"When your message comes true - and it surely will - then they will know that a prophet has been among them." Ezekiel 33:33 Acton Insights 4: "Aleksandr Solhenitsyn: Prophet and Critic." (Father Hans Jacobse) People who really know me, realize that I have a penchant for the political macabre. I have read more biographies on Hitler and Stalin than all my other non-fiction reading combined. I am fascinated by the outworking of evil on the historical stage. As G. K. Chesterton once quipped, "The depravity of man is at once the most empirically verifiable and intellectually resisted argument that we face." So naturally, when I see a class at the Acton Institute offering an in-depth discussion on the life of the famed Russian writer and political prisoner Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, I had to take it. I first learned about this man when I was reading his famous book "The Gulag Archipelago" while I was living in the Russian city of Stavropol. One evening while he was describing Stalin's black paddy-wagons that would secretly whisk away political enemies veiled in the dark-of-night to some far off camp in Siberia, there came a knock at my door. "Are you Mr. Veeks (Russian pronunciation of Weeks)? I need to see your passport!" There standing on the doorstep at 8:00 p.m. was a very somber looking Russian soldier demanding to see my papers. My mind flashed in horror, was there a black paddy-wagon waiting for me too? Was the KGB fixin' to ship me off to the Russian tundra never to be heard from again? Luckily, after I showed him my picture and proper credentials, he left without a word. One thing was for sure, I was done reading that book for the night. Aleksandr's Short Bio During WW2 Solzhenitsyn was a decorated soldier in the Soviet Red Army. As a commander on the East Prussian Front, he witnessed horrendous war crimes at the hands of his fellow Russian soldiers, and he couldn't stay silent. After one of his private letters was confiscated by the Soviet officials, which criticized Joseph Stalin's immoral tactics in war, he was imprisoned for 8 years in the Russian camp-system for the crime of "Anti-Soviet Propaganda." After serving his full time, he was released, and he started writing. His first big book detailed what life was like in Stalin's work-camps titled "A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich." It was published at the time when Nikita Khrushchev was starting to allow new voices to be heard, and his book immediately sold-out. Shortly after this "The Gulag Archipelago" was also written, and it made it's way to the West where it received international acclaim. The world was given a glimpse behind the iron curtain into the Soviet's repressive regime for the first time. After Khrushchev was removed from office in 1964, the KGB (Soviet Secret Police) started to crack down on all anti-Soviet writers; Solzhenitsyn was chief on their list. On 12 February 1974, Solzhenitsyn was arrested and deported from the Soviet Union to West Germany and stripped of his Soviet citizenship. He eventually received the Nobel Prize for literature, and was invited by Stanford University to stay there and continue his work. A 20th Century Firebrand In 1978 Aleksandr was asked to give the commencement address at Harvard University. Father Jacobse, Acton's expert on Solzhenitsyn, said it was here where he made his "trenchant critique of Western Culture." He was a modern day prophet boldly speaking out against the dangers of materialist ideology. As a prophet he "laid truth bare in naked agony" as he declared what he saw coming for every modern society that no longer trusted in God. He was speaking not just against athiestic Russia; but he included secular America in his condemnation as well. He believed what led to the decay in the East was now taking root in the West. Using his past experiences to predict what was in store for mankind's future, Solzhenitsyn made four bold predictions for the fate of Western man: (1) People were Losing Civic Courage: Solzhenitsyn said cowards are born in the ruling and intellectual circles. When people are afraid of losing their grip on power, position and prestige they also lose their nerve to stand up against the popular tide. Men are no longer men. Because of that people are afraid to disagree with the consensus, they morph into the status quo, and it is here where truth dies. (2) There is a Subjectification of Law: Because God is tossed out of the dialogue in materialist cultures, people decide law on "what works" instead of "what's right." As a result, moral impulses are paralyzed and society becomes a sewer. (3) A Dimming of any Awareness of Transcendent: Man is no longer considered different than an animal. Instead of being defined as a being stamped with God's image, we are now the products of our appetites. We become what makes us happy? We promote what we desire? And of course, if something brings us any pain it must inherently be wrong. Father Jacobse says, "That is why while bombs are falling, the interest in the Kardashians is climbing." (4) A complete Uniformity of Thought: Instead of informing the populace, governments and media outlets are now turning toward propaganda. Political correctness has overtaken logical argumentation. Instead of allowing for honest debate, propagandists can only point the finger and cry, "You're a hater." That is how you keep people in-line. Conclusion The Harvard speech was given almost 40 years ago, and on every point it seems that Aleksandr was spot on! So Father Jacobse asked, "How then do we move forward?" Solzhenitsyn gives two answers to combat materialism's poison: * We must do all we can not to live by lies. To be a mature human is to live in the truth. * "One word of truth outweighs a world of lies." Aleksandr believed that nothing can stand against a word spoken in truth. Just as God and his Logos created reality from the power of language, we too can speak change into culture through courageous truth-telling. Since Jesus is the truth, he empowers words that are spoken in truth. But for words to have power, they must be heard. Those who have the truth must speak out if they are going to overcome the darkness around them. Those who remain silent, are allowing the darkness to spread. What I find interesting in this last point is that Stalin was able to ship people off to Siberia without resistance because he used fear to silence the people. No one spoke up while they saw their uncles, aunts, dads and moms be shipped off to the farthest reaches of Siberia. No one spoke up because they too feared pain. And in the meantime, truth was murdered. Don't let this happen to our country. Don't buy the propagandist's lies. And speak up, even if only one person listens. Because for that one person, the world becomes a different place! A better place.
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