In his essay “Religious Humanism: A Manifesto,” Wolfe argues that “religious humanism offers the best antidote to the ravages of the ‘culture wars.’” He says that “the term ‘religious humanism’” suggests “a tension between two opposed terms – between heaven and earth. But it is a creative, rather than deconstructive, tension. Perhaps the best analogy for understanding religious humanism comes from the Christian doctrine of the Incarnation, which holds that Jesus was both human and divine. This paradoxical meeting of these two natures is the pattern by which we can begin to understand the many dualities we experience in life: flesh and spirit, nature and grace, God and Caesar, faith and reason, justice and mercy.”
When I read “it is a creative, rather than deconstructive, tension,” a light suddenly went on and I realized that Wolfe was what he claimed, a conscientious objector to the culture wars. My mind went to Gandhi and MLK, Jr. Both fought vigorously for cultural, legal, and political transformation. But, they refused the role of combatant, embracing instead the role of creative sufferer. Creative rather than deconstructive or destructive!
Anticipating the objection that religious humanism, with its ambiguities and paradoxes, is really a masked form of the liberal position, Wolfe reminds the reader that “the majority of religious humanists through the centuries have been deeply orthodox, though that does not mean they don’t struggle with doubt or possess highly skeptical minds.” Wolfe is not surprised by this orthodoxy. Religious dogma restates the mysteries of faith. Wolfe quotes Flannery O’Connor: “dogma [are] an instrument for penetrating reality. Christian dogma is about the only thing left in the world that surely guards and respects mystery.”
Wolfe says: “So we arrive at yet another paradox: that the religious humanist combines an intense (if occasionally anguished) attachment to orthodoxy with a profound spirit of openness to the world.”
In America, Wolfe sees “imaginative writers” as the leading religious humanists. “Nathaniel Hawthorne’s insistence on the reality of evil, the inexorable presence of the past, and a tragic sense of life stood in stark contrast to Emerson’s optimism and utopianism. Throughout his career, Hawthorne struggled to achieve a more sacramental perspective, which placed self in relation to the transcendent, and which encompassed a vision of redemptive suffering. It is possible to draw a direct line from Hawthorneto such modern American writers as T.S. Eliot, Flannery O’Connor, Walker Percy, Richard Rodriguez, and Annie Dillard.”
The next post will more directly draw a link between Wolfe’s ideas and our MOJ project.
See Beyond Politics and Beyond Politics II.
In my last post, I encouraged us to look beyond politics as we creatively engage the task of developing Catholic Legal Theory. Gregory Wolfe has helped clarify my thinking, giving voice to my intuitions. He describes himself as a “conscientious objector” in the culture wars, and although I was skeptical of his claim at first, I have now come to see it.
His objection is different than many other Catholics who find it difficult to take sides in the culture wars because they think that the right (Republicans) is correct on some issues and the left (Democrats) is correct on other issues. His objection, as I understand it, is more fundamental. He objects to the primacy given to politics in our culture. I will address this in posts entitled Beyond Politics III and Beyond Politcs IV. But, first his view of religious conservatives and liberals.
In an essay with the “half-serious, half-ironic” title, “Religious Humanism: A Manifesto,” Wolfe argues that conservatives err by emphasizing the divinity of Christ at the expense of his humanity with a tendency to “hold such a negative view of human nature that the products of culture are seen as inevitably corrupt and worthless.” He sees the liberal error as emphasizing the humanity of Christ at the expense of his divinity, making him “nothing more than a superior social worker or popular guru.” Liberals, he posits, have the tendency “to accommodate themselves to the dominant trends of the time baptiz[ing] nearly everything, even things that may not be compatible with the dictates of faith.”
He suggests that it is difficult to maintain “the incarnational balance of the human and the divine” because “human beings find it difficult to live with paradox. It is far easier to seek resolution in one direction of the other; indeed, making such a choice often seems to be the most principled option.” I can relate to this in my own life, but that is for another day.
Sunday, November 30, 2008
Now that the election is past, I’d like to encourage us to move beyond politics (at least for two years but maybe longer) and to think more creatively about how MOJ and the development of Catholic Legal Theory can contribute its small part to the transformation of our culture. And, yes, I believe we have been given only a small but important portion of this vineyard to till.
As most of you know, I intentionally do not blog directly (at least not very often) on partisan politics, and I did not publicly endorse a candidate, although there was probably little doubt about who I thought was disqualified. As I have mentioned before, I don’t like to blog directly on partisan and especially electoral politics because of an intuition that we are engaged in a much more important, longer-term, and deeper project than the partisan bickering (no matter how important) of the moment.
Thanks to my children directing me to Gregory Wolfe, his collection of essays, Intruding Upon the Timeless, and his journal Image, I now have some words to express this intuition. In an essay entitled “Why I am a Conscientious Objector in the Culture War,” Wolfe states that he has strong opinions on most of the current hot button issues and will give voice to those opinions where appropriate. He is not bothered by the conflict but by the means used to wage the culture wars. “[T]he urgent need at the moment is to recognize that we cannot reduce culture and its various modes of discourse to nothing more than a political battleground. The political institutions of a society grow up out of a rich cultural life, and not the other way around. As it etymology indicates, the word culture is a metaphor for organic growth. Reducing culture to politics is like constantly spraying insecticide and never watering or fertilizing the soil.”
His words resonated with me. But, after reading this essay, I argued with my daughter that far from being a conscientious objector, Wolfe was fighting the culture war on another perhaps nobler front. Another of his essays showed me I was wrong, but that is for another post...
My thoughts are further developed in Beyond Politics II, BP III, and BP IV.
Thursday, November 27, 2008
By the President of the United States of America.
A Proclamation.
The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle or the ship; the axe has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consiousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom. No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American People. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.
In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the City of Washington, this Third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the Unites States the Eighty-eighth.
By the President: Abraham Lincoln
William H. Seward,
Secretary of State
Monday, November 24, 2008
President Obama may reject Sally Quinn's advice that he attend the National Cathedral. Instead of attending church, he might favor a good physical workout on Sunday morning. This article is from Politico:
"President-elect Barack Obama has yet to attend church services since winning the White House earlier this month, a departure from the example of his two immediate predecessors.
On the three Sundays since his election, Obama has instead used his free time to get in workouts at a Chicago gym. ..."
Monday, November 17, 2008
In response to the news of the labor dispute between a teacher’s union and the Scranton diocese, one of the students in my Catholic Perspectives on American Law seminar asked this:
Is the Church's position on Labor inconsistent? Does the Church expect companies/American industry to do what it will not (i.e. recognize and negotiate with organized labor)? Is it possible that, in the Church's eyes, what is good for American workers may not, in some cases, be consistent with Church doctrine?
Do we have enough facts to judge the situation in Scranton? In addition to questions about the facts on the ground in Scranton, I have several others of a more general nature.
Does the “right” of employees to organize depend, at least partly, on the nature of the employer’s activity? In other words, does it matter whether the employer is a huge for-profit corporation where no personal relationships between upper management and lowly workers are possible; a small for-profit company, a public school district, a police or fire department, a non-profit agency large or small, or a religious organization, including a religious school? Is there a difference between being employed by an entity that simply wants your labor for 40 hours a week vs. one that expects you to participate in its life?
Is the right to unionize an absolute right in the eyes of the Church? Or, is the employee’s right a right to participate in decisions, including decisions at work, that effect the worker’s well being. (Scranton does have an Employee Council). Can a union in any setting – but especially in a setting like a Church – become so belligerent in its attitude and demands and so antithetical to the work of the employer that the employer has a legitimate right to refuse further dealings with the union?
What do others more knowledgeable than I think?
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
The Catholic News Agency reports:
Washington DC, Nov 11, 2008 / 05:02 am (CNA).- President-elect Barack Obama’s transition team is preparing the first actions of his presidency, planning to lift embryonic stem cell research funding restrictions and rules which prevent international organizations that receive U.S. aid from counseling women about the availability of abortion.
The latter rules, known as the “Mexico City Policy,” were developed under the Reagan administration, revoked by the Clinton administration, and restored by President George W. Bush’s administration.
Cecile Richards, president of Planned Parenthood Federation of America said her organization had been communicating with Obama’s transition staff almost daily. “We expect to see a real change,” the Washington Post reports.
...
