Sunday, December 30, 2012

Omnipotent Moral Busybodies?

C. S. Lewis wrote, “Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under Omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”

"Omnipotent moral busybodies?  I am not sure what Lewis meant by that term, but it grabs my attention.  Maybe he meant lawmakers who need to stay busy.  Or do-gooders guided by  their opinions only.  Maybe he meant intellectuals who think that by using only human reason and human reasoning, they can help create a better world.  Or perhaps he was referring to activists who refuse  to consider the greatest guide to morality:  The eternal Word of God.  These thinkers/moralists will never replace God's ideas for right and wrong, appropriate and inappropriate.  What is fair?  What is balanced?  One might say: "Well, it depends what century you are living in."  It is a point well taken.  But some things never change. I will march to the drum-beat of things tested and true.  Foolish legislation and Hollywood will not dictate to me how I am supposed to think.  It is not about arrogance and pride.  It is not because I, as a person, think that I am superior to others.  Be it far from me to think that way.  However, the greatest teacher of all time and place told me that I am the "light of the world."  With all my faults: I will take it, I will live it.  "Your Word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path."  (Ps. 119:105)

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