WHAT HAS OUR WORLD COME TO?

HERE'S WHAT HAPPENED TODAY. I WENT TO A MOVIE.

SOUNDS INNOCENT ENOUGH...........


I know we live in a new, violent time. You watch people being shot or mowed down almost weekly now. You silently say, 'Thank God it didn't happen to me. You go to bed thinking you're OK.'

And then you go to a movie in a public theatre.

The lights go out and the previews start. Suddenly something on your right catches your eye. It's a man with white hair who seems to be walking drunk. He stands right the middle of the aisle for a long time, and then he takes a seat on the aisle. He starts to fidget. He leaves a package on the seat and then walks all the way across the front of the screen and leaves.

The movie starts. I cannot pay any attention to it. Is that a bomb in the seat? Why did he leave? Is he coming back? Wait. There he is coming from the the side of the theatre. He's back. Maybe it wasn't a bomb. 

I try to watch the movie, but I can't. I keep watching him nervously squirm in his seat.

I turn around because I hear a noise behind me. I realize I hadn't checked out the people behind me. I sink low in my seat so my head is not a visible target. I think to myself, 'My God, is this what my life has come to?'

I start to get involved in the movie.

But then, I see a small red light near the screen. Uh oh. Is that a laser beam from a high-powered rifle? I watch it go behind the curtain and then appear again. It was an usher.

I thought about just getting up and going home and never going to a movie theatre again, considering what the nightly news has done to my brain.

I took and breath and watched the movie. I made it out alive. Is it worth the anxiety anymore?