Do you believe in evil?

OPINION:

Do you believe evil exists?

Over the past several months, as you read countless stories about college students aligning with the butchery of Hamas, did you think you were witnessing something blatantly wrong? Did you know in your heart that you were watching something beyond the pale, something that was just bad, something that was evil?

These past few days, as you’ve been bombarded by our nation’s celebration of the seventh deadly sin of “pride” and our denial of biology, our denial of genetics, our denial of science, and our denial of self-restraint. Have you felt a sense of discomfort, that something was terribly wrong?

This week, when you looked into the eyes of the 20-year-old woman on Instagram dressed like a cat, boasting about her reasons for leaving Christianity, did you feel as if you were staring into the eyes of something that just wasn’t right?

When you watched a young man shout “We are God!” at a march for abortion rights, what did you think?

When a young woman at the same rally looked into the camera and said, “I love killing babies. I love it. I’ve had [dozens of abortions], and I’m going to have more,” what did your conscience tell you?

Did your blood run cold, and were you nearly speechless when you watched what our country has become?

Did something well up inside you? Did a voice within scream: “What is wrong with us? What is this world coming to? Somebody, please do something! Moral neutrality be damned. This insanity must stop!”

What is your reaction to all of this? Have you bought the lie that there is no such thing as right or wrong and that it doesn’t matter what you believe as long as it works for you? Or, in the face of this insanity, does your heart cry out that something is desperately off-kilter? What does your gut tell you?

Do you think our cultural elites in Hollywood and Washington have it right? Do you believe that all is well, that we are on the “right side of history,” and that the progress marches boldly in a positive direction? Do you think we are on the verge of utopia — that we have the goodness within ourselves to develop our own systems of morality — that we don’t need the boundaries or restrictions of any absolute standards — that we can have liberty without the limits of the laws of nature and nature’s God?

Or, in the shadow of all this, is your conscience telling you that there is an objective difference between good and bad, that right and wrong exist, that morality and immorality, vice and virtue have immutable definitions, that the human heart has the propensity to choose poorly, and that the most empirically proven fact in all of human history is the very existence of sin and that evil is real?

The irony is that if your answer is yes, you have more hope than those who say no. If you acknowledge that an absolute wrong exists, you must acknowledge that there is an absolute right. For there to be badness, there must be an objective goodness to serve as its measure. As the sages of the ages, from Aristotle to Augustine, have taught us over and over again: The only measuring rod of evil is the unchanging and immutable standard of good.

Wouldn’t it be meaningless to protest injustice if there is no judge? Common sense tells us that the scale must be something beyond the thing being weighed. In other words, without a lawgiver bigger than you and me and our wants, desires, opinions and passions, how would any of us know what is fair or unfair, good or bad?

Think about it. If you and I are the final measure of right or wrong, then we cannot evaluate the morality of any action at any time for any reason. The logical end of such narcissism can be only a futile nihilism that we now see in the ever-increasing tribalism so pervasive in social media and our daily news feeds.

So, I ask again, as you watch the “absolute badness” of adults grooming children, the misogyny of men pretending to be women, and the blatant injustice of college students marching with those who justify the beheading of Jewish babies, do you believe in evil?

If your heart’s cry is yes, then take courage. The absolute goodness you just implicitly embraced is God, the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the Creator of all things, the savior of mankind, and the judge at the end of days. He is our only hope and salvation.

• Everett Piper (dreverettpiper.com, @dreverettpiper), a columnist for The Washington Times, is a former university president and radio host.