common in any form conjointly or apart.

All Cultures are Not Equal Part 2 of 2

Here’s the problem with multiculturalism: Are values or ideals such as invention, fundamental rule of law, freedom of expression and women’s autonomy and self-determination equally held across all cultures? If all cultures are equal, how does one account for the fact that, for the last half millennium, it has been one culture—the culture of the West, and now of America—that has shaped the world? Multiculturalists and the ignorant alike explain it in terms of oppression. Western civilization, they say, became so powerful because it is so malevolent. The study of Western civilization, they insist, should focus on colonialism and slavery––the distinctive apparatuses of Western coercion. But are colonialism and slavery uniquely Western? Not at all. History tells us they are universal. As for bondage, it has existed in every culture. Did not American Indians practice slavery long before Columbus set foot in the Western Hemisphere?

What is idiosyncratically Western, in fact, is not slavery, but the elimination of such. And what distinguishes the West from all other cultures are the institutions of democracy, free enterprise, and natural and social sciences. These institutions developed because of a synthesis of classical reason and Judeo-Christian morality. And it is these institutions, I and other enlightened others contend, that comprise the source of Western strength and explain the West’s long-standing dominance in the world. The West’s greatest strength is not merely its military power, but also the unparalleled power of its ideas and institutions.

But what about America? If America is a nation of immigrants––mostly non-white immigrants––doesn’t that, by definition, make it a multicultural society? No! America is a multi-ethnic society. We don’t want it to be a multicultural society. I’m a second-generation American from Sicily. So, no––the United States and Western Europe are not made up of imperialist, colonialist, resource-exploiting, avaricious, snatching, brown-coffee skin-hating people. Our values are worth defending––not just because they are ours, but because they are worthy and good.

All Cultures are Not Equal Part 1 of 2

Question: Do you think America, and those nations associated with the West are made up of colonizing expansionists, intent on exploitation of natural resources and are fine-tuned at loathing rustic skinned people whose moral principles, code, values do not merit defending? Does this question not seem absurd? If you were to argue that no one thinks this way, you would be wide of the mark. Too many people do. And what’s even more disconcerting, many of these people were born and live in the West. Expressed in a different way; they have come to loathe their own way of life. Why so?

This thinking is the product of a tenant or dogma extensively imparted by educators in our schools, especially post-secondary institutions and many political minded liberal elitists. It’s known as multiculturalism, the belief that all cultures are equal. Expressed in a different way; no culture’s morals, art works, system of politics and government, or literary works are greater or poorer than any other. But is this true? Let me stir the pot by raising the possibility that some cultures have contributed more than others and in some instances, much more than others. Having made this statement, some would accuse me of defiling the principal dogma of multiculturalism? Perhaps I have!

More recently, President Donald Trump expressed a similar sentiment in Warsaw: “We write symphonies. We pursue innovation…We treasure the rule of law and protect the right to free speech and free expression…We empower women as pillars of our society and of our success…That is who we are…Those are the priceless ties that bind us together…as a civilization.” For this, Trump was disparaged by multiculturalists. How could he say these things? As if these were unique qualities to white-dominated nations, instead of universal truths of humanity across all cultures.