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A Catholic Defends the Building of Walls
No, I’m not here to report that Marco Rubio has started espousing a Fortress America policy. I’m not even the Catholic in question here, as I’ve become deeply skeptical of our political will to secure the nation’s southern border. But, in a pleasant turn of events, Bishop Robert Barron — the Church’s apostle of the New Evangelization and the recently-installed auxiliary bishop of Los Angeles — spoke powerfully to the importance of cultural preservation in the context of last Sunday’s reading from Nehemiah.
The Biblical passage chronicles the return of the Israelites from exile to the city of Jerusalem, and the actions taken by their leadership to restore the city and its people. Nehemiah and Ezra set out to renew the moral, spiritual, and intellectual strength of the people by reading the entirety of the Torah to them, but also the structural integrity of the city by rebuilding its walls. As Barron puts it (beginning around 4’45”):
Israel had to preserve itself … from the world — they had to have their own integral identity — precisely because they had a great mission in the world and for the world. If Israel lost its way, if its walls were breached, if it lost its identity and integrity, then it couldn’t be a sign of Yahweh for the sake of the world. It’s a paradox that people will often miss, I think. Identity for the sake of the mission. Separation, if you want, but for the sake of connection.
It’s a little inside-Catholic-baseball when Barron turns to the failures to preserve cultural integrity in the post-Vatican II Church, but the parallels between this and current political struggles in the West — particularly, in the United States during the Obama administration — are profound.
Being Catholic is more than “being a nice person.” The Church didn’t need to tear down its walls to take the Good News out to the world. In fact, just the opposite. As Barron says (in Latin, of course), “You cannot give what you do not have.” The intent of Vatican II was to open the windows to the modern world in order to let the life of the Church out. It wasn’t to “modernize” the Church; it was to “Christify” the world.
This is a very conservative view, in my opinion. It might be the very definition of conservatism: “We have something good here. We need to preserve it so as to share this goodness with the rest of the world.”
Likewise, there is something — or should be something — more to being American than being prosperous, having all the best toys, and the most free-time to play with them. Do you believe America has a mission? Do we, the people, still have sight of it?
This election season makes me think we do not. The Democrats and the Left (but, I repeat myself) don’t believe in America’s mission and haven’t for some time. They’ve disparaged America and torn at its walls through public education, the courts, and the media for as long as I can remember. If anything, they’ve been trying to Swedenize America, not to Americanize the rest of the world.
If I were to describe America’s mission, I would quote Scripture again, this time repeating the inscription on the Liberty Bell:
Proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof.
I would further distinguish this as the Liberty of Excellence, not the Liberty of Indifference which has taken hold in so many libertarian circles. There’s a give and take – Bishop Barron’s “rhythm between walls and bridges, between resistance and assimilation” – in which excellence demands that government support the integrity of our society’s institutions (marriage, for example), while leaving the people alone to decide how and if they will engage with them.
There are a (very) few institutions which recognize America’s role in the world and work diligently to preserve what it has achieved. I’m thinking Hillsdale College, for one, but we need more. It’s high time we conservatives bend our backs to the task. Pick up that stone and, with apologies to Peter Robinson, rebuild that wall!
We have a mission to fulfill.
Published in General
The key in your statement is “if they could” what keeps most people isn’t our visa system it is a whole bag of other issues.
Well, I think the desire to fit in to American Christian main stream in form opens the Church up to theological change. Evangelical/ protestant forms of worship and aesthetics come from their different cultures and theologies. It is, I think, a mistake to think you can try to adopt their forms without opening yourself up to their theology.
If you want to get a good fix on Fr Barron’s Catholicism watch his CD’s on Catholicism. Beautiful photography, brilliant discussion.
I agree fully with the Bishop’s broad points:
But his interpretation of Vatican II isn’t, imo, as deep or true as the interpretation of Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, who also used the image of walls.
The pre-Vat. II Church, said Ratzinger (looking back 30 years after the Council), was like a fortress, protecting the faithful from the errors of the world behind strong, high walls. What the Council fathers saw is that the walls were about to be breached by modern culture, specifically mass media. (So, it wasn’t Catholic fathers saying, “Let’s tear down the walls.” It was Catholic fathers saying, “These walls can’t hold.”)
So, what do we do? Do we surrender to modernity? No. Said Ratzinger, “We train the faithful in guerrilla warfare.” The boundaries of identity would have to be interior, not exterior. The fidelity of the faithful would rely on an intimate personal relationship with Christ more, outward authority less.
Nor, imo, should “modernize” be understood as antipathetic to “Christifying”. The Council fathers didn’t understand it that way. They were consciously and explicitly modernizing in order to Christify modernity.
Of course many liberals misunderstood. They thought the Church was going to change her teaching. But many conservatives misunderstood too. They thought the enemy was modernity.
I have to completely disagree. It has now been over 50 years since VII. Where has the Church changed any theology? Still no birth control, no divorce, still transubstantiation, still seven sacraments, still purgatory, still the communion of saints, still importance of the Blessed Mother, etc. If anything Marionology has only expanded. Fifty years is a long time. I don’t see on what you base that opinion on.
I agree that liberals misunderstood and continue to misunderstand. But, I think conservatives have always better understood the importance of preserving identity (accounting for modernity as necessary) while advancing the mission.
I’m advocating we do the same with regard to America.
Personally I think the Catholic Church should be fighting many elements of modernity. See Chesterton’s Orthodoxy.
A great suggestion!
But, I think conservatives have always better understood the importance of preserving identity (accounting for modernity as necessary) while advancing the mission.
I think it helps to understand what is meant by modernity or modernism — granted, it’s a term used pretty broadly, but here is a good summation from a reliable source, Dr. Ludwig Ott’s Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma (emphasis mine):
“The cognitional theoretical basis of Modernism is agnosticism, according to which human rational cognition is limited to the world of experience. Religion, according to this theory, develops from the principle of vital immanence (immanentism) that is, from the need for God which dwells in the human soul. The truths of religion are, according to the general progress of culture, caught up in a constant substantial development (evolutionism).”
Manny, I agree with you that official doctrine hasn’t changed, but I think what Valiuth says also is true, if not in doctrine then in practice. The widespread disregard of the Church’s teaching on contraception and divorce come, I think, from Catholics adopting Protestant views about such matters. Lex orandi, lex credenda — if you have a very casual liturgical style, it tends to downplay what Catholic doctrine teaches about the Real Presence and the need to be properly disposed. I don’t think it’s any accident that Catholic orthodoxy and faithfulness were, in this country, most strong when Catholic identity was strong and set us apart from the surrounding norms.
As an immigrant myself, I was once (until quite recently) sympathetic to this view. Three things have made me change my mind:
It’s shocking that the importance of borders even needs defending in this way. After all, how does little or no border enforcement help the average American? I still don’t understand why there isn’t across-the- board support for stronger borders and stricter immigration policies overall. Usually political rifts open up when some groups benefit from something that inconveniences or harms other groups. How does lax border enforcement benefit any group that has any electoral power? Only the Democratic elite are benefitted, but their voting constituents are certainly not, nor is any other large group of voting Americans. Ann Coulter may be right: the fact that this is even an issue is a sign of mass psychosis.
The practice of doctrine has always been sporadic. The issues may have changed, but there have been those who have not practiced fully since the first century. I don’t think irregular practice has led to theological changes. Valiuth’s point was that the theology will ultimately have to change, and I don’t see evidence for that. All the more reason, then, to build those walls. ;)
I like that. I would add that modernity is a result in the loss of faith in those truths. “Truths” have become relative, if not outright denied. There’s more to modernity than this, but I agree that captures the heart of it.
How prophetic. In response, they emphasized positive involvement with media.
It’s noteworthy that with so much else going on, the Council got the exponential impact of media on culture back in 1963. Radio, movies, and the quick rise of TV were changing the world even back then.
Maybe it also helped that Marshall McLuhan, a Catholic, and his seminal books The Gutenberg Galaxy (1962) and Understanding Media (1964) were in wide circulation during the Council years.
The Democrat elite benefit from new voters. The Republican elite benefit from having a buyers’ market in unskilled labor. The rest of us benefit from having cheaper produce, etc.
Also, we get to feel morally superior to all the “racists” who don’t want open borders.
In my town, 20% of our public school students speak Somali in their homes. I don’t think the public school establishment would be alone in opposing a greater emphasis on Western Civilization in the classroom.
Yes. More comprehensively, the Church deliberately shifted away from a paternalistic, legalistic, and defensive cultural mode, to a mode of bold engagement, and self-standing faith, grounded in interiority.
Too many conservatives miss the meaning and greatness of Vatican II, because (like liberals) they’ve conflated it with what Benedict XVI called the “false council” of the media accounts. They judge it mainly as if it were a political, rather than a religious event, and from the point of view of the losses that attended it, rather than the dramatic gains it has achieved under grace.
It’s important in the context of this discussion, because
a) The Council didn’t render the walls porous; historical events and developments did that.
b) The solution the Church proposes isn’t to rebuild those walls, but to build up the faithful from within, so that each of us lives her faith personally and with a missionary, outward-facing spirit.
In other words, the locus of Catholic identity has shifted.
Likewise, Americans may believe that our real identity is better preserved by a welcoming disposition toward immigrants than a defensive, exclusionary one.
I don’t pretend it’s a clear and simple matter. But I doubt walls are the answer.
Valiuth’s point was that the theology will ultimately have to change, and I don’t see evidence for that. All the more reason, then, to build those walls. ;)
Manny, I stand corrected, and I agree with you!
How prophetic. In response, they emphasized positive involvement with media.
Yes, the Church decided to throw open the windows to the outside culture, just when the outside culture was belching forth toxic pollution.
If the Church had maintained serious, orthodox catechism, the damage wouldn’t have been so dramatic. I grew up in the 70s, and I can tell you that the religious instruction I received at my Catholic grade school was worse than worthless — it not only did not teach me about the Faith, I was taught multiculturalism instead. I remember being taught about reincarnation in grade school, with no discussion or teaching about the differences between it and Christianity, or that Christianity had claims to truth that would not allow for both reincarnation and Christianity to both be true. In short, I was taught relativism, as were, unfortunately, many in my generation.
Most people around the world probably don’t want to move to America, and many of those who do won’t for various reasons that have nothing to do with our laws. But if we have open borders, immigration will increase. By how much it will increase is anyone’s guess, but it will increase.
I would say that the ability to feel morally superior would fall under the mass psychosis category.
This is a tough question in our day and age but it was obvious to our parents. The very idea of a nation as a collection of people with a common language and culture which has prevailed for hundreds of years seems to have come to an end for much of western civilization.
There was a Freakonomics podcast not too long ago on this issue which sort of put Libertarians and Liberals against conservatives on open borders. Alex Tabarok the economist was making the libertarian case for open borders and when asked whether or not open borders would have a fundamental change to the nation’s cutlure and valuves he replied with the not so reassuring “probably not”.
Anyway it is worth a listen if you want to hear the mostly pro-arguments for more immigration.
Here’s the thing: Mr Tabarok has no idea whether the culture and values would be changed or not. But for the moment, let’s take him at his word, “probably not.” Then “possibly yes” is also true. If it does turn out to be yes then both the immigrants and the people already here lose since the attractions for the immigrants were the very culture and values that are destroyed. In other words, a lose/lose proposition. Why sign up for that, even if it is not the most likely outcome?
As to the likelihood of this outcome, one need only cast one’s eyes across the oceans: across the Atlantic to see the havoc wrought in Europe (e.g., the Low Countries, Sweden, France) and across the Pacific to Japan where immigration is tightly controlled for fear of cultural destruction.
Valiuth – It will be long, difficult work converting Hispanic immigrants to Republicans.
Not that we shouldn’t try, but we can’t hope for more than slim gains and over the long term. Same for courting black voters. We should try, and target the most likely candidates (e.g., more conservative church-goers), but the gains are unlikely to be large or immediate.
Of course, a slim gain can be very significant electorally. But we also have to face facts in the short-term: for now, we can’t count on much support from those voting blocs, and it doesnt help conservatism to allow massive increases in the Hispanic immigrant population.
Dr. Lorentz – Good point. Also, libertarians don’t seem to consider anything cultural, communal, or familial very important politically. They are radically individualistic.
I’m somewhat libertarian and individualistic myself, within reason. It’s not all about Me Me Me. All things in moderation… anyway most things, so as not to be immoderate about it.
Migrations and Cultures by the illustrious Thomas Sowell is compelling evidence of the critical importance of culture and family.
Any number of other books are, too, starting with Homer, the Bible, and Shakespeare.
One can also just look around at the world. Compare an Ashkenazi Israeli engineer to a Congolese farmer. Compare a Frenchman to a Bangladeshi.
Or just look at the comparative achievements of Mexican, Nigerian, and Korean immigrant groups in the US, even after making any necessary adjustments to ensure a proper comparison.
Following this year’s March for Life in Washington D.C., we’ve seen stories such as these having to do with groups of young people who got stranded on their return home:
Impromptu ‘Turnpike Mass’ catches media’s attention
and
Living the Gospel in a Pennsylvania Hotel.
Bishop Barron’s homily was lived out by these faithful people. They give me hope for our future. These are real life examples of those who see
The kids in those stories do have something good and beautiful and true. I don’t know their politics, but I pray they hold onto the true, the beautiful, and the good, and continue share it with the world. If they do that, I think we’ll be OK.
The danger on the side is the notion that national borders separating wealthier countries from poorer ones are morally objectionable.
Or the lunacy that having one world government is preferable to nations with borders.
Very good article – thank you – there is balance in everything – it’s become so hard to find it in the current worldwide conditions – it is amazing how fast cultures are changing – we need the wisdom of the Church more than ever.