When I looked at today’s readings this was the most convicting. We have been told that we should just fit in, and that we should be part of the herd, like rabbits, not thinking independent, like hawks (the original analogy used wolves, but hawks exist in NZ: wolves do not).
As James pointed out at Thinking Housewife, naturally we descend to a fairly nasty and brutish existence.
We continue to believe that “doing what comes naturally” is the same for men and for women, but nothing could be further from the truth.
Men, absent faith in God and obedience to his commandments, will spread their seed to the maximum extent feasible, unless constrained by custom or law. Women, under the same circumstances, will seek out the strongest, bravest, and boldest man to father their children.
We are in denial about the mostly black culture that we have created in our “inner cities.” (How easily that rolls off the tongue; “inner” meaning “inhabited by blacks!”) For these women, their mate, even though incarcerated, can offer them more in the way of protection (and thrills) than any poor black man living an honest life.
(Hat tip TradChristianity)
Now to today’s passage. My immediate thought was that all the things we are not supposed to think about are the tools that advertising uses: lust, greed, sloth (this will make your life easier) and covetousness.
1So if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth, 3for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4When Christ who is your life is revealed, then you also will be revealed with him in glory.
5Put to death, therefore, whatever in you is earthly: fornication, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed (which is idolatry). 6On account of these the wrath of God is coming on those who are disobedient. 7These are the ways you also once followed, when you were living that life. 8But now you must get rid of all such things — anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive language from your mouth. 9Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have stripped off the old self with its practices 10and have clothed yourselves with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator. 11In that renewal there is no longer Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and free; but Christ is all and in all!
When we think of this, we have to hold two brutal facts at once.
The first is that there is variance between people. Some of this is coded by sex, some by race, but within each group there is considerable variation. Considering prison and the example above (which involved black men) there have been similar dynamics among (female) prison guards and prisoners — with Maori, with Pakeha — locally. Being white is not a sign of evil: being black is not a virtue.
However, if you look at a professional rugby team you will find many Polynesians, and if you look at an advanced math class you will find Ashkenazi and Han. If you are an outlier (and being elite means you are an outlier in that area) then having certain racial and cultural characteristics helps.
Having acknowledged there is a little truth in HBD, we must also say, strongly, that there is no difference in the moral agency of these people. As Roosh, in full Snark, points out…
On one morning I looked to the guy on my bed and he seemed a lot more beta than I had remembered when I was enjoying the martinis he was buying me the night before. I was no longer turned on, so it was obvious that I was raped. I called the police and made his life a living hell for violating my body without having been granted 100% full consent. He didn’t get jail time but is on a sex offender list, and had trouble getting a job last time I checked. What’s really interesting is that if I had the same quantity of drinks and drove a car, I would be held responsible for my actions and go to jail if caught, but if I decide to have sex with a guy after meeting him in a bar, I’m not held responsible at all. This is how things should be.
No difference in moral agency means that we should merely care that the person had the ability to understand what they were doing. Not if they were born in poverty, to an unmarried woman, in a minority, from a sexual congress with a thug. The sins of the parents are not accounted (praise God) to the children. Or, as a commentator said in reply to Roosh…
That’s not how the story ends:
As a woman who went up to the pearly gates and St. Peter let me in…I met this fellow called God. He told me about all the bad things I thought were good and how I always rejected the right path. Crying and not realizing that there was a life after my fabulous one on Earth I blamed society and men for my sins. Unfortunately God is a just judge and told me that the sins I committed were my own and I never bothered to repent of them because I laid blame on everybody else. All the graces and gifts He gave me the opportunity to have I rejected because they were boring and would make me feel bad.
Now I’m in hell for all eternity suffering for the 60 years of fun I had on Earth
Now, if we all have moral agency, we all have to put away that impurity that holds us from Christ and live as he lived. All of us. We cannot blame society, the church, the current hellish state of the family courts, or the fascist tendencies of the Left — who wish to control the language, so we can no longer speak truth.
It is clear from this that Paul is talking to believers, so to finish, we need to remind ourselves that we have been given much by Christ, so much will be demanded. We cannot be lazy Christians. We need to daily choose right, and avoid the wrong,
And this means we need to pray, daily, for the power to do this.
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Sir, I live near to the City of Baltimore, just south of it. You don’t know even the half of all that happens here. ..but love the commentary and continue to find wisdom here.
Well, I live in NZ for a reason: the only North American City I have stayed in for extended periods is Toronto, and that was bad enough. However, on the net at present there are various reliable witnesses to the current state of the culture in Maryland, but the most reliable of these is about to move to the Vaterland. Because she knows more than half of what happens there.