Aniston interview encapsulates culture of hopelessness
In an interview with Cosmopolitan magazine out tomorrow, actress Jennifer Aniston spoke about the “pressure” people felt to have a relationship that will last. “Whoever said that everything has to be forever? That’s unrealistic or hoping for too much. I don’t think it’s worth all that pressure,” Aniston told Cosmo!
Now, hold on a minute there, ‘friend’! Let’s just unpack this awhile! First of all, where is this “pressure” you’re referring to coming from? Surely, these days, to quote Cole Porter, “Heaven knows, anything goes”?
What does a modern western society care about who should be allowed to marry, how long a marriage should last or, if, indeed, anyone should get married, in the first place?
Well, perhaps the answer is, that despite all the noise to the contrary, ’society’, actually, does care about these things and ’society’, actually, cares a lot.
But, why? Why does society care so much? Given the way the ’free love’ commandment (’do unto others and do and do and do’) is regularly genuflected to in our media, why is society resisting the ’slime directive’ and stubbornly putting poor people like Jennifer under this pressure to have a relationship that will last?
Could it be that it is actually written into our nature, and Jennifer’s, too, to seek out lasting relationships? Why? Because, ultimately, we know, deep within our genes — or wherever — that that is what we should do because that is what will make us happy or happi-er, in any case ( I mean, only God can make us truly happy, right? )
Only yesterday, Trinity College’s leading Neuroscientist, Professor Ian Robertson (I hope I haven’t trod on anyone’s toes here) told Newstalk’s Orla Barry that to break the values you hold (in that case, honesty — the discussion was about a taxi driver who had found $32,500 and returned it to its rightful owners) is to damage yourself.
These inconvenient values, along with our requirement to act in accordance with them, are built into our genes or something over millions of years and you can’t just jettison them because you feel like it or because some other psychologist says you should (jettison them, that is).
You see, looking at it again, Jennifer’s call to hopelessness – for that is what it is – seems like the tail of that trojan horse which an old atheist and pseudo-psychologist named Albert Ellis deposited in our lives many years ago. Ellis ‘observed’ (psychologists always say they ‘observe’ when they want to avoid being contradicted) that what makes us mentally ill, in the shape of anxiety and depression, is our beliefs about what we should do when what we do do contradicts those beliefs.
That makes a lot of sense, in a way, I suppose, but instead of suggesting that people change their behaviour and follow their consciences ( the reasonable thing to do, surely ), Ellis proposed that the word ’should’ itself was the problem — Ellis used to speak about his patients ’shoulding’ all over themselves! The word ’should’, according to Ellis, should be taken out of the English language.
I think the first thing one should notice here is that the old Ellis idea which, at one point, enjoyed almost universal approval in pseudo-psychological and, I’m afraid, Church and religious circles too, seems to contradict what Prof Robertson said — it also contradicts the latest scientific research, by the way! You can’t just shake off your ’shoulds’ as if they were some acquired and otherwise inexplicable social ‘construct’. No, they come straight from, wait for it, this is going to hurt, the Natural Law, yes, the old Ten Commandments themselves. Surprise, surprise, there’s no real getting away from your conscience.
Secondly, just think about it for a minute: If you took the word ’should’ out of the English language, how many of the Ten Commandments would you be left with? But that was the whole point, wasn’t it?
Amazing, really: that intelligent, often religious people fell for this ruse from the author of The Case against Religion: the Psychotherapist’s View; that an atheist activist who who liked to refer to Christianity as “an irrational belief system” which he taught was at the core of many mental health problems – particularly among Catholics – was allowed a powerful place in the heart of many a Christian counselor! So much for John Paul II’s exhortation “duc(ere) in altum” ( “put out into the deep”). For goodness sake, forget about the deep, all you have to do is barely scratch the surface and you see this anti Christian / anti monotheistic idea for what it is.
What’s really ironic is that the exhortation to ‘be your best’ seems to have near universal approval in every area other than morality. The one area that offers life ( “the flesh has nothing to offer” – John 6:63 — after all ) only offers life if we love to the end, to the utmost, with our whole heart, our whole mind, our whole strength — assuming we want to be happy. St Paul (a word for him as we approach the end his year) talked about Christians running in a race looking for an imperishable wreath (1 Corinthians 9: 24-27). So let’s hold out for excellence in the moral life and for one expression of that, the pursuit of permanent lasting relationships. Let’s not be taken in by Jennifer’s and Albert’s ‘call to hopelessness’ because it is “by hope we are saved” (Spe Salvi, Pope Benedict XVI, 2007).
And, on the day, more or less, that the Pope visits Mt Nobo where tradition states that God gave Moses a view of the Promised Land from afar, let’s hear it for Moses, let’s hear it for perseverance and let’s hear it for the hope that the word ’should’ should point to!
This blog has been brought to you today by the number 10 and by the word ’should’! 
Sunday, May 10th, 2009 and is filed under GOD, Great men and women, Love Thy Neighbour, Pain and suffering, Prayer & the Christian life, Science, Thoughts & Questions, Views on News.
Responses are currently closed
G.P. Fitzpatrick Says:
I just happened to read this while surfing the web, my sentiments exactly regarding the culture of hopelessness. Most americans are not thrilled with the “poop” culture of HOLLYWEIRD.
Phoenix AZ, USA
June 30th, 2009 at 7:50 pm
mary Says:
I just feel so many young couples have civil marriages and leave God out the union then as Isee it becomes flimsy a relationship is when blessed by God something to be worked hard at
September 10th, 2009 at 4:08 pm