A clash of cultures

When Jesus stepped into his world it was inevitable that there would be a clash of cultures. The faith he established was a boulder tossed into the pond of traditional Judaistic faith and traditional Roman/Greek thought and culture. The ripples are still being felt. Through the centuries alternate philosophies and cultures have resisted and fought to re-establish themselves against what has become traditional western Christian faith and practice. 

If you are hearing more about rights, progress, equality, victims, colonialism, the marginalized and terms like them, this is not accidental? Do you sense that everything is being classified according to race-gender-class and sexuality? It is not a conspiracy theory to realize that an organization of consent is being driven to deem a certain fringe of society as hostile, threatening, dangerous, irrelevant and in need of eradication. It is wise to pay attention when the thinkers in our world start to speak up about the changes we are undergoing.

In the March/April edition of Touchstone magazine, R.J. Snell, Princeton University lecturer, explores our current battle against the Anti-Culture tsunami that has overwhelmed believers. The article, Reason Takes Up Arms – How Best to Face the Total War of the Anti-Culture focuses on the image of Michael the archangel in battle against Lucifer. Philip Schaff coined the phrase anti-culture and it should be noted that most major institutional influences have now come under the control of those who adhere to a position opposed to the Judaeo-Christian perspective of our world.

While seminaries and churches continue to support the battle lines drawn up by traditional apologetics of the former generations the new offensive has enacted a blitzkrieg around the entrenched defensive positions and attacked the vulnerable who are unprepared for the offensive. Dr. Terry Young, of CREST leadership, states that it is like the Germans around the French’s Maginot line. Christianity is being viewed as the culprit that must be dismissed or destroyed. Augustine, in his City of God, wrote extensively on this issue when Christianity was blamed for the fall of Rome. In 1259, Aquinas, faced a similar cultural sea change with the repudiation of the Crusades and the overpowering might of Islam.

Charles Taylor, in A Secular Age, is noted for his definition of ‘exclusive humanism’ as “the belief that there are no final goals beyond human flourishing and that such flourishing can be attained and satisfied without any reference to, belief in, or involvement with the transcendent. On this understanding, ordinary, immanent fulfillment is all there is, all we can hope for, and all we need or should want.” In other words, our culture is all about me and all about now. Believers, now in the minority, must position themselves as dissenters against this new foundation for western cultural thought.

In our times, if we attempt to present a traditional authoritative view opposed to the newly framed interpretations on meaning, freedom and human good, this dissent would place us outside the favour of the cultural influencers and in direct opposition to all that is considered good and right. The anti-culture is no longer willing to debate and give Christians a hearing. They have considered the faith as the source of wrong and seek only to shut it down and shout it down. This wave is clearly in control of our media, our government, our education systems and is now overwhelming the arenas of sport, history, business, fashion and art.

The ascending anti-culture demi-gods will not be satisfied until every niche of our society has embraced their views. Not until our ethics, morals, family, church, education centers, community organizations, business practices are dismissed in the “dustbin of history” will this effort slow down. By mocking, condemning, ignoring and creating more allegiances against traditional worldviews they hope to persevere. Tolerance is an illusion now. Until the old is cancelled completely and until everyone left is embracing the new model there will be no relenting in the battle. The old is being relabeled as dangerous, antiquated, colonial, useless and a threat to all modern peoples.

Snell cites the word of Antonio Gramsci (1891-1937), “one of the intellectual fathers of anti-culture,” when he advocates for hegemony (the dominance of one group over another) as something that must be achieved by “persuading the subordinate classes to accept the values and ideas which the dominant class had itself adopted, and by building a network of alliances based on these values.” We see the alliances being broadened with appeals to the LGBTQ communities, the social media platforms, the aboriginal communities, the racial communities, the educational elite, the marginalized, the medical community, environmentalists, the governing and judicial communities and whoever else will listen.”

The plan it seems is to undermine the moral distinctiveness of the church and once dominance is attained to entrench the new thought and strengthen it by stretching the boundaries and acceptance of what is new. As Jordan Petersen notes, the new progressive liberalism or postmodernism is simply neo-Marxism in a new skin. Once the rhetoric is established, that the former influencers (Judaeo-Christian institutions) have really been the oppressors all along, Snell says “the battle against oppression never ceases, and new victims must constantly be identified, even as the institutions and structures of hegemony must always be reinforced in their organization of consent.” We see this recently in the arena of sports.

Snell continues, “power must be nurtured, hegemony extended and solidified, so that it becomes prevalent, all-encompassing, and seemingly undeniable and irrevocable. To allow recusants is to render hegemony fragile, and so small-town florists, bakers, and pizza shop owners must be cowed or destroyed.”  He adds that “anti-culture will not be satisfied until every human thought and aspiration, emotion and sentiment, is taken captive. But since hegemony and the war for position is unending, even complete acquiescence will not end the war, so insatiable is the culture of death and the way of lies.”

Snell, as a guest professor, sees the impact on students. He says, “Their tastes are off, their loves misshapen, their values distorted, their beliefs skewed, as even a cursory glance at campus events of the last few years would indicate, let alone a close study of their values, actions and commitments.”

Young says “we have reached the point where the network (of anti-culture) is in place. Big tech, education, media, government, global institutions are beginning to sound alike. This is the total reset of things.” He says that in a California school district they are retelling the mission work of Christianity. “What missions was all about was theocide.” Christian missionaries were out to kill all the gods of the other nations. There is a need to return to the original gods. So, the school in implementing exercises to get students back in touch with the Aztec gods. To go back to what was or what should be.

“Dialogue is dying because dissent is being destroyed,” says Young. “Dialogue is being prohibited.” The anti-culture forces will not be satisfied until everyone of us acknowledges that we aren’t right, that we aren’t thinking right. We are being told to throw everything old out and a chaotic and violent culture is on the verge of breaking out. While Christians feel the impact immediately the larger hit on other religions and other conservative leaning immigrants is soon to come.