Keeping the Faith: Pope Francis I

We have a new Pope: Francis I. There is little more which can be said here which hasn't likely already been said. He appears a holy and humble man, steeped in the tradition of the Church and intending to carry forth those traditions in an increasingly hostile world.

Those hostilities will raise their ugly heads. After all, all those liberals, atheists, and secularists who cry so loud for tolerance aren't about to tolerate anyone not like them.

And Pope Francis certainly isn't like them. While preaching for the poor and the sick he has yet insisted that Church teaching is true and must be followed. Though he is seen as a personable man, there is no amount of personal goodwill which the left holds for those who work against them.

The celebrations are still happening; the masses of thanksgiving and the prayers for the new Pontiff still fall from the lips of the faithful. The grace period has only just begun. Yet it will end soon enough, as soon as Pope Francis has to remind the world of the errors of her ways. That is when the prayers of the faithful really begin to matter, when we pray for him to have the strength to speak for Christ in an increasing relativist world.

We trust that he will have that strength. All the evidence, all the tradition; all of our faith says so.

Peace and Love

Ah, peace. Let's be for it, shall we?

And in the meantime, let's also be for happiness and sunshine and, and, unicorns. Yes, unicorns, because it all makes about as much sense, doesn't it?

Aren't we all for peace? Happiness? Sunshine? Of course; but then all those bugbears get in the way, don't they? All those nasty facts such as that there are members of the human race who do not and will not support us. All those who will use war and propaganda against all of our very trendy ideas about peace will work against us despite our lofty ideals.

But we will win, our ideals will win, won't they? Because they are ideal and everyone will see them, will they not?

They will not. Why? Simply and obviously because some folks will, simply and obviously, choose not to accept them. The curse of a vapid individualism is that it must allow that the feelings of every individual deserves to be heard. Every faction, it seems, deserves its day in court.

At what cost? The millions who died during World War II or the Great Leap Forward? Would they share a general and vacuous feeling that: 'all we are saying, is give peace a chance?'

We doubt it.

Polls and Morality and a New Pope

A recent poll by the people at Quinnipiac University tells a tale of American Catholics who seem to believe, by a paper thin margin, that the Vatican in general and next Pope in particular has to moderate. The Church is moving in the right direction, they say, but needs to alter its stance on contraception, gay marriage, women priests in order to become more in step with the modern world. All of that would be okay: if the Church cared about what the modern world thought.

Fortunately, She does not. Nor should She. If religion is to be of any real significance then it must do what it can to lead its flocks toward becoming better people. This cannot mean telling them to do whatever they want. In a sense, a seriously religious institute is analogous to being a parent: we cannot allow our kids to do anything they want or they will become vain and selfish adults. Neither should the Church follow poll results when considering doctrine, because it just doesn't matter what individual Catholics believe about eternal and unchanging morals any more than what a eight year old might believe about doing his chores or homework. Morality doesn't change simply because Catholics as a group may want it too. It doesn't change for non-Catholics either, of course, but that is a bit of a separate question right this minute.

In areas where the poll may have real meaning, it might well be good for Church leaders to step up and take notice; the priestly sex abuse scandal comes to mind. But there are three things which matter with such issues. First and foremost, sexual abuse is minors is an affront to morality and ought to be eradicated; Church doctrine teaches as much. This leads to point two: where such sins have occurred, up to and including any possible cover ups, we are not dealing with propagating dogma so much as with individuals within the Church doing heinous things. When Church leaders violate dogma, and this is point three by the way, then the laity have the right to call them out. The non-clerical members of the Church have an obligation to remind Church leaders to set things right when they err. Such is working within rather than against the Church.

All the bother about what type of leader the next Pope ought to be, then, is only so much blather. It doesn't matter what the people think, Catholic or not. It would very interesting to see how many of the poll respondents are in the pew week in and week out serious Catholics or simply folks who say they're Catholic. Would that not skew the poll numbers against the Vatican? Yet even that doesn't matter with regard to eternal truth. But it would interesting to hear, as an academic exercise.

Be all that as it may, what we should want in a Pope is a solid traditionalist from wherever in the globe the Spirit drives the Cardinals in conclave to find him. Polls will not affect that decision. Nor should they.

Libertarians are Moral Relativists

Are libertarians moral relativists? It's a fascinating question on several levels, not the least of which involves areas where they are and are not willing to pass judgement. Government run economies? Bad. Free markets? Good. But what of all the other issues which vex humanity, which gnaw at the conscience both of the person and the body politic, and are, if we are to be true to any decent sense of right and wrong, more important than economics?

Abortion? A woman may or may not have one - her choice. Gay marriage or same sex partnerships? Any couple where each person enters into the contract freely is all right with them. Freedom of speech? You can anything you want without bother about whether it should be said. In short, whatever does not harm another person (and this generally seems to apply only towards physical harm) is to be tolerated by everyone else.

But of course, there are things which do harm that are not physically hurtful. Even our libertarian friends recognize the need for laws against theft or slander. So why are they so unwilling to consider whether other things not, perhaps, obviously harmful to an individual are in fact harmful to them or society, so much so that society has the right to ban them? This we ask before we are even near the question of whether abortion physically harms another individual. Why are libertarians so unwilling to even consider whether human women have human babies, with all that that question demands of us?

It appears that, in areas which don't tickle their fancy, libertarians don't particularly care about moral right and wrong. If a guard at GITMO looks at a detainee cross eyed you would think it the worst civil rights abuse ever (this without a consideration of why the detainee was there in the first place) and libertarians, quite properly, condemn drone strikes. Why not address any and all moral questions, questions of man's inhumanity to man, even of man's inhumanity to himself, if you will, with the same intensity if they are really interested in doing the right thing all the time?

Then we have their view of religion. Libertarians say they are for religious freedom. Yet as a group it is not something they stress. They were on the whole conspicuously silent over the HHS mandate debacle. They say they are for the Five Freedoms; they sure seem to fret over the four, with a decidedly shallower emphasis than on the fifth. This can only mean one thing: on the whole, they don't care very much about God.

And that is their weakness. Buckley's right, you know. The battle between the individual and the collective is the battle between God and atheism on another level. Without individuals ordained with individuality, along with the acceptance that that individuality is ordained upon them rather than being created for and by themselves as a mere human construct, then there's no point in working for individual rights. Without a consideration of the origin of the individual along with what he is or ought to be, it is ultimately pointless to discuss individual rights. Without knowing, the best we can, what we should be, we are no better than the collective.

We've said before that liberals want what the want solely because they want it. We fear that libertarians are the same way, and to an ill purpose. It allows them to ignore moral questions they prefer not to address.

So again we ask, are libertarians moral relativists?

Yes.

Science Lacks Virtue

We overvalue science in our modern world. We truly do. Oh, this isn't to belittle the great engineering feats which science has made possible, nor the advances in medicine which make our lives longer and healthier, nor even things such as television or the Internet which offer the possibility of making our mental lives better, even when they merely entertain. All of that is well and good, so far as they go. The trouble lies in the attitude that science makes us better simply because it's science. We act as though science has value, or gives virtue.

Not necessarily, if at all, can science do that. It may offer the opportunity to be a better, more virtuous people. But it does only that, and we are speaking somewhat anthropormorphically in attributing that much to it really.

Can science define or defend the value of a human life? Can it teach us that stealing is wrong; indeed, can it define theft? Can it say anything about our responsibility towards the environment or, more importantly, one another?

Obviously not. To be sure, it may tell us that if we continue on such and such a road we might drive ourselves into extinction. But that's all it can do. Whether we ought to do such and such else so that we will not become extinct is a question of value. Science only tells us what will happen should we construct a building without the proper strengths, or perhaps even what may happen if we continue on a certain course with no variation. It does not, will not, and cannot tell us what we should do with the information it supplies.

People make those judgments, and they are not argued in the realm of science. They're argued in the realm of philosophy, the realm where we might actually be able, by conscious debate and a reasoned consideration of who we are rather than merely that we are, conclude what are and are not good things to do. Science provides facts; however useful they may be, they are ultimately very rote and, by themselves, without meaning. We provide value and virtue. We are above science.

Science by itself lacks virtue. Those who pray at its altar pray to a valueless void.

Detroit Brought on Emergency Manager

Well, the inevitable is finally about to happen. Detroit will be taken over by a state appointed emergency manager, with all the outrage which comes with the territory. It's undemocratic, it's dictatorial, it's racist. Blah, blah, blah.

The charge of racism is the weakest. If Detroit could run itself, if Detroit voters had elected responsible leaders, this would not have happened. That about says it all. Vote responsibly and you'll get responsible leaders. Otherwise, you'll get what you got: arrogant grandstand players.

The leaders weren't all that leader like. They selfishly protected their turf while rejecting state aid which might have helped, such as putting Belle Isle under the state DNR. But Detroit have that, because Belle Isle is hers alone. Never mind that that once beautiful park is now an eyesore. Never mind that Detroit is part of Michigan and ought to be willing to share what it can with the state.

Which leads to another issue, one all to often overlooked if it's ever even considered at all: what about Detroit's obligation to the state? We incessantly hear, from Detroiters and her Democratic allies, about what Michigan should do for Detroit. But what about what Detroit should do for outstate Michigan, namely, keep her affairs in order? We don't hear about that. Why? Because it's undemocratic, it's racist, and blah, blah, blah.

Yet perhaps stupidest charge of all comes from those who say the emergency manager is undemocratic. Detroiters, supposedly, have now lost democracy. Yet two things are ignored by this argument. One, that they are still in fact represented democratically through their state representatives. Every Detroiter has a state representative and a state senator. The emergency manger law is a state law; this means that Detroiters had input on it through them. Oh? That wasn't enough? Well, that's democracy, folks. You will sometimes lose. Get over it, if you really love the democratic process.

The second ignored fact is that cities are subsets of states. Detroit does not have relationship to Lansing analogous to that of Michigan's to Washington DC. It is an entity crated by Michigan and thus subject to the state's whim. Detroit can be taken out of existence should the state so decide. If you don't like that, work to change it. But as with the state representative situation, Detroiters are still represented by that process. There is still democracy in Detroit.

Bring on the emergency manager. Hopefully it will bring on a better Detroit. Short of that, it shall at least give Detroiters, and we mean every single Detroiter who has voted for the terrible leadership from which the whole city has suffered, a comeuppance of their own making. And as childish as we will admit this will sound, it will delightful to see.

Sequester Blues

So the President has now ordered $85 billion dollars in budget cuts forced by the sequester. He doesn't like it, and blames the GOP for not being willing to compromise. Republicans don't like it, and blame the Democrats who don't want to cut spending. But is it really all that?

What's $85 billion when the deficit is several trillion? Next to nothing, when you think about it for a moment. It should not be that hard to find that relatively paltry amount to reduce spending, especially when spread over the entire federal government. And to those who reject such cuts as a draconian use of the meat cleaver, well, what's wrong with the meat cleaver approach? Surgical budget cuts only mean that everything should be gone over with a fine toothed comb, which only gives entrenched bureaucracies time to legitimize themselves.

Use the meat cleaver, and use it more harshly than what may or may not be happening with the sequester cuts. Why not start by telling every government entity that it will lose ten percent of its budget next year no matter what? Force everyone to cut spending no matter what. Yes, they'll squeal. Yes, the special interest groups who live off government largesse will squeal. But they'd squeal if you cut their budget one small dime; a dollar cut would be treated like the amputation of a limb. Ignore their cries and cut their budget.

$85 billion dollars in spending cuts is nothing. Stop whining about it, and just do it, bureaucrats.