Some Irreligious Living Results, By Roger Behra

SHORT COMMUNICATION 138

Some Irreligious Living Results

By

Roger Behra

There is a late night radio program called “Coast to Coast” with George Nory as the host. Very frequently George states again one of his beliefs that “there are no coincidences”. He believes that events happen for a good reason. And the following communication fits his thinking very well. What you are about to read is definitely not a coincidence.

Recently some research completed in America in 2007 was published. The research compares mental illness among high school and college students as of 2007 with the same group and age who were studied in 1938. That year was the tenth year of the Great Depression in America. The research results were astounding and the results confirmed what counsellors on campuses nationwide have long suspected but did not know to what degree.

What the 2007 research revealed is this. For every 1 student dealing with mental illness in 1938, there are 5 students dealing with mental illness in 2007. Five times as many students are dealing with anxiety and other mental health and depression issues as youth of the same age who were studied in the Great Depression. That is the astounding revelation the counsellors had to realize. But what is not astounding is the reason for so much mental illness and the problems resulting from it among modern youth.

In 1938 the Great Depression was already 10 years olds. And the daily emphasis at that time was the matter of surviving from day to day with only the basics of daily living. And religious living was practiced by 80% of families. God was a very great part of family life. Thanks were often given to God for the bare essentials of daily life-job, food, shelter.

During the past 50 years, from 1967 to 2007, the emphasis has been increasingly on the external, which includes wealth, looks, and status. Also, close to 60% of families practice non-religious living. God and the blessings needed in daily life are sadly missing. One or more of the cornerstones of human development-mental, emotional, spiritual, physical-are neglected or very poorly developed. As a result people are full of tension, anxiety, and depression. People do not know why they are here or where they are going to end up after life is over for them. People do not firmly realize that there is a life in eternity after life on earth is over and that God is vitally important in their lives as each day passes.

The popular culture of today is a direct result of the counterculture movement that started in the 1960’s, whose motto was to throw out the old and bring in the new. Well, the new is this and to repeat, for every student in 1938 who suffered mental illness there are five students in 2007 who suffer the same. That is a very sad result, but it is not surprising in the culture of today. And there does not seem to be any change for the better on the horizon. The American culture is not about to change. It is going to continue to reap what it has sowed.

R. B.