As one who enjoys reading, I have too many “favorites.” But an all-time favorite read is “The Traveler’s Gift” by Andy Andrews. It’s a historical fiction that travels through time encountering some of history’s notables: Abraham Lincoln, Solomon, Harry Truman and Anne Frank, to name a few.
In one chapter, a vivid word picture is painted describing the fear, danger and determination felt by the Frank family while hiding during the ravages against the Jewish people in World War II. Anne Frank dialogues with the book’s main character about her dire circumstances and contrasting resilience.
“Our very lives are fashioned by choice. … First we make choices. Then our choices make us,” the young lady remarks of her family’s determination enduring two years of atrocities in the Holocaust.
What choices have we made as a society in the last decades?
Collectively, we’ve come to choose a culture that celebrates personal gratification, elevates a pop culture of extravagant extremes and over-sexualized relationships, and applauds success as defined, not by achievement, but by fame and notoriety. In the name of tolerance and political correctness, we’ve come to choose “whatever” over that which is good and decent. We’ve chosen a nanny-state government that intimidates and rejects the faith community that serves as the hand of love in benevolence and charity, not simply a handout.