‘A puzzling paradox confronts observers of modern society. We are witnesses to a dramatic expansion of market-based economies whose capacity for wealth generation is awesome in comparison to both the distant and the recent past. At the same time, there is a growing perception of substantial threats to the health and well-being of today's children and youth in the very societies that benefit most from this abundance.’ (Keating and Hertzman, 1999)
Fascinating - we have always assumed "richer = better (health indicator wise)". To some degree that seems to be true, but we are now seeing rich societies getting richer, while their "well-being indicators" (in areas such as mental, physical and social health) either stabilise or drop. It appears that the consumerisation, capitalisation, globalisation, post-modernisation, whatever-nisation of our society is taking its toll in ways we never expected.
That leaves a challenge for all of us involved in God's global mission - those of us ministering in these contexts have to develop a new model of health and well-being, with which we engage the modern (or post-modern) epidemics. Just as we cannot ignore the diseases of the developing world, we cannot ignore the diseases of the modern world.
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