Depressing would be a profound understatement in describing the leading stories in todays newspapers. One headline reads "Bankruptcy rate soars 50%." Another announces "GM to cut 10,000 salaried jobs." A third says "Housing starts tumble."
The "good life" as we have come to know it in more prosperous times is vanishing like a morning mist. Few now believe that governments or organizations like the United Nations are up to the task of finding real solutions.
So called "stimulus programs" seem terribly short sighted, desperate and uninspiring. So if hope is a ground or source of happy expectation as defined by the dictionary on what does one base positive expectations in an ever increasingly negative world? Atheists, agnostics, secularists or humanists have little to offer a world desperately looking for a glimmer of good news.
The greatest teacher who ever lived spoke of a time when mens hearts would be " failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth." I have no doubt he was thinking about our times and realities like global terrorism, economic turmoil, wars and rumours of wars, famine, pestilence, all of which are reported almost daily in our papers.
If he had stopped there we might well despair. I find His message of love and hope more relavent today than ever and as in every generation His truth is timeless.
Gerald Hall
Parksville, B.C.
