Change?

Social historians may want to correct me but one of the trends of the current era has been the constant need to innovate, to change. It seems, at times, that the desire for change outweighs any of the values that continuity might have to offer. 'A change is as good as a holiday'. 'If there's no change you're dying'. Add your own truism here if you like. Truisms enshrine a superficial truth but can't be tested to far without problems. All too often they become maxims on which other principles are built. Consequently, these new 'principles' have poor foundations, take on a life of their own and the underlying problem is perpetuated. Logically at some time it should all come toppling down.

What is gained by change? Well certainly things that are wrong need to be corrected. Change is frequently needed to avoid the mistakes we have made in the past. Should we hanker after change for change's sake? Here we are on less firm ground. All too often it can become an exercise not in improving the general situation but in giving the impression that something is being done. Sometimes it's an exercise in 'spin'- putting the best face on a bad situation. At other times it's the favoured activity of an unthinking collective under threat and trying to throw it's weight about. At the worst it's an exercise in deception- creating a smoke screen for something rather dubious going on that they don't want you to know about.

Now I'm not suggesting that we should all shroud ourselves in some sort of time capsule rather that changes do need to be carefully examined for their 'motives'. The indicators of bad change are clear. It has no real foundation historically, philosophically or theologically for that matter. It's imposition produces no real fruit in the long term rather, frequently, the opposite. If no reason can be found, apart from innovation for it's own sake, then these sort of changes need to be set aside.

Oh - and, by the way, Happy Dominica Secunda post Pentecosten!