Young People, Stop Trying to Change Your World; You Probably Don't Know What You're Doing

This isn't an anti-millennial post. It's a post I wish I had read when I was younger. Like many young people today, I too heard the mantra, "Change your world." I heard it at high school and college graduation ceremonies. I heard it in the classroom. I heard it in pulpits and in Sunday school. I see it all over the internet. I can think of no other commandment of men so burdensome and hard to bear as this one. Not even the scribes and Pharisees of Jesus' day were so cruel as to lay this burden on the backs of the people. And imagine the level of narcissism one has to have in order to think that somehow they're different or smarter than everyone else to be able to change what no one else will. Yet people take it seriously. However, some have at least enough sense to know that changing the world is too arduous a task. Thus they modify it to, "Change the world by changing yourself." "Be the change you want to see," they say. This is a little better than trying to change the world, but it is just as misguided. With this mantra ringing in everyone's ears, is it any wonder that young people have become exhibitionists in their own social justice fake-reality show?

Young people are impatient and impulsive (I remember how impatient and impulsive I was). Armed with the directive to change the world and the belief that they can, they'll easily believe that anything new must be better. Furthermore, they'll be tempted to think that, whenever traditional morals, politics, or religious beliefs and practices are traded for newer ones, the older ones must be the source of social ills and the new ones are the solution. They'll applaud this statement made by Karl Marx, "So far philosophers have merely interpreted the world in various ways; it is necessary to change it."

In this way of thinking, history becomes a series of trivial facts, truth is no longer concerned with that which is and always has been but with that which is feasible, institutions are a barrier to freedom and enjoyment, and ethics cease to be that which is built upon enduring realities but rather upon that which is practical and convenient for the moment. And what an odd thing it is that many of these young people hyped up on change are so concerned with preserving nature but are in denial that there is such a thing as human nature. They'll line up to picket for days when an oil company lays a pipeline, but they'll threaten your life if you try to preserve human dignity by standing up for basic concepts of human nature. Pope Benedict XVI described this way of thinking well when he said, "The truth with which man is concerned is neither the truth of being, nor even in the last resort of his accomplished deeds, but the truth of changing the world, molding the world--a truth centered on future and action."

What will happen in 30, 40, 50 years when newer generations become bored with the changes made today? Will there be any reason to stand in their way of what they will, no doubt, deem to be progress? Will that which is changed today even matter in the long run? Is there even a limit to how much change can or should be enacted? These questions, of course, are irrelevant to the change-mongers, for their main concern is that change needs to happen and that it needs to happen now. They believe older structures to be repressive, stuffy, outmoded, and outdated. Tear them down and make way for the new! But they do not realize how much they are like those in the French revolution described by Alexis de Tocqueville: "Half-way down the stairs, we threw ourselves out of the window in order to get to the ground more quickly."

How different this way of thinking is from other times when the younger generation was taught instead to understand the world, to gain wisdom and understanding, and to seek out what is true, what is good, and what is beautiful. Solomon the Wise said, "My son, fear the Lord and the king, Do not associate with those given to change; For their calamity will rise suddenly, and who knows the ruin those two can bring?" (Prov. 24:21-22). Matthew Henry comments, "Have nothing to do, he does not say, with those that change, for there may be cause to change for the better, but those that are given to change, that affect change for change-sake, out of a peevish discontent with that which is and a fondness for novelty, or a desire to fish in troubled waters; Meddle not with those given to change either in religion or in a civil government." He goes on to say, "Those that are of restless, factious, turbulent spirits, commonly pull mischief upon their own heads ere they are aware."

Those given to change will be wise in their own eyes, but those who seek wisdom and understanding before all else will realize how much they rely on the wisdom, traditions, and institutions of previous generations. They will realize that some change is necessary but it must come slowly. And, instead of finding it necessary to overturn older structures, they will learn how to use them to make the necessary changes for the better. Here's the important point: You cannot know what to change in the world, or how to change it, without having at least a basic understanding of how the world works. Would you change the oil in your car without knowing what oil is for or where it's supposed to go? Why would you try to change the world without knowing how the world is supposed to work?

Am I against change? Yes and no. First and foremost, I am against binding heavy burdens, too hard to bear, upon the backs of our young people. They should not have to feel like it all depends upon them to change this world into some preconceived, ideological notion of utopia. To place this burden on them is to ask them to become the death of themselves and of their society. They need to know that to be able to be successful in life means standing upon the shoulders of those who have gone before, especially the giant ones. They have the previous generations to help them. They do not have to go it alone.

Secondly, I have enough sense to know that some change is good, some change is indifferent, and some change is destructive. It takes wisdom to know the difference. Russell Kirk said, "All human institutions alter to some extent from age to age, for slow change is the means of conserving society, just as it is the means for renewing the human body. But American conservatives endeavor to reconcile the growth and alteration essential to our life with the strength of our social and moral traditions...They understand that men and women are best content when they can feel that they live in a stable world of enduring values."

I am a Christian and a Protestant, so I understand that some change is necessary. As a Christian, the Scriptures instruct me to "be transformed by the renewing of your mind" (Rom. 12:2). As a Protestant, I understand that it is possible for institutions like the church to become corrupt. But as a Protestant and heir to both the Reformation and Renaissance, I know that the solution is not to tear down the old institution and replace it with something entirely new. No, the solution is found in returning to the sources. "Ad fontes" was as much a Reformation slogan as it was a Renaissance one. But we must be cautious of change. Even good change, if it is done without regard to those who are slow to catch on to the necessity of the change, can be damaging. The wisdom to know when change is either good, indifferent, or destructive also includes the patience to implement the necessary change in a careful and orderly way.

Young people, I urge you to stop your ears to the mantra of "Be the change." Rather, open your ears to the call of wisdom, "Hear instruction and be wise, and do not disdain it" (Prov. 8:33).