Musing – Are we facing an economic crisis? Or a moral/cultural implosion?

Hebraic Musing – Are we facing an economic crisis? Or a moral/cultural implosion? 

The news is awash with economic challenges and election news is economy driven. BUT the pattern in other news articles in recent weeks ought to raise an even greater concern. Have you read recent articles about cannibalism, mommy porn in Time magazine, a porn book as best-seller, gay marriages, right to life issues, teen pregnancies, shrinking church attendance, increasing teen suicides – to name a few? What in the world is going on? One of many scriptural examples in 1 John 5:19 We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one.

•“Cannibals In The News: Five Bizarre Acts Of Human Flesh Eating In One Week” is a headline in Huff Post. And yes, I glanced over two of these articles in my daily news reading.
•“Church attendance” – While 40% claim to go to church, the actual attendance is closer to 20%; and declining! And teens are finding church to be irrelevant while teen suicides are increasing.
•“Fifty Shades of Grey” novels a.k.a. “Mommy Porn” have become the recent best-sellers! We no longer gasp at ‘costume malfunctions’!
•“Mommy Porn” on the front page of Time magazine, and defended by the editors.
•“Gay Marriage” -- President Obama finally revealed his stance; or his politically motivated position.
•“Abortions” -- Americans have aborted more than 53 million babies; far more human beings than the Nazis murdered during the Holocaust. And now our President and many in House of Congress have gone on the record in support of sex-selection abortions.
•“Teen pregnancies” -- the United States has the highest teen pregnancy rate of the Western industrialized world and 79 percent of teenagers who become pregnant are unmarried. About 820,000 teens become pregnant each year; 34 % of teenagers have at least one pregnancy before they turn 20. 

I repeat – What in the world is going on? America grew and prospered as a Christian nation built on a foundation of Judeo-Christian beliefs, laws and practices. As we look at the list above, we realize that the foundation is crumbling fast, especially recently. And since it is the people allowing it to happen without calling on God, what can or will stop us on this ‘slippery slope’?

 Point to Ponder 

How to prepare ourselves and those around us to deal with the ‘world’ to come? 

Yosef a.k.a. Joe Brusherd
Author “Hebraic Insights – messages exploring the Hebrew Roots of Christian faith”
Author “Biblical Marriage” (published June 2012, see Amazon.com)
Weekly e-mails “Hebraic Musings” blogging available at www.InsightsByYosef.com
To be added to distribution -- Yosef1@cox.net

Definition of the “slippery slope” argument (definition from pg. 250 “Hebraic Insights”) 

Definition of the "slippery slope" argument is essentially that, if you make any exceptions to a rule, or if you make rules that depend on fine distinctions, pretty soon people will be ignoring the original rule entirely. If you allow exceptions to a rule, it creates a slope away from the absoluteness of the rule which people will slide further and further until they will not obey the rule at all. Have you heard the following statements? - If you give people an inch, they will take a mile. - If you let your camel put its nose into your tent, pretty soon the whole camel will be in the tent. A study of “slippery slope” logic points out that, when making laws that are exceptions to the rule, one needs to remain aware of the underlying absolute rule. Failure to do so will make the slope slippery.

Points to Ponder 

Question: Where are the absolutes? 

Answer: In God’s Torah, which is not well taught in most of our traditional Christian churches today. 

And Torah teaching is definitely not found in our public school curriculum.