Moralism

In his article “How America Got Mean,” David Brooks laments what he calls “the de-moralization of American culture.” Brooks notes that “over the course of the 20th century, words relating to morality appeared less and less frequently in the nation’s books:

According to a 2012 paper, usage of a cluster of words related to being virtuous also declined significantly. Among them were bravery (which dropped by 65 percent), gratitude (58 percent), and humbleness (55 percent). For decades, researchers have asked incoming college students about their goals in life. In 1967, about 85 percent said they were strongly motivated to develop “a meaningful philosophy of life”; by 2000, only 42 percent said that. Being financially well off became the leading life goal; by 2015, 82 percent of students said wealth was their aim.

Washington Post columnist Ty Burr believes the current American political climate is characterized by a sense of crass rule-breaking and flagrant boorishness. Such repugnant behavior was once regarded as an unfortunate side effect of political polarization. Now it is not only well within the mainstream but considered necessary to rally one’s political base. And Burr traces the genesis of this degeneration not to a particular political scandal, but to the release of a movie.

Burr wrote in a recent Post editorial: “Notions of entertainment and personal behavior were turned on their heads. Where audiences had once valued class, they now reveled in the joyously crass.”

Burr is, of course, referring to Animal House, the 1978 collegiate comedy depicting a fictional frat house. Starring John Belushi, Donald Sutherland and a host of other famous names, it elevated the previously unknown National Lampoon magazine into a hitmaking brand for film comedies.

Burr says he saw a preview screening of the film at Dartmouth College, where screenwriter Chris Miller was in attendance. Miller was a Dartmouth alum, and had based his film on the real-life antics of his fraternity, Alpha Delta. Burr writes:

That night, you could feel the collective mood swing like a compass needle toward a new north. The movie fed into and articulated a growing frustration with an overbearing political correctness, the fear that you couldn’t say what you wanted to without stepping on someone’s toes. Which, of course, made a lot of people want to step on someone’s — anyone’s — toes.

Burr says after the film’s end, he quickly saw its prevailing attitude reflected in the raucous student response to it:

Still burned onto my retinas is the image of screenwriter Miller being carried down Fraternity Row on the shoulders of a mob of cheering students, their faces flushed with happiness. What were they celebrating? Nothing less than the permission to indulge their privileges without guilt or responsibility.

Possible Preaching Angle:

All of us are influenced by the media that we consume and the truth--or lack thereof--within it. Let us be discerning in both our consumption and our production, of the messages we receive, counter, and amplify, so that God's character is revealed through our conduct.

Past generations of Americans viewed God as the basis of truth and morality. Not anymore. A new study shows that most Americans reject any absolute boundaries regarding their morality, with 58% of adults surveyed believing instead that moral truth is up to the individual to decide.

According to findings from pollster Dr. George Barna, belief in absolute moral truth rooted in God’s Word is rapidly eroding among all American adults. This is regardless if they are churched or unchurched, within every political segment, and within every age group. Even among those who do identify God as the source of truth, there is substantial rejection of any absolute standard of morality in American culture.

Perhaps most stunning, this latest research shows a rejection of God’s truth and absolute moral standards by American Christians, those seen as most likely to hold traditional standards of morality. Evangelicals, defined as believing the Bible to be the true, reliable Word of God, are just as likely to reject absolute moral truth (46%). And only a minority of born-again Christians—43%—still embrace absolute truth.

The study found that the pull of secularism is especially strong among younger Americans, with those under age 30 much less likely to select God as the basis of truth (31%), and more likely to say that moral standards are decided by the individual (60%).

As Jeff Meyers writes in his new book, Truth Changes Everything, “We live in a world where we cannot go a single day without hearing that truths are based on how we see things rather than on what exists to be seen. Truth is not ‘out there’ to be found; it is ‘in here’ to be narrated.”

You can read the full study from Arizona Christian University here.

Possible Preaching Angle:

A biblical worldview rests firmly on the idea that Truth can be known. It says that Truth isn't constructed by our experiences and feelings. Rather, a biblical worldview says that Truth exists. It is a person. It is Jesus (John 14:6).

Do some Christians harm their witness by falling into the trap of “moral grandstanding” or “virtue signaling”? Or do we convey the message that we are just as depraved as others? Clinical psychologist Joshua B. Grubbs writes about a study which asked 6,000 Americans questions about their most important moral and political beliefs and how they communicate them to others.

Almost everyone admitted they were occasionally guilty of grandstanding--sharing their beliefs selfishly for respect or status. However, habitual grandstanders experienced conflicts in their personal relationships:

People who reported grandstanding more often also reported more experiences arguing with loved ones and severing ties with friends or family members over political or moral disagreements. People who indicated using their deepest held beliefs to boost their own status in real life also reported more toxic social media behaviors. (These include) picking fights over politics on Facebook and berating strangers on Twitter for having the “wrong” opinions.

Grubbs advises all grandstanders to check their motivations: “When you enter into contentious territory with someone who differs in opinion, ask whether you’re doing so because you’re genuinely interested in communicating and connecting with your fellow human. Or are you just trying to score points? ... Do you find yourself trying to one-up the good deeds of someone else to make yourself look good to people whose respect you crave?”

On April 12, 2012, the White Sox's pitcher Philip Humber pitched a perfect game. That is, he retired 27 batters in a row. No walks, no hits. It's a feat that's been accomplished by only 18 other pitchers in Major League Baseball's 108-year-old history. But then in November of that same year, the White Sox cut him from their team roster.

An article in Sports Illustrated zeroed in on Humber's deadly character flaw—perfectionism. The article's subtitle read, "For one magical April afternoon, Philip Humber was flawless. But that random smile from the pitching gods came with a heavy burden: the pressure to live up to a standard no one can meet." The article continued:

The biggest problem with Humber wasn't his talent. It was, according to those close to him, the unrealistic expectations he set for himself. "He's a perfectionist," says Robert Ellis, [a former mentor to Humber.]"

Humber admitted, "After the game it was like, I've got to prove that the perfect game was not a fluke—I almost felt like I had to prove that I deserved to be on that list. I was thankful for it, but at the same time I wanted to make sure that everyone knew that this wasn't a joke. I'm really good enough to do this."

Every time Humber took the mound, he tried to be the pitcher he was in Seattle—but competence seemed unattainable, much less perfection. In his next start, he allowed nine runs in five innings. Two outings later he was bombed for eight runs in 2 1/3 innings. Every time he fell short of the new standard he set for himself, he pushed himself harder. He began spending more time than ever in the video room. He played with every imaginable grip for his pitches. He threw extra bullpen sessions. He ran more, lifted more. He asked teammates how they dealt with their struggles. He couldn't understand why he couldn't recapture the magic. "I just feel lost," Humber said.

The article concluded with a ray of hope: "Philip Humber doesn't know what will come next in his baseball story. This he knows: He's done chasing perfection."

Possible Preaching Angles: The quest for perfection ruined Humber's season and he never regained his form. As followers of Christ, we must let go of our perfectionism. Only Christ has achieved true and lasting perfection. We rest in his perfect track record.

In 1927 the director Cecil B. DeMille cast British-born actor H. B. Warner as Jesus in his famous silent film King of Kings. Warner, who 19 years later played the druggist in It's a Wonderful Life, was kept on a short leash during the filming of King of Kings. Cecil B. DeMille was concerned that any behavior by the lead actor deemed inconsistent with the image of Christ would result in negative publicity for the film.

As a result, DeMille enforced strict measures to ensure that Warner kept up a good Jesus-image (or what DeMille thought would be a good representation of Jesus). Both Warner and his co-star Dorothy Cumming (who played Mary, the mother of Jesus) had to sign agreements that barred them for five years from appearing in film roles that might compromise their "holy" screen images. During the filming, Warner was driven to the set with blinds drawn, and he wore a black veil as he was delivered to the set. DeMille separated Warner from the other cast members, even forcing him to eat alone every day. Warner couldn't play cards, go to ballgames, ride in a convertible, or go swimming.

Unfortunately, the regimen of rules and regulations didn't make Warner more holy. Instead, all of the pressure to be more Christlike without having the power or forgiveness of Jesus seemed to drive Warner over the edge. During the production of King of Kings, rather than act more like Jesus, Warner merely relapsed into his addiction to alcohol.

Possible Preaching Angles: Legalism, the Law, the Power of the Holy Spirit—This illustration shows the futility of trying to keep the Law, or a manmade list of rules and regulations, without relying on the new life in Christ and the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit.

The primary reason the majority of kids from Christian homes stray from the faith is that they never really heard it or had it to begin with …. Scratch the surface of the faith of the young people around you and you'll find a disturbing deficiency of understanding of even the most basic tenets of Christianity.

This is illustrated by a conversation I recently had with a young woman in her early twenties who had been raised in a Christian home and had attended church for most of her life. After assuring me that she was, indeed, saved, I asked her, "What does it mean to be a Christian?"

She replied, "It means that you ask Jesus into your heart."

"Yes, all right, but what does that mean?"

"It means that you ask Jesus to forgive you."

"Okay, but what do you ask him to forgive you for?"

"Bad things? I guess you ask him to forgive you for bad things, the sins you do."

"Like what?"

A deer in the headlights stared back at me. I thought I'd try a different tack.

"Why would Jesus forgive you?"

She fidgeted. "Um, because you ask him?"

[I asked], "What do you think God wants you to know?"

She beamed. "He wants me to know that I should love myself and that there's nothing I can't do if I think I can."

"And what does God want from you?" I asked.

"He wants me to do good stuff …. You know, be nice to others and don't hang around with bad people."

[Apparently], we've transformed the holy, terrifying, magnificent, and loving God of the Bible into Santa and his elves. And instead of transmitting the gloriously liberating and life-changing truths of the gospel, we have taught our children that what God wants from them is morality. We have told them that being good (at least outwardly) is the be-all and end-all of their faith. This isn't the gospel; we're not handing down Christianity.

Christianity is the unreligion. It turns all our religious instincts on their heads ….

The ancient Greeks told us to be moderate by knowing our inclinations. The Romans told us to be strong by ordering our lives. Buddhism tells us to be disillusioned by annihilating our consciousness. Hinduism tells us to be absorbed by merging our souls. Islam tells us to be submissive by subjecting our wills. Agnosticism tells us to be at peace by ignoring our doubts. Moralism tells us to be good by discharging our obligations. Only the gospel tells us to be free by acknowledging our failure. Christianity is the unreligion because it is the one faith whose founder tells us to bring not our doing, but our need.

Sarah Ferguson is an English ex-royal. Commonly called "Fergie" and well known to readers of tabloids, the red-haired former Duchess of York was married to Prince Andrew, the second son of Queen Elizabeth, from 1986 till their divorce in 1996.

Sarah found her place in the tabloids through missteps and scandals. Her Wikipedia biography says,

By 1991, the marriage was in trouble, and the couple had drifted apart. While her husband was away on naval or royal duties, the Duchess was frequently seen in the company of other men …. Prince Andrew and the Duchess of York finally announced their separation in 1992 ….

The Duchess endured widespread public ridicule contributing to her further estrangement from the British Royal Family. After four years of official separation, the Duke and Duchess announced the mutual decision to divorce in 1996.

A 2011 article about Sarah in The Week reported on her more recent troubles. She was caught trying to sell access to her former husband for $40,000. She nearly went bankrupt. And she received a painful royal snub: she was not among the 1,900 people invited to the 2011 royal wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton.

Sarah did watch the wedding, however, and she says,

With Catherine going up the aisle, you know what went through my head? I feel like I've handed her the baton and said, "Well done. And you'll do it right." I didn't do it right, and now I am going to go get Sarah right."

In that pursuit, we can all identify with Sarah Ferguson. Sooner or later, we come to the point where we realize we've botched things up royally, and we need to fix not just a situation—we need to fix ourselves. And that raises one of the most important questions you'll ever try to answer: What do you do when you decide you're going to go get yourself right? How do you go about that? The world and our own sense of morality tells us one thing; the gospel tells us quite another.

One of the more popular TV ads during the 2010 Super Bowl was sponsored by Audi and takes a poke at the imaginary "green police" out of control.

Standing at the checkout counter of a store, the clerk tells a customer: "Okay, so it's $37.08. Paper or plastic?"

The customer replies, "Plastic."

Into the scene walks a uniformed officer who says, "That's the magic word. Green police. You picked the wrong day to mess with the ecosystem, plastic boy." The officer then hauls the customer away with his hands in cuffs behind his back.

In quick succession we see different scenes of the green police arresting other people guilty of minor environmental infractions.

Green police line the side of a suburban street sifting through garbage cans at the curb. An officer finds a battery in the garbage. An officer in charge yells, "Let's go. Take the house."

A man stands at his kitchen sink at night with an orange rind in hand. Suddenly a searchlight blazes through the window upon him and a green policeman orders over a loudspeaker: "Put the rind down, sir! That's a compost infraction." The man puts the rind down and runs away into the darkness.

A green policeman stands on the brightly lit porch of a comfortable looking suburban home. When the homeowner walks onto the porch, the officer asks, "Did you install these bulbs?" When the homeowner says yeah, he is hauled away to a waiting squad car, and a TV reporter speaks into the camera, "Tragedy strikes tonight where a man has just been arrested for possession of an incandescent light bulb."

A green policeman busts two teenagers for drinking from plastic bottles.

As green policeman surround a man and woman in a hot tub, one of the officers announces, "The water setting is at 105," and the couple is arrested.

The commercial ends with a green policeman busting two real police officers in a squad car. The green policeman asks the real cop, "Are those Styrofoam cups you're drinking from?" The cop says yeah, and the green policeman responds, "Please step out of the car and put 'em on the hood."

In this ad, the problem with the green police is that they are pursuing a good thing—a healthy environment—in an extreme way. They are well meaning, but overzealous.

So it is with legalists. While some are motivated by a Pharisaical spirit, others are pursuing a very good thing—purity and holiness—but they are doing it to an extreme. They police the actions of others in behaviors that the Bible says nothing specifically about. While the Bible does call the leaders of the church to exercise church discipline with regard to certain actions that are clearly named in Scripture, legalists want to raise the bar and also enforce their extra-biblical standards on others.

You're only as good as your last pass.

—Brett Favre, holder of many NFL passing records, three-time MVP, and 10-time all-pro, Super Bowl XXXI champion

The gospel is not good instructions, not a good idea, and not good advice. The gospel is an announcement of what God has done for us in Jesus Christ.

—Michael Horton, Professor of Theology and Apologetics at Westminster Seminary California