Decadence

The day after the Trump assassination attempt, The Wall Street Journal ran a story in which they interviewed Americans about the state of our nation. The article concluded, “The weariness was palpable nationwide as The Wall Street Journal spoke with more than four dozen people about how they felt about the shooting that came close to killing a former U.S. president. They pointed fingers and expressed anger, fear, and heartbreak...”

Nearly to person, they expressed a sense of dread, saying there seems to be no good news on the horizon… But unlike other times of crisis, after 9/11 or Sandy Hook or George Floyd, this event left few Americans hopeful that any good might come out of tragedy.

A sixty-three-year-old cook said, “The world has gone to Hades in a handbasket.” A thirty-two-year-old electrician from New Orleans said, “There’s a hole in this country…We’re not sticking together.” A retired project manager said, “We’re in crisis. There is no easy solution, there’s no sound bite. We’ve lost our ability to listen or to hear.”

The article ended by focusing on a married couple in their late 40s from Austin, Texas. “They used to joke about plans to survive a zombie apocalypse,” the authors noted. “Now they talk seriously whether they can afford land outside of a city. A quiet place away from civil unrest.”

I imagine you're familiar with the phrase "ship of fools." It was a common medieval motif used in literature and art, especially religious satire. One such satire is Hieronymus Bosch's famous oil painting by the same name, which now hangs in the Louvre in Paris. [See an image of "Ship of Fools."] This marvelous work, which is filled with symbolism, shows ten people aboard a small vessel and two overboard swimming around it. It is a ship without a pilot (captain), and everyone onboard is too busy drinking, feasting, flirting, and singing to know where on earth the waves are pushing them.

They are fools because they are enjoying all the sensual pleasures of this world without knowing where it all leads. Atop the mast hangs a bunch of dangling carrots and a man is climbing up to reach them. Yet above the carrots we find a small but significant detail: a human skull. This is the thirteenth head in the painting, unlucky in every imaginable way. The idea is that these twelve fools, who think all is perfect, are sailing right to their demise. The only pilot on board, the only figure leading the way, is death.

At one time, Mike Tyson was the most feared heavyweight boxer in the ring. Based on an interview with Tyson, Jon Saraceno revealed what went wrong:

Mike Tyson is anything but at peace. Confused and humiliated after a decadent lifestyle left him with broken relationships, shattered finances, and a reputation in ruin, the fighter cannot hide his insecurities, stacked as high as his legendary knockouts….

"I'll never be happy," he says. "I believe I'll die alone. I would want it that way. I've been a loner all my life with my secrets and my pain. I'm really lost, but I'm trying to find myself. I'm really a sad, pathetic case."

The divorced father of six is blunt, gregarious, funny, vulgar, outrageous, sad, angry, bitter, and, at times, introspective about the opportunities he squandered over the last two decades. He discusses his drug use ("The weed got me"), lack of self-esteem, and sexual addiction.

He says, "My whole life has been a waste—I've been a failure."

Ali is a young man with little money and no wife. This is all the incentive he needs to take the ninety-minute bus ride from his village to Baghdad. As soon as he arrives, the 21-year-old Iraqi heads straight to Abu Abdullah's. There it costs him only $1.50 for 15 minutes alone with a woman.

The room is a cell with a curtain for a door, and Ali complains that Abu Abdullah's women should bathe more often. But Ali sees the easy and inexpensive access to sexual favors as a big improvement over the days when Saddam Hussein was in power. The dictator strictly controlled vices such as prostitution, alcohol, and drugs. The fall of the regime gave rise to every kind of depravity. In addition to brothels, Iraqis have their choice of adult cinemas, where 70 cents buys an all-day ticket, and the audience hoots in protest if a nonpornographic trailer interrupts the action.

Referring to all the newly available immoral activities, Ali grins and says, "Now we have freedom."

Extreme makeovers are in. According to PlasticSurgery.org, in 2020 (the latest year for which statistics are available) there were 15.6 million cosmetic procedures performed. The top 5 cosmetic surgical procedures were: Nose reshaping (352,555), Eyelid surgery (325,112), Facelift (234,374), Liposuction (211,067), and Breast Augmentation (193,073).

The president of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons sounds a warning: "It gives people the false perception that they can be anybody they want to be."

The Roman Emperor Nero may have been in Paul's mind when he penned his letter to the Christians at Rome.

Among Nero's many immoral acts were the public banquets he offered for the people of Rome. It was said he used the whole city as his private house to entertain his myriad guests. But what went on at the gatherings could only be whispered in the streets. The Roman historian Tacitus (A.D. 56-120) described one of Nero's more elaborate parties, which he said was typical:

The festivities were held on a small lake populated with exotic birds, fish, and other animals imported for the occasion. Guests were floated out on rafts to be lured in one direction or another. On one shore were brothels crowded with noble ladies; on another, naked prostitutes enticed the guests. As darkness descended, torches were lit, and the groves and buildings filled with song and laughter. Nero, the historian Tacitus says, "polluted himself by every lawful and lawless indulgence."

It was in the middle of Nero's decadent reign that Paul wrote about the extremes to which people can go apart from God: "God gave them up to degrading passions. Their women exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural, and in the same way also the men, giving up natural intercourse with women, were consumed with passion for one another…. God gave them up to a debased mind and to things that should not be done. They were filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, covetousness, malice. Full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, craftiness; they are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, rebellious toward parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless" (Romans 1:26-31, NRSV).

Ronald Warwick, captain of the luxury cruise ship Queen Elizabeth II, questioned a passenger who paid full fare for his dog to join them on an around-the-world cruise. (Accommodations range from $25,000 to $150,000.) "Wouldn't it have cost less to leave him at home?"

"Oh no," the man said. "When we are away a long time, the dog's psychiatrist fees are so high, it's less expensive to bring him along."

It would be easy ... to criticize ... the waste, the trash, the sad attempt to buy affection in a splash of wild extravagance. Yet, for all of that, this is a genuine time of family fun; a day when games are played together, books are read and puzzles puzzled, a meal is eaten family-style, smiles and kisses are in plentiful supply; a day when memories are brought forth, dusted off, and handed round. ...

May I find in moments such as these an echo of those "tidings of great joy"? I wonder, would the Christ-child, if he sat beneath our sparkling tree, condemn as crass and empty all he saw? Or might he laugh and cheer and clap his sticky hands with glee to see his miracle take place again and life become abundant shared in love?

For 35 years, the Motion Picture Production Code served as a moral guideline for American filmmakers. The code, to which filmmakers were required to adhere, included this paragraph: "No picture shall be produced which will lower the moral standards of those who see it. Hence the sympathy of the audience shall never be thrown to the side of crime, wrongdoing, evil, or sin." How quaint that sounds today.

The videotape of history seems stuck on fast rewind--as our post-Christian era comes to resemble the pre-Christian era: Material affluence amid moral decadence. ... In a time of despondency and despair over the hubristic follies of our own republic, Christ's road remains open. We had the truth, we can find it again.