I went to church last Sun­day as every Christian is supposed to do unless something out of the ordi­nary makes it impossible. I am therefore putting on my preacher’s cap this week to draw attention to some social issues that has to be addressed for our moral well being as a country.

Failure to do this has the potential to not only throw the future of our youth into confusion but also to trans­form the future of our coun­try from a peaceful nation into a crime infested one.

The scripture that the Pastor quoted in preach­ing to us was Luke Chapter 17:32 “Remember Lot’s wife”. This scripture pri­marily cautions against disobedience and therefore indiscipline which is a char­acteristic of failed states or third world countries.

Any nation that wants to develop at a fast pace must deal with indiscipline hence my decision to talk about remembering Lot’s wife who out of disobedience suffered the consequences and be­came a pillar of salt.

The news currently going around on the airwaves is about a student from one of the Class A schools in the country who has found himself on the wrong side of the law. Students have been known to indulge in pranks and it is one of the characteristics of youthful exuberance but to fake your own kidnapping is at another level.

If an SHS student can conceive such an idea to defraud the parents, I dread to imagine what he would be capable of when he gets to the University. Clearly he is either a very bad young man or he has been influenced by colleagues.

It is also possible that he has been influenced by mov­ies which are screened on various TV at various media stations, especially foreign movies which portrays gang activities of kidnappings etc.

A concerted effort must be made by various stake­holders to address this er­rant behaviour of the youth otherwise we are headed for trouble as a nation.

Greediness and selfish­ness for some time now have characterised our social fibre and is gradually assum­ing monstrous proportions. Most Ghanaians have thrown values such as honesty out the window.

If you doubt it, just con­duct a simple test by leaving your purse on your seat in a church. Then come back after church a little later for it and see if you would still find it where you placed it.

It would have been long gone as if it developed legs and decided to just walk out of the church audito­rium. We have developed a penchant for gossip and people are on social media searching for the latest juicy gossip about celebrities.

Young Christians have lost appetite for the word of God and are not studying it like the older generation used to do. Instead of remembering Lot’s wife and the lessons the consequences of her ac­tions offers, they just don’t care.

Young people disobey authority with pleasure. They view their parents who try to guide them along the narrow path as monsters with dictatorial tendencies who are trampling on their human rights.

They therefore lack the discipline required to sustain their jobs at the workplace and easily get fired. On the nation building front instead of people in the country also realising that they are part of the problem, they hyp­ocritically point fingers at the few politicians and gloss over the dumping of refuse in drains, demanding bribes from people at the office, facilitation of cheating in exams, facilitation of smug­gling of cocoa among others across our borders etc.

Until we recognise that we are part of the problem and that at the individual level we need a mindset change, our national devel­opment agenda will suffer.

By Laud Kissi-Mensah