The Haunt of Jackals Part 4

We live in the haunt of jackals. Under the thin veneer of wealth and prosperity is a spiritual desolation which pervades the entire country and its people. And the generations which are moving into the haunt are now standing stunned, "with empty hands and palms turned upwards in an age which advances progressively backwards."

They have inherited a wasteland of trouble, violence and confusion. There is nothing meaningful for them to do, they are alienated from the Church at large because no one has recognized their callings or even bothered to learn their language so they could be reached. They have inherited the haunt of jackals, and the Church hides behind it's fortress walls and speaks more and more to itself about itself and for itself while the riot increases outside.

Or worse, they hide with and then judge, moralize and condemn the very people they are called to love and embrace.

The haunt is a desolate place where fear reigns and everything comes pre-tainted. There are no safe houses in the haunt and it is patrolled by jackals, by wild dogs who despite their individually small stature, are particularly savage. The jackals come in a variety of costumes, the most easily identifiable is the modern media jackal who focuses intently on individual acts of crime, perversion, cynicism and lust. The goal of most modern media is to attract an audience by packaging and re-presenting these base acts while manipulating individuals to purchase goods and services which promise to enhance or provide "life." The jackals fill both programming and advertising.

In modern language, the word "jackal" has a second meaning. A "jackal" can be defined as "a person who collaborates with others in the commission of base acts." We have just begun to see the beginnings of crossovers between the media and the events it reports. Not only do talk shows daily glamorize the normal misery which many people engage in, they are actually beginning to elicit fresh acts of violence and perversion by bringing together destructive forces in front of a television audience. Violence, and even death, have been the results of their lust for the most tantalizing and scandalous stories.

And when one turns off the set, or lays down the latest copy of GQ or LA Style, and walks out into the tired air, the city has been made a place desolate of meaning and beauty. The hard pavements stretch out like a desert, littered with once meaningful words now made multi-colored logos. And the mall has become the modern temple of worship and pretended meaning. We all have their meaningless words printed across our shirts to identify nothing at all.

Idolatry by any other brand is just the same: the modern idolmakers no longer melt down our personal jewelry and fashion out a small hot cow for adoration; now they take our general dreams and deepest longings and use them to re-create a host of techno-images which reflect the resonance of our deepest needs and spiritual aspirations. And as we are less and less able to live up to the expectations of these images, our frustration and alienation grows and our ability to actively engage life and each other is diminished.

Have you noticed that despite the boom in communications technology, people are less and less likely to talk with each other? They talk at each other. They posture, hold their opinions, do their business, but people no longer meet at the city gate and talk with each other. They stay in their darkened apartments and houses and stare at one of the 63 channels on their viewscreen. Their real needs for life are appeased and deflected as they are vicariously run through basic emotional experiences by what they view. And all the while, as they attempt to feed on these empty images, the wheat grows up around the posts, and the streams gurgle by with yeast cultures forming in the shallows and the sun.