A hopeless generation?

Our parents were told they could have it better than past generations.  And they did.  Technology and standards of living have increased dramatically in the last century, even the last sixty years.  The effects on society have been enormous, and some more positive than others.

But in the last thirty or so years things were moving so fast that we borrowed to get more and more, both as a country and as individuals.  Now we're left in a country that's deep in debt, but just as seriously a country with a high level of personal debt- huge mortgages, credit cards, loans, even student loans, with all problems, financial and stress related, this causes.

Even for those who've avoided debt as much as possible the dream of life continually improving seems unlikely.  I know so many people who've graduated in the last few years and struggle to get even a low skilled job, let alone one requiring a degree.  Perhaps the picture is skewed because of where I live, but youth unemployment is a rising political issue.  As is the older generation who will need-and expect- increasing levels of expensive care, which my generation will have to pay for.  Will we have it better than past generations?  I doubt it.

And yet on TV we see people endlessly having fun, doing exciting things.  Is it any wonder if we want to escape our dull, hopeless lives, to win fame, celebrity, and that we'll often go to extreme lengths such as humiliating ourselves in front of millions on X factor or Big Brother to get it?  But even that is shallow.

The future used to seem shiny and exciting, a world of robot servants and hovercars and interstellar travel.  Now we bitterly consider what a mess we've made of our own planet rather than thinking about colonising others.  The future doesn't seem to contain much hope now.  Certainly not the immediate future of cash-strapped Britain.  Perhaps that's what we were hoping our politicians will deliver in this election- a reason to hope in the future.  Perhaps it's too early to say whether that hope was entirely in vain.


So where are we to find our hope for the future?  At this point I should go all Christian and give the answer; "in Christ."  And it's true, of course.  I do believe it.  But that's not to disown responsibility for the future of planet Earth and its inhabitants.  That hope in Christ has got to affect what we do on Earth, not just what will happen to us after death.  Because of that hope, it's up to us, the people of Christ, to look at the world around us and work out how we can make it a better place, a place of hope.