Musings Part 2

Reach Out and Click Someone

Stories abound about the social perils of the Internet. Public libraries, especially here in the Bible belt, face heated philosophical debates and community uproars about the provision of Internet access. Should librarians be censors of who accesses any particular material on the Internet? Should censor programs be installed that keep young boys from looking at women's breasts and also keep not-so-young men from finding out optimum treatment strategies for their wives who just got a diagnosis of breast cancer?

Many commentators suggest that the youth of America are losing their relational skills because they confine themselves in dim basements and roam about in the bizarre dis-reality of Internet chat rooms where reality is uncertain at best. Adolescents disappear into the cyber-fantasies of violent on-line role-playing games and virtual-reality combat.

For a little more than two years I have had Internet access. Prior to that time I could only contact distant people by phone or by the postal system. At one time it took about two weeks for me to send off written correspondence to a colleague in Canada and get a response from her, if she responded at once. If she is like me and my mail got buried in her desk or brief case, several more weeks could easily elapse before it re-emerged and a response was made. Since the advent of the Internet, we now can have three iterations of response in less time than it took me to write the few paragraphs on this page. This has resulted in our having splendid interactions weekly rather than yearly. It has also enabled me to have fine 'conversations' with her son who is more than 1,000 miles from both of us, at no cost.

It seems to be my lot in life that many of the people who are most important to me live great distances from me. Fortunately, many of these are 'wired' and are accessible via the Net. I have found that my favorite aspect of going to work in the morning is checking my in-box to see who has clicked on 'send' during the night and sent me a message. Happily, this happens a lot. After getting a fine message from a Scottish friend on Friday, I pondered how fortunate I was to be able to communicate with my dear friends irrespective of distance or potential cost. I greatly relished the warm inner glow I experienced after I double-clicked on 'open.'

What has made the Internet so compelling and popular to millions is its geographic independence. Distance simply doesn't matter. I can reach out to someone in Australia as quickly as I can to someone in the next room. Equally compelling is the low-cost or free communication possible through the Net. A number of providers will give users free e-mail in exchange for their tolerance of on-line advertising.

Larry Dossey has made a life work of studying the nature and efficacy of prayer in its many forms. In several of his books he cites research studies that clearly show prayer operates independently of distance, and often of time. Prayer is much like the Internet, we can cover the vast gulf between Heaven and Earth in an instant. Even here, distance doesn't matter.

On-line providers make e-mail available to us at no cost as advertisers have pre-paid the costs of providing e-mail service. God has made communication channels between Earth and Heaven available at no expense to us as the costs of these links were pre-paid nearly twenty centuries ago on a gloomy Friday afternoon. So gloomy, in fact, that afternoon brilliance was replaced with the coldness of an ebony night sky.

Without the heavenly access paid for and obtained on that Good Friday, I would be like those adolescents lost in virtual-reality wars. I would be like others trapped in windowless dungeons exchanging meaningless drivel on-line with unseen unnamed entities, without possibly of seeing them in the light of day. If the events of that fateful Friday had not happened, I would be forever getting a "Waiting for Reply" message when I tried to connect with http://www.Heaven.org.

Mankind has created a huge array of virtual sites. Some of these are inspirational, educational, and most beneficial to humanity. Others are decadent beyond measure and destructive to the soul. It is my choice where I click. Because of the brilliant Sunday that followed that dusky Friday afternoon, I have a greater choice of sites to visit.

Presently, I can only visit sites on the screen of my computer monitor, but I know that God's server will never give me a busy signal or bump me off-line. All I have to do is find a quiet place and connect. His web site is fabulous beyond imagination. In fact he challenges us to explore it often. "Call to me, and I will answer you, and I will tell you great and mighty things, which you do not know ... and this is the confidence which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us, and if we know that he hears in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests we have asked from Him." What is truly entrancing to this computer user is the promise that one day, like the stuff of sci-fi techno-thrillers, I will be able to travel in His site and it won't be fiction.

If God sends you an e-mail, be sure to open it before it gets deleted from the system.


Parking Spaces

Robert Ornstein wrote a landmark book, New World New Mind, in 1989 which demonstrates the human mind is not programmed to respond to "slow-motion disasters" such as the arms race, global warming, deficit spending, and overpopulation. He claims that in the biological world before the advent of Industrialization, the only dangerous phenomenon occurred with the speed of light; most creatures being remarkably suited to respond effectively to fast-action disasters. In a fraction of a second, a shadow on the cave wall could be interpreted and a determination made as to whether dinner was about to get away or if a huge carnivore was about to bump an unwitting hominid further down the food chain. Flash flood, tornadoes, lightning, avalanches, land slides, and falling trees. These all happen real fast.

I was quite amazed when I took my present hospital position more than six years ago to learn that one of the employee benefits included free parking in a conveniently located subterranean garage. For several years I could plan on easily finding a space therein, irrespective of my arrival time at work. For years my car has basked in the cool shadows of the garage, even in the searing days of August in the deep South. Spared the assault of relentless solar radiation, my nearly adolescent car looks far younger than its almost twelve years

Several weeks ago Ornstein's hypothesis was confirmed in my own experience. One day I arrived later in the morning for work than usual, and to my amazement, found a space in the lower level of the garage. In fact, there were quite a number of spaces available. The hospital just opened another nearby facility and many of our workers were moved to it from the main campus, thus freeing up space in the garage. For three weeks now I have again enjoyed the luxury of a parking space, regardless of when I arrive at the hospital.

In an instant I realized that I had been outwitted by a slow phenomenon and had forgotten how it once was before a slow "disaster" took place. Reflecting back, I realized that over the past three years the competition for parking spaces had, indeed, become rather keen, requiring me to arrive progressively earlier each morning to gain refuge from the sun's inflammatory insults. Yet, in spite of my best efforts, a number of times I was forced to park out in an open lot. I would then make a mid-day bid for a place in the garage when other workers left at lunch time to hurry off for a frantic trip through a fast food drive-up. On those rare occasions when I would go out at lunch time, I would have to time my absence to insure getting a space before the competition returned. Alas, it got to the point where even this strategy would fail me and my car would end up spending an afternoon roasting on an expanse of incendiary asphalt.

I wondered how it was that I once had the freedom to come and go when I wanted, yet always find ample refuge from the sun. I never had to worry about a cool place to leave the car and I could walk to the hospital in refreshing shade, even in July. More importantly, I wondered how it was that I forgot so completely how it had been, when there was once no competition. Fierce competition had become the order of the day. Competition has become the hallmark of virtually every aspect of our society. It was because of fears of competition in the marketplace that the hospital opened up the new facility.

It appears that cultures are also refractory to Ornstein's biological "slow-motion disasters" as well as a number not mentioned in his text. The American culture seems to be refractory to many of the dangerous social and moral trends taking place.

Sociologists claim that when illegitimate births constitute 25% of all births, an important critical mass of family values is lost to the collective population. We now have 70% of babies being born outside of marriage in large parts of the population. Many children have no contact whatever with a father figure. A huge number of children live with a single over-worked stressed-out parent barely keeping above water. A large number of us reached adulthood with no concept of Dad.

A hundred years ago ten percent of marriages would ultimately fail. Within the evangelical church world a mere fifteen years ago, divorce was almost unknown. Now more than two out of three marriages ultimately fail and the failure rate within conservative churches is little different from the larger secular culture.

In the 1960s a few thousand babies would be aborted each year in clandestine abortion mills south of the border or in the back alleys of America. Now, more that a million and a half (one out of three American babies) are put to death by saline injection, extirpation, or pithing (partial birth abortion). At one time the only thing pithed in America were frogs in high school biology classes, and even that was bothersome to many. A clinic in the north piths some 1,500 babies each year. Since 1973, thirty-seven million American children have been denied the opportunity to draw their first breath.

When an income tax was first proposed earlier in the century, the proponents feared a national revolution if the maximum tax rate was over one percent. Many cities alone now assess this much and state and federal taxes can exceed fifty percent. The average American works about five months out of twelve just to pay direct and indirect taxes.

When my mother was hospitalized with a complicated pregnancy, of which I was the result, her total hospital bill for several weeks was a mere $150. Today, a complicated pregnancy can cost $250,000. A liver transplant can exceed $300,000. Fifty million of our citizens are under or uninsured for medical expenses and live in fear of illness induced financial calamity. Academic papers discuss the ethical considerations of giving organ transplants to people, if the result is to destroy their quality of life because of the financial consequences of transplantation.

Ornstein wrote his landmark book only nine years ago. Yet, another best seller written some twenty centuries earlier indicates the author clearly understood the inherent dangers of not paying attention to the slow phenomenon in our lives. St. John admonished his readers "Walk while you have the light, that darkness may not overtake you; he who walks in the darkness does not know where he goes." He knew what dark shadows on the wall could mean. He knew even better what dark shadows in the soul always meant; separation from God.

A cultural darkness has the insidious ability of encroaching so slowly as to go quite undetected. Ornstein and John are both correct. Ornstein understands the adaptive biological responses to fast and slow phenomenon. John understood the needed spiritual responses to the encroaching darkness of soul that all cultures seem to face. He knew it was time to get moving. He realized that the larger darkness of the culture could easily come to infect the souls of inattentive individuals.

The rampant prosperity and economic expansion of the past eight years continues to dazzle and blind us. America is in a twilight and unaware that absolute darkness is close at hand. In a consumer society awash in abundance, it's nearly effortless for erosion of moral and ethical foundations to go unnoticed. I too am subject to the realities of Ornstein and St. John. I was outwitted by the unseen forces of darkness at work among us. There are things I do now that I would not have dreamed of doing twenty years ago. There are things the culture now accepts for our children that biology teachers once wouldn't accept for their frogs. Yet, there is hope for us.

"It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper shall not come to you; but if go, I will send Him to you. And He, when He comes, will convict the world concerning sin, and righteousness, and judgement."


Return

How did i get back here,
hugging my doll, shedding a tear?

Babbling.
Drooling.

Isn't childhood fine,
but at eighty, a bad sign?

Cooing.
Fooling.

Wondering aloud with infantile squeals,
all i do is push against the wheels?

Hoping.
Dreaming.


Do i have to eat my spinach?


S.U.V.

In recent years there has been an explosion of wishful thinking in America. Evidence of this is to be found on every highway, surface street, and Interstate in the land. While driving about town the past few months I have noticed two new high-end sport utility vehicles competing for market share with several other best sellers that have been on the road several years. What I have observed all of these to have in common is the implication made by their names. "Discovery", "Navigator", Expedition", and "Explorer" are names given to these rugged and expensive $30-50,000 heavy-duty gasaholics, which with light trucks now make up forty percent of the American vehicle market.

Throughout time there has been romance and adventure associated with exploration, discovery, expeditions, and navigation. Many of us carry glamorous images of a very privileged few visiting exotic places that most of us will only see through the pages of National Geographic. We believe these elite adventurers will enjoy an intoxicating esprit de corp as they share grand challenges, make great discoveries, and achieve their lofty goals while guided by the stars. The producers of high-profit S.U.V. vehicles know this about us and use this against us when marketing theses dream carriers to us.

What we fail to admit to ourselves is that owning and driving one of these chariots will not take us to the stars, or to new lands. They will never facilitate the celebration of shared vision and fulfillment with other enlightened seekers. What they will do is allow us to get hopelessly in debt while attempting to pay them off over seventy-two months at $600 a month or more. Some of these vehicles yield more that $16,000 in pure profits for their builders and it is not at all unusual for payments and insurance on these to exceed monthly housing costs. These vehicles, more often than not, transport people on long arduous commutes to an oppressive unfulfilling job rather than to an alpine vista or a transcendent journey of the soul.

There is a great discontentment in the land and a vast restlessness of soul that has people looking for satisfaction and fulfillment. Countless surveys would suggest there is a collective angst in our midst that is only growing in spite of a white-hot economic expansion that has been underway for eight years now. In spite of our lives being filled with vast material abundance, our souls are empty voids longing to be filled with destiny, calling, and purpose.

There is a sense that if we keep moving and keep looking we will eventually find a way to scratch the inaccessible itches in our souls, those deep longings to find our spiritual home. The problem is we keep looking in all the wrong places and keep picking the wrong ways to get there. The only places we seem to end up in are the malls, fast-food drive-up windows, drive-thru tellers, and commercial ghettos of assorted auto repair shops and parts stores. This year nearly two million of us will add bankruptcy court to our 'to-do' lists. Millions more will end up in the valley of despair when they realize each month seems to last longer than the paycheck. A beautiful woman I shared Thanksgiving with ended up in the unknown when she committed suicide because her life lasted longer than her paycheck.

Some centuries ago a best-seller travel guide described the ultimate urban travel destination which I found quite beyond comprehension, and I have been in thirty-one countries and enjoyed many of the world's greatest cities.

What I found most compelling about this guide Book was the delineation of the journey itself. Just like the romantic images we have of the great expeditions of old, the adventure is limited to a hardy few willing to make a trip of faith into uncertain territory. For certain, no utility vehicle, not even the opulent Lincoln Navigator, will transport us to this grand mecca of pleasure.

The Apostle Paul tells us that "the Lord Himself will descend from Heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first, then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and thus we shall always be with the Lord." One day those of us who have elected to travel by faith rather than by sport utility vehicle will be given the opportunity to exercise an option on a one-way ticket to the most exotic and fabulous of all destinations, a city where the foundation blocks are made of priceless stones and the streets of transparent gold, where no immigration officers check visas.

"And the material of the wall was jasper; and the city as pure gold, like clear glass. The foundation stones of the city wall were adorned with every kind of precious stone. The first foundation stone was jasper; the second, sapphire; the third, chalcedony; the fourth, emerald; the fifth, sardonyx; the sixth, sardius; the seventh, chrysolite; the eighth, beryl; the ninth, topaz; the tenth, chrysoprase,; the eleventh, jacinth; the twelfth, amethyst. And the twelve gates were twelve pearls; each one of the gates was a single pearl. And the street of the city was pure gold, like transparent glass."