A THOUGHTFUL AND INTELLIGENT ASSESSMENT

One of the most challenging things I read each month is Hillsdale College’s Imprimis. It is intellectually stimulating and culturally relevant.  I don’t pretend to understand everything I read there, but isn’t that the nature of a challenge? 

The edition I just read [July/August 2025/Volume 54, Number 7/8] did not miss the mark. It was an encapsulation of the recent 2025 Commencement Address delivered by Victor Davis Hanson [who many of us see occasionally making contributions on the various conservative news networks].

His introductory remarks were warm, personal and real, as he reflected on his first visit to Hillsdale College in 2004. He reflected on three observations made during that visit:

1.   He left a bicycle unlocked on campus overnight and found it the next morning neither vandalized or stolen.

2.   While visiting the campus bookstore he noticed no therapeutic course titles like peace studies, environmental studies, leisure studies, film studies, gender studies, or sexual studies. Instead, there were courses in all classical aspects of philosophy, literature, languages, history, mathematics, and science.

3.   Upon arriving he observed that students, faculty, and staff at Hillsdale College are happy. “They smile. They say hello to strangers. They shake your hand.”

I will not replicate his remarks – except a few that particularly struck me. He challenged the graduating class with corresponding points about honor, tradition and optimism.

I underlined the following:

“When individual behavior and decorum falter, so does a country, which is, after all, only the common reflection of millions of its individuals.” [p.3]

Immediately thoughts of violence, looting and destroying property leaped to the foreground of my memory. Thoughts about the unsympathetic exchanges between our two political parties and the angry tirades we watch on the floor of our Congress disturbed my mind.

Granted, those who propagate these vehement expressions of anger and discontent are a minority, however, they inevitably taint the bigger picture of our COUNTRY! 

The fact that these exchanges take place as frequently as they do mars the good reflection that we desire!

I also took note of Dr. Hanson’s words regarding tradition:

“So often in the present age, we in our narcissism and arrogance confuse our technical and material successes with automatic moral progress. We seem unaware that thinkers of the past – as early as the Greek poet Hesiod, some 2,700 years ago – worried about just the opposite: they worried that material progress and greater wealth would result in moral regress, given the greater opportunities to gratify the appetites with perceived fewer consequences and to use sophistry to excuse the sin.”

 

[I had to look it up: sophistry means slightly deceptive reasoning.]

Would anyone argue this point? Has moral behavior been improved by our material gain and technological prowess?

I don’t think so.

Cite the diminishing impact and influence of the church in America as a consequence of our wealth and sophistication. It’s a good question for debate: Does the declining influence of the church correspond to the increase of immorality? What do you think?

However, Dr. Hanson deliberately closes his remarks “on a happy note”. He looks to the generation he is addressing in this speech for optimism. He states that “the strength of this country - even in its darkest days like those of April 12, 1861 [the Battle of Fort Sumpter], or December 7, 1941 [the attack on Pearl Harbor] or September 11, 2001 as evidence that even in its darkest days - has always been its singular ability to remain not just unshaken, but confident in its values, its resilience, and its inherent strength to overcome all challenges.” [p.5]

I’m 73½. 🙂  [I’m remembering George Carlin’s bit that states when you reach a certain age, you start counting ‘half-years’ again!]

In short – I’m an old guy. Although I’m still aware of the contributions of Abraham, Moses, Samuel and quite a number of older folks who made major contributions to history [His story]. I’m also aware that our president is 79 years of age – and sets a pace that few can sustain.

However, the future will be more likely impacted by a new and younger generation. Let’s hope and pray that those who cherish values like faith, freedom and respect will lead us into a future that protects those of all ages, finds creative and fair solutions to the complex issues of the global community, and propagates democracy as a preferred system of government. 

ALCOHOL USE IS NO LONGER A MORAL ISSUE

Temperance is not a term that we hear or use much in the 21^st century.  But 175 years ago, it was a highly recognized word in American culture.  Around 1850, there was a moral debate going on that ended up focusing on the evils associated with the use of alcohol. 

A poem was published along with a woodcut of a swell-headed, bottle-toting gentleman:

How could I ever think to wed

A man who’s always drunken;

Who really has so large a head,

It looks like a ripe pumpkin.

The woodcut included the words: “Choose for yourselves men: the bottle or a bride.”

Remarkably, in 1851, Maine lawmakers declared the entire state of Maine “dry.”

By 1874, a group of women formed the Women’s Christian Temperance Union [WCTU], advocating total abstinence from alcohol because of its destructive effects on health and family life. 

In the early twentieth century the Prohibition Party had been formed to make an impact on the country’s politics.

SIDEBAR:

My mother was a member of the WCTU and the Prohibition Party.  She would not drink a beverage from a glass that in any way resembled a wine glass. 

I recall an election year when she was denied the privilege of voting because she was not Democrat or Republican, but a member of the Prohibition Party.  She went to the judge on duty at the courthouse in Beaver, PA and he ruled her eligible to vote!  

She had strong convictions opposing the use of alcohol and made no attempt to hide them.  For a humorous story about my mom and dad, see my bog article:  https://hal-lelujah.blogspot.com/2011/12/egg-nog.html

 THE END OF PROHIBITION

 “By the 1930s, it was clear that Prohibition had become a public policy failure. The 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution had done little to curb the sale, production and consumption of intoxicating liquors. And while organized crime flourished, tax revenues withered. With the United States stuck in the throes of the Great Depression, money trumped morals, and the federal government turned to alcohol to quench its thirst for desperately needed tax money and put an estimated half-million Americans back to work.”  [https://www.history.com/news/the-night-prohibition-ended]

In February 1933, Congress easily passed a proposed 21st Amendment that would repeal the 18th Amendment, which legalized national Prohibition.  For the first time in American history, a Constitutional amendment had been repealed!  On December 5, 1933, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Utah were the last three states to meet the necessary ratification process to repeal the amendment. 

“An hour later, with little pomp and circumstance, President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued a proclamation declaring the end of Prohibition while also admonishing the country to drink responsibly and not abuse ‘this return of individual freedom.’ ‘I trust in the good sense of the American people,’ the president said, ‘that they will not bring upon themselves the curse of excessive use of intoxicating liquors, to the detriment of health, morals and social integrity.’”  [Ibid.] 

A remarkable fact of irony is displayed in the fact that the well-known and highly effective group – Alcoholics Anonymous – was created just a year later in 1934.  By 1939 it published its groundbreaking book, ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS.  In 1940, it opened its first headquarters in Lower Manhattan.  [https://www.columbusrecoverycenter.com/alcohol-addiction/history-of-aa/]

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THE COST OF EXCESSIVE ALCOHOL USE

According to a study by Ardu’ Recovery Center Today:
[https://www.ardurecoverycenter.com/economic-costs-of-excessive-alcohol-use/]

Excessive drinking takes a heavy economic toll across the United States. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the 2010 economic cost of alcohol abuse was $249 billion. 

Productivity losses and healthcare expenses account for 83% of the annual economic cost. While targeted policies offer the most effective means to alleviate financial stress, cost-benefit analyses consistently reveal that the costs of alcohol consumption outweigh any economic benefits.

A 2023 report from Harvard Medical School projected that the annual cost of treating alcohol-associated liver disease (ALD) alone would more than double over the next two decades, increasing from $31 billion in 2022 to $66 billion in 2040.  

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This information is not frequently published although it is obviously readily available.  We continue to live in a country where – within legal age limits – the consumption of alcohol is a free choice.  The morality of this issue is now rarely addressed.

As families and individuals, we must deal with the consequences of our choices. 

Turning Things Around

I recently placed a joke on my Face Book page:

When I asked my friend if she was planning to attend church, she just shook her head. "I haven't gone in a long time," she said.

"Besides, it's too late for me. I've probably already broken all seven commandments."

It's really not funny.  It pokes fun at a culture that has forgotten the important guidelines that God wrote with His own hand for Moses!

Why not test yourself right now?  How many of the Ten Commandments can you name?  Do you know where to find them (other than Google)?  After you've jotted them down on paper or in your mind, check yourself by grabbing a Bible and looking in Exodus 20 or Deuteronomy 5.  How'd you do?

This morning I read Jeremiah 9 and was struck with God's strong remarks about lying!  Apparently Judah was consumed with patterns of lying that were destroying trust among the people and breaking the heart of God!

[God speaking]   With tongues bent like bows they shoot their lies at one another.  Truth does not win out in this land;  deceit always seems to triumph.  One evil leads to another because they don't know who I am...every brother is ready to cheat and deceive;  every neighbor is prepared to lie when it suits him.  In this land of liars, friends have no misgivings about deceiving one another;  no one even thinks to tell the truth. They've trained their tongues to utter lies;  they wear themselves out with all their sinning.  Jeremiah, you live in a place where deception is assumed;  as their lies pile up, they refuse to acknowledge Me.

It occurred to me that this could very well be a description of our American culture.  We are reaping the benefits of Seinfeld and Friends from previous decades.  We've scrubbed the Ten Commandments from our school walls and public forums.  A mere 20% of our population attend worship on any given Sunday. Honesty and integrity are exceptional descriptors today and we marvel when we see their examples.  

Businesses pass on their losses from shop-lifting and we all pay the price of a culture that is losing its underpinnings.  I could go on, but do I really need to?

The end result of Jeremiah's message was to see the people hauled away into exile in Babylon!  No one knows yet what the end result will be for America.

But for those of us who care, what can we do?

The answer is obvious.

Exhibit honesty and integrity in all our dealings!  Practice, model and exhort conformity to God's 'Big Ten'.  Talk about these things to our children, grandchildren, friends and neighbors.  Do it while you're playing, or during a meal, or when you take a walk together (Deuteronomy 6:4-9)!  

Begin again to weave a cultural fabric that's founded on the principles taught in God's Word!  Believe with all our hearts that God will honor such behavior (because He does!).  

Resist conformity to cultural modes.  Set high, godly standards for all who are watching you live your life.  

There was a day in our history when deals were made and sealed with a handshake.  A man's word was a thing of value.  Let's forge a future that has the same power!  I'll work hard at it - how about you?  

For a related post, check out "I Lied" (written November 15, 2011).