Monday Morning Music Ministry

6-12-23

Progress. We may conclude after the lessons of history, over uncountable generations, and every civilization that has dedicated itself to the ideal… that Progress is a false god. Perhaps a worthy goal in the abstract, but little more.

The challenge inherent in “progress” is the fact that it is an abstraction. A chimera: literally something honored in the breach, a dream whose precise realization is an illusion; something impossible to define or finally achieve.

If we judge and celebrate Progress by prosperity, we ignore the poverty, starvation, and misery around the world. If we call the triumph of diseases “Progress” we ignore cancers, plagues, epidemics, and self-initiated ways of dying. We think it Progressive that humanity is proving itself more compassionate and welcoming… yet dysfunction, abuse, addictions, suicides, failed marriages, depression, and wars touch every country, family, and household we know.

What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun (Ecclesiastes 1:9).

We think we know better than all of previous humankind – “we” being contemporary, liberal, secular societies – that we have, progressively, learned lessons from previous cultures; we have built on the discoveries of wise people; that science guides us ever upward. Indeed we are aware of many lessons of history – triumphs and disasters – but that does mean we learn from them.

In infantile fashion, we pick and choose from the annals of history, not to learn and see more clearly and improve our ways, but to craft new justifications for our original, base inclinations. The pattern is called Human Nature; the inclination, theological or otherwise, is called Sin. The result is called Self-Destruction.

Of course, it masquerades as “Progress,” so we congratulate ourselves.

What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.

The West is undergoing a radical transformation of attitudes and codes these days. Under the name of Progress, the roles (and even functions) of the sexes are being redefined. Millennia of foundational spiritual beliefs and attitudes are being denied and even outlawed. Totalitarian practices have permeated national governments and local councils, supplanting authoritarianism, which in its turn had supplanted freedom of thought and expression. Murderous Marxism, tried and failed so often, is being recommended in myriad forms… to be tried one more time. And another, and…

We can look to the French Revolution, among many spasms of Progress, for similar experiments. Discontent led to radicalism so severe that the Church was abolished and its properties confiscated. Members of the monarchy, then the aristocracy, then the middle class, were slaughtered: the revolution “ate its babies” before the factions began slaughtering each other. New governments started foreign wars to distract – and conscript – the public. Fiat currencies were invented; a new calendar was devised; women’s rights were proclaimed and quickly suppressed; and new religions were fabricated to replace Christianity – “The Cult of Reason”; “The Cult of the Supreme Being;” and so forth.

Ultimately, this eruption of Progress, like the Chinese “Cultural Revolution” and myriad others that followed, accumulated its most dispositive statistics by the numbers of people persecuted and slaughtered.

What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.

The 20^th century saw history’s greatest advances in knowledge, discoveries, inventions, medicines… and was by far the bloodiest century of persecution, death, and wars of any century. Innovations dedicated to killing. Progress? We believe ourselves kinder to animals; we no longer kill baby seals or slaughter herds of buffalo. Yet we slaughter babies at rates unprecedented in the history of “humanity.”

As the French say, Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose – The more things change, the more things stay the same. Really, a paraphrase of Ecclesiastes. So perhaps the millions of aborted babies are merely the “new” version of infant sacrifice practiced by “primitive” societies. But in this Age of Progress, we sacrifice to the gods of self-indulgence, convenience, and a “wiser” form of progressive morality. We know better.

In the post-Christian West, our orgy of selfish delusion lives on borrowed time, existing more and more tenuously on the inertia of expired sanity and fleeting prosperity. Our homes were built on solid foundations, but are crumbling. A few people have vague memories, inchoate awareness, of history’s lessons. But… collectively we are different. We know better. If there is a God, He will forgive us; He always has. Right?

I believe the most serious of all sins, theologically and practically, is the Sin of Pride. It precedes all other sins, and enables all other sins. We know better than our consciences. We know better than history’s examples. We know better than God. But…

What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.

Ultimately the human race and, yes, much of the Christian world, has put itself in this dreadful situation. For individuals, where sin abounds, grace abounds much more; yet surely judgment is coming to this world. I am reminded, if you will indulge an extreme shift of reference, of a 1952 movie, Ma and Pa Kettle At the Fair. It was one of a series of movies about a family of rural nitwits, very popular at the time.

In this movie, Ma and Pa were tossed in the town jail, framed by the village harpy. Even the jailer was sympathetic to their plight, and he repeatedly left the jail cell unlocked or ostentatiously dropped his keys, so that Ma and Pa could escape. More dumb then honest, each time they called, “Oh, Sam! You dropped your keys!”

When Sam sighed in resignation and shuffled away, Pa slowly lamented, “I wish we could figure a way to escape from this old jail…”

We find ourselves in cultural and moral prisons these days. Jesus provides our way to escape; He leaves us the keys; He is the key. And we – deserving the jail cells wherein we find ourselves, often of our own making – nevertheless we wish we could figure a way to escape. The keys are in front of us. But…

There is nothing new under the sun.

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The Contemporary Christian Music singer and songwriter Rich Mullins sang this (caught on amateur video) at the end of a 1992 concert. A few short years later Rich was killed in a highway accident.

Click: Rich Mullins – This World is Not My Home

11-15-21

Charles Dickens opened his book A Tale of Two Cities with the famous words, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” William Wordsworth assayed societies’ turmoils and wrote, in The Prelude, “Bliss was it, in that dawn, to be alive; but to be young was very heaven!” And the author of Ecclesiastes, probably Solomon, wrote “There is nothing new under the sun,” less philosophical than Dickens; and more fatalistic than Wordsworth.

We live in times now that are fraught with turmoil. From major power struggles around the world, “wars and rumors of wars” – to acrimony in Washington and even echoes of hatred and destruction in unlikely settings of school-board meetings and downtown neighborhoods.

Do we live today in such a zone of a dichotomy? – are these the “best of times”? Well, things are generally more prosperous than in the past; literacy has increased; medicines and procedures are saving lives. These things are mostly true in our country and around the world. We have sent humans to the moon and maybe, soon, to Mars.

Signs of progress are all around us.

But what word should we apply to other “signs of the times”? – unrest around the world; revanchist empires; slavery and human trafficking; genocide and abuse; religious and political repression; increased drug use; divorces, suicides, and homelessness; broken homes… REgress? Surely not progress.

Humankind needs a different yardstick, or a different dictionary – or a different value system – when science concocts ways to protect and prolong life… and develops means to end life before birth, and with the elderly, in advance of natural death. Governments seek life elsewhere in the universe, yet encourage the snuffing of lives in the womb. Or deny that a heartbeat in the baby is life.

And so forth. “Vanity, vanity; all is vanity,” Solomon continued in his indictment. “Meaningless.”

If we – humankind; not merely our immediate neighbors – ever are to redeem our species, what we call Civilization, it will require a revolution (or counter-revolution, actually) of our souls, our standards, our values. Values: what is valuable to us?

This week I was corresponding with friend Nicole LeBlanc, a gifted pianist, who issued challenges for people to list favorite works of Beethoven in several musical genres. Next came thoughts of the reasons for our affections; and then of the interpreters of his works. I have internalized such questions, the reason why I have several recordings each of all the works of Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert. We respond to differences in instrumentation, tempi, dynamics, interpretation.

How can we listen to the musical miracle that was Bach, or be moved to tears by works of Mozart – who first composed at age five, and wrote supernal melodies as easily as other men perspire – and think that the world has progressed beyond them?

Such thoughts returned me, from a different route than beholding the spread of nihilism, to a consideration of “progress.”

Question: Which scenario leads to greater enjoyment, richer appreciation, more satisfaction to your soul and mind: hearing Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony (or insert any great work of art) only once in your life as often was the case in centuries past; or having access to DVDs and videos by the dozens, and listening to the music several times a year, for years and years? It is a challenging question, with implications.

In fact, in the question we can substitute any work of art, fine wine, or travel adventure. Does saturation equate with increased enjoyment, intellectual enrichment… progress?

I am a free-enterprise capitalist, and I endorse democracy (like Churchill, I suppose: democracy is the worst form of government unless you consider the rest. I suppose.) Yet since I recognize that human nature is corrupt, I regret civil architectonics such as capitalism and democracy that let humankind work its will. Eventually they must produce harm.

Potential great artists and composers spend their careers designing advertisements and writing commercial jingles to seduce our better judgments. Their works will remain in the culture about long as the fortunes they accumulate producing the ephemeral material. Ah! Some might say that daVinci and Michelangelo also spent their lives and their talents on commercials, too – advertisements for God, commissions for the church. Is it any different?

Yes, is the answer; yes.

We return to the question of standards and value-systems. It is worthwhile to devote your life to an ideal; a noble truth. It is the proper calling of humanity to praise God for the gifts He has given us… to return those gifts, in my view. We advance humankind by recognizing what is true, what is noble, what is right, what is pure, what is lovely, what is admirable. We should think about such things.

These things that are excellent and praiseworthy, and not selfish or short-sighted, these things will save the earth and benefit our fellow creatures. This is progress.

Finally, I return to “creativity.” In so many ways we are like the animals, but… we have the spark of creativity. And that is why it is a shame to waste it on the promotion of transitory things. We are to be “imitators of Christ,” Thomas à Kempis urged, writing of spiritual ways.

I wrote here recently that we actually cannot create anything, as God has created all, and this is a finite world: maybe we can only rearrange. Yet, in what we call creativity, we can in a way imitate God. A solemn privilege! We can imagine, we can dream, we can explain. We can take blank paper, white canvases, and rough chunks of stone… and bring forth works of art and beauty and understanding. We can not, and need not all be Beethovens. But we must, all of us, dream and “create.”

We too can touch souls, and change hearts. To appreciate other artists, and to translate God’s profound messages and love for others through our works – and not to cheapen our talents, throw them away, or use them for selfish and hurtful ends here in the 21st century – now, that would be progress.

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Surprise! You might be expecting a passage of Baroque music or a great poem. But I am going to share a country song, one that expertly captures the essence of creativity – from loneliness to sacrifice to devotion to resonance. We can all relate! The Christian songwriter sings of the iconic 16th Avenue in Nashville, home to studios, publishing offices, and dreams. The songwriters around him relate, too, by their expressions.

Click: 16th Avenue

9-27-21

“The only things in life we can be sure of are death and taxes.” Well, those are not the only things. One more is that stupid, lying saying itself. We hear it a lot, which doesn’t make it truer.

We can be sure of many things. King Solomon said that there is nothing new under the sun, and he was famously wise for such clarity. We can be sure of death, yes; and sickness, disease, sin. Broken promises, lost love. Not so quick – we can also be sure of life, birth, new life, and re-birth. Love. Happiness, joy, innocence, forgiveness, redemption. Salvation.

The good side of the ledger is longer, and more profound, than the dark side.

We can read those good items off the list, and we can write them. We can live them, and share them. But none of it is automatic. Sometimes the gloomy list of things in life seems written boldly, in large letters. And sometimes – too often – the cheery words and promises seem hard to read… the letters small… the words smudged.

But they are there. Move your eyes closer; turn up the light; focus.

Focus. Things like death and taxes, hard times and false friends can seem indeed like the stark, sure things in life. And sometimes the blessings and good can seem distant and obscure. Well, God promised us many things, but not always a silver platter – we are better off when we focus, concentrate, pray, seek, and find.

I recently “discovered” a place called Pictured Rocks on the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. The UP is a strange and large place that once welcomed workers who felled all its trees (it is dense forestland again) and copper (mostly removed) and iron ore (largely mined). Now it is a remote and, despite its spurts of past exploitation, a sparsely populated forestland.

Its soil is not pure dirt, if there be such a thing. It still has traces and veins of copper, iron, and other minerals. But just as fermentation can be a curse or a blessing in foods, so do these random minerals in the soil – not enough to mine successfully any more, and perhaps annoying to farmers – “redeem” themselves. Along Lake Superior are sandstone cliffs, beaches, sand dunes, waterfalls, inland lakes, a deep forest, and a wild shoreline of cliffs. The minerals, exposed to the sun and air and moisture, present rainbows of copper-oranges and oxidized greens and all varieties of colors. Rust actually can be beautiful.

Dig a little and discover the good that lives in surprising places.

Yeast, wine, cheeses, black tea, penicillin, and a thousand things that “turn”… are transformed to good. As people, we can “turn” too; and even circumstances can turn to good. You know the song: tadpoles to bullfrogs; caterpillars to beautiful butterflies. Rusty rocks to unlikely rainbows.

Turn the pages of life if you have to. There is beauty everywhere in God’s world, and treasures in His plans. Focus; you will see them.

You can be them.

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Click: This Is My Father’s World

7-18-16

Our recent essay “Welcome To the Revolution” has excited a bit of discussion, some readers claiming I am an alarmist, and others granting that I might be predicting the future instead of, as I believe, reporting on the present. To the charge that I am an alarmist, I would reply that doctors operate when there is disease; firemen rush to houses on fire; when I see alarming things, I sound the alarm.

There are many subjects that American schools do not teach any more, and we generally are an anti-intellectual society. In that vein – specifically, the danger of even right-thinking Americans being ignorant of the Current Crisis – I recall what Alexander Boot wrote about Hellenistic Man, that “he was not ignorant of history; he simply did not see how it affected his life.”

For the immediate future, I believe we are headed for the Summer of Our Discontent. Where once a polite diving-line was drawn between Democrats and Republicans, even liberals and conservatives, now there are bottomless chasms between family members. Ugly schisms divide former friends. “Occupy” and “Black Lives Matter” partisans ascribe blood libels to Tea Partiers, and vice-versa.

Those who think murdered soldiers and policemen are victims of random gunfire, and those who think we are seeing war in the streets. Now, Baton Rouge. Next?

The conventions and campaigns will be ugly – and the Thanksgiving dinners and Christmas parties of many families likely will be bloodier. These rifts will slowly – if ever – heal: people must first desire healing; and for all the empty clichés about Getting Along, the contemporary American is quite happy to excoriate his opponent. Hate Thy Neighbor.

So this is a classic case of “inability to see the forest for the trees,” America’s fatal state of decline. We have gone from decadence to destruction, and when we catch a glimpse of the “forest” – an active society where things continue to happen, where we still wake up, go to sleep, and scurry about our affairs – it is rather a case of inertia that masks the crisis.

Our fall has not been the result of a sudden explosion, but gradual poisons in our cultural water supplies.

One of the favorite Bible verses of Christians in recent years has been II Chronicles 7:14: “If My people, which are called by My name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.”

How many of us are guilty of quoting that verse, even applying it, superficially? For one thing, it seems, in a forest-for-the-trees manner, like a fortune-cookie aphorism. “Straighten up your act, people,” to be followed by spontaneous revival and Heaven on earth.

But the verse needs to be parsed – examined phrase by phrase. In the first place, linguistically, it strictly is not a promise of God. It is a conditional statement: “If… then.” The Bible is filled with many such conditions, warnings, threats, and yes, promises. But God requires things of His people. Humility. Prayer. Seeking Him. Repentance. All of them “big time.”

THEN He will forgive transgressions and heal the land.

“If.” That is the condition – a big “if.”

“My people.” Not necessarily the entire population, but the Children of God. The saved; today, Christ-followers.

“Who are called.” All of us must be open to the specific call of God on our lives: His will for us.

“Humble themselves.” This does not mean to stop being haughty in church, but to adopt true servants’ hearts.

“Pray.” Jesus Himself prayed fervently before every important act. How less should we?

“Seek My face.” Request guidance and acknowledge God as the source of all good things.

“Turn from their wicked ways.” Here God means true repentance… transformative changes in our personal lives.

Then you “will hear from heaven.” Prayers will be answered.

Then He will “Forgive your sins.”

Then He will “heal your land.”

That makes this verse more than “words to live by.” Or something for Christians to claim in agreement or to memorize for a Bible study or Sunday School class. Not those things alone – good start – but incomplete. Even the famous verse is incomplete! It is the second half of a sentence, not a new sentence in Two Chronicles, as Donald Trump would call it.

Can we, o average American and Christian Patriot, read the context, and learn what the Lord was really saying? Starting with Chapter 7, verse 11:

Thus Solomon finished the house of the Lord, and the king’s house: and all that came into Solomon’s heart to make in the house of the Lord, and in his own house, He prosperously effected.
12 And the Lord appeared to Solomon by night, and said unto him, I have heard thy prayer, and have chosen this place to Myself for an house of sacrifice.
13 If I shut up heaven that there be no rain, or if I command the locusts to devour the land, or if I send pestilence among my people;
14 If My people, which are called by My name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.
15 Now Mine eyes shall be open, and Mine ears attent unto the prayer that is made in this place.

First, that is a lot of IFs. Second, there are severe warnings. A third point might be that these are specific instructions to David’s son Solomon and the people of ancient Israel. However, it is valid for us to draw lessons.

The most sobering of lessons, chastisements, and warnings of punishment (indeed, God’s promise) is a few verses later:

19 …If ye turn away, and forsake my statutes and my commandments, which I have set before you, and shall go and serve other gods, and worship them;
20 Then will I pluck them up by the roots out of My land which I have given them; and this house, which I have sanctified for my name, will I cast out of My sight, and will make it to be a proverb and a byword among all nations.
21 And this house, which is high, shall be an astonishment to everyone that passeth by it; so that he shall say, Why hath the LORD done thus unto this land, and unto this house?
22 And it shall be answered, Because they forsook the Lord God of their fathers, which brought them forth out of the land of Egypt, and laid hold on other gods, and worshipped them, and served them: therefore hath He brought all this evil upon them.

In effect: We bring this evil upon ourselves.

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Click: Leaning On the Everlasting Arms

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Real Clear Religion, on whose site many readers have followed Monday Music Ministry, has been for many people an indispensible part of their daily fare. It is going through changes right now after almost seven years.

For those who have followed us on RCR, please be sure to continue receiving our weekly essays by Subscribing to Monday Morning Music Ministry. (See link under “Pages” at right.)

6-6-16

There is a danger in being a historian. Even the amateur historian and those who love to read history benefit from the special aspect of what my lodestar Theodore Roosevelt called “History as literature” – the thrill of past glories, the tragedy of conflicts, sensing the real lives of real people long ago. We gain perspective as we confront our own challenges. Even better, we legitimately feel like a player in the world’s great events – a part of the contending ideas and possibly grand visions; a soldier in conflicts, if not military then intellectual and spiritual.

Well, you can tell I am enthusiastic about history. The study, the pursuit, the lessons. George Santayana famously said that those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it. A cartoon-meme popping up on the web these days has an old guy reflecting that those who DO know history are doomed to watch other people repeat the mistakes.

That IS a danger. But I began by saying that being a historian – having a historical perspective – can have its pitfalls. The broader the view, more seductive is the tendency to believe in cycles… pendulum swings… and what the writer of Ecclesiastes averred: “There is nothing new under the sun.”

Indeed. The awful aspects of human nature are unchanged. So too are the propensities in the human breast to hope. There are elemental virtues and common sins. I believe these are the things referred to in Ecclesiastes. But too many people think – when they think at all about such things – that our challenges and problems can’t be all that bad, because countless civilizations have experienced them before us.

Experienced, yes. Survived? Usually not – and especially not when we talk about moral decline, fiscal irresponsibility, decline in family values, sexual immorality, addictions, loss of patriotic fervor and appreciation of heritage and tradition, lessened charitable impulses, and turning away from God’s Word. Yes: review history. We are not the only culture to experience these things.

But, in your review, notice that few societies, precious few, have redeemed themselves and crawled back into the sunshine. Virtually all have withered and died. Some over long, painful gray periods of dissolution. Some quickly, as by invasions. But the law of civilization and decay is that when societies fall, it is usually from within.

I pivot from the panorama of history, behind us, to the current situation about which I will say as dispassionately as I can: The world has gone mad. To me, the only question is the tense: future-progressive (still occurring) (by the way, I am inclined to capitalize Progressive, but that is another essay…) or present tense. In either case, it is still a tense situation.

I employ benchmarks from history’s record of self-destructive societies. I have considered that the great march of personal freedom, intensifying in the West over the past 500 years, has allowed humankind to let human nature overtake the structure of governments, laws, arts, and science – and resulted in the previous century birthing more slaughter than any other century; and this century, so far, reviving (to take an example) slavery on a grander scale than ever before.

So it is not only a madness of the West, although we madly lead the mad parade to “the dawn of nothing – O make haste,” as Omar Khayyam wrote. Savagery, abuse, hatred: all alive and well around the world. Wars and rumors of wars.

We have rejected in many ways the concept of Absolute Truth, the possibility of its existence, and the benefits of seeking to know it. History’s masses often suffered, but often they believed in improvement; in advancement; in better things and better days. They believed in themselves, in leaders they respected… in God.

The world, in turning inward instead of outward, living for today without regard to an afterlife, abandoning standards that nurtured their ancestors, of course will reflect disharmony and chaos. Art imitates life, after all (what Plato called “Mimesis”). This should worry us very, very much about the state of things ’round about us. This world is not one politician, or one new fad, or one hangover, away from righting ourselves.

We have become lovers of our own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good; traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God.

You might have heard these words before. They were predicted about our times – or, anyway, the End Times. Do they describe this age? If not revealed in our actions, and conflicts, and multiple crises… then in the writing on the walls of our art and culture. Our headlines.

Never since the Flood has humankind, over the face of the earth and not in isolated pockets, rejected Truth in such determined ways. II Timothy 3 continues: “In the last days, perilous times will come,” and names the attributes of our times we listed above.

It concludes: “From such, turn away.”

These were not merely warnings; not simple predictions. They were prophecies – the Bible’s “sure things” if we do not “turn away from such.” Will it be difficult, for each of us, and as a people? About that, the Bible does promise: Yes. Very difficult.

But our world depends on it.

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Click: Whispering Hope

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Real Clear Religion, on whose site many readers have followed Monday Music Ministry, has been for many people an indispensible part of their daily fare. It is going through changes right now after almost seven years.

For those who have followed us on RCR, please be sure to continue receiving our weekly essays by Subscribing to Monday Morning Music Ministry. (See link under “Pages” at right.)

1-11-16

Solomon, who seldom got things wrong, wrote, “There is nothing new under the sun,” in Ecclesiastes. The French writer Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr wrote, “Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose” – the more things change, the more they stay the same.

The subject of such aphorisms, and much of the world’s wise sayings, is not, say, the weather, or taste in fashion. It is human nature.

We humans, most of us, have shinier toys, and live in somewhat more comfortable homes, than of generations ago; and eat more food, or in more variety, than did our ancestors.

Yet we still bash each other’s heads in at every opportunity: the last century was the bloodiest in world history. We still get sick and die, and in general terms plagues and poxes merely have been replaced by heart conditions and cancers. And stress, and psychological disorders, and addictions – the demons of the 21st century.

We complain about the same things that the ancients did. I am reminded that Mark Twain said, “Everybody talks about the weather, but nobody ever does anything about it.” It is probably true that the early Egyptians and Chinese and Athenians and Romans and Persians and Mayans complained about their bosses, spouses, landlords, scheduled events, children, shoddy footwear, and mothers-in-law.

And when human nature got more serious about things… well, there always has been cheating and jealousy and theft and lying and murder. Pride and arrogance. And, more constant than any of these things, brokenness, hurt, the need for forgiveness. The need for a Savior.

God provided that Savior, and He inspired love and forgiveness, sacrifice and charity; all in precious scant supply now as forever, thanks, once again, to the fact of human nature.

Recently it occurred to me that we have scarcely progressed from the essential afflictions of our distant ancestors in another important manner. I love these revelations, because I maintain that the human race requires periodic lessons in humility. In important things, and in the many trivial things that are the mortar of the important things. These wake-up calls can even be amusing, but are wake-up calls nonetheless.

Many of us consider the “cult of celebrity” a normative cancer. You know: movie stars, singers, and sport stars vs heroes. Skewed standards. Truly this is a contemporary phenomenon, because protean antecedents of our times’ celebrities – painters, composers, poets, artists – often dedicated their work to God and were fulfilled by serving Him. “Less of me; more of Him.” In researching my biography of Johann Sebastian Bach, I continually was struck by how utterly humble he was about his work, his accomplishments, his “celebrity,” in contradistinction to his God.

When we think we in America have been liberated from the trappings of royalty, repressive social and economic systems, and checks against free thought, is when we swindle ourselves most extravagantly, however. A very common denominator illustrates this the best.

We frequently hear complaints from, say, sports fans about ticket prices and athletes’ salaries. In the proverbial next breath the same fans often admire those salaries (“hey, if the owners didn’t have the money, they couldn’t pay it, right?”). Of course, owners – just like shop or factory bosses faced with higher labor costs – pass it along to the consumers. In sports, fans themselves pay those obscene players’ salaries by accepting higher prices for cars and candy bars and shaving creams that sponsor the games. Ticket prices for cold, hard seats. And stratospheric fees, parking costs, merchandise, and absurd prices for hot dogs, popcorn, and drinks.

The same with concert tickets, apparel festooned with logos, and advertised items hawked by celebrities paid millions to sell them to us gullible consumers. Little different than “tributes” paid to robber barons in the Middle Ages. Except that we willingly put these exalted peoples’ feet on our heads. We have thrown off royalty – oh, yeah? look at the faces on supermarket tabloids. We do them honor; we practically worship them. Plus ça change…

Compounding our foolishness, we are supremely inconsistent. Half of the people in America grouse about oil company profits – usually citing income, not profits – and ignoring research, development, costs of operation and such. In contrast, I have heard nobody offer anything other than admiring whistles over George Lucas’s $4-billion sale of the Star Wars franchise. Who do we think is funding that crazy purchase?

Neither any resentment, ever, of the rapid and mammoth wealth accumulated by Bill Gates or Steve Jobs. “Oh, but they made things that people need.” Yes. Like… oil products and gasoline?

Why do people hate – yes, hate – the CEOs whom Michael Moore tells us to hate – “oh! those big houses!” – but have no problems with actors being paid $20-million and more per film? Most of the money paid at the gas pump goes to government taxes, not the gasoline or research or development or executives’ salaries. And a portion of every movie ticket is obeisance to the glamorous stars. In effect, a celebrity tax. Few complaints.

These are only a few reality-checks about our value systems. And, as I said, some reminders that human nature has not changed that much.

Returning to the spiritual aspect of our lives, more important than any of this. We think we have graduated from a society where highwaymen once lurked behind trees, whereas a multitude of internet pirates lurk behind our computer screens today. Wall-street cheats. Our jails more crowded than ever. Nothing new under the sun.

No, in God’s world we need to remember the old days, good or bad, by better or worse standards.

But there were times in human history when the vast majority of artists and writers and scientists acknowledged God as behind everything, the Maker and Redeemer. And they sought to honor Him in all they did. Common people toiled and sometimes suffered, but always consoled themselves in the ministrations of the Holy Spirit. Communities were built around churches, and the Word was central to everyone’s lives. Prayers were lifted daily – often continually throughout the day – and church attendance was weekly, or sometimes daily. Jesus was at the center of peoples’ lives, in all classes, in villages, towns, and cities.

But we know better in the 21st century. We are smarter – smart enough to dismiss God from our lives. We are happier – at least we pay more for things that promise to make us happy. We live more comfortable lives – if we would slow down for a moment to enjoy them once in a while. Our religion, as a society, is something we are so comfortable with that we don’t feel the need to “force” it on others… even our children.

Maybe the French got it wrong. The more things change, it might be that the worse they become. Is there anything new under the sun? Well… we still need a Savior.

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Some people think that the greatest creation of Franz Josef Haydn was not one of his 104 symphonies; or a string quartet, the genre he molded; or the mighty oratorio The Creation. Here is his Mass For Troubled Times, an astonishing, stirring, church piece, one of 14 masses he wrote. We live in troubled times, no less than his 1800 Vienna. Let it minister to you – traditional Latin words, in Kyrie; Gloria; Qui Tollis; Credo; Quoniam; Sanctus; Et Incantus Est; Et Resurrexit; Sanctus; Benedictus; Agnus Dei; Dona Nobis Pacem. Conducted by Grete Pedersen in a magnificent Oslo church.

Click: Mass for Troubled Times