"In the absence of vertical transcendence they turn to horizontal transcendence", No, that's not what you think

Over at Crisis Magazine, James Kalb had some interesting thoughts in his, "When Concerns for Peripheries Eclipse Interest in the Sacred Other". There may a subtle double-entendre in the quotation I lifted for the title of today's blog spot, but ignoring that, it points to the difference between the two major world views competing for our world,

"But progressive politics, however convinced of its rectitude, has a problem as a substitute for religion. If everything is this-worldly, and things are what we make them, then transcendence—that which is greater than us—doesn’t exist. This means something essential is missing, because there’s nothing to worship. Without some higher reference point the whole effort becomes simply a field for the exercise of power.
That won’t do, so people look for an escape, and in the absence of vertical transcendence they turn to horizontal transcendence. The Holy, we are sometimes told, is that which is Wholly Other. In a horizontal world there is no such thing, so we look for that which is as different from ourselves as possible. The result is the religion not of the Wholly Other but of the Holy Other. 'Love God, and your neighbor as yourself” becomes 'love as divine the person who’s as different as possible.'"

"Loving as divine the person who's as different as possible" certainly helps explain society's fascination, and worship, of all things LGBTetc. Those who do so have lost all sense of vertical transcendence, an ideal that serious Christians should understand. The knowledge of the presence of a transcendent God and Savior shapes our thoughts, our actions, and world view.

We need to see who in our lives is living in a horizontal world, worshiping the "wholly other" and not the "Holy Other" and show them that there is another way if they would only take the time to look up.