“For some of us, Cynicism is sapping us.
Cynicism is a prejudice against Good.
Cynicism profiles Goodness.
If Goodness or Joy walks into the store, Cynicism follows it—cause it doesn’t trust it.
Cynicism stereotypes Joy.
Cynicism is an all or nothing thing.
Either everything is beautiful or nothing is.
Cynicism: either everything goes well or nothing does.
Cynicism means that you trust darkness, but you don’t trust light.
You trust brokenness, but you don’t trust healing.
You trust that there are zombies. That it’s a metaphor for something in life, and life is a mess, and dark and broken and mangled.
You trust that.
But if true Wholesomeness were to stand right in front of you, the real thing—the real thing that you long for—stood right in front of you, you’d dismiss it. Because Cynicism gets to the point where you can never embrace Joy.
You can never embrace Goodness. You can never embrace a good thing, because it just might be an illusion. It just might deceive you. It might be tricksy. It might trick you, so you can’t trust anything.
Now here’s the thing, Cynicism can help you for a while. But it just can’t get you through anything. Because any remedy that would ever come you way, you’re going to doubt it. Because the one thing in life that you trust is your Doubt.
Cynicism doesn’t know how to stand, feisty with hope, staring at a tomb.”
Zack Eswine
The Greatness of an Ordinary Hope
Seven Rivers Presbyterian Church Podcast (7/11/2017)
Quote found at 25:15-28:36.