the end of the world as we know it?

I've been reflecting a lot lately on the world, the goings on within it, and the attitude about said goings on possessed by people around the world. I think it's fair to say that things are not as they used to be, and yet remain the same. Why the paradoxical statement?

Simply put, we see changes in nearly every aspect of our daily lives as we move through the technological advances of the current age and the newness of adjusting our living to meet with those standards, while remaining essentially the same, with the sameness of our desires, values (to an extent, more on this later), habits, and general ideologies. We change as the world changes, but despite all of the change, we're essentially the same. (Consider the rest in the context of the American lifestyle and cultural belief system. I don't claim to know about much more than that.)

It's crazy to imagine a "simpler time" as many consider any time before the present. In our nostalgic reminiscing, we even categorize the WWII era as "simpler". Why? People were still being killed daily, genocide was still an enemy we thought heinous enough to wage war against. People still engaged in both the good and the bad, and still longed for something even better. And what about the classic pioneering era of the 1800s? Those really were simpler, weren't they? After all, they had no televisions, no credit cards, no 401ks to worry about.... I still wonder, though, how simple these times were. Most of us (or maybe even all of us) would not find it easy to tend to a herd of cattle, to milk cows by hand at 5 a.m., to travel across thousands of miles in a covered wagon without roads to smooth out the bumpy terrain. I'd venture to say that most of us would not be lounging on a sofa if we had, in fact, lived in that era, and if nothing else, would know even more than at present, the value of hard work, self-sacrifice (and do we really know anything about this at all?), and endurance.

Mourning probably is the best course of action when considering what our society has come to:

• indulgence of every kind (materialism, gluttony, sloth, sexual immorality, adultery)
• absence of compassion, mercy
• feeling of superiority, apathy regarding others' pain/suffering
• devaluation of human life ("justified" murder, apathy when faced with blatant genocide, war for its own sake...)
• pride of tremendous proportions
• consumerism--take whatever I want because I deserve it, accrue debts I cannot pay because need things, hoarding what I still have for myself
• miserly attitude v. generous one
• self-righteous attitude toward others and rest of the world

It is very sad, indeed.