The Problems Facing Modern Civilization

parents who have decided to separate shortly after marriage. Their “orphaned” state during their parents’ lifetime soon becomes one of social alienation. The rising incidence of this kind of orphaning is creating complex problems in modem society, one of which goes by the name of “deprivation dwarfism,” a disease, according to medical experts, that can cause sleeplessness and severe bowel disorders, and used to kill many children in orphanages. A recent report by western medical authorities says, “Lack of love can stunt children’s physical growth, retard their intellect, or even kill them.” Pediatricians say that as late as 1915, some 90 percent of the children who died in Baltimore orphanages (in Maryland, U.S.A.) within the first year of admission, did so because of lack of love.32 According to Dr. Gardner, studies of human biology have shown that impulses arise from the higher level of the brain. These impulses enter into the bodily system and generate hormones of different kinds which are necessary for physical growth. One of these turns protein into sugar. This natural process in those children who grow up denied of their parents’ affection is greatly inhibited. As a result, their bodies are unable to make full use of the available protein necessary for their growth. This is an example which shows how fatal it is to deviate from the path of nature. Man cannot make another world of his own by deviating from the world created by God. On the contrary, he must live out his life in accordance with this world. If he abandons the path of nature in favour of some other path, this will only end in failure, if not actual disaster. THE EXPERIMENT OF UNRESTRICTED FREEDOM On the question of abortion, Americans have now divided themselves Into two opposing groups, one unreservedly upholding abortion, and describing themselves as “pro-choice” rather than “pro-abortion,” while the other is against abortion and calls itself “pro-life.” The American magazine Newsweek illustrates the current mood with a photograph of a procession of American women, whose leader, a young woman, is holding aloft a placard bearing in bold lettering the orders: “Keep your laws and your morality off my body.”33 Modern western thinkers hold their greatest asset to be freedom. But the experiment in the West of having fewer and fewer restrictions on freedom has demonstrated that personal liberty cannot be the highest good. Had it been so, it would never have resulted in the ugly extremes which the above example suggests. There is no disputing the fact that freedom as a quality of life is something of great value. But, for man, the highest good is freedom within limits, rather than absolute freedom. Personal liberty, however, must never be subject to man-made restrictions, for no man is superior to his fellow men, and no one has the right, therefore, to curtail another’s freedom. Restriction is a matter of God, and man must bow to God’s dictates when He so wills it.