To me, something like the following is signified through this verse: the unlimited [divine] nature cannot be accurately contained by a name; rather, every capacity for concepts and every form of words and names, even if they seem to contain something great and befitting God's glory, are unable to grasp his reality. But starting from certain traces and sparks, as it were, our words aim at the unknown, and from what we can grasp we make conjectures by a kind of analogy about the ungraspable. Whatever name we may adopt to signify the perfume of divinity, it is not the perfume itself which we signify by our expressions.; rather, we reveal just the slightest trace of the divine odor by means of our theological terms. As in the case of jars from which perfume has been poured out, the perfume's own nature is not known. But from the slight traces left from the vapors in the jar, we get some idea about the perfume that has been emptied out. Hence, we learn that the perfume of divinity, whatever it is in its essence, transcends every name and thought. However, the wonders visible in the universe give material for the theological terms by which we call God wise, powerful, good, holy, blessed, eternal, judge, savior, and so forth. All these give some indication of the divine perfume's quality. Creation retains the traces of this divine perfume through its visible wonders as in the example of a perfume jar.
- First Homily on the Song of Songs
We should not proceed without considering why the king does not use gold as his ornament but images of gold; and not silver, but studs impressed from this material in the likeness of silver. We understand this as follows: every teaching concerning the ineffable nature of God, even if it seems to reveal the best and highest possible understanding, is the likeness of gold, not gold itself, for the good transcending the human mind cannot be accurately presented. Even if someone like St Paul was initiated into the ineffable mysteries of paradise and heard words not to be spoken, any understanding of God remains unutterable. Paul himself says that such conceptions are ineffable. Those persons, therefore, who offer us any good thoughts about these mysteries, are unable to state anything regarding the divine nature. Rather, they speak of the splendor of God's glory, the stamp of his Nature, the form of God, the Word in the beginning, the Word being God. All these expressions seem to us who have not seen the divine nature as gold from that treasure. But for those capable of looking on the truth, they are likenesses of gold and not gold shining in the delicate studs of silver. Silver is the meaning of these words as scripture says: "The tongue of the just is a fire-tried silver." [Prov 10:20]
The revelation presented here says that the divine nature transcends every conception which tries to grasp it. Our understanding of the divine nature resembles what we seek. It does not show its form, which no one has seen or can see, but through a mirror and a riddle it provides a reflection of the thing sought, that is, a reflection present in the soul by a certain likeness. Every word signifying these conceptions is like a point lacking extension since it cannot show what is present in the mind. Thus every thought of ours falls short of the comprehension of God. Every word which tries to explain God seems to be a little dot incapable of being coextensive with the breadth of the conception. Thus the soul led through such conceptions to comprehend what cannot be laid hold of except by faith must establish in itself a nature transcending every intelligence.
- Third Homily on the Song of Songs
Saturday, December 27, 2008
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Last Things
While I have generally resisted the tide of growing pessimism that has been reflected in various corners of blog-world regarding the state of our society, I think it's safe to say that, when the normally-sanguine Richard John Neuhaus starts openly discussing Kulturkampf, then things are very bad indeed.
For myself, I think Cardinal Stafford's recent remarks at CUA are a comprehensive summary of why we as a society have lost our way, and why there very well may be no return. I recommend reading the entirety of his remarks, and reflecting on them in conjunction with the close of the liturgical year.
For myself, I think Cardinal Stafford's recent remarks at CUA are a comprehensive summary of why we as a society have lost our way, and why there very well may be no return. I recommend reading the entirety of his remarks, and reflecting on them in conjunction with the close of the liturgical year.
Friday, October 3, 2008
Family Life and Asceticism
"Cooper identifies two developments that dramatically reshaped how individuals in the Western Empire understood family and household as social institutions. The first, a frequently mentioned argument that reaches back to Gibbon, is that the Christian regard for asceticism (and especially sexual continence) deterred Romans from marrying and creating households, thus weakening the institutional cornerstone of the classical civic sphere. Here, Cooper deftly analyzes a persistent cultural debate among Christians to show that, while the vast majority of lay and clerical writers did recognize the potential tension between asceticism and marriage, many also attempted to reconcile the two by classifying family life as a second-tier form of asceticism. The second development, which has been less studied by previous scholars, is the emerging theological perception of marriage as an eternal bond: not simply a relationship that ideally should not be ended, but a spiritual union that could not be dissolved. Cooper argues that these two developments contributed to a distinctly Christian vision of marriage as the creation of a new family unit founded on a unique conjugal bond rather than as the manifestation of a reproductive contract between two families"
From a fascinating book review of a scholarly work on the emergence of the Christian family in the late Roman empire.
From a fascinating book review of a scholarly work on the emergence of the Christian family in the late Roman empire.
Reading Images In Depth
"Until well into the 20th century, when artists began to despair about the possibilities of communicating through language of any kind, a painting, whether a portrait or the depiction of a scene, whether religious, allegorical, historical or private, was meant to be read. This was an essential feature of the aesthetic act: the possibility of communication, through a shared vocabulary, between the viewpoint of the artist and the viewpoint of the audience.
A picture could be venerated for its craft or its matter, but beyond veneration was the promise of something to be learned, or at least recognised. As early as the 6th century, Pope Gregory the Great had declared: "It is one thing to worship a picture, it is another to learn in depth by means of pictures, a venerable story. For that which writing makes present to the reader, pictures make present to those who cannot read, to those who only perceive visually. Especially for the common folk, pictures are the equivalent of reading."
Taking away the hierarchical tone of the pope's statement, it is obviously quite true that pictures tell stories. But paradoxically, in our time, when images are once again given priority over the written word, when advertising and the electronic media have privileged the image because it can, we are told, deliver information instantaneously and does not even require time for reflection, we lack the shared iconographic vocabulary to read it."
- Alberto Manguel, from a lecture given at Tate Britain.
I originally heard this idea from a lecture given by Manguel on the Big Ideas program, which has an audio podcast I listen to occasionally, and which I highly recommend. His lecture was on Picasso and the sad duality of his art and his life. The most interesting aspect of the lecture was the unintentional way in which Manguel reveals Picasso's work to be an aesthetic disaster. While admiring Picasso's craft and the breadth of his vision, Manguel hints at the abyss that lies at the center of the modern aesthetic. If images are fundamentally a representation of the Self, if the poetic vision of the artist is the controlling dynamic of artistic representation, then what is to prevent the neuroses of a Picasso from being a valid basis for art? The contemporary art world has responded to this question with an answer of "nothing". Art is purely self-representation. The created order is simply matter to be manipulated for the purposes of self-expression. The duality of Picasso that Manguel finds so perplexing is simply a product of his aesthetic assumptions, and one can walk around any art gallery today and find his aesthetic children working out the dynamics of those assumptions, see Wenda Gu et al.
Most "conservative" art critics react strongly to the artistic dissolution that is the natural outworking of the modern aesthetic, but often struggle to locate the precise source of the disorder rampant in contemporary art. Roger Kimball published an essay in First Things this summer that comes the closest to diagnosing the problem, but he seems uneasy with the natural conclusions that follow from the problems he identifies. Although his entire essay points to it, Kimball fails to explicitly draw the fundamental conclusion that his essay points to - namely that all true art is religious art, at least in its most basic dimension.
Aesthetics is the study of the Beautiful, and by extension the True and the Good. Only insofar as a work of art attempts to represent the Good does it succeed aesthetically. Such a statement would be relatively trite and uncontroversial, were it not for the fact that there is a critical question that remains unanswered by such a statement - how are we to gain knowledge of the Good? The answer to this question is where I believe many conservative art critics such as Roger Kimball go wrong. While agreeing that good art should represent the Good and the Beautiful, many artists remain bound by the notion that knowledge of the Good comes primarily through the Self. Hence, one often hears admiration of various Baroque, Romantic, and Renaissance masters because their work is supposedly more beautiful, but there is never any critical evaluation of their underlying aesthetic. Their works are reputed to be beautiful because I, the Self, think they are beautiful. They are beautiful because they appeal to my senses in some extraordinary way, because the Self is elevated to some higher plane of experience by these works. In such criticism, the dynamic of the Self, whether that of the artist or viewer, remains central to understanding and experiencing the art. While I can find agreement with such views in admiring the artistic values of such non-contemporary styles, I find them to be ultimately unsatisfying. The underlying aesthetic error in this approach is never addressed, and its intimate relation to modern artistic nihilism is never fully examined.
There is of course, another answer to the question of how one can know the Good - namely, that knowledge of the Good comes only from knowledge of the Sacred. Manguel's quote from Gregory the Great highlights this - true art tells a venerable story. Interestingly, Manguel's focus is on the narrative aspect of Gregory's statement, as if Pope Gregory were emphasizing the word "story" in the quote. I would argue, however, that were Gregory here, his real emphasis would be on the word "venerable." Art only succeeds insofar as it gives us some knowledge of the sacred order of the world. The ability to read images in depth, as Manguel exhorts us to do, can only succeed insofar as those images reflect the true Image through which the created order was made. When the study of the image becomes the study of the Self, there will only be the inevitability of non-existence. Theologians remind us that there is only One Being that does not draw its existence from another, and that any being which ceases from dependence on this One Being will immediately become nothingness. So also the world of art and images. When images cease to draw their existence from the true Image, only the abyss will remain. Picasso's tragedy was not the duality of his life and his art. Rather, the duality existed because of the deeper tragedy of his aesthetic non-existence.
A picture could be venerated for its craft or its matter, but beyond veneration was the promise of something to be learned, or at least recognised. As early as the 6th century, Pope Gregory the Great had declared: "It is one thing to worship a picture, it is another to learn in depth by means of pictures, a venerable story. For that which writing makes present to the reader, pictures make present to those who cannot read, to those who only perceive visually. Especially for the common folk, pictures are the equivalent of reading."
Taking away the hierarchical tone of the pope's statement, it is obviously quite true that pictures tell stories. But paradoxically, in our time, when images are once again given priority over the written word, when advertising and the electronic media have privileged the image because it can, we are told, deliver information instantaneously and does not even require time for reflection, we lack the shared iconographic vocabulary to read it."
- Alberto Manguel, from a lecture given at Tate Britain.
I originally heard this idea from a lecture given by Manguel on the Big Ideas program, which has an audio podcast I listen to occasionally, and which I highly recommend. His lecture was on Picasso and the sad duality of his art and his life. The most interesting aspect of the lecture was the unintentional way in which Manguel reveals Picasso's work to be an aesthetic disaster. While admiring Picasso's craft and the breadth of his vision, Manguel hints at the abyss that lies at the center of the modern aesthetic. If images are fundamentally a representation of the Self, if the poetic vision of the artist is the controlling dynamic of artistic representation, then what is to prevent the neuroses of a Picasso from being a valid basis for art? The contemporary art world has responded to this question with an answer of "nothing". Art is purely self-representation. The created order is simply matter to be manipulated for the purposes of self-expression. The duality of Picasso that Manguel finds so perplexing is simply a product of his aesthetic assumptions, and one can walk around any art gallery today and find his aesthetic children working out the dynamics of those assumptions, see Wenda Gu et al.
Most "conservative" art critics react strongly to the artistic dissolution that is the natural outworking of the modern aesthetic, but often struggle to locate the precise source of the disorder rampant in contemporary art. Roger Kimball published an essay in First Things this summer that comes the closest to diagnosing the problem, but he seems uneasy with the natural conclusions that follow from the problems he identifies. Although his entire essay points to it, Kimball fails to explicitly draw the fundamental conclusion that his essay points to - namely that all true art is religious art, at least in its most basic dimension.
Aesthetics is the study of the Beautiful, and by extension the True and the Good. Only insofar as a work of art attempts to represent the Good does it succeed aesthetically. Such a statement would be relatively trite and uncontroversial, were it not for the fact that there is a critical question that remains unanswered by such a statement - how are we to gain knowledge of the Good? The answer to this question is where I believe many conservative art critics such as Roger Kimball go wrong. While agreeing that good art should represent the Good and the Beautiful, many artists remain bound by the notion that knowledge of the Good comes primarily through the Self. Hence, one often hears admiration of various Baroque, Romantic, and Renaissance masters because their work is supposedly more beautiful, but there is never any critical evaluation of their underlying aesthetic. Their works are reputed to be beautiful because I, the Self, think they are beautiful. They are beautiful because they appeal to my senses in some extraordinary way, because the Self is elevated to some higher plane of experience by these works. In such criticism, the dynamic of the Self, whether that of the artist or viewer, remains central to understanding and experiencing the art. While I can find agreement with such views in admiring the artistic values of such non-contemporary styles, I find them to be ultimately unsatisfying. The underlying aesthetic error in this approach is never addressed, and its intimate relation to modern artistic nihilism is never fully examined.
There is of course, another answer to the question of how one can know the Good - namely, that knowledge of the Good comes only from knowledge of the Sacred. Manguel's quote from Gregory the Great highlights this - true art tells a venerable story. Interestingly, Manguel's focus is on the narrative aspect of Gregory's statement, as if Pope Gregory were emphasizing the word "story" in the quote. I would argue, however, that were Gregory here, his real emphasis would be on the word "venerable." Art only succeeds insofar as it gives us some knowledge of the sacred order of the world. The ability to read images in depth, as Manguel exhorts us to do, can only succeed insofar as those images reflect the true Image through which the created order was made. When the study of the image becomes the study of the Self, there will only be the inevitability of non-existence. Theologians remind us that there is only One Being that does not draw its existence from another, and that any being which ceases from dependence on this One Being will immediately become nothingness. So also the world of art and images. When images cease to draw their existence from the true Image, only the abyss will remain. Picasso's tragedy was not the duality of his life and his art. Rather, the duality existed because of the deeper tragedy of his aesthetic non-existence.
Saturday, September 13, 2008
Regio Dissimilitudinis
" For Benedict, the words of the Psalm: coram angelis psallam Tibi, Domine – in the presence of the angels, I will sing your praise (cf. 138:1) – are the decisive rule governing the prayer and chant of the monks. What this expresses is the awareness that in communal prayer one is singing in the presence of the entire heavenly court, and is thereby measured according to the very highest standards: that one is praying and singing in such a way as to harmonize with the music of the noble spirits who were considered the originators of the harmony of the cosmos, the music of the spheres. From this perspective one can understand the seriousness of a remark by Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, who used an expression from the Platonic tradition handed down by Augustine, to pass judgement on the poor singing of monks, which for him was evidently very far from being a mishap of only minor importance. He describes the confusion resulting from a poorly executed chant as a falling into the “zone of dissimilarity” – the regio dissimilitudinis. Augustine had borrowed this phrase from Platonic philosophy, in order to designate his condition prior to conversion (cf. Confessions, VII, 10.16): man, who is created in God’s likeness, falls in his godforsakenness into the “zone of dissimilarity” – into a remoteness from God, in which he no longer reflects him, and so has become dissimilar not only to God, but to himself, to what being human truly is. Bernard is certainly putting it strongly when he uses this phrase, which indicates man’s falling away from himself, to describe bad singing by monks. But it shows how seriously he viewed the matter. It shows that the culture of singing is also the culture of being, and that the monks have to pray and sing in a manner commensurate with the grandeur of the word handed down to them, with its claim on true beauty. This intrinsic requirement of speaking with God and singing of him with words he himself has given, is what gave rise to the great tradition of Western music. It was not a form of private “creativity”, in which the individual leaves a memorial to himself and makes self-representation his essential criterion. Rather it is about vigilantly recognizing with the “ears of the heart” the inner laws of the music of creation, the archetypes of music that the Creator built into his world and into men, and thus discovering music that is worthy of God, and at the same time truly worthy of man, music whose worthiness resounds in purity."
From "The Origins of Western Theology and the Roots of European Culture," address to Representatives from the World of Culture, Sep 12, 2008
Go read the whole thing. And then get on your knees and thank God for Pope Benedict.
One of the reasons I have a deep fondness for Benedict's work is that he consistently transcends the disorders and schizophrenia that are rampant in the modern Church. His discussion here of liturgical music is a perfect example of this phenomena. In the modern Church, the topic of liturgical music is a common battleground for intelligent Catholics who take the Church seriously. On the one side, you have the "liberals" who see liturgical music as yet another religious form that must be updated to conform with the vagaries of modern culture. Hence the provenance of the liturgical crimes of Marty Haugen. On the other side, one has the conservatives, who insist that the Mass must be accompanied by beautiful music. They happily attend liturgies with chamber symphonies that perform classical German masses from the 18th and 19th century, or Renaissance polyphony, or some other brand of classical music.
In the midst of the logorrhea over that state of liturgical music in America, a crucial fact often gets overlooked: the liberal and conservative approaches to liturgical music are opposite sides of the same coin, and both represent a distorted view of the function of music within liturgy. A Schubert mass is no less of a distortion, liturgically speaking, than a work from David Haas' corpus. For both parties, music is seen as an accompaniment to the mass, as if it served an analogous function to a film score. For both camps, the primary reference for determining the suitability of a given piece of music is the Self. Whatever musical style is deemed most beautiful by the Self is therefore deemed to be most suitable for the liturgy. To see this phenomena for yourself, go into the conservative Catholic webforum of your choice and pose the question "what's so bad about Marty Haugen music?" I'm willing to wager that the overwhelming number of responses will be something along the lines of "I don't think his music is very pretty, and we should have pretty music at Mass." Thus, the Self triumphs over all.
I think Benedict's brief remarks listed above show a way out of this mess. As Benedict makes clear, true liturgical music serves a theological purpose and is tied to the order of creation and the nature of the human person. Reclaiming Western liturgy is a much deeper project than simply ordering up a handful of talented singers to sing pretty music during Mass.
From "The Origins of Western Theology and the Roots of European Culture," address to Representatives from the World of Culture, Sep 12, 2008
Go read the whole thing. And then get on your knees and thank God for Pope Benedict.
One of the reasons I have a deep fondness for Benedict's work is that he consistently transcends the disorders and schizophrenia that are rampant in the modern Church. His discussion here of liturgical music is a perfect example of this phenomena. In the modern Church, the topic of liturgical music is a common battleground for intelligent Catholics who take the Church seriously. On the one side, you have the "liberals" who see liturgical music as yet another religious form that must be updated to conform with the vagaries of modern culture. Hence the provenance of the liturgical crimes of Marty Haugen. On the other side, one has the conservatives, who insist that the Mass must be accompanied by beautiful music. They happily attend liturgies with chamber symphonies that perform classical German masses from the 18th and 19th century, or Renaissance polyphony, or some other brand of classical music.
In the midst of the logorrhea over that state of liturgical music in America, a crucial fact often gets overlooked: the liberal and conservative approaches to liturgical music are opposite sides of the same coin, and both represent a distorted view of the function of music within liturgy. A Schubert mass is no less of a distortion, liturgically speaking, than a work from David Haas' corpus. For both parties, music is seen as an accompaniment to the mass, as if it served an analogous function to a film score. For both camps, the primary reference for determining the suitability of a given piece of music is the Self. Whatever musical style is deemed most beautiful by the Self is therefore deemed to be most suitable for the liturgy. To see this phenomena for yourself, go into the conservative Catholic webforum of your choice and pose the question "what's so bad about Marty Haugen music?" I'm willing to wager that the overwhelming number of responses will be something along the lines of "I don't think his music is very pretty, and we should have pretty music at Mass." Thus, the Self triumphs over all.
I think Benedict's brief remarks listed above show a way out of this mess. As Benedict makes clear, true liturgical music serves a theological purpose and is tied to the order of creation and the nature of the human person. Reclaiming Western liturgy is a much deeper project than simply ordering up a handful of talented singers to sing pretty music during Mass.
Friday, August 22, 2008
Cell phones, sentimentality, and the decline of public space
Brilliant essay by Jonathan Franzen. Though he takes a predictable turn towards the psychological, there are some interesting insights into the negative ways in which modern gadgets shape our society.
Sunday, August 17, 2008
Germain Grisez, Contraception and Natural Law
I am still working my way through the conclusion of this book, but so far I can not recommend it highly enough. Any contemporary Catholic who is interested in the ethical underpinnings of the Church's teaching on contraception should familiarize themselves with Grisez's arguments. For myself, Grisez's thesis has tied together a number of philosophical problems which have been nagging me for some time now. The chief difficulty among said problems is my perception that, in the popular Catholic mind at least, the Church's teaching on the intrinsic immorality of contraception has split itself into a seemingly irresolvable dialectic. On the one hand, there are proponents of what I would call a "scientific" natural law theory, who oppose contraception on the grounds that "contraception is immoral because it frustrates the natural purpose of the act." Underlying this theory is a certain version of natural law which assumes that natural law is the "scientific" search within a construct called "human nature" for a set of categorical moral norms ,the violation of which defines the limits of human action. On the other hand, there are those who, rejecting the scientific-natural law theory for various reasons, would propose what I call the psychological-therapeutic model. In this view, contraception is forbidden because non-contraceptive sex leads to the fullest state of emotional and personal well-being. Underlying this argument is the notion that ethical norms are most properly founded upon psychological principles.
The deficiencies of this dialectic have become more strongly apparent to me over the summer. On a theoretical level, my recent reading of Leo Strauss and Alasdair Macintyre has convinced me that the scientific model of natural law is fundamentally deficient, and incapable of rationally grounding a consistent ethic. Moreover, I think Philip Rieff shows why abandoning this model for a psychological-therapeutic model is even more disastrous and unsustainable. On a practical level, I seem to have recently had an inordinate number of encounters with people, both online in real life, who wrestle with one end or the other of this dialectic. One can see this in the wide range of sometimes-incompatible statements which get offered up in support of Church teaching. These statements span the ideological range from "this is how you have great Catholic orgasm" to "you can never prevent conception when it is possible," to discussion of a mythical "contraceptive mentality" which is somehow supposed to be the same thing as actual contraceptive acts.
(N.B. - For online examples of people who wrestle the scientific natural law view, check out the comments thread on the various contraception posts on Dr Liccione's blog, such as this recent example on this post. For online examples of the therapeutic model, you need only to spend a few minutes on this website, an unfortunate, if well-intended example of the problem)
From what I can tell so far, Grisez's work shows a way out of this dialectical mess. While I will not recapitulate his argument here, his book offers a fairly sound critique of both models, and proposes a theory more closely aligned with classical-Thomistic virtue ethics. By aligning the Church's teaching with the pursuit of fundamental human goods, I think Grisez escapes the problems in modern ethical theory highlighted by Macintyre and Strauss. Also, by rejecting the psychological model, the ghost of Philip Rieff can be effectively laid to rest in popular Catholic thought. On a practical level, many of the popular deficiencies offered up in support of Church teaching can be corrected by a careful reading of Grisez's argument. Contraception is not merely the fact of not having children. The traditional formulation of primary and secondary ends in marriage does not have to be interpreted as "really good" and "not as "good" or as "more important" and "less important." Maximizing family size is not a moral obligation which follows from the Church's anti-contraceptive stance. There are other examples one can think of, most of which I believe Grisez's argument effectively answers.
As a closing aside, I think that Grisez's approach offers the possibility of more fully integrating the the two modern documents most closely associated with Church teaching on contraception. Humanae Vitae (HV), lately lionized on the occasion of the anniversary of its release, tends to be popularly associated with the scientific natural law view. This explains its frequent citation by those of a more philosophic bent, as well as the endless quibbling which occurs over some its phrasings and their translation (e.g. the phrase "grave reasons"). However, I think a close reading of HV points towards the more classical virtue ethics proposed by Grisez, and explains its constant emphasis on the goods of human life and marriage, and its less explicit emphasis on the violation of moral obligation.
More interestingly, is the recent series of catechetical talks given by John Paul II, popularly referred to as the "Theology of the Body" (TOB), and which have enjoyed a popularity among the faithful, though typically in a more distilled and summarized form as exemplified by the work of Christopher West. I would argue that these talks have been misread in three fundamental ways: the first is by the theological academy, which is not so much of a mis-reading as a non-reading, whereby the content of JPII's message is dismissed as not consonant with the various structures of modern theology. The second misreading of TOB is by the traditionalist camp, whereby the persistent personalist language employed by JPII is taken as evidence that the content is nothing other than existentialist nattering, with the ghost of Heidegger given free reign over Church teaching. The third mis-reading tends to follow the psychological-therapeutic model I discussed above, and Christopher West's work is often the most prominent example of this mis-reading (though to his credit, West often shows a more perceptive reading of JPII, and the conflicts between this more perceptive reading and the popular therapeutic understanding are left unresolved.)
However, it is my belief that TOB can be read in a manner more closely tied to JPII's original intent. Such a reading would approach the talks on their own terms, namely as a catechesis explaining the true shape of the goods known through human relations. When seen in the light of a virtue ethics such as Macintyre's or Grisez's, where moral actions are the means by which human goods are freely realized within the community (i.e. Church), then the substance of TOB becomes yet another expression of that constant and unbroken ethic which the Church has proposed from Her founding. In such a reading, the constant reference to the origin of Creation found in TOB becomes a method for revealing the full and supernatural end towards which all human actions must be directed.
The deficiencies of this dialectic have become more strongly apparent to me over the summer. On a theoretical level, my recent reading of Leo Strauss and Alasdair Macintyre has convinced me that the scientific model of natural law is fundamentally deficient, and incapable of rationally grounding a consistent ethic. Moreover, I think Philip Rieff shows why abandoning this model for a psychological-therapeutic model is even more disastrous and unsustainable. On a practical level, I seem to have recently had an inordinate number of encounters with people, both online in real life, who wrestle with one end or the other of this dialectic. One can see this in the wide range of sometimes-incompatible statements which get offered up in support of Church teaching. These statements span the ideological range from "this is how you have great Catholic orgasm" to "you can never prevent conception when it is possible," to discussion of a mythical "contraceptive mentality" which is somehow supposed to be the same thing as actual contraceptive acts.
(N.B. - For online examples of people who wrestle the scientific natural law view, check out the comments thread on the various contraception posts on Dr Liccione's blog, such as this recent example on this post. For online examples of the therapeutic model, you need only to spend a few minutes on this website, an unfortunate, if well-intended example of the problem)
From what I can tell so far, Grisez's work shows a way out of this dialectical mess. While I will not recapitulate his argument here, his book offers a fairly sound critique of both models, and proposes a theory more closely aligned with classical-Thomistic virtue ethics. By aligning the Church's teaching with the pursuit of fundamental human goods, I think Grisez escapes the problems in modern ethical theory highlighted by Macintyre and Strauss. Also, by rejecting the psychological model, the ghost of Philip Rieff can be effectively laid to rest in popular Catholic thought. On a practical level, many of the popular deficiencies offered up in support of Church teaching can be corrected by a careful reading of Grisez's argument. Contraception is not merely the fact of not having children. The traditional formulation of primary and secondary ends in marriage does not have to be interpreted as "really good" and "not as "good" or as "more important" and "less important." Maximizing family size is not a moral obligation which follows from the Church's anti-contraceptive stance. There are other examples one can think of, most of which I believe Grisez's argument effectively answers.
As a closing aside, I think that Grisez's approach offers the possibility of more fully integrating the the two modern documents most closely associated with Church teaching on contraception. Humanae Vitae (HV), lately lionized on the occasion of the anniversary of its release, tends to be popularly associated with the scientific natural law view. This explains its frequent citation by those of a more philosophic bent, as well as the endless quibbling which occurs over some its phrasings and their translation (e.g. the phrase "grave reasons"). However, I think a close reading of HV points towards the more classical virtue ethics proposed by Grisez, and explains its constant emphasis on the goods of human life and marriage, and its less explicit emphasis on the violation of moral obligation.
More interestingly, is the recent series of catechetical talks given by John Paul II, popularly referred to as the "Theology of the Body" (TOB), and which have enjoyed a popularity among the faithful, though typically in a more distilled and summarized form as exemplified by the work of Christopher West. I would argue that these talks have been misread in three fundamental ways: the first is by the theological academy, which is not so much of a mis-reading as a non-reading, whereby the content of JPII's message is dismissed as not consonant with the various structures of modern theology. The second misreading of TOB is by the traditionalist camp, whereby the persistent personalist language employed by JPII is taken as evidence that the content is nothing other than existentialist nattering, with the ghost of Heidegger given free reign over Church teaching. The third mis-reading tends to follow the psychological-therapeutic model I discussed above, and Christopher West's work is often the most prominent example of this mis-reading (though to his credit, West often shows a more perceptive reading of JPII, and the conflicts between this more perceptive reading and the popular therapeutic understanding are left unresolved.)
However, it is my belief that TOB can be read in a manner more closely tied to JPII's original intent. Such a reading would approach the talks on their own terms, namely as a catechesis explaining the true shape of the goods known through human relations. When seen in the light of a virtue ethics such as Macintyre's or Grisez's, where moral actions are the means by which human goods are freely realized within the community (i.e. Church), then the substance of TOB becomes yet another expression of that constant and unbroken ethic which the Church has proposed from Her founding. In such a reading, the constant reference to the origin of Creation found in TOB becomes a method for revealing the full and supernatural end towards which all human actions must be directed.
Sunday, August 10, 2008
The Quotable Philip Rieff
Set into the context of Reich's attack on the family as the nucleus of all authoritative institutions, his repeated calls for a do-it-yourself adolescent sex education acquires political significance. Sex education becomes the main weapon in an ideological war against the family; its aim is to divest the parents of their moral authority. Reich ignores the facts of prolonged infancy and pedagogoic love. Indeed for him, sexual love is opposed to pedagogic love, the latter creative of authority, the former subversive of it. The first place in which equality must be achieved is in the family - thus destroying it. American children seem to me more than a little Reichian.
[...] By assuming that adolescence is actually the prime of life, Reich expressed his hatred of all doctrines of maturity, including the psychoanalytic version. There is something adolescent about the Reichian theory; for him all hope rests with the possibility of creating revolutionary children.[...] In fantasy, Reich led a children's crusade against all authority, including the authority of the proletariat. He turned social causality upside down: it as if only revolutionary children could breed a revolutionary regime. [...] With John Dewey, Wilhelm Reich is one of the great theorists of the child as the agent of social change.
-The Triumph of the Therapeutic, Chapter 7 - the Therapeutic as Martyr
[...] By assuming that adolescence is actually the prime of life, Reich expressed his hatred of all doctrines of maturity, including the psychoanalytic version. There is something adolescent about the Reichian theory; for him all hope rests with the possibility of creating revolutionary children.[...] In fantasy, Reich led a children's crusade against all authority, including the authority of the proletariat. He turned social causality upside down: it as if only revolutionary children could breed a revolutionary regime. [...] With John Dewey, Wilhelm Reich is one of the great theorists of the child as the agent of social change.
-The Triumph of the Therapeutic, Chapter 7 - the Therapeutic as Martyr
Friday, August 8, 2008
Solzhenitsyn 1918-2008
"It was only when I lay there on rotting prison straw that I sensed within myself the first stirrings of good. Gradually it was disclosed to me that the line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either, but right through every human heart, and through all human hearts. This line shifts. Inside us, it oscillates with the years. Even within hearts overwhelmed by evil, one small bridgehead of good is retained; and even in the best of all hearts, there remains a small corner of evil."
-The Gulag Archipelago
-The Gulag Archipelago
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
The Quotable Alasdair MacIntyre
"Friendship of course, on Aristotle's view, involves affection. But that affection arises within a relationship defined in terms of a common allegiance to and a common pursuit of goods. The affection is secondary, which is not in the least to say unimportant. In a modern perspective affection is often the central issue; our friends are said to be those whom we like, perhaps whom we like very much. 'Friendship' has become for the most part the name of a type of emotional state rather than a type of social and political relationship. E.M. Forster once remarked that if it came to a choice between betraying his country and betraying his friend, he hoped that he would have the courage to betray his country. In an Aristotelian perspective anyone who can formulate such a contrast has no country, has no polis; he is a citizen of nowhere, an internal exile wherever he lives. Indeed from an Aristotelian point of view a modern liberal political society can appear only as a collection of citizens of nowhere who have banded together for their common protection. They possess at best that inferior form of friendship which is founded on mutual advantage. That they lack the bond of friendship is of course bound up with the self-avowed moral pluralism of such liberal societies. They have abandoned the moral unity of Aristotelianism, whether in its ancient or medieval forms."
-Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue
-Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue
Friday, July 25, 2008
Shakespeare, Ideology, and the Catholic Church
Robert Miola has a devastating review of Joseph Pearce's The Quest for Shakespeare in the current issue of First Things. Miola says that Pearce's work suffers from two fatal flaws: firstly, Pearce's biographical account of Shakespeare appears to exhibit no real familiarity with the rudiments of modern Shakespeare scholarship. While I have no pretensions to Shakespearean historiography, this seems about right to me. I had seen lighter versions of Pearce's fundamental thesis pop up in various conservative Catholic media outlets previously, and I always thought it was a bit ridiculous. Despite my limited knowledge of Shakespeare and his place in English history, I could not quite fathom how one of the most overly-researched figures in English literature could lately be discovered as a Catholic.
The larger and more important criticism that Miola makes is to pose the question of why a recusant Shakespeare matters at all. Though Miola does not put it so forcefully, he seems to indicate that Pearce's work is primarily ideology masquerading as scholarship, noting with irony that Pearce himself decries such ideologically-driven scholarship when in the form of post-structuralist theory. In short, Miola argues that, in attempting to locate a Catholic Bard, Pearce operates within the same structural and methodological world as his ideological opponents.
If Miola is correct, then I would suggest that Pearce's work is representative of a larger trend within the world of conservative Catholicism, namely the tendency to express the faith within a neat framework of ideological concepts. Such ideology typically divides the world into opposing theological schemes, between which there can be little hope of reconciliation or even understanding. Needless to say, one of these schemes would be considered intrinsically orthodox, and the rest are to be thought of as essentially heretical. Google the phrase "save the liturgy, save the world" sometime, and you can see some excellent examples of what I refer to here.
I think this is trend is fundamentally destructive, and runs counter to the aims that most faithful Catholics hope to achieve within the Church. Conservative Catholics would do well to remember that a slavish commitment to ideology is part of what led to the current mess within the Church. A simple inversion of liberal ideology which masquerades under the label of orthodoxy will not solve any problems, and is likely only to perpetuate them in the long run. The Catholic "worldview" (if there is such a thing) is one that sees things for what they really are. Jesus Christ is the eternal Word that grounds all reality, and our call to conversion is a call to union with that Reality. Ideology, whether conservative or liberal, is a move away from what is real, towards our own self-constructed ideas, and must inevitably lead away from Christ Himself.
The larger and more important criticism that Miola makes is to pose the question of why a recusant Shakespeare matters at all. Though Miola does not put it so forcefully, he seems to indicate that Pearce's work is primarily ideology masquerading as scholarship, noting with irony that Pearce himself decries such ideologically-driven scholarship when in the form of post-structuralist theory. In short, Miola argues that, in attempting to locate a Catholic Bard, Pearce operates within the same structural and methodological world as his ideological opponents.
If Miola is correct, then I would suggest that Pearce's work is representative of a larger trend within the world of conservative Catholicism, namely the tendency to express the faith within a neat framework of ideological concepts. Such ideology typically divides the world into opposing theological schemes, between which there can be little hope of reconciliation or even understanding. Needless to say, one of these schemes would be considered intrinsically orthodox, and the rest are to be thought of as essentially heretical. Google the phrase "save the liturgy, save the world" sometime, and you can see some excellent examples of what I refer to here.
I think this is trend is fundamentally destructive, and runs counter to the aims that most faithful Catholics hope to achieve within the Church. Conservative Catholics would do well to remember that a slavish commitment to ideology is part of what led to the current mess within the Church. A simple inversion of liberal ideology which masquerades under the label of orthodoxy will not solve any problems, and is likely only to perpetuate them in the long run. The Catholic "worldview" (if there is such a thing) is one that sees things for what they really are. Jesus Christ is the eternal Word that grounds all reality, and our call to conversion is a call to union with that Reality. Ideology, whether conservative or liberal, is a move away from what is real, towards our own self-constructed ideas, and must inevitably lead away from Christ Himself.
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Alasdair MacIntyre and the RNC
The 2008 RNC is being held here in my hometown of St Paul, MN, and as the event gets closer, our local paper is filling up with daily news items about various protests that have been planned. I think of Alasdair MacIntyre whenever I see these stories:
"It is easy also to understand why protest becomes a distinctive moral feature of the modern age and why indignation is a predominant modern emotion. 'To protest' and its Latin predecessors and French cognates are originally as often or more often positive as negative; to protest was once to bear witness to something and only as a consequence of that allegiance to bear witness against something else."
"But protest is now almost entirely that negative phenomenon which characteristically occurs as a reaction to the alleged invasion of someone’s rights in the name of someone else’s utility. The self-assertive shrillness of protest arises because the facts of incommensurability ensure that protestors can never win an argument; the indignant self-righteousness arises because the facts of incommensurability ensure equally that the protestor can never lose an argument either. Hence the utterance of protest is characteristically addressed to those who already share the protestors’ premises. The effects of incommensurability ensure that the protestors rarely have anyone else to talk to but themselves. This is not to say that protest cannot be effective; it is to say that it cannot be rationally effective and that its dominant modes of expression give evidence of a certain perhaps unconscious awareness of this."
MacIntyre, After Virtue
Ironically enough, all these planned protests require a permit from the city, a nice bureaucratic-managerial touch which MacIntyre would likely appreciate for its absurd irony.
"It is easy also to understand why protest becomes a distinctive moral feature of the modern age and why indignation is a predominant modern emotion. 'To protest' and its Latin predecessors and French cognates are originally as often or more often positive as negative; to protest was once to bear witness to something and only as a consequence of that allegiance to bear witness against something else."
"But protest is now almost entirely that negative phenomenon which characteristically occurs as a reaction to the alleged invasion of someone’s rights in the name of someone else’s utility. The self-assertive shrillness of protest arises because the facts of incommensurability ensure that protestors can never win an argument; the indignant self-righteousness arises because the facts of incommensurability ensure equally that the protestor can never lose an argument either. Hence the utterance of protest is characteristically addressed to those who already share the protestors’ premises. The effects of incommensurability ensure that the protestors rarely have anyone else to talk to but themselves. This is not to say that protest cannot be effective; it is to say that it cannot be rationally effective and that its dominant modes of expression give evidence of a certain perhaps unconscious awareness of this."
MacIntyre, After Virtue
Ironically enough, all these planned protests require a permit from the city, a nice bureaucratic-managerial touch which MacIntyre would likely appreciate for its absurd irony.
Monday, July 14, 2008
Benedictio Cerevisiae
Blessing of Beer
V. Adiutorium nostrum in nomine Domini.
R. Qui fecit caelum et terram.
V. Dominus vobiscum.
R. Et cum spiritu tuo.
Oremus.
Bene+dic, Domine, creaturam istam cerevisiae, quam ex adipe frumenti producere dignatus es: ut sit remedium salutare humano generi, et praesta per invocationem nominis tui sancti; ut, quicumque ex ea biberint, sanitatem corpus et animae tutelam percipiant. Per Christum Dominum nostrum.
R. Amen.
Et aspergatur aqua benedicta.
English translation
V. Our help is in the name of the Lord.
R. Who made heaven and earth.
V. The Lord be with you.
R. And with thy spirit.
Let us pray.
Bless, + O Lord, this creature beer, which thou hast deigned to produce from the fat of grain: that it may be a salutary remedy to the human race, and grant through the invocation of thy holy name; that, whoever shall drink it, may gain health in body and peace in soul. Through Christ our Lord.
R. Amen.
And it is sprinkled with holy water.
V. Adiutorium nostrum in nomine Domini.
R. Qui fecit caelum et terram.
V. Dominus vobiscum.
R. Et cum spiritu tuo.
Oremus.
Bene+dic, Domine, creaturam istam cerevisiae, quam ex adipe frumenti producere dignatus es: ut sit remedium salutare humano generi, et praesta per invocationem nominis tui sancti; ut, quicumque ex ea biberint, sanitatem corpus et animae tutelam percipiant. Per Christum Dominum nostrum.
R. Amen.
Et aspergatur aqua benedicta.
English translation
V. Our help is in the name of the Lord.
R. Who made heaven and earth.
V. The Lord be with you.
R. And with thy spirit.
Let us pray.
Bless, + O Lord, this creature beer, which thou hast deigned to produce from the fat of grain: that it may be a salutary remedy to the human race, and grant through the invocation of thy holy name; that, whoever shall drink it, may gain health in body and peace in soul. Through Christ our Lord.
R. Amen.
And it is sprinkled with holy water.
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
The Ruin
Wondrously wrought and fair its wall of stone,
Shattered by Fate! The castles rent asunder,
The work of giants moldered away!
Its roofs are breaking and falling; its towers crumble
In ruin. Plundered those walls with grated doors —
Their mortar white with frost. Its battered ramparts
are shorn away and ruined, all undermined
By eating age. The mighty men that built it,
Departed hence, undone by death, are held
Fast in the earthâs embrace. Tight is the clutch
Of the grave, while overhead of living men
A hundred generations pass away.
Long this red wall, now mossy gray, withstood,
While kingdom followed kingdom in the land,
Unshaken âneath the storms of heaven — yet now
Its towering gate hath fallen. . . .
Radiant the mead-halls in that city bright,
Yea, many were its baths. High rose its wealth
Of hornèd pinnacles, while loud within
Was heard the joyous revelry of men —
Till mighty Fate came with her sudden change!
Wide-wasting was the battle where they fell.
Plague-laden days upon the city came;
Death snatched away that mighty host of men. . . .
There in the olden time full many a thane,
Shining with gold, all gloriously adorned,
Haughty in heart, rejoiced when hot with wine;
Upon him gleamed his armor, and he gazed
On gold and silver and all precious gems;
On riches and on wealth and treasured jewels,
A radiant city in a kingdom wide.
There stood the courts of stone. Hot within,
The stream flowed with its mighty surge. The wall
Surrounded all with its bright bosom; there
The baths stood, hot within its heart. . . .
From Cook and Tinker, Translations from Old English Poetry, pp. 56-57; trans. by Chauncey B.Tinker.
Shattered by Fate! The castles rent asunder,
The work of giants moldered away!
Its roofs are breaking and falling; its towers crumble
In ruin. Plundered those walls with grated doors —
Their mortar white with frost. Its battered ramparts
are shorn away and ruined, all undermined
By eating age. The mighty men that built it,
Departed hence, undone by death, are held
Fast in the earthâs embrace. Tight is the clutch
Of the grave, while overhead of living men
A hundred generations pass away.
Long this red wall, now mossy gray, withstood,
While kingdom followed kingdom in the land,
Unshaken âneath the storms of heaven — yet now
Its towering gate hath fallen. . . .
Radiant the mead-halls in that city bright,
Yea, many were its baths. High rose its wealth
Of hornèd pinnacles, while loud within
Was heard the joyous revelry of men —
Till mighty Fate came with her sudden change!
Wide-wasting was the battle where they fell.
Plague-laden days upon the city came;
Death snatched away that mighty host of men. . . .
There in the olden time full many a thane,
Shining with gold, all gloriously adorned,
Haughty in heart, rejoiced when hot with wine;
Upon him gleamed his armor, and he gazed
On gold and silver and all precious gems;
On riches and on wealth and treasured jewels,
A radiant city in a kingdom wide.
There stood the courts of stone. Hot within,
The stream flowed with its mighty surge. The wall
Surrounded all with its bright bosom; there
The baths stood, hot within its heart. . . .
From Cook and Tinker, Translations from Old English Poetry, pp. 56-57; trans. by Chauncey B.Tinker.
Wednesday, July 2, 2008
Communio Personarum
"This is so because, right from the beginning, that unity which is realized through the body indicates not only the body but also the incarnate communion of persons -communio personarum - and calls for this communion"
Pope John Paul II, General Audience of November 14, 1979
excerpted from The Theology of the Body, Human Love in the Divine Plan
One of the key features of John Paul II's teaching on the meaning and nature of the human person is the idea that the human person is expressed through the body. Moreover, the body itself has intrinsic meaning and expresses, in its very existence, fundamental truths about Man and the created world. As this excerpt indicates, one of those inherent truths expressed by the body is the communio personarum - that man was created for communion with other persons. The body, in itself, calls for the creation of community.
This truth occurred to me after reading this article. I find it rather amazing that, although Donor 401 did everything within his power to negate the intrinsic meaning of his body and its sexual acts, his actions still created a community of persons. The body still has a tendency to reveal the truth about the human person, no matter how we try to escape it.
It also occurred to me that, while God can (and is?) bringing good out of evil acts, the "family" depicted here is nothing less than a Satanic parody of God's design for families, a counterfeit counter-icon of the Holy Family. Kyrie eleison.
Pope John Paul II, General Audience of November 14, 1979
excerpted from The Theology of the Body, Human Love in the Divine Plan
One of the key features of John Paul II's teaching on the meaning and nature of the human person is the idea that the human person is expressed through the body. Moreover, the body itself has intrinsic meaning and expresses, in its very existence, fundamental truths about Man and the created world. As this excerpt indicates, one of those inherent truths expressed by the body is the communio personarum - that man was created for communion with other persons. The body, in itself, calls for the creation of community.
This truth occurred to me after reading this article. I find it rather amazing that, although Donor 401 did everything within his power to negate the intrinsic meaning of his body and its sexual acts, his actions still created a community of persons. The body still has a tendency to reveal the truth about the human person, no matter how we try to escape it.
It also occurred to me that, while God can (and is?) bringing good out of evil acts, the "family" depicted here is nothing less than a Satanic parody of God's design for families, a counterfeit counter-icon of the Holy Family. Kyrie eleison.
Friday, June 27, 2008
Words
The world does not need words. It articulates itself
in sunlight, leaves, and shadows. The stones on the path
are no less real for lying uncatalogued and uncounted.
The fluent leaves speak only the dialect of pure being.
The kiss is still fully itself though no words were spoken.
And one word transforms it into something less or other—
illicit, chaste, perfunctory, conjugal, covert.
Even calling it a kiss betrays the fluster of hands
glancing the skin or gripping a shoulder, the slow
arching of neck or knee, the silent touching of tongues.
Yet the stones remain less real to those who cannot
name them, or read the mute syllables graven in silica.
To see a red stone is less than seeing it as jasper—
metamorphic quartz, cousin to the flint the Kiowa
carved as arrowheads. To name is to know and remember.
The sunlight needs no praise piercing the rainclouds,
painting the rocks and leaves with light, then dissolving
each lucent droplet back into the clouds that engendered it.
The daylight needs no praise, and so we praise it always—
greater than ourselves and all the airy words we summon.
from Interrogations at Noon
© 2001 Dana Gioia
in sunlight, leaves, and shadows. The stones on the path
are no less real for lying uncatalogued and uncounted.
The fluent leaves speak only the dialect of pure being.
The kiss is still fully itself though no words were spoken.
And one word transforms it into something less or other—
illicit, chaste, perfunctory, conjugal, covert.
Even calling it a kiss betrays the fluster of hands
glancing the skin or gripping a shoulder, the slow
arching of neck or knee, the silent touching of tongues.
Yet the stones remain less real to those who cannot
name them, or read the mute syllables graven in silica.
To see a red stone is less than seeing it as jasper—
metamorphic quartz, cousin to the flint the Kiowa
carved as arrowheads. To name is to know and remember.
The sunlight needs no praise piercing the rainclouds,
painting the rocks and leaves with light, then dissolving
each lucent droplet back into the clouds that engendered it.
The daylight needs no praise, and so we praise it always—
greater than ourselves and all the airy words we summon.
from Interrogations at Noon
© 2001 Dana Gioia
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Catholic Experience and Contraception
A recent comment I posted on the thread to this post:
"Having foundered on fundamental disagreements regarding first principles, it seems that this discussion has inevitably turned to an existential exchange of claims regarding the "authenticity" of Church doctrines on contraception, especially insofar as those doctrines have an "experiential" basis.
While a combox is rarely a suitable form for this sort of existential discourse (one's college dorm discussions at least took place with actual people, with whom one lived and regularly interacted), it seems that there is perhaps some benefit to discussing the "real" experiences of Catholics in regard to the matter. Moreover, it seems the commenters in this thread who seem the most concerned about "hearing the voices of women" on the issue, are in fact very poorly acquainted with any actual Catholics, men or women, who have accepted the Church's stance on these matters. With that in mind, I offer the following thoughts:
My wife is a cradle Catholic who grew up, like most women of her generation, being taught that "theological development [should be] based on the actual experiences of men and women rather than on the ideal experience that no one has." Upon leaving her parents' house, she followed that premise to its natural conclusion, and promptly left the Church, a pattern her two sisters repeated also, and which was shared by most women of their generation. Naturally, she rejected the Church's teaching on contraceptive acts, both in theory and in practice. However, a time came in her life when she was forced to re-evaluate her relationship to the Church, as well as consider the significance and status of its teachings on contraception. The interesting part of her story is that she was firm in her rejection of the former until careful study of the latter. Her reconciliation with the Church came only through an acceptance of the Church's teaching on the meaning of the marital act. Indeed, it was a close reading of Humanae Vitae (from a tract containing an introductory essay by the aforementioned Janet Smith) that first captured her moral imagination on the subject. In understanding the Church's teaching on the meaning of the human person, and its embodiment in the most intimate of human acts, as well as its "obstinacy" in the face of popular opinion on the matter, she came to realize that, just perhaps, the Church had a vision for human existence that is somewhat deeper than the cultural currents of our time.
We now live in a suburb of St Paul, MN, and she is connected to a wide network of Catholic familes, nearly all of whom accept the Church's teachings on contraception, with varying degrees of understanding and practice. Interestingly, the women and families with whom she is connected here make up the majority of mass-attending Catholics at their respective parishes, at least for their generational group. For none of them is the "rhythm method" the "sacred pillar of Catholic identity," and none of those women would recognize the snide and facile conflation of theology and practice that lies behind such remarks. Indeed, most of them are adamant about the fact that they do not practice the "rhythm method," and are equally adamant about the non-negotiable role of the Church's teachings on contraception, especially as it shapes their own lives and marital acts. Most of them see and understand, even if they cannot fully articulate it, the right order of theology and practice in this area, and choose to not contracept, not because this or that practice or method is somehow formative of their identity, but because contracepted sex would be a repudiation of their existence as human persons. They realize contraceptive acts are not the acts of human beings - they are they the acts of a consumer, using persons as mere products for the fulfillment of sterilized pleasure. And most of them understand these things, not from careful consideration of theological propositions, but from that lived experience which some commenters in this thread regard as a theological fetish. Indeed, most of them have gained these experiences in as "authentic" a manner as one could hope for, either through extensive use of contraceptives followed by non-contraceptive practices, or from hard and bitter divorces which resulted from contraceptively sterilized marriages.
While I do not expect that anecdotal evidence such as this will be sufficient to change the opinions of some on this matter, I hope that those who have expressed concern about the experiences of "real Catholics" on the issue will at least take time to meet, interact with, and understand the large and growing number of Catholics who have actual experience in the matters at hand."
"Having foundered on fundamental disagreements regarding first principles, it seems that this discussion has inevitably turned to an existential exchange of claims regarding the "authenticity" of Church doctrines on contraception, especially insofar as those doctrines have an "experiential" basis.
While a combox is rarely a suitable form for this sort of existential discourse (one's college dorm discussions at least took place with actual people, with whom one lived and regularly interacted), it seems that there is perhaps some benefit to discussing the "real" experiences of Catholics in regard to the matter. Moreover, it seems the commenters in this thread who seem the most concerned about "hearing the voices of women" on the issue, are in fact very poorly acquainted with any actual Catholics, men or women, who have accepted the Church's stance on these matters. With that in mind, I offer the following thoughts:
My wife is a cradle Catholic who grew up, like most women of her generation, being taught that "theological development [should be] based on the actual experiences of men and women rather than on the ideal experience that no one has." Upon leaving her parents' house, she followed that premise to its natural conclusion, and promptly left the Church, a pattern her two sisters repeated also, and which was shared by most women of their generation. Naturally, she rejected the Church's teaching on contraceptive acts, both in theory and in practice. However, a time came in her life when she was forced to re-evaluate her relationship to the Church, as well as consider the significance and status of its teachings on contraception. The interesting part of her story is that she was firm in her rejection of the former until careful study of the latter. Her reconciliation with the Church came only through an acceptance of the Church's teaching on the meaning of the marital act. Indeed, it was a close reading of Humanae Vitae (from a tract containing an introductory essay by the aforementioned Janet Smith) that first captured her moral imagination on the subject. In understanding the Church's teaching on the meaning of the human person, and its embodiment in the most intimate of human acts, as well as its "obstinacy" in the face of popular opinion on the matter, she came to realize that, just perhaps, the Church had a vision for human existence that is somewhat deeper than the cultural currents of our time.
We now live in a suburb of St Paul, MN, and she is connected to a wide network of Catholic familes, nearly all of whom accept the Church's teachings on contraception, with varying degrees of understanding and practice. Interestingly, the women and families with whom she is connected here make up the majority of mass-attending Catholics at their respective parishes, at least for their generational group. For none of them is the "rhythm method" the "sacred pillar of Catholic identity," and none of those women would recognize the snide and facile conflation of theology and practice that lies behind such remarks. Indeed, most of them are adamant about the fact that they do not practice the "rhythm method," and are equally adamant about the non-negotiable role of the Church's teachings on contraception, especially as it shapes their own lives and marital acts. Most of them see and understand, even if they cannot fully articulate it, the right order of theology and practice in this area, and choose to not contracept, not because this or that practice or method is somehow formative of their identity, but because contracepted sex would be a repudiation of their existence as human persons. They realize contraceptive acts are not the acts of human beings - they are they the acts of a consumer, using persons as mere products for the fulfillment of sterilized pleasure. And most of them understand these things, not from careful consideration of theological propositions, but from that lived experience which some commenters in this thread regard as a theological fetish. Indeed, most of them have gained these experiences in as "authentic" a manner as one could hope for, either through extensive use of contraceptives followed by non-contraceptive practices, or from hard and bitter divorces which resulted from contraceptively sterilized marriages.
While I do not expect that anecdotal evidence such as this will be sufficient to change the opinions of some on this matter, I hope that those who have expressed concern about the experiences of "real Catholics" on the issue will at least take time to meet, interact with, and understand the large and growing number of Catholics who have actual experience in the matters at hand."
Quebec, the Cube and the Cathedral, and Leo Strauss
George Weigel has a book called The Cube and the Cathedral, in which he uses two architectural landmarks in France as an analogy for the contrast between modernist-nihilist and cultural-religious visions of the world. When I was in Quebec two weeks ago, I discovered that the Old City district there has its own version of Weigel's analogy.
The first landmark is the site of the oldest market in North America, anchored by the Church of Notre-Dame-des-Victoires.
The second landmark lies a block or so down from the Church, and is a sculpture given as a gift from France to Quebec in 1987.
One of the more persistent questions of my life is to try and understand exactly how Western culture got from there to here. How does a culture come to the point where it decides to stop building churches, and starting building formless arrangments of aimless lines? It's not enough to simply trace the problem, as Weigel does, to 19th-century atheistic humanism and the ensuing rise of secularism. The problem must lie deeper than that, since after all, the 19th century cultural trends that Weigel deplores did not come from nowhere - they are themselves the product of other trends and cultural philosophies which must be explored if the full context of the problem is to be understood.
I do not pretend to have a full answer to the question posed by the cube and the church. I do think, though that one clue is provided by the purpose of La Grand Arche, the modernist cube referred to in Weigel's book. It is built to house the International Foundation for Human Rights. In other words, if we seek to understand the Cube, and why an entire culture would celebrate itself through such a monstrosity, it would perhaps be worth our time to understand what is intended by the phrase "human rights."
Which brings me to Leo Strauss, and his exploration of the modern doctrine of Human Rights, as explored in History and Natural Right. If Strauss' account is in any way correct, it seems that the anthropology and metaphysics implied in the modern doctrine of human rights is indeed in profound conflict with that authentic Catholic anthropology which leads to the building of churches. By tracing the problem back to early-modern philosophy, Strauss shows that the rise of 19th-century secularism is a direct descendant of philosophical trends that were on their face seemingly compatible with the existing Christian order, but in were actually in a position of radical discontinuity with that order. Of course, I would argue that this disconinuity has its roots in an even earlier time, which coincided roughly with the Renaissance, but that is a post for another time.
I would also note in passing that Catholics who consider themselves "politically conservative" generally accept Lockean natural right theory wholesale. A close reading of Strauss should make such persons a bit uncomfortable. I myself am generally appreciative of Edmund Burke, and found Strauss' critique of Burke to be rather intriguing, and a bit unsettling.
The first landmark is the site of the oldest market in North America, anchored by the Church of Notre-Dame-des-Victoires.
The second landmark lies a block or so down from the Church, and is a sculpture given as a gift from France to Quebec in 1987.
One of the more persistent questions of my life is to try and understand exactly how Western culture got from there to here. How does a culture come to the point where it decides to stop building churches, and starting building formless arrangments of aimless lines? It's not enough to simply trace the problem, as Weigel does, to 19th-century atheistic humanism and the ensuing rise of secularism. The problem must lie deeper than that, since after all, the 19th century cultural trends that Weigel deplores did not come from nowhere - they are themselves the product of other trends and cultural philosophies which must be explored if the full context of the problem is to be understood.
I do not pretend to have a full answer to the question posed by the cube and the church. I do think, though that one clue is provided by the purpose of La Grand Arche, the modernist cube referred to in Weigel's book. It is built to house the International Foundation for Human Rights. In other words, if we seek to understand the Cube, and why an entire culture would celebrate itself through such a monstrosity, it would perhaps be worth our time to understand what is intended by the phrase "human rights."
Which brings me to Leo Strauss, and his exploration of the modern doctrine of Human Rights, as explored in History and Natural Right. If Strauss' account is in any way correct, it seems that the anthropology and metaphysics implied in the modern doctrine of human rights is indeed in profound conflict with that authentic Catholic anthropology which leads to the building of churches. By tracing the problem back to early-modern philosophy, Strauss shows that the rise of 19th-century secularism is a direct descendant of philosophical trends that were on their face seemingly compatible with the existing Christian order, but in were actually in a position of radical discontinuity with that order. Of course, I would argue that this disconinuity has its roots in an even earlier time, which coincided roughly with the Renaissance, but that is a post for another time.
I would also note in passing that Catholics who consider themselves "politically conservative" generally accept Lockean natural right theory wholesale. A close reading of Strauss should make such persons a bit uncomfortable. I myself am generally appreciative of Edmund Burke, and found Strauss' critique of Burke to be rather intriguing, and a bit unsettling.
Leo Strauss, History and Natural Right - Chapter 5
[begin quote]
Locke is a hedonist: "That which is properly good or bad, is nothing but barely pleasure or pain." But his is a peculiar hedonism: "The greatest happiness consists" not in enjoying the greatest pleasures but "in the having those things which produce the greatest pleasures." It is not altogether an accident that the chapter in which these statements occur, and which happens to be the most extensive chapter of the whole Essay, is entitled "Power." For if, as Hobbes says, "the power of a man...is his present means, to obtain some future apparent good," Locke says in effect that the greatest happiness consists in the greatest power. Since there are no knowable natures, there is no nature of man with reference to which we could distinguish between pleasures which are according to nature and pleasures which are against nature, or between pleasures which are by nature higher and pleasures which are by nature lower: pleasure and pain are "for different men...very different things." Therefore, "the philosophers of old did in vain inquire, whether summum bonum consisted in riches, or bodily delights, or virtue, or contemplation?" In the absence of a summum bonum, man would lack completely a star and compass for his life if there were no summum malum. "Desire is always moved by evil, to fly it." The strongest desire is the desire for self-preservation. The evil from which the strongest desire recoils is death. Death must then be the greatest evil: Not the natural sweetness of living but the terrors of death make us cling to life. What nature firmly establishes is that from which desire moves away, the point of departure of desire; the goal toward which desire moves is secondary. The primary fact is want. But this want, this lack, is no longer understood as pointing to something complete, perfect, whole. The necessities of life are no longer understood as necessary for the complete or good life, but as mere inescapabilities.The satisfaction of wants is therefore no longer limited by the demands of the good life but become aimless. The goal of desire is defined by nature only negatively - the denial of pain. It is not pleasure more or less dimly anticipated which elicits human efforts: "the chief, if not only, spur to human industry and action is uneasiness." So powerful is the natural primacy of pain that the active denial of pain is itself painful. The pain which removes pain is labor. It is this pain, and hence a defect, which gives man originally the most important of all rights: sufferings and defects, rather than merits or virtues, originate rights.[...]The painful relief of pain culminates not so much in the greatest pleasures as "in the having those things which produce the greatest pleasures." Life is the joyless quest for joy.
[end quote]
Emphases in bold are my own. While I have reservations about Strauss, I think that his account of Locke and the modern natural law tradition poses a serious challenge to any Catholic who wishes to defend both classical liberalism and traditional Catholic political doctrine, which is typically grounded in the Thomistic natural law concept.
Locke is a hedonist: "That which is properly good or bad, is nothing but barely pleasure or pain." But his is a peculiar hedonism: "The greatest happiness consists" not in enjoying the greatest pleasures but "in the having those things which produce the greatest pleasures." It is not altogether an accident that the chapter in which these statements occur, and which happens to be the most extensive chapter of the whole Essay, is entitled "Power." For if, as Hobbes says, "the power of a man...is his present means, to obtain some future apparent good," Locke says in effect that the greatest happiness consists in the greatest power. Since there are no knowable natures, there is no nature of man with reference to which we could distinguish between pleasures which are according to nature and pleasures which are against nature, or between pleasures which are by nature higher and pleasures which are by nature lower: pleasure and pain are "for different men...very different things." Therefore, "the philosophers of old did in vain inquire, whether summum bonum consisted in riches, or bodily delights, or virtue, or contemplation?" In the absence of a summum bonum, man would lack completely a star and compass for his life if there were no summum malum. "Desire is always moved by evil, to fly it." The strongest desire is the desire for self-preservation. The evil from which the strongest desire recoils is death. Death must then be the greatest evil: Not the natural sweetness of living but the terrors of death make us cling to life. What nature firmly establishes is that from which desire moves away, the point of departure of desire; the goal toward which desire moves is secondary. The primary fact is want. But this want, this lack, is no longer understood as pointing to something complete, perfect, whole. The necessities of life are no longer understood as necessary for the complete or good life, but as mere inescapabilities.The satisfaction of wants is therefore no longer limited by the demands of the good life but become aimless. The goal of desire is defined by nature only negatively - the denial of pain. It is not pleasure more or less dimly anticipated which elicits human efforts: "the chief, if not only, spur to human industry and action is uneasiness." So powerful is the natural primacy of pain that the active denial of pain is itself painful. The pain which removes pain is labor. It is this pain, and hence a defect, which gives man originally the most important of all rights: sufferings and defects, rather than merits or virtues, originate rights.[...]The painful relief of pain culminates not so much in the greatest pleasures as "in the having those things which produce the greatest pleasures." Life is the joyless quest for joy.
[end quote]
Emphases in bold are my own. While I have reservations about Strauss, I think that his account of Locke and the modern natural law tradition poses a serious challenge to any Catholic who wishes to defend both classical liberalism and traditional Catholic political doctrine, which is typically grounded in the Thomistic natural law concept.
Train Across the St Croix River
There is one story and one story only
That will prove worth your telling,
Whether as learned bard or gifted child;
To it all lines or lesser gauds belong
That startle with their shining
Such common stories as they stray into.
Is it of trees you tell, their months and virtues,
Or strange beasts that beset you,
Of birds that croak at you the Triple will?
Or of the Zodiac and how slow it turns
Below the Boreal Crown,
Prison to all true kings that ever reigned?
Water to water, ark again to ark,
From woman back to woman:
So each new victim treads unfalteringly
The never altered circuit of his fate,
Bringing twelve peers as witness
Both to his starry rise and starry fall.
Or is it of the Virgin's silver beauty,
All fish below the thighs?
She in her left hand bears a leafy quince;
When, with her right hand she crooks a finger, smiling,
How many the King hold back?
Royally then he barters life for love.
Or of the undying snake from chaos hatched,
Whose coils contain the ocean,
Into whose chops with naked sword he springs,
Then in black water, tangled by the reeds,
Battles three days and nights,
To be spewed up beside her scalloped shore?
Much snow if falling, winds roar hollowly,
The owl hoots from the elder,
Fear in your heart cries to the loving-cup:
Sorrow to sorrow as the sparks fly upward.
The log groans and confesses:
There is one story and one story only.
Dwell on her graciousness, dwell on her smiling,
Do not forget what flowers
The great boar trampled down in ivy time.
Her brow was creamy as the crested wave,
Her sea-blue eyes were wild
But nothing promised that is not performed.
Robert Graves, "To Juan at the Winter Solstice"
Fr Adolphe Tanquerey - The Spiritual Life: A Treatise on Ascetic and Mystical Theology
II. Defects Born of Pride
"From the intellectual point of view, we think ourselves capable of approaching and solving the most difficult questions, or at least of undertaking studies which are beyond the reach of our talents. We easily persuade ourselves that we abound in judgement and wisdom, and instead of learning how to doubt, we settle with finality the most controverted questions."
As I further explore Leo Strauss, I have come to the realization that one of my comments below was a cheap and facile remark based on nothing other than my complete lack of familiarity with Strauss. It has been withdrawn accordingly.
I include the quote from Fr Tanquerey as a reminder to myself that doubt, properly understood, is one of the rarest and most difficult intellectual virtues to cultivate. I do not refer here to the more popular conception of "doubt," popular today in "Emergent" Evangelical circles and certain quarters of the Catholic world, where "doubt" is a signifier for emotional ambiquity regarding some tenet of the faith, and is typically used as an excuse for one's unwillingness to engage in the difficult tasks of shunning vice and cultivating virtue.
As Fr Tanquerey indicates here, doubt is nothing other than the virtue of humility applied to the operations of one's intellect, and whose particular focus is the relation of one's own judgements and opinions relative to those of others. May God grant us all the grace of such humility.
"From the intellectual point of view, we think ourselves capable of approaching and solving the most difficult questions, or at least of undertaking studies which are beyond the reach of our talents. We easily persuade ourselves that we abound in judgement and wisdom, and instead of learning how to doubt, we settle with finality the most controverted questions."
As I further explore Leo Strauss, I have come to the realization that one of my comments below was a cheap and facile remark based on nothing other than my complete lack of familiarity with Strauss. It has been withdrawn accordingly.
I include the quote from Fr Tanquerey as a reminder to myself that doubt, properly understood, is one of the rarest and most difficult intellectual virtues to cultivate. I do not refer here to the more popular conception of "doubt," popular today in "Emergent" Evangelical circles and certain quarters of the Catholic world, where "doubt" is a signifier for emotional ambiquity regarding some tenet of the faith, and is typically used as an excuse for one's unwillingness to engage in the difficult tasks of shunning vice and cultivating virtue.
As Fr Tanquerey indicates here, doubt is nothing other than the virtue of humility applied to the operations of one's intellect, and whose particular focus is the relation of one's own judgements and opinions relative to those of others. May God grant us all the grace of such humility.
Leo Strauss, History and Natural Right - Introduction
"This means that people were forced to accept a fundamental, typically modern, dualism of a nonteleological natural science and a teleological science of man. This is the position which the modern followers of Thomas Aquinas, among others, are forced to take, a position which presupposes a break with the comprehensive view of Aristotle, as well as that of Thomas Aquinas himself. The fundamental dilemma, in whose grip we are, is caused by the victory of modern science"
On the one hand, this little aside from the introduction describes quite nicely the situation of many modern Catholics. They have a two-story universe, as it were, where the physical or natural world serves no directed purpose or end, and can be engaged, used, or manipulated as each individual sees fit, since there is no ultimate purpose behind merely material things. Only the relatively small corner of the world known as "the human soul" is subject to purpose and meaning. Divine revelation and Divine law are directed only towards the interior world of the human soul, and the purely material world is left to fend for itself, as it were. Oddly enough, it can be argued that this peculiarly modern mindset is not a very Catholic one, since the very structure of sacramental theology supports the idea that physical objects are subject to Divine purposes and can reveal or even contain Divinity itself.
On the other hand, does any intelligent Thomist believe such a thing as Strauss says here? Just because scientific methods can very capably describe the efficient and material causes of the natural world, does that really mean that modern Thomists now exclude formal and final (i.e. teleological) causes from the explanation of the natural world? I smell a a whiff of old-fashioned Enlightment-era hyperrationalism in this particular passage. Richard Dawkins would be proud.
On the one hand, this little aside from the introduction describes quite nicely the situation of many modern Catholics. They have a two-story universe, as it were, where the physical or natural world serves no directed purpose or end, and can be engaged, used, or manipulated as each individual sees fit, since there is no ultimate purpose behind merely material things. Only the relatively small corner of the world known as "the human soul" is subject to purpose and meaning. Divine revelation and Divine law are directed only towards the interior world of the human soul, and the purely material world is left to fend for itself, as it were. Oddly enough, it can be argued that this peculiarly modern mindset is not a very Catholic one, since the very structure of sacramental theology supports the idea that physical objects are subject to Divine purposes and can reveal or even contain Divinity itself.
Summer Reading List
Here is what I plan to read this summer. I just finished a winter-long Aquinas reading project, so these are my "fun books." Sad, isn't it?
Leo Strauss, History and Natural Right
I've lately become interested in various critiques of Natural Law theory. Leo Strauss' account is supposedly one of the more penetrating, and he is apparently critical of both the Enlightenment-era natural law tradition as well as the Scholastic formulation. This is interesting to me, since, in my view, those two natural law theories are diametrically opposed. I'm very interested to hear what Strauss has to say.
This book also contains a fairly extended critique of historicism, and reading it is part of my effort to understand the influence of Hegel and all his disciples on Western thinking. I've seen several intelligent critiques of contemporary Catholic theology which rest on the proposition that modern Catholic theology is deeply (and erroneously) dependent on historicist assumptions. This book occasionally gets invoked in those critiques, so I am very curious to see what all the fuss is about.
Philip Rieff, Triumph of the Therapeutic
This is one of those books that I've read about for a long time, but never actually got around to putting eyes on paper. It is a classic work of cultural analysis, and, from what I hear, gives one of the most damning critiques of contemporary Western culture that can be found.
Germain Grisez, Contraception and Natural Law
I'm perpetually of two minds on whether or not the Church's teachings on contraception are more coherently explained by natural law theory or by JPII's more biblical-patristic account, commonly referred to as "Theology of the Body" (readers take note - I despise that phrase, and henceforth will not use it in this blog)
This intellectual waffling of mine, combined with my questions on natural law theory in general (see Leo Strauss above) should make for a interesting read.
Leo Steinberg, The Sexuality of Christ in Renaissance Art and in Modern Oblivion
Don't laugh. Several people for whom I have deep intellectual respect claim that this is one of the best books they've ever read.
As time permits, here's what else might be on tap:
Jean-Luc Marion, God Without Being
Supposedly contains a defense of Aquinas from Heidegger's "ontotheology" critique. Marion also has a (perhaps undeserved?) reputation as a "postmodern" philosopher. Should be interesting.
If Wikipedia is any indication, Marion seems to intersect a number of topics that have been on my mind lately....patristics, neo-Platonism, ontology, phenomenology/Personalism, Aquinas, La Nouvelle Theologie...you name it, he seems to be connected to it somehow
George Bernanos, Diary of a Country Priest
I am woefully inadequate in my reading of good literature. This book has a good reputation amongst intelligent and orthodox Catholics.
Anonymous, Meditations on the Tarot
Written by Valentin Tomberg, a convert to the Church from neo-pagan esotericism. Forward by von Balthasar. How much weirder can you get? A perfect "beach read" for philosophy/theology nerds.
Leo Strauss, History and Natural Right
I've lately become interested in various critiques of Natural Law theory. Leo Strauss' account is supposedly one of the more penetrating, and he is apparently critical of both the Enlightenment-era natural law tradition as well as the Scholastic formulation. This is interesting to me, since, in my view, those two natural law theories are diametrically opposed. I'm very interested to hear what Strauss has to say.
This book also contains a fairly extended critique of historicism, and reading it is part of my effort to understand the influence of Hegel and all his disciples on Western thinking. I've seen several intelligent critiques of contemporary Catholic theology which rest on the proposition that modern Catholic theology is deeply (and erroneously) dependent on historicist assumptions. This book occasionally gets invoked in those critiques, so I am very curious to see what all the fuss is about.
Philip Rieff, Triumph of the Therapeutic
This is one of those books that I've read about for a long time, but never actually got around to putting eyes on paper. It is a classic work of cultural analysis, and, from what I hear, gives one of the most damning critiques of contemporary Western culture that can be found.
Germain Grisez, Contraception and Natural Law
I'm perpetually of two minds on whether or not the Church's teachings on contraception are more coherently explained by natural law theory or by JPII's more biblical-patristic account, commonly referred to as "Theology of the Body" (readers take note - I despise that phrase, and henceforth will not use it in this blog)
This intellectual waffling of mine, combined with my questions on natural law theory in general (see Leo Strauss above) should make for a interesting read.
Leo Steinberg, The Sexuality of Christ in Renaissance Art and in Modern Oblivion
Don't laugh. Several people for whom I have deep intellectual respect claim that this is one of the best books they've ever read.
As time permits, here's what else might be on tap:
Jean-Luc Marion, God Without Being
Supposedly contains a defense of Aquinas from Heidegger's "ontotheology" critique. Marion also has a (perhaps undeserved?) reputation as a "postmodern" philosopher. Should be interesting.
If Wikipedia is any indication, Marion seems to intersect a number of topics that have been on my mind lately....patristics, neo-Platonism, ontology, phenomenology/Personalism, Aquinas, La Nouvelle Theologie...you name it, he seems to be connected to it somehow
George Bernanos, Diary of a Country Priest
I am woefully inadequate in my reading of good literature. This book has a good reputation amongst intelligent and orthodox Catholics.
Anonymous, Meditations on the Tarot
Written by Valentin Tomberg, a convert to the Church from neo-pagan esotericism. Forward by von Balthasar. How much weirder can you get? A perfect "beach read" for philosophy/theology nerds.
Catechism Catholicism
In recent months, there has been much discussion in the Catholic-oriented media about the possibility of a solemn papal declaration for the so-called"fifth Marian dogma"
Now I generally oppose this effort, not because the dogma is not true, but because it reinforces what I perceive to be a wholly negative trend in the modern Church, namely, the perceived dependence of Catholic dogma on papal authority. Included below is a portion of an email I sent to some friends discussing this issue. As I argue below, I think this trend in ecclesiology reinforces the more destructive trends occurring in the life of the modern Church.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Generally speaking, I "oppose" the declaration, not in the sense that I think it is untrue, but rather because I can't make real theological sense out of it, nor can I see how it would be a good idea, ecclesially speaking.
a) My current theological understanding is that the "mediatrix" and "co-redemptrix" titles derive from the common nature which the Blessed Virgin shares with Christ, and through which we were redeemed, receive grace, etc. I think this is the Thomist formulation, and I haven't seen any other strong arguments for the titles that aren't essentially lists of (necessarily imprecise) quotations from the liturgy, papal documents, etc.
Now the problem here is that if this is the theological basis for the mediatrix/redemptrix, then it would seem to be simply a consequence of an already-defined dogma, namely the theotokos. As such, it is hard for me to see the necessity of an additional dogmatic declaration.
Since canon law currently requires us to invoke Ratzinger in these types of discussions, I will additionally note that I believe this was part of Ratzinger's earlier views on the topic, namely that the doctrines, while true, are theologically vague and subject to confusing interpretation.
b) my second concern is a more practical one - I'm concerned that a papal declaration would simply reinforce the "pope = Catholic CEO" model of ecclesiology that seems to exist in the minds of modern Catholics...that is to say, can't we all just believe something without the pope having to officially say that it is true? The mediatrix and coredemptrix titles exist in the liturgy, they exist in tradition.....can't we just believe them, as part of the ordinary magisterium? Is there really a Marian crisis within the Church that requires solemn proclamation? Wouldn't a proclamation simply re-inforce one of the more negative trends in the modern Church, namely the phenomena of "Catechism Catholicism"...i.e. the attitude that "I believe doctrine X because the pope and the Catechism say so," as in opposition to sacred tradition and liturgy?
I think in some ways, too, that this phenomena of "Catechism Catholicism" is part of the ongoing story of the Church's struggle to fully understand the implications of Vatican I. Regarding Vatican I, it seems clear that a strong papal primacy is part of the dogmatic patrimony of the Church...but there is a strong argument to be made that the pronouncement came at a time when Catholic culture worldwide was in the initial stages of its collapse, due to the rise of secularism/modernism, etc......the strong formulation of papal primacy allowed the average Catholic, whose grasp of liturgy and tradition was becoming more tenuous, to begin formulating the Faith in more strictly hierarchical/monarchical terms. This led to the ecclesial mess we have today, where the average orthodox Catholic formulates their ecclesiology, not primarily with reference to Scripture, liturgy, tradition, but to "canon X of CCC", or "papal document y." This is the "pope=CEO of the Church" model of ecclesiology, and one sees it in both liberal and conservative factions...conservatives, when they say things like "I wish the pope would just fire Cdl Mahony," and in liberals when they say, "I wish the pope would hurry up and ordain women,gays,dogs, etc"
In some ways, even the cultural mess that followed Vatican II can be seen as part of the outgrowth of the development of "Catechism Catholicism." I think many of the Vatican II promulgations can be seen as an attempt to undo the mess caused by the misappropriation of Vat I teaching. Hence all the emphasis on the collegiality of bishops, and the function of the laity, and the returning of the liturgy to the people and their cultures, etc......all of which is well and good, except that the laity and bishops were in full-blown cultural collapse at the time. I don't think I need to elaborate on the many unfortunate results that came from the conjunction of V2 teaching with modern Western culture of the late 20th century...
To illustrate more clearly what I am referring to here, check out this blog post and its long chain of comments. It highlights quite nicely what I am trying to get across - namely, that misuse of the Petrine privilege can have the unintended effect of weakening the Church's authority. In the post, a conservative Catholic argues with a fairly standard paint-by-numbers liberal theologian over the subject of Church teaching.
The interesting thing is that the crux of the liberal theologian's argument for rejection of many critical Church teachings, such as Humanae Vitae (HV), is that they were not infallibly proclaimed, and thus subject to "development," by which he means "negation. And in a strict technical sense, he's correct - HV was not infallibly proclaimed.
It's an interesting exchange, because it shows how the misuse of dogmatic authority can contribute to all sorts of unforeseen problems. I think it would have been unfathomable to theologians 200+ years ago to make the argument that "well, it's not infallible, so we can believe what we want." Thus, one dogma (infallibility) is played off of another (contraception), because there is a mindset, rampant in both conservative and liberal circles, that the only important dogmas are ones defined from the extraordinary magisterium. The movement for the fifth Marian dogma only reinforces this unfortunate trend, in my opinion, since it seems to reinforce, this time from a "conservative" standpoint, the idea that that "it only really matters if the Pope says its true!"
Now I generally oppose this effort, not because the dogma is not true, but because it reinforces what I perceive to be a wholly negative trend in the modern Church, namely, the perceived dependence of Catholic dogma on papal authority. Included below is a portion of an email I sent to some friends discussing this issue. As I argue below, I think this trend in ecclesiology reinforces the more destructive trends occurring in the life of the modern Church.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Generally speaking, I "oppose" the declaration, not in the sense that I think it is untrue, but rather because I can't make real theological sense out of it, nor can I see how it would be a good idea, ecclesially speaking.
a) My current theological understanding is that the "mediatrix" and "co-redemptrix" titles derive from the common nature which the Blessed Virgin shares with Christ, and through which we were redeemed, receive grace, etc. I think this is the Thomist formulation, and I haven't seen any other strong arguments for the titles that aren't essentially lists of (necessarily imprecise) quotations from the liturgy, papal documents, etc.
Now the problem here is that if this is the theological basis for the mediatrix/redemptrix, then it would seem to be simply a consequence of an already-defined dogma, namely the theotokos. As such, it is hard for me to see the necessity of an additional dogmatic declaration.
Since canon law currently requires us to invoke Ratzinger in these types of discussions, I will additionally note that I believe this was part of Ratzinger's earlier views on the topic, namely that the doctrines, while true, are theologically vague and subject to confusing interpretation.
b) my second concern is a more practical one - I'm concerned that a papal declaration would simply reinforce the "pope = Catholic CEO" model of ecclesiology that seems to exist in the minds of modern Catholics...that is to say, can't we all just believe something without the pope having to officially say that it is true? The mediatrix and coredemptrix titles exist in the liturgy, they exist in tradition.....can't we just believe them, as part of the ordinary magisterium? Is there really a Marian crisis within the Church that requires solemn proclamation? Wouldn't a proclamation simply re-inforce one of the more negative trends in the modern Church, namely the phenomena of "Catechism Catholicism"...i.e. the attitude that "I believe doctrine X because the pope and the Catechism say so," as in opposition to sacred tradition and liturgy?
I think in some ways, too, that this phenomena of "Catechism Catholicism" is part of the ongoing story of the Church's struggle to fully understand the implications of Vatican I. Regarding Vatican I, it seems clear that a strong papal primacy is part of the dogmatic patrimony of the Church...but there is a strong argument to be made that the pronouncement came at a time when Catholic culture worldwide was in the initial stages of its collapse, due to the rise of secularism/modernism, etc......the strong formulation of papal primacy allowed the average Catholic, whose grasp of liturgy and tradition was becoming more tenuous, to begin formulating the Faith in more strictly hierarchical/monarchical terms. This led to the ecclesial mess we have today, where the average orthodox Catholic formulates their ecclesiology, not primarily with reference to Scripture, liturgy, tradition, but to "canon X of CCC", or "papal document y." This is the "pope=CEO of the Church" model of ecclesiology, and one sees it in both liberal and conservative factions...conservatives, when they say things like "I wish the pope would just fire Cdl Mahony," and in liberals when they say, "I wish the pope would hurry up and ordain women,gays,dogs, etc"
In some ways, even the cultural mess that followed Vatican II can be seen as part of the outgrowth of the development of "Catechism Catholicism." I think many of the Vatican II promulgations can be seen as an attempt to undo the mess caused by the misappropriation of Vat I teaching. Hence all the emphasis on the collegiality of bishops, and the function of the laity, and the returning of the liturgy to the people and their cultures, etc......all of which is well and good, except that the laity and bishops were in full-blown cultural collapse at the time. I don't think I need to elaborate on the many unfortunate results that came from the conjunction of V2 teaching with modern Western culture of the late 20th century...
To illustrate more clearly what I am referring to here, check out this blog post and its long chain of comments. It highlights quite nicely what I am trying to get across - namely, that misuse of the Petrine privilege can have the unintended effect of weakening the Church's authority. In the post, a conservative Catholic argues with a fairly standard paint-by-numbers liberal theologian over the subject of Church teaching.
The interesting thing is that the crux of the liberal theologian's argument for rejection of many critical Church teachings, such as Humanae Vitae (HV), is that they were not infallibly proclaimed, and thus subject to "development," by which he means "negation. And in a strict technical sense, he's correct - HV was not infallibly proclaimed.
It's an interesting exchange, because it shows how the misuse of dogmatic authority can contribute to all sorts of unforeseen problems. I think it would have been unfathomable to theologians 200+ years ago to make the argument that "well, it's not infallible, so we can believe what we want." Thus, one dogma (infallibility) is played off of another (contraception), because there is a mindset, rampant in both conservative and liberal circles, that the only important dogmas are ones defined from the extraordinary magisterium. The movement for the fifth Marian dogma only reinforces this unfortunate trend, in my opinion, since it seems to reinforce, this time from a "conservative" standpoint, the idea that that "it only really matters if the Pope says its true!"
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