There’s so much talk these days about so-called “Millennials.” Millennials are the generation born between 1980 and 2000. They are “digital natives,” and the defining events of their lives include the Oklahoma City bombing, 9/11, the War on Terror, Harry Potter, the Great Recession, and the birth of social media. Oh, and by the way, they love avocado toast.
The words “endangered species” brings to mind fatalistic headlines about animals on the verge of extinction. Landing on the endangered species list is, in the minds of many, as good as a death sentence. Lately, however, endangered species are more often making the news for being removed from the list, not making it.
Here’s a prediction: Thousands of years from now when archaeologists excavate American churches, they’ll identify the 1990s era by “What Would Jesus Do?” bracelets, DC Talk CDs, and purity rings.
Americans are afraid… perhaps more than at any time since 9/11. It’s understandable. Despite the fact that most of us are safer today than we think, the sheer evil that’s behind a mass shooting or a violent attack is put right in our face by the 24-hour news cycle.
Recently, a friend shared with me a statement on a personal issue that she wanted to post on social media. I urged her not to do it, partly because of my own experiences with social media, and partly because I’m convinced that what happens on these platforms isn’t nearly as consequential as we often feel they are.
In his book, “The Reason for God,” Tim Keller argues that Christianity is the only truly global religion. Indeed, within a few generations of Christ, the Christian faith had spread across much of the known world—from India to North Africa to furthest reaches of the Roman Empire and into the barbarian lands of Northern Europe. Yet up until a hundred years or so ago, for all kinds of historical and sociological reasons, Christianity became a predominantly Western religion.
The state of our national discourse is, to put it mildly, discouraging and unhelpful, and the reaction to the recent shootings only amplified how bad it is. Once again, everyone took their place along partisan battle lines to pound the same old drums, but it’s past time we admit that there’s something deeper going on in America than too many guns, or too few guns, or violent video games, or the President’s rhetoric, or even the evil of white supremacy.
“If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds,” Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn wrote, “and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them.”
A few weeks ago, I came across a video that you might call “YouTube Gold.” That’s the phrase used these days for “an oldie-but-a-goodie” video. It was a classic Chuck Colson speech. He was speaking at a conference that was otherwise overly-academic.
