I seem to have had a quiet life. Yes, it began with deciding the proximity of the next Nazi bomb through the tune of its whistle or seeing how many doodlebugs I could count in a day. Then 10 years of a Jesuit education, a long marriage, a 40-year career, and some 23 descendants.
But as I pick up my newspaper each morning I get a renewed sense that the world is changing at a tremendous pace. I can’t give you a list of possible changes because that would take up the whole of this magazine. So I just mention a few which stick in my mind.
Government has changed. In the old days in Britain we switched between Labour and Conservative. But the differences were not great. So Labour would pull things a little to the left and the Conservatives to the right. Now – and I’m not going to use the B word – our democracy seems to have crash-landed.
It would appear that it only works effectively if we all have roughly similar principles, including the tolerance of those who disagree. Can we rescue it or are we going to end up like the tinpot republics running around to catch their tails?
Of course, the internet, and the multiplicity of computers, have been a huge factor – followed by the smartphone.
The benefits are substantial, but we have reached a stage where it is assumed that everyone is similarly equipped. My bank was quite put out to discover that I use no mobile phone. This is apparently needed to avoid scams. And that in itself relates to change: for most of my life I have never faced real crime. (Except for one serious threat of assassination some years ago. This came to me in a detailed email sufficiently plausible for me to call in the police. I never discovered the author or the reason.) Nowadays I deal with several attempts each month by criminals who try to swindle me.
Of course I am a sinner: I had five children, and nowadays that would be regarded as an irresponsible contribution to global warming. Indeed, poor British families receiving Universal Credit can only claim benefit for two children. This limit came into force for children born since April 2017. Clearly, having a third child is now a sin against the state, if not yet actually illegal. However, the average number of births per woman required to replace the UK population is 2.1. It now stands at 1.7 – down from 1.76 in 2017. Meanwhile, the longevity of the old continues to increase.
This failure of replacement has already had damaging effects, both social and financial, in Japan – and in due course it will hit us too.
Once upon a time I lived in a country which regarded abortion as a crime. Its fans today argue their case is a matter of “human rights”. And it is indeed a matter of human rights: the most obvious precedent for removing the human rights for an identifiable group of individual human beings was the Nazi government; presumably they were protecting the “human right” not to have Jews in the population.
LGBT? There have always been some people whose gender has not been fully clear. Such people were in the greatest need of sympathetic support. Ranges of characteristics were used to establish which gender was most appropriate. Now it has become a matter of choice. This would be simply comical, if there were not distressed people who are genuinely anxious about their ambivalent condition.
Decades ago, when I ran courses for engaged couples, we were looking at the menopause. When we asked the couples if they knew of anyone suffering from this, the only hand that went up was that of our chaplain. It turned out to be his housekeeper. This, in fact, is a serious condition, so congratulations for those who have an answer to it. It is, I read, to take and store ovarian tissue from young women. When they hit the menopause these tissues can be reinserted, and (bingo!) end of menopause.
The newspapers are delighted: this would be a fundamental benefit in the lives of women – who anyhow suffer quite enough to bring us into the world.
Unfortunately, Melanie Davis, a consultant gynaecologist, tells us that, despite the newspapers’ excitement, this is a complex matter, involving a number of issues, making it unlikely that this will become an effective solution.
But, today, my major concern is not the political decisions which we may hope will be made over the next few weeks. It is my fear that our former balanced democracy will be replaced by political squabbles rather than a stable democracy genuinely focussed on the benefits of the people.
secondsightblogdotnet 
Quentin writes:
// But as I pick up my newspaper each morning I get a renewed sense that the world is changing at a tremendous pace. //
Yes. If it were only technological change, there’d be little inherent trauma, I imagine. In my parents’ lifetime (Dad was born in 1893 and Mother in 1902, and both lived past their seventieth birthdays) a tremendous amount of material change took place, yet the world into which I was born in 1942 was not dramatically different in a broadly spiritual sense, I think, from what it had been in 1893. In the current era, which I date to the 1960’s, continual major spiritual upheaval has been the norm. I suppose the culprit has to be the communications revolution. What’s changed is the enormous increase in the amount of human chatter, a super-multitude of voices assaulting the ears of everyone.
For me your last sentence identifies the ONLY cause of the present upheavals (not only in the political sense) and offers the solution too – a stability formed by people focused & actuating a respected, and expected, social ‘norm’ of benefit for all.
There is no real ‘democracy’ when selfish partisan preferences, of any kind, rule over others to their detriment. It has to change toward a society where it’s members work for the well being of all.
As, i think, the younger generations are starting to appreciate, and trying to express.
Is that not ‘Christian’!?
The only alternative is the perpetuation & increase of the unrest & injustice we are producing now.
…… And a dystopian future ….. Be it of a ‘1984’ type or of a more feudal nature. …. If A.I. doesn’t get the upper hand first!!
Bob Dillion wrote and sang the song, ‘The Times they are a-changing’ how true!
Apart from the technologies and the anti-human uses some of them are being implemented. AI has been mentioned, then there is G5 which is dangerous especially for people on mobiles and for children living near these transmitters and a whole host of dangerous chemical and unhealthy medical practices and vaccines especially in America.
Has the world seen a moral decline from times past? I don’t think it has. This world has seen it all before with modifications, it is just as sinful and evil as ever it was since the Fall of Man.
Has the Church changed in these changing times? In its lust for power, prestige money and influence it has lost sight of Christ and Christianity, thinking they have to be all things to all men so to win some. What a sinful departure from God.
As Christians, we are in this world but not of it, but the Church today is full of worldliness, they want their sin, in other words, they want their cake and eat it. Sorry to tell them it is not possible.
How many know the signs of the times and how to read them?
This world and its fallen human beings are lost.
The only good news for mankind today with all its problems sorrows, fears, anxieties, relationships,
is Christian to be faithful to Christ and the Gospel and its teaching and to love one another.
If we want to see change for the better for Mankind, live and communicate the Gospel faithfully. By doing that, amidst all we see going horribly wrong, we may be God’s instrument in the saving of some.
In his email to contributors, Quentin asks:
// Today we consider the increasing changes in our society and its values. And the evidence suggests that the rate will increase. Is our society improving or decaying? //
It’s improving materially and disintegrating spiritually and socially. I’m afraid that’s beyond question. The causes are a great many, but it all seems to come down to material change.
I recently read a novel by Fred Hoyle, “October the First Is Too Late”. The serious proposition within the science-fiction wrapping is that human societies are doomed to progress gradually into chaos, then to collapse or explode or implode, then to start again and repeat the process, over and over. Ultimately, there’s no choice. It’s the Tower of Babel in new clothes. I’m inclined to feel that this may be the best humanity can do. It’s a sad destiny, but really not a tragic one, if you see it in the context of something infinitely greater.
One thing is sure, The Kingdom of God is moving towards the end of time, but before that, the devil and his cohorts human and demons are going to be active as they are now. The Lord’s return is imminent. Whether we believe it or not will not stop His return.
Things have got so bad, the exceeding sinfulness of Man is manifesting itself globally even under our noses with the Church, the Law, Business, science being used for wicked ends including murder.
Truth is at a premium as everyman does what is right in their own eyes. Evil abounds in philosophy and politics and the media as it seeks to influence one to first accept evil and then join with it.
Babies are being murdered by the millions every year and in many cases, their organs harvested, not to mention the abortion of millions of more babies every year. This is evil the wholesale slaughter of the innocents.
Will things get worse? It is hard to imagine that it would, but it will before the end comes.
We need to be quite sure of the ground upon which we stand in faith, in our living and in our Christian understanding is not only right but that the effects of that is God-pleasing. For then you are on solid ground, God-pleasing and your Salvation will be certain.
These are the evil of the times we are living through. There was a day you know when good and evil in society was well known and if one was wise, one chose the good and eschewed the other.
Nowadays it is all a matter of opinion. But opinion does not save us, never did. Only Christ, the truth
can save anyone. Stand on holy ground in everything, there lies one peace and certainty of the full appearing of eternity and those who have eternal life, fit by God grace to dwell with Him there with all its joys.
When time shall be no more, evil will be no more and all its effects in this world. and this world will be burned up and a new heaven and earth will be created. Scripture has told us this for millenniums. All will be fulfilled according to it, not our petty opinions however cleverly devised on anything.
Get ready for this world is in for a rough ride never experienced since the begging of the world.
Too preachy for the modern man in this perishing world eh?
Error – third last line should have read: this world is in for a rough ride never experienced since the beginning.
Quentin writes:
// Government has changed. In the old days in Britain we switched between Labour and Conservative. But the differences were not great. So Labour would pull things a little to the left and the Conservatives to the right. Now – and I’m not going to use the B word – our democracy seems to have crash-landed. //
I believe I’ve read that the days when Labour was ascendant in Britain saw some decidedly radical changes. Perhaps you were too young then to remember them clearly. Also, I suspect that your elders may remember those days sympathetically, and that may have colored your understanding. Europeans – among whom I consider the British – all have historical memories of monarchies, which, it sometimes seems to me, they think of as the good old days. Europeans may also be instinctively inclined to consider autocracy the best possible form of government, certainly superior to democracy. Thus, the EU.
David Smith
You wrote: ‘Europeans may also be instinctively inclined to consider autocracy the best possible form of government, certainly superior to democracy. Thus, the EU.’
I cannot accept you are serious, David, when you speak of autocracy. I suggest everyone look up the dictionary definition and meaning of autocrat and autocratic.
I don’t think even though Democracy is not perfect, it is to be preferred over a tyrannical autocrat ruling over everyone and does not need to be elected or give an account to anyone, just be obeyed.
Nektarios writes:
// David Smith
You wrote: ‘Europeans may also be instinctively inclined to consider autocracy the best possible form of government, certainly superior to democracy. Thus, the EU.’
I cannot accept you are serious, David, when you speak of autocracy. //
It’s a half-baked idea, but I’m serious. The old world has a long history of maximum leaders. I’m guessing that to an appreciable degree, there’s a perhaps subconscious predisposition among many Europeans to return to the glory days of authoritarian rule by getting rid of the shackles of democracy.
David Smith
Democracy can definitely be improved upon for sure, authoritarian rule, on the other hand, cannot, it is impervious to the people they rule, usually by a dictator, making their countries impoverished and economically almost bankrupt leading to civil unrest.
They only shackle man has is those he created or allowed himself to be bound by.
I consider there are many more people in the world that would choose to live in peace with each other, and help each other prosper. (Rose tinted glasses?). …. Gradually introduce an ‘independent autocracy’ for everyone over their own lives, work situations, social conditions (small groups & areas working for the good of themselves & all other areas. Within an ‘elected central advisory body’ with limited intervention & powers at first if need be) …. and see what happens.
… But no, that’s an outrageous idea! …
So, the people who choose to cultivate elevated ‘status’ & power over others, by any means they can, continue to be a thorn in the flesh of social cohesion, and impose laws & rule by force to elevate themselves more & more … That’s where ‘democracy’ has got us to now.
G.D & fellow Secondsight bloggers as we are Election fever or apathy:
: A Few Aphorisms to Make Your Day
If God wanted us to vote, he would have given us candidates.
~Jay Leno~
The problem with political jokes is they get elected.
~Henry Cate, VII~
We hang the petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office
~Aesop~
If we got one-tenth of what was promised to us in these State of the Union speeches, there wouldn’t be any inducement to go to heaven.
~Will Rogers~
Politicians are the same all over.? They promise to build a bridge even where there is no river.
~Nikita Khrushchev~
When I was a boy I was told that anybody could become President; I’m beginning to believe it.
~Clarence Darrow~
Why pay money to have your family tree traced; go into politics and your opponents will do it for you.
~Author unknown~
Politicians are people who, when they see light at the end of the tunnel, go out and buy some more tunnel.
~John Quinton~
Politics is the gentle art of getting votes from the poor and campaign funds from the rich, by promising to protect each from the other.
~Oscar Ameringer~
I offer my opponents a bargain: if they will stop telling lies about us, I will stop telling the truth about them.
~Adlai Stevenson, campaign speech, 1952~
A politician is a fellow who will lay down your life for his country.
~ Tex Guinan~
I have come to the conclusion that politics is too serious a matter to be left to the politicians.
~Charles de Gaulle~
Instead of giving a politician the keys to the city, it might be better to change the locks.
~Doug Larson~
There ought to be one day — just one — when there is open season on senators.
~Will Rogers~
Very good, Nektarios – I enjoyed every one of these. Thank You. g
// If we got one-tenth of what was promised to us in these State of the Union speeches, there wouldn’t be any inducement to go to heaven.
~Will Rogers~ //
There’s more than a smidgen of truth there. One of the attractions of materialism, which science and engineering have exalted in people’s minds, is the promise of heaven on Earth. The constant stream of technical improvements and innovations in, say, the past century strongly suggests that scientists have the power to create a paradise here below, given enough time.
Of more than 50,000 Australians who participated over the past month, in a massive ABC TV (National Broadcaster) research project most — 78% — were optimistic about their own futures.
But they were much less hopeful for the future of the nation, ( with 51% optimistic), and despairing about where the world is going. Only 30% hopeful for the future of the globe.
It seems the fear of what lies outside our own sphere of control is far worse than the adversity we face personally.
When confronted with a menu of 27 worry factors, ranging all the way from money to love to human survival, only four qualified as a matter of immediate personal concern to the majority of respondents.
1. Climate change was the leading worry; 72% of respondents said it would affect their lives.
2. Saving for retirement was a problem for 62 %,
3. Health for 56 %,
4. 50 % of respondents were darkly convinced ageing was definitely a thing that was going to happen to them!
The age group having the least amount of sex is 18-24-years old and those over 75. Shock!
45% of Australians believe there are more than two genders, with 38% disagreed.
When asked whether the decline of the traditional family has made Australia worse, nearly half thought the decline had a negative impact on Australia, while 37 per cent didn’t think it made a difference.
My feeling is that all of this would have been radically different from opinions of 10 years ago.
The changes you refer to are predominantly centred around women, yet the biggest step forward we have made in Western cultures over the past 50% must surely be in the freeing up of the feminine in our culture to enrich and enhance our living in every area.
But yes – as Bob Dylan and you and the ABC note – the times are very much “achanging”.
galerimo writes:
// 45% of Australians believe there are more than two genders, with 38% disagreed. //
In an essay in Quillette, the author suggests that the recent odd phenomenon of rapid adoption by very large numbers of people of nutty beliefs like this may be explained by the attempt of low-status people to gain status by adopting the beliefs of higher-status people. It’s the kernel of a plausible explanation.
https://quillette.com/2019/11/16/thorstein-veblens-theory-of-the-leisure-class-a-status-update/
Joining the tribe by adopting its dogmas is quite simply the way things work at all levels. I remember well joining various tribes in my search for such adoption. Also we ‘try on’ meanings as if they were clothes..do they fit?, will we look good in them? Will we gain acceptance /clout by adopting this or that culture?
Quentin
In your intro to the topic, you wrote: ‘our democracy seems to have crash-landed.’ It certainly seems to have ground to a halt with all the failed attempts with the EU negotiator on Brexit who has not really negotiated in good faith at all with our former PM.
It is the old game of divide and conquers, as the EU has done in other countries to get what it wants. If you don’t agree with the EU they send you back to argue and home and to agree with the EU’s position.
The damage is done, time spent on this Brexit issue has divided the nation, brought our parliamentary system to a halt. The EU has none this elsewhere, like Greece for example.
What has not been mentioned the internal market of the EU represents 15% of world trade but it is not in a healthy state and with a global downturn in the offing, a fall on the euro currency, the problems in many of the countries within the EU as many don’t agree with the unelected Commissioners who rule the EU around set the agendas.
Democracy has not crash-landed as you say, preoccupied for a time with this nonsensical Brexit and future trade deal with the EU.
My view, for what it is worth is it is the EU that is running out of time, of its options if we leave with a hard Brexit. They will, of course, dig in and double down but they are not fooling anyone. If we leave has many say we should have, the EU will either negotiate proper and give us a deal or treaty that is worth having instead of this rubbish deal they are presently proposing, otherwise it is all over for the EU and its Nazi roots who thought up the system.
British Democracy though not perfect will recover and flourish.
I hear the howls of businessmen and women, they would move to the EU that will soon be gone? Well let them, we can produce our own or from other places. This country, God -willing, flourish once again and the gravy-train which is the EU will end and we will once again trade with the EU with more independent and more agreeable terms of trading satisfying everyone.
Corrections, sorry about so many errors.
2nd para. should read: …send you back to argue at home.
3rd Para. the line should read: The EU has done this before.
4th Para. line should read:… Commissioners who rule the EU and set the agendas.
5th Para. line should read: If we leave as many say we should have,…
Last Para. lines should read: God willing, will flourish once again and the gravy-train which is the EU will end. We will once again trade with Europe as independent and more agreeable terms of trade satisfying everyone.
I use a program called ReadPlease (free). I expect that there are others. I use it for any writing over about 5 lines. Hearing it written out loud enables me to check much more quickly and accurately than reading alone.
Any suggestions from others?
Yes – thank you for putting up with all my mistakes – I find it very consoling to read others’.
Quentin
I use Grammarly ( the free version), it is more limited but picks up on errors when I write, However on technical words and syntaxy I would have to pay for. It is very helpful.
The changes you refer to are predominantly centred around women, yet the biggest step forward we have made in Western cultures over the past 50% must surely be in the freeing up of the feminine in our culture to enrich and enhance our living in every area.
This might have some quite unexpected impacts as well. The emergence of movements like MGTOW, Forever Alone and Incel is pretty strange, and seems linked to increased sexual freedom of women plus online dating apps like Tinder (never thought of before 7-8 years ago). The impact on people’s ability to form families and raise children in the future is a potential issue.
There are various predictions that the indigenous populations of many Western countries are going to experience an increasing downward spiral in fertility rates, much more rapidly than other ethnic groups in these countries (whose proportionate share of the population will start to jump up). The impact of this is also hard to predict, but could significantly change these places.
Lastly some academics have recently come up with a theory that the level of general intelligence is in steep decline, and this decline linked to dysgenic factors will accelerate in coming generations, leading to increased mental illness, erratic political behaviour, a slowing/stagnating of the pace of innovation and weakening the capacity of future generations to actually manage a complex technological society. Part of the idea is that evolutionary processes in humans favour patriarchies (as well as high levels of infant mortality) in the longer run.
Interesting, all of that, FZM, and discouraging. Too much peace and plenty has done great damage to the Western spirit over the very short period of the past half century. The human mind, like the mammalian body, is strengthened by adversity and weakens in the absence of existential stress.
Pray for wisdom, discipline, compassion, and courage.
And some other academics have come up with equally surprising, if somewhat more cheery, results.
In 1971 only 22% of Indian women were literate, by the end of 2001 while 54.16% female were literate.
The growth of female literacy rate is 14.87% as compared to 11.72 % of that of male literacy rate. (History of women’s Education in India)
And it is because of the patriarchal nature of South African society girls are at a disadvantage in attaining quality education
Nevertheless from 2008-2012, the primary school enrolment rate for boys was 89.7 per cent; for girls, it was 90.9 per cent. (The Borgen Project)
And in some countries, in Latin America and the Caribbean and Europe and central Asia, young women are beginning to earn the same and sometimes even slightly more than young men.
Given the force of patriarchy against which this and so much more has been achieved by women it seems the opposite is true – privileged male patriarchal times too are achanging.
And some other academics have come up with equally surprising, if somewhat more cheery, results.
Not to say that these results are not positive but you hear about them a lot. This is the kind of thing I have been hearing since I was young.
And in some countries, in Latin America and the Caribbean and Europe and central Asia, young women are beginning to earn the same and sometimes even slightly more than young men.
Given the force of patriarchy against which this and so much more has been achieved by women it seems the opposite is true – privileged male patriarchal times too are achanging.
Were these things achieved by women alone? For example, if the Central Powers were victorious in the First World War and/or if Communism and the Western Democracies had not defeated Fascism in the Second there would have been no space for Feminism.
The surprising things I was noting were, for example, that when feminism reaches more advanced stages, as if has in the West, you may have the emergence of things like hyper-polygamy, widespread sterility and not just male privilege disappearing but portions of the male population being pushed into the inferior status that was imposed on women in patriarchal times, in the name of equality.
If that is combined with the demographic replacement of the pro-Feminist culture with more patriarchal ones, that suggests there is something wrong with the Feminist narrative I was raised with.
When you ask if these things were achieved by women alone I agree that they were not.
But it was the courage to push through so many cultural (domestic confinement) and legal barriers (voting rights),that makes their cause worthy of note when considering “changed times” in a positive light. Even with male collaboration, at times.
I think I am willing to take the risk with hyper-polygamy and widespread sterility (presuming of course that none of this is compulsory!) if only because it has all been so disadvantageous for women in our Western civilization for so long.
Even that could not be any worse than our inherent and inherited patriarchy.
Given the numbers of women who voted for Donald Trump – Republican and Democrat – I think we are still a long way from the scenario you describe.
When you ask if these things were achieved by women alone I agree that they were not.
But it was the courage to push through so many cultural (domestic confinement) and legal barriers (voting rights),that makes their cause worthy of note when considering “changed times” in a positive light. Even with male collaboration, at times.
These things are worthy of note and are positive, but I got the impression that Quentin was talking about more recent changes in the O/P. Women not being confined in the home and having voting rights has been the norm for my whole life time.
Also in many places these changes happened largely because of men who killed or enslaved anyone (male or female) who would try to oppose them and who made it illegal for women not to leave the house, not to vote, to take more than one year maternity leave per child and so on. They were further strengthened by massive levels of mortality among young men due to industrial warfare and murders of prisoners. So, the idea that male collaboration was some kind of minor or secondary thing here, no.
I think I am willing to take the risk with hyper-polygamy and widespread sterility (presuming of course that none of this is compulsory!) if only because it has all been so disadvantageous for women in our Western civilization for so long.
Hyper-polygamy involves one man having 5-6 women sexually available to him at any one time, actually many more over a period of time; when a minority of males have the large majority of females available to them. You find this kind of situation in some tribes of hunter gathers but it seems a weird thing for Feminism to aspire to bring back into being.
Likewise with having one cultural and ethnic group (the one more favourable to Feminism) replaced by one that is more patriarchal. And reducing the intelligence level of their own group.
Even that could not be any worse than our inherent and inherited patriarchy.
Depending what this actually means, I don’t agree. I’m not sure what the difference between ‘patriarchy’ and things like I described above is.
Given the numbers of women who voted for Donald Trump – Republican and Democrat – I think we are still a long way from the scenario you describe.
Donald Trump is the kind of man who will be successful and powerful in a polygamous society. But generally it is true that some of this stuff would only affect people presently under 35.
FZM
The lower sperm count in males, along with the feminization of males and the intellectual dumbing down of the mind, is the long term plan of the Globalists, introduced slowly chemically with the likes of Fluoridation in the water and umpteen products daily like toothpaste. Glycophates on the other hand which runs off fields into the water and turns frogs and fish gay and getting into the food chain with the same effect on human beings.
As for freedom of women, depends what one means by freedom? Are we speaking freedom, human rights, or just the right to do what we like impervious of all the consequences? It is quite clear that some academics would not only disagree on both counts as they bravely fight against the liberal trends today They point out there is a price to be paid for taking such actions.
There is a Divine order in the creation of mankind. We play around with this at our peril as those academics point out.
As an aside, those wanting to vote Liberal Democrat in the forth-coming Election may want to think twice as they are introducing the most abortionist agenda probably in the world today!!