Article: It Is Dangerous to be Right When the Government is Wrong

Yesterday, Judge Andrew Napolitano, of Fox News fame, published an article on Natural Law as a primer to his upcoming book of the same title, "It Is Dangerous to be Right When the Government is Wrong: The Case for Personal Freedom".  If the title looks familiar, it's because it is a quote by the 18th Century French philosopher Voltaire

In the article, The Judge draws together, with his usual wit and pragmatic examples, the relationship between Natural Law, Human Law, and the danger that lies in the movement we have seen recently to uproot the entire system (which has led to the most prosperous and free socio-economic system on earth) and replace it with the tried, tested, and failed political philosophy of Positivism.

Judge Nap concludes at the end of the article (bolded emphasis mine):

Although we have explored at length how man-made law must be subject to the Natural Law, perhaps the best indication of the falsehood of Positivism is that, deep down, we know that the transgression of our natural rights is wrong. We do not simply disagree with it, but feel a sense of visceral outrage that one human would try to treat us as inferior and subject to his will; it is antithetical to our selfhood. Thus it is in our human nature not just to yearn for freedom, but to recognize when those yearnings are unnaturally restricted. Elsewhere, V referenced Thomas Jefferson when he stated that "people should not be afraid of their governments. Governments should be afraid of their people." It should be clear that Positivism’s scheme of law relies upon the people obeying laws because they are afraid of the government, not because those laws are in accord with the Natural Law, and therefore just.

If we are to live forever in a legal system founded on Positivism, then we can only hope that we will have laws which, coincidentally, happen to be just. But there is another way, the way of the Natural Law: Rather than be content to follow the will of the truncheon, we can choose to listen to those words which enunciate truth, and our Founders’ promise that those truths will not be denied by government.

This book is about the titanic battle between adherents of Positivism and believers in the Natural Law; stated differently, between Big Government and individuals. As we shall see, the danger that befalls individuals inevitably comes from the government. The government makes it dangerous for us to be right when it is wrong.

Click here to read the full article at lewrockwell.com.


I look forward to reading his book and am going to get started on a post on the dangers of Positivism from the Catholic Perspective, which it seems the U.S. Bishops are just starting to wake up to.

+AMDG+

Faith and Firearms, Part 3: Double Effect

Part Two of "Faith and Firearms" left off with a discussion of exactly what constitutes "legitimate defense", and a few statistics to highlight the reality that law enforcement cannot be everywhere at all times to protect us in the critical moments of a violent encounter.

My apologies for the delay in being able to get out this Part 3; as always, life is happening and when it comes to spending time with our precious Abigail or blogging, her smile and laugh takes the cake.

But, now that I'm actually here, I wanted to return from the practical to the philosophical with a brief recap of the  doctrine of double effect.  I emphasize the word brief because this doctrine has been explored and pored over by moral philosophers for centuries, and could be the subject of extended discussion.

The doctrine or principle of double effect was introduced by St. Thomas Aquinas in his Summa Theologica (II-II, Qu. 64, Art.7).  His doctrine makes the point that, as with all of our actions, the lawful, natural, and right action of defending one's life against the unjust action of an aggressor often has more than one effect.  In the case where lethal force is used, the secondary effect could very well be--and often is--the death of the aggressor.

“Nothing hinders one act from having two effects, only one of which is intended, while the other is beside the intention. … Accordingly, the act of self-defense may have two effects: one, the saving of one's life; the other, the slaying of the aggressor.”

His discussion continues with the follow-on assertion that such an action is justified, provided that the primary effect--protecting one's own life--is justified, but that the justification of such an action also comes with conditions:

“Therefore, this act, since one's intention is to save one's own life, is not unlawful, seeing that it is natural to everything to keep itself in being as far as possible.  And yet, though proceeding from a good intention, an act may be rendered unlawful if it be out of proportion to the end. Wherefore, if a man in self-defense uses more than necessary violence, it will be unlawful, whereas, if he repel force with moderation, his defense will be lawful.”

In other words, it is permissible to use as much force as is necessary to repel or stop the intended aggression, but anything more (excessive force) renders the act unjust.  A second, equally critical condition is that the act may not be committed in anticipation of unjust aggression.  The act of aggression must have already begun in order for it to be justly and lawfully repelled.  This puts the defender at a distinct disadvantage, because the aggressor more often than not has the elements of both cunning, skill (violent criminals are often repeat offenders), and surprise.   This is where the importance of being aware of surroundings, being selective in personal associations, and following your gut instinct come into play.  Violence, just like with sin, should be avoided at all costs.

It is just--and in some cases an even a greater good--to forgo one's right to self-defense for the sake of charity.  Christ himself, who is the personification of charity, modeled this most perfectly by refusing to defend himself from the most heinous of violent actions, and clergy are called to model this same charity.  However, as I discussed in Part Two, there are other situations and offices where a person's duty or obligations require the defense of either themselves or of another person, for example a father to defend his children or a husband to defend his wife.

So how does this all relate to "keeping and bearing" a firearm?  The stark reality is that violence is not always avoidable.  Sometimes the aggressor finds us regardless of our intention to avoid them, and in those situations we must be prepared to respond according to our responsibilities.  As Cody Alderson, the author of a thought-provoking article entitled, "It Bothers Me," (Concealed Carry Report, February 2, 2011) put it,

Unfortunately, the force needed to put a criminal into a condition of not being able to continue their heinous crime of rape, maiming, or murder can very well cause loss of life to the criminal. We have no reliable system or tool to render rapid and total incapacitation that can be used by the public in defense against crimes of violence other than the gun. It is by far the best available tool for a victim to be able to use to deploy enough force to rapidly incapacitate a violent criminal.

That's it for "Faith and Firearms" for now.  I may revisit the topic sometime in the future, as the Spirit prompts.  In the mean time, for a more in-depth discussion of the Catholic teaching on self-defense, visit New Catholic Encyclopedia, "Self-Defense."  A deeper philosophical discussion of double effect can also be found in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

+AMDG+

Faith and Firearms, Part 2: Legitimate Authority

Part 1 of this series ended with section 2265 of the Catechism:


2265  Legitimate defense can be not only a right but a grave duty for one who is responsible for the lives of others.  The defense of the common good requires that an unjust aggressor be rendered unable to cause harm.  For this reason, those who legitimately hold authority also have the right to use arms to repel aggressors against the civil community entrusted to their responsibility.


So, anyone who holds legitimate authority has "not only a right, but a grave duty" to protect the lives of those they are responsible for.  So, what does "those who legitimately hold authority" mean?  Does that mean ourselves?  Local law enforcement (police)?  The government?  Well, according to the natural law, yes, yes, and yes.


Authority and responsibility go hand-in-hand.  The most basic unit of the "civil community" is the family and, until recently, it has been broadly accepted across demographics, cultures, and faith traditions that the husband and father, as the head of the household (in case anyone has any questions about what this means from the Christian perspective, see Ephesians 5:25), holds the responsibility to serve, provide for and protect the family.  This is certainly not to say that the wife/mother and children are not capable of defending the family, but the primary responsibility--the responsibility to lay down his life--falls squarely on the shoulders of the father.  If we accept that the father holds the ultimate responsibility within the family--that God has entrusted them to his care--then he (and certainly the wife and mother, if he is not present) has a right and a "grave duty" to repel aggressors against it, using arms if necessary.


A common retort is, "Those rules don't apply anymore.  We have enough police now that are only a 911 call away."


Well, true, the police will usually come if you call 911, but (depending on the city) the average time for responding to a priority 1 call (a life-threatening situation) is 7-10 minutes.  According to the Justice Department's 2005 Report of Criminal Victimization in the United States, in 71.1% of violent crimes, it took law enforcement more than 5 minutes to respond. Smaller, local departments may be able to respond more quickly, but even as we saw in the case of the 2009 Fort Hood shooting, where Sgt Kimberly Munley arrived on scene within a matter of minutes to heroically stop Nadal Hassan, his damage--13 dead and 38 others wounded--had already been done.  As the saying goes, "the police are only minutes away when seconds count."  This is certainly not meant to be a ding on police officers who put their lives on the line day in and day out, only an acknowledgement of the reality that they cannot be everywhere and at all times.  As a note, according to 2007 U.S. Justice Department Statistics, there are 463,000 sworn officers in the various jurisdictions within the U.S. Assuming three 8-hour shifts per day, that leaves 154,000 officers on duty for a national population of 300 million.  In other words, there is approximately one officer on duty for every 2,000 citizens.  It may feel like they're going to be there right away, until you're the one that needs them there right away.


There is more to it than just the time aspect.  The Supreme Court has ruled consistently (over ten separate times, in fact, including 1981's Warren vs. District of Columbia, 1989's DeShaney v. Winnebago County, and most recently in 2005 Castle Rock v. Gonzalez) that, despite the common motto, "to protect and serve," police do not have a sworn obligation to protect individuals.  If they did, citizens would have legal--and possibly criminal--recourse against police for not saving the lives that depended on their action.  Their primary and only constitutional responsibility is to enforce the law and, by doing so, to maintain the order of society at large.  More often than not, that means prioritizing their limited resources and apprehending those suspected of violent crime after the fact so that the can be brought to trial.  Individual incidents of violent crime--particularly crime against law-abiding citizens--generally cannot be dealt with beforehand by police because before the crime has taken place...no crime has taken place.


So, the police cannot respond instantaneously to protect us, and cannot respond to a crime until its commission has begun to unfold.  In that gap until they can, and in as much as we can anticipate potential crimes through awareness of our surroundings and circumstances, the legitimate authority for defense defaults to the individuals who are present.  In a situation where the threat is against the family, that responsibility falls primarily on the father.


Again, as I stressed in Part 1, the decision to keep and bear arms in the form of firearms--as is our Constitutionally-protected right--is a very personal one.  But should the worst happen, I for one want to be prepared to respond to any predator who threatens the life of physical well-being of my family with whatever amount of force is necessary to stop them.  If I can help it, and cannot convince them that harming my family is not in their best interest, I would prefer to keep that fight beyond arms' reach, and firearms are the logical tools that allow me to do that.


Look for next week's return from the practical to the philosophical, as I'll explore in more depth the doctrine of double effect.


+AMDG+

Faith and Firearms, Part 1

It's the new year, I'm back into the blog world after deciding to take a break from grad school, and I'm going to start 2011's posting off with a bang...literally.   This is the first in a series of posts (however many it takes) to discuss two things that, until a couple of years ago, I never saw as being related: faith and firearms.  I've focused until now on the spiritual battle that we are called to engage in, but the reality is that we are not only spiritual beings.  God has put us, body and soul, to live and work in a physical world.  As we saw with the tragic shootings in Arizona last week, and that we hear about all too frequently these days, evil is very real and very much at work within that world.  It manifests itself in the hearts and the physical actions of men, often with devastating effects.  Where it is within our ability and responsibility, we have a duty to prevent those acts, and where we cannot prevent them, to repel them with force.

Since my wife and I began dating over five years ago (man, how time flies), and in particular during our engagement, I had to think long and hard about one of the grave responsibilities that would soon fall upon my shoulders as the head of the household: the physical protection of my family.  That has been brought into even sharper focus now being a father, and was finally stirred to the point where I knew I needed to put something down in writing when I listened to an episode of one of my favorite independent living podcasts, Off the Grid News, entitled, Does God's law require us to own a gun?

In response to the title's immediate question, are we morally obligated to own a firearm?,  I would argue that no, there is no direct moral imperative to own or train to use any type of weapon. It is a personal choice.  But before we can discuss that specific choice, another, deeper question has to be considered: How far does my duty as a husband and father to protect my family extend?  If it came to a point or situation where there was no other option to protect their lives (or my own) from the malicious intentions of a ne'er-do-well, would I be able to do what was necessary to stop them, even if stopping them requires lethal force?  Where is the line between relying exclusively on God's providence for protection, and recognizing that He has put resources at my disposal to carry out this particular responsibility, as far as it is within my capacity to do so?  I don't relish even having to think about the potential of malicious harm coming to my family, but the reality is that it happens every day, hundreds if not thousands of times per day, to people who never thought that it would happen to them.  Although statistically unlikely, it is very real, and has very real and grave consequences.

So, we are led into the deeper philosophical discussion of legitimate defense.  The Catechism addresses directly in Part Three, Article 5: The Fifth Commandment (2264-2265):

2264  Love toward oneself remains a fundamental principle of morality.  Therefore it is legitimate to insist on respect for one's own right to life.  Someone who defends his life is not guilty of murder even if he is forced to deal his aggressor a lethal blow: 

If a man in self defense uses more than necessary violence, it will be unlawful: whereas if he repels force with moderation, his defense will be lawful...Nor is it necessary for salvation that a man omit the act of moderate self-defense to avoid killing the other man, since one is bound to take more care of one's own life than another's. (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, II-II, 64,7)

 2265  Legitimate defense can be not only a right but a grave duty for one who is responsible for the lives of others.  The defense of the common good requires that an unjust aggressor be rendered unable to cause harm.  For this reason, those who legitimately hold authority also have the right to use arms to repel aggressors against the civil community entrusted to their responsibility.

I quickly came to the conclusion that: (1) I am responsible for the lives of my family, both physical and spiritual, as far they are within the authority and ability that God has given me to serve them and protect them; and (2) I therefore have a grave duty to be working constantly toward ensuring the defense of both.

As the last sentence of 2265 alludes to, there are divisions of legitimate authority, beginning with the family and extending into the community and society at large, and so there are divisions (or layers) of responsibility for providing legitimate defense.  More on that in the next post, Faith and Firearms Part 2: Legitimate Authority.

+AMDG+

Have things changed?

Fresh off the heels of an election that ushered in a change of  power in the House of Representatives (the branch of government that was designed by the founders to have the most power), I figured I'd take this Philosophy Friday--aka Philosophy weekend--to open up some discussion on a document that was literally revolutionary and changed the world, the Declaration of Independence.

First, the source:

IN CONGRESS, JULY 4, 1776



The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America


When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.


He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:


For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:


For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:


For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.


We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.


— John Hancock


New Hampshire: Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton

Massachusetts: John Hancock, Samuel Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry


Rhode Island: Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery

Connecticut: Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott

New York: William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris

New Jersey: Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark


Pennsylvania: Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross

Delaware: Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean

Maryland: Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton

Virginia: George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton

North Carolina: William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn

South Carolina: Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton
Georgia: Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton

This brief document, which was the culmination of literally centuries of political philosophy and historical shift away from the idea of the "divine right of kings," made some pretty bold and unambiguous statements about our rights as human beings and citizens, where those rights ultimately come from, and how England--specifically the king himself--had abrogated its ultimate responsibility as a government authority, to protect and safeguard the rights of men.

In the interest of generating a little discussion, I would like to pose the question:  Two hundred years later, have things changed?  Do the Declaration's assertions (elaborated on and codified in law by the Bill of Rights of the U.S. Constitution) still apply, unchanged, today?  To be more specific, I guess I should ask, if our rights do not come from the "Creator" God that many in our society have rejected--or at least refuse to publicly acknowledge--as the ultimate grantor of rights, then where do they come from?  How can we determine them, and who serves as the ultimate arbiter as to which declared rights are valid and not valid?  How do we set a benchmark to know when those rights have been so egregiously violated, that there remains no choice other than "to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."

I've been thinking about this a lot lately but, before I comment further, I would like to hear your thoughts.  Please share. I'd appreciate your frank and honest comments.

+AMDG+

Being, Not Doing

It seems like my planned "Philosophy Fridays" are turning more into "Philosophy weekends."  Life is making demands, but I'll try to do a better job of scheduling posts for the next week.  In the meantime, for this week I just wanted to share a little bit of a follow-up to my previous post about Abigail, A Father's Joy.

We've had her for six weeks now.  I can't believe time has gone by so quickly.  I have this secret hope that life will somehow slow down, that she won't grow up and take off into the world, but I've lived enough of life to know that just isn't the case.  If anything, it'll feel like it's continuing to speed up.

This little girl, who can't speak, has a very limited vocabulary for communicating her needs (i.e. crying), and cannot even regulate her own bodily functions, has taught me a very important lesson in those six weeks:  Life is about being, not doing.  What I mean by that is, we humans, created in the image and likeness of God, don't derive our inherent worth and dignity from anything that we think, say or do; we get it from who we are and how we were created, not by what we do.

In a strictly utilitarian sense, Abigail cannot do anything for us.  She cannot produce.  She cannot contribute any novel, creative thoughts or ideas, art, music, or feats of engineering.  She cannot serve others or make conscious acts of faith or love (at least, I don't think she can, but she has an uncanny way of staring longingly at the crucifix, and reminds me that I need to do more of that), and only now is she beginning to be able to express glimpses of pleasure.  All that she can do is communicate her needs, in complete dependency, and rely on us to figure out what she needs and provide for her.  The utilitarian mindset would argue that she does not give at least as much as she takes and therefore has no worth as a human being.

I knew that utilitarian worldview was completely wrong.  In her, I have been given an even deeper glimpse into just how evil and self-interested it is.  It is what leads many to believe that, until a child in the womb can experience consciousness, it is not a human being, or that an adult who, through illness or injury, is no longer able to "contribute" to society, ought to be able to end their own life or have someone else make the decision to do it for them.

Now, being a father--even for only six weeks--I have had the chance to see a little bit more deeply how our Father in Heaven sees us, and how he created us to see each other, as beings with infinite worth from conception until natural death.  Thank goodness His is not a utilitarian view; if it were, we would be seen as rebels, waging war against His kingdom in our sin, instead of loving and allowing Him to love us. As a saying I heard a few months ago goes, "There is a reason we are called human beings, not human doings."

We are created to live in a relationship of love from from the first moment of our existence in our mother's womb, until He decides that our time in this life has come to a close and sends his messenger to carry us before His throne.  Sometimes that relationship of love is only one way, from Father to child, and it is that love alone that brings us into and holds us in existence.  That's right, without God's constant love for us, we would cease to exist.  Thank  God--that His love is infinite and suffices, even when we cannot, or choose not to, return it.

Sacred Heart of Jesus, burning with the Father's love for us, have mercy on us when we fail to love as you have created us to love.


+AMDG+

Fact and Feelings: Objective Truth vs Subjective Experience (Part 2)

Last week's post addressed the question posed by Pontius Pilate of Christ, What is truth?

The question that flows from that, even if we accept that there is objective truth, is, How can we know the truth when we find it?  Can we rely on our consciences, our "moral compasses," so to speak, to tell us when we have found it?

Well, first the short answer: no, we can't.  Our compasses have been contaminated and no longer reliably point toward north.

Of course that answer deserves some explanation.  Our intellects have been darkened and wills weakened by original sin to the point that they are unreliable when it comes to identifying truth on our own.  In fact, not only are we not able to recognize truth on our own, we also cannot accurately tell how far from the truth we have strayed (i.e. we cannot even recognize the existence or degree of our own sin).  This is a concept that is largely lost on our society today, which tends to discount the possibility of sin altogether and explain our suffering under the human condition "as merely a developmental flaw, a psychological weakness, a mistake, or the necessary consequence of an inadequate social structure, etc." (CCC 387).

Saint Augustine, in his Confessions, admitted that even once he recognized and conceded that there was evil, he could not discern where it came from.  This "mystery of lawlessness" as he referred to it, was only resolved by his conversion to the "mystery of faith."

So then, if we cannot recognize our own sin, what good is our conscience?  Doesn't it play a role?  Isn't our ultimate responsibility not to violate our conscience?

I tend to think of our conscience as being like one of those old cassette tapes (you remember those, don't you?).  The quality of the recording depended on two things: the quality of the cassette receiving the recording, and the clarity with which the original recording was transmitted to it.  In the same way, our consciences are only as good as we allow them to be by: (1) disposing ourselves--through an attitude of humility and obedience--to the source of truth and the grace by which we receive it; and (2) Seeking out that authentic truth as He has revealed himself to us, and not as we would intend him to be.  Just like a cassette tape whose fidelity quickly fades when it is re-recorded from itself or other tapes instead of the master, so it is with our consciences; their fidelity quickly fades when not frequently and properly oriented to the source of righteousness and goodness.

So, yes we do have a grave responsibility not to sin by violating our conscience, but that is only half of the equation.  The other half lies in our responsibility to form our consciences to be like the mind of Christ; in other words to have no tolerance to what he has defined as sin and to act as he has commanded us to act.

Then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger explained this idea in his essay, Conscience and Truth, which is included in the compilation Values in A Time of Upheaval:

It is true on this level of judgment (conscientia in the narrower sense) that an erring conscience obligates.  The rational tradition of Scholasticism makes this proposition absolutely clear. As Paul had affirmed (Rom 14:23), no one may act against his own convictions.  But the fact that one's conviction is naturally binding at the moment one acts does not mean a canonization of subjectivity.  One who follows the conviction at which he has arrived, never incurs guilt.  Indeed, one must follow such a conviction.  But guilt may very well consist in arriving at such perverse convictions by trampling down the protest made by the anamnesis of one's true being.  The guilt would then like on a deeper level, not in the act itself, but in that neglect of my own being that has dulled me to the voice of truth and made me deaf to what it says within me.

So, the ability to recognize the truth and live according to it--wisdom--is not something that comes organically from within us, at least in our fallen state.  Rather it has existed from the beginning of creation (cf Proverbs 8:22-36) and is given to us as a gift, to correct, untwist, and reorient us back to the purpose for which we were created, to know, love, and serve God.  To go with the early compass analogy, the grace and gift of wisdom frees our compasses to swing back toward north, so that we are able to live lives oriented toward the Truth--toward Christ--and not toward ourselves and society.  It cannot be obtained by grasping at it, only by submitting ourselves to His loving authority, as has been handed down to us in His Church.  Then we are able to do as St. Paul commends us in his Second Letter to the Thessalonians, To avoid the deception of the "man of lawlessness" (cf 2 Thess 2:3-10) and to "stand firm and hold fast to the traditions which you were taught by us, either by word of mouth or by letter" (2 Thess 2:15).


+AMDG+

Fact and Feelings: Objective Truth vs Subjective Experience (Part 1)

Welcome to the first installment of "Philosophy Fridays!"  In the interest of all of our very precious blog time, let's get right down to it.


"What is truth?" Pontius Pilate's words as recounted by St. John (18:36) tell us just as much about the man who asked them, and are just as much a searching of his own troubled heart, as they are about the God-man, Jesus Christ, who stood accused before him.  Pilate, in his questioning of the accused and the accusers (the Jews), became even more troubled when, after he had Christ scourged, found out exactly why the Jews were so violently adamant about having this seemingly innocent man not only scourged and publicly humiliated but executed in a way reserved for the most horrible of criminals: crucifixion; "by that law he ought to die, because he has made himself the Son of God. When Pilate heard these words he was even more afraid" (John 19:7-8).

In a way, Pilate's searching and questioning are a microcosm of the great question of the broken human condition:  What is truth?  Where can we find it?  How do we know it when we find it?  These are the the great questions that philosophers and theologians have pondered for the entirety of recorded human history.  In today's world, sadly, it seems that we have become surrounded by so many distractions and "creature comforts" that many are numbed by the droning on of everyday life and do not even bother to ask the questions any more.  Where we do, just as many others have become convinced by what Pope Benedict XVI has referred to as the "dictatorship of relativism," that truth is whatever we experience and believe it to be, and changes just as fluidly as societal norms.  When that happens, we begin to put feelings and sensory experiences above the truth that they are meant to point us toward.  Our feelings and experiences begin to take the place of faith and become idols in themselves, to the point that fact and truth become like flags waving in the wind instead of a firm foundation. This topic, the meeting of subjective experience with the objective, unchanging Truth that was at the heart of Pilate's question, is what I'll start on here and get more into in the weeks ahead.

Catholic Professor and Theologian Peter Kreeft, in his recent book Jesus Shock, retells a story by the Chinese Christian writer Watchman Nee that I think captures the properly ordered relationship between fact, faith, and feelings and what happens when that relationship gets out of whack:

Fact, Faith, and Feeling are three men walking on a wall.  Fact goes first, Faith second, and Feeling third.  As long as Faith keeps his eyes ahead on Fact, all three stay on the wall and make progress.  But as soon as Faith takes his eyes off Fact and turns around to see how Feeling is doing, Faith falls off the wall, and Feeling follows, while Fact walks on.

"The point is obvious," Kreeft adds, "the object of our faith is not feeling but fact, not subjective experience but objective truth." That, in a nutshell, is what it's all about.

Whether it is pop psychology, science, or what I like to call "feel good faith," the world offers so many ways (and so-called experts) to boost that subjective experience by giving us temporary, here-and-now answers, but do any of them ultimately satisfy our deepest longing for that eternal, outside-ourselves Truth?

Well, let's look at it with another analogy.  Imagine a play.  The key actors, in the hundredth or two hundredth casting and finding themselves somewhat removed from the original casting of the play, begin to wonder what the point of the play was in the first place.  Why was it written?  What message was it meant to convey? In other words, what is the point?  Assuming the playwright/producer/director is still alive and very much active in the play, although not in a way that the actors can explicitly perceive, wouldn't it make sense for the actors to take those questions to him?  What if they didn't?  What if they instead began to ask the question of each other (through speculation), of the set (nature), or even of the script (history) that has been lined out, crossed through, and highlighted in odd places by previous performers?  Could they reliably turn to any of these sources for the answer to the question that only the author himself can answer?

That turning inward and refusal to take the question to the author (and take his word for it--literally, since he sent his Word to us in the flesh) is exactly what we do when we refuse to take our longing to God and instead fill the desire that he leaves with other "stuff."  We substitute our own limited experience, perceptions, thoughts, etc. that leave us unsatisfied--our "truth"--for the Truth that never fails to satisfy.

Pilate probably didn't realize that the question he asked, he may as well have asked on behalf of an entire human race desperate to know the Truth.  He probably also didn't realize that the Truth was right there, standing right before him, who had already declared that "I am the way, and the truth, and the life..." (John 14:6).  His question had already been answered, and in a manner so generously, infinitely inconceivable that it could only be perceived with the eyes of faith and not feelings or the senses.

To be continued in Part Two.

Coming This Friday...

I've been thinking for some time now that it's about high time I wrote a series, and it just so happens there's been one topic bugging me that would be perfectly suited for it.

If you can't tell from my previous posts, I have a sort of love-hate relationship with news.  I love knowing what's going on in the world.  On the other hand, I can't stand the media, or at least how they tend to sensationalize everything into 5-minute (or less) sound bytes, like bubble gum for our brains.  Then, I pick up a book from any of the great Catholic thinkers, from the Church fathers to St. Augustine to St. Thomas Aquinas, right up to our modern-day popes, John Paul the Great and Benedict XVI and think, "Why in the world do I even bother to turn the TV on."  Seriously, it's like a war going on in my brain.  It's like soup and sandwich vs Snickers...both sound so good but only one is really satisfying.

So, I'm making a commitment to pick the good books up (Scripture and the Catechism being tops among them) and do some mental and spiritual weightlifting.   After all, it beats real weightlifting any day of the week.  No excuses, no holds barred, it's time to dig in.

So, starting this Friday, I'd like to introduce my first series...Philosophy Fridays.

The first topic?  One that I think needs to be discussed more today: Fact and Feelings: Orienting Objective Truth and Subjective Experience.

Please drop in when you can, subscribe if you'd like, and, by all means, leave feedback.

God bless you and I'll see you Friday!

AMDG