Quote for the Day

1. 
   Blackadder permalink

   January 21, 2013 6:17 pm

   What would be an example of this “person-oriented” society?
   • 
     Matt Talbot permalink*

     January 21, 2013 6:43 pm

     The very fact that you need to ask that question is rather poignant, Blackadder.

     The following should give you some sense of King’s answer:

     A true revolution of values will soon cause us to question the fairness and justice of many of our past and present policies. On the one hand we are called to play the good Samaritan on life’s roadside; but that will be only an initial act. One day we must come to see that the whole Jericho road must be transformed so that men and women will not be constantly beaten and robbed as they make their journey on life’s highway. True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it is not haphazard and superficial. It comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring. A true revolution of values will soon look uneasily on the glaring contrast of poverty and wealth. With righteous indignation, it will look across the seas and see individual capitalists of the West investing huge sums of money in Asia, Africa and South America, only to take the profits out with no concern for the social betterment of the countries, and say: “This is not just.” It will look at our alliance with the landed gentry of Latin America and say: “This is not just.” The Western arrogance of feeling that it has everything to teach others and nothing to learn from them is not just. A true revolution of values will lay hands on the world order and say of war: “This way of settling differences is not just.” This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nation’s homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into veins of people normally humane, of sending men home from dark and bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice and love. A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.
     • 
       Blackadder permalink

       January 21, 2013 8:07 pm

       It’s fine to talk about a revolution in values and the creation of a person oriented society, but as the histories of the various “people’s democracies” show, things don’t always go quite as planned.

       So I am curious. Are there any examples of these new societies of which King spoke, or do they represent, as yet, and unknown ideal?
       • 
         Matt Talbot permalink*

         January 22, 2013 12:00 am

         It’s fine to talk about a revolution in values and the creation of a person oriented society, but as the histories of the various “people’s democracies” show, things don’t always go quite as planned.

         So, because Something Might Go Wrong, we shouldn’t even aspire for something better…or something? What exactly is your point?

         Are there any examples of these new societies of which King spoke, or do they represent, as yet, and unknown ideal?

         Yes.

         King charted a way to get to the society he described. We can either travel that road, or not. It really is up to us.
   • 
     Paul DuBois permalink

     January 22, 2013 6:58 am

     The second chapter of Acts provides an example “And all they that believed were together and had all things common. Their possessions and goods they sold and divided them to all, according as every one had need. And continuing daily with one accord in the temple and breaking bread from house to house, they took their meat with gladness and simplicity of heart: Praising God and having favour with all the people. And the Lord increased daily together such as should be saved.” Communism was an invention of the first Christians, not Marx. Marx just forgot the faith and love part of it and so his version failed.

     The world cannot stand the light and will always denounce it and try to extinguish it. I do not know the practical way forward, I do know as Christians we are called to do what King said in the quote above and have spent too much time debating if it can be done practically.
2. 
   Blackadder permalink

   January 22, 2013 7:09 am

   Matt,

   The rhetoric about a revolution in values has been around for a long time. Usually, this amounts to nothing, and in the few occasions when it has things have often gone quite badly, eg 100 million dead. So I think Lennon’s response is apt here: you say you want a revolution? We’d all love to see the plan.

   PS You say that there have been examples of the person oriented societies of which King spoke, but then you don’t say what they were. Unless you think we are currently living in one of those societies?
   • 
     Matt Talbot permalink*

     January 22, 2013 12:15 pm

     King charted a way to get to the society he described. We can either travel that road, or not. It really is up to us.

     PS As Dr King said more than once: Adjourn your councils of despair.
     • 
       Blackadder permalink

       January 22, 2013 12:52 pm

       Matt,

       So has there ever been a person-oriented society or not?
       • 
         Matt Talbot permalink*

         January 22, 2013 1:31 pm

         What do you mean?

         PS please post your reply below, so that it is more than an inch wide…

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