Terminal Decline of Civilization and Hope for the Future
By: Pastor Andrew Isker
The United States . (And the Western World) is well within a period of terminal decline. This is a cause of great discouragement and even despair for many. For many years the decline was noticeable but easy to deny. Slowly, imperceptibly you notice that things are not as good as you once remembered. “Oh it is just a recession. Things will return to normal soon.” Services that you always took for granted, whether it be courteous help or functioning roads and bridges disappear.
“Oh it’s just Covid. Things will get back to the way they were eventually.” But they never do. Things continue to get worse. The most perverse sexual degeneracy is paraded before us constantly. You are ruled by a head of state who is demonstrably a petty criminal and know nothing will be done about it. What used to cost ten dollars a few years ago is now twenty. Nothing seems to be able to arrest the decline.
You might be tempted to despair. You might think “it’s over.” “All is lost.” Human civilizations decline and even collapse. Rome was thought to be the eternal city, even after it had become Christian. When it, like America, was in its death throes, many despaired just as so many are tempted to do today. But in the midst of this collapse, one of the titanic figures of Christian history, Augustine of Hippo wrote The City of God. In it he argued that human cities are not eternal, only the city of God is. Far from supporting a gnostic attitude of “‘this world is not my home’ so just give up caring about this world,” this book was instrumental in shaping the thinking of those who would build Christian civilization over the next 1500 years.
We are in a very similar position as the original readers of The City of God. Rather than despairing, we should look beyond the decline to what will come next. Rather than hoping for a return to a mythical golden age of 1776 or the 1950s, we should look to the future. Recognizing that things are falling apart and never going back together, we should ponder what kind of world will we build for our great, great-grandchildren. What things must be done? What things must be secured? What can we do to prepare to rebuild a world for our people and our posterity after much of what now exists is in ruins?
When the Saxons arrived in Britain and saw the Roman ruins, the remains of great villas and fortresses, they were amazed at the greatness of the long dead civilization that preceded them, as if these buildings had been built by the gods. It is not hard to imagine 200 years into the future people looking with similar amazement at the lost technological achievements of this place called “America.” “No, it’s not a legend, they really were able to light and heat their homes by splitting the atom.”
The only way to avoid such a fate is for those who are aware of the decline and alarmed by it to begin constructing parallel society as the world that exists continues to crumble. That is how classical civilization was carried forward into medieval Christendom. Peoples began to decentralize and localize. Their economic activity no longer could be international like it had been when Rome keep the sea lanes and trade routes open. New economic and political organization was an absolute necessity to adapt to the rapid change in circumstances.
God has given us means that were unavailable so many centuries ago. We can begin the process of creating a parallel economy, parallel systems of communication and information, and parallel social and political organization right now. We don’t have to hope in a political system that will not allow itself to voted out of power. We don’t have to rely on an economic system that is run by those who hate us and want us dead. We have the tools right at our disposal to begin rekindling the vital spirit of Christian civilization for a new era.
We don’t have to wait for things to happen to us. We can begin to rebuild even before it all comes crashing down. That is what Gab is for. The nation that we love, that our ancestors built and died for does not have to disappear like so many great empires before it. We can preserve this place and rebuild it anew if we consciously adopt this mission of civilizational rebirth and set to work using tools like Gab.
It’s not over. We are going to win.
