Following my last post, the idolatry of humanism has been manifesting itself into our culture and our politics. And, as humanitarianism is the ethical arm of humanism, it can be said that ressentiment is the outworking of this ethics.

Ressentiment goes beyond resentment and envy, in the fact that it is active and not passive. As Schlossberg so aptly puts it:

Ressentiment begins with perceived injury that may have a basis in fact, but more often is occasioned by envy for the possessions or the qualities possessed by another person. If the perception is not either sublimated or assuaged by the doing of some injury to the object of the feeling, the result is a persistent mental condition, stemming from the repression of emotions that are not acceptable when openly expressed. The result is hatred and the impulse to spite and to say things that detract from the other’s worth. One of the most common secret elements to be repressed is Schadenfreude, the rejoicing at another person’s misfortune; vengeance is the principle manifestation of ressentiment.

Sound familiar? The liberal left is full of ressentiment talk, from punishing the evil rich corporations to those evil swastika bearing republicans. The current welfare system is based off of ressentiment as well.

Altruism, the counterfeit of Christian love, has its source in this poisonous brew of ressentiment. Altruism permits demeaning those who are successful or those deemed superior by using the mask of “caring for the poor.” This is not so in Christian love. Christian love helps the weak, the sick, the poor and the needy not because it values those attributes, but because it values the person. Altruism would use the needy as a foil to strike against the rich, and in the process dehumanize the needy, and give their problems ontological worth.

The byproduct of giving poverty or need an ontological worth, by elevating it as a value above the objects of ressentiment (the rich), the humanist in effect keeps the poor and needy in a position where they will always be poor and needy, as seen in the modern “War on Poverty”, which has been waged for 3 generations and has only increased the number of people who depend on government subsidies.

Deep down, this humanism that drives the political left, this ressentiment that they hold (as well as many of the moderates and political right as well) , is the cause of the ghettos, the slums, the crime that exists. This thinking is nothing more than a pathology, derived from the worship of humanity, and results instead in the debasement of humanity.

What America and the world needs is a return to the values of Christian love, as exemplified by modern folks such as John M. Perkins. However, Christian love is impossible without the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit that comes through placing your trust in Jesus Christ as the savior for your sins. People need to repent of sin and selfishness and the idol of humanism and turn to Jesus to be free.