Wednesday, July 20, 2011

What comes first?

John B. Kienker, managing editor of Claremont Review of Books, has a positive review of Peter’s Modern and American Dignity in the June/July issue of First Things. He concludes the piece with this friendly criticism:

Ultimately, however, Lawler finds mere political goals–particularly “veneration” of the American founders–inadequate, implying that only “the perspective of genuine believers” can effectively secure human dignity. But these days it seems challenging enough to persuade 300 million of our fellow Americans to embrace the dignity of citizenship again without trying to convert them as well to Christianity. That we must leave to God’s grace.

Peter responds here. Kienker’s comments reveals aspects of the Claremont approach which might be of interest to those revolving around the First Things orbit: 1) His concern is modern in the sense that he wants to lower the bar (from say supernatural virtue to civic virtue) in order to actualize the goal. 2) Instead of JPII’s priority of culture, he reserves a pride of place for politics. 3) His last line hints at a strict reason/revelation divide which denies Christianity’s persuasive power in the public square.

In regards to the last point, the notion that Americans should embrace a Christian account of human dignity is based upon observations of our nature which we can see with our own eyes e.g. openness to the Truth, social and relational beings, etc. This is a flag our Claremont friends can rally around, even if it represents more than just Americans.

Saturday, July 16, 2011

Marriage for Savages

Ross Douthat’s Op-ed The Future of Gay Marriage discusses Dan Savage’s call for Open Marriage. Savage’s suggestion that we legitimate infidelity poses the following question for Sophisticated Americans: If the Judeo-Christian understanding of marriage as heterosexual is oppressive, then why isn’t its insistence on monogamy also oppressive?

Douthat explains the notion of Open Marriage as a blend between (gay) conservative and liberationist views of marriage. Here we would see it as a logical outgrowth of the Lockeanization of marriage. Aspects of marriage like sexual complimentarity and child care duties are dismantled in light of the ‘free individual and nothing more.’ This is the idea behind Justice Kennedy’s mystery passage in Casey and which he reiterates in Lawrence v. Texas: “At the heart of liberty is the right to define one's own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life.”

In a follow-up post, Douthat argues this individualist understanding will allow manliness to run amok. Monogamy was a way of civilizing or domesticating the thumos of males. Autonomy in principle will yield to a contest of wills in practice, with an unruly male spiritedness coming out ahead. Liberation indeed.

Finally, it is interesting to see Savage defend Open Marriage on the grounds of NATURE, albeit through a Modern rather than a Classical or Christian lens. He thinks we are not ‘wired for monogamy.’ For Savage, the good is natural and nature is identified with our instinctive and spontaneous inclinations. This is in contrast to the pre-modern view which found rationality and teleology (purpose) in nature. At the moment this view is unpopular, but Savage’s proposal to return to nature might allow this older understanding to return-however much he has wrong, at least he has the starting point right.

Sunday, July 10, 2011

Getting Lost in Percy’s Cosmos

Over at ISI’s blog, Jennifer Hooten ranks Walker Percy’s The Moviegoer as #3 on her Five Books Every American Should Read list. Her summary of the novel runs through themes discussed at this blog e.g. homelessness, social selves.

Like The Moviegoer, Percy’s Love in the Ruins has the hero undergo a similar character development. Both novels also have secondary characters which are human signposts (Binx’s brother, More’s daughter) for the main characters. These human signposts or saints are absent in the later novels. Is Percy getting darker or is this a development of his ‘Indirect Communication’? He writes: “My theory (like Flannery's) is that the times are such that the language of religion is so exhausted, de trop, that the tactic of the apologist must be indirect, perhaps even devious. More devious even than S[oren] K[ierkegaard]"

Percy and O’Connnor’s method has certainly made them amenable to Sophisticated or Secular Americans today, but it also makes them vulnerable to misinterpretation as well. Flannery O’Connor had to write a Note to the 2nd edition of Wise Blood in order to clarify its meaning. Their fictional worlds are strange lands so without a point in the right direction, the reader is likely to get lost.

Friday, July 1, 2011

X-Men on “My Place in this World”

Like its predecessors, X-Men: First Class covers the same thematic material. The importance of TOLERANCE is stressed, but not in the classical sense of putting up with objectionable practices, nor Jerry Seinfield’s non-judgementalism (“Not that there is anything wrong with that!”). Instead, it is the Modern Liberal notion of societal approval. Being accepted by others is what drives Hank McCoy (Beast) to hide his mutation.

Betting one’s happiness on what others think of you is a risky proposition, as Aristotle tells us, and so McCoy’s hankering for human respect turns out to backfire on him. Raven, after some soul searching, rejects McCoy’s inclusion idea in favor of Self-acceptance. “Mutant and proud!” she proclaims. Substitute the word “Gay” for “Mutant” and you have the lesson for the day.

Yet even her Sovereign Self seems restless with such an account of things. She quickly flakes out and buys into Erik Lehnsherr’s (Magneto's) version of SOCIAL DARWINISM. For Eric, the dignity of the human person is replaced with the survival of the fittest. Mutants are the next stage of evolution and their might should make right. Magneto is the series’ villain and his master morality sales talk has repeatedly siphoned off X-Men recruits throughout the films, which makes you wonder whether Professor X’s preaching on diversity and tolerance require a more solid ground than his choir realizes.