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“People were eating, drinking,
marrying and being given in marriage up to the day Noah entered the ark.
Then the flood came and destroyed them all” (Luke 17:27). Aldous
Huxley was not far off the mark. Mankind’s obsession with entertainment
and pleasure will as surely destroy all that makes human life worth living
as did the waters that drowned the ancient world.
The mass media has transformed science,
education, journalism, politics, and even religion, into bite-sized
amusement performances. Most of the nightly TV shows enjoyed by an
estimated 90 million Americans make fun of purity and honesty, and revel
in anomia, the opposite of agape. What
we are viewing is actually a cultural love affair with death.
Politics, once serious argument (for
example, the Lincoln-Douglas debates in the 19th century), is
now largely a test of who is the most witty, telegenic personality.
Televised news comes in 45 second doses with the average camera shot
lasting 3½ seconds. New York radio station WINS says, “Give us 22
minutes, and we’ll give you the world.”
In the same breath that a newscaster
announces the agony of thousands in another earthquake, hurricane, or
tidal wave, he quickly adds with a smile, “And now, this word from
Burger King.” Scenes of mass killings are juxtaposed with frivolous
commercials designed to induce laughter. We are only a step away from
cracking jokes about a crucifixion or cheering arrogantly as a lion eats
an unpopular martyr.
Humor, which in its healthy form is
spontaneous and intelligent, has become calculated silliness Our mindless
laughter is rapidly becoming what Huxley feared; the people in his Brave
New World were laughing instead of thinking—but worse, they did not
know what they were laughing about or why they had stopped thinking!
Dr. George J. Bryjak, professor of
sociology at the University of San Diego, says, “For tens of
thousands of Americans, sport is the one thing that makes life worth
living. As we approach the 21st century, this trend will not only continue
but accelerate. ... Pollster George Gallup, Jr., reports that ‘most
people feel little satisfaction from what they’re getting out of their
religion.’ Although the number of people who watch televised National
Football League games on any given Sunday still lags behind church
attendance, I am quite certain which activity generates the most
enthusiasm—and it’s not singing ‘0 Come All Ye Faithful’” (San
Diego Union, Nov. 11, 1986).
Buster Soaries describes us as “an
entire country ... hypnotized by television, mesmerized by music, and
anesthetized by drugs and alcohol. ... While technology grows, theology
shrinks, and God is reduced to a convenience item for casual use.” No
wonder Jesus looked ahead to this generation and asked: “When the Son
of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?” (Luke 18:8).
In this amusement and entertainment
culture, children have difficulty learning right from wrong—and that
spells disaster for human survival on this planet. William Raspberry
quotes a New York Times story about a school counselor sitting by
neutrally while his class concluded that a girl was stupid to return $1000
that she had found. The counselor “told them he believed the girl had
done the right thing, but that, of course, he would not try to force his
values on them. ‘If I come from the position of what is right and what
is wrong,’ [he argued] ‘then I’m not their counselor.’”
Is it possible to reverse this deadly
process? Can agape love be revived after it has grown cold? Can our
downward spiral of anomia be averted before national or global
suicide occurs?
Yes! The apostle John reached the highest
summit of biblical revelation when he declared that “God is love [agape]”
(1 John 4:8). That one word, rightly appreciated, would overnight end
wars, crime, military spending, selfishness, and corruption—a goal that
all the scientists and politicians in the world are powerless to
accomplish. But the Bible declares that the present world, as a whole,
will never accept God’s solution to our human problem.
As Individuals We Can Get Hold of
It
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