While nature may abhor a vacuum, the average college student feels quite comfortable in places where profundity of thought has suffered long in exile, and accordingly the flocks of lost sheep congregate in the hallowed grounds of Free Speech Alley whenever the fuming peddlers of salvation rear their vengeful heads. These soldier-preachers represent the fiercely faithful and perceive themselves to be the inheritors of St. Paul the Apostle’s legacy, and love them or hate them, they certainly arouse the curiosity, wrath and sense of humor of the student population.
While their methods may not be entirely effective in converting the heathens, they must strike a chord given the large crowds they attract, although as anyone who has partaken in the entertainment knows, the pseudo-theological discourse reaches heights of vacuity rarely seen outside of Fox News. Before you easily recline in your chair, thinking you’re reading yet another tirade against the “intolerance” of those mean old “judgmental” preachers who mistake the “real Christ of love and compassion” for hate, just wait. The great majority of idiocy surrounding these “debates” originates from the cackling peanut gallery of students, an odd alliance of modern pagans quacking obscenities and weak-hearted Christians spouting the endlessly tedious mantra that “God is love.”
While I may not agree with everything they say, the wandering prophets of damnation at least believe in something, and for this they deserve our respect. While I like them on various levels, they all share the common attribute of devoting their lives to a cause which extends beyond themselves, and they can securely say they stand for their beliefs, and this in itself is noteworthy.
On the other hand their own immaturity is laughably absurd at best, and deeply troubling at worst, since their actions indicate the deep levels of despair and self-loathing which must afflict an alarming portion of LSU’s students. Evidently the life of shrieking hollowness needs a venue to reassure itself of its tenuous grip on existence, and the preachers’ martyrdom complexes are fed through the constant barrage of profanity and hubris that would even make Robespierre squirm.
To complement the proudly defiant exhibitors of the baser tendencies of human nature are the hippies and progressive spiritualists, whose clichés come straight from the ninth edition of “Chicken Soup for the Morally Clueless, Utterly Pathetic, and Squeamishly Indecisive.”
“Don’t be judgmental!” they cry. That would be intolerant, and God knows intolerance is the greatest of sins. We can all live in a world where you can be you, I can be me, our good buddy Beezelbub can be Beezelbub, and we can all follow the twisting whims of momentary desires and appetites. While this wouldn’t stray too far from the popular notion of happiness, I hope I’m not alone when I protest. I prefer self-restraint, morality and a self-imposed limit to the depraved narcissism television has rotted our minds with. Sorry for being judgmental.
You may think in your self-assurance that religion is mere “modern mythology,” and their attitudes throwbacks to days before society “progressed.” Do you presume that the problems of existence have altered since the development of cellular phones, microwaves and air conditioners? Too often in our culture we perceive science as the final arbiter of truth, yet truth also concerns issues of morality, meaning and selfhood, and the way in which individuals operate within the world. Scientific advancements and democratic progressions will never bring true solace and satisfaction to these ends. Many things remain relevant today in the teachings of religion despite the best efforts of the passionless, and I suspect they will linger ad infinitum.
I don’t agree with everything the preachers stand for, and I don’t pretend to be a good or true Christian, but I also don’t fool myself into believing that I am better then they for my sins and temptations.
Last Mardi Gras, I was on Bourbon Street celebrating when I spotted a crowd of testifying evangelists. I was struck by how ridiculous they looked amidst the teeming masses when I noticed a pack of frolickers happily adorning glowing-red devil horns pass them by howling.
Perhaps, I thought, the preachers do have a point.