It's Wednesday, March 3rd, 2023.

I'm Albert Moller, and this is The Briefing, a daily analysis of news and events from

a Christian worldview.

America is experiencing what the Surgeon General calls an epidemic of loneliness, and

the nation's top public health officer went on to say that this epidemic has been heightened

certainly by the experience of COVID-19, but it's actually a longer-range problem that

is bringing devastating health consequences.

The Surgeon General tried to point to this epidemic, describing it in terms as akin to

other public health threats, and Surgeon General Vivek Murthy went on to release a massive

report documenting just how increasingly lonely Americans are.

Now as you look at this report, you understand this is a big problem, and you look at this

in recognition that what is attempted here is a quantification of something we all basically

know we sense is happening, but now you've got all kinds of documentation with federal

health authorities reporting all kinds of statistics about how much less time Americans

are spending with friends, how much less time American family members are spending

with family, how much less time Americans are spending going to church working in the

neighborhood, and here's where Christians need to understand all of this is incredibly

predictable.

As a matter of fact, what we're looking at here is something that a secular state, in this

case a secular government simply can't confront on honest terms, because what we are seeing

here is what is inevitable once some massive processes of reshaping the culture are set loose.

And we as Christians should be first of all heartbroken about this.

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