Here is what we worry about!

Here is what we worry about.  Our national crisis is so deep and endemic that we may not be able to pull ourselves out of it.  Its evolution was so slow that it was like a person aging over a lifetime.  We were young, and one day,  we look into the mirror and don't recognize ourselves.  We didn't notice that we were changing during those years but we did. That is obvious in the mirror's reflection.

The U.S. crisis creeped slowly into our society like aging repaints and resculpts our faces and bodies. The crisis slipped so insidiously under the doors of our schools, into the classrooms and into the minds of students and permeated what they thought, held important, and true. After many years of this, the United States looks into the mirror and doesn't recognize itself. It didn't notice it was changing, but it did. That is obvious in the nation's reflection.

This epidemic thinned out our national character and seeped into our citizenry over decades. Teachers, parents, business people, political leaders, even the religious–practically everyone–were stained and tainted by a system that gradually–so gradually–morphed our nation. This transformation is not the responsibility of any political party; it can't be blamed on any particular set of individuals; religions can't be blamed; it was an inevitable evolution - a shift from valuing to possessing. There may be nothing we can do about it. That's what we worry about.

During this period, an adult population of parents, not taught properly by their parents and teachers, raised children that attended school. These kids were taught by teachers that grew up in a laissez faire culture. Youngsters who see themselves as entitled to diplomas without earning them are supported in their expectations by their parents who may also have earned diplomas in a system that didn't demand academic excellence. The teachers and school administrators in the system did not demand excellence because very few remembered what excellence means. When that occurs, achieving mediocrity is awarded with a medal, and the liberty bell tolls mournfully.

The most sad characteristic of the U.S. crisis is that we have a populace that doesn't generally know what has been lost in the process. It can't remember what it never knew.  It is impossible to explain this loss to anyone. It is like trying to explain the grief of losing a child to cancer, for example, to a person who has never had children.

Today's requiem mass is conducted by a diminishing population of knowers. Grief spills out in tears over the loss of good ideas, values, beautiful thoughts that may not hold any sway today because they weren't regarded with enough respect over the years to demand that they be remembered and held up like torches that light our way.