‘The Times They Are A-Changin’. Again. Tumultuously

“The times they are a-changin’.” So sang Bob Dylan. “Change” was a prophetic theme when the song first came out. And change is upon us once more, albeit this time a different kind of change. The times they are a-changin’.

Ever since the 1960s, America – and I suppose most of the quote-unquote “Western World” – has lived with the revolution of those turbulent years. Fuelled by protest against Vietnam, and singing along to the tunes of not just Bob Dylan but (of course) The Beatles, and others, much of the discourse and context in which the church lives and works in the Western World has been shaped by the changing times in which we live, and which have been bequeathed by the 1960s.

But things are changing. Again. The evidence for this is everywhere. There is a new return to the traditional in some quarters. A longing for the “traditional west” and its purported culture and “civilization.” Politics are not what they were. Old divisions and partisanships have given way to new divisions and partisanships. Alliances once certain now seem fragile.