Owned. That describes most of us. All of us.
Cultural analysts point to the current trend to trade in civil freedoms in the name of national security, but that's what has been happening on a social level for decades. We've traded our liberty to think as individuals in exchange for the safety of conformity. In fact, we've been doing it for so long that we're beginning to lose touch with reality. That's the first sign of insanity, and certainly absurdity.
We have forgotten the reality that we are flesh and blood, and we live on a material earth, that exists now, and existed before the twenty-first century. It is real. Our ability to act and choose is real. The fact that we are alive is real. We are a part of history. We can choose to do whatever we wish with our lives.
But we've forgotten that fact. Instead we bow as idolaters before our Golden Culture. Culture is not real—it is manmade. It doesn't exist, it is an idea, an idea that is subject to our approval, not the other way around. We are as described by the prophet Isaiah: He feeds on ashes, a deluded heart misleads him; he cannot save himself, or say, "Is not this thing in my right hand a lie?" (Isaiah 44:20, New International Version).
Sometimes the best medicine is to find a lonely field to sit silently in, feel the dirt with your fingers, imagine the people that walked on it before you, and realize that you are bound to the earth, and the earth is yours. Your life is your own. God gave it to you. This is your one chance to be the image
of God. Don't let presumptuous cultural mores dictate who are and what you do.
Think. Examine. Live.
Remember, you are responsible first to God, and then to the authorities he sets up—and culture is not one of them. (Romans 12).
2 comments:
yes we are owned, we are slaves , but not slaves of culture.we are the slaves of trends, of fashion, of what other think and say, of stereotypes, slaves of ourselves.u can't say that people are slaves of culture becaus,as you said, it is man made.culture does exist, because under this name hide the arts the customs the beliefs and way of life of all civilisations.culture has deep roots in history,beeing a part of it.I don't think that people live theyr lifes acording to the cultural mores.unfortunatelt people act in mobs,thinking as a crowd and not as individuals. people don't take in consideration theyr opinions and only care about the others opinion, the opinions of powerful and popular ones, and of the church.A rumanian proverb says:Don't mind about the stick from your neighbours yard, mind about the pole in your eye!Well,that's what people should do:think ,and do what they think in stead of leting others think for them and do what those think.
Anyhow,interesting entry.all my best wishes, Vlad.
P.S. Miss talking to you like this.Maybe you will write...hope so. ciao
P.S.2 Simona says Hy! too
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