Let us reflect on the impoverished character we generally see in so many people in society around us, especially members of the last three generations.  This moral decline is getting progressively worse as time goes on – with each passing year and with each new generation.

So many members of these generations display their weakness of character and their wallowing in vice through what they set as their highest values and goals: comfort, convenience, pleasure, entertainment, conformity, and being coddled.[1]

So many such people stand for little-or-nothing that requires personal sacrifice or for which they would willingly give up their lives.

  They “stand for” forcing the government to give free medical care to them and to others. 

➢  They “stand for” having the federal government waive the repayments of their student loans.

➢  The “stand for” welfare payments and government subsidies for practically everything.

➢  They “stand for” forcing employers to pay workers more money through a government-mandated minimum wage.
 

➢  They “stand for” taxing more money from the rich.

➢  They “stand for” pressuring the government to bail out foolish risk-taking that turns out badly, such as building or buying a house in a flood zone.
  

➢  They “stand for” collecting money through being a “political activist” or a “community organizer” without having to get a real and productive job.

➢  They “stand for” street protests in order to get their way.
 

➢  They “stand for” commuter transit subsidies.

➢  They “stand for” the government forcing taxpayers to subsidize foolish and non-cost-effective electric cars, solar and wind power, and other boondoggles.
 

  And so on. 

Many such people slouch through life seeking pleasure and entertainment.  They are unwilling to make personal sacrifices.  Sacrifice is painful – whereas their shallow lives are filled as much as possible with continual self-indulgence.  Even if they are (gullibly) terrified by the emotional alarmism that the Establishment feeds them (e.g., global destruction because of climate change), nonetheless, such a bogeyman does not make their own lives uncomfortable or require of them any significant sacrifice.  They simply demand that the government “do something” to “fix” the problem.

They are unwilling to make personal sacrifices because pain is the opposite of the comfortable life at which they aim.  They do not get married and they frustrate Nature through abortion by refusing the children whom God sends them or naturally would send them.  This should not surprise us because marriage involves taking responsibility.  Likewise, it involves accepting responsibility when a person welcomes into the world and into his family, the children that God would send him.

So many such people do not pursue the truth because that pursuit: 1) takes effort, 2) is unpopular, and 3) might present to them an uncomfortable conflict between the popular “correct” opinions they want to hold and whatever they might discover to really be the truth.  Thus, they find the truth to be “inconvenient” or they deny the existence of truth – instead saying everyone has his “own truth”, which merely means his opinion.

Instead of the truth, they merely latch onto the self-interested, “approved” propaganda that they are fed by the mainstream media, by the entertainment industry, by the universities, and by other leftists.  These people would usually ignore an account of the truth available from a conservative source because such an account takes too much effort to find and because the truth could expose them to being accused by their peer group of “disinformation”.

The disciples of the leftist leaders do not value thinking or the truth but only value having the “correct” opinions.  For this reason, they justly possess a reputation of wanting to silence whatever opposes their own “correct” opinions.[2]  Such people cannot think-through, discuss, and debate ideas with those who have a contrary opinion.  This is the reason why there are leftist fads such as “safe spaces” on college campuses where leftist students do not need to “fear” encountering someone who disagrees with them.[3]

At bottom, these people are stunted both in their intellects and in their wills.  Because of their underdeveloped wills, they have no real love – i.e., no real noble, sacrificial, unshakable love.

When a person loves something, he stands for it.  When he loves something, he fights for it.  When he loves something, he honors and respects it, he sacrifices for it, and he is willing to die for it (if necessary).

Thus, we see that many such people in society do not love the truth and are not devoted to it.  They do not have a real love of any people and do not have real friendships.  Instead, they have convenient, comfortable, transitory liaisons, which are counterfeit “friendships” that Aristotle and St. Thomas Aquinas call “friendships of pleasure” and “friendships of utility”.[4]

In contrast to these sham “friendships”, here is the character of the real sacrificial love of genuine friendship:

If a man should give all the substance of his house for love, he shall despise it as nothing.

Canticle of Canticles, 8:7.

Such real, committed love does not shrink in the face of difficulties.  It lasts “until death do us part”, as Sacred Scripture teaches us:

Put me as a seal upon thy heart, as a seal upon thy arm, for love is strong as death ….

Canticle of Canticles, 8:6.

These people in society have no real love for persons around them and this is a reflection of their lack of any real love of God.  Thus, they are irreligious, do not attend church, and have no spiritual anchor.

We should pray for these confused, pitiable followers of the leftist leaders who guide them down the path of unhappiness in this life, as a foreshadowing of the unspeakable eternal misery to come (unless they convert and repent). 

Our being God’s tool in their conversion is a very worthy purpose for our lives!