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Rev. Rich Lang |
What the hell is going on in this country? I’m simply staggered by the weight of worries and the depth of anxiety experienced as the idealism that once made this nation honorable (flawed, but honorable) atrophies. It’s like watching someone you love very much waste away into inevitable death. Or, more to the point, it’s like watching one’s own body waste away into death. We seem to be living in a time of irreparable loss. How did this all happen?
There is never any one factor. Life is far too dynamic and complex to limit causality to one factor. The death of our nation is the result of thousands and thousands of decisions. Throughout the history of our nation there have always been struggles between corporate power versus individual liberty. There have always been struggles between imperial government versus those who insist on limited government. There have always been struggles between landowners and the landless. Within these struggles, and others, our nation forges its destiny.
But for me, I think our nation’s fate was irreparably sealed in November 2000 when corporate interests consolidated around George W. Bush performing a Supreme Court-led coup d’état against democracy. Having perverted the democratic process, the assault on our nation continued with the events of Sept. 11, 2001.
The official story would have us believe that 19 low-life Arabs outwitted the entirety of our military and intelligence apparatus, causing the free-fall destruction of three buildings with two planes, crashing another plane into the most heavily defended building in America, completely disintegrating both it and its passengers, crashing yet another plane into a field, disintegrating both parts and bodies — feats never accomplished before or since — and then, as a kind of dessert, a bunch of military-issue anthrax shows up in the offices of two key Democratic Party leaders. The after-dinner drink, straight out of the Nazi playbook, was to ram through an unread, undebated PATRIOT Act that has led to our current surveillance society of lawlessness. The really bizarre turn of events is that the American people actually accept the official story, and become irate with those who call it into question. It’s like how we feel when someone spills the truth about Santa Claus. It reminds me of Jesus’ question to his disciples: “Are you being willfully stupid?”
For those of us who see the world through a Biblical lens, the implosion of our imperial quest is not surprising. God, the spirit of life itself, opposes the consolidation of power that imperial quests represent. Such idolatry is always violent, and always leads to delusion and eventual self-destruction. Our nation has embarked on a voyage of sorrows with the worst yet to come. I think it’s time for the Church to publicly talk about this. I think we need a Truth Commission. Anyone want to help? |
