Does Everyone Have a Sixth Sense?

Last Saturday, the country was left grappling with another reminder of human depravity. An 18-year-old gunman entered a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, killing 10 and injuring three more. The victims, who were predominantly black, included Heyward Patterson, a local church deacon; Pearl Young, a retired school teacher; and Aaron Salter, a retired police officer.  

Mass shootings are too familiar, but no less overwhelming: friends and family in agony, communities left to pick up the pieces, collective rage over the brutal violence, a longing for justice, and a rush to explain why. 

For many news outlets, the narrative is a cut-and-dried example of right-wing extremism. The shooter’s manifesto pointed to an embrace of “replacement theory,” the idea that white Americans are being systematically edged out of society by minorities. “That idea,” claim Isaac Stanley-Becker and Drew Harwell of The Washington Post,  

once relegated to the fringe, has gained currency on popular right-wing television programs and in the halls of Congress. The apocalyptic vision has accumulated followers during the coronavirus pandemic, which has deepened political polarization and accelerated the online flow of racist ideology.  

The shooter’s 180-page document confirms that he was indeed motivated by replacement ideology and outright racism. In it he described his plan to deliberately attack a black supermarket, as well as his support for antisemitic and neo-Nazi causes. “I will carry out an attack against the replacers,” he wrote, “and will even livestream the attack.”  

In a sort of guilt by association, blame was leveled at Republicans, especially those who hold conservative views on immigration, whether or not they harbor any ill will towards minority groups or immigrant neighbors. Ignored was the shooter’s description of his own ideals, which includes outright rejections of conservatism as “corporatism in disguise.”  

“Are you right wing?” he asks rhetorically. “Depending on the definition, sure. Are you left wing? Depending on the definition, sure. Are you a socialist? Depending on the definition.”  

As Kyle Smith at the National Review summed up:  

The manifesto, while certainly political, is ideologically all over the map, as was the Unabomber’s. Whoever your ideological boogeyman of today’s discourse is, this person doesn’t link up to him very easily. 

How do we make sense of this? Human beings are meaning-making creatures. The fact that we have an instinctive need to know why bad things happen says something about the kind of creatures we are and the moral kind of universe we inhabit. But we are also prone to misdiagnose the problem, and therefore mis-prescribe a solution, because of our allegiance to false ideologies that become a hammer looking for nails. 

People are more than many ideologies can explain. This is why Communist and Fascist dictatorships end up looking like each other over time. As my colleague Tim Padgett put it recently, “Sometimes worldviews simply give shape to the evil already within individuals.” 

And that’s what the Christian worldview says: That evil is already within individuals. The more the social bonds of a culture unravel, the more that people are pushed to their ideological extremes. This is especially the case in a world where digital technologies both radicalize and incentivize bad behaviors. 

In such a world, politicized theories dominating our discourse are proving to be inadequate to explain violence on this level. Racism, while not what it was a few decades ago, is far from extinct. In its most diabolical forms, entire groups of people are seen as the enemy, as evident by the shooter’s manifesto. At the same time, the current analysis of nearly everything, including these incidents, is being dramatically hampered by what I call a “critical theory mood.”  

While most Americans, including the pundits, have not read the academic source material behind the various expressions of formal critical theory, there is a predisposed commitment, on both the right and the left, to divide the world by tribes, people groups, and political parties and, in doing so, to pre-determine who’s right and wrong, good and evil, if by nothing else but association. The dramatically different ways that clearly racially motivated acts are treated and described—compare this event with the Waukesha tragedy a few months ago—based on these people groupings simply demonstrate that we have no clue how to distinguish between good and evil.  

 Critical theory in its formal form or as a cultural mood is short-sighted and inadequate. The Christian vision of the cosmos, people, morality, and human history offers an adequate understanding of good and evil on every level: both societal and individual.  

As a young man, Tom Tarrants, was injured in a shootout with FBI agents and sent to prison. “If anyone deserved to die, it was certainly me,” this former member of the Ku Klux Klan, once filled with racial hatred, wrote recently in Christianity Today. But God worked a miracle, even in solitary confinement: repentance and even reconciliation with some of those he tried to kill.  

Only the Gospel can do that.  

As we grieve, we pray for justice and for healing to God who reigns over everything, even Buffalo, New York, last Saturday. In Him, we have hope, understanding, and a way forward. 

“Religion, not gender,” the Economist reports, “is the best predictor of views on abortion.” The editors write: 

Shocked by a draft Supreme Court opinion that would allow states to ban abortion…. some [activists] hope that women enraged by the loss of Roe v Wade will vote en masse for Democrats in November. 

But, they argue, that hope is misplaced. Whereas the gap between men and women on abortion restrictions is just 6%, religion—combined with race—accounts for a 65% difference.  

Among both men and women, for example, 92% of atheists favor pro-abortion policies. Likewise, according to Gallup, 75% of those who attend religious services weekly identify as “pro-life.”  

In other words, abortion is not an issue of women against men.  It’s an issue of worldview. Women are, of course, most affected by issues surrounding pregnancy, but not always the way that we are led to believe. 

The real question is what is the pre-born? Are they, abortion advocates suggest, just disposable tissue or “lives worth sacrificing?” Or are they, in the words of Scripture, “fearfully and wonderfully made” in the image of God? 

According to the U.S. Department of Education, since the start of the pandemic, more than 1.5 million students have left traditional public schooling.

Many parents are realizing, some for the first time, that students aren’t learning what their parents thought they were learning. As one former college professor noted, if you haven’t been in education in the past three years, it’s almost unrecognizable to what you experienced growing up.

This has led to incredible growth in the number of home schooling families and record enrollments for nearly every Christian school that I know of.

Part of the Colson Center’s calling as a worldview-equipping institution is to serve Christian educators by equipping them to think and teach from a Christian worldview.

We invite you to partner with us as we serve Christian education in this strategic moment by training Christian educators. To learn more about our work in Christian education, and to support it, visit www.breakpoint.org/september.

According to Wired magazine, “Eighteen months of using front-facing cameras has distorted our self-image.” It’s what health experts are calling “Zoom Dysmorphia.” We’re spending so much time looking at ourselves through cameras, it’s crushing our self-esteem.

 

Doctors have seen this effect for a long time. Feelings of distress and self-focus rise when people spend too much time looking in the mirror, even people who don’t have a diagnosed body image problem. A safe conclusion is that as humans, we weren’t designed to look at ourselves. We find our best sense of belonging, identity, and self-worth by focusing outwardly, not inwardly. 

 

Consider babies. They’re utterly unselfconscious. They get tremendous joy from just looking at others. It’s only as we get older that we make ourselves miserable with our constant consideration of ourselves. 

 

All of this mirrors a profound spiritual reality that’s communicated to us in the greatest commandment: don’t think too much of yourself, but fix your eyes on God, by loving Him with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and your neighbor as yourself.

Recently, Chinese authorities announced that minors can only play video games for three hours a week, and not on school days. 

Of course,  this  kind of thing would never happen in the West, for all kinds of reasons, not least of which is our worship of individual autonomy. We can’t even pass real restrictions on known dangers like violent pornography and Instagram. 

In a communist vision, on the other hand, individuals and their freedom are dispensable. After all, video games are really addicting, and a generation of young men lost in fantasy worlds can’t serve their state. Banning video games is a small step for a nation that already tracks faces, encourages snitching through a social credit system, and sends police right to your location if you violate protocol. 

Humans are neither mere parts of a community nor autonomous individuals. The only worldview that sustains freedom recognizes who we are: moral agents, entitled to and responsible for  our decisions, and members of a larger community, responsible to and for others whom Jesus called our “neighbors.”

While some studies conclude that “students made little or no progress while learning from home,” the effects of school shutdowns vary depending on additional factors: socio-economic status, the type of distance learning, and especially the involvement of parents. 

Though it’s mostly bad news, there is a marked silver lining. For example, one teenager told the New York Times, “… Although living through COVID has been really hard … I am so incredibly lucky to say that I probably gained more than I lost.”

Like most of the damage from this pandemic, the key factors for education were pre-existing conditions. Students already accustomed to facing challenges can grow more resilient in adversity. Students whose education was already more than information transfer were able to build curiosity in new ways. Parents who accepted that their kids’ education was primarily their responsibility made necessary pivots.

In other words, the important lessons to be learned are about far more than crisis management. It’s about what education really is.

The world’s richest person, Jeff Bezos, is reportedly spending a lot of money on immortality. According to MIT’s Technology Review, the Amazon founder has invested heavily in experimental genetic research to reverse the process of aging.

It’s just a new twist on an old story. Sixteenth-century conquistadors sought the fountain of youth. For Indiana Jones, it was the Holy Grail. For 21st century tech gurus, it’s the science of epigenetics, driven by a worldview of transhumanism. People have always looked to escape death, and they will spend a fortune along the way. 

And that’s the tragic irony: the only real solution to death is free. Pseudo-science may promise eternal life, but only Jesus can deliver. As He said, “I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish…”  He offers two things all the money in the world can never buy: not just a way to live forever, but also a reason to want to.

For years, urban innovators have dreamt of “15-minute neighborhoods,” where people have everything they need within a short walk. The pandemic is making the employment side of that possible for many. In Britain, for example, 24 percent of workers say they want to work from home permanently. 

One of the things that makes the 15-minute neighborhood concept so appealing to many is that many people feel a lack of neighbors. Although they do have neighbors, roughly one-in-four Americans under age 30 say they don’t know any of them. There’s a desire to reinvigorate the idea of neighborhood. 

Of course, Jesus raised that bar even higher. Love your neighbors, He said, and as He taught via the parable of the Good Samaritan, our neighborhood often includes those we wish it didn’t. For a generation so quick to cancel others, this neighborhood thing could prove difficult. 

But if we obey Christ and truly love our neighbor, it could really be something…

Philipp Dettmer has an amazing YouTube video about the immune system, one of the most complex systems in the human body. The key to how this vast network of specialized cells survives infections is found in the antibodies: the proteins this system creates after the body has been attacked.

 

In other words, immunity comes through challenge. That’s why it’s important that our immune systems get stronger, which involves being exposed to a wide range of attacks. 

 

The lesson for Christian parents is similar. We can’t protect kids from false ideas by eliminating their exposure to them. Age-appropriate protection is important, but children who are never exposed to bad ideas develop a worldview without the antibodies they need to confront these infectious ideas in real life. 

They are like, as the Apostle Paul put it, “infants, tossed back and forth by the waves.” Knowing when to introduce bad ideas to our kids is important, but they must develop the discernment to recognize bad ideas and the wisdom to confront them. The goal is not isolation but inoculation.