2008 Retrospective: Did It Really Hurt That Much?

2008 is gone. The retrospectives sounded staggering, really. How often does one realize that in a single year, each month provided some event of such magnitude that they would have defined any other year? The Chinese earthquake, and then the Olympics; the collapse of Bear Sterns, then later Lehman and possibly the US financial system; the Russian invasion of Georgia, and then the Israeli invasion of Gaza; and so forth, till I realized how much I’d forgotten. Unimaginable times, only set to burgeon the more. We are told to expect worse things from the economy—recession in the US economy, continued contraction in the world economy. The effects of such a recession promise to be profound and unpredictable—especially for the younger generations used to ongoing prosperity and a continuous climb away from poverty and hunger towards the bright new World of Man. We cannot expect Hamas and Israel to ever come to an accord without Hamas altering its stated first principles, those fundamentals upon which all its policy is based and around which all its actions center—among which is perpetual jihad till Israel exist no longer. The Israeli invasion cannot properly be considered a crisis in the sense of a sudden worsening of a previously stable situation. Israel and Palestine have been at war for generations, now, no matter PNA President Abbas’s stated focus on a two state solution. If the Palestinian government had truly been interested in a two state solution, the suicide bomber and “one Palestine from sea to sea” propaganda would have been stopped and Hamas put out of existence a long time ago. China stands on the edge of a knife. A lot of economists and world scene watchers hold out hope for China’s quick recovery. They hope it shall be able to take the role of the US in the world economy, shall rise stronger than ever—a prospect which ought to be more feared than hoped for. There’s something a little mad about desperation for another nation of mass consumers—especially when this involves completely ignoring such inconvenient facts as the means by which China’s export economy is maintained, what happens to political prisoners when they disappear in the dark of night, religious oppression under Chinese rule, etc., etc., ad nauseam. If China rises while the West falls, a great many things promise to be swept away, among them freedom, human rights, and possibly the countries surrounding it in Asia. The Church continues mixed. Benedict leads. Some follow. He works hard, and the West yawns. Locally, the bishops of the U.S. have mapped out different courses this past year through reaction to President-elect Obama’s campaign and platform, through reaction to Representative Pelosi and Vice-President Elect Biden. Politics does not give a real reading of a Catholic bishop—their primary job remains to be Lords Spiritual and not Temporal—but in times to come, the state of the nation may intrude more into the affairs of the Church than is comfortable.