Commentary on frustration cont’d
(We may need to peddle back to get our train of thought… We were speaking of our growth in body, in mind and in soul. We’ve noted it is an unending struggle. Such a protracted struggle can lead us to frustration, exhaustion, indifference or boredom [see Part 49 & 50]. To remedy exhaustion, we spoke on sleep and leisure [Part 50-54]. To remedy boredom on flexibility and challenges [Part 55-57]. We’ve now been dealing with frustration [from Part 58] and had begun listing its possible solutions [see Part 63]. So far, we’d listed three dealing with what I can summarise as patience, prudence and not being naïve about who we’re up against. In today’s read, we conclude with this Adversary.)
6. Aside from what we’ve noted about the devil in Part 63-65, there is one last point we should at acknowledge. And here I borrow from a certain American author and from a certain Polish gentleman who was into acting and hiking and philosophy. The American author wittily summarised a good society as one in which it is easy to be good. If the devil is to tip things to favour his end game, then he’d be interested in a bad society, a bad culture. Even just here in Kenya, we surely all agree that it is much, much easier to be unmanly, to engage in bad habits rather than their contrary good habits. In practically every place in this motherland, we are strongly inclined to be late for meetings, to drive like your father owns the road, to be unfaithful in your relationships, to copy assignments or in exams, to be corrupt, to drink yourself silly, to produce mediocre work or substandard workmanship, and so on. Basically, the society or culture we live in here and now, has things tipped towards vice. The Polish gentleman I mentioned earlier labelled cultures such as this (which is pretty identical to that in many other countries) as a “culture of death”. Just the very environment we breathe is tipped towards bad habits that strangle our virtue and poison our manliness. This is part of the frustration we experience. As one of our Cabinet Secretaries put it, if thieving goes unpunished and criminals live in luxurious richness, who would bother with working hard or honestly? Which children would believe in studying hard? This is the society we live in; one where it is easier to be bad, easier to be unmanly and harder to be good, harder to be manly. But we can’t give up, either as men, or as Christians. Read now Annex 66a (below, on the optimism of a Christian) and 66b (on How to Win the Culture War).
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