Crumbling Ethical Values

Crumbling Ethical Values

Today's news is about the greedy, unethical conduct of corporate executives who by their dishonesty have cost shareholders and employees of their companies their wealth and retirements. Yesterday is was greedy, unethical doctors and medical professionals. The day before it was greedy unethical lawyers. Before that it was unethical stockbrokers. Prior to that it was unethical politicians and an unethical president. At the bottom of the pond are unethical thieves, burglars and robbers who take the property of others for their own use.

All of these categories of people have a common ailment. They suffer from an absence of moral/ethical values and a lack of shame that allows them to pursue their greed-driven course without any sense of wrongdoing. Their rule of conduct is, "if I can do it and get by with it, its OK." Their success assures them they are smarter than the poor jerks from whom they steal and that the purse goes to the strong and the daring. The clamor in Washington is for new laws to deal with corporate fraud. But those who themselves are afflicted with the moral virus are ill suited to find a solution.

America's ethical disaster follows, as night follows day, the decision by the nation's thought leaders to reject and abandon the Christian ethical code, which in days past was foundational in the moral training of our citizens. These intellectuals refuse to consider the Bible as of any value for modern life, and they are determined to keep young people from being exposed to its moral influence.

In days past not everyone was a Christian, not everyone went to church, but everyone was exposed to a common set of moral, social, business values that all were expected to subscribe to and live by. Those that did not were exposed and shunned or even convicted and punished by law. Today, thanks to the influence of several powerful groups at work in our society, those old values have been rejected and driven from the marketplace of ideas.

Since 1950, two generations of Americans have grown up; most did not receive that indoctrination in moral responsibility. Today we see the fruits of it in our daily ethical scandals.

To pass laws to force corporate executives to be honest is but to treat the symptom. We must look to those academics, jurists, politicians, media spokespersons, secular humanists and their kindred who for years have been making war against Christianity. We must reject their amoral value system and their cultural leadership. We must restore the spiritual values that made America great, not only militarily and economically but morally as well.

Robert McCracken wisely observed, “We on this continent should never forget that men first crossed the Atlantic not to find soil for their ploughs but to secure liberty for their souls.” "Our nation was founded as an experiment in human liberty. Its institutions reflect the belief of our founders that men had their origin and destiny in God; that they were endowed by Him with inalienable rights and had duties prescribed by moral law, and that human institutions ought primarily to help men develop their God given possibilities" (John Foster Dulles).

These observations are old-fashion but they are absolutely right. Without God and his ethical standards our plight will only get worse.

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