On Heresy Hunter's "Litany of Stupid Saints"

Here it is: a Litany of Stupid Saints, by Heresy Hunter. Go ahead, read it. (Do it now - at least the first paragraph. Please.) ... Now for comment.

First of all, I think the litany is pretty funny. But is it fair? That depends on what we understand the point to be.

If the point is simply to pillory the views of Jorge Bergoglio/Pope Francis, then it's not really fair (at least not all of it). Taking just the first point on 'proselytism': Pope Francis (reportedly) said, "Proselytism is solemn nonsense, it makes no sense. We need to get to know each other, listen to each other and improve our knowledge of the world around us... This is important: to get to know people, listen, expand the circle of ideas." Now logically, being sensitive to the whole context, 'proselytism' here should be taken to refer specifically to a way of spreading/sharing the gospel which is somehow opposed to getting to know those being evangelized; which getting to know would obviously have to include listening to them (not just preaching to them); and which listening, one would hope, should result in an improved knowledge of the world around us and an expansion of the "circle" of ideas (or of the "triangle" - or "sphere" or "polyhedron" or whatever geometrical or non-geometrical figure of speech you happen to prefer - of ideas).

Now clearly 'proselytism,' thus defined, can creditably enough be charged with making no sense. And certainly that kind of 'proselytism' is not at all the kind of proselytism that was practised by Gabriel Lalemant, Jean de Brebeuf, Isaac Jogues, and the other NA martyrs (not to mention the proselytism of Peter Faber, who is obviously dear to the pope). As a matter of strict necessity, the Jesuit missionaries had to listen to and get to know the people they were sent to, they had to expand their own knowledge, before they could even begin to make disciples and teach the Amerindians to obey the commandments given by Jesus. (This is too obvious, really!) So Hunter's criticisms on this point, taken straight up, are not fair. In fact, taken straight up, they make no sense! (Score one for Bergoglio.)

On the other hand, the "litany of stupid saints" is - I hope you didn't miss this! - satirical. As such, instead of directly attacking Francis' views - i.e., what Francis really thinks -, I think the point could be taken to be about Francis' ability to communicate - i.e., the unfortunate things Frances sometimes actually says. It's not fair to say based on what Francis says that he is fundamentally stupid or 'un-Catholic' and that he would actually accept the stupid or 'un-Catholic' implications (or likely interpretations) of some of the things he says (and which we hear so much about, thanks to our ever-vigilant and unfailingly balanced news media). It is fair to say, however, that he is, at least in some respects, a poor communicator - at least insofar as a better communicator would understand in advance the implications of whatever words he might choose and so (presumably) find and use words that didn't have such silly/false/scandalous implications (or probable interpretations).

So on the whole, I approve of this piece of satire. Read appropriately, it made some important points: Francis tends to say things which, at least as they are likely to be interpreted by the ordinary person, would be objectively foolish and false. Thus, the Pope's words have rather naturally led many people to think that these are the Pope's actual beliefs - which presumably, all things considered, they are not, even though many people (who do actually hold such objectively foolish beliefs) evidently wish they were. (This is, of course, a vague generalization, and only a vague generalization.)

But a note of caution: Others could easily read the piece differently: They could interpret it as simply being a witty demonstration of what a lousy Catholic our Pope is. I don't think that is the most charitable reading of the litany, simply because this interpretation would have Hunter attempting to make a point that is objectively foolish and untrue to the reality: the litany demonstrates no such thing.

But how to avoid such uncharitable interpretations? In general, unfortunately, it's not actually possible: People will hear what they want to hear (it's part of that 'hardness of heart' thing you find here and there in the Bible). But perhaps this might be a helpful principle: "We need to get to know each other, listen to each other and improve our knowledge of the world around us... This is important: to get to know people, listen, expand the circle of ideas." Insofar as one natural interpretation of the litany would actually tend to undermine this authentic Jesuit principle, it would, under this interpretation, be a rather counter-productive and self-refuting piece of satire.

Christopher West: "naked without shame"?

If Christopher West is "naked without shame," should we think of Genesis 2:25, or The Emperor's New Clothes? (C'mon - it's an innocent question!)

I recently finished listening to Christopher West's "Naked Without Shame" talks, recorded in 2002, which one can listen to here. (It's free!) It was painful at times, but interesting. One of the most persistent questions I had while listening was, what do people see in this guy? Why is he so popular? Thinking about it, I realized I actually have the same question about a lot of things. In particular I have this question about (certain) televangelists (Oprah, for example). And if I had two words to describe the way West's talks struck me, they would perhaps be "annoying televangelist."

"Now that's not very nice!" you might think, especially if you're a CWest fan, and maybe you're right. But I don't think there's much substance in such a reaction. So what if it's "not very nice"?: You still need to ask: Is it just (as an assessment)? Is it justified (i.e., worth mentioning)? Well, not necessarily, I suppose.

For instance, I remember the reaction of one American 'journalist' to the election of Pope Benedict (way back in 2005): her comment was that he wasn't the right man for the job, partly because (according to her) he had an ugly face (I believe she actually used the expression "unfortunate visage"). Now that assessment is also "not very nice," but that's not the real problem with it. The real problem is that it's incredibly shallow and stupid.

So I suppose someone might think that characterizing West's talks as "annoying televangelism" is also, besides "not very nice," shallow and stupid. But the question is whether that would be correct. So what grounds my characterization?

To begin with, annoying televangelists may be basically good people, doing basically good work. So you can't say, "Now you listen to me: He's a good man, doing good work! Therefore it's not fair to compare him to annoying televangelists." That doesn't follow.

But if all there was to my impression of CWest as an annoying televangelist was, say, an antipathy to the man's style, then I suppose it wouldn't be very nice to mention it (publicly, at least), and probably there would be no justification for mentioning it - other than, say, if I was explaining to someone why I can't get too excited about his apostolate.

But as to whether my characterization might be stupid and shallow (and obviously I hope it's not!), it's important to recognize that "annoying televangelist" is not at all on the level of "unfortunate visage." But if it indeed is not, then what is the substance of this characterization?

To begin with, granted: annoying televangelists are typically primarily annoying because of their style. (And this does apply in the case of my reaction to CWest - it's just annoying, the way he talks, all of the exaggerated intonations and emphases, the dumb jokes, the bombast.)

But beyond style, I would associate two things with such characters: while they may present a message that is good in itself, they tend to present it in a shallow, demagogic way; and besides promoting the authentic message - that is, the one which they claim to be promoting -, they tend to be self-promoting, and in ways that obscure or corrupt the authentic message.

Now it seems to me that a good televangelist need not and should not be annoying. (Joel Osteen, for example, is only a little bit annoying.) And he need not and should not be a shallow self-promoter. Rather, he should be able to present things in a simple way, for a general audience, without saying things that are shallow, that are plain nonsense, or that are misleading and demagogical (i.e., 'rabble-rousing,' manipulating the crowd through popular emotions, prejudices, and fears). And this is to say that he should also be able to promote his message, and (incidentally) promote himself (there's nothing per se wrong with this), but without deviating from the authenticity of the message, which should always include the implicit aim of stimulating people to think clearly, critically, and reflectively. And if I'm not mistaken, "Naked Without Shame" deserves criticism on both these counts (shallowness and self-promotion).

To demonstrate that this assessment is correct would require some detailed analysis of the various things West actually says in his talks (and maybe I'll do some of that at some point). But I think there are also serious problems with the overall thrust of West's fundamental message. I think Fr. Angelo Geiger correctly identifies the main one, namely, his (rhetorical, at least) rejection of a hermeneutic of continuity (see below), which I would express by saying that his message is fundamentally Protestant. That is to say, he (implicitly) dismisses the constant teaching tradition of the Church from the time of the Apostles and (explicitly) preaches a theological revolution (whether he does so in reality, or primarily just  rhetorically, is another question). There is nothing wrong with reformation (i.e., reform) within the Church. But the Protestant Reformation was a revolution, a revolt, a rejection of the real, visible, historic Church, and the creation of new, alternate institutions, fundamentally conceived as invisible, spiritual realities (invisibly united and visibly fragmented), precisely in opposition to the visible, historic church founded by the apostles and shepherded by their successors.

I imagine West might deny that his message is at all 'Protestant,' because he thinks he is promoting the message of the pope ("it's the pope, for crying out loud!"), and perhaps he thinks that it follows that his message must be Catholic. But it seems to me that in fact there's nothing authentically 'Catholic' about painting the pope as a theological revolutionary in relation to the first 2000 years of the Church, and it seems absurd to think that John Paul II himself would ever accept this characterization of his "theology of the body" or of his own pontificate. But, of course, "the pope has announced a theological revolution and I am its messenger" is a message which can play well to certain audiences and can serve as very effective self-promotion - it certainly simplifies things if we can shuffle aside the first 1500 years of the Church and focus on the Bible alone, or shuffle aside the first 2000 years of the Church and focus on four-years-worth of weekly catechetical addresses offered in the early 1980's by one pope (the 263rd successor of Peter, by the way). But teaching people to thank God for JPII and his TOB, and implicitly to thank God that they didn't live under any of those pre-TOB-revolution popes (who are collectively remarkable for their utter failure to publish any writings about the timing of sexual climaxes and such), is a highly dubious brand of 'Catholicism.'

Of course, the real focus of West's apostolate maybe just isn't on helping people to love the truth, and especially the highest and deepest truths - that is, his focus is not really theological, per se. Instead he's reaching out primarily to people who are psychologically wounded and warped by the lies of the 'sexual revolution,' so the fine points of truth and logic and the bigger picture of Catholic faith are extraneous to the narrow, essentially therapeutic purpose of his talks. That's fine. And this might be an effective propaedeutic to theology.

The problem, however, is that West sells himself as offering (and presumably actually aims to offer) something much more profound and universal than this, and this being the case, he does not have the right to just ignore the errors and un-Catholic tendencies in his position, even if these happen to be incidental to whatever immediate and real therapeutic value there is in his message.

In any case, 2002 is a while back now, so here's hoping that West has matured to the point where he no longer sees fit to deal with critics by assigning question-begging derogatory labels to them while ignoring their actual critiques. (To paraphrase West's strategy (at least back in 2002): "Well the Pharisees didn't like it when Jesus preached the gospel either" and "My critics are 'liberals' or 'conservatives' - but I'm Catholic!" [enthusiastic applause from the adoring crowd; eye-rolls from critics].)

...


Fr. Angelo Geiger makes some excellent points about West's "blind spot" here. An excerpt:

West is easily interpreted as suggesting that without TOB Catholics have never had any clear vision of what God's intention for human sexuality was from the beginning. Otherwise, would he not make a greater effort to teach chastity with a hermeneutic of continuity instead of concentrating almost exclusively on a very narrow part of magisterial teaching on human sexuality? It seems he is suggesting that our past has been clouded by puritanism because we did not have TOB, and our future will be the age of the love banquet because we do.

Is my interpretation of West a bit facile? But this is the problem with trying to popularize a work of deep theology and philosophy. It is not even clear to me whether West is engaged in apologetics or catechesis. The two are not the same thing. Apologetics is a kind of preamble to catechesis that elicits the assent of faith in respect to difficult truths by way of arguments that are easily understood and appealing to someone who has no basic understanding of revelation. Catechesis is sacramental preparation or ongoing education, based on faith already elicited.

Granted, the two overlap: Catechumens will often have to come to terms with issues they have a hard time with before their initial catechesis is completed, but apologetical explanations are not sufficient to complete a catechesis. If a new vision of human sexuality gets them in the door, only the tradition of the ages will get them to the sanctuary. In either case, TOB is not easily distilled to those who are relatively uninitiated.

The fact is the fundamental problem with human sexuality, even in the Victorian age and that of the sexual revolution is original sin. West acknowledges the fact of original sin when he says:

Of course, on this side of heaven, we will always be able to recognize a battle in our hearts between love and lust. Only in eternity will the battle cease, as will marriage as we know it.

But he says this only in passing. His real point is the following:

There will be no renewal of the Church and the world without a renewal of marriage and the family. And there will be no renewal of marriage and the family without a return to the full truth of the Christian sexual ethic. This will not happen, however, unless we can find a compelling way to demonstrate to the modern world that the biblical vision of sexuality is not the prudish list of prohibitions it is so often assumed to be, but rather it is the banquet of love for which we so desperately yearn.

West is right that many do assume that the Church's "vision of sexuality" is a "prudish list of prohibitions," but the vast majority of people today assume that the prohibition of fornication, contraception and soft-core pornography is prudish. Is Hefner really a pornographer because of prudery, or is perhaps the "Playboy Philosophy" just an obsessive rationalization for lust? I am not saying that prudery was not a factor in Hefner's life, but it simply does not account for the extent of his monumentally prurient behavior. So is prudery the real problem? I think our real work is not to show how TOB rescued the biblical vision of sexuality, but to show how the teaching of the Church in general has been misinterpreted.

I said that my problem with West's presentation is his interpretation of the past and the future and the way in which the present age of TOB is the hermeneutical key for both. What I mean is that his fundamental interpretation of the past is prudery and his fundamental interpretation of the future is something akin to original innocence. Original sin gets lost in the shuffle. The message is that we've got to be positive. "Think good thoughts via TOB," we are told, "and everything will settle down."

It's not going to happen. It's not. 

Doctors refusing to prescribe birth control pills?!

This is a story from an actual newspaper(!):
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/Some+Ottawa+doctors+refuse+prescribe+birth+control+pills/9450917/story.html

 

An excerpt:

OTTAWA — At least three Ottawa family physicians are refusing to prescribe birth control pills or any form of contraception for their patients, saying doing so conflicts with their “medical judgment, professional ethical concerns and religious values.”

The doctors, who work at Care-Medics Medical Centres in Ottawa, distribute letters to patients informing them of their positions, according to office staff there. A copy of one of the letters, signed by Dr. Edmond Kyrillos, has been posted on Facebook through a group called Radical Handmaids.

The letter informs patients that the doctor only provides one form of birth control, “Natural Family Planning.”

“In addition, I do not refer for vasectomies, abortions nor prescribe the morning after pill or any artificial contraception. If you are interested in the latter, please be aware that you may approach your own family doctor or request to be seen by another physician.”

...

Radical Handmaids, which describes itself as a group of pro-choice advocates, said the letter was sent to them anonymously by a woman in Ottawa. “Yes this is a real doctor. No you are not in a time warp,” the posting read.

Among comments was this one from Kate Suppa: “When you become a doctor, you take an oath to do not harm. Impeding someone’s ability to receive the care they need is doing harm and should not be legal.”

[Etc.] 

My reaction?

OMG, sisters! Can you, like, believe this story? In Canada, in 2014, we still have practising physicians who have, like, 'moral values' and non-mainstream 'medical judgments.' WTF! If someone doesn't ban these people, I am so moving to Quebec. This kind of independence cannot be tolerated. We need to do a much better job of forcing our tolerant and progressive values, the sacred values of the anti-religious secular feminist state, upon those who dare to dissent. Let's go, long-suffering sisters (and the brave sensitive men who support them): let's womyn the barricades, let's crush these outliers! We must not let our clocks run backwards - now more than ever we must cling to our grand narrative of 'progress' and 'enlightenment' (in a pragmatic way, of course, that is, when it's convenient).

Gay Marriage Advocacy

This is seriously about how intelligent and open-minded a lot of (most?) gay marriage advocates are (at least qua gay marriage advocates, that is, as regards their advocacy of gay marriage):

"You're a homophobe."
"How so?"
"Come on! You don't believe in gay marriage."
"That's true, but why should that imply that I'm a homophobe."
"Listen: most people these days would think you're a homophobe if you don't believe in gay marriage - therefore you're a homophobe."
"So if most people believe something, then it must be true?"
"No. ... But I think you're a homophobe."
"How so?"
"You don't believe in gay marriage."
"That's true, but..."
[etc.]

Intellectual curiosity vs. intellectual dishonesty

Intellectual curiosity is a vital antidote against intellectual dishonesty (and is necessary, though not sufficient, for intellectual flourishing), whereas a lack of intellectual curiosity is an excellent bellwether for intellectual dishonesty (where intellectual curiosity is lacking, intellectual dishonesty is sure to be found not far away).

Supposing that might be true, what is intellectual curiosity? It’s certainly very different from – though not necessarily incompatible with –, say, a fondness for picking up and spouting arcane jargon. Rather, it’s a natural inclination of healthy human beings to feel wonder in the face of things and people and ideas and a desire to learn to properly understand and appreciate all these things for what(ever) they truly are.

It seems to me that someone who says, “There’s no point in us discussing such and such an issue, because we have very different fundamental views about such and such (about the world, about truth, about human nature, etc.)” is very likely lacking in intellectual curiosity (and thus likely prone to intellectual dishonesty). Such a person simply doesn’t want to understand anything different from what she already understands. She is perhaps rather similar to a skittish horse, which simply can’t function properly – can’t placidly plod along – without blinders on to shut out distractions and to keep its gaze focused on its given task.

 

Now there’s nothing really wrong with someone having a narrow focus, so long as that person has a clearly defined job to do and she needs to stay focused on just getting that job done. But some of the tasks which life imposes on us are just not like that. If you have a wild horse, for example, that needs to keep track of the rest of the herd, be on guard against predators, etc., the horse needs to be able to look around and see what is what, to assess, in its own horsy way of assessing things, the ‘big picture’ of what is going on around it. Blinders are a bad idea in this kind of situation.

And this is the kind of situation that human beings are in when they have fundamental disagreements with the other human beings with whom they live. Whenever disagreements arise, it is always possible to just take up arms – whether physical or verbal – and attack, or to just plug one's ears and hole up in one’s ideological fortress. But most of us can see that this is a vicious kind of response, not worthy of a human being. It is a corruption of our intellectual curiosity -- even if it is one which, to some extent, inevitably occurs, given the sickness (or just feebleness) that, with varying severity, infects every human being. But it is also something that we can commit ourselves to working against, because, while it clearly is a sickness of our race, still, whatever psychoses do affect us, the undeniable existence of intellectual curiosity – which is as undeniable as the existence of children – continues to speak to us of the metaphysical possibility and the moral necessity of working to overcome such psychoses (that is, such losses of contact with reality).

Not that the evident existence of intellectual curiosity necessarily speaks to all of us. It is possible to become like the Dwarfs in C.S. Lewis’ beautiful depiction in The Last Battle of the death of intellectual curiosity. The Dwarfs decide that they’re on their own and they will only look out for each other. They are little skeptics who don’t want to be taken in by any grand tales (any ‘metanarratives’), who aren’t interested in serving any grand cause, so they refuse to believe in any ‘truth’ except that “the Dwarfs are for the Dwarfs.” They viciously and gleefully attack anyone who is outside of their clique and even when their plight becomes evidently hopeless they refuse to receive any help from others:

    “Well, at any rate there’s no Humbug here. We haven’t let anyone take us in. The Dwarfs are for the Dwarfs.”
    “You see,” said Aslan. “They will not let us help them. They have chosen cunning instead of belief. Their prison is only in their own minds, yet they are in that prison; and so afraid of being taken in that they cannot be taken out…”

The Dwarfs are beautifully depicted because they are so true to life. At first they are almost frighteningly ugly, like the recent disgustingly ugly display put on by abortion zealots in Argentina. But in the end we can see that they are simply and tragically ridiculous.* (And it strikes me as more than coincidental that you very rarely (if ever) see a Dwarf child in Narnia – and that such vitriolic contempt for the lives even of innocent little children should be found together with a similar spitting, chanting, sneering contempt for intellectual curiosity in Argentina.)

[*Even though, in Lewis' account, it's also true that they are still not entirely beyond the possibility of finally accepting redemption.]

Truth is subjective! (for me)

"Truth is subjective. We all construct our own world of 'truth' and no one's version of 'truth' is any more valid than anyone else's. There is no 'objective' truth."
"Heil, Hitler!"
"Totally valid."
"You're an idiot."
"Totally valid."...
"You actually believe that you're an idiot and that Nazi's are cool?"
"No, I didn't mean those things were valid for *me*, but they are for *you*."
"Hmm... you're kind of missing the point... But... your claim about the subjectivity of truth: who is that valid for?"
"For me."
"So shouldn't you have said, "*I* construct *my* own world of 'truth' and no one else's version of 'truth' has any validity for *me*"? In other words, you don't care what anybody else thinks."
"That's right: you want to be a Nazi, go ahead. I won't like it, but it's totally valid, for *you*."
"But you're missing the point: I don't want to be a Nazi!"
"Sure, that's valid for *you*, but I really don't care."
"You really are an idiot!"
"Again, totally valid, but I don't care."

Knowing and Belonging

Joseph Ratzinger (Benedict XVI), Jesus of Nazareth, p. 280f.:

“I am the Good Shepherd; I know my own and my own know me, as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep” (Jn 10:14f.). These verses present two striking sets of interrelated ideas that we need to consider if we are to understand what is meant by “knowing.”

First of all, knowing and belonging are interrelated. The Shepherd knows the sheep because they belong to him, and they know him precisely because they are his. Knowing and belonging (the Greek text speaks of the sheep as the Shepherd’s “own,” ta ídia) are actually one and the same thing. The true shepherd does not “possess” the sheep as is they were a thing to be used and consumed; rather, they “belong” to him, in the context of their knowing each other, and this “knowing” is an inner acceptance. It signifies an inner belonging that goes much deeper than the possession of things.

Let us illustrate this with an example from our own lives. No human being “belongs” to another in the way that a thing does. Children are not their parents’ “property”; spouses are not each other’s “property.” Yet they do “belong” to each other in a much deeper way than, for example, a piece of wood or a plot of land, or whatever else we call “property.” Children “belong” to their parents, yet they are free creatures of God in their own right, each with his own calling and his own newness and uniqueness before God. They belong to each other, not as property, but in mutual responsibility. They belong to each other precisely by accepting one another’s freedom and by supporting one another in love and knowledge – and in this communion they are simultaneously free and one for all eternity.

In the same way, the “sheep,” who after all are people created by God, images of God,* do not belong to the shepherd as if they were things – though that is what the thief and robber thinks when he takes possession of them. Herein lies the distinction between the owner, the true Shepherd, and the robber. For the robber, for the ideologues and the dictators, human beings are merely a thing that they possess. For the true Shepherd, however, they are free in relation to truth and love; the Shepherd proves that they belong to him precisely by knowing and loving them, by wishing them to be in the freedom of the truth. They belong to him through the oneness of “knowing,” through the communion in the truth that the Shepherd himself is. This is why he does not use them, but gives his life for them. Just as Logos and Incarnation, Logos and Passion belong together, so too knowing and self-giving are ultimately one.

[*That is, God, Holy Trinity: Father (Origin) begetting Son (Word, Image), together breathing forth the Spirit (Love, Gift).] 

What a beautifully challenging picture of the world we indeed live in: We are indeed responsible for each other, challenged to accept one another's freedom, and to support one another in love and knowledge. And the true shepherd is the one that reveals the truth and offers his love - and so we become free to enter into that life, to seek to cling to him so as to be (and to live as) one of his own (so as to in turn lay down our lives...).

But the true shepherd has competitors, enemies. There are others who would like to take charge of the sheep and make a different kind of world. Still, the true shepherd lays down his life for all, even for the ideologues and dictators, those who are rather rapists and seducers than lovers,* who pursue an empty kind of freedom which is divorced from communion in truth and so who despise and fear reality, and hate life, hate others, hate the truth (and who thus ultimately hate themselves), and who thus suppress any natural compunction they might feel about spitting on those who dare to challenge the idol they have made of their ideology. They know - deep-down, at least - their own guilt: they know that hatred of truth and complicity in lies are deeply shameful; and they know, deep-down, that they are in fact decidedly humble and fallible little creatures, subject to the truth, not Lord over it; they know that they should thus always be open-minded, open to the possibility of correction, so as to be open to the truth; and yet they are afraid to reveal themselves - most of all to themselves - so they hide in dishonest rhetoric and malicious venom. It seems too great a risk to enter into a genuine dialogue, and so to be open to communion in the truth. They  know deep down their own pettiness and guilt, but because they haven't encountered divine mercy, they are afraid to trust and to open themselves up to something bigger than themselves, something that transcends the familiar and comfortable ideological tent they inhabit, which they have learned to embrace as their reality and source of security, and over which they do their desperate best to reign as little tyrants.

And yet, as long as they live, as long as they are still able to choose life, the true shepherd continues to lay down his life for all these sheep. That is, he continues to offer us the gift of a share in his life, whereby we can know and love the truth, know and love the Shepherd (first of all acknowledging that we need one - we need help, we need guidance, we need redemption!), and thus know and love even ourselves, so that finally we can freely rejoice together in the beautiful gift of life. Some people are too afraid or confused or too accustomed to a life of hedonism or of spitting on others with violent self-righteous ideology to take seriously the gospel, this offer of the gift of life. Nonetheless, conversion is possible, the offer is there.

***

Eternal Father, for the sake of His sorrowful passion, have mercy on me and on the whole world.



[*Wayne Brockriede wrote an article entitled "Arguers As Lovers" (see Philosophy and Rhetoric, 1972) in which he classifies, in a rather simplistic but useful way, three kinds of arguers, that is, three possible ways of presenting and promoting truth-claims: as a rapist, as a seducer, as a lover. The rapist openly tries to force his view on the other person by the use of power (by censorship, for example, simply refusing to allow the other to even express his point-of-view - which can be accomplished simply by plugging one's ears, refusing to honestly listen to his point of view). The seducer likewise is indifferent to the humanness of the other person, but uses charm and deceit in an effort to "eliminate or limit his coarguer's most distinctively human power, the right to choose with an understanding of the consequences and implications of available options" (this is a standard device of ideologically motivated teachers, professors, politicians, journalists, parents, etc.). The lover, finally, sees the other person as a person, not as an object or victim. As Brockriede explains it, "the lover wants power parity." Rather than simply facing an adversary, "the lover...is willing to risk his very self in his attempt to establish a bilateral relationship." There is a clear resonance here between Brockriede's "lover-arguer" and Ratzinger's description of the true shepherd, who lays down his life in order to offer us freedom in relation to love and truth, freedom to belong to him (and him to us) in love, through oneness in knowing and through communion in the truth.]