The secularization and degradation of the U.S. since World War II
Lead Summary
By
-
By Jim Thompson
HCP columnist
Morals, ethics and honesty are constantly changing or at least they have been constantly changing in the seven decades I have been around.
This column is a selection of scattered remembrances and current observations, some appalling, some not, that flash across my memory. I hasten to say I am cursed with a very good memory, at least of the older scenes, but perhaps you should not ask me what I did last week.
I remember the rare occasion when I was a child and went to the grocery with my dad (was not so rare with my mother). Once, we came home with a large box with a light blue patterned paper, something like how a Christmas present would be wrapped. The printing was small and down in the corner. Welcome to the marketing of feminine products in the 1950s.
These were the days on television when married couples slept in twin beds and how fresh young women felt was not in TV commercials.
Then, there is the matter of Sen. Thomas Eagleton of Missouri. Nominated as the Democratic vice president running mate with George McGovern in 1972, he was forced to step down when it was revealed he had been treated for bouts of depression.
Eagleton was replaced by Sargent Shriver.
Richard Nixon won with 60.7% of the popular vote and 520 electoral votes to McGovern’s 17. Watergate was not needed after all.
To chase an off-subject rabbit for a moment, however, that was not the biggest Republican landslide, Reagan did that in 1984, beating Walter Mondale with 58.8% of the popular vote and 525 electoral votes to Mondale’s 13.
The closest Franklin Roosevelt ever got to numbers like these was 1936.
In recent years, there have been secular trends that have disturbed my wife and me. There used to be an international children’s charity called “the Christian Children’s Fund.”
In 2002, it became “Child Fund.”
A long-term supporter, my wife took it on as a personal mission to find a similar organization that was Christian-centric. We left Child Fund as soon as we were convinced the children we had been sponsoring would not be left in the lurch.
We spent a number of years in the Lutheran denomination. The Lutherans used to have an affiliated financial services firm called “Lutheran Brotherhood.” It exclusively served all the Lutheran denominations (there are several). We bought several insurance products from them, most notably long-term care insurance.
A few years ago, in a strangely worded press release, they announced they were changing their name to “Thrivent.”
Now you can find commercials for their products everywhere, no mention of anything to do with any Christian religion.
What I have failed to detail until now, however, is all the colleges and universities that were founded as Christian institutions and decided to move to a secular route going forward: Harvard (trained Congregational and Unitarian clergy, although never affiliated with any denomination), Wake Forest (Baptist), Princeton (Presbyterian), Duke University (Methodists and Quakers) and so forth and so on.
You get the idea.
Today, it bothers me that Christianity has been so far removed from our daily lives. Although exceedingly more complex than this, the French Revolution, in particular facets, moved along the lines I am describing above, albeit, until recently, we have moved much slower, taking seven decades to accomplish what the French did in one.
However, the recent developments of the strange year of 2020, seem to be accelerating our tendency to follow the French pattern of more than two centuries ago.
The absolute rejection of civil order which we have seen in some sectors in the last few months, the excuse of the COVID-19 virus, being used to suppress civil liberties and traditions, seems alarmingly parallel to some aspects of the French Revolution.
Just today, while writing this, for instance, authorities in New York say there will, for the first time, be no shafts of light commemorating 9/11 this year. The excuse? It is too dangerous for the workers to set up the search lights. That sounds like something out of Robespierre’s mouth.
I fear our accelerating secularism and disregard for the rule of law is leading to a societal degradation none of us could have even imagined last New Year’s Day. Like the French Revolution, we are addressing some things that need addressing, but in our haste, I fear we are throwing the baby out with the bath water.
Jim Thompson, formerly of Marshall, is a graduate of Hillsboro High School and the University of Cincinnati. He resides in Duluth, Ga. and is a columnist for The Highland County Press. He may be reached at jthompson@taii.com.
HCP columnist
Morals, ethics and honesty are constantly changing or at least they have been constantly changing in the seven decades I have been around.
This column is a selection of scattered remembrances and current observations, some appalling, some not, that flash across my memory. I hasten to say I am cursed with a very good memory, at least of the older scenes, but perhaps you should not ask me what I did last week.
I remember the rare occasion when I was a child and went to the grocery with my dad (was not so rare with my mother). Once, we came home with a large box with a light blue patterned paper, something like how a Christmas present would be wrapped. The printing was small and down in the corner. Welcome to the marketing of feminine products in the 1950s.
These were the days on television when married couples slept in twin beds and how fresh young women felt was not in TV commercials.
Then, there is the matter of Sen. Thomas Eagleton of Missouri. Nominated as the Democratic vice president running mate with George McGovern in 1972, he was forced to step down when it was revealed he had been treated for bouts of depression.
Eagleton was replaced by Sargent Shriver.
Richard Nixon won with 60.7% of the popular vote and 520 electoral votes to McGovern’s 17. Watergate was not needed after all.
To chase an off-subject rabbit for a moment, however, that was not the biggest Republican landslide, Reagan did that in 1984, beating Walter Mondale with 58.8% of the popular vote and 525 electoral votes to Mondale’s 13.
The closest Franklin Roosevelt ever got to numbers like these was 1936.
In recent years, there have been secular trends that have disturbed my wife and me. There used to be an international children’s charity called “the Christian Children’s Fund.”
In 2002, it became “Child Fund.”
A long-term supporter, my wife took it on as a personal mission to find a similar organization that was Christian-centric. We left Child Fund as soon as we were convinced the children we had been sponsoring would not be left in the lurch.
We spent a number of years in the Lutheran denomination. The Lutherans used to have an affiliated financial services firm called “Lutheran Brotherhood.” It exclusively served all the Lutheran denominations (there are several). We bought several insurance products from them, most notably long-term care insurance.
A few years ago, in a strangely worded press release, they announced they were changing their name to “Thrivent.”
Now you can find commercials for their products everywhere, no mention of anything to do with any Christian religion.
What I have failed to detail until now, however, is all the colleges and universities that were founded as Christian institutions and decided to move to a secular route going forward: Harvard (trained Congregational and Unitarian clergy, although never affiliated with any denomination), Wake Forest (Baptist), Princeton (Presbyterian), Duke University (Methodists and Quakers) and so forth and so on.
You get the idea.
Today, it bothers me that Christianity has been so far removed from our daily lives. Although exceedingly more complex than this, the French Revolution, in particular facets, moved along the lines I am describing above, albeit, until recently, we have moved much slower, taking seven decades to accomplish what the French did in one.
However, the recent developments of the strange year of 2020, seem to be accelerating our tendency to follow the French pattern of more than two centuries ago.
The absolute rejection of civil order which we have seen in some sectors in the last few months, the excuse of the COVID-19 virus, being used to suppress civil liberties and traditions, seems alarmingly parallel to some aspects of the French Revolution.
Just today, while writing this, for instance, authorities in New York say there will, for the first time, be no shafts of light commemorating 9/11 this year. The excuse? It is too dangerous for the workers to set up the search lights. That sounds like something out of Robespierre’s mouth.
I fear our accelerating secularism and disregard for the rule of law is leading to a societal degradation none of us could have even imagined last New Year’s Day. Like the French Revolution, we are addressing some things that need addressing, but in our haste, I fear we are throwing the baby out with the bath water.
Jim Thompson, formerly of Marshall, is a graduate of Hillsboro High School and the University of Cincinnati. He resides in Duluth, Ga. and is a columnist for The Highland County Press. He may be reached at jthompson@taii.com.