To Defend "Aristocracy" in Society:
(Musings of your humble servant at Rerum Novarum)
Though it was noted in yesterday's posting on distributivism that I would be writing on this subject soon{1}, the truth is, what you are about to read was already substantially completed when that statement was made.
The idea for this posting was brought to your host's attention last month when he was sent an article on some utopian approach to economics. Reviewing the idea got me thinking a bit more about the subject of aristocracy and how I have long viewed it at least in some form or another. Indeed much as your host will soon be writing on a third approach to politics which is badly needed in the current political climate{2}, the purpose of this post is to do something that would appear to be anathema to an American view of society. Yes my friends, I am going to make a defense of aristocracy here.
Now it is true that to some extent we have always defended aristocracy at this humble weblog but not in what might be called a traditional sense and certainly not in any kind of overt or explicit systematical fashion. But I will get to that in the process of interacting with some of the aforementioned article in question which can be read here:
Home of the Brave? (John Steinsvold)
Material for the above article will be in darkgreen font from here on out.
Economists concede that economics is an inexact science. What does that mean? Perhaps it means their economic forecast is better than yours or mine.
As I have said many times, find for me a rich economist and I will take his advice.
Recently, economic indicators have been rising and people have their fingers crossed.
If one knows what to look at with economic indicators, they can have a good idea of where the economy is going.
Economists have given us reason to hope that the job market will improve and that the stock market will continue on a steady climb.
Well, this article from Steinsvold was written prior to early 2006 and the economy has been quite good overall since mid to late 2003. A strong reason for this was the tax cuts President Bush had implemented back in 2001 which took the predictable two years{3} to have a measurable effect across the board.
Yet, the newspapers continue to report more layoffs and more jobs going overseas.
Actually, the economy has been at better than full employment{4} for a while now in the lions share of most states in the union.
Meanwhile, our economy is getting more and more complex.
The biggest problem in society is that we do not teach people about money and how to use it. Financial literacy is not taught in schools and frankly it should be. How the market works is also not taught in schools and frankly it should be. Most of the information the MSM distributes on how the economy works is erroneous but that is merely in keeping with the McElhinney Media Dictum{5} and therefore should not be too much of a surprise to readers of this humble weblog.
We associate complexity with progress for some ungodly reason.
Well, an increase in knowledge, understanding, and the like will generally result in a greater refinement over time. This is the natural order of things. However, that does not mean that complexity necessarily means progress -some truths can indeed be very simple to comprehend even if they are smaller components oftentimes of larger concepts.
The following problems, however, have become inherent in our economy. What does that mean? It means they will be around for a while:
Needless poverty, unemployment, inflation, the threat of depression, taxes, crimes related to profit (sale of illicit drugs, stolen ID's, muggings, bribery, con artists, etc.), conflict of interest, endless red tape, a staggering national debt, plus a widening budget deficit, 48 out of 50 states in debt, cities in debt, counties in debt, skyrocketing personal debts, 50% of Americans unhappy at their work, saving for retirement and our children's education, health being a matter of wealth, competing in the "rat race", the need for insurance, being a nation of litigation, being subject to the tremors on Wall Street, fear of downsizing and automation, fear of more Enrons, outsourcing, bankruptcies, crippling strikes, materialism, corruption, welfare, social security, sacrificing quality and safety in our products for the sake of profit, the social problem, of the "haves" vs. the "havenots" and the inevitable family quarrels over money.
I should note if I have not already that this article is quite intriguing. There are even some subsidiary ideas in the piece that I found myself agreeing wholeheartedly with. The problem is, the assumption that is made in the article that the problems it seeks to outline have to do with the use of money. We have a seriously ignorant populace when it comes to financial education of this there is no doubt. But what is being recommended in the above article (henceforth referred to as "Mr. Steinsvold's economic schemata") is really not all that new in concept.
Can we learn to distribute our goods and services according to need (on an ongoing basis) rather than by the ability to pay? Why not? Poverty and materialism will be eliminated! Our sense of value will change. Wealth will no longer be a status symbol. A man will be judged by what he is; not by what he has. He will be judged by his achievements, leadership, ideas, artistic endeavours or athletic prowess; not by the size of his wallet.
Here is the problem in a nutshell: when incentive is removed for people to better themselves, the result is logically and historically a systematic collapse. What is described above is no different than what the Pilgrims went through at Plymouth Rock initially. They had this grand idea that everyone would share everything and there was no private property, no division of labour, everything was to be done in common and in "cooperation" as the writer noted in his piece. In less than three years, that community was on the verge of dying out. The reason for this is because there was no incentive to do anything by those with the greater gifts and abilities.
Why should those with greater gifts and abilities be motivated to when they would get out of it no more than those of the least gifts and abilities??? In Mr. Steinsvold's economic schemata, those with the least gifts and abilities would be given priority in distribution and that would make matters even worse. He even admits to it in these words:
Yes, everything will be free according to need. All the necessities and common luxuries will be available on a help yourself basis at the local store. Surely, this country is capable of supplying the necessities and common luxuries for everyone in this country many times over.
The more "expensive" items, such as housing, cars, boats, etc. would be provided for on a priority basis. For example, the homeless would provided housing ahead of those living in crowded quarters. How will this priority be established? Perhaps a local board elected by the people in the neighborhood such as a school board. Or perhaps the school boards could absorb this responsibility in addition to their present duties.
As I noted already, this is what they did at Plymouth Rock in 1620 and they were on the verge of being destitute in a mere three years with crop failure being but one of the many hardships they faced. The Pilgrims eventually realized by necessity the importance of private property and giving people incentives to produce and they survived and thrived as a result. In later centuries, Mr. Steinsvold's economic schemata would be promoted under various forms of communialism and given titles such as "communism" and "socialism." And every place it has been tried, it has failed miserably and always will.
The truth is that all men are created equal in dignity but not in gifts, talents, or abilities. This is why if things are left to their natural state, there will always be an aristocracy in society whether we like it or not. John Adams once noted that there are five indicators of sorts which will determine how one will proceed in life as far as what advantages they would have over others. Let us consider these ideas under the umbrella of what could be called John Adams' theory of natural aristocracy.
--The first indicator is accident of birth. Whether we like it or not, some people will always be born to advantages over and above others and start out for that reason ahead of others.
--The second indicator is good looks. Whether we like it or not, those who are more attractive are going to have an advantage over those who are unattractive and they will have more doors open to them on that basis alone.
--The third is talent. Whether we like it or not, those with more talent have an advantage over those with less talent.
--The fourth is merit or achievement and it speaks for itself.
--The fifth is persistence or determination. This one is capable of being cultivated by anyone and is capable of compensating to some extent for lacking in the other areas so noted.
Those are the five indicators outlined by John Adams and taken from a rational standpoint, they make excellent sense. So some will always have advantages over others in the natural order of things. However, that does not mean that they will per se come out better in the end for having the aforesaid greater advantages. To consider this point for a moment, let us return to the first of the indicators and go through each one again briefly.
We noted the first indication as "position of birth" and indeed this can be quite an asset. However, one should consider the ancient Chinese proverb "from rich to poor in three generations" and how often this has happened over time. Obviously positions of birth are not enough and they can be wasted through complacency. The same is the case with the third indicator of "talent" and how often have we heard of someone with God-given talents to an extraordinary degree that never fulfilled their potential for one reason or another??? Of the second indicator, often those of the beautiful people who have that as an advantage starting out can end up losing by not being motivated to develop themselves further and thus should their looks fade, they will be in deep kim chee.
Now then, from each of these first three indicators you have a natural aristocracy of sorts in the human condition. It is unavoidable and every attempt in history to not acknowledge this in social or economic planning has resulted in failure. This is why socialism and communism cannot work, never have worked, and never will work. So if we recognize that there is an aristocracy intrinsic to humanity and always will be whenever the variables so noted above are dispersed so unevenly, what do we do about it is the question.
Do we rob from those who are lucky enough to be born into more privileged circumstances and thus violate the fundamental right of property which like life and faculties is God-given and which is a right which precedes all human legislation??? Those who advocate policies such as distributivism would say we should and that is all we need to say at this time with regards to what they advocate.{6} Shall we take a stick and bludgeon all the pretty people to make them equally hideously ugly so that there is no advantage there???{7} It is one possibility after all.
Do we fine people for utilizing their special talents or otherwise discourage them with economic or social restrictions so that they will not outshine others to thus keep the playing field "equal" in outcome??? Certainly if we do that, no one needs to worry about the persistence and determination part of it because if the first three are dealt with as noted above, they will not be of any value. So unless the intention is to bring everyone down to the least common denominator, the focus should be on traits or characteristics which are not built in but indeed can be learned or otherwise acquired.
As I have said (and I was not the first), there is always an aristocracy in society. The question is, should such an aristocracy be shaped by blood or by merit??? In other words, should a society be focused on someone becoming an aristocrat in society by an accident of birth, the accident of having exceptional appearance, etc. Or rather still, should things be focused more on the utilization of God-given gifts coupled with learning how to efficaciously use them???
In America, there are opportunities for people to advance in the financial aristocracy over time even if some have more advantages than others. However, in Mr. Steinsvold's economic schemata, these do not exist. Like it or not, people require some kind of motivation or else they will not do anything. And Mr. Steinsvold's economic schemata taken as a system inexorably strips this from them.
Any system, be it religious or secular requires some form of motivation for progress and some chart to measure whether or not progress has been made. Inevitably such a system (whatever it is) will show that some achieve more than others do. As long as we recognize that such a societal aristocracy will always exist as long as people exist, the questions that remains are (i) how that aristocracy is shaped, (ii) what factors are emphasized over others, and (iii) what motivation is given for people to strive to excel. I would claim that the fourth and fifth indicators should be what should be emphasized, namely merit/achievement and persistence/determination. For those are the areas of greatest variable and the least built in advantages.
Again, all are created equal in dignity but not in gifts, talents, or abilities. But I do not see why we cannot place the focus of aristocracy in areas which admit of the greatest possible members. Mr. Steinsvold undoubtedly is of good will in presenting his idea for a society without money. But money is merely a unit of measurement and like all commodities it is worth what people believe it is worth.
Truthfully, the lions share of the problems Mr. Steinsvold noted in his article are hardly going to go away if money is done away with. However, many of them could be reduced or eliminated by the application of some basic common sense and a proper approach to law in a just society. That happens to be why this weblog has focused so much on that subject seeing it as getting at the root and matrix of so many of the problems that plague society.
Mr Steinsvold can be contacted here for those who are interested in doing so:
steinsvold2@verizon.net
Notes:
{1} The subject of aristocracy will be written on soon at this weblog and it is an important yet often misunderstood or overlooked component to any society. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa May 25, 2007)]
{2} With the election on the horizon for 2008 and wanting to avoid for the sake of his own sanity too much focus on those issues beyond what is necessary to do, it seems appropriate to write as time allows on some of the systems and principles that shaped the outlooks of the Founding Fathers of the United States.[...] Part of the reason for this decision is because there is a significant imbalance in politics today and we want to propose a remedy for the common problems inherent in the political approaches of both major parties. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa April 17, 2007)]
{3} Five percent was the standard unemployment figure we used in our college economics classes when dealing with employment models and the like. But in actuality, the rate can be higher or lower depending on various factors. Or as Wikipedia notes in an article on the subject matter...
As readers can see, by recent OECD standards, our 5% figure is in the middle of the range. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa October 28, 2006)]
{4} It takes about two years for any policies to affect a noticeable change in the economy. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa October 28, 2006)]
{5} Defining the McElhinney Media Dictum (circa August 2, 2004)
{6} I had in mind a rather sardonic example for this footnote which on second thought, I will dispense with at this time.
{7} After all, as Brad Pitt is probably light years better looking than I am, should I therefore advocate violence against him to compensate for this "unfair advantage"??? Should those less attractive than me advocate the same to compensate for whatever "unfair advantage" I may have over them??? Etc. etc. etc.
Friday, May 25, 2007
Revisiting "Distributivism":
I received an email the other day from someone who was promoting some new book they had written on economics where they sought to (it would appear) make the pitch for distributivism. I should note at the outset for those wondering if this is the same thing as distributism, the answer is they are one and the same thing.
As I noted earlier, audioblogger is not working and I am not able to access recordings I made previously on this subject. That means I need to reinvent the wheel on this which does not please me but nonetheless here goes a rehashing of the matter in essentials and perhaps a slightly different restatement of the principles in a more syllogistic format.
To start with, the Catholic Church, whose teaching office (Lat. magisterium) is often appealed to as an "endorser of distributivism"{1} is on record historically as affirming the value of not only faith but also reason. Faith and reason cannot really contradict one another -something that the present pope has gone on record as affirming along with many of his predecessors. Pope Leo XIII's writing Rerum Novarum is often a source of prooftexts by advocates of distributivism. However, before noting why this is a ludicrous notion, let us consider some of what Pope Leo XIII said in his encyclical Aeterni Patris on the importance of reason:
(Musings of your humble servant at Rerum Novarum)
I received an email the other day from someone who was promoting some new book they had written on economics where they sought to (it would appear) make the pitch for distributivism. I should note at the outset for those wondering if this is the same thing as distributism, the answer is they are one and the same thing.
As I noted earlier, audioblogger is not working and I am not able to access recordings I made previously on this subject. That means I need to reinvent the wheel on this which does not please me but nonetheless here goes a rehashing of the matter in essentials and perhaps a slightly different restatement of the principles in a more syllogistic format.
To start with, the Catholic Church, whose teaching office (Lat. magisterium) is often appealed to as an "endorser of distributivism"{1} is on record historically as affirming the value of not only faith but also reason. Faith and reason cannot really contradict one another -something that the present pope has gone on record as affirming along with many of his predecessors. Pope Leo XIII's writing Rerum Novarum is often a source of prooftexts by advocates of distributivism. However, before noting why this is a ludicrous notion, let us consider some of what Pope Leo XIII said in his encyclical Aeterni Patris on the importance of reason:
[T]he natural helps with which the grace of the divine wisdom, strongly and sweetly disposing all things, has supplied the human race are neither to be despised nor neglected, chief among which is evidently the right use of philosophy. For, not in vain did God set the light of reason in the human mind; and so far is the super-added light of faith from extinguishing or lessening the power of the intelligence that it completes it rather, and by adding to its strength renders it capable of greater things. [Pope Leo XIII: Encyclical Letter Aeterni Patris (circa August 4, 1879)]
Now then, if reason is an important help -a "natural light" as given to us by God, than it requires that we respect its strictures. One of those strictures is the law of non-contradiction and I will get to this in a moment. However, I want to start this from a philosophical/religious approach first by noting something that Jesus of Nazareth once said. In speaking of the Sabbath and certain Mosaic regulations, he noted that "[t]he Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath" (Mark ii,27). Another way of saying this is that law is made for man, not man for law. So if the law is made for man and not vice versa, then there have to be certain rights intrinsic to man which do not derive from law. This brings us to the theory of Claude Frederic Bastiat which was constructed to combat perverse perceptions by various "social planners" of what law was intended for in society. I intend to revisit it here briefly for the benefit of those who are not familiar with it before using it to address the problems with "distributivism."
To start with, Bastiat asserted that there were three fundamental interrelated rights of man. These rights do not derive from law but instead from God. Or to quote{2} from his magnum opus The Law for a moment:
We hold from God the gift which includes all others. This gift is life -- physical, intellectual, and moral life.
But life cannot maintain itself alone. The Creator of life has entrusted us with the responsibility of preserving, developing, and perfecting it. In order that we may accomplish this, He has provided us with a collection of marvelous faculties. And He has put us in the midst of a variety of natural resources. By the application of our faculties to these natural resources we convert them into products, and use them. This process is necessary in order that life may run its appointed course.
Life, faculties, production--in other words, individuality, liberty, property -- this is man. And in spite of the cunning of artful political leaders, these three gifts from God precede all human legislation, and are superior to it.
Life, liberty, and property do not exist because men have made laws. On the contrary, it was the fact that life liberty, and property existed beforehand that caused men to make laws in the first place. [Claude Frederic Bastiat: Excerpt from The Law (c. 1850) as quoted in a Rerum Novarum posting (circa October 3, 2002)]
The above formulation as the reader can hopefully see is grounded on the principle noted by Jesus of Nazareth from the Gospel of Matthew: man is made for law and not vice versa. Bastiat goes further though and defines what man is by crystallizing specific rights which taken together embody the totality of man: his physical, intellectual, and moral existence. These are noted under the three headings of "life, faculties, and production." Once this is established, we can appreciate what law is and what it is intended to do. Naturally, this is where Bastiat goes next in his examination:
What, then, is law? It is the collective organization of the individual right to lawful defense. [Claude Frederic Bastiat: Excerpt from The Law (c. 1850) as quoted in a Rerum Novarum posting (circa October 3, 2002)]
Law therefore is to give an organization to society as a whole what individuals have intrinsic to them. To the extent that law achieves this, it is just. However, to the extent it fails, it is unjust. Furthermore, as Bastiat noted, these rights are not able to be separated but instead stand or fall together:
Each of us has a natural right--from God--to defend his person, his liberty, and his property. These are the three basic requirements of life, and the preservation of any one of them is completely dependent upon the preservation of the other two. For what are our faculties but the extension of our individuality? And what is property but an extension of our faculties? [Claude Frederic Bastiat: Excerpt from The Law (c. 1850) as quoted in a Rerum Novarum posting (circa October 3, 2002)]
If we recognize this right as individuals, then there is a logical extension that we must likewise note and that is the rights of people in groups to defend their rights as individuals. Or as Bastiat said it:
If every person has the right to defend -- even by force -- his person, his liberty, and his property, then it follows that a group of men have the right to organize and support a common force to protect these rights constantly. Thus the principle of collective right -- its reason for existing, its lawfulness -- is based on individual right. And the common force that protects this collective right cannot logically have any other purpose or any other mission than that for which it acts as a substitute. Thus, since an individual cannot lawfully use force against the person, liberty, or property of another individual, then the common force -- for the same reason -- cannot lawfully be used to destroy the person, liberty, or property of individuals or groups. Such a perversion of force would be, in both cases, contrary to our premise. [Claude Frederic Bastiat: Excerpt from The Law (c. 1850) as quoted in a Rerum Novarum posting (circa October 3, 2002)]
In other words, all valid and just law is based on the rights of individuals and the common force that protects society as a collective logically is limited by that which it substitutes for: the right to protect the life, faculties, and production of individuals which can also be stated as "person, liberty, and property." And as the rights so enumerated above precede law and are not delegated by law, then the common force cannot be used to destroy the right of individuals or groups anymore than an individual can. For if it could, then we would be entertaining contradiction. Bastiat noted the problems with such legal perversion in the following words:
Force has been given to us to defend our own individual rights. Who will dare to say that force has been given to us to destroy the equal rights of our brothers? Since no individual acting separately can lawfully use force to destroy the rights of others, does it not logically follow that the same principle also applies to the common force that is nothing more than the organized combination of the individual forces?
If this is true, then nothing can be more evident than this: The law is the organization of the natural right of lawful defense. It is the substitution of a common force for individual forces. And this common force is to do only what the individual forces have a natural and lawful right to do: to protect persons, liberties, and properties; to maintain the right of each, and to cause justice to reign over us all. [Claude Frederic Bastiat: Excerpt from The Law (c. 1850) as quoted in a Rerum Novarum posting (circa October 3, 2002)]
Now that we have outlined the fundamental rights of man and pointed out the logic that must accompany any valid usage of law, let us consider the "three ways" of economics starting with socialism.
Of course those familiar with Claude Frederic Bastiat know that he formulated his theory in the face of the encroaching socialism of nineteenth century France. His theory in other words does not harmonize whatsoever with socialism because the latter demeans man at all three levels: it denies him the right to his life and how he wants to live it, it seeks to hinder his faculties by imposing artificial boundaries on him, and it seeks to deny the right to property. For that reason, no more needs to be said about the "value" of socialism than that. Let us therefore consider capitalism.
Is there anything intrinsic to capitalism that hinders any of these fundamental rights??? The answer is "no" which is not the same as saying that all forms of capitalism are just. Indeed, it is possible to violate fundamental rights in a capitalist context also; however, these violations are not intrinsic to the system itself. Having noted that, let us consider "distributivism" and whether or not the same can be said about this supposed "catholic third way" of approaching economics.
To start with, the "distributivist" apologist applies a false and deceiving definition to "capitalism." While undoubtedly there are other definitions which have minor differences, the following definition (taken from an essay promoting the concept) will be used as representative of the standard view of those with that outlook. To wit:
Capitalism [is] understood as a system where a minority controls the means of production, and the majority of the dispossessed must sell their labor, because that is all that they have left. [LINK]
Notice if you will the presuppositions in the above definition which are by no means self-evident. First of all, the idea that capitalism is by necessity a system "where a minority controls the means of production" is absurd because it is by no means intrinsic to the system. There is nothing stopping people in a capitalistic society from coming together to agree to work together for the betterment of them all -getting a group together comprising of people with different degrees of knowledge, different skills, different resources, and the like. Furthermore, the notion of "means of production" as some kind of finite pie is also an assumption that is by no means proven.
The essence of capitalism is that of a system where the means of production are privately owned, operated for profit, and where various accumulation of assets are determined through a market which is called "free" meaning that buyers and sellers determine the value of an item not government. There is no requirement for the "means of production" to be limited -this presumption shows an ignorance on the part of those making the assertion of aristocracy.{3} But rather than construct a defense for capitalism, it suffices to see if distributivism can withstand the same scrutiny that capitalism can and socialism cannot. In short: is it harmonious with safeguarding the fundamental rights of man.
Now to the credit of distributivism, it does place a premium on all three rights in the abstract -it is grounded on property and this is certainly an improvement over socialism. It also endeavours to give a great impetus to cultivating the life, faculties, and production of people but the same can be said for capitalism properly understood. So let us move from the abstract and take this to reality for a moment: let us presume that we were going to implement distributivism tomorrow.
If we were to implement distributivism tomorrow, to start with, where would the property come from which we would give to others??? Land I remind you is not infinite but instead is finite. So unless we were going to put everyone on a farm,{4} that means any city dweller would have to get property that belongs to someone else. That is the problem because the moment you take away property from its owner and give it to another, there is theft and a violation of the very fundamental right to property that distributivists claim to want to promote. And as undermining one of the fundamental rights means undermining all three, distributivism is an economic approach which is intrinsically immoral.
Now I realize that distributivists would claim that they base their economic approach on the social encyclicals of various popes but unless they are going to claim that those popes advocated the amputation of reason and the forced degradation of man,{5} they would be wise to recognize the distributivist approach for what it is: an approach that however noble-sounding in theory is not capable of being implemented in reality without involving the undermining of the fundamental rights of man via a perversion of law.
Like socialism, distributivism sounds really nice in theory but would be a dehumanizing beast in application. Whatever the problems in application of capitalism are (and there are many) at the very least such problems are not intrinsic to the economic model itself.
Notes:
{1} The grounds for this are (to out it nicely) tenuous at best.
{2} All quotations from Claude Frederic Bastiat's 1850 magnum opus The Law were taken from a Rerum Novarum posting circa October 3, 2002 where they were first referenced on this humble weblog.
{3} The subject of aristocracy will be written on soon at this weblog and it is an important yet often misunderstood or overlooked component to any society.
{4} This seems to be another thing popular with the distributivist crowd: the idea of being a person of the land. What if someone does not want to be a "person of the land"??? Such advocates would seem to claim that they should be forced to in the interest of promoting their agenda and thus they would violate the right to a person's faculties or (to phrase it slightly differently) their liberty.
{5} See the quotation above from Pope Leo XIII on the subject of reason as evidence that he did not view things this way. And as he did not view reason this way; ergo his social encyclical cannot legitimately be misconstrued to do so either without again engaging in formal contradiction.
To start with, Bastiat asserted that there were three fundamental interrelated rights of man. These rights do not derive from law but instead from God. Or to quote{2} from his magnum opus The Law for a moment:
We hold from God the gift which includes all others. This gift is life -- physical, intellectual, and moral life.
But life cannot maintain itself alone. The Creator of life has entrusted us with the responsibility of preserving, developing, and perfecting it. In order that we may accomplish this, He has provided us with a collection of marvelous faculties. And He has put us in the midst of a variety of natural resources. By the application of our faculties to these natural resources we convert them into products, and use them. This process is necessary in order that life may run its appointed course.
Life, faculties, production--in other words, individuality, liberty, property -- this is man. And in spite of the cunning of artful political leaders, these three gifts from God precede all human legislation, and are superior to it.
Life, liberty, and property do not exist because men have made laws. On the contrary, it was the fact that life liberty, and property existed beforehand that caused men to make laws in the first place. [Claude Frederic Bastiat: Excerpt from The Law (c. 1850) as quoted in a Rerum Novarum posting (circa October 3, 2002)]
The above formulation as the reader can hopefully see is grounded on the principle noted by Jesus of Nazareth from the Gospel of Matthew: man is made for law and not vice versa. Bastiat goes further though and defines what man is by crystallizing specific rights which taken together embody the totality of man: his physical, intellectual, and moral existence. These are noted under the three headings of "life, faculties, and production." Once this is established, we can appreciate what law is and what it is intended to do. Naturally, this is where Bastiat goes next in his examination:
What, then, is law? It is the collective organization of the individual right to lawful defense. [Claude Frederic Bastiat: Excerpt from The Law (c. 1850) as quoted in a Rerum Novarum posting (circa October 3, 2002)]
Law therefore is to give an organization to society as a whole what individuals have intrinsic to them. To the extent that law achieves this, it is just. However, to the extent it fails, it is unjust. Furthermore, as Bastiat noted, these rights are not able to be separated but instead stand or fall together:
Each of us has a natural right--from God--to defend his person, his liberty, and his property. These are the three basic requirements of life, and the preservation of any one of them is completely dependent upon the preservation of the other two. For what are our faculties but the extension of our individuality? And what is property but an extension of our faculties? [Claude Frederic Bastiat: Excerpt from The Law (c. 1850) as quoted in a Rerum Novarum posting (circa October 3, 2002)]
If we recognize this right as individuals, then there is a logical extension that we must likewise note and that is the rights of people in groups to defend their rights as individuals. Or as Bastiat said it:
If every person has the right to defend -- even by force -- his person, his liberty, and his property, then it follows that a group of men have the right to organize and support a common force to protect these rights constantly. Thus the principle of collective right -- its reason for existing, its lawfulness -- is based on individual right. And the common force that protects this collective right cannot logically have any other purpose or any other mission than that for which it acts as a substitute. Thus, since an individual cannot lawfully use force against the person, liberty, or property of another individual, then the common force -- for the same reason -- cannot lawfully be used to destroy the person, liberty, or property of individuals or groups. Such a perversion of force would be, in both cases, contrary to our premise. [Claude Frederic Bastiat: Excerpt from The Law (c. 1850) as quoted in a Rerum Novarum posting (circa October 3, 2002)]
In other words, all valid and just law is based on the rights of individuals and the common force that protects society as a collective logically is limited by that which it substitutes for: the right to protect the life, faculties, and production of individuals which can also be stated as "person, liberty, and property." And as the rights so enumerated above precede law and are not delegated by law, then the common force cannot be used to destroy the right of individuals or groups anymore than an individual can. For if it could, then we would be entertaining contradiction. Bastiat noted the problems with such legal perversion in the following words:
Force has been given to us to defend our own individual rights. Who will dare to say that force has been given to us to destroy the equal rights of our brothers? Since no individual acting separately can lawfully use force to destroy the rights of others, does it not logically follow that the same principle also applies to the common force that is nothing more than the organized combination of the individual forces?
If this is true, then nothing can be more evident than this: The law is the organization of the natural right of lawful defense. It is the substitution of a common force for individual forces. And this common force is to do only what the individual forces have a natural and lawful right to do: to protect persons, liberties, and properties; to maintain the right of each, and to cause justice to reign over us all. [Claude Frederic Bastiat: Excerpt from The Law (c. 1850) as quoted in a Rerum Novarum posting (circa October 3, 2002)]
Now that we have outlined the fundamental rights of man and pointed out the logic that must accompany any valid usage of law, let us consider the "three ways" of economics starting with socialism.
Of course those familiar with Claude Frederic Bastiat know that he formulated his theory in the face of the encroaching socialism of nineteenth century France. His theory in other words does not harmonize whatsoever with socialism because the latter demeans man at all three levels: it denies him the right to his life and how he wants to live it, it seeks to hinder his faculties by imposing artificial boundaries on him, and it seeks to deny the right to property. For that reason, no more needs to be said about the "value" of socialism than that. Let us therefore consider capitalism.
Is there anything intrinsic to capitalism that hinders any of these fundamental rights??? The answer is "no" which is not the same as saying that all forms of capitalism are just. Indeed, it is possible to violate fundamental rights in a capitalist context also; however, these violations are not intrinsic to the system itself. Having noted that, let us consider "distributivism" and whether or not the same can be said about this supposed "catholic third way" of approaching economics.
To start with, the "distributivist" apologist applies a false and deceiving definition to "capitalism." While undoubtedly there are other definitions which have minor differences, the following definition (taken from an essay promoting the concept) will be used as representative of the standard view of those with that outlook. To wit:
Capitalism [is] understood as a system where a minority controls the means of production, and the majority of the dispossessed must sell their labor, because that is all that they have left. [LINK]
Notice if you will the presuppositions in the above definition which are by no means self-evident. First of all, the idea that capitalism is by necessity a system "where a minority controls the means of production" is absurd because it is by no means intrinsic to the system. There is nothing stopping people in a capitalistic society from coming together to agree to work together for the betterment of them all -getting a group together comprising of people with different degrees of knowledge, different skills, different resources, and the like. Furthermore, the notion of "means of production" as some kind of finite pie is also an assumption that is by no means proven.
The essence of capitalism is that of a system where the means of production are privately owned, operated for profit, and where various accumulation of assets are determined through a market which is called "free" meaning that buyers and sellers determine the value of an item not government. There is no requirement for the "means of production" to be limited -this presumption shows an ignorance on the part of those making the assertion of aristocracy.{3} But rather than construct a defense for capitalism, it suffices to see if distributivism can withstand the same scrutiny that capitalism can and socialism cannot. In short: is it harmonious with safeguarding the fundamental rights of man.
Now to the credit of distributivism, it does place a premium on all three rights in the abstract -it is grounded on property and this is certainly an improvement over socialism. It also endeavours to give a great impetus to cultivating the life, faculties, and production of people but the same can be said for capitalism properly understood. So let us move from the abstract and take this to reality for a moment: let us presume that we were going to implement distributivism tomorrow.
If we were to implement distributivism tomorrow, to start with, where would the property come from which we would give to others??? Land I remind you is not infinite but instead is finite. So unless we were going to put everyone on a farm,{4} that means any city dweller would have to get property that belongs to someone else. That is the problem because the moment you take away property from its owner and give it to another, there is theft and a violation of the very fundamental right to property that distributivists claim to want to promote. And as undermining one of the fundamental rights means undermining all three, distributivism is an economic approach which is intrinsically immoral.
Now I realize that distributivists would claim that they base their economic approach on the social encyclicals of various popes but unless they are going to claim that those popes advocated the amputation of reason and the forced degradation of man,{5} they would be wise to recognize the distributivist approach for what it is: an approach that however noble-sounding in theory is not capable of being implemented in reality without involving the undermining of the fundamental rights of man via a perversion of law.
Like socialism, distributivism sounds really nice in theory but would be a dehumanizing beast in application. Whatever the problems in application of capitalism are (and there are many) at the very least such problems are not intrinsic to the economic model itself.
Notes:
{1} The grounds for this are (to out it nicely) tenuous at best.
{2} All quotations from Claude Frederic Bastiat's 1850 magnum opus The Law were taken from a Rerum Novarum posting circa October 3, 2002 where they were first referenced on this humble weblog.
{3} The subject of aristocracy will be written on soon at this weblog and it is an important yet often misunderstood or overlooked component to any society.
{4} This seems to be another thing popular with the distributivist crowd: the idea of being a person of the land. What if someone does not want to be a "person of the land"??? Such advocates would seem to claim that they should be forced to in the interest of promoting their agenda and thus they would violate the right to a person's faculties or (to phrase it slightly differently) their liberty.
{5} See the quotation above from Pope Leo XIII on the subject of reason as evidence that he did not view things this way. And as he did not view reason this way; ergo his social encyclical cannot legitimately be misconstrued to do so either without again engaging in formal contradiction.
I recorded some audios last year which I tried to access for the next weblog posting but they are not available. This is despite Audioblogger's promise last year after they closed that feature to host the audios recorded "indefinitely", apparently "indefinitely" as a measure of time is less than a year now.
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Musings on Chris DiSomma's Birthday:
For those who do not know who Chris is/was, I recommend reviewing this thread before continuing with the post you are currently reading.
Remembering Chris (circa November 26, 2005)
I also reflected a small bit on his passing in December of last year when I found myself thinking of him again. As today would have been his birthday, I have for a week now wondered how to commemorate this occasion if at all. And frankly, I am not at my usual capacity for that so what I will do instead is post the lyrics to a song played at his memorial. But first some background on it.
This is a song I did not know was his favourite and perhaps it is a coincidence that it has been among my favourites for many years. (Chris and I never discussed this but it now seems like more than a coincidence.) Interestingly enough, while the chords of the song are not that hard, the solo is deceptive in that it sounds easier to play than it really is. And I spent no small amount of time trying to nail the guitar solo in years past but I never succeeded at it.
Maybe at some point I will figure it out if I ever take to playing the electric guitar again. But without further ado, a song that definitely described Chris' heart and to some extent, every time I hear it now I will always think of him. The song is called Simple Man:
Mama told me when I was young
Come sit beside me, my only son
And listen closely to what I say.
And if you do this
It will help you some sunny day.
Take your time... dont live too fast,
Troubles will come and they will pass.
Go find a woman and youll find love,
And dont forget son,
There is someone up above.
And be a simple kind of man.
Be something you love and understand.
Be a simple kind of man.
Wont you do this for me son,
If you can?
Forget your lust for the rich mans gold
All that you need is in your soul,
And you can do this if you try.
All that I want for you my son,
Is to be satisfied.
And be a simple kind of man.
Be something you love and understand.
Be a simple kind of man.
Wont you do this for me son,
If you can?
Boy, dont you worry... youll find yourself.
ollow you heart and nothing else.
And you can do this if you try.
All I want for you my son,
Is to be satisfied.
And be a simple kind of man.
Be something you love and understand.
Be a simple kind of man.
Wont you do this for me son,
If you can? [Ronnie Van Zant (d. 10/20/77)]
I know he can hear me and therefore I reiterate what I noted back in December:
Chris despite everything that happened between us you will always be close to my heart my friend: always. May God rest your soul until (hopefully) we meet again in a much better place.
For those who do not know who Chris is/was, I recommend reviewing this thread before continuing with the post you are currently reading.
Remembering Chris (circa November 26, 2005)
I also reflected a small bit on his passing in December of last year when I found myself thinking of him again. As today would have been his birthday, I have for a week now wondered how to commemorate this occasion if at all. And frankly, I am not at my usual capacity for that so what I will do instead is post the lyrics to a song played at his memorial. But first some background on it.
This is a song I did not know was his favourite and perhaps it is a coincidence that it has been among my favourites for many years. (Chris and I never discussed this but it now seems like more than a coincidence.) Interestingly enough, while the chords of the song are not that hard, the solo is deceptive in that it sounds easier to play than it really is. And I spent no small amount of time trying to nail the guitar solo in years past but I never succeeded at it.
Maybe at some point I will figure it out if I ever take to playing the electric guitar again. But without further ado, a song that definitely described Chris' heart and to some extent, every time I hear it now I will always think of him. The song is called Simple Man:
Mama told me when I was young
Come sit beside me, my only son
And listen closely to what I say.
And if you do this
It will help you some sunny day.
Take your time... dont live too fast,
Troubles will come and they will pass.
Go find a woman and youll find love,
And dont forget son,
There is someone up above.
And be a simple kind of man.
Be something you love and understand.
Be a simple kind of man.
Wont you do this for me son,
If you can?
Forget your lust for the rich mans gold
All that you need is in your soul,
And you can do this if you try.
All that I want for you my son,
Is to be satisfied.
And be a simple kind of man.
Be something you love and understand.
Be a simple kind of man.
Wont you do this for me son,
If you can?
Boy, dont you worry... youll find yourself.
ollow you heart and nothing else.
And you can do this if you try.
All I want for you my son,
Is to be satisfied.
And be a simple kind of man.
Be something you love and understand.
Be a simple kind of man.
Wont you do this for me son,
If you can? [Ronnie Van Zant (d. 10/20/77)]
I know he can hear me and therefore I reiterate what I noted back in December:
Chris despite everything that happened between us you will always be close to my heart my friend: always. May God rest your soul until (hopefully) we meet again in a much better place.
Monday, May 21, 2007
Sunday, May 20, 2007
Congressman Duncan Hunter, author of last year's border fence bill, reacts to this year's Senate compromise (Hugh Hewitt)
I fail to see how anyone can seriously those who talk about national security who are too obtuse to recognize that building a fence that cuts down on illegal immigration makes it harder for undesirables to get into the country via the southern border. I am at the point now where I am toying with the idea revoking the citizenship of anyone born in this country whose parents did not come into the country legally. The citizenship for such people could be restored upon their parents becoming legal citizens.
I am moving towards this position by my own admission because frankly, something needs to be done to discourage illegal immigration and amnesty will not achieve that. It did not work in 1986 when the "one time" attempt resulted in an increase of illegal immigrants and it is not going to work this time. If anything it will be significantly worse this time because rather than roughly 2.5 million illegals it will be about 12 million or more this time.
I have often referred to Santayana's dictum that "he who does not learn from history is doomed to repeat it" and it applies on this issue as much as any other. And that is the bottom line really.
I fail to see how anyone can seriously those who talk about national security who are too obtuse to recognize that building a fence that cuts down on illegal immigration makes it harder for undesirables to get into the country via the southern border. I am at the point now where I am toying with the idea revoking the citizenship of anyone born in this country whose parents did not come into the country legally. The citizenship for such people could be restored upon their parents becoming legal citizens.
I am moving towards this position by my own admission because frankly, something needs to be done to discourage illegal immigration and amnesty will not achieve that. It did not work in 1986 when the "one time" attempt resulted in an increase of illegal immigrants and it is not going to work this time. If anything it will be significantly worse this time because rather than roughly 2.5 million illegals it will be about 12 million or more this time.
I have often referred to Santayana's dictum that "he who does not learn from history is doomed to repeat it" and it applies on this issue as much as any other. And that is the bottom line really.
Saturday, May 19, 2007
To "Texas Fred" on the Realignment of His Presidential Political Allegiences:
I admittedly was wondering about your supporting of Tom Tancredo as I noted earlier in the year -viewing it as a conservative supporting another longest of long shots for the presidency. But your change to support for Fred Thompson makes me feel a lot better better. I say this out of a belief that Fred Thompson can actually win if nominated. At the moment, I am split between Duncan Hunter and Fred Thompson and favouring the the former at this time. But heck, if Fred Thompson gets the nomination he will get my vote easily. I like his tough as nails approach both in his roles on television and also in real life.
As I made clear in the aforementioned posting, I would love to see a Hunter/Thompson ticket or even a Thompson/Hunter one. Something where the candidates are solid and have either long track records of conservative voting on key issues (ala Hunter) or someone who has the right temperament and instincts from every conceivably objective form of measurement (ala Thompson). But it has to be candidates who have a realistic chance to win and by every geopolitical instinct I have Tom Tancredo does not fit that bill.
Despite the MSM playing the "Republicans are dead in 08" tune, I do not buy it -they can rise like the proverbial phoenix again. But they will not do it with Guiliani or McCain -it has to be someone who walks the walk not just talks the talk when an election is just around the corner. And it has to be someone who can actually win and frankly that is not the case with Tom Tancredo for many reasons. However, without question Fred Thompson can win and I am pleased therefore to see you throw your support behind Fred Thompson for that reason.
I admittedly was wondering about your supporting of Tom Tancredo as I noted earlier in the year -viewing it as a conservative supporting another longest of long shots for the presidency. But your change to support for Fred Thompson makes me feel a lot better better. I say this out of a belief that Fred Thompson can actually win if nominated. At the moment, I am split between Duncan Hunter and Fred Thompson and favouring the the former at this time. But heck, if Fred Thompson gets the nomination he will get my vote easily. I like his tough as nails approach both in his roles on television and also in real life.
As I made clear in the aforementioned posting, I would love to see a Hunter/Thompson ticket or even a Thompson/Hunter one. Something where the candidates are solid and have either long track records of conservative voting on key issues (ala Hunter) or someone who has the right temperament and instincts from every conceivably objective form of measurement (ala Thompson). But it has to be candidates who have a realistic chance to win and by every geopolitical instinct I have Tom Tancredo does not fit that bill.
Despite the MSM playing the "Republicans are dead in 08" tune, I do not buy it -they can rise like the proverbial phoenix again. But they will not do it with Guiliani or McCain -it has to be someone who walks the walk not just talks the talk when an election is just around the corner. And it has to be someone who can actually win and frankly that is not the case with Tom Tancredo for many reasons. However, without question Fred Thompson can win and I am pleased therefore to see you throw your support behind Fred Thompson for that reason.
Thursday, May 17, 2007
"Tales From the Crypt Mailbag" Dept.
Unlike a lot of people, your host rarely likes to post laudatory emails he receives because it gives the appearance of tooting our own horn. A general principle we follow in this area is to do so only when it provides the opportunity to clarify something about our methodology, our foundational presuppositions, or something along those lines. When this is possible, it can serve to give the reader a bit of a glimpse into how we approach subjects in general. With that in mind, the following email will provide an opportunity to do that so without further ado...
Dear Shawn,
I have read your website "Rerum Novarum" for a year or so and wanted to thank you profusely for your hard work and thoughtful analysis. I do not agree with everything you write, but I admire your willingness to look at matters objectively and come to your own conclusions.
We live in a divisive 24/7 media culture and the perception has been created that one cannot have principled disagreements with someone else on issues without one side being somehow degraded. Obviously I have a passion for many issues but I am nonetheless aware that there are people who disagree with me on some/many/most/all things. I do not lose sleep over this because of a belief I have that ultimately what is true will have lasting efficacy and what is false will not. As far as objectivity goes, it is appreciated when others realize that there is a conscious striving for that to the fullest extent possible here at Rerum Novarum. As far as not agreeing with everything written on this weblog, heck this writer does not agree with everything on this weblog which while it may sound strange to read nonetheless is true for reasons to be noted in a footnote.{1}
It is also worth noting even if in brief that if someone agrees with another person all the time, then only one person is doing the thinking. There should be divergences in spots even amongst positional allies and I have noted on occasions in the past that I do not expect people to accept my view on anything uncritically. More on this in a moment.
I especially respect the way you have addressed the "Apologetics Oligarchy" that seems to be present on the internet. First off, let me say that I am strictly a lurker in comboxes and blogs. I have never gotten in any discussion or argument in any of them, to my knowledge.
There is nothing wrong with that as far as I am concerned -indeed my own view of comments boxes as a whole is not a flattering one.{2}
I also have attempted to avoid reading much on blogs because I think it a waste of my time, and I tend to get worked up when I do so. This especially happens whenever I read Mark Shea's website.
Considering the kind of agitprop he has with an increasing frequency engaged in, that is not a surprise.
I am very glad you have addressed Mr. Shea's actions on his blog and throughout the blogosphere. Even before Mr. Shea focused on torture, the war in Iraq, and the present administration, I was troubled by the tone of his website, and his tendency to jump to snap judgments. Believe me, I am no supporter of the homosexual agenda, but I found the constant banner "Gay Brownshirts on the March" to be in poor taste.
What motivates me on this as with anything else is principles. Unfortunately, it is sadly evident that too many others who should care about these things do not. I reiterate something I have said many times before and it is this:
--A given viewpoint or position is not right or wrong (or to be perceived as "acceptable" or "unacceptable") on the basis of who holds or espouses a particular view or position. Rather, something is right or wrong on the basis of objective evidences or what can also be called non-normative criteria.
In a nutshell, it is failure to recognize this principle which explains a lot of the hypocrisy and double standards we are seeing -the fallacious provincialism{3} in these people's approach is both undeniable as well as profoundly disturbing (to put it mildly).
I have been very troubled by the tendency among Catholics, lay and clerical, to transform matters on which Catholics may disagree in good faith into pseudu-magisterial teaching. I cannot tell you how many times I have heard the argument: conservatives may be against abortion, but because they are wrong on the other "life" issues (capital punishment, welfare, immigration), it is acceptable to vote for "pro-choice" candidates. That Mr. Shea and others against this war use the same fallacious arguments to justify their vilification of those who disagree with them regarding this war and torture is, for me, the "unkindest cut of all."
I have noted a few times now that these "apologist" sorts are often intellectually dependent and demonstrate serious problems in exercising the thinking mechanism. The examples you note above only touch on the tip of the iceberg but they are by no means insignificant. (Nice use of Shakespeare by the way.)
I must say, I am especially grateful that you systematically addressed the issue of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Prior to reading your postings, I assumed that the bombings were per se immoral under just war principles because they involved deliberately targeting a civilian population. I assumed that the only justification for the bombing was a utilitarian one. I am not by any means convinced that your position is correct, but I certainly appreciate your reasoning.
Now it seems appropriate to outline what the view of this writer is on agreements and disagreements in more detail by citing a rare gem of sorts which we wrote in a weblog update.{4} Without further ado:
We at Rerum Novarum tend to irritate pundits, agenda provocateurs, and apologists of various stripes because of an inherent refusal on our part to accept uncritically any position whatsoever. And in doing this, there is consistency on our part because when the present writer takes the time to set down a position, he expect those who are genuinely interested in ideas to weigh the position set forth by objective criteria and nothing else.
Unlike the lions share of people from various outlooks who set forth opinions in the public square, the present writer does not expect anyone to accept any of his statements as some kind of arbitrary out of context injunction simply because he says it. This would base the veracity or lack thereof of his statements on a subjectivist context and would imply that truth does not objectively exist.
If you learn to think in principles you learn to think logically. Principles make thinking a lot easier and one of the goals of your host is to focus as much on principles themselves and in how those principles are to be fruitfully applied. For that reason, we will continue to press certain parties who do not seem concerned with principles and logic -either wholly or on arbitrary subject matters- to reconsider their positions. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa December 30, 2006)]
I am sure that I owe some debt to the late Mike Mentzer (RIP) for some of the phrasing in the above paragraph as essentially I was synthesizing and expounding on a principle he made more than once in his writings: the principle of what determines the truth or falsity of a statement.
Basically, as long as someone is willing to consider a position on its merits, that is all anyone could ask for. And contrary to what some may perceive, that has been the motivating factor for why I have slapped down some of the people who have taken issue with me on that subject. Others who have disagreed with me and sought to make actual arguments for their positions which are grounded in reason and logic while seeking to implement moral and ethical principles have not seen me treat them with anything but courtesy.{5}
However, there is something wrong with the environment when these self-anointed "apologists" cannot discuss these matters calmly and rationally but instead play the agitprop card in a fashion that would make any marxist proud. That is what I have addressed to members of the apologetics oligarchy in the past{6} and they are not in the slightest bit interested in seeing these problems corrected. Now that I am aware in some cases of a $$$ connection{7}, it makes a lot more sense as to why so many of them are "backbone-challenged" (to put it nicely). However, as there are others who do not have that connection who act the same way, it is frankly not as easy a puzzle to unravel and still try and give a charitable interpretation to how they approach these matters.
Perhaps most importantly, I value your dedication to extending Christian charity to those who disagree to you. You are an excellent example for the rest of Catholics on cyberspace.
Well, I do what I can -not always gracefully by my own admission but on the whole I believe I do a lot better than most.
This email has become longer than I intended. I hope to drop you a line in the near future asking you a few questions about magisterial teaching and how specific it needs to be in order to make a particular position normative. I will leave that for a later day.
Feel free to drop a line anytime. Thanks for the email and the opportunity to clarify some points which can at times get overlooked by those more interested in polemics than in truth.
Notes:
{1} There are "points to ponder" installments which encompass viewpoints your blog host does not agree with. There is also the "guest editorial" feature and someone need not agree with the webmaster to post an editorial here as long as (i) it is reasonably written, (ii) is thought-provoking, (iii) it shows a basic grasp of a diverse expression of vocabulary, and (iv) it is a subject that interests the webmaster. Beyond that, anything is fair game really.
{2} Revisiting the Comments Box Subject Again (circa January 26, 2007)
{3} On the Argumentation Fallacy of Provincialism--An Audio Post (circa May 8, 2005)
{4} I said "a rare gem" because as a rule, weblog updates are not places where I expound on points anymore than is necessary to note reasons for adding certain links to the side margin and removing other ones, etc.
{5} This did not go reported by me at the time because I had already discussed these matters enough at that time (read: late summer 2005) to not want to go into it yet again. However, there are some dialogues in the archives of one of my email accounts which I may in the future utilize in some form or another. (If I even bother to delve into these subjects again that is.)
{6} If I have a burr under [my] saddle on anything Jimmy it is (i) the complete lack of sound thinking that permeates Catholic circles on these subjects and (ii) the way Greg and I have been treated by members of the apologetics oligarchy when discussing this subject. I am also aware that if an opinion is reiterated enough, many people will accept it as correct even if it is not. The latter is human nature sadly whereas the former is something that should be of concern to those who believe that Catholics have important contributions to make to the arena of ideas. There are serious problems here which too many want to pretend do not exist which I have noted in past public postings on this subject matter. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa November 28, 2006)]
{7} Previously I had my suspicions in this area but in recent months, there has been confirmation of at least one significant example of the apologetics oligarchy selling truth down the river for $$$. I do not want to go into it right now but suffice to say, my disgust at the moneychangers has deepened as has my disappointment at the lack of a backbone by many who claim to care about apologetics who are not willing to speak up about these problems. (Preferring instead to stick their heads in the sand and pretend these problems are "no big deal.")
Unlike a lot of people, your host rarely likes to post laudatory emails he receives because it gives the appearance of tooting our own horn. A general principle we follow in this area is to do so only when it provides the opportunity to clarify something about our methodology, our foundational presuppositions, or something along those lines. When this is possible, it can serve to give the reader a bit of a glimpse into how we approach subjects in general. With that in mind, the following email will provide an opportunity to do that so without further ado...
Dear Shawn,
I have read your website "Rerum Novarum" for a year or so and wanted to thank you profusely for your hard work and thoughtful analysis. I do not agree with everything you write, but I admire your willingness to look at matters objectively and come to your own conclusions.
We live in a divisive 24/7 media culture and the perception has been created that one cannot have principled disagreements with someone else on issues without one side being somehow degraded. Obviously I have a passion for many issues but I am nonetheless aware that there are people who disagree with me on some/many/most/all things. I do not lose sleep over this because of a belief I have that ultimately what is true will have lasting efficacy and what is false will not. As far as objectivity goes, it is appreciated when others realize that there is a conscious striving for that to the fullest extent possible here at Rerum Novarum. As far as not agreeing with everything written on this weblog, heck this writer does not agree with everything on this weblog which while it may sound strange to read nonetheless is true for reasons to be noted in a footnote.{1}
It is also worth noting even if in brief that if someone agrees with another person all the time, then only one person is doing the thinking. There should be divergences in spots even amongst positional allies and I have noted on occasions in the past that I do not expect people to accept my view on anything uncritically. More on this in a moment.
I especially respect the way you have addressed the "Apologetics Oligarchy" that seems to be present on the internet. First off, let me say that I am strictly a lurker in comboxes and blogs. I have never gotten in any discussion or argument in any of them, to my knowledge.
There is nothing wrong with that as far as I am concerned -indeed my own view of comments boxes as a whole is not a flattering one.{2}
I also have attempted to avoid reading much on blogs because I think it a waste of my time, and I tend to get worked up when I do so. This especially happens whenever I read Mark Shea's website.
Considering the kind of agitprop he has with an increasing frequency engaged in, that is not a surprise.
I am very glad you have addressed Mr. Shea's actions on his blog and throughout the blogosphere. Even before Mr. Shea focused on torture, the war in Iraq, and the present administration, I was troubled by the tone of his website, and his tendency to jump to snap judgments. Believe me, I am no supporter of the homosexual agenda, but I found the constant banner "Gay Brownshirts on the March" to be in poor taste.
What motivates me on this as with anything else is principles. Unfortunately, it is sadly evident that too many others who should care about these things do not. I reiterate something I have said many times before and it is this:
--A given viewpoint or position is not right or wrong (or to be perceived as "acceptable" or "unacceptable") on the basis of who holds or espouses a particular view or position. Rather, something is right or wrong on the basis of objective evidences or what can also be called non-normative criteria.
In a nutshell, it is failure to recognize this principle which explains a lot of the hypocrisy and double standards we are seeing -the fallacious provincialism{3} in these people's approach is both undeniable as well as profoundly disturbing (to put it mildly).
I have been very troubled by the tendency among Catholics, lay and clerical, to transform matters on which Catholics may disagree in good faith into pseudu-magisterial teaching. I cannot tell you how many times I have heard the argument: conservatives may be against abortion, but because they are wrong on the other "life" issues (capital punishment, welfare, immigration), it is acceptable to vote for "pro-choice" candidates. That Mr. Shea and others against this war use the same fallacious arguments to justify their vilification of those who disagree with them regarding this war and torture is, for me, the "unkindest cut of all."
I have noted a few times now that these "apologist" sorts are often intellectually dependent and demonstrate serious problems in exercising the thinking mechanism. The examples you note above only touch on the tip of the iceberg but they are by no means insignificant. (Nice use of Shakespeare by the way.)
I must say, I am especially grateful that you systematically addressed the issue of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Prior to reading your postings, I assumed that the bombings were per se immoral under just war principles because they involved deliberately targeting a civilian population. I assumed that the only justification for the bombing was a utilitarian one. I am not by any means convinced that your position is correct, but I certainly appreciate your reasoning.
Now it seems appropriate to outline what the view of this writer is on agreements and disagreements in more detail by citing a rare gem of sorts which we wrote in a weblog update.{4} Without further ado:
We at Rerum Novarum tend to irritate pundits, agenda provocateurs, and apologists of various stripes because of an inherent refusal on our part to accept uncritically any position whatsoever. And in doing this, there is consistency on our part because when the present writer takes the time to set down a position, he expect those who are genuinely interested in ideas to weigh the position set forth by objective criteria and nothing else.
Unlike the lions share of people from various outlooks who set forth opinions in the public square, the present writer does not expect anyone to accept any of his statements as some kind of arbitrary out of context injunction simply because he says it. This would base the veracity or lack thereof of his statements on a subjectivist context and would imply that truth does not objectively exist.
If you learn to think in principles you learn to think logically. Principles make thinking a lot easier and one of the goals of your host is to focus as much on principles themselves and in how those principles are to be fruitfully applied. For that reason, we will continue to press certain parties who do not seem concerned with principles and logic -either wholly or on arbitrary subject matters- to reconsider their positions. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa December 30, 2006)]
I am sure that I owe some debt to the late Mike Mentzer (RIP) for some of the phrasing in the above paragraph as essentially I was synthesizing and expounding on a principle he made more than once in his writings: the principle of what determines the truth or falsity of a statement.
Basically, as long as someone is willing to consider a position on its merits, that is all anyone could ask for. And contrary to what some may perceive, that has been the motivating factor for why I have slapped down some of the people who have taken issue with me on that subject. Others who have disagreed with me and sought to make actual arguments for their positions which are grounded in reason and logic while seeking to implement moral and ethical principles have not seen me treat them with anything but courtesy.{5}
However, there is something wrong with the environment when these self-anointed "apologists" cannot discuss these matters calmly and rationally but instead play the agitprop card in a fashion that would make any marxist proud. That is what I have addressed to members of the apologetics oligarchy in the past{6} and they are not in the slightest bit interested in seeing these problems corrected. Now that I am aware in some cases of a $$$ connection{7}, it makes a lot more sense as to why so many of them are "backbone-challenged" (to put it nicely). However, as there are others who do not have that connection who act the same way, it is frankly not as easy a puzzle to unravel and still try and give a charitable interpretation to how they approach these matters.
Perhaps most importantly, I value your dedication to extending Christian charity to those who disagree to you. You are an excellent example for the rest of Catholics on cyberspace.
Well, I do what I can -not always gracefully by my own admission but on the whole I believe I do a lot better than most.
This email has become longer than I intended. I hope to drop you a line in the near future asking you a few questions about magisterial teaching and how specific it needs to be in order to make a particular position normative. I will leave that for a later day.
Feel free to drop a line anytime. Thanks for the email and the opportunity to clarify some points which can at times get overlooked by those more interested in polemics than in truth.
Notes:
{1} There are "points to ponder" installments which encompass viewpoints your blog host does not agree with. There is also the "guest editorial" feature and someone need not agree with the webmaster to post an editorial here as long as (i) it is reasonably written, (ii) is thought-provoking, (iii) it shows a basic grasp of a diverse expression of vocabulary, and (iv) it is a subject that interests the webmaster. Beyond that, anything is fair game really.
{2} Revisiting the Comments Box Subject Again (circa January 26, 2007)
{3} On the Argumentation Fallacy of Provincialism--An Audio Post (circa May 8, 2005)
{4} I said "a rare gem" because as a rule, weblog updates are not places where I expound on points anymore than is necessary to note reasons for adding certain links to the side margin and removing other ones, etc.
{5} This did not go reported by me at the time because I had already discussed these matters enough at that time (read: late summer 2005) to not want to go into it yet again. However, there are some dialogues in the archives of one of my email accounts which I may in the future utilize in some form or another. (If I even bother to delve into these subjects again that is.)
{6} If I have a burr under [my] saddle on anything Jimmy it is (i) the complete lack of sound thinking that permeates Catholic circles on these subjects and (ii) the way Greg and I have been treated by members of the apologetics oligarchy when discussing this subject. I am also aware that if an opinion is reiterated enough, many people will accept it as correct even if it is not. The latter is human nature sadly whereas the former is something that should be of concern to those who believe that Catholics have important contributions to make to the arena of ideas. There are serious problems here which too many want to pretend do not exist which I have noted in past public postings on this subject matter. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa November 28, 2006)]
{7} Previously I had my suspicions in this area but in recent months, there has been confirmation of at least one significant example of the apologetics oligarchy selling truth down the river for $$$. I do not want to go into it right now but suffice to say, my disgust at the moneychangers has deepened as has my disappointment at the lack of a backbone by many who claim to care about apologetics who are not willing to speak up about these problems. (Preferring instead to stick their heads in the sand and pretend these problems are "no big deal.")
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
WWTD? Who Cares? (Jonah Goldberg)
Basically, Mr. Goldberg takes issue with the approach to geopolitics as espoused by a certain Republican named Ron Paul running for president. This part summarizes well the gist of the article:
[I]s it really so compelling to say that American foreign policy in the 1930s was America’s finest hour?
The luxury of this stance derives from the fact that Paul can say every foreign policy problem is fruit from the poisoned tree. He can stand outside reality like a contrafactual sci-fi writer, saying that if we only had taken a different fork in the road everything would be fine. I don’t buy that. But even if he were right, that ship has sailed (to horribly mangle a metaphor). Declaring in 2007 that we should adopt Robert Taft’s foreign policy is flatly childish and absurd. But it’s intellectually safe because it forces the opposition to prove a negative.
Those who wonder why your host manifested the intention to write on a significant imbalance in politics today and propose a remedy for the common problems inherent in the political approaches of both major parties{1} last month now understand part of the reason why we will be doing that. The problem is that anyone can be a critic -that is why President Theodore Roosevelt once noted that it is the one in the arena who deserves the credit, not critics.{2} And those who cannot propose a viable alternative to what they are critical of are not deserving of serious consideration by anyone with a normal intact functioning brain. And that is the bottom line really.
Notes:
{1} [I]t seems appropriate to write as time allows on some of the systems and principles that shaped the outlooks of the Founding Fathers of the United States.[...] Part of the reason for this decision is because there is a significant imbalance in politics today and we want to propose a remedy for the common problems inherent in the political approaches of both major parties. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa April 17, 2007)]
{2} For the full quote from Theodore Roosevelt which is paraphrased above, see the Rerum Novarum "points to ponder" installment circa March 17, 2007.
Basically, Mr. Goldberg takes issue with the approach to geopolitics as espoused by a certain Republican named Ron Paul running for president. This part summarizes well the gist of the article:
[I]s it really so compelling to say that American foreign policy in the 1930s was America’s finest hour?
The luxury of this stance derives from the fact that Paul can say every foreign policy problem is fruit from the poisoned tree. He can stand outside reality like a contrafactual sci-fi writer, saying that if we only had taken a different fork in the road everything would be fine. I don’t buy that. But even if he were right, that ship has sailed (to horribly mangle a metaphor). Declaring in 2007 that we should adopt Robert Taft’s foreign policy is flatly childish and absurd. But it’s intellectually safe because it forces the opposition to prove a negative.
Those who wonder why your host manifested the intention to write on a significant imbalance in politics today and propose a remedy for the common problems inherent in the political approaches of both major parties{1} last month now understand part of the reason why we will be doing that. The problem is that anyone can be a critic -that is why President Theodore Roosevelt once noted that it is the one in the arena who deserves the credit, not critics.{2} And those who cannot propose a viable alternative to what they are critical of are not deserving of serious consideration by anyone with a normal intact functioning brain. And that is the bottom line really.
Notes:
{1} [I]t seems appropriate to write as time allows on some of the systems and principles that shaped the outlooks of the Founding Fathers of the United States.[...] Part of the reason for this decision is because there is a significant imbalance in politics today and we want to propose a remedy for the common problems inherent in the political approaches of both major parties. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa April 17, 2007)]
{2} For the full quote from Theodore Roosevelt which is paraphrased above, see the Rerum Novarum "points to ponder" installment circa March 17, 2007.
Tuesday, May 15, 2007
Points to Ponder:
In our milieu it is often assumed that "factual" simply means "true," and that "facts speak for themselves." But facts seldom do. Our convictions do not arise from facts alone but always from some whole, some picture that we compose from these smaller pieces of information. [Professor Lessl]
In our milieu it is often assumed that "factual" simply means "true," and that "facts speak for themselves." But facts seldom do. Our convictions do not arise from facts alone but always from some whole, some picture that we compose from these smaller pieces of information. [Professor Lessl]
On Some Upcoming Post Subjects and Weblog Formatting:(Musings of your humble servant at Rerum Novarum)
[Update: This posting was just revised a bit to reflect some recategorizations and additional primary categories being added to insure that (to our knowledge) none of the primary categories contain any overlapping of one another. -ISM 5/16/07 7:51pm]
[Update: For easier reading, this posting was further revised and one of the footnotes incorporated into the text along with some new material explaining the reason for one of the primary categories which on the surface would seem an odd addition to any weblog restructuring. -ISM 5/17/07 10:30am]
It was noted last month that your host planned to write on the Founding Fathers, some of the principles and systems that shaped their outlook, and also to point out what he believes is a serious problem of imbalance in the modern political climate.{1} That intention is being worked through bit by bit as we have both time to and also are in the mood to write on that subject.
On another front, your host informed the readers of the arduous task of tagging the posts in our massive archive late last month.{2} The good news is that we figured out a couple more short cuts since writing on that matter last -mainly through finding some natural categorizations in the archives in the process. So while the weblog probably will not be close to fully and thoroughly archived until summertime but as it is, the entire weblog has been given a preliminary go-through. While still far from complete, it can now be said that nearly 100% of the posts to this weblog can be broken down into eighteen non-overlapping primary categories. These categories are as follows -with a brief explanation of each:
--Points to Ponder: Posted tidbits from various sources (including sometimes tidbits written by your host) intended to cultivate the reader's pondering capacities. As of the next posting, there will be 310 installments in the "points to ponder" feature of this weblog.
--Expository Musings: These are threads which are as a rule of a longer and/or more detailed nature generally. However, sometimes there are threads so categorized which are not per se that long but may have taken more time to refine into the shape in which they were blogged than other postings of a similar length or for some other reason were categorized in this format. As of today (and including this posting) there are 370 posts tagged with this label including multi-parts of material in a series format. Among the audio posts, the longer and/or more detailed of them are tagged with this label though some of the others will have to be listened to as time allows for it to see if they should be classified here or not.
--Dialogues/Mailbag Discussions: These are threads posted in a dialogual format which could be derived from various sources. As of today, there are 293 posts tagged with this label.
--Miscellaneous Threads/Briefer Musings: These are generally threads which contain various forms of briefer musings. Among the posts so labeled are various "miscellaneous threads" postings, the shorter or briefer audio posts{3}, etc. This is basically the defacto primary category for any posting unless it is clear that for some reason or another there is not a proper fit. That makes this the largest of the categories by default and thus there are as of this writing 696 of these kinds of postings tagged at this humble weblog.
--Stray Links of Interest: Exactly what it says. As of today, there are 179 posts which involve just stray links on various subjects or links with very little commentary on our part.
--Guest Editorials: These are editorials submitted by others which were posted to this weblog. As of today there are 29 of them posted -though before the end of the week there will be another one posted time-willing.{4}
--Spiritual Instruction: These are postings dealing with facets of spirituality. As of today, there are 39 of them posted.
Taken together, one of the above seven categories is tagged on almost 90% of all postings to this weblog. But those are not the only primary categories we have utilized -indeed the next nine comprise roughly the remaining 10% of the weblog's postings:
--Lyrics/Poetry/Haikus: These are postings which chiefly involve one or more of the subjects in the tagline. There is currently 28 of those postings to this weblog.
--Lyrics/Poetry/Haikus/Plus Musings: These are postings which involve either lyrics, poetry, or haikus but also have some brief musings by your weblog host. There are 11 of these posted to the present weblog.
--Personal: These are postings of a more personal nature. As of today there are 48 of them.
--Personal Musings: These are postings containing musings of a more personal nature. As of today there are 18 of these.
--Humour/Parody/Satire: Self explanatory. There are 13 of these in the archives.
--Humour/Parody/Satire/Plus Musings: Also self-explanatory as these contain the same as the previous category but also some brief musings by your weblog host. There are 8 of these in the archives.
-- Excerpts from Literature/Writings: These are postings which contain excerpts from either literature or from various writings. There are 12 of them in the archives of this weblog as of today.
--Quizzes: Basically as a temporary diversion the occasional online "quiz" has been taken. As of today, there are 42 of them posted to this weblog -the last one from January of 2006.
--Weblog Maintenance/Updates: Self-explanatory. There are 34 of these tagged in the archives.
--Weblog Maintenance/Updates/Plus Musings: Likewise self-explanatory. There are 14 of these in the archives.
--Archivally Obsolete/Duplicate Post/Minutiae: Basically postings which fit one or more of the criteria noted in the tagline for some reason or another. As of today, there are 32 of them though in a testament to this weblog's focus on perennial relevance as well as quality over time, 26 of those postings were in 2002 and 5 were in the first couple months of 2003. As this latter category may appear to be an odd one to include, your host wants to explain briefly the reasons why before wrapping up this posting.
Essentially, we would be less than fully honest if we did not admit that there are some postings in the archive which we do not find to be of value anymore for a variety of reasons which we are not going to delve into at the moment{6} except to note one significant reason which went into this determination.
For you see, your host has refused to purge his archives of stuff which in retrospect he regrets posting. Part of the reason for this is principles as we have been critical of others for trying to airbrush the historical record at their own sites to avoid telling the truth about their past actions or statements in a given point of time. But another reason is that life itself is a process of growth and development across a broad continuum. This includes weblog writing and interests.
We have no problem admitting that it took a bit of time before this weblog really started to take a discernible shape and some of the features and/or principles which have become standard or typical over time were in the "finding their feet" stage early on. The posts noted in the "archivally obsolete/duplicate posting/minutiae" category may also have been a localized kind of project which either was left incomplete due to time or interest factors or which was of a limited applicability back before your host sought to as much as possible make this weblog's contents have both a timeless and general applicability and also a particular circumstantial one.{7} But that is all that this writer intends to say on the matter at the present time except to say that yes, we have even categorized the obsolete or otherwise no-longer-of-any-real-value chaff from the archives.
Taken together, the eighteen categories above comprise by our count 100% of all posts to this weblog as primary categorizations. But besides those primary categories, there are also various additional tags including the following which will at some point be added as applicable to all the various postings on this weblog to which they can be ascertained to apply:
--Beer/Wine/Various Spirits
--Capitalism/Commerce/Economics/Trade
--Culture War
--Excerpts from Literature/Writings
--Gerard Serafin (RIP)
--Immigration
--Mainstream Media (MSM)
--Mea Culpa
--Perversion of Law/Government Theft
--Politics/Elections/Sociological/Geopolitical
--President George W. Bush
--President Ronald Reagan
--Reviews
--Sports
--The Blues
--The Fundamental Rights of Man
--US Constitution/Founding Fathers/Federalist Papers
--War in General/War on Terror/War in Iraq
There will undoubtedly be other secondary categories which are derived as needed as well{8} but at the moment, those are the ones that have been found to be most useful. Anyway, that is what has been done as there has been time here and there. Oh and as we noted last month, there is no anticipation on our part that we will be done with this until some time in the summer at the earliest. The end result will be to make it a lot easier to find things on our part and also for the readers who are interested in perusing nearly five years of blog archives since we undertook this "new thing" (Lat. Rerum Novarum) back in August of 2002.
Notes:
{1} [I]t seems appropriate to write as time allows on some of the systems and principles that shaped the outlooks of the Founding Fathers of the United States.[...] Part of the reason for this decision is because there is a significant imbalance in politics today and we want to propose a remedy for the common problems inherent in the political approaches of both major parties. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa April 17, 2007)]
{2} Readers of this humble weblog may have noticed the labels on the bottom of the page of many of the blog posts. I have been in recent weeks taking a few minutes here and there and adding labels to various posts by subject. This is an arduous process but thankfully, I know some shortcuts that have enabled me to get a significant jump on it.[...] ... Suffice to say, this will take a while and when the project is completed, I will be able to significantly reduce the number of links in the side margin of my weblog and post there only the categories themselves whatever the total number of them ends up being. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa April 28, 2007)]
{3} Some audioposts we know are of an expository nature as that was how they were titled after they were recorded or in the recordings themselves. As for the rest, they may be reclassified from this format to another after we have had the opportunity to listen to them anew and determine where they should be placed. (Until we know for sure, if it appears that they were of a "briefer musing" styling, that is where they will be placed.)
{4} We say "time willing" because while we do not write the editorials, we do format them for posting and that does take time on our part to do.
{5} Originally we noted exceptions in this footnote but we are not aware of any as of this post revision.
{6} A few come to mind offhand including (i) because they focused discussion on areas we are not interested anymore in dealing with, (ii) they may have been a near duplicate of a previous posting which may have had a technical glitch in it at the time which was subsequently corrected, or (iii) they simply may have been a kind of inside joke between a couple of people at the time which a casual reader would not get.
{7} This was as much an intuitive decision as a purely rational one so it would not be fair to say it was part of a well-organized plan.
{8} A few that come to mind are the subjects of theology and some equivalent category or categories covering the areas of philosophy, ethics, reason, and logic.
[Update: This posting was just revised a bit to reflect some recategorizations and additional primary categories being added to insure that (to our knowledge) none of the primary categories contain any overlapping of one another. -ISM 5/16/07 7:51pm]
[Update: For easier reading, this posting was further revised and one of the footnotes incorporated into the text along with some new material explaining the reason for one of the primary categories which on the surface would seem an odd addition to any weblog restructuring. -ISM 5/17/07 10:30am]
It was noted last month that your host planned to write on the Founding Fathers, some of the principles and systems that shaped their outlook, and also to point out what he believes is a serious problem of imbalance in the modern political climate.{1} That intention is being worked through bit by bit as we have both time to and also are in the mood to write on that subject.
On another front, your host informed the readers of the arduous task of tagging the posts in our massive archive late last month.{2} The good news is that we figured out a couple more short cuts since writing on that matter last -mainly through finding some natural categorizations in the archives in the process. So while the weblog probably will not be close to fully and thoroughly archived until summertime but as it is, the entire weblog has been given a preliminary go-through. While still far from complete, it can now be said that nearly 100% of the posts to this weblog can be broken down into eighteen non-overlapping primary categories. These categories are as follows -with a brief explanation of each:
--Points to Ponder: Posted tidbits from various sources (including sometimes tidbits written by your host) intended to cultivate the reader's pondering capacities. As of the next posting, there will be 310 installments in the "points to ponder" feature of this weblog.
--Expository Musings: These are threads which are as a rule of a longer and/or more detailed nature generally. However, sometimes there are threads so categorized which are not per se that long but may have taken more time to refine into the shape in which they were blogged than other postings of a similar length or for some other reason were categorized in this format. As of today (and including this posting) there are 370 posts tagged with this label including multi-parts of material in a series format. Among the audio posts, the longer and/or more detailed of them are tagged with this label though some of the others will have to be listened to as time allows for it to see if they should be classified here or not.
--Dialogues/Mailbag Discussions: These are threads posted in a dialogual format which could be derived from various sources. As of today, there are 293 posts tagged with this label.
--Miscellaneous Threads/Briefer Musings: These are generally threads which contain various forms of briefer musings. Among the posts so labeled are various "miscellaneous threads" postings, the shorter or briefer audio posts{3}, etc. This is basically the defacto primary category for any posting unless it is clear that for some reason or another there is not a proper fit. That makes this the largest of the categories by default and thus there are as of this writing 696 of these kinds of postings tagged at this humble weblog.
--Stray Links of Interest: Exactly what it says. As of today, there are 179 posts which involve just stray links on various subjects or links with very little commentary on our part.
--Guest Editorials: These are editorials submitted by others which were posted to this weblog. As of today there are 29 of them posted -though before the end of the week there will be another one posted time-willing.{4}
--Spiritual Instruction: These are postings dealing with facets of spirituality. As of today, there are 39 of them posted.
Taken together, one of the above seven categories is tagged on almost 90% of all postings to this weblog. But those are not the only primary categories we have utilized -indeed the next nine comprise roughly the remaining 10% of the weblog's postings:
--Lyrics/Poetry/Haikus: These are postings which chiefly involve one or more of the subjects in the tagline. There is currently 28 of those postings to this weblog.
--Lyrics/Poetry/Haikus/Plus Musings: These are postings which involve either lyrics, poetry, or haikus but also have some brief musings by your weblog host. There are 11 of these posted to the present weblog.
--Personal: These are postings of a more personal nature. As of today there are 48 of them.
--Personal Musings: These are postings containing musings of a more personal nature. As of today there are 18 of these.
--Humour/Parody/Satire: Self explanatory. There are 13 of these in the archives.
--Humour/Parody/Satire/Plus Musings: Also self-explanatory as these contain the same as the previous category but also some brief musings by your weblog host. There are 8 of these in the archives.
-- Excerpts from Literature/Writings: These are postings which contain excerpts from either literature or from various writings. There are 12 of them in the archives of this weblog as of today.
--Quizzes: Basically as a temporary diversion the occasional online "quiz" has been taken. As of today, there are 42 of them posted to this weblog -the last one from January of 2006.
--Weblog Maintenance/Updates: Self-explanatory. There are 34 of these tagged in the archives.
--Weblog Maintenance/Updates/Plus Musings: Likewise self-explanatory. There are 14 of these in the archives.
--Archivally Obsolete/Duplicate Post/Minutiae: Basically postings which fit one or more of the criteria noted in the tagline for some reason or another. As of today, there are 32 of them though in a testament to this weblog's focus on perennial relevance as well as quality over time, 26 of those postings were in 2002 and 5 were in the first couple months of 2003. As this latter category may appear to be an odd one to include, your host wants to explain briefly the reasons why before wrapping up this posting.
Essentially, we would be less than fully honest if we did not admit that there are some postings in the archive which we do not find to be of value anymore for a variety of reasons which we are not going to delve into at the moment{6} except to note one significant reason which went into this determination.
For you see, your host has refused to purge his archives of stuff which in retrospect he regrets posting. Part of the reason for this is principles as we have been critical of others for trying to airbrush the historical record at their own sites to avoid telling the truth about their past actions or statements in a given point of time. But another reason is that life itself is a process of growth and development across a broad continuum. This includes weblog writing and interests.
We have no problem admitting that it took a bit of time before this weblog really started to take a discernible shape and some of the features and/or principles which have become standard or typical over time were in the "finding their feet" stage early on. The posts noted in the "archivally obsolete/duplicate posting/minutiae" category may also have been a localized kind of project which either was left incomplete due to time or interest factors or which was of a limited applicability back before your host sought to as much as possible make this weblog's contents have both a timeless and general applicability and also a particular circumstantial one.{7} But that is all that this writer intends to say on the matter at the present time except to say that yes, we have even categorized the obsolete or otherwise no-longer-of-any-real-value chaff from the archives.
Taken together, the eighteen categories above comprise by our count 100% of all posts to this weblog as primary categorizations. But besides those primary categories, there are also various additional tags including the following which will at some point be added as applicable to all the various postings on this weblog to which they can be ascertained to apply:
--Beer/Wine/Various Spirits
--Capitalism/Commerce/Economics/Trade
--Culture War
--Excerpts from Literature/Writings
--Gerard Serafin (RIP)
--Immigration
--Mainstream Media (MSM)
--Mea Culpa
--Perversion of Law/Government Theft
--Politics/Elections/Sociological/Geopolitical
--President George W. Bush
--President Ronald Reagan
--Reviews
--Sports
--The Blues
--The Fundamental Rights of Man
--US Constitution/Founding Fathers/Federalist Papers
--War in General/War on Terror/War in Iraq
There will undoubtedly be other secondary categories which are derived as needed as well{8} but at the moment, those are the ones that have been found to be most useful. Anyway, that is what has been done as there has been time here and there. Oh and as we noted last month, there is no anticipation on our part that we will be done with this until some time in the summer at the earliest. The end result will be to make it a lot easier to find things on our part and also for the readers who are interested in perusing nearly five years of blog archives since we undertook this "new thing" (Lat. Rerum Novarum) back in August of 2002.
Notes:
{1} [I]t seems appropriate to write as time allows on some of the systems and principles that shaped the outlooks of the Founding Fathers of the United States.[...] Part of the reason for this decision is because there is a significant imbalance in politics today and we want to propose a remedy for the common problems inherent in the political approaches of both major parties. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa April 17, 2007)]
{2} Readers of this humble weblog may have noticed the labels on the bottom of the page of many of the blog posts. I have been in recent weeks taking a few minutes here and there and adding labels to various posts by subject. This is an arduous process but thankfully, I know some shortcuts that have enabled me to get a significant jump on it.[...] ... Suffice to say, this will take a while and when the project is completed, I will be able to significantly reduce the number of links in the side margin of my weblog and post there only the categories themselves whatever the total number of them ends up being. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa April 28, 2007)]
{3} Some audioposts we know are of an expository nature as that was how they were titled after they were recorded or in the recordings themselves. As for the rest, they may be reclassified from this format to another after we have had the opportunity to listen to them anew and determine where they should be placed. (Until we know for sure, if it appears that they were of a "briefer musing" styling, that is where they will be placed.)
{4} We say "time willing" because while we do not write the editorials, we do format them for posting and that does take time on our part to do.
{5} Originally we noted exceptions in this footnote but we are not aware of any as of this post revision.
{6} A few come to mind offhand including (i) because they focused discussion on areas we are not interested anymore in dealing with, (ii) they may have been a near duplicate of a previous posting which may have had a technical glitch in it at the time which was subsequently corrected, or (iii) they simply may have been a kind of inside joke between a couple of people at the time which a casual reader would not get.
{7} This was as much an intuitive decision as a purely rational one so it would not be fair to say it was part of a well-organized plan.
{8} A few that come to mind are the subjects of theology and some equivalent category or categories covering the areas of philosophy, ethics, reason, and logic.
Sunday, May 13, 2007
"One From the Vault" Dept.
(On Rider Reform)
As is evident to anyone paying even a modicum of attention to the goings-on up on Capitol Hill, the Democrats in Congress are obviously trying to use the subject of funding the Iraq situation to stuff various elements into the mix which are not germane to the subject at hand. These are of course matters which they are too cowardly to vote on individually. The latter approach to circumventing political accountability is precisely what "riders" attached to legislation are by the way for those who do not know. And for this reason, it seems appropriate to remind readers of this humble weblog of something your host wrote in January of 2004 where a proposal for rider reform was set forth.
We intend at some point (possibly this year) to present that idea at the state level for Washington state and would (of course) like to see this kind of approach work its way across the various state legislatures and eventually into the congressional bodies at the federal level also. But for the time being, we merely intend to remind longtime readers of that proposal and introduce it to those who had not seen it before.
(On Rider Reform)
As is evident to anyone paying even a modicum of attention to the goings-on up on Capitol Hill, the Democrats in Congress are obviously trying to use the subject of funding the Iraq situation to stuff various elements into the mix which are not germane to the subject at hand. These are of course matters which they are too cowardly to vote on individually. The latter approach to circumventing political accountability is precisely what "riders" attached to legislation are by the way for those who do not know. And for this reason, it seems appropriate to remind readers of this humble weblog of something your host wrote in January of 2004 where a proposal for rider reform was set forth.
We intend at some point (possibly this year) to present that idea at the state level for Washington state and would (of course) like to see this kind of approach work its way across the various state legislatures and eventually into the congressional bodies at the federal level also. But for the time being, we merely intend to remind longtime readers of that proposal and introduce it to those who had not seen it before.
Friday, May 11, 2007
Prayer Requests:
I would ask for prayers for the soul of 17 year-old Brittany Salzano and her family...she was hit by a car last weekend and killed instantly. Please also pray for the driver who hit her. Thanks.
I forgot to post this last week so I will post it now. As one who believes in a concept known as the communion of saints I do believe that prayer for those who have passed on can be beneficial for them much as prayer for those who are on earth can be.
With that in mind, pray please for Gloria Strauss and her family and help them out in other ways too however you can.
I would ask for prayers for the soul of 17 year-old Brittany Salzano and her family...she was hit by a car last weekend and killed instantly. Please also pray for the driver who hit her. Thanks.
I forgot to post this last week so I will post it now. As one who believes in a concept known as the communion of saints I do believe that prayer for those who have passed on can be beneficial for them much as prayer for those who are on earth can be.
With that in mind, pray please for Gloria Strauss and her family and help them out in other ways too however you can.
Thursday, May 10, 2007
Points to Ponder:
War is not the answer to everything, but in the recent past it has been the answer to slavery, German imperialism in 1914, fascism (1922-1945), and communism at various spots around the world until in 1989 -checkmated and wildly overspending on arms- the beast withered from within and gave up the ghost. [Michael Novak]
War is not the answer to everything, but in the recent past it has been the answer to slavery, German imperialism in 1914, fascism (1922-1945), and communism at various spots around the world until in 1989 -checkmated and wildly overspending on arms- the beast withered from within and gave up the ghost. [Michael Novak]
Monday, May 07, 2007
On the "Unsinkable Cork":
(Musings of your humble servant at Rerum Novarum)
Those who are familiar with Bill Cork and an email address/website he once had will know what I mean by the title of this posting. Anyway, I start this post off by noting a recent circumstance that when it was brought to my attention was quite a shock to see. Without further ado:
The Journey Home (Bill Cork)
Much as with Rod Dreher's situation, I predict a storm of people will try to impute to Bill the worst of motives. I repeat now what I said after observing this happen with RodDreher earlier this year then end this with some expository musings on Bill personally and his situation. First though, the noted rehash of my statement pertaining to RodDreher:
I had intended to comment on this thread some time back but circumstances and time constraints made me postpone it until now. I noticed that some of Rod's feedback was of the predictable nasty sort and others tried to play the "let us throw apologetics arguments at Rod" approach which at this point is not going to work. I will simply note that Rod's approach to the historical record is selective and arbitrary on the whole papal issue and if he was consistent in his rationale, it would undermine his current position in very significant ways. That is all I will say about it since no argument has a chance of persuading Rod while he is in the "honeymoon phase" of his religious transition. I therefore wish him the best and only ask that he remain open to reassessing his foundational presuppositions from time to time. (Or as Benjamin Franklin liked to say "question his own infallibility.) [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa January 8, 2007)]
The same situation I see as impacting the movement taken by Bill Cork but obviously Dreher has the glorious tradition of Orthodoxy he retreated towards. Bill by contrast went with what I must call a cult and I say that as someone who had my own affiliation with two different cults of my own in my lifetime. The first as some might be aware was the Society of St. Pius X schismatic "Catholic" movement but the second was the cult of the conspiracy theorist. The latter was not a long affiliation but it certainly influenced my views on not a few matters particularly after I intellectually worked my way through it, routed it as a viable theory{1} and cast it aside as logically and rationally specious (to put it nicely). But the purpose here is not to delve into that -I merely note it at the outset so that readers can get a grasp of how I am going to approach this posting to some extent.
To give a bit of history on my familiarity with Bill Cork (to the extent there was a familiarity), I remember Bill as someone who was heavily involved in a large effort against a radical fringe extremist "apologist" five years ago. That was in fact how I became familiar with him and while there were many involved in that endeavour, Bill was among the most tenacious. For that I had a measure of respect for him. Bill was also ahead of the curve on the war in Iraq -heck I remember Bill beating the drums for that when I was still sorting out my own position{2} before taking a definitive stand. It took me longer than Bill but I also set forth a cement-like position that has not wavered and will not. By contrast, I was not comfortable with the position as Bill and not a few other Catholics set it forth -viewing it as being too grounded on tenuous and less definite evidences and less on the more solid and irrefutable factors involved. This had its predictable effect when Bill and several others later did a complete 180 when the foundation they built their houses of argument on washed out and left them with nothing on which to stand.
Bill was also involved in a kind of opposition to Mel Gibson's film The Passion of the Christ and I disagreed with him on this matter in late 2003 by taking a stand on principles which were consistent. I saw at that point and in some later situations a number of things that bothered me about some of Bill's statements but I am never one to rush in on these matters for a variety of reasons. Most significant perhaps is that people need the opportunity to ponder issues and this approach rarely is in a straight line for anyone. Instead, the pondering (note I do not say "thinking"{3}) by its nature involves many facets of the human person and for that reason there will be a waxing and waning, a pulling one way and then another depending on the particular circumstances a given person faces.
The spiritual life (of which I would never be presumptive to say I am anything akin to an expert on) has its ebbs and flows like the tide on a beach. And while I can say that I sensed some of that in Bill's work when I actually looked at it, this was something that happened with less and less frequency over time admittedly. Some of that may have been that there was a perceived difference in priorities subject-wise, differences in core interests, or whatever. Admittedly my own conscious attempt to distance myself from the St. Blogs contingent -a move that happened in stages{4} played a part in that. But that point aside, there were indicators that something was afoot with Bill even if I could not connect all the dots as to what eventually happened.{5} I will go over some of this now since this subject is one that many will probably make uncharitable swipes at Bill on. I hope nonetheless that he will review what I am going to say in the proper spirit of authentic dialogue as I have enunciated it over the years.{6}
As I said already, there were small signs in retrospect that Bill was having a hard time of sorts finding a consistent voice -the first of which was that he kept renaming his weblog. I cannot recall how many Latin names he went with offhand -I remember Pro Deo et Patria at one point, Ut Unum Sint at another point. Then he used Built on a Rock -the latter was not in Latin but one need not have a Latin name for their blog.It was a fashionable sort of thing for Catholics of the "St. Blogs" contingent to give their blogs a Latin name and that was themotivation I took for choosing the name I did initially. Over time, I have come to see a greater depth to the choice of weblog name I made but one can say that a name denotes to some extent an identity. That Bill kept changing his weblog name to me looked as if he was trying to find an identity of sorts. It might sound overly-simplistic to put it that way but that is how I see it. Here is a more complex approach to the same subject and I will use the analogy of the Supreme Court to make.
After recently completing a very good book on the Supreme Court called Supreme Conflict which goes into not only the selection but also the psychology of the court, I see a mirror in Bill with Justice Anthony Kennedy and it gets back to what I said earlier about Bill struggling to find an identity. The book well outlines how this was Kennedy's problem and why he ended up looking so promising to conservatives but has on key conservative issues been such a let-down. Kennedy started with conservative instincts and still to some extent has them but without a solid template of sorts from which to operate from, there were and are inconsistencies in how he comes down on a given issue. Too often without such a template the environment to some extent can play an influence that may well go unnoticed and a sequence of small shifts (each in and of themselves seemingly innocuous) can create over time the materials for a completely different paradigm altogether.
Basically, the identity issue was one clue to me along with his war flip flop{7} and the handling of the whole Mel Gibson Passion of the Christ situation already noted above. To those who would be reading up to this point and wonder why I would bother with the subject in question, I remind them of the subtitle of this weblog in part{8} but also a reason is because Bill was to some extent a minor celebrity of sorts in certain circles in which we both ran in to the extent one can "run" in cyberspace.
I say he was a "minor celebrity" because he was one of those who were in the "Catholic convert" stories -if memory serves his story was in the Surprised by Truth series somewhere.{9} In making this recent decision, Bill did decide to resign his position with the Galveston archdioceses which was certainly a proper thing to do and I am sure Bill will seek to make a more detailed accounting of certain factors motivating his decision over time. This pattern is the natural course of things for a convert to a particular outlook or a revert to a previous outlook to do. (I expect it in other words and would be surprised if he did not actually do this at some point.) In the above thread he makes the following statement which I want to briefly focus on before ending this thread of musings:
I’ve been laying out theological and ecclesial issues over the past two months that were contributing factors to my loss of trust in the authority of Rome and the Catholic Magisterium.
If what I noted above does not give a hint already, I will spell it out here more bluntly: I never thought Bill Cork had a significant grasp of matters theological. Bill would probably expect me to say that but now the cat is out of the bag. It is not unique to Bill but frankly, most Catholics do not and I do not see the apologetics oligarchy as being of much assistance in this area at all. They are such a predictable lot that if they have not done it already I will tell you what many of them will do: they will bombard Bill either with shrieks of how he is "hell bound" for his "apostasy" or they will try to respond to whatever he posits as his reasons or difficulties with apologetics arguments. Those sorts love to argue after all (seemingly for the sake of arguing at times) and I am not saying they are wrong per se in what they will say.{10} They are wrong though to assume it will have an effect on Bill at this stage.
Remember, a change in one's viewpoint is not an instant situation but generally takes a good period of time. There are also a variety of factors involved and not all of them are intellectual ones. Indeed, some of them are of a more personal nature{11} and this is seldom recognized. They can be personal, they can even be financial or whatever but I am not about to engage in assuming nefarious reasons for Bill's recent about face. Indeed, having not seen enough of his stuff in recent years,{12} I am hardly in a position to take a definite statement on it. For this reason, I will only presume that Bill was not adequately formed theologically and I can probably predict some of the issues where there were problems.
Among the biggest of the problems is what happens with those who do not fully understand what is and is not magisterial; namely, what is and is not a matter of required assent in other words and what is not. This is something that apologists in recent years have shown a fairly general consensus on with regards to not understanding these distinctions all that well. Bill was not an apologist but he was involved with church bureaucracy to a certain extent. I also believe this put him in a position where he may have felt he had to defend certain bureaucratic statements which he may well have not been comfortable with. Two in particular come to mind which I will mention briefly in a footnote.{13}
Now admittedly, some of these musings are based on incomplete information and supplemented with intuition. As I noted already, I did not read Bill's weblog much in recent years{14} -certainly not enough to fill in all the blanks. But frankly, even if I had, I would not have seen this one coming. A move to Orthodoxy, sure I could see that to some extent if the problem is the authority issue. Heck, even a move to a kind of Anglo-Catholic view or (stretching it a bit) a form of high church Lutheranism perhaps as Bill was a Lutheran pastor at one point. But a return to Seventh Day Adventism??? No my friends, I would not have seen this one coming for a variety of reasons. And when you consider that Bill is being offered a pastors position at a parish coupled with some of what I have heard through the grapevine{15}, it does lend one to wonder a bit but that is all I will say on those matters. Bill will get a lot of abuse on this from other people -not from me.
I want to note in closing, if it is not obvious in what is noted above that I wish Bill Cork the best and I only ask him to do what I would ask anyone to do: from time to time reappraise their foundational presuppositions. This time, I would request of him to try and fill in those areas where he was lacking before even if only to better understand these issues from an ecumenical context to better serve authentic dialogue with Catholics and Seventh Day Adventists. In a nutshell Bill, be open once again to "questioning a little of your own infallibility" (cf. Benjamin Franklin), that is all I would ask of you, me, or indeed of anyone else.
Notes:
{1} That is not to say that I solved every previous puzzle involved in this mind you. However, by identifying the root causes or foundational presuppositions that guided that particular weltanschauung, I was able in applying them to so many of the positions taken by the conspiracy sorts to see the viability of the overarching theory itself melt away like ice cream on a hot July day. Hence, when I set that outlook aside definitively, I basically imposed a kind of self-agnosticism on the areas I had not yet solved. Over time and with greater research and reflection on a host of issues, most of them have resolved themselves of their own volition without the need for active intellectual involvement on my part. (And on occasion in responding to conspiracy-theorist sorts on issues I once set aside in this fashion, I was able to intellectually overcome them when revisiting them anew.) The very few that remain will likely go by the wayside in the same fashion as most of the others; ergo I see no reason to alter my approach to them taken lo these past eleven odd years.
{2} Bill Cork goes over his recent about-face on the war issue here. I have to admit that these so-called "war protesters" have moved me towards a more hawkish stance myself then even the one I outlined here. I anticipated in that entry the war protesting angle and my view has not changed about protesters. If Bush was handling this as Johnson handled Vietnam, then to some extent I could grant the protesters some leeway. But in my gut I know this is simply liberal idiots trying to play politics. After all, where were they when Clinton was bombing Kosovo???...
If we do go to war and these people try to gum up the machinery, they should be treated the same way a soldier would be treated if he tried to abandon his unit in battle. That is all I will say on the matter at this time because I am starting to get livid thinking about these clowns and that is not a good mindset to be in for blogging. [Excerpts from Rerum Novarum (circa January 25, 2003)]
{3} No one can claim to approach issues in a purely abstract way and apart from personal mitigating factors in their apprehension of reality. This is why I have focused more and more on foundational presuppositions and less on the round and round kinds of arguments that go nowhere as I have gotten older and (hopefully) aged with some measure of grace. In a nutshell, someone who is not willing to reassess themselves in this area from time to time -to (in paraphrasing Benjamin Franklin) "doubt a bit of their own infallibility" makes themselves incapable of any potential progress as a human being. Bill certainly did such a reassessment himself as of late and while I do not agree with where it took him, that he did the reassessment certainly earns a measure of respect from me. I only ask of him the same thing I did of Rod Dreher and it is this: remain open to a future reassessment and "doubting your infallibility" again at some point.
{4} There are hints in this in the weblog archives starting in late 2003. The process was a gradual one picking up steam through a series of events and circumstances coupled with realizations about the nature of that group. Eventually, it hit critical mass and compelled me to make my own formal exodus from them as a collective last year for reasons I outlined in no small detail HERE.
{5} And I obviously did not as this news came as a surprise to me. (Though in my own defense, I had not read enough of a cross-section of Bill's work in recent years to likely see such a shift anyway even if it manifested itself in his work which -since he deleted it all- I do not know if it was there all along or not.)
{6} Some Principles For Authentic Dialogue and the Proper Use of Sources in Papers (circa February 9, 2006)
{7} I mean no disrespect to you in phrasing it this way Bill but I would be less than honest if I did not tell you how I viewed that matter.
{8} My musings on ...well...basically whatever I want to muse on...[Subtitle of this weblog from virtually (if not actually) day one]
{9} I am really going off of memory here because I have not read any of those books and have relied for my information of who was in them from second and third hand sources -not the most reliable of ways to get information sometimes but I note it here nonetheless.
{10} Some of them are actually quite good at what they do -either in general or on particular subjects.
{11}I bring up the fact that Bill's entire family is Seventh Day Adventist as a huge factor here far and above any intellectual reason he may give. Those Catholics who seize on this idea and run with it I only hope are not among the same crowd who took issue with me making the exact same argument when I challenged in no small fashion a position espoused by Karl Keating a couple years ago along these same lines. I am only being consistent here, not playing the "it is okay to criticize apostate Bill this way but not Supreme Maximum Leader Karl" hypocritical bullshit that so often permeates those whose vision is so badly impaired with fallacious provincialism that they cannot see the forest for the trees. But I digress.
{12} See footnote five.
{13} The first is the 2002 USCCB subcommittee text on Jewish-Christian relations which was not well formulated and lent itself to being badly misinterpreted as indeed most people did. The second (I suspect but I have nothing to go on here but intuition with the latter one) is the USCCB's campaign in 2005 to abolish the death penalty in the United States. I cannot recall offhand Bill's position on the death penalty but I can only imagine that if he did not share the view of the USCCB on the matter (as I indeed do not) that he could have a serious problem with the manner in which they have gone about this issue.
{14} Which was not that often over time admittedly. Some of that may have been that there was a perceived difference in priorities subject-wise, differences in core interests, or whatever.
{15} I have heard through the grapevine a number of things that I do not believe would be helpful to note here. It remains my view that the family situation as a Catholic in a sea of Seventh Day Adventists was the most significant factor. It is natural to not want to rock the boat on these matters and my guess is that is a more significant factor than most of the others that could be mentioned.
(Musings of your humble servant at Rerum Novarum)
Those who are familiar with Bill Cork and an email address/website he once had will know what I mean by the title of this posting. Anyway, I start this post off by noting a recent circumstance that when it was brought to my attention was quite a shock to see. Without further ado:
The Journey Home (Bill Cork)
Much as with Rod Dreher's situation, I predict a storm of people will try to impute to Bill the worst of motives. I repeat now what I said after observing this happen with RodDreher earlier this year then end this with some expository musings on Bill personally and his situation. First though, the noted rehash of my statement pertaining to RodDreher:
I had intended to comment on this thread some time back but circumstances and time constraints made me postpone it until now. I noticed that some of Rod's feedback was of the predictable nasty sort and others tried to play the "let us throw apologetics arguments at Rod" approach which at this point is not going to work. I will simply note that Rod's approach to the historical record is selective and arbitrary on the whole papal issue and if he was consistent in his rationale, it would undermine his current position in very significant ways. That is all I will say about it since no argument has a chance of persuading Rod while he is in the "honeymoon phase" of his religious transition. I therefore wish him the best and only ask that he remain open to reassessing his foundational presuppositions from time to time. (Or as Benjamin Franklin liked to say "question his own infallibility.) [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa January 8, 2007)]
The same situation I see as impacting the movement taken by Bill Cork but obviously Dreher has the glorious tradition of Orthodoxy he retreated towards. Bill by contrast went with what I must call a cult and I say that as someone who had my own affiliation with two different cults of my own in my lifetime. The first as some might be aware was the Society of St. Pius X schismatic "Catholic" movement but the second was the cult of the conspiracy theorist. The latter was not a long affiliation but it certainly influenced my views on not a few matters particularly after I intellectually worked my way through it, routed it as a viable theory{1} and cast it aside as logically and rationally specious (to put it nicely). But the purpose here is not to delve into that -I merely note it at the outset so that readers can get a grasp of how I am going to approach this posting to some extent.
To give a bit of history on my familiarity with Bill Cork (to the extent there was a familiarity), I remember Bill as someone who was heavily involved in a large effort against a radical fringe extremist "apologist" five years ago. That was in fact how I became familiar with him and while there were many involved in that endeavour, Bill was among the most tenacious. For that I had a measure of respect for him. Bill was also ahead of the curve on the war in Iraq -heck I remember Bill beating the drums for that when I was still sorting out my own position{2} before taking a definitive stand. It took me longer than Bill but I also set forth a cement-like position that has not wavered and will not. By contrast, I was not comfortable with the position as Bill and not a few other Catholics set it forth -viewing it as being too grounded on tenuous and less definite evidences and less on the more solid and irrefutable factors involved. This had its predictable effect when Bill and several others later did a complete 180 when the foundation they built their houses of argument on washed out and left them with nothing on which to stand.
Bill was also involved in a kind of opposition to Mel Gibson's film The Passion of the Christ and I disagreed with him on this matter in late 2003 by taking a stand on principles which were consistent. I saw at that point and in some later situations a number of things that bothered me about some of Bill's statements but I am never one to rush in on these matters for a variety of reasons. Most significant perhaps is that people need the opportunity to ponder issues and this approach rarely is in a straight line for anyone. Instead, the pondering (note I do not say "thinking"{3}) by its nature involves many facets of the human person and for that reason there will be a waxing and waning, a pulling one way and then another depending on the particular circumstances a given person faces.
The spiritual life (of which I would never be presumptive to say I am anything akin to an expert on) has its ebbs and flows like the tide on a beach. And while I can say that I sensed some of that in Bill's work when I actually looked at it, this was something that happened with less and less frequency over time admittedly. Some of that may have been that there was a perceived difference in priorities subject-wise, differences in core interests, or whatever. Admittedly my own conscious attempt to distance myself from the St. Blogs contingent -a move that happened in stages{4} played a part in that. But that point aside, there were indicators that something was afoot with Bill even if I could not connect all the dots as to what eventually happened.{5} I will go over some of this now since this subject is one that many will probably make uncharitable swipes at Bill on. I hope nonetheless that he will review what I am going to say in the proper spirit of authentic dialogue as I have enunciated it over the years.{6}
As I said already, there were small signs in retrospect that Bill was having a hard time of sorts finding a consistent voice -the first of which was that he kept renaming his weblog. I cannot recall how many Latin names he went with offhand -I remember Pro Deo et Patria at one point, Ut Unum Sint at another point. Then he used Built on a Rock -the latter was not in Latin but one need not have a Latin name for their blog.It was a fashionable sort of thing for Catholics of the "St. Blogs" contingent to give their blogs a Latin name and that was themotivation I took for choosing the name I did initially. Over time, I have come to see a greater depth to the choice of weblog name I made but one can say that a name denotes to some extent an identity. That Bill kept changing his weblog name to me looked as if he was trying to find an identity of sorts. It might sound overly-simplistic to put it that way but that is how I see it. Here is a more complex approach to the same subject and I will use the analogy of the Supreme Court to make.
After recently completing a very good book on the Supreme Court called Supreme Conflict which goes into not only the selection but also the psychology of the court, I see a mirror in Bill with Justice Anthony Kennedy and it gets back to what I said earlier about Bill struggling to find an identity. The book well outlines how this was Kennedy's problem and why he ended up looking so promising to conservatives but has on key conservative issues been such a let-down. Kennedy started with conservative instincts and still to some extent has them but without a solid template of sorts from which to operate from, there were and are inconsistencies in how he comes down on a given issue. Too often without such a template the environment to some extent can play an influence that may well go unnoticed and a sequence of small shifts (each in and of themselves seemingly innocuous) can create over time the materials for a completely different paradigm altogether.
Basically, the identity issue was one clue to me along with his war flip flop{7} and the handling of the whole Mel Gibson Passion of the Christ situation already noted above. To those who would be reading up to this point and wonder why I would bother with the subject in question, I remind them of the subtitle of this weblog in part{8} but also a reason is because Bill was to some extent a minor celebrity of sorts in certain circles in which we both ran in to the extent one can "run" in cyberspace.
I say he was a "minor celebrity" because he was one of those who were in the "Catholic convert" stories -if memory serves his story was in the Surprised by Truth series somewhere.{9} In making this recent decision, Bill did decide to resign his position with the Galveston archdioceses which was certainly a proper thing to do and I am sure Bill will seek to make a more detailed accounting of certain factors motivating his decision over time. This pattern is the natural course of things for a convert to a particular outlook or a revert to a previous outlook to do. (I expect it in other words and would be surprised if he did not actually do this at some point.) In the above thread he makes the following statement which I want to briefly focus on before ending this thread of musings:
I’ve been laying out theological and ecclesial issues over the past two months that were contributing factors to my loss of trust in the authority of Rome and the Catholic Magisterium.
If what I noted above does not give a hint already, I will spell it out here more bluntly: I never thought Bill Cork had a significant grasp of matters theological. Bill would probably expect me to say that but now the cat is out of the bag. It is not unique to Bill but frankly, most Catholics do not and I do not see the apologetics oligarchy as being of much assistance in this area at all. They are such a predictable lot that if they have not done it already I will tell you what many of them will do: they will bombard Bill either with shrieks of how he is "hell bound" for his "apostasy" or they will try to respond to whatever he posits as his reasons or difficulties with apologetics arguments. Those sorts love to argue after all (seemingly for the sake of arguing at times) and I am not saying they are wrong per se in what they will say.{10} They are wrong though to assume it will have an effect on Bill at this stage.
Remember, a change in one's viewpoint is not an instant situation but generally takes a good period of time. There are also a variety of factors involved and not all of them are intellectual ones. Indeed, some of them are of a more personal nature{11} and this is seldom recognized. They can be personal, they can even be financial or whatever but I am not about to engage in assuming nefarious reasons for Bill's recent about face. Indeed, having not seen enough of his stuff in recent years,{12} I am hardly in a position to take a definite statement on it. For this reason, I will only presume that Bill was not adequately formed theologically and I can probably predict some of the issues where there were problems.
Among the biggest of the problems is what happens with those who do not fully understand what is and is not magisterial; namely, what is and is not a matter of required assent in other words and what is not. This is something that apologists in recent years have shown a fairly general consensus on with regards to not understanding these distinctions all that well. Bill was not an apologist but he was involved with church bureaucracy to a certain extent. I also believe this put him in a position where he may have felt he had to defend certain bureaucratic statements which he may well have not been comfortable with. Two in particular come to mind which I will mention briefly in a footnote.{13}
Now admittedly, some of these musings are based on incomplete information and supplemented with intuition. As I noted already, I did not read Bill's weblog much in recent years{14} -certainly not enough to fill in all the blanks. But frankly, even if I had, I would not have seen this one coming. A move to Orthodoxy, sure I could see that to some extent if the problem is the authority issue. Heck, even a move to a kind of Anglo-Catholic view or (stretching it a bit) a form of high church Lutheranism perhaps as Bill was a Lutheran pastor at one point. But a return to Seventh Day Adventism??? No my friends, I would not have seen this one coming for a variety of reasons. And when you consider that Bill is being offered a pastors position at a parish coupled with some of what I have heard through the grapevine{15}, it does lend one to wonder a bit but that is all I will say on those matters. Bill will get a lot of abuse on this from other people -not from me.
I want to note in closing, if it is not obvious in what is noted above that I wish Bill Cork the best and I only ask him to do what I would ask anyone to do: from time to time reappraise their foundational presuppositions. This time, I would request of him to try and fill in those areas where he was lacking before even if only to better understand these issues from an ecumenical context to better serve authentic dialogue with Catholics and Seventh Day Adventists. In a nutshell Bill, be open once again to "questioning a little of your own infallibility" (cf. Benjamin Franklin), that is all I would ask of you, me, or indeed of anyone else.
Notes:
{1} That is not to say that I solved every previous puzzle involved in this mind you. However, by identifying the root causes or foundational presuppositions that guided that particular weltanschauung, I was able in applying them to so many of the positions taken by the conspiracy sorts to see the viability of the overarching theory itself melt away like ice cream on a hot July day. Hence, when I set that outlook aside definitively, I basically imposed a kind of self-agnosticism on the areas I had not yet solved. Over time and with greater research and reflection on a host of issues, most of them have resolved themselves of their own volition without the need for active intellectual involvement on my part. (And on occasion in responding to conspiracy-theorist sorts on issues I once set aside in this fashion, I was able to intellectually overcome them when revisiting them anew.) The very few that remain will likely go by the wayside in the same fashion as most of the others; ergo I see no reason to alter my approach to them taken lo these past eleven odd years.
{2} Bill Cork goes over his recent about-face on the war issue here. I have to admit that these so-called "war protesters" have moved me towards a more hawkish stance myself then even the one I outlined here. I anticipated in that entry the war protesting angle and my view has not changed about protesters. If Bush was handling this as Johnson handled Vietnam, then to some extent I could grant the protesters some leeway. But in my gut I know this is simply liberal idiots trying to play politics. After all, where were they when Clinton was bombing Kosovo???...
If we do go to war and these people try to gum up the machinery, they should be treated the same way a soldier would be treated if he tried to abandon his unit in battle. That is all I will say on the matter at this time because I am starting to get livid thinking about these clowns and that is not a good mindset to be in for blogging. [Excerpts from Rerum Novarum (circa January 25, 2003)]
{3} No one can claim to approach issues in a purely abstract way and apart from personal mitigating factors in their apprehension of reality. This is why I have focused more and more on foundational presuppositions and less on the round and round kinds of arguments that go nowhere as I have gotten older and (hopefully) aged with some measure of grace. In a nutshell, someone who is not willing to reassess themselves in this area from time to time -to (in paraphrasing Benjamin Franklin) "doubt a bit of their own infallibility" makes themselves incapable of any potential progress as a human being. Bill certainly did such a reassessment himself as of late and while I do not agree with where it took him, that he did the reassessment certainly earns a measure of respect from me. I only ask of him the same thing I did of Rod Dreher and it is this: remain open to a future reassessment and "doubting your infallibility" again at some point.
{4} There are hints in this in the weblog archives starting in late 2003. The process was a gradual one picking up steam through a series of events and circumstances coupled with realizations about the nature of that group. Eventually, it hit critical mass and compelled me to make my own formal exodus from them as a collective last year for reasons I outlined in no small detail HERE.
{5} And I obviously did not as this news came as a surprise to me. (Though in my own defense, I had not read enough of a cross-section of Bill's work in recent years to likely see such a shift anyway even if it manifested itself in his work which -since he deleted it all- I do not know if it was there all along or not.)
{6} Some Principles For Authentic Dialogue and the Proper Use of Sources in Papers (circa February 9, 2006)
{7} I mean no disrespect to you in phrasing it this way Bill but I would be less than honest if I did not tell you how I viewed that matter.
{8} My musings on ...well...basically whatever I want to muse on...[Subtitle of this weblog from virtually (if not actually) day one]
{9} I am really going off of memory here because I have not read any of those books and have relied for my information of who was in them from second and third hand sources -not the most reliable of ways to get information sometimes but I note it here nonetheless.
{10} Some of them are actually quite good at what they do -either in general or on particular subjects.
{11}I bring up the fact that Bill's entire family is Seventh Day Adventist as a huge factor here far and above any intellectual reason he may give. Those Catholics who seize on this idea and run with it I only hope are not among the same crowd who took issue with me making the exact same argument when I challenged in no small fashion a position espoused by Karl Keating a couple years ago along these same lines. I am only being consistent here, not playing the "it is okay to criticize apostate Bill this way but not Supreme Maximum Leader Karl" hypocritical bullshit that so often permeates those whose vision is so badly impaired with fallacious provincialism that they cannot see the forest for the trees. But I digress.
{12} See footnote five.
{13} The first is the 2002 USCCB subcommittee text on Jewish-Christian relations which was not well formulated and lent itself to being badly misinterpreted as indeed most people did. The second (I suspect but I have nothing to go on here but intuition with the latter one) is the USCCB's campaign in 2005 to abolish the death penalty in the United States. I cannot recall offhand Bill's position on the death penalty but I can only imagine that if he did not share the view of the USCCB on the matter (as I indeed do not) that he could have a serious problem with the manner in which they have gone about this issue.
{14} Which was not that often over time admittedly. Some of that may have been that there was a perceived difference in priorities subject-wise, differences in core interests, or whatever.
{15} I have heard through the grapevine a number of things that I do not believe would be helpful to note here. It remains my view that the family situation as a Catholic in a sea of Seventh Day Adventists was the most significant factor. It is natural to not want to rock the boat on these matters and my guess is that is a more significant factor than most of the others that could be mentioned.
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