The world we live in today is a frightening one. It's hard to imagine things getting much worse. We live in a world full of selfish people focused merely on their own immediate gratification. Families are falling apart at the seams--in the US almost half of first marriages end in divorce within 15 years, shattering families nationwide. A lot of couples are skipping marriage all together. Marriage is often seen as a silly tradition of our intolerable ancestors that is no longer needed in today's society. The mere definition of marriage has been called into question. The principle of chastity is met with scorn and disdain. Instead, couples are expected to live together before the possibility of marriage is even discussed. Indeed the battle for families is raging.
People will lie, steal, cheat, anything to get ahead in their career. When discussing integrity in a team building exercise the majority of my classmates present informed me that a person can have integrity and still lie about things every now and then. A little doesn't hurt. My classmates argued that it was okay to cheat on a big test if you'd completely forgotten to study the previous night. No one needs to tell the truth all the time, right? I wonder how many people could go even just one day without telling a lie. I fear the number would be small. It's all about money, as the Zormanites of Alma's time, our "hearts [are] set upon gold, and upon silver, and upon all manner of fine good" (Alma 31:24).
Our selfish habits have resulted in major environmental problems. Our skies are graying with pollution while our glaciers are melting as the ever looming threat of global warming hangs over us. Our oil sources are depleting, our water is constantly wasted as we murder acres upon acres trees world wide to further our development. Are we really developing in the right direction?
Our economy is a mess. Everyday companies worldwide are downsizing--a polite way of saying they're dumping loyal employees out into the streets with little if anything to fall back on.
On Tuesday, America celebrated the election of a new president. It has been said to be a historical event--our first black president. We have comes leaps and bounds since the day Martin Luther King Junior told us about his dream for a more accepting America. Barack Obama believes he can heal our country, our world. He eloquently speaks of change and hope, of establishing a better world for our children. He seems to understand the America our founding fathers had in mind when they drafted the Declaration of Independence. As of now we are a divided country. Obama believes he can unite us again. I hope he can.
Despite rising crime rates, a crumbling natural environment and a toppling economy--things that Obama aims to tackle--what scares me most is the world's rejection of God. No president can fix this issue. In a grade of about 45 students I'm fairly confident that I was the only one to attend church regularly. Most thought a belief in God was silly, that I was ignorant and didn't know better for having faith in anything. They told me that I was blindly believing what I had been taught. I have always found that incredibly ironic. I have spent hours reading, hours writing, listening, hours praying, asking, experimenting, believing and living to reach my firm knowledge that there is a God and that He lives and that He has a son named Jesus Christ who lived, died and still lives for me. I have always been told to learn things for myself--especially things of spiritual matters. I wonder how much time and energy my athiest friends have put into their "knowledge" that God does not exist. I can't imagine very much. Chances are that they have blindly believed their parents, teachers, writers, scientists, the media--who ever taught them that there is no God. God is being pushed out of the world. President Gordon B. Hinckley, the former leader of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and prophet to the world was once quoted as saying, "I fear God is abandoning America because America is abandoning God." Our Father in Heaven can only bless our lives when we let Him into it. If we don't want Him there, He will leave us be. Why anyone would want to sepparate themselves from God I can't understand but in this frightening world it happens everyday.
As the Weepies sing, "And the world spins madly on"
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