Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
From the remarks last month of Rev. Charles Chaput, Archbishop of Philadelphia, to the "Cardinal O'Connor Conference on Life":
Catholics need to wake up from the illusion that the America we now live in – not the America of our nostalgia or imagination or best ideals, but the real America we live in here and now – is somehow friendly to our faith. What we’re watching emerge in this country is a new kind of paganism, an atheism with air-conditioning and digital TV. And it is neither tolerant nor morally neutral.
As the historian Gertrude Himmelfarb observed more than a decade ago, “What was once stigmatized as deviant behavior is now tolerated and even sanctioned; what was once regarded as abnormal has been normalized.” But even more importantly, she added, “As deviancy is normalized, so what was once normal becomes deviant. The kind of family that has been regarded for centuries as natural and moral – the ‘bourgeois’ family as it is invidiously called – is now seen as pathological...."
The task you need to take home with you today is this. Never give up the struggle that the March for Life embodies. No matter how long it takes; no matter how many times you march – it matters, eternally. Because of you, some young woman will choose life, and that new life will have the love of God forever.....
Changing the course of American culture seems like such a huge task; so far beyond the reach of this gathering today. But St. Paul felt exactly the same way. Redeeming and converting a civilization has already been done once. It can be done again.
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Jan '12
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Joseph Stanko
Noesis Noeseos
But again I'd like to offer for reflection a tactical concern, a matter ofstyleand timing andemphasis. Just now, when the Republicans could prevail so easily as long as the public discourse focused on economics and foreign policy, just now may not be the best time to draw the focus to arenas in which the populace is still so severely divided.
That's simply not true. I hate to break it to you but there is simply no easy path to victory this fall. ... .
Take Iran, with the exception of Ron Paul (who won't win) all our candidates support military action to stop Iran from getting nukes. Liberals furiously oppose this, the last thing they want is another war in the Middle East.
Or take the deficit. Lots of people in this country, perhaps a majority, think the best way to shrink the deficit is to raise taxes, mainly on Wall Street and "the 1%." · 10 minutes ago
On this empirical question, I'll simply note your disagreement.
Jan '12
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Jun '11
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Noesis Noeseos
Joseph Stanko
Noesis Noeseos
Just now, when the Republicans could prevail so easily as long as the public discourse focused on economics and foreign policy, just now may not be the best time to draw the focus to arenas in which the populace is still so severely divided.
That's simply not true. I hate to break it to you but there is simply no easy path to victory
Take Iran, with the exception of Ron Paul (who won't win) all our candidates support military action to stop Iran from getting nukes. Liberals furiously oppose this, the last thing they want is another war in the Middle East.
Or take the deficit. Lots of people in this country, perhaps a majority, think the best way to shrink the deficit is to raise taxes
On this empirical question, I'll simply note your disagreement.
With Noesis Noeseos, I thought this election should have been a walk in the park. But we have weak candidates, and I must admit it was a brilliant strategy on Obama's part to suddenly make the election seem to be about things like contraception. Perhaps he played that card too early, though?
Jun '10
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Noesis Noeseos
Alas, I fear that I cannot conceive of how the religious claim can be totally separated from a mind that harbors, at least to some degree, a berth for the transports of bigotry.
This strikes me as far more offensive than anything Richard Stewart said. He merely expressed his faith and you branded it "offensive." Now you seem to be saying that anyone who harbors a sincere Christian faith is probably also highly susceptable to bigotry.
How is that not more offensive? Please tell me I'm misreading you.
Jan '12
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Oh, I haven't commented on what the good archbishop said: Whether atheism or paganism, I'll defer. That deviancy has passed from stygmatization to tolerance--a move that might pass muster under classical liberalism--to "celebration," no sane person can doubt. The result is precisely what he quotes Gertrude Himmelfarb as lamenting.
But, friends, this is exactly what Gramsci and Marcuse were seeking all along. Too bad we didn't keep up on our neo-Marxists. "Know your enemy" served us well in WWII. It might have prevented the Alinskyite from having captured the While House. Then again, there is that pesky elite media, bah!
Jun '10
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Noesis Noeseos
Joseph Stanko
Or take the deficit. Lots of people in this country, perhaps a majority, think the best way to shrink the deficit is to raise taxes, mainly on Wall Street and "the 1%." · 10 minutes ago
On this empirical question, I'll simply note your disagreement. · 9 minutes ago
Here is some empirical data to back me up.
Jan '12
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Joseph Stanko
Noesis Noeseos
Alas, I fear that I cannot conceive of how the religious claim can be totally separated from a mind that harbors, at least to some degree, a berth for the transports of bigotry.
This strikes me as far more offensive than anything Richard Stewart said. He merely expressed his faith and you branded it "offensive." Now you seem to be saying that anyone who harbors a sincere Christian faith is probably also highly susceptable to bigotry.
How is that not more offensive? Please tell me I'm misreading you. · 2 minutes ago
My objection is against claims of exclusivity. That word "only" is a real killer. Talmud-burnings, the rack, and expellations have risen from it. All with exclamations of "It's God's will!" The history is as harsh as it is indisputable.
Do I have to explain any further?
Jan '12
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Joseph Stanko
Noesis Noeseos
Joseph Stanko
Or take the deficit. Lots of people in this country, perhaps a majority, think the best way to shrink the deficit is to raise taxes, mainly on Wall Street and "the 1%." · 10 minutes ago
On this empirical question, I'll simply note your disagreement. · 9 minutes ago
Here is some empirical data to back me up. · 4 minutes ago
Let's hope for your sake the polls never change.
Jun '10
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Noesis Noeseos
Professor Rahe, I respect you mightily, but I do not envy at all how you must have to accommodate some of the burdens that fideism and dogma must place upon the intellect. There is sublimity indeed in the speculations of Thomas Aquinas, but even his had to defer to authority for authority's sake. Most regrettable. · 3 hours ago
Is it regrettable that a scientist has to defer to the results of experiments, even when they disprove his most sublime theories? Or that a historian has to defer if newly discovered documents disprove his interpretation of a past event? Is it regrettable when beautiful theories have to yield to the truth?
In theology, divine revelation is the raw data. Theology is the science that attempts to systematize that data to help us better understand it. Aquinas had no wish to be free to "speculate" anything his unconstrained imagination could dream up, he wanted his theology to speak truthfully about God. Dogma helps rather than hinders that process.
Jun '10
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Noesis Noeseos
My objection is against claims of exclusivity. That word "only" is a real killer. Talmud-burnings, the rack, and expellations have risen from it. All with exclamations of "It's God's will!" The history is as harsh as it is indisputable.
Do I have to explain any further? · 9 minutes ago
You're saying since I believe this I am a bigot, and a short step removed from book burning and torture. Am I understanding you?
Jan '12
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Joseph Stanko
Is it regrettable that a scientist has to defer to the results of experiments, even when they disprove his most sublime theories? Or that a historian has to defer if newly discovered documents disprove his interpretation of a past event? Is it regrettable when beautiful theories have to yield to the truth?
In theology, divine revelation is the raw data. Theology is the science that attempts to systematize that data to help us better understand it. Aquinas had no wish to be free to "speculate" anything his unconstrained imagination could dream up, he wanted his theology to speak truthfully about God. Dogma helps rather than hinders that process. · 2 minutes ago
Why, it must be true, you have said it.
You really don't understand the philosophical acceptation of the word "speculation." It is not "conjecture," but "reflecting on the interplay of contradictions among particulars." Thomas was a master at this.
Now, it's really a bold statement to say that divine revelation (no doubt, you have one and only one revelation in mind) is "raw data."
And people wonder why a Jew must guard his frontiers.
Listen to some Schuetz. At least the feeling is right.
Edited on February 25, 2012 at 11:17pmJan '12
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Joseph Stanko
Noesis Noeseos
My objection is against claims of exclusivity. That word "only" is a real killer. Talmud-burnings, the rack, and expellations have risen from it. All with exclamations of "It's God's will!" The history is as harsh as it is indisputable.
Do I have to explain any further? · 9 minutes ago
You're saying since I believe this I am a bigot, and a short step removed from book burning and torture. Am I understanding you? · 5 minutes ago
Not on the face of it. The bigotry came afterward, sometimes when people mouthed those very words.
Joseph, don't make it all about you. There's a history here, fellow. [Comment redacted]
[Ed.'s Note: The Ricochet CoC forbids the use of all caps. On the internet, that's shouting, and it's hardly conducive to civil conversation]
Edited on February 26, 2012 at 6:37amJun '11
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Noesis Noeseos
Not on the face of it. The bigotry came afterward, sometimes when people mouthed those very words.
Joseph, don't make it all about you. There's a history here, fellow.[Comment redacted]
Edited 0 minutes ago
Is it possible that the bad things that were done were not done in genuine faithfulness to the [Name] we revere?
Edited on February 26, 2012 at 6:38amJun '10
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Noesis Noeseos
Now, it's really aboldstatement to say that divine revelation (no doubt, you have one andonlyone revelation in mind) is "raw data."
Do you know where I got this idea? From reading Aquinas and subsequent Thomists. I was trying to explain the task and method of theology as Thomas himself understood it, at least if I've understood him correctly.
May '10
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
How? Where?
Could you be concrete?
Jan '12
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Christopher Esget
Noesis Noeseos
Not on the face of it. The bigotry came afterward, sometimes when people mouthed those very words.
Joseph, don't make it all about you. There's a history here, fellow. [Comment Redacted]
Edited 0 minutes ago
Is it possible that the bad things that were done were not done in genuine faithfulness to the [Name] we revere? · 3 minutes ago
Pastor Esget, I'd like to accept what you say at face value, but there has just been for too long a period of time too many strong assertions by people who supposedly were heirs to the apostolic succession that what I am calling the bad things were done in the [Name].
This is one reason why Luther broke away from Rome, but then came the workhouses for the Jews.
But I don't want to belabor this point. You know the gospels better than I, but there are passages in the King James Version that speak militantly against the Sanhedren, with the implication that it stands for Judaism generally, and declare that a new law has deposed the law of Moses.
(cont.)
Edited on February 26, 2012 at 6:40amJun '10
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Noesis Noeseos
Joseph Stanko
You're saying since I believe this I am a bigot, and a short step removed from book burning and torture. Am I understanding you? · 5 minutes ago
Not on the face of it. The bigotry came afterward, sometimes when people mouthed those very words.
Joseph, don't make it all about you. There's a history here, fellow. BAD THINGS WERE DONE in the NAME you revere.
I'm still struggling then to understand what you found offensive about "And only the Gospel can change our culture, when individual people are changed by Jesus himself." It seems to me to merely reflect the Christian belief that Jesus commanded us to "preach the gospel to the whole creation."
Our task is to share the Good News, everyone is free to accept or reject it. The consequences of that decision are entirely in God's hands, not ours.
Jun '11
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Noesis Noeseos
Pastor Esget, I'd like to accept what you say at face value, but there has just been for too long a period of time too many strong assertions byh people who supposedly were heirs to the apostolic succession that what I am calling the bad things were done in the NAME.
I'll use Irenaeus' analogy of the mosaic: some have taken the tiles that make the image of the King, and reassembled them into an image of a fox.
Once the Christian Faith became married to the power of empire, it became compromised, and often barely resembled the faith of the apostles. These things were wrong, horribly so. But I don't think I'm alone in saying orthodox Christians today unequivocally reject them not only as sins but as utterly inconsistent with the words of Scripture.
Jan '12
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Sorry, I don't read German well enough to be able to read Luther's translations. I have read, and I credit it, that Luther himself advocated placing Jews in work camps (a kind of Arbeit macht frei).
Without waxing too parochial, I just want to say that a certain critical sensitivity has arisen with respect to those claims of the Christian religion that emphasize its singularity. When that aspect was emphasized, the "bad things" followed, and the history was horrible.
I am more of a Hegelian than I am a Jew, and it is precisely because I desire to sublate those militant moments when one confession battles another that I study philosophy. This study, however, and the reason I pursue it, impells me to write against the kind of dogmatic claims that fall ludicrous before any serious examination.
The core of religion will survive even more competent examinations. This core consists of the fact that we each are in our subjectivity fallen short of our objective nature as an instance of the universal species. But it also consists in the fact that the only balm is mutual confession and subsequent forgiveness.
Jun '11
Re: Paganism with Air-Conditioning and Digital TV
Noesis Noeseos
This is one reason why Luther broke away from Rome, but then came the workhouses for the Jews.
Lutherans of all stripes today absolutely reject Luther's anti-semitic statements.
I'm not sure if you're implying that Luther was responsible for the holocaust (a frequent assertion), but Siemon-Netto's The Fabricated Luther: The Rise and Fall of the Shirer Myth is essential reading on the topic.