I Have My Work Cut Out For Me...

I have come to a very scary revelation. It is going to take me the next 25 years to even begin to digest and process what I have learned in these past four years of seminary. As I was sitting in my Foucault class this afternoon doing everything that I could to simply keep my mouth shut and not weigh into a conversation that could only end up badly for me. I realized that I can not simply dismiss many of these ideas that I have disagreed with on such a gut level. I don’t think that I will ever reach a point where I am in agreement, but I think that it will be critical for my ministry to try to understand where these ideas have come from and at the very least to understand the needs and desire of the people who express them.

I believe that we are all interconnected. What I do affects you and what you do affects me. No mater how hard I may try to understand some of the ideas that I hear expressed by my colleagues, I can’t get past this basic idea that we are all a part of something much bigger and if I do something harmful to myself or to my relationships with others, those actions will have a ripple effect that will impact many more people and ultimately society.

Take a popular television program like The Bachelor for instance. It could be argued that it is just a television show, and that it is simply a form of entertainment, but I can’t help but see the way that it denigrates the relationship between two people and reduces love, commitment and ultimately marriage to the level of a game show. I struggle to see how this could possibly have any form of positive impact on society. But then I have to step back and ask the question, how did we get here? Was a program like The Dating Game that I watched as a child preparing our society to accept a program like The Bachelor? If so, what will be the next step beyond The Bachelor? I mean the divorce rate is already above 50%, how much worse can it get? Do we ultimately do away with marriage all together?

Are we reaching a point in society where our relationships with each other are becoming so shallow that we will allow "America" to vote online and decide who we should pick to “hook-up” with? Perhaps that will be the next generation of Facebook, “Pick the top 5 girls/guys I should be with.” Notice I didn’t say marry, I’m really afraid that marriage itself may be a dying institution. This whole idea of Facebook just seems to keep people at a distance. Oh sure I know what time people get up, what they had for breakfast, and what they are doing today, but that just gives me the illusion that I know them, I am only learning what they want me to know which may give the impression that I know them, but the reality is often quite different.

I am very concerned about our ability to really connect with each other on a deep personal level. In my lifetime I have seen a tremendous change in how we define a traditional family, marriage and personal relationships. These changes, I believe, will only become more and more profound in the foreseeable future. How do we respond to these changes? How do we as a society negotiate this new world? How do we mourn the loss of these things that we have held so dear while seeking to look forward and embrace the future? I think that I will definitely have my work cut out for me over the next 25 years figuring this all out.

Blessings