The Sirens’ Call
The year 2025 is beginning to be a turbulent ride upending our lives as we knew it. The earth and humanity are facing critical times. People are going nuts. They are experiencing confusion and not knowing how to survive through constant disruptions and chaos coming out of the Trump administration. How do we make a sense of it all? How are we going to make it for the next four years?
The Odyssey is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems along with the Iliad attributed to Homer.
The Odyssey is the story of Odysseus, king of Ithaca and a Trojan War hero. He has been absent from his home for the past 20 years: the first ten spent at war in Troy, and the second ten spent at sea trying to get home. However, Odysseus runs into countless obstacles along his journey that delay his attempt to return home to Ithaca.
One of his formidable challenges comes when Odysseus and his crew encounter Sirens in the sea who lures sailors on ships with their alluring Sirens’ song to cliffs and rocks to their death. To save his crew’s lives, Odysseus instructs his sailors to plug their ears with beeswax to prevent them from hearing the Sirens’ song and himself ordering them to steer towards the Sirens’ song. Odysseus straps his body to the mast of the ship in an effort to be able to listen to the song of the Sirens without steering the ship toward destruction.
Homer ‘s Sirens’ call in The Odyssey is an apt metaphor of what’s happening in our current landscape. There are many noises and distractions out there trying to grab our attention. Social media today is the modern-day equivalent of the “Sirens’ call” that is leading us astray. Without proper fact checking in place, these media platforms owned by billionaires are spewing out like firehose every day filled with misinformation, disinformation, and bad information monetizing our attention using AI algorithms.
Truth is precious. And it’s hard to find these days. People with good information make good decisions. People with bad information make bad decisions. Inundation of bad information in the public sphere is sewing chaos and is leading us toward our own downfall.
Jesus warned us in Matthew 7:13-14, “Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the road is easy that leads to destruction, and there are many who take it. For the gate is narrow and the road is hard that leads to life, and there are few who find it.”
This is where the metaphor of putting beeswax in our ears to avoid hearing the Sirens’ call is a good start toward recovering our sanity and redirecting our attention to Christ who speaks the truth that leads to life. Here are few suggestions:
· Fasting from mass media or modest consumption
· Spending time in nature or gardening
· Get a goodnight sleep, eat healthy diet, and exercise
· Spend quality time with people who nourish you
· Volunteer for service in your local community
· Quiet time for prayer, meditation, devotional reading, journaling, or curl up with your favorite book (The loudest voice in your head is not always the right voice. Often it is the “quiet small voice” that we can only hear when we are quiet with ourselves.)
Turn your eyes upon Jesus,
Look full in His wonderful face,
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim,
In the light of His glory and grace.
John