I had my ideological conversion experience long before my spiritual one. It began with an opportunity to stare into the dark heart of the "peace" movement of the 1980s, which led to my pursuit of a master's degree in history in order to ascertain when that strain of thought emerged within the overall development of the West. Some circumstances in my work life around that time made for my first real exposure to identity politics as well. Within a short time, I was off and running, subscribing to National Review, Commentary, The American Spectator and Insight and attending every think-tank conference that time and money would allow.
But with regard to questions of God's nature and ultimate meaning, I languished in the zone somewhere between vaguely Eastern all-is-one-ism and secular agnosticism. As time went on, the entire matter slid further down my list of important things to think about.
When Christians would invite me to consider their take on it, I would buck at the remaining sticking points I had. Without belaboring them, given that I've discussed the subject of sticking points in past posts, they included my sense that salvation looked like a rigged game to me, and the patriarchal design for the universe which Christianity proclaimed.
As I worked through those, my resistance narrowed down to the matter of an actual Devil. So immersed in modern sensibility was I that I just couldn't take that step. The notion of an anti-God in the form of a being at work in the world flew in the face of what I thought I knew about reality.
My prior conversion to conservatism served me well at the moment of my tipping point. So aware was I of the foul nature of Leftism's essence that I kept coming back to the word "demonic" to describe it. The events of the past decade - dustups over homosexual "marriage and transgender bathrooms, distortion of the notion of rights beyond all recognizability (to include, among other things, health care), the disregard from nearly all corners for the disastrous debt the nation was imposing on itself, and the mutations into which that "peace" movement that started it all for me into rank appeasement of the most radical and threatening regimes the West had ever faced - forced me into a position of seeing Lucifer's face in the daily life of our civilization.
And now, with the latest flare-up of the abortion issue, we can feel his hot breath on our necks. I'm not the first observer to note that we are irreversibly past the point of any "safe, legal and rare" smokescreens. No one bothers to talk that way anymore. We now have industries, particularly the film industry, that want to quit doing business in Georgia because that state's legislature and governor enacted a law that protects a person when an obstetrician can detect the person's heartbeat.
There is no shortage of accounts of what abortion actually is. Two recent movies, Gosnell and Unplanned serve well to drive that home. I came across a piece today that likewise makes plain the evil of the procedure:
In the course of my morning persusal of various opinion outlets, I also came across an absolutely chilling piece to which I will not link. I will tell you that it is at Buzzfeed and that it is by NARAL's Amy Everitt. It is entitled "CEOs Must Stand Up For Abortion Rights," and its thrust is that America's corporations are lax in ensuring that women have the opportunities for career advancement that they deserve.I changed my opinion on abortion after I read an article in Esquire magazine, way back in 1976. I was home from grad school, flipping through my dad’s copy, and came across an article titled “What I Saw at the Abortion.” The author, Richard Selzer, was a surgeon, and he was in favor of abortion, but he’d never seen one. So he asked a colleague whether, next time, he could go along.Selzer described seeing the patient, 19 weeks pregnant, lying on her back on the table. (That is unusually late; most abortions are done by the tenth or twelfth week.) The doctor performing the procedure inserted a syringe into the woman’s abdomen and injected her womb with a prostaglandin solution, which would bring on contractions and cause a miscarriage. (This method isn’t used anymore, because too often the baby survived the procedure — chemically burned and disfigured, but clinging to life. Newer methods, including those called “partial birth abortion” and “dismemberment abortion,” more reliably ensure death.)After injecting the hormone into the patient’s womb, the doctor left the syringe standing upright on her belly. Then, Selzer wrote, “I see something other than what I expected here. . . . It is the hub of the needle that is in the woman’s belly that has jerked. First to one side. Then to the other side. Once more it wobbles, is tugged, like a fishing line nibbled by a sunfish.”He realized he was seeing the fetus’s desperate fight for life. And as he watched, he saw the movement of the syringe slow down and then stop. The child was dead. Whatever else an unborn child does not have, he has one thing: a will to live. He will fight to defend his life.The last words in Selzer’s essay are, “Whatever else is said in abortion’s defense, the vision of that other defense [i.e., of the child defending its life] will not vanish from my eyes. And it has happened that you cannot reason with me now. For what can language do against the truth of what I saw?”
Everitt is the Devil's mouthpiece. She advocates for a world in which selfishness - indeed, the obsolescence of familial connectedness - is placed among the highest values that people ought to embrace. Oh, she gives perfunctory lip service to women "choos[ing] if, how and when to have a family," but does so in the context of the imperative that women not "miss out on opportunities."
So much for the idea that the family as the basic unit of societal organization is a creation of almighty God, and that it is the environment in which we first learn about trust, nurturing, teamwork, accountability, humor, and a number of other conditions for being fully human.
It's a mean, cold world that these people intend to impose upon us. Their invitation is for you and me to willingly offer our souls for devouring.
That's how late in the day it is.
You have seen the face of Lucifer? And he's there in medicare, medicaid and the national healthcare debate? Call the press so they can interview you and circulate word of his apparition. Demonization has been ezposed as time worn tactic of despots desparate to work their wiley ways. Here's a parlor game for you: google demonization.
ReplyDeletePolitics is Mammon. It only takes the heart to convert.
ReplyDeleteYes, he's in out health care debate, given that the Left is trying to convince the post-American public that health care can somehow be a right.
ReplyDeleteAnd I have no aspirations to be a despot. I am merely saying that contemporary Leftism is beyond incorrect. It is evil.
The only counter-argument to my position is that the things I enumerate in this post are okay.
ReplyDeleteOther than abortion (by the way I read that Selzer piece in Esquire when it appeared as well as various other pieces and books written by this brilliant surgeon-author) and if the devil's smirking face is behind every willful violation of the 5th (Augustinian Division followed and /or violated by Catholics & Lutherans) Commandment is this in regard to any and all killing of one human by another human being or are there exceptions as in war, assuming it is the (preferably non-Christian) enemy?
ReplyDeleteAnd I have difficulty with your seeing Lucifer in the Mideast peace process, particularly the internationally negotiated Iran nuclear agreement intended to avoid nuclear confrontation between rival non-Christian states. There appears to be a Mayday situation brewing in which our generally peace loving country may become involved. I don't know if Netanyahu is a fan of Israel's Satanic universal health care program which is quite successful and popular but I may see his face in a nuclear holocaust.
ReplyDeleteKibbutz? God (aka Prince of Peace) or Lucifer (aka Angel of Light)?
ReplyDeleteThe Iran deal was awful and it is an excellent thing that the US pulled out and that European trade with Iran is shriveling as a result. Civilized nations must never confer legitimacy on evil regimes bent on obliterating them.
ReplyDeleteRe: you latest comment: I have no idea what you're getting at, other than trying to avoid looking at the spiritual cancer eating at our nation.
The Iran deal might have been arguably awful but I fail to see Satan in it, though he might be in war, which is always awful. Why not look for the Holy Spirit? All you have to do is humbly ask in quietude. Satan as you see him is all over Israel, the defense of which you hold so dearly. As for family, hold yours together and I'll hold mine. One day at a time...
ReplyDeleteI pray that someday you may be released from the grip of Israel-hatred.
ReplyDeleteIsrael hatred? Where did you get that? I do not hate Israel. Grip? You're a bit off here.
ReplyDeleteWhy did you say this?: " Satan as you see him is all over Israel, the defense of which you hold so dearly."
ReplyDeleteWell, because they have a nnational health care program, liberal abortion laws and their kibbutz is anything but the nuclear family.
ReplyDeleteAs I've said before, most Western nations are infected to some degree.
ReplyDeleteIn fact, I can't think of one that isn't.
ReplyDeleteCan't call on the Holy Spirit in Israel.
ReplyDelete