I as everyone else in life, encounter people with views other than my own. It is life. In youth I never gave conservative versus liberal much thought probably due to wise parents who arranged activities to keep their kids out of trouble rather than talk politics. However, as I grew older, I became fascinated with how people develop intellectually, politically, socially, spiritually, with world-views that shape who we are, and what we do as a person, a family, and as a nation. What is it exactly that molds us into who we become? Is there a common denominator? What defines our actions? What is the thought process that develops so acutely it defines what we do on a daily basis?
There are many forms of thought that indicate where we are on the political spectrum. There are progressives, democrats, leftists, socialists, Marxists, communists, liberals, fascists, Stalinists, Maoists, Leninists, and other indicators of our views based on the way we think and what we support. We are what we think. Likewise, there are words for what could generally be in the category or genre of conservative. In political philosophy, the above words mean profoundly different things as they relate to our ideology.
Spiritually, over a lifetime I have learned that every aberrant human behavior is due to a wound or a hurt. We act out our hurts or virtues in the market place whether we are aware of them or not. Behavior has an origin spoken or unspoken, acknowledged or not acknowledged, aware or not aware, confronted or ignored.
Jesus said “my sheep hear my voice and obey.” Obedience to His word is paramount for an ordered life. Jesus said, “I come to give you life and give it more abundantly, and Satan is out to “kill, destroy, and steal.” Satan said, I will not serve and the rebellion of mankind began. There is sin—and it has consequences.
Where is the intersection of disordered affections due to sin and a political philosophy that is acceptable and civil, or one that flies in the face of what is contrary to Scripture and ungodly? We are living in times where Sister Lucia of Fatima labeled it one of “diabolical disorientation.” Our present times are one of great confusion and division. As a nation we are on the cusp of violence due to such radically differing views of the populace. No matter the subject there is great discord that has grown to hatred. What will be the spark to send people over the edge into societal chaos is unknown, but as the anger and animosity builds it may not take much for some form of eruption?
G. K. Chesterton called the mind of a progressive, “the modern and morbid habit of always sacrificing the normal to the abnormal.” The rebellion in the streets and the hearts and souls of man is an alienation from God. If one is alienated from God, they are alienated from self, and thus others. The angry man is not even able to articulate why they are angry. Anarchy is their utopia.
As they march and vent their anger with the heel of their shoes, their pen, or their voice, they are rejecting tradition, virtue, the normal for the abnormal, for something that works versus something that doesn’t work, order for chaos, and supplanting new forms of “social justice” in all of its ill formed thinking. All the while the unbeliever is rejecting the tradition of the gospel and the very words of Jesus, and striving to build a new world with no foundations other than living by their glands. The liberal is looking to replace any traditional thinking for the chaos of the unknown. In short, the liberal wants a world without God because they think they have a better way to order society. The liberal also wants to end any connection to the traditional normal and desires to have the state supreme. The state cannot reform man’s soul, but only the Lord can. It is for this reason Jesus did not come as a political ruler. He came to change hearts—and no matter the politics, a person becomes better if a heart is changed towards God.
When man believes in nothing, he will believe in anything. Likewise, if he believes in nothing, he will believe in anyone. Or the old adage, “if a man doesn’t stand for something, he will fall for anything.” The fruit of unbelief is tyranny. Reject God, and blood runs in the streets. It will take more blood in the streets to bring the Lord back into the classrooms of America. The only blueprint for peace of soul comes from God—nowhere else. That is the history of civilization.
As Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen often said, “marry the age and you become a widow in the next. Man’s whimsy is fleeting because the grass withers and the flower fades, but the Word of God endures forever. Truth is timeless and not wrapped up into the ideology or the fancy of the culture of the day. Truth will always win. Sometimes it takes longer than we may desire, but truth always prevails.
There is little doubt there are many well-intentioned people with liberal views. But, at the very foundation of their thinking is an individual rejecting the plan and order of God, and His ordained word giving mankind a plan for civility and order in a fallen world. In their actions they say, I will do it my way. I will not serve — I have a better way. Jesus was clear when he said, “My ways are not your ways, and unless a seed falls into the ground and die, it cannot bear fruit. “ Man’s rebellion is rooted in pride.
As Isaiah said, “it has been your sin that has separated you from God.” Sin alienates us from everyone and everything, and the result is a life of chaos for individuals, families, cities, countries, and countries.