Transformation in Christ_ On the Christian Attitude - Dietrich Von Hildebrand [128]
Ways to combat illegitimate influences of public opinion
Public opinion as such should have no hold whatsoever on a true Christian. With his vision enlightened by the divine Truth, he must not attach any weight to the fact that a certain opinion is held by a great number of people or that a certain point of view is modern or fashionable.
His life is lived in the sight of Him in whose eyes “a thousand years . . . are as yesterday, which is past” (Ps. 89:4), He says with the Psalmist: “They shall perish but Thou remainest: and all of them shall grow old like a garment. And as a vesture Thou shalt change them, and they shall be changed. But Thou art always the selfsame: and Thy years shall not fail.” (Ps. 101:27-28).
He should regard public opinion with a healthy distrust, for it is only a work of man and a nursling of the spirit of the world. In order to make himself impermeable to all mere currents of the age, he must look for a support in the doctrine of the Church. He must turn his eyes away from the garish pageant of the idols of the day and shut his ears to the noise of ephemeral appeals.
Above all, the Christian must be on guard against the subtle poison of public opinion which is ever trying imperceptibly to seep in through his pores. He must not for a moment forget this danger of contagion and must systematically immunize himself against it by absorbing the right spiritual counter-poisons.
Again and again, he should represent to himself, together with all their implications, the eternal truths of God; again and again, he should open his mind to the radiation of the light of Christ, and in that light examine with unbending sternness whatever the spirit of the age offers and suggests. He must never breathe the air of a profane environment in the attitude of naive trustfulness. Let him be always conscious of his own frailty and of Christ’s warning: “Beware of false prophets.”
For he will not have attained to true freedom until public opinion no longer has any hold on his spirit; until he no longer knows any dependence but one—an unconditional dependence on Christ, to whom he has given himself, for all times, by a free and full decision which involves his whole personality.
There are, however, two distinct forms of dependence on public opinion. The one we have just discussed consists in being fascinated by that which is topical: the salient ideas of the age. The mind of such a person is captivated by the mere fact that a thing is vital in this external sense of publicity and topicality; he disregards its particular meaning and content. He delights at being in tune with things coming and new, with whatever is in the air, with the great forces of the future. He is intoxicated with the dynamic impetus of an intense movement.
Conventionalism diminishes freedom
The other form of dependence on public opinion lies in the opposite direction. It is present in those who feel secure and comfortable in their unreserved adherence to a stable public opinion hallowed by tradition, the attitude of conventionalism. The first form of dependence on public opinion is the great danger to characters eager for novelty and sensation, discontinuous, over-susceptible to the charms of dynamism; the second form is likely to occur in the narrow-minded, habit-ridden type of man.
The conventionalist is more or less immune to the seduction of the changing ideas and fashions that dominate public opinion, so impressed by its spirit of the new. All the more however, is he anxious to conform to a medium of ideas upon which tradition and long custom have placed a stamp of valid public authority. He cleaves to what has always been held; what his fathers and forefathers have deemed right. By contrast to the worshipper of the moment’s idols, who succumbs to the impact of current opinions and newly surging enthusiasms, owing to his