Changing Modern Culture, A Long And Winding Road

Smitty at TOM addresses a post from Jerry at Goldfish and Clowns. Jerry makes a good point about music having an appeal on an intellectual level. Look what an influence the folk and rock music of the sixties and seventies had on our culture.

If you reinvigorate someone at the deepest level, it becomes far easier to do so at all other levels. Intellectual appeals are a good thing, but ofttimes God speaks through His language, namely music, with far greater effect. Music engages heart and soul. The mind has no choice but to follow.

Speaking the common language of music opens doors no conservative blog, podcast or what have you can ever hope to reach. Cephas Hour isn’t part of the silliness that says let’s take popular songs and somehow extrapolate from them life lessons. It is music that both asks questions and provides answers. It is the open hand that says come, let us reason together; from there providing guidance toward common sense thinking, grounded in the faith, that leads to a radical shift toward normalcy. Certainly there are fans who are liberals. That’s okay. You’ve opened a dialog based in a common interest. That is the idea, isn’t it? Speaking to those who disagree with you and let what happens as a result happen?

Music does reach into a person’s heart. Talk is cheap and the cacophony of voices can seem like a veritable Tower of Babylon what with all the noise from the left and the seeming dearth of voices from the right. We’ve allowed the left to push the cultural agenda for several generations and it’s time we pushed back.

Smitty has a good point. Patience is virtue, especially when it comes to changing the modern culture. The secular progressives have had over a hundred years to work on their subversion of our culture and we can not expect to change it overnight.

Moving toward a conclusion, what do Christians do? Here I’m going to break the Maslow pretense and have he temerity to link a few places in the New Testament.

First, patience. Moses had to write off two generations in Sinai before the Israelites were ready. We have, at the high end, a bunch of deadbeat Boomers who’d beggar any number of generations in the name of me, me, me, and I. At the low end, the non-approach to societal continuity has stunted the growth of the Millennials. I’m not of the notion that, once raised in moochery, the human mind is incapable of growth. But we need to admit that the yield of mature, liberty-loving Americans from this bunch is going to be low.

Second, principles. We can vary all over the place in style, but the basic substance of our mission to nourish minds and drive actualization cannot be distracted by shiny things, “Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ” holds true now as ever. Because that’s very clearly been the case in this country since the Godless Commies arrived and started going after our Precious Bodily Fluids.

Third, panache. While being patient and adhering to principle, have some panache. As you are equipped. When inclined. Taking frequent breaks from engagement with the foe. That whole armor of God you put on wasn’t for just the parade, folks! In real life (where it matters) but also online, engage the culture. If your Twitter profile says ‘Christian’, you’re going to get some blowback. Return some cheerful, loving fire, in good taste. One of my favorite tacks is mocking the idolatrous view of government given to us as Progress.

My contention, to answer the mail on Jerry’s original question is: be yourselves. Let the sudden, surprising precipitation of results from the solution be a love note from God. Miracles are ferociously tricky to plan. Yet to the patient, who’ve abided in what’s good, and diligently sought to double their issue of talents, good things just seem to happen. The pagans call it ‘luck’.