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The West is at war with itself:

It does not take astute analytical abilities, incisive perception, or acute political awareness to see that the West is fraying at the edges. Indeed, it is a world splitting apart. The older I get, the more I grieve over what I see happening in America, in Australia and in the West. There is a major war going on and it is ripping the West apart.

Let me examine three aspects of this: first, I draw upon a recent article looking at the American scene; second, I add another worrying component to this; and third; I bring in the much-needed spiritual dimension, and remind us of a voice that has too often been neglected.

Two nations

In a recent piece, Andrew Coy offers this thesis: “What is becoming increasingly clear is that America is disintegrating into two warring factions.” Others of course have spoken of this new American Civil War that we are witnessing. Coy makes some helpful points along the way. He writes:

Imagine the two separate belief systems. Notice how diametrically different Side A is from Side B. Be aware of just how different the cultures, customs, and norms are. Notice that the two sides do not resemble each other at all, and they look as if they had two separate histories; they certainly look as if they are demanding extremely different futures. And one characteristic that makes it more crucial is that the red states and the blue states can be found by locations and regions.

He goes on to list various stark differences. Here are some of them:

• Red states believe that America is an exceptional country that has done great things but has also committed sins as a country. Blue states believe that America is anything but exceptional and must be destroyed. Red states believe in 1776, while blue states believe in 1619.
• Red states believe that God is the Creator and is the One who gives us freedom, liberty, responsibility, and choice. Blue states believe that government is the creator and the entity that takes care of them from the womb to the tomb. Blue states believe that government is the answer. Red states believe government is usually the problem.
• Red states believe in capitalism, free markets, competition, and less government. Blue states believe in socialism, Deep State politics, government control, and censorship of unwelcome ideas and thoughts and voices.
• Red states believe that locking down our economy, shuttering our schools and churches, putting masks back on, and confining Americans back to a China-like existence should be the absolute last option and choice if it even is an option at all. Blue states believe that shutting down churches, schools, and individual homes should be the first consideration, right out of the box, when the next China COVID virus scare comes along.
• Red states believe “my body, my choice” when it comes to the vaccine, while blue states believe “my body, my choice” when it comes to the baby in the womb.
• Red states believe that once vaccinated, they need not wear a mask again. And “oh, by the way,” why do I have to wear a mask if the vaccine actually works? While blue states appear to look forward to and cherish more masks, more lockdowns, and more government control of our lives. And blue states insist that they never promised anything with regard to the effectiveness of the vaccine.
• Red states are no longer listening to the CDC and Fauci, while blue states believe that Fauci’s words are from Mt. Sinai, and they follow the CDC guidelines with Jonestown-like obedience.

Cancel Culture and Collusion

One of course can think of other things to add to his list. Let me mention just one, since another example of it just appeared in today’s news: Red states believe in truth, open debate, and the sharing of ideas. Blue states believe in censorship and cancel culture — only one point of view is allowed.

We see this everywhere with the nefarious collusion of the Big State, Big Tech, and Big Pharma. Consider this latest case:

YouTube has temporarily suspended Sky News Australia from posting on its video platform, issuing a first strike to the popular conservative news channel over “COVID-19 misinformation,” according to a statement. The tech giant said its decision to issue a strike was based on local and global health authority guidance, which Sky News Australia challenged as being constantly “subject to change” alongside updates to guidance from the various authorities. Sky News Australia said the suspension was over “old videos” posted on its channel. The strike means that Sky News Australia is suspended for a week from uploading content to its 1.85 million subscribers on its YouTube account.

“Specifically, we don’t allow content that denies the existence of COVID-19 or that encourages people to use hydroxychloroquine or ivermectin to treat or prevent the virus,” YouTube said in an early version of its statement that was sent to local media. “We do allow for videos that have sufficient countervailing context, which the violative videos did not provide.” Sky News Australia said it “expressly rejects that any host has ever denied the existence of COVID-19 as was implied, and no such videos were ever published or removed.”

As someone who has been booted off Fakebook and had a video pulled by UselessTube, I know all about this. It is all part of the radical left’s cancel culture. And it is quickly spelling the end of freedom and democracy.

Two Spiritual Cultures

All these examples of two separate cultures are part of a much bigger division, of course. There is a kingdom of darkness and a kingdom of light. There is Satan and his attempt at coerced rule, and God and His reign of love. There really are two humanities, based on this spiritual division. See more on this here.

So it should come as no surprise that we find all these divisions in the West. It is a spiritual division based on radically differing worldviews. The major battle taking place in the West is over the Judeo-Christian worldview and the secular humanist worldview. These two heavyweights are slugging it out for global domination.

Generally speaking, those pushing the ‘blue state’ positions are part of the secular humanist camp, while those aligning themselves with ‘red state’ beliefs are usually found holding to the Judeo-Christian worldview. Yes, there are exceptions to this, but it seems this is largely the situation we find ourselves in today in America and the West.

I mentioned above that the world is splitting apart. In 1978 Soviet dissident and Gulag survivor Alexander Solzhenitsyn gave the commencement address at Harvard University. Talk about a clash of cultures. He was actually booed by his audience for daring to share valuable truths with them.

The prophet Solzhenitsyn was certainly aware of the massive division in modern human culture — it really is “A World Split Apart”, as the title of his speech put it. I have spoken to this very important address earlier, and quoted from it.

Let me finish this article with a few more quotes from it. He asks, “How did the West decline from its triumphal march to its present sickness?” He mentions the Renaissance and the Enlightenment, and continues:

It became the basis for political and social doctrine and could be called rationalistic humanism or humanistic autonomy: the proclaimed and practiced autonomy of man from any higher force above him. It could also be called anthropocentricity, with man seen as the center of all…

The humanistic way of thinking, which had proclaimed itself our guide, did not admit the existence of intrinsic evil in man, nor did it see any task higher than the attainment of happiness on earth. It started modern Western civilization on the dangerous trend of worshipping man and his material needs… Mere freedom per se does not in the least solve all the problems of human life and even adds a number of new ones.

And yet in early democracies, as in American democracy at the time of its birth, all individual human rights were granted on the ground that man is God’s creature. That is, freedom was given to the individual conditionally, in the assumption of his constant religious responsibility. Such was the heritage of the preceding one thousand years. Two hundred or even fifty years ago, it would have seemed quite impossible, in America, that an individual be granted boundless freedom with no purpose, simply for the satisfaction of his whims.

Subsequently, however, all such limitations were eroded everywhere in the West; a total emancipation occurred from the moral heritage of Christian centuries with their great reserves of mercy and sacrifice. State systems were becoming ever more materialistic. The West had finally achieved the rights of man, and even to excess, but man’s sense of responsibility to God and society had grown dimmer and dimmer.

He then discusses “the calamity of an autonomous, irreligious humanistic consciousness”:

It has made man the measure of all things on earth — imperfect man, who is never free of pride, self-interest, envy, vanity, and dozens of other defects. We are now paying for the mistakes which were not properly appraised at the beginning of the journey…

We have placed too much hope in politics and social reforms, only to find out that we were being deprived of our most precious possession: our spiritual life. It is trampled by the party mob in the East, by the commercial one in the West. This is the essence of the crisis: the split in the world is less terrifying than the similarity of the disease afflicting its main sections…

No one on earth has any other way left but — upward.

(My quotes come from the book version of his speech, but a slightly different version is found here.)

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Originally published at CultureWatch.
Image: Maren Winter/BigStock