Nihilism, not desire for truth or justice, seems to be making its way into the United States, and many other countries in the world. So many people vote, not out of concern for others, not to make things better, but as a way to hurt their enemies. They prefer making others cry than they care about their own well-being, which is why they are willing to suffer and die so long as they see their enemies suffer and die with them. For many, this is demonstrated by the way they just want to “own the liberals.” This spirit has been with us before; St. Salvian saw it right before the destruction of the Roman Empire. “There is now a new and immeasurable evil among most men: it is not enough for anyone to be happy himself, unless another is unhappy.”[1] When people hold hate as a virtue, and the desire to hurt their enemies as the foundation for governmental policies, it should be obvious, the rot and decay they support will destroy everything, including themselves. When we see many who vote concerned merely to put people in power to wreck everything which “liberals” desire, even if, or especially if, what liberals desire is a good which will help everyone, we know we stand at a point of crisis, and how we handle it will determine our future. We should have hope, because nihilism is only strengthened by despair, but we should also be realistic, realizing that we face an existential threat in our nation, and if we are not careful, we can find the United States self-destructing (as many of its enemies, who seem to support the forces of nihilism, want).
Such nihilism bodes ill for the future. The people who have gained power will use it to continue to wreck the system. During the 2022 mid-term elections, they were able to scapegoat President Biden, claiming he was behind inflation, supply chain problems, indeed, the price of gas, despite the fact Biden and the Democrats have done much to make sure the problems are not as bad as it is for the rest of the world. They wanted things to be bad, thinking it will have people turn to them. They, of course, have no interest in making things better before 2024, for they feel that they have not gained all the power they should possess. We should not be surprised to see they will do all they can to hinder economic recovery. They are not interested in the common good, or any public good; they are interested in themselves and their own private pleasures. If the media had not treated them with such kid gloves, if the media had properly and consistently demonstrated what various Republicans were saying they would do if they got power (such holding the economy of the United States hostage in order to make sure they could do what they wanted to destroy the common good), and if the media had properly shown all the Republicans did to make sure things did not get better, it is likely that Republicans would not have received as many votes as they did in the 2022 election. For, despite the fact that many who support them support them in their nihilism, others, who do not have the time or ability to process all that has been going on, just believed their slogans about the economy, without looking to what the Republicans plan to do if they were given positions of power. They believed the Republicans wanted to help, and so they voted for the ones they were led to believe would do something to fix the problems they saw, without knowing how and why the problems were there.
Many Christians in the United States, sadly, have given themselves over to the nihilism. They have been led to reject the common good, and with it, the expectations placed upon every country to do what they can to promote social justice. If they would only listen to the Scripture they claim to follow, and the greater Christian tradition, they would find their rejection of social justice is what destroys a country. Similarly, they would learn God works through the promotion of social justice, and uses it to save dying nations: “Thus says the LORD: ‘Keep justice, and do righteousness, for soon my salvation will come, and my deliverance be revealed’” (Isa. 56:1 RSV). Christians who are concerned about the future of the United States should be concerned about justice and its promotion, not in ignoring it, otherwise, they risk suffering the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah, whose injustices led to their own self-destruction (cf. Ezek. 16:49-50). Thus, the nation which has turned away from justice, the nation which has turned to cruelty, must repent and turn back to the justice they have neglected:
Now, O son of God, take care to look with the pure eye of justice on God , as the eagle does on the sun, so that your judgments may be just without the taint of the selfish will. Otherwise, the high Judge, Who gave His command to mankind, whom He mercifully calls to Himself through penitence, may say to you: “Why have you killed your neighbor without my justice?” [2]
The mid-term elections in the United States, therefore, should give us some concern, as those who rejected social justice, received more votes and so more positions of power than they should have. They will use the power they have been given to make things as bad as possible for the nation; hopefully, no one will be fooled by them in 2024, and they will be quickly cast aside. However, until then, there is hope, because they do did not attain all the power they thought they would get. That means, they are being resisted, and the more harm they now cause, the more that resistance will grow. Hopefully, they will be prevented from following their worst instincts. And, if more people turn to the promotion of the common good, to the promotion of justice, the nation can still be saved, despite the captivity they currently find themselves under.
“Local conflicts and disregard for the common good are exploited by the global economy in order to impose a single cultural model.”[3] This is going to happen more and more. We can see this in the way that Republican nihilists show no concern for refugees. They hate them because their cultures promote ideals that they have neglected, such as concern for the common good, which they always label as “communist” or “socialist,” even though proper engagement with the common good does not require anyone to follow such ideologies. A particular cultural model, one coming from the “White Anglo-Saxon Protestant” heritage of the past, is embraced by nihilists, not because they care for it themselves, as much as they see it as a tool to get votes. This is why so many of them will appear pious and religious in front of the camera, speaking about Christianity, while ignoring the basic moral teachings of the Christian faith. They know how to use the fear of the other as a tool to exploit and control the population. But again, it is clear, their power is not as great as they thought it would be or should be. They can be put in check; they can be prevented from causing all the harm they want to do. The key is to embrace justice, true justice, and its expectations for the common good; to make sure the poor, the needy, are taken care of instead of abandoned, and to make sure our common home, the Earth, itself is protected; if we don’t do this, we only have ourselves to blame. “Justice, and only justice, you shall follow, that you may live and inherit the land which the LORD your God gives you” (Deut. 16:20 RSV). Those who take joy in hurting others, especially the poor, will face the consequences of their action, if not in temporal history, than in the judgment before the eschaton. “The oppressors of the poor should know that they are deserving of a more serious sentence when they have prevailed over those whom they desired to injure. For they are to be condemned to a more atrocious future punishment to the extent that they have behaved more forcefully in this world against the life of the wretched ones.”[4]
We should, then, have a realistic understanding of what lies before us. We should have hope for the future, as we should see the forces of nihilism have not won a final victory. It is clear, not everything has been lost. But, if the present nihilism is not confronted by the forces of the good, with the promotion of the common good and the justice needed to enact it, we will face great pain and sorrow in our future, as the forces of nihilism will break apart and destroy our nation. The more we resist them, the better the chances will be that the pain will be short-term, and we will be able to attain the recovery we need. The 2022 elections show we are still fighting a long-term battle. We might have lost a few of the conflicts, but the fight for the soul of the nation, and for the future of the world, is not yet lost.
[1] Salvian the Presbyter, “The Governance of God” in The Writings of Salvian the Presbyter. Trans. Jeremiah F. O’Sullivan (Washington, DC: CUA Press, 133.
[2] St. Hildegard of Bingen, “Letter 324r” in The Letters of Hildegard of Bingen. Volume III. Trans. Joseph L Baird and Radd K Ehrman (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), 122.
[3] Pope Francis, Fratelli tutti. Vatican translation. ¶12.
[4] St. Isidore of Seville, Sententiae. Trans. Thomas L. Knoebel (New York: Newman Press, 2018),208.
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