Exclusivity has been a big deal historically. The urge to form a minority clique to the exclusion of all the others remains a major incentive to this day. It is the envy-fueled engine by which all of society expects to keep up with (and, if we are honest, hopes to overtake) the Joneses/Kamaus. It is the desire to breathe rarefied air from atop stratospheric social peaks.
I'm not a communist; I reject the concept emphatically. Still, you just have to wonder about exclusive clubs and elite fraternities. Implicit in all their snobbery is an admission: there aren't enough trappings lying around to get everyone a Ferrari. That's even a bit understandable. But why also go and be proud and arrogant about it?
Enter oppression, necessitated by the urgent importance of keeping the restless rabble in their place. The stench of corruption can never be wiped out, not at the rate at which fat cats generate carrion. Meanwhile, it's a real maze of doublespeak nowadays because the workers must be infused with ignorant HOPE, as if the future cake has not already been partitioned, as if crumbs will not be up for grabs for the fittest to survive on.
Somehow it's not bad enough yet; exclusivity must go ahead and get ridiculous. At some point the lofty one gets lonely, but is straitjacketed by status against reaching out to lower beings for human contact. It is a rigid, predator-prey type of arrangement that must be sustained at all costs, and varnished with esoteric and eloquent euphemisms. Many secrets must be hermetically kept within the inner circle. One must avoid, at all costs, letting unwashed profane ignorant masses in on the party.
Contrast this with Jesus, who said he had done nothing in secret, who healed every sick in sight, fed thousands of hungry and freely forgave sins. I love the way true Christians all over the world speak the same "language" albeit in different tongues.
Evangelism is antithetical to Exclusivity. One seeks to include, the other to alienate. One proclaims the truth, the other hides secrets.
Reach out, friends.
I'm in love with your verbiage. "It is the desire to breathe rarefied air from atop stratospheric social peaks." Wow! That's good writing. I think there are a lot of Christians who use "come out from among them" and "a little leaven..." and "don't be unequally yoked" as green lights to become the oppressors rather than those freeing people from bondage. Backwards.
ReplyDeleteThanks. You've reminded me how the message ALSO applies to Christians as well. The church has still got Pharisees in it.
DeleteVery well put.
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