America has new gods.
America's new true gods.
We're
not a Christian nation.
We're
not even a nation of Christians.
Sure,
the majority population calls themselves that.
But
when has that ever truly meant anything?
People
call themselves all kinds of things that their actions contradict.
The
importance is what people do, not what people say.
America
has new gods.
Multiple
gods.
We
don't worship the Abrahamic deities in their many names.
We
worship greed.
We
worship unadulterated self-centeredness.
We
worship fear.
These
are the new gods of America.
Greed,
where corporate overlords bilk us out of our paychecks and our future for short-term quarterly savings and gains.
And
we praise them for doing it.
Self-centeredness,
where people can unabashedly argue their right to own a deadly weapon they treat
like a toy is more important than our children's right to live.
And
their voices grow louder.
Most
insidious of all, however, is the fear.
Fear,
that drives people who follow a holy book that preaches: Hebrews 13:2 “Do not
neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained
angels unawares,” to decry and condemn those fleeing destruction and death.
Fear,
that drives people to value their own sense of righteousness over those who
just want to love.
Fear,
that drives people to identity politics wherein their ideas become their
identity and no matter how wrong they are, any evidence against them is an
attack on them as a person not an argument, and civil discourse becomes crushed
and forgotten.
Fear,
that drives people to vote against their own interests and give up their own
freedom while stealing it from others with a smile on their faces.
This
is America today, and these are our new gods.
These
are the gods of a nation that is okay with its children being killed en masse.
These
are the gods of a nation that is okay with a system guaranteeing the creation of
the less-fortunate, then punishing them for being so.
These
gods happen when we are no longer a nation.
Americans
do not seem to care about America anymore.
They care about being an American, but not being America.
They
do not care about their fellow Americans.
They
care about themselves, to hell with anyone else.
“I
have mine, whatever the cost.”
We
are the trees who have forgotten we are a forest.
That
is America today; these are our new gods.
I
hope we’re proud of ourselves.
Because
I’m not.
