In the movie MASH Hawkeye observes Major Frank Burns praying, and remarks, “Have you ever seen this syndrome before?” Duke replies, “Not in someone over the age of eight.” That interchange captures the spirit of the late ’60’s/late ’70’s. Irreverent, anti-authority, self-confident, free love,–and in the movie, elitist.
I grew up in the ’60’s/’70’s and feel that there is much to be treasured from that era, now gone. Peace and love, philosophy, self-reliance, music, freedom, individuality. But along with these ideals, this idealistic time, came the kind of spirit that MASH captures so well. Religion is ridiculed and the religious Frank Burns is an intolerable character.
Where so we go from there? The spirit of the ’60’s/’70’s declared religion to be childish and ridiculous, and irreverent camaraderie to be the virtue of the day. I think society bought it, and that those values persist today. People turn to pop-culture to find behavioral norms and proprieties. And for some, probably a lot, there is no place for prayer, no use for prayer.
Churches are failing, even synagogues and mosques are seeing diminution in attendance. A while back I thought we are in a “post-Christian” age. Now I see it as a “post-religious” age. Even the “spiritual-but-not-religious” demographic is less than half of North American culture, and only a fraction of the population in Europe.
Certainly there were bad ideas in religions. Certainly there were abuses of power. Certainly there was hypocrisy. But religion also contributed some of society’s most glorious cultural artworks, literature, philosophy, and, of course, theology. The religious and spiritual impulse is a beautiful aspect in the human situation. It makes the psyche sing. It gives us honesty, sincerity, generosity, care for others, the quest for truth, repentance and human perfection, and ecstasy. Without spirituality, what are we left with?
“But on earth indifference is the least/We have to dread from man or beast,” the poet W. H. Auden writes. I don’t know. I fear indifference. I can’t but feel that the indifference to religion and even spirituality is numbing society. We’re getting bland to everything, getting bland. And we are retreating into tribes. Instead of spiritual community that reaches out to the stranger and foreigner, we are retreating into tribes that close off the other. We ignore religion to the peril of the loving community that the world can be. While religion is often castigated for causing wars, I think that the lack of genuine religion is causing us to be more xenophobic and antagonistic to the other. Will the indifference of our age ever produce another work like Beethoven’s 9th? Will we ever know again the peace that passes understanding? Will we ever again sing, “Love divine! All loves excelling!”
David Fekete 