Monday, April 7, 2008

Postmodern Myth-ality?

"Do you really believe Post-moderness is a reality?" I've had quite a few conversations recently that started with this question. In fact, one guy I respect a great deal asked if I think there is such a thing as 'post modernity', or if it is just modernity with a twist. Another guy I look up to a great deal said that he thinks the whole thing is a myth, and that it is just another example of people thinking they are unique. Instead, according to my friend, the way things are today is just the fallenness of man all over again. People believe what they want to believe, and they (we) don't want to hear otherwise.

As much as I respect these guys, I cannot help but to think that we are in a time that is quite different from previous years. The problem of sin is certainly the same, but the context surrounding that problem, the platform upon which it sits, is very different. Even further, how one goes about addressing it has to be different. The state things are in today seems to be like a scene in the Matrix (remember the movie that took the world by storm for a few years with the actor from "Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure"). We are trying to fight Agent Smith in ways that he does not allow himself to be hit. If we throw a seemingly deadly blow in the form of propositional truths, somebody can simply say appreciate that as one person's take, but he/she will decide something else to be true for him/herself. This flexibility of truth seems to be a phenomenon that the modern church has not had to deal with (by modern, of course I mean the era before the one we are in right now). I am convinced that the truth, is the truth, is the truth...but in order to even enter into a conversation where truth can be revealed, it seems that we must at least try to recognize that there may need to be a conversation before the conversation.

I would love to hear what others have to say about this, so i'll pass the question along; "Do you really believe post-moderness is a reality?" Is the time we are in today any different from times before, or are people simply couching sinful obsession with self in a way that appears to be original? Is Post-Modernity a reality, a myth, or something in between?