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I often take inspiration from my pastor’s sermons for topics on which I choose to blog. One of his recent sermons offered an apropos topic for me to scribble some thoughts. The sermon was titled “The Body Snatcher”, taken from the old 1950s movie, “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” which was later redone in 1978. The plot of the movies was formed around alien spores from space that were able to reproduce duplicates of human beings. These creatures were void of normal human qualities, such as emotions. The Biblical text, for my pastor’s sermon, was Acts 16:16, which tells of an encounter the Apostle Paul had with a young girl who had been taken over by a demonic force. Realizing that the sickness from which she was suffering provided a business opportunity, there were those who used her sickness to promote fortune-telling for a fee.

Influence over others has been a hallmark for getting things done since time immemorial. Supervisors impose their “SUPER” vision in the workforce daily. Managers and leaders use virtual remote control to channel people from one task/project to another seamlessly. I think we can say that society is, for the most part, a benefactor for good with this practice. The community activist, who sees a social ill that needs addressing, and rallies public support to remedy that ill, does a good thing. Contrarily, one who has less than honorable intentions who recognizes a need but focuses attention on a group as the reason for economic, social or institutional degradation, does a bad thing. For example, most of a nation’s population is convinced that their economic troubles are due to a minority group that’s draining resources from the economy. In either of these cases, people are remotely ushered into a certain emotional or mental position by someone else. The ability to apply personal thought is supplanted by a charisma, an intrusive influence that causes one to adopt someone else’s thoughts, hook, line and sinker.

The current political climate in which we all live in America today in unquestionably operating on a body snatcher-type MO. The smart politicians can recognize where and how people are hurting, usually in the pocket-book, and somehow turn that suffering into a sense of victimization brought on by “them”. You know “them”, that group who is suffering, too. That group that should be allies in a fight against what all disenfranchised folks are suffering from, but they just don’t look like us, they don’t live in our part of town, they don’t go to the same church as we do… It must be their fault that I’ve lost my job, my house, my style of living. It just couldn’t be because I’m not prepared to work in a shifting environment, more attuned to technology and computer use. I’m a part of the class that has made society great.

I often wonder what heights of good emotional and mental health could be achieved if people would be encouraged to think for themselves. How closer would we be to achieving liberty and justice for all?

I’m old and blessed…hope you will be too.