By Pastor Eric Anderson, Lifespring Church, Crosby-Ironton Courier

We are now in a Honor/Shame society.

There are crucial scientific and logical precedents which should have been considered before making decisions about society-altering executive actions, certainly more than, but not less than "mandated masking."

So it begs question: How did we get to this point where these were even allowed to be made, under "emergency orders? How did governors make this a mandate with so many exceptions and so little ability to enforce?

Answer: Because they expect us to enforce it among ourselves. And, sadly, it will happen by good ol’ peer pressure.

How? We have moved from a right/wrong society, where virtues such as personal responsibility, courage, and hard work were expected, to a Honor/Shame culture (prevalent among nations in the east with pantheistic religions), where current values (honor/shame) have replaced transcendent virtues and principals

This is Marxism, in it's current manifestations in the cultural, now the political realm. Multi-culturalism, social justice, identity politics, safety-ism, health, diversity are the ideal and normal lens of assessing what is good to celebrate (honor) what is bad to repudiate and change. (shameful) much must be said, but consider, through the "masking framework" alone…

Honor: You can worship God with a mask, or online.

Shame: You are a violator of Romans 13 and harming, your Christian witness if you disagree or add a…”but."

Honor: To be considered a good citizen" by agreeing with them (experts) and obeying them.

Shame: To be a peasant: Any disagreement. Or, how about this…

Honor: Blame Donald J. Trump for all our problems.

Shame: Any nuance, any defense of the former president and you are a shameful nationalist, you are harming your Christian witness.

In an Honor/Shame Culture: You are "Honorable" if you obey the current "values" of what is popular in culture, as passed down by the elites (in education, entertainment, big business, big tech, and government)… You are "Shamed" if you don't.

"Cancel culture" is one result but not the root.

Honor/Shame, in today's Marxist Groupthink, is the antithesis of both our Nations foundation and the deeper foundation which informed it, Christian Virtue; for Honor/Shame, especially in a Masking society, all individuality is lost, your identity is seen by your identifications: skin color, gender, sexuality, and Masking.

Where is the arrival? Where is the utopia point? Where is atonement in an Honor/Shame Religion? How about forgiveness? Is peace ever achieved, ever secured?

Answer: There isn't. This type of Honor/Shame promises freedom yet gives only enslavement. Human efforts' to build "towers of babel" have always failed spectacularly (and destructively).

Mankind, without reference nor reverence for Holy God, produces more, not less guilt and shame.

As a friend pointed out, it is ironically "shameless."

Here is Truth: There is one Creator and we don't get to create our own truth. He alone reveals what is honorable and what is shameful. In him alone is found meaning.

Here is the Truth: We are shameful people, who deserve our shame, but according to God's standard and before his Holiness.

The Good News: His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, despised the shame of the cross by being covered in our shame, the right response from Holy God Wrath and judgment. He died in shame, rose in honor, offering us the forgiveness, peace, freedom, clear thinking, true justice, and the good life, now and in eternity, that which the government, elites, friends, in their ever evolving honor/ shame code, can never give.