The comments in the At the Crossroads post raised some interesting
points about political and spiritual attitudes and how easy it is nowadays to
see the latter in terms of the former in which case you have effectively
materialised spirituality. I think it's worth salvaging this discussion from
relative obscurity and giving it its own place here.
It started when Chris responded to my statement that the spiritual
person has to reject leftism or liberalism because that is a materialistic
distortion of true spirituality, inverting the correct order of being, and
redirecting moral energy from God to earthly man. He wrote that he had a
liberal Christian friend who had objected to him making a similar argument and
said that neither leftism not rightism was any more anti-spiritual than the
other. He argued that progressivism was not a replacement for his Christian
belief but a natural complement to it, its most fundamental axiom being
that of love and mercy.
This is a common modern conception and I believe it to be
completely wrong and that anyone who holds it will sooner or later lose any
connection to real spiritual understanding and be left with a materialistic
imitation of it, no different really to secular humanism, its supernatural
heart ripped out. I wrote in reply as follows:
"Chris, your friend is mistaken. The very basis of the left
is anti-religion and if that has not always been apparent (though see the
French revolution and Marx when it certainly was) it is now. The love and mercy
of the left is rooted in the natural not the supernatural or spiritual (and it
is therefore unreal) and effectively denies the need for transcendence.
If you are a progressive and a Christian, one of those will have to give since they are contradictory, one looking at man as a material being who may aspire to spirituality but does so on his own terms and without the need for a full repentance while the other sees that there is no spirituality without sacrificing the worldly self which, for the progressive, is the real centre of attention.
Essentially, the progressive sees things in terms of this world and man as he is in this world while the true Christian sees things in terms of the next world and man as he should be in order to qualify for entry to that world.
If you are a progressive and a Christian, one of those will have to give since they are contradictory, one looking at man as a material being who may aspire to spirituality but does so on his own terms and without the need for a full repentance while the other sees that there is no spirituality without sacrificing the worldly self which, for the progressive, is the real centre of attention.
Essentially, the progressive sees things in terms of this world and man as he is in this world while the true Christian sees things in terms of the next world and man as he should be in order to qualify for entry to that world.
Just to be clear. In my view, both left and right are secular
terms that derive from the ideology of the left. The left is secular even when
it is religious and anything that is secular, even if it calls itself right, is
of the left."
To which Chris replied: "So, if I understand you correctly,
you would say that even the classical liberalism that inspired the
revolutions of the Anglophone world were also fundamentally derived from the
ideology of the left?"
I replied: "Well, they weren't derived from a fully
theocentric outlook and anything that isn't centred in God tends to become
secular. I'm not saying that the Enlightenment wasn't a necessary step in
the development of human consciousness but I am saying that if the political
isn't seen wholly in the light of the spiritual and isn't wholly subservient to
that then it will upstage the spiritual more and more until that becomes
completely secondary. As has happened."
Chris then wondered if "a society that is rooted in
transcendent Reality naturally sets the table for autocracy and totalitarianism?
After all, if ultimate Reality is a hierarchy, doesn't it follow that human
society ought to reflect that, as we see in all Traditional religion-based
civilizations? But history indicates that these societies were, in large part
at least, oppressive and inhumane. Are we trying to a square a circle? "
I disagreed, saying that "it may be that for Enlightenment
ideas to take their effect certain more fundamental principles had to be placed
on the back burner for a while. Or it may be that they were cast aside because
of human pride in our new-found intellectual status. Or both.
Anyway, I'm not a traditionalist who thinks we should go back to how things were and nor am I even particularly interested in societies as such. I am interested in individuals and how they respond to life. I think that spiritually orientated individuals will naturally create a rightly ordered society and these may vary, not significantly but somewhat. Good, honest, rightly motivated people will create a good world and vice verse. One of my main criticisms of the modern left is that it is none of these things. For me, that is because it is demonic in its ultimate inspiration, absurd as I know that will sound to most people.
Why would a culture (I prefer that word to society) rooted in transcendent reality be totalitarian? It might if it were ideologically rooted rather than genuinely so but if it lived according to a proper awareness of God then it would try to balance hierarchy with the realisation that all men and women are potentially sons and daughters of God. Societies that were oppressive and inhumane were clearly not properly aware of God or had descended from a proper awareness to an ideology.
True spirituality will not come from societies but from individuals. This, of course, is another way the left has it back to front."
At this point edwin came in with a very pertinent comment that
backed up what I was trying to say.
"If we are spiritual beings then any approach to human
problems that ignores this dimension will not work, for it will not be based on
fact but on fantasy, that fantasy being that we are merely matter with
consciousness that is superadded, an epiphenomenon of matter. The reason why
the conservative movements always fail and the Left always advances is
precisely because the so-called right shares the basic assumptions of the Left.
There are those in the U.S. who think a return to the Constitution is what we
need. But we started with the Constitution, which makes no mention of God, and
it has led us to the current mess we are in. You can't transfer sacredness from
God to a document and expect that people will accept the document as somehow
Divine and untouchable. A culture rests on a cultus, a form of worship. And if
we make our animal instincts and opinions our cultus - well, we see where that
leads. To place God outside the world is effectively to banish Him from our
lives except as a special and occasional thought. To see God working in and
through us and the creation is the only cult that will work, for it is the only
truth."
Chris (who I suspect had slightly been playing devil's advocate all along!)
then said " I agree with most of what has been said here. We have a
culture that (as CS Lewis would say), puts "first things" second and
"second things" first. But, if things were set straight, and we
returned to a spiritual culture, how would it be different than the pre-modern
societies of the past? "
There were some more interesting comments which you can see under
the original post and I would like to express my thanks to everyone who
contributed to a stimulating discussion. That is one of the reasons I started
doing this blog. To sum it all up, though, I would say that God must be at the
centre of everything and everything seen in his light if we are really to live
in truth and goodness. This is hardly a new thought but it has been
increasingly lost over the last several hundred years until now we have a
situation in which, even if God is admitted, he takes second place to humanity
and its own independent aims. The supernatural is subordinated to the natural.
And regarding left and right, it is important to realise that the left from the beginning has been fundamentally anti-God though that is presented as being pro-human. The right largely came about as an attempt to salvage something from the wreckage of spiritual rejection but as long as it accepts any of the left's frame of reference it will always have to concede more and more ground which is precisely what has happened. The true opposition is not between left and right but between spiritual and material or a world centred in God and one centred in Man. Or, more precisely, between the vision of Man as a Son of God and one in which he is seen as the creator of himself.
It may have been somewhat inevitable that, as we grew in intellectual understanding of the outer world and left our spiritual childhood in which we lived predominantly by faith, we would lose touch with deeper truths and see things more in the light of ourselves. But that transitionary phase should have been completed long ago. Instead, we have got stuck in it. It is high time we moved on from our self-centred materialistic impasse and started seeing life as it is, the creation of a Creator, instead of through the prism of our own limited selves.
And regarding left and right, it is important to realise that the left from the beginning has been fundamentally anti-God though that is presented as being pro-human. The right largely came about as an attempt to salvage something from the wreckage of spiritual rejection but as long as it accepts any of the left's frame of reference it will always have to concede more and more ground which is precisely what has happened. The true opposition is not between left and right but between spiritual and material or a world centred in God and one centred in Man. Or, more precisely, between the vision of Man as a Son of God and one in which he is seen as the creator of himself.
It may have been somewhat inevitable that, as we grew in intellectual understanding of the outer world and left our spiritual childhood in which we lived predominantly by faith, we would lose touch with deeper truths and see things more in the light of ourselves. But that transitionary phase should have been completed long ago. Instead, we have got stuck in it. It is high time we moved on from our self-centred materialistic impasse and started seeing life as it is, the creation of a Creator, instead of through the prism of our own limited selves.
6 comments:
William,
I'm happy that you recognized that, indeed, I was just playing devil's advocate and not making a silly effort at trolling an important discussion. My push back is part of a process that I hope will help clarify my own position . I apologize if I often come off as being merely combative .
For the record , I, like you ,reject progressivist secular humanism , but neither have I been comfortable with accepting the contemporary "conservative " position ( for the reasons that you perfectly explained ) nor have I been comfortable with embracing any of the strains of reaction full stop. But , as you alluded to , modernity has not been entirely a disaster ; in fact , I would say it has also been a great dignity. I just can't see how it would be possible to retain the "good" elements of modernity IF it is necessary to also reject one of its core principles - the sovereignty of the individual.
The irony of it all is that it was the theo-centric culture of Christendom that gave birth to the humanists of the Renaissance . The question for me is whether or not the evolution, or should I say devolution, of this Christian humanism into the modern cult of man was a forgone conclusion .If not , where was the rupture then?
You didn't seem combative at all, Christ, just curious which is good. And I am grateful to you for the chance to expand on the post. After all, that is the point of comments. Good ones, such as yours were, can add to the original point by elucidating it or challenging it to see if it holds up.
It's hard to tell if Christian humanism inevitably had to descend into what it has done. I would say , not inevitably. But the rupture was surely during the 18th century with the French Revolution a fairly definitive point.
Thanks William.
I can see how the French Revolution could be seen as a marker for the general trend away from the spiritual culture of Christendom . But it is not as clear to me that the same could be said of the American experiment, in consideration of its basis in natural law and the doctrine of imago dei . But even if that weren't the case and we give more weight to Edwin's point that the constitution makes no explicit reference to God , does it follow that such a political order would necessarily be less oriented to the transcendent? If anything , I think most folks would argue that a constitutional republic is more in keeping with a truly spiritual culture, not less.
A belief can be so deeply rooted in a culture that its explicit mention is unusual and unnecessary. That the U.S. Constitution makes no mention of God rests, I believe, on the fact that deism was the accepted belief of many of its signers. It remains as such among those who refer to the U.S. as a "procedural government", i.e. one concerned with pragmatic measures that ensure public order and contractual accountability. This leads to dualism: God hovering somewhere outside the bounds of an effectively godless public life. The notion of a Creator then becomes an optional extra with no actual impact upon governance. Religion is seen as a purely private matter and is now even looked upon as the province of the stupid. The contempt for the Bible Belt among the political class is no longer even disguised. We are progressing to a point where traditional religious beliefs may be regarded as "hate" crimes punishable by law. God is first made optional; then, denigrated; then outlawed. And all of this happens in the name of compassion and mercy for classes of "sinners" - the sexually deviant and the unbelievers who must not be made to feel they are stigmatized in any way. The Constitution, along with the Bible and any other writing, is subject to interpretation, no matter how explicit its clauses are. And a culture will interpret its history, and its founding documents, according to its present beliefs, not those of its past. For those of us who see materialism and practical atheism as disastrous and who look for a way to counter its harms, the realization that there is no going back, no return to any originalism. We may have to remain a small and seemingly negligible presence in our culture, but we are only free to determine our own actions, not those of others. The ancients considered exile a terrible punishment. We may have to endure a different kind of exile: living among our countrymen as aliens in spirit.
I find your argument compelling. But, that's precisely where I find myself at a loss.....
Just as CS Lewis intimated with regards to the political order, I ask myself "What is the alternative ?" Are we making a case for a state sponsored religion?
But, history contains an abundance of evidence for the dangers of such a thing and the threat of theocracy. After all, it was largely the impetus to protect religious minorities that gave rise to Liberalism in the first place centuries ago.
And I think that's why there are many who contend that it is precisely the defense of originalism and the rejection of the notion of a "living constitution" which is the critical issue- because that's one of the means by which the culture (is being) changed.
Sadly, I think that you are quite right that there is probably no going back and must adopt some form of the "Benedict Option".
No state-sponsored religion and no imposition of any structure can effect a real change in our culture. The idea that external factors can determine internal conditions - of minds and hearts - is precisely the mistake that liberalism makes repeatedly. The Left thinks of government, the judiciary, the media as the means for enforcing its notions and banishing all others. This is why politics is everything for the Left. And politics comes down, in the end, to raw power. We can all see and sense that something is happening, a kind of sea change that is bringing us to a totalitarianism of the Left. But force cannot succeed for long in stabilizing society; only in spreading fear, which loses its power as time goes on and people learn how to circumvent authority and undermine it until it collapses. As unpopular as it is, we must speak the truth when there is some good to be gained by it. There are people who are open to genuine spirituality, which religions tend more to starve than to nourish. And we can communicate with one another, as we are doing now, and in that way strengthen and encourage one another, even if we differ in our ideas. The Benedict option, as I understand it, suggests that we can withdraw into families or communities and take with us whatever is valuable in our heritage and preserve it for the future, as the monasteries are said to have done during the dark ages. But we have no heritage in the sense that the early Benedictines did. There are no manuscripts to be copied; no religious regimens to be followed; no place we can go that removes us from the currents of the world. We are in the mix, for better or worse, and can only stand on the truth as we know it and live it and take what comes as a result. There are no external or structural solutions. We are, for the most part, on our own. And perhaps this is what is needed now. We cannot know what will come of it.
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