In the Essay section, the perrenial essay, "The Night My Father Shot Santa." Merry Christmas! FK

 
          Hold on a second while I take a pickle from the barrel and adjust my seat before the wood stove at this here local general store. Ok, there we go. Now where was I?
 
            Oh, yes, youth today. In this small town just a few miles from the family farm, I have seen the trends go from earrings on men, to purple Mohawks on both mem and women, to razors in lips and multiple face piercings to – wow – gauges that expand earlobes to 6 inch diameter’s, and of course tattoos, tattoos, tattoos, so many that the usually ugly little body prints have climbed up the age pyramid to include 70-year-old former gearheads and current grandpas and grammas. Worse by far has been the recent – in the past 6 years – and alarming spate of ‘non-sexuals,’ young people whose sex is impossible to tell due to dress, hormones, surgeries, or you-guess-what. This ain’t New York City, mind you, or even Peoria. This is nowhere-ville, a place of meat processing factories surrounded by the actual meat-on-hoof that is being processed, an area where the air is often ripe with the smell of manure and cow slurry, and where goin’ to meetin’ apparel consists of a football jacket and clean jeans.
 
            So what the hell is going on?
 
            Clearly, it is the end of civilization.
 
            It is not just the freak show that we are witnessing or participating in, but actual facts on the ground. Let me enumerate a few: 30% of 40-year-olds have never been married and 25% of high school students identify as LGBTQ etcetera, including 40% of the girls; participants in religion has dropped below 50%, and atheism has doubled to 18% since 1999 (both numbers are still way better than in Western Europe); less than 40% of students in high school are proficient in reading, suicide rates are up 40% in youth since 2020, and death rates from drugs, mostly fentanyl from Mexico, kills over 100,000 mostly young people a year. The birthrate is less than 1.7 children per female, far below replacement numbers, and millions of illegal aliens are being crammed into the country to make up for it, most without proper vetting and with no training in the rights and responsibilities of US citizens; however, given that the truth in news is impossible to determine, maybe that is a moot point. Oh, and the national debt has passed 33 trillion, with one seventh of the national budget going towards paying the interest alone on that debt, with both numbers expected to rise dramatically in only the next 6 years. 
 
            I know, it takes your breath away and I bet you can add to that, but I ain’t done talkin’ yet, so sit yourself back down again and have another pickle. This one’s on me.
 
            Ahem. HOWEVER:
 
            It just so happens that we got free tickets to see the Green Bay Packers in Lambeau Field less than two weeks ago, and the experience was exactly as I expected, and then some – that is, from the perspective of 20 years ago. That’s right. At the stadium and in the parking lots and in the streets and on the grassy lawns rented for parking and at the church parking lot, also rented for parking, and from the windows hung with Packers signs and logos, life seemed so NORMAL. No, it was not exactly the same as 20 years ago – there were the tatts and some of the ear candy, and there were more young women present, many of whom swore just like the guys, but even they were obviously women and virtually all were adorned with men who were obviously men. What the heck?, we have to ask ourselves. Were we in a time warp?
 
            No, but in a way, yes. Football tickets cost a lot, and most people have to drive to Green Bay to see the game (not so in big cities), and cars cost a lot too, so most of these people would have to have at least middling jobs. Added to that, the game was in Wisconsin, so most of the fans at the stadium would be considered by the census bureau to be “white,” making for greater cultural uniformity than we would expect on average in the current US of A. But even with that, the normalcy was shocking.
 
            ‘Normal’ in America means fun, good cheer, respect for others, orderliness (outside of pranks and goofiness) and those certain ways that Americans recognize other Americans. Everyone I talked to, and there were many, understood where I was coming from – from the jokes and wisecracks to the concerns over the quarterback’s recent sac, and so on. For instance, on the long walk back to our cars, we were herded in certain directions by the police, and the sound of “mooo” sprouted from among the crowd. We do not like to be herded, and we are not afraid to let it be known. But we sometimes allow it anyway when we know it is temporarily necessary for efficiency and order. There you have it: American.
 
            So America is not as messed up as many of us often think. There is joy and continuity and cohesion. However, the stats say that there are cracks in the dam that have become so wide and numerous that the whole dam seems about to break down. What gives?
 
            Sure, there are multiple causes, but here’s what I think is happening in a nutshell.
 
            Wait, wait, don’t leave just yet even if you know where I’m going with this. Have another pickle – and I think there’s a half-filled bottle of brandy over there behind the counter.
           
            Yes, and bring me a glass, too. Anyway, what I think is the taproot of our dysfunction is the secularization of society. Sure, it sounds grand and pompous and preachy, but think: what is the point of life without a bed-rock belief in a higher purpose that reaches beyond death? Without that, all our efforts amount to only sound and fury. What I think has happened is that a whole lot of people have been told to look at the secularized Western model for their personal meaning. When this proves to be insufficient, they find the societal fabric it has created to be despicable. The disappointment they endure is a grown-up version of finding out that one’s parents lied about Santa, and in their anger at the deceit they want to tear it all down. Since they are taught to not find something enduring within themselves, they want to tear down themselves as well. Since they also expect a mate to fill that hole, when those mates don’t deliver, they want to tear them down, too – or not have any to begin with. The same goes for government, and the same goes for many new and improved theologies. The world is so disappointing that they don’t want to bring children into it, and for some of the slightly more optimistic youth, children would simply get in the way of having fun.
 
            That last probably goes for many of the young in the crowd at the game, but we also saw babies there, and everyone seemed to love them. So yes, there still is something good going on in America, but the threats to that goodness are great and often overwhelming. We need God, but government will not and should not bring us back to God; that is up to us, and it is essential, not only for the soul and spirit, but for the common good. Everyone who has dodged feces in the Tenderloin District of San Francisco, or has heard of the thieves and thugs terrorizing people on Chicago’s Magic Mile knows that something has to change. It is as if we are hearing the prophecies of Jeremiah and Isaiah from the Old Testament warning us of the fall of our civilization. The Jews did not change and were destroyed by Assyria and Babylon. But maybe we still have time to change. Such a change would be difficult for all of us, I know. We must swim against the current, but such an effort couldn’t come at a better time of year.
 
            Hey, wait, where ya goin’ so soon? Don’t want another shot? I haven’t told you about my trip to the Holy Land, or about my latest colonoscopy either. Hey, I went out of my way to say that I’m not holier-than-thou towards the end, didn’t I? Gave us a chance at redemption before it’s too late and all, too, didn’t I?
 
            What’s that? You’re missing the game? Well, why didn’t you say so? Because you couldn’t get a word in edgewise?
 
            All right, I’ll give it a rest and go back to the flat screen where Americans really gather. But it’s true, yes, I think it’s true. We need a little Christmas, as the song says, to bring us a little magic, a lot of beauty and a lot of hope – all possible as long as we still have a flicker of light left within. And I think we still do. Go Pac go!