I came across a presentation by Hans Rosling for Technology, Entertainment and Design Talks that named some of the basic components for cultural stability and development. Two significant foundational needs he names are education and health.

The issues of health and wholeness are defining of cultural stability or the lack of it. Evident in the dialogue of our time, there is a major shift regarding those areas and their perceived purpose.

Let me illustrate this change with the situation at Penn State, where people in power knew and permitted the sexual violence against children to continue. The role of the effort or the reason for the institution is in danger of being lost in our cultural understanding. The significance has shifted to the institution or organization as a entity to be protected and preserved, to the loss of importance of the persons serviced by such a provider.

Does the school exist to instruct, inform, equip and culture young people?

Or is there a precarious twist, causing people to believe the school exists for the school or its staff, not the children or the community in which they live?

The needs of the masses are in danger of becoming secondary; building and financing the institution or the system is top priority.

Interestingly, this is a long-term concern for faith organizations, too. Education and health systems are vital for the well-being of the people served. Those institutions cannot be seen as more important than the persons who need them.