Bigots: maybe they're not so bad?

Some people are harder to love than others. Bigots*, for example, can be pretty annoying, especially when their bigotry is aggressively expressed - in the form of rudeness, arrogance, confident assertion of ignorant claims, arguments that blatantly beg questions, hypocritical double standards, refusal/inability to listen, etc. (Certainly I don't like dealing with bigots: I prefer people who are intellectually interesting and intellectually interested - like my kids, for example.)

But there are also some things to be said in favor of the aggressive bigot: it's good to be passionate about what you believe, and it's good to be prepared to openly state what you believe and to at least attempt to defend it. Why is that? Well, to believe some claim just means to hold that that claim is true. And it is good to be passionate about the truth, to openly state the truth, and to attempt to defend the truth (although of course we should always remember that even claims which we sincerely and passionately believe to be true may turn out to be false).**

Of course, not everyone needs to passionately devote their lives to discovering speculative truths and to becoming extraordinarily knowledgeable (we all have our own 'things' in life with which we are specially occupied), but everyone has to at least live their everyday lives in light of certain beliefs (i.e., suppositions of truth), and, at least from time to time, ask themselves certain basic questions about the nature of the world and their own purpose in it. These are matters of practical, psychological, and moral necessity.

It's true that the passionate, aggressive bigot gets some things seriously wrong: she shouldn't be so arrogant, she should have the courtesy and consistency to also listen, instead of just telling others what she thinks and expecting them to listen to her, she should learn how to make arguments that make sense, etc. But we all have our own peculiar faults, we all act badly sometimes, and it is important to remember (note to self) that the basic tendency underlying the bigot's inept performance is a desire to live and promote the truth, and this underlying tendency is something that is fundamentally healthy and good.

Also, while she may be annoying, that in itself is not even a bad thing. People are often annoyed or offended unjustly, so it is always an open question, when someone is offended or annoyed, who is at fault: offender or offendee (or, of course, both)? That the bigot is not afraid to offend, then, shows her courage and devotion - not to the truth, unfortunately, but at least to what she thinks is the truth. And of course, again, she really should proceed with more circumspection, not forgetting that what she sincerely believes to be true might turn out to be false: For it is no small misstep, some mere peccadillo, to act as if whatever I believe to be true is simply the same as the truth. To act in this way is in fact to show great ignorance of and contempt for the truth.*** But the point remains that the bigot's courage and devotion would be good things - and could become good things -, if only she could learn to correct those faults which are vitiating them.


*My working definition of bigot: a person who is obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices. One can thus be a bigot who is well-loved, well-mannered, and never annoy anyone. But this kind of bigot I won't talk about here. It may also be worth pointing out that bigots are always people, before they are bigots - 'bigot' should never be thought of as exhaustively describing a real person's character and identity (as in, "all you need to know about Martha is that Martha's a bigot!").
**If one were to deny this by claiming, "actually, the truth doesn't matter," the question would still remain: "is that actually true, that the truth doesn't matter?" At this point someone might still say, "but I just don't care," and you might ask, "why not?" and who knows where it goes from there. In any case, most people are not wont to maintain that the truth just doesn't matter and that they just don't care about it (although they will maintain this often enough in regard to particular truths, even very important ones, provided they don't want the bother of having to honestly consider the case for such a truth and of subsequently possibly having to amend their lives in some way).
***This is true even in the case where what the bigot believes is in fact true. Someone who knows some truth and defends it, but in a bigoted way, abuses the truth: the truth should be treated with respect (sometimes even reverence) and presented to others accordingly. Bigotry is not about what you believe, it's about how you believe. (Of course, sometimes what you believe affects how you believe: for example, some people come to believe that the only way to make 'progress' (however defined) is by violence, so naturally they will come to express their beliefs in violent and irrational ways.)

Oh, Bluster!

People like to take positions. That’s easy. When they encounter opposition to a position they have taken, that’s when it gets interesting. That’s when you get some insight into their character (and often enough it's your own character that will be in question). Possible responses to opposition include ignoring, insulting, misrepresenting, etc. One response which is more promising is to try to ask some difficult questions of one’s opponent. This is a good thing, so far as it goes: it seems to indicate a willingness to openly, honestly examine the real nature of the controverted issue. Unfortunately, often such questions are merely rhetorical and also naïve (raising such questions is a common, sometimes effective, but never enlightening polemical strategy). And when those questions turn out to be not so difficult and one’s opponent easily answers them, one all-too-often-tempting option is to simply ignore the answers and to bluster on about the righteousness of one’s cause and that’s the point where one's personal character is revealed. So remember: You can bluster, but you can’t hide. Your bluster reveals you. So why not stop pretending? Why not go ahead and actually listen to what other people have to say?

(I was) Naomi's steward

I came across this picture of Naomi sleeping recently. At first it reminded me of her death and filled me with the pain of loss.

 The phrase "sleep in heavenly peace" came to me. (A small comfort.)

When she completed her earthly course in May of this year, Naomi was 2 years and 3 months old. This end to her earthly life was sudden and unexpected. One moment she was our wonderful, joyful, beautiful, funny little girl (daughter, sister, granddaughter, niece, cousin, friend, etc.), running and skipping, jumping and dancing, poking and joking, hugging and kissing, picking flowers, blowing bubbles, feeding our resident pheasant, sleeping every night in her bedroom across the hall from us (actually me, often enough, sleeping with her); the next her soul had departed and we had the devastating pain of holding her lifeless body before saying goodbye to that too, leaving us with only her favorite pink princess nightie lying in her empty bed.

Of course this has been terribly painful. We cling to the pictures and short videos and memories we have of Naomi.

But we also believe that Naomi is God's beloved daughter just as much as she is ours. It is simply a fact that it wasn't us who had the idea of Naomi, this precious unique individual, and then created her for ourselves - and this fact surely has consequences, whatever else you believe. We believe she was a blessing bestowed upon us by God. When this happened, when she was conceived in Theresa's womb and began her existence, she was placed under our stewardship. We were stewards. (See below*, excerpt from Chrysostom's commentary on the parable of the wasteful steward (Lk. 16).) But God has always been and will always be her Lord, and difficult as it is, we have to be content to accept the appalling strangeness of the mercy of God (to borrow a phrase). He created her for us, it is true, to be our daughter (sister, etc.); but first for himself, to be his daughter, to be a unique and precious part of his creation and an eternally blessed participant in his own divine life.

Contemplating the picture of Naomi sleeping, I thought of the host of those to whom St. Paul refers as 'sleeping,' who are now (somehow) with the Lord - and with Naomi, in that calm and bright holy night, which to us seems so silent. I thought of each time Naomi slept, and of the fact that each of her (and our) sleeps could have been her (or our) last on Earth: each time we enter the subconscious night of sleep - in a way analogous to death - we can never be entirely certain where we shall visit or to what we shall awaken...

For now we (who love her) must awaken to the absence of precious Naomi. This is often difficult. But we also believe that she has been granted an early passage to eternal rest, light, and joy, with Jesus, our holy mother Mary, and all God's saints. This too is one of God's gifts, and is a gift to us just as Jesus' death was a gift to us: "If I am lifted up from the Earth, I will draw all people to myself." First Jesus spoke these words (John 12:32); now Naomi too is among those drawing us up. Certainly, while Naomi was alive with us, we did thank God for his gift of her to us - as we thank him still for the gift of her life, and for Isaac, Nathaniel, and Tabitha - and we recognized the primacy of his Lordship over our stewardship (we might as well - it's not exactly optional). But while it is obviously not the gift we would have chosen, we believe that her death too is a part of the Lord's provision for us, a gift of God's merciful love, whereby he calls us to a greater perfection in accepting the gospel, in understanding who we are and how to be humble stewards of God's gifts, and in learning to trust in him as Lord, giver of life.

 

***

Silent night, holy night

All is calm, all is bright

Round yon virgin mother and child

Holy infant so tender and mild

Sleep in heavenly peace

*St. John Chrysostom: "An erroneous opinion, weighed down by mortal things, increases the reproaches due to us, and diminishes the good: such an opinion is to think that whatever we possess for the needs of life, we possess as lords; and thus we also grasp such things as if they were the most important goods. But the contrary is true: for in the present life we are not placed as lords in our own house, but as strangers and foreigners we are led where we wish not, and for how long we see not: who now has a secure place, in a short time becomes a beggar. Wherefore, whoever you are, know that you are the dispenser of another’s things, and that the rights over them have been conceded to you for a passing and brief time of use. Putting away from your soul, then, the arrogance of lordship, assume the humility and moderation of a steward." [Opinio quaedam erronea aggravata mortalibus auget crimina, minuit bona: ea vero est opinari quod ea quaecumque possidemus in usu vitae, possideamus ut domini; et ideo etiam opportune ea apprehendimus tamquam bona praecipua. Sed contrarium est: non enim nos ut domini in vita praesenti collocati sumus in propria domo, sed tamquam hospites et advenae quo nolimus ducimur, et quo tempore non putamus: qui nunc locuples est, in brevi fit mendicus. Ergo quicumque sis, noveris te esse dispensatorem alienorum, et quod transitorii usus et brevis tibi iura concessa sunt. Abiecto ergo ab anima dominii fastu, sumas humilitatem et modestiam villici.] (From Aquinas' Catena aurea in Lucam, c. 17, lc. 1.)

The Jesus Prayer

"Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God, have mercy on me, a sinner."

"Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God": The great mystery of our God, our creator and redeemer, who became man, conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary, in order to reveal to us most profoundly the face of God, and so to invite each individual in a unique way to become an active participant in the divine life of knowledge and love which orders and moves the whole universe. - There is one who enlightens every soul born into the world; he was the true Light.  He, through whom the world was made, was in the world, and the world treated him as a stranger.  ... the Word was made flesh, and came to dwell among us; and we had sight of his glory, glory such as belongs to the Father’s only-begotten Son, full of grace and truth. ... We have all received something out of his abundance, grace answering to grace. (John 1:9-16)

"Me, a sinner": Who, me? A what? Yes, me - and you too - a sinner. Someone who knows - no matter how vaguely or clearly - about what is true and good, about what really matters, about how best to live, about certain actions that I should and should not do, of the love I owe to God and to neighbor - but who often enough chooses not follow through on that knowledge. - Inwardly, I take delight in God’s law,  but I observe another law in my lower self, which raises war against the law of my conscience, and so I am handed over as a captive to that law of sin which my lower self contains. (Romans 7:22-23)

"Have mercy": that is, look with love upon my defects - and so, heal my wounds, restore my brokenness, sweeten my bitterness, correct my misunderstandings, enlighten my ignorance, give courage to my tremulous heart, enflame my tepid love. - Pitiable creature that I am, who is to set me free from a nature thus doomed to death?  Nothing else than the grace of God, through Jesus Christ our Lord. (Romans 7: 24-25)

Pope Francis' "Big Heart" interview

I started writing something about the 'Big Heart' interview (published in the Jesuit's America magazine) a while ago. Then I read this analysis: The phoney war in the Church: five linguistic thoughts on THAT interview. I think that Ches (the author) explains the problems quite beautifully and his article definitely deserves a read and ponder. The main issue which Ches addresses, and which I think many others have ignored, is: what do the words, the specific language, the pope used, taken in context, actually mean? What is their true significance, as uttered in the present world and in the present environment of competing ideologies? (And what vanity it would be to suppose that Pope Francis speaks pure gospel, in a way that simply transcends ideology.) Too many have decided to be 'charitable' by ignoring the world-historical and ecclesiastical-historical context of the pope's words and pretending that the best way to read him is in accordance with some presumption, of innocence/orthodoxy/liberalism/etc., so that the objective meaning of his words is so obscured by hermeneutical mists that all anybody can really do is to put the 'best' spin on it he can manage - that is, in accordance with however his conscience conceives of the 'best.'

The best way to read Bergoglio, however - that is, the way which accords with true charity, which is absolutely inseparable from truth -, is to see what substantive issues he has chosen to emphasize, which he has chosen to marginalize, and - unfortunately not a null category - which he has distorted using rather clearly identifiable ideological buzz-words (see article linked to above). Surely this kind of analysis is necessary for discerning how it is that the new pope is reading the signs of the times, and which banner - which basic conception of God and man and Church - he is undertaking to take up and march under. It is tempting to say, which ideology he wants to champion, Papa Bergoglio's extremely vague protestations against 'decadent' and 'bankrupt' ideology and in favor of 'genius' notwithstanding. And indeed, it is tempting to say this, to suggest that the pope's comments have an unfortunate air of ideological cant, precisely because of the squishy vagueness of these his protestations.

True progress: institutions, freedom, God

Institutions are good and, anyway, necessary (i.e., unavoidable - anarchists are profoundly unrealistic). But they do have within them a totalitarian tendency. They can loom so large in human life, society, history, that they come to appear to be the ultimate reality - or at lest the ultimate arbitrators of what should count as reality. To the extent this happens, institutions discourage us from pondering ultimate realities, and so also from pondering the ways in which they themselves may be distorting our understanding of reality and thus - in spite of responding to various real or artificial or even merely imagined needs (here I think especially of educational institutions these days) - inhibiting genuinely human progress.

From Pope Benedict XVI's Caritas in veritate, para. 11 (my unofficial, and better-than-the-official, translation into English):

...the true progress of man concerns the whole person in each and every dimension. When an expectation of eternal life is taken away, human progress in this world is left short of breath (spiritu privatur). Enclosed within history, it can run into the danger of giving itself over solely to the increase of power and possessions; humanity thus loses the heart to strive for higher goods and for the great and generous (selfless) initiatives, towards which universal charity urges us. By his own powers alone man does not progress, nor can progress be given to him wholly from outside. In the course of history, this has often been supposed, that the creation of institutions would be enough to make it possible to provide the abundance of resources required in light of humanity's right to progress.  Sadly, too much confidence was placed in those institutions, as if they would be able to deliver the desired objective by themselves. In reality, institutions alone are not enough, because integral human development, including all of its elements, is primarily a vocation, and therefore it brings with it a certain free and solidary responsibility, which every person must assume. Moreover, such progress requires a transcendent viewpoint on the person, it needs God: without him,  progress is either denied, or turned over exclusively into the hands of man, who falls into the conceit of saving himself (of being his own saviour), in the end pushing forward a dehumanized kind of progress. For indeed, only an encounter with God allows us to not see "in the other always only an other," but to recognize the divine image in him, so that thus the other is uncovered in his reality and so love ripens into "caring concern for  the other."


The authoritative Latin:

...verum hominis progressum ad totam personam eius in omnibus rationibus pertinere [16]. Dempta vitae aeternae exspectatione, hoc in mundo spiritu privatur humanus progressus. Intra historiam conclusus, periculum adire potest ne ad opes augendas tantummodo se tradat; humanitas sic despondet animum praestantiora bona atque magna liberaliaque incepta appetendi, ad quae universalis caritas impellit. Suis tantum viribus non progreditur homo, neque ei mere extrinsecus datur progressus. Annorum decursu saepenumero hoc putatum est conditas institutiones humanitati progressus ius suppeditare affatim posse. Proh dolor in his institutionibus immodica fiducia est collocata, quasi optatum propositum per se ipsae consequi possent. Institutiones revera solae non sufficiunt, quandoquidem humanus omnibus ex partibus integer progressus imprimis est vocatio quaedam ideoque liberam solidalemque responsalitatem secum fert, quam omnes suscipere debent. Talis progressio praeterea personae transcendentem prospectum requirit, Deo indiget: sine Eo progressus aut negatur aut hominis manibus solummodo demandatur, qui in iactantiam se ipsum salvandi incidit, inhumanum denique progressum provecturus. Ceterum cum Deo tantum occursus non sinit « in altero semper alterum solummodo » [17] cernere, sed in eo divinam imaginem agnoscere, dum sic alter reapse detegitur atque amor maturescit qui « alterius hominis curatio » [18] fit.

The original(?) German:

...die echte Entwicklung des Menschen einheitlich die Gesamtheit der Person in all ihren Dimensionen betrifft.[16] Ohne die Aussicht auf ein ewiges Leben fehlt dem menschlichen Fortschritt in dieser Welt der große Atem. Wenn er innerhalb der Geschichte eingeschlossen bleibt, ist er der Gefahr ausgesetzt, sich auf eine bloße Zunahme des Besitztums zu beschränken; so verliert die Menschheit den Mut, für die höheren Güter aufnahmebereit zu sein, für die großen und selbstlosen Initiativen, zu denen die universale Nächstenliebe drängt. Der Mensch entwickelt sich nicht bloß mit den eigenen Kräften, noch kann die Entwicklung ihm einfach von außen gegeben werden. Im Laufe der Geschichte hat man oft gemeint, die Schaffung von Institutionen genüge, um der Menschheit die Erfüllung ihres Rechtes auf Entwicklung zu gewährleisten. Leider hat man in solche Institutionen ein übertriebenes Vertrauen gesetzt, so als könnten sie das ersehnte Ziel automatisch erlangen. In Wirklichkeit reichen die Institutionen allein nicht aus, denn die ganzheitliche Entwicklung des Menschen ist vor allem Berufung und verlangt folglich von allen eine freie und solidarische Übernahme von Verantwortung. Eine solche Entwicklung erfordert außerdem eine transzendente Sicht der Person, sie braucht Gott: Ohne ihn wird die Entwicklung entweder verweigert oder einzig der Hand des Menschen anvertraut, der in die Anmaßung der Selbst-Erlösung fällt und schließlich eine entmenschlichte Entwicklung fördert. Im übrigen gestattet nur die Begegnung mit Gott, nicht »im anderen immer nur den anderen zu sehen«,[17] sondern in ihm das göttliche Bild zu erkennen und so dahin zu gelangen, wirklich den anderen zu entdecken und eine Liebe reifen zu lassen, die »Sorge um den anderen und für den anderen«[18] wird.

"Dear Madame Marois": a confused letter from a pretentious academic

Matt Friedman, a guy who teaches history at Rutgers University, recently wrote an annoyingly self-righteous letter to Pauline Marois, premiere of Quebec. I find Friedman's letter annoying because I always find pretentious academics who don't know what they're talking about annoying. But let's get into some specifics.

Friedman is writing to protest against the imposition of the "Charter of Quebecois values" currently being proposed by the government of Quebec. After an impassioned recital of his bona fides as a real Quebecois who holds real Quebecois values - though he is temporarily in exile from sa patrie -, he gets into trying to tell us what is wrong with the Charter.

He first explains that the law would allow certain things and disallow others, then, after making the accusation that the proposed Charter is essentially totalitarian, he writes: "Indeed, it is an axiom of both the Common and Civil Law that, for a law to be just it must apply equally and without discrimination. Yet the secularism you seek to impose on Québec is fundamentally unequal and discriminatory. It is therefore unjust."

Now I'm pretty sure the axiom he refers to means that the law must apply equally to all of those who fall under its prescriptions. It doesn't mean that the law itself must fail to make any distinctions, that is, that the law itself must not discriminate, that the law must regard every possible state of affairs as 'equal' - in other words, that the law should be nihilistic. The purpose of law is precisely to discriminate, and to do so in a way that is just and that will promote the common good... isn't it?? Friedman's claim is analogous to the claim that laws against murder discriminate against murderers - yeah, that's the point! (This all-too-common argument is one that annoys the heck out of me: "X is discriminatory; therefore X is unjust." No; to be discriminating is a good thing; it is to be capable of seeing reality and making sound judgments. To call something unjust is an act of discrimination, so if discrimination as such was really unjust, then it would be unjust to call anything unjust! That way of talking is thoroughly nonsensical.)

But then we might ask, how do advocates of unfettered tolerance, like Friedman, feel about someone wearing a KKK outfit, or displaying a big swastika tattoo? I'd actually be okay with that (i.e., tolerate it, not be happy about it) in some cases, perhaps in the case of a student, for example - but students are not agents of the state. As students they are expected to be open-minded, to want to learn, to be willing to examine their beliefs and values. But they are not representatives of the state and of societal values. (On the other hand, when it comes to a student having a covered face, I would incline towards intolerance. I think seeing someone's face is an important part of communicating with her, and I don't think that there are any real religious or cultural values tied specifically to the niqab that are worth defending. Are there any??) But Friedman, like Marois, seems reluctant to talk about - let alone defend - any of the specific values that are associated with any specific cultural symbols.

Friedman goes on to accuse Marois of not understanding her own cultural patrimony, of embracing, without realizing it, a "profoundly Christian secularism." [Insert extended discussion of this apparently oxymoronic concept here.] He writes: "To prohibit the display of religious symbols by citizens in public employment while the government of Québec displays them on its letterhead, in the Assemblée nationale, on Sureté de Québec cruisers – the physical embodiment of state power – and our society displays it in its geography and calendar, is not to preserve neutrality but privilege."

He thinks that Marois and co. don't understand this, and perhaps there's some truth to that [again, insert extended discussion here of exactly what that truth is], but he is just as confused as they are, because his own viewpoint no less than theirs pretends to value value-neutrality (to promote a culture of cultural neutrality) - which is impossible. And Friedman is even more confused than Marois, because he ignores the fact that most Quebecers - especially the Francophone ones - support the proposed legislation and fails to recognize that he too is endorsing a similar individualistic anti-cultural multiculturalism, which at its core is merely nihilistic. He thus fails to realize that the Charter is perfectly congruous with mainstream Quebecois culture - of which he is unwittingly a good representative in many ways -, because, au contraire de his conceited panegyric, mainstream Quebecois culture is simply nihilistic and shot through with irrationalism. I suspect that Friedman's self-righteous endorsement of Levesque and the noble humanism (or whatever) of the Quiet Revolution is simply nonsense and that in reality Marois and Drainville are, if anything, better interpreters and more genuine heirs of the legacy of Levesque than is Friedman. In any case, if Friedman wants to pretend to promote neutrality, it is a mystery how he can so baldly privilege (his interpretation of) the ideological legacy of Levesque.

And finally, I'm disgusted by Friedman's lack of ingenuousness: First he writes, "I believe that you are a very reasonable, well-meaning person, Mme. Marois, and I don’t doubt that you are motivated by the best-possible intentions." Then he concludes, "It appears that you believe that you can play the people of Québec like a violin; that you have so much contempt for us that you can manipulate us at the basest level. I hope I am wrong about you..." Really, Mr. Friedman? Make up your mind, man! But hey, let's face it: that kind of double-speak is just how lefties roll. Friedman or Marois, take your pick: when it comes to fundamentals, I don't see much difference here.