so take me as you find me

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lifesong

Everyone needs compassion
Love that's never failing
Let mercy fall on me

Everyone needs forgiveness
The kindness of a Saviour
The hope of nations

Saviour, He can move the mountains
My God is mighty to save
He is mighty to save
Forever author of salvation
He rose and conquered the grave
Jesus conquered the grave

So take me as you find me
All my fears and failures
Fill my life again
I give my life to follow
Everything I believe in
Now I surrender

Shine your light in
Let the whole world see
We're singing, for the glory
Of the risen King
Jesus, Shine your light in
Let the whole world see
We're singing for the glory
Of the risen king

yourstruly

michelle
psalms 27:4
RJC Humans
IGNYTE, Trinity@PL
child of God

Sunday, July 31, 2005

-11:34 am

Thanks to Sandra for that food for thought. I can totally agree with her point of view. Having read The Handmaid's Tale myself and done in-depth analysis of the theme Dystopia, it's a chilling wake-up call in the form of a satirical novel portraying a possible future society that we could face if trends today are allowed to perpetuate. A future where women were merely functional in existence, without identities, divided into social classes which dictates their prescribed funtions. Forced to bear babies for men they did not know and love, to have children they cannot call their own. Subjected to emotional deprivation and mental torture. This is every woman's nightmare.

Nowadays, it seems acceptable and even laudable that science technology is moving at such a fast pace. Instead of decrying the degrading state of our moral values and principals, mass media is promoting challenging points of view, turning our youth into the very "depraved and crooked generation" the Bible describes.

I'm glad I get to do units like Bioethics and Globalisation for English. Issues like euthanasia, cloning and artificial intelligence all surface in our discussions. Do we humans allow ourselves to play God? Do we dictate who lives and who dies? With the swift mechanisation and automation with the advent of efficient machinery and computerised systems, will humans be replaced by human-like robots, and the entire world run by computers? Movies like I, Robot and A.I. shows how these might all become alarming futuristic possibilities given our present circumstances.

I am not advocating that we return to the olden days where farmers traditionally had to plough their fields manually, where factories employed hundreds of workers to fix together parts of a computer. The pros of having machinery can be illustrated by this following example. Doctors now have the assistance of precision equipment used to execute operations in which the slightest movement of the scapel can result in a severed artery and hence death of the patient.

My question is, are we prepared enough to handle the power we wield in the form of science techonology and knowledge in a responsible way, exercising them with proper science ethics and humanity? The moral courage is needed to stand up for what is right, and not give in to what is evidently wrong. We all know that power corrupts. The rapid advancement of science and medical technology is all well and good, but only when it is handled in the right way for the betterment of all mankind.

Though territorial boundaries and barriers are being broken down on a day to day basis with globalisation, with the help of the internet, cultures and values are also being interchangably universal. The onslaught of Westernisation, or more suitably called Amercanisation (even Macdonald outlets are sprouting faster than bateria in China), has caused the Asian countries to lose their traditional culture, more especially for the young.

I remember the prologue of a novel Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan, which so aptly encapsulates this modern day phenonmenon:

The old woman remembered a swan she had bought many years ago in Shanghai for a foolish sum. This bird, boasted the market vendor, was once a duck that stretched its neck in hopes of becoming a goose, and now look!- it is too beautiful to eat. Then the woman and the swan sailed across an ocean many thousands of li wide, stretching their necks toward America.

On her journey she cooed to the swan: "In America, I will have a daughter just like me. But over there nobody will say her worth is measured by the loudness of her husband's belch. Over there nobody will look down on her, because I will make her speak only perfect American English. And over there she will know my meaning, because I will give her this swan- a creature that became more than what was hoped for."

But when she arrived in the new country, the immigration officials pulled her swan away from her, leaving the woman fluttering her arms and with only one swan feather for a memory. And then she had to fill out so many forms she forgot why she had come and what she had left behind.

Now the woman was old. And she had a daughter who grew up speaking only English and swallowing more Coca-Cola than sorrow. For a long time now the woman had wanted to give her daughter the single swan feather and tell her, "This fetuer may look worthless, but it comes from afar and carries with it all my good intentions." And she waited, year after year, for the day she could tell her daughter this in perfect American English.

A sad story of a mother's broken heart. Of heritage lost, hopes dashed and disappointed dreams. Perhaps we should ask ourselves if the battle between Western and Asian values are really what they are? I think otherwise. Western values represent the modern values and Asian values represent the traditional values. Hence, the conflict is not between two cultures, but between the old and the new, the traditional and the modern. I feel that adopting modern values are fine, as long as the values are morally correct. However we should also learn to embrace traditional values, with the exception of views like "Females are inferior to males" or "Females must stay at home and bear children, preferably only sons".

The changing world does not necessarily imply that our values must change with it. For believers like us, we are called to be the salt and light of this world (from yesterday's sermon), to preserve the moral values and be guardians against moral decay in this generation. To be lighthouses to guide the way for the lost, to shine for Jesus. We are to be the shining stars in the universe, to live radically holy lives no matter what people may say because we know the truth.

"Do everything without complaining or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe, as you hold out the word of life- in order that I may boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labour for nothing." -Philippians 2:14-16