Wake Up! Paganism Isn’t New, but It Is Rising

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We’ve heard it said lately that what we’re seeing in our culture is sin — and that’s true. But let’s not stop there. What we’re seeing is not simply a lack of virtue in a particular political party or a few mentally ill individuals making poor moral choices. What we are witnessing is a culture-wide descent into paganism—the same kind of paganism the prophets condemned in the Old Testament. And mark this: it is not new. Instead, it is ancient and dark. And it is very definable.

The prophets—men like Amos, Micah, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah — weren’t confused about the character of the nations around them. They saw it plainly.

And under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, they named it in the Bible. Here's what they described and what we’re seeing again, right now:

 

- Bribed Judges: Justice no longer serves truth; it serves power (Micah 3:11).

- Oppression of the Poor: The poor are crushed, while the rich fatten themselves

without guilt (Amos 5:11).

- Glorified Violence: Violence and conquest are celebrated as if bloodshed were glorious. (Habakkuk 1:9-11).

- Idolatry and Syncretism: Blending false gods with the true God (Zephaniah 1:4-6).

- Luxury without a Conscience: A culture drunk on luxury and intoxicated with substances,  escaping reality and numb to sufferings and sins around it (Amos 6:4-6).

- Predatory Leaders: Leaders devour their people; religious leaders sell smooth words for a price. (Zephaniah 3:3-4).

- Perverted Justice: A justice system that mocks righteousness and rewards/enables/praises evil (Habakkuk 1:4).

- Persecution of the Faithful: A world that despises the faithful, silences them, calls them dangerous, and kills them (Jeremiah 26:11).

-Breakdown of Family: Betrayal in relationships and dysfunction within the moral anchor of society: the family (Micah 7:5-6).

- Greed: Normalized Theft (Micah 2:2).

- Sexual Immorality: Turning God’s gift of sexuality into a selfish tool (Amos 2:7).

- Mockery of the Sacred: Deride and trivialize sacredness. Loss of reverence before God; human dignity is malleable (Malachi 1:7-8).

- Moral Relativism: Everyone does what is right in their own eyes, because objective

truth has been thrown into the trash (Micah 7:2-4).

What we are witnessing in America right now is not progress or liberation; it’s regression. Indeed, what we see before our eyes is not new. It’s very, very old. It is Babylon with a fresh coat of paint. It is Assyria dressed in digital clothing. It is paganism—raw, unmasked, and celebrated.

Let’s be honest: this has always been here in the shadows, dormant and tolerated. But now, it’s coming out into the open; it is returning. It is manifesting before us. Our culture is not becoming more neutral or secular —it is becoming more pagan.

And so, listen up! The problem is not the religion of Christ. It’s the religion of self. It is the religion of power. It is the religion of relativism. It is the way of the old gods of paganism. And here’s the hard truth: when Christianity is taken for granted, paganism, not neutrality, takes its place.

And here’s something else: you can’t moan about the state of the culture while turning your back on Christ. You can’t cry about injustice, immorality, and chaos while treating the Word and Sacraments like optional extras. You can’t complain about pagan darkness while neglecting the Light of the world. You can’t dismiss the Church and then wonder why evil fills the void.

Wake up out of your spiritual drunken stupor! Cultural outrage without Christian repentance is hypocrisy. Moral panic without worship and catechesis is empty noise. You don’t get to treat Christianity as an inconvenience—a nagging cultural relic, outdated and in the way—and then become outraged when paganism pokes through.

So, what now? What shall we do? Repent; return to Christ’s Church. That’s not a slogan. It’s not a sentimental plea. It’s the only real answer. Repent—not only of what the culture has become, but of what we have allowed it to become. Repent of what we have ignored. Repent of the ways we have rolled our eyes at Christ and shrugged at His Church, as if Christianity is some inconvenience for the modern man. Repent of thinking articles like this are radical or extreme.

Indeed, stop pretending that we can accommodate this darkness and remain unscathed. Stop acting like neutrality is possible. It’s not. We don’t need more political slogans. We don’t need to sanitize paganism with nicer language. We need to return to Christ. To the Word. To the font. To the altar. To the clear, concrete, cruciform reality of Christianity. Christ-crucified or the gods of paganism: wake up because that’s the choice. There is no middle ground. See you at church on Sunday.

The Rev. Matt Richard is pastor of St. Paul’s Lutheran Church, Minot, N.D.

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