Desensitization and the Christian

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The recent controversy over the beauty pageant contestant from California has led to heated debates on some Christian blogs. The two most salient questions are: one, have today's (conservative) Christians compromised Biblical views on sexual purity; and two, if so, do they realize it? The answer to the first question: yes. The second: they better.

If anything, the controversy holds up a mirror to the current state of Christian churches vis-à-vis sexuality, and the reflection is an unappealing mixture of immaturity, confusion, and willful complacency.

In an unrelated but still relevant article, writer Robin Phillips at Robin's Readings & Reflections addresses the desensitization of Christians to our hyper-sexualized culture. Its repercussions affect not only sexual purity but eventually Biblical worldview as a whole.

How do the edges of our worldview give way in the first place? When they concern standards—the things we say no to—the pattern is usually the same: our standards are surrendered to the degree that we become desensitized to the things we once objected to. When one is saturated in worldly culture, this happens by default unless we actively strive against it. Desensitization occurs when a person is inundated with a flood of offensive material presented in the least offensive fashion possible, so that it seems almost laughable to make a problem out of it.
Read the entire excellent post here. (A note of reminder: as usual, a link is not necessarily a blanket endorsement of a site's views/doctrinal predisposition.)

 

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