Advent 2025, Week 2: Isaiah 9, Preview
Have you sensed that there is a widening ideological divide in our American culture? I’ve written about it here on the blog, the sorting of our society. I recently heard someone suggest, however, that only 10% of people hold to the extremes poles of cultural ideology. 80% reside in the middle. I wouldn’t have guessed that. But I had an experience this past week that challenged my assumptions.
This past week, on the same day I attended a breakfast and a lunch, both of which featured presentations by the Lancaster Journalism Fund. It was simply coincidence that the two events happened on the same day.
The first event was the quarterly gathering of Connection Village, sponsored by Conestoga Valley SEEDS and held at our school district boardroom. At Connection Village, representatives from a variety of Conestoga Valley based organizations meet to talk about life in our community. I represented the faith community, as I am president of the CV Ministerium. Also in attendance were representatives from the school district, first responders, business, social services, government, and finance. We each shared “wins,” with the goal of encouraging healthy community connections. It is a wonderful gathering.
The second event was new to me, Lancaster County in Common. Sponsored by the Lancaster Journalism Fund, and held at the Lafayette Fire Company, I barely knew anyone. Representatives from Ad Voz led us in conversational exercises, focusing on practicing listening. I was reminded of our humanity as I listened to strangers briefly tell me about their lives.
These events were so uplifting because there is another discouraging reality in our culture. Lancaster Journalism Fund representatives reported that as recently as 20 years ago, our local Sunday newspaper, the Sunday News, reached 80%-90% of county households. Now it only reaches 20%. There is no longer a common source of community news. Our local TV station is great, but it also doesn’t provide the level of commonality that the newspaper once did.
Instead, Lancastrians, just like most other communities across the country, hear about news from a fractured variety of sources. National platforms, and especially social media, can lead us to believe that most people are actually extremists, and that we should be extremist too.
If the person I mentioned at the beginning of this post is correct, and 10% of the country holds to the extreme ideological poles, that is still a lot of people. 10% + 10% of a population of 340 million is 68 million people.
How, then, do we address this?
One experimental solution in my community is Roundabout CV. Conestoga Valley is one of five communities across the country that have been selected for the launch of a hyper-local new source, Roundabout. It will not use an algorithm. Instead it will be only for residents of CV, to post about life and events in CV. Will it bring us together? Will it help us cross ideological divides? I think it has potential.
But I also believe there is a deeper lack peace. This second week of Advent we will talk about what can bring genuine peace. See for yourself ahead of time by reading Isaiah 9.
To help guide us this Advent, we are using Christianity Today’s Advent devotionals, Darkness Then Light. Darkness Then Light includes a daily devotional, as well as weekly themes that our blog series is following.
Photo by Nick Fewings on Unsplash
Engaging Scripture 