After 50-plus years of social unraveling, many reformers still see the “therapeutic model” as a cure for what ails American society. Or would a return to the classical virtues, as a means of healing first the person and then the culture, be the way of renewal?

Read the rest of my essay over at Acton News and Commentary: here.

In Christ,

+Fr Gregory

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As the Fast approaches…

h/t: Pithless Thoughts

James V. Schall, S.J. is professor at Georgetown University and one of the most prolific Catholic writers in America. His most recent book isHere are some observations about recent events that are in harmony with my earlier post (here).

In Christ,

+Fr Gregory

In the famous scene in Book 8 of the Confessions, Augustine encounters the Life of Anthony, the African monk. Augustine sees that he must withdraw from involvement in public life. He cites Ponticianus who, in the city of Treves, on reading this Life of Anthon, asked himself:  “What do we hope to gain by all the efforts we make? What are we looking for? What is our purpose in serving the State? Can we hope for anything better at Court than to be the Emperor’s friends?”

This “being friends of the Emperor” looms mightily in the reasoning of contemporary Catholics who accept Obama’s thinking about the scope of state power. Suddenly, in the light of a state that now demands of its employees the price of their conscience and reason, such classic withdrawal questions again become pertinent to the well being of our souls.

In Saint Francis of Assisi, Chesterton recalled this same Anthony and the monks of the Egyptian desert. The culture of the late Roman Empire was so distorted and corrupt, Chesterton thought, that one could no longer involve himself in it. The only alternative was to withdraw. In the following centuries, the Christian soul of man would be purified so that it could again see nature and man as God intended.

Various Catholic politicians, clerics, academics, and critics have tried to justify the substance of the Obama move to control the whole public order. It makes sense that withdrawal from politics may be in order. If doctors and nurses must, at the price of professional recognition, participate in abortions and all that goes with it, not to enter such professions at the risk one’s soul becomes rational. If Obama is reelected, such issues will immediately confront most good people, not just Catholics, but primarily them as they are the ones most clearly targeted.

The president apparently thinks that all wealth is produced by the state. The wealth of the citizens, thus, should pass through state hands to be redistributed to the citizens as a benefaction of the state. The state defines “the good” of the citizen in education, welfare, health, and well-being.

The First Amendment no longer functions as a restriction to the state. Religion contributes to the state only in so far as it assists in carrying out state policies. If it claims exemption, it is imposing its values on the freedom of the state to define the good.

No higher law exists by which we define what the state is. In the Catholic view, the current issues of health care, abortion, sterilization, euthanasia, fetal experimentation, and gay marriage are not primarily religious questions. The basic arguments about what these practices imply are from reason.

Catholicism gets into the controversies as one of the last major voices of reason in the public order. Christian revelation is addressed to a reason that is itself intelligible. It does not tell reason what it is, though it does insist that reason be reasonable.

The president seeks to define what constitutes religion. Those Catholics and other religious people who agree with him have implicitly accepted what this state demands of them. Their support basically entails a rejection of that natural reason found in the order of things.

In this context, the victory of the Obama approach to public life means that reasonable and believing Catholics and other citizens will have little choice but to withdraw from the public life of a country that enforces these policies. Such choices, no more and no less, are what is at stake in these controversies.

via Political Withdrawal?.

Christians, like all people of good will, are called upon under grave obligation of conscience not to cooperate in practices which, even if permitted by civil legislation, are contrary to God’s law. Indeed, from the moral standpoint, it is never licit to cooperate formally in evil.

Pope John Paul II, Evangelium Vitae  no. 74

The  Immorality of the HSS Mandate. The Obama administration will now require employers through their health insurance program provide artificial contraceptive drugs and devices. “Beginning August 1, 2012, most new and renewed health plans will be required to cover” these services “without cost sharing for women across the country.” According to the press release from the Department of Health and Human Services:

Women will not have to forego these services because of expensive co-pays or deductibles, or because an insurance plan doesn’t include contraceptive services. This rule is consistent with the laws in a majority of states which already require contraception coverage in health plans, and includes the exemption in the interim final rule allowing certain religious organizations not to provide contraception coverage.

While the current “rule allows certain non-profit religious employers that offer insurance to their employees the choice of whether or not to cover contraceptive services” after August 1, 2013, religiously based employers “do not currently provide contraceptive coverage in their insurance plan” will be required to do so or face significant fines.  “This additional year,” HSS says is to “allow these organizations more time and flexibility to adapt to this new rule.” In the interim, “employers that do not offer coverage of contraceptive services to provide notice to employees, which will also state that contraceptive services are available at sites such as community health centers, public clinics, and hospitals with income-based support.”

Along with other religious and non-religious groups from both the political left and right, the US Catholic bishops have objected to the HSS mandate arguing, among other things, that mandate is a violation of religious freedom. In addition, the argument goes, the mandate is unjust because it requires that employers engage in activities (for example, early term abortion) that are contrary to the Christian tradition and natural law (you can read the whole text here).  It is this second objection that is central to understanding the objections of the Catholic Church to the policy. Merely asking employers who object to stand, as one commentator put the matter, “several steps removed” from providing contraceptive drugs misses the point of the Catholic Church’s objection. The State has no right to require any citizen or institution, religious or not, to support financially contraception and abortion.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

I will leave to others the economic arguments against the possibility providing drugs for free. Others have addressed that better than I (see here). My concern here is on the philosophical and theological arguments made by the Catholic bishops. While we ought not to minimize the Constitutional arguments against the mandate, as we will see the Catholic bishops are a deeper and broader argument grounded.

In later essay, I want to raise address the moral status of artificial contraception in the Orthodox Church.  The mandate and the arguments both for and against it hinge in part of the morality of the required services. The patristic evidence is clearly opposed to what today we would call artificial contraception (J. Noonan, Contraception: A History of Its Treatment by the Catholic Theologians and Canonists, First Edition. Belknap Press; Enlarged ed edition,1965). The Church’s liturgical tradition sees children as divine blessing not only for the couple themselves but also for the “for the continuation of the [human] race” (Rite of Betrothal). And in the marriage service the priests asks that God grant the newly married couple “ the fruit of the womb, fair offspring, concord of soul and body” as they “may be expedient” for the couples salvation and earthly happiness (Rite of Crowning).

But seen in light of the Tradition of the Orthodox Church, the Catholic bishops are correct in their assertion that the mandate reflects a faulty understanding of human biology and so anthropology. Unlike other mandated service that actually “prevent disease[s]” such as high blood pressure or cancer, the HSS mandate does not. It rather works to prevent the normal, healthy function of the human body. To do this, the government treats pregnancy as a disease. But “pregnancy is not a disease” and in fact represents the proper functioning of the human body. It is simply wrong to think of contraception in terms of disease prevention. But again, I’m getting ahead of myself.

So, let’s return to what else the Catholic bishops had to say.

Respect for the Conscience of Individuals and Communities. Their argument begins by reiterating their support for healthcare reform. Any such reform must respect “the conscience rights of everyone involved in the complex process of providing that healthcare.” Contrary to what seems to be the Obama administrations very narrow understanding, respect for human conscience must embrace not only private individuals (for example, patients) but also healthcare professionals and social institutions, religious or secular, Catholic or not. This leads then to a discussion of “two serious objections to the ‘preventive services’ regulation issued by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in August 2011.”

First the Obama administration is “forcing private health plans — nationwide, by the stroke of a bureaucrat’s pen—to cover sterilization and contraception, including drugs that may cause abortion.” This mandate has been imposed without the consent of at least some of the significant actors who must bear the financial and moral cost of the rule.  “Moreover,” the bishops write, “forcing plans to cover abortifacients violates existing federal conscience laws.” As others have observed as well (Birth-Control Mandate: Unconstitutional and Illegal), the mandate does not abide by current federal law. Assuming I’ve understood the bishops correctly they are arguing that the mandate is illegal on its face. For this reason they are calling “for the rescission of the mandate altogether.”

Doing Evil that Good May Result? As morally and politically problematic as this all is the bishops voice a second, more substantial concern. Specifically

that the mandate would impose a burden of unprecedented reach and severity on the consciences of those who consider such “services” immoral: insurers forced to write policies including this coverage; employers and schools forced to sponsor and subsidize the coverage; and individual employees and students forced to pay premiums for the coverage. We therefore urged HHS, if it insisted on keeping the mandate, to provide a conscience exemption for all of these stakeholders—not just the extremely small subset of “religious employers” that HHS proposed to exempt initially.

This point that is worth reflecting on carefully.

The argument being made here is that by requiring third parties (whether employers or health insurance companies) to pay for contraceptive and abortifacient drugs the mandate violates the (subjective) conscience of individuals and institutions. This is bad enough. What is worse however is that the law compels persons and institutions to support in actions that are themselves objectively, and gravely immoral. This former criticism goes beyond the merely political argument and suggests that the Catholic bishops see the mandate itself unjust and so makes compliance by institutions or individuals morally impossible.

Writing in the 13^th century, the Roman Catholic theologian and saint Thomas Aquinas discussing what it means to tolerate evil. In the Summa Theologiae he observes that “Human government is derived from the divine and should imitate it. God, although he is omnipotent and perfectly good, permits some evils to occur in the universe, evils which he could prohibit. He does this because if these evils were removed, greater evils would ensue. Thus also in human government, those who rule properly should tolerate certain evils lest other good things are lost and even worse evils come about.” (Summa Theologiae, Secunda Secundae, q. 10, art. 11 c)

Law Isn’t Morality. Not everything which is immoral ought to be illegal. Take for example prostitution. We can’t say prostitution is a good thing—it isn’t. Nor can we pretend that that it is anything other than harmful to the prostitute, the client and society in generally. But, as a matter of political prudence, should it be illegal? While there are arguments for and against outlawing it, one could argue that laws prohibiting prostitution, like laws against drug use, are imprudent. Such laws are imprudent because are difficult, if not impossible, to enforce. Even in cases of public morality, there are circumstances in which it is prudent for government to withdraw. Such government self-restraint is essential if there is to be room for families, religious communities and other social institutions to exercise their own legitimate authority in human affairs. Moreover, in some case it is better for the State to tolerate evil because it is   unable to effective enforce law against it. When this happens the law itself is imprudent and even if passed with the noblest of ends, has the unintended effect of undermining respect for the civil authority.

Returning to the bishops’ statement, as a matter of political prudence outlawing contraceptive drugs and devices might very well cause more harm than good. This is why I think the Catholic bishops are not asking that artificial contraceptives be outlawed. Instead they are arguing that the government cannot mandate participation in moral evil. Again while not everything that is immoral should be illegal, the government has no right to require of its citizens that they participate in what is legal but objectively immoral.

In effect, the Catholic argument is that the HHS mandate is requiring as a matter of law, and so enforced by the coercive power of the state, that US citizens commit, directly or indirectly, the sins of contraception, abortion and sterilization. Again, if my analysis is correct, the argument here is that the mandate is radically unjust because it requires that individual citizens and social institutions comply with a government mandate in violation of (1) their conscience, (2) the dictates of natural law and/or (3) the Gospel.

The Catholic Church’s Defense of the Public Square. Stepping back from the immediate issue of the HHS mandate, the principle being defended by the Catholic bishops is an important one. While Roman Catholics were early advocates for healthcare reform, we need to be careful in asserting (as even some Catholics have like Rick Santorum have done) that the bishops brought the current situation on themselves and so on the rest of us. I don’t think this is the case. The Obama administration is responsible for the contested decisions. If the Catholic bishops were naïve in their support of the Patient Affordability Act, and I think there were, naivety is not a sin.  If anything it is the Obama administration who has exploited the good will of the Catholic bishops as well as many of the administration’s other supporters.

The genius of the American Experiment is not limited government as such; our political philosophy is not some adumbration of “small is beautiful.” Rather we are united in the moral and anthropological conviction that human beings are social creatures. As communal beings we are only most fully ourselves in and through a rich and varied social life. An expansive government, one that intrudes or dominates the Public Square, will necessarily diminish the richness and variety of society. When this happens, we are all of us worse off.

The Problem Before Us. Do we want the Public Square dominated by government? Or do we rather want a government that respects the right and obligations for individuals and communities to govern themselves directly and not simply through the ballot box? Orthodox Christians and all people of good will, owe a debt of gratitude and support to the Catholic bishops for taking—as they so often have on other issues—the lead in responding to an intrusive government.

In Christ,

+Fr Gregory

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(Source: Moscow Patriarchate) Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk, head of the Moscow Patriarchate’s Department for External Church Relations and head of the Synodal Biblical and Theological Commission, gave in interview to the Bogoslov.ru portal. In a talk with the portal’s editor-in-chief, Archpriest Pavel Velikanov, he explains his vision of the role his Commission plays and the place it occupies in today’s life of the Church. He also speaks about theological problem facing the Orthodox Church today and the preparation and conduct of a Pan-Orthodox Council, as well as other topics.

Q. Your Eminence, on October 5, 2011, you were appointed as chairman of the Synodal Biblical and Theological Commission. It is you that the supreme leaders of the Russian Orthodox Church have chosen for a very delicate and manifold task to direct the work of the Church in the area of theology. We would like to know your vision of the role and place of the Commission in today’s life of the Church. Is it planned to develop the Commission into something like ‘a leading research institute’ or ‘an experts’ council’ or will it functions remain the same?

A. In the first place I would like to stress that the Synodal Theological Commission and its chairman have never been set the task ‘to direct the work of the Church in the area of theology’. Unlike, say, episcopal ministry, which is primarily the service of direction (1 Cor. 12:26-29) as well as preservation of the doctrinal and canonical Tradition, theological ministry is a special calling. What is required to fulfil it, along with faithfulness to the Church, is appropriate competence and ability to think theologically. Today we face the task not ‘to direct theology’ but to create conditions for the new generation of Orthodox theologians to develop these abilities.

By definition the Commission is not a theological research institution. It rather acts as an experts’ council which, acting on the instruction of His Holiness the Patriarch and the Holy Synod, works on specific topics collegially formulating answers to posed question. This is its principal task.

As far as other forms and areas of the Commission’s work are concerned, we propose to consider them at the forthcoming plenary session.

Q. Your Eminence, you are a theologian rightly recognized by the scientific communities both inside and outside Russia. In your view, what are the most acute theological problems facing the Orthodox Church as a whole today? Are there problems the solution to which really determines the future of Orthodoxy?

A. Today’s Orthodox Church preserves continuity with the apostolic Christian community and in this sense she is above all a Church of the Tradition. The future of Orthodoxy depends on faithfulness to the church Tradition – the tradition that the Church has preserved in diverse historical situations through centuries.

As opposed to some liberally-minded Christian communities, the Orthodox Church does not need any rethinking or re-interpretation of her doctrinal or moral teaching. And when ecclesiastical scholars, patrologists, historians, liturgists and representatives of other disciplines, in their studies encounter some problems, these problems do not concern doctrine as such but they are specific problems arising in any serious scholarship.

However, there is one really acute and pressing problem which is quite theological, that of church mission today. In this case it is a not a matter of church message, not what the Church preaches but what needs to be done to make church preaching intelligible and effective in today’s situation. Indeed, theology is not only an in-depth study of the meaning of the Church’s dogmatic and moral teaching. It is also a proclamation, a special way of proclaiming to the world and people the truths of the faith through various means. It is not without reason that Patriarch Nicephorus of Constantinople, a well-known defender of the veneration of icons, used the expression ‘the melody of theology’.

Today we face the task to find such ways of expressing the church teaching as to enable us to give account of our hope to those around us who are still far from the Church or those who are on the way to it.

A particular part of this task is the work on the Catechesis carried out today under the Synodal Biblical and Theological Commission.

Q. Recently there have been intensive discussions on the preparation and convening of a Pan-Orthodox Council. How intensively is this preparation process going? How do you see the role of the Biblical and Theological Commission in the preparation of this Council so important for all Local Churches? Indeed, there is a whole number of questions, in particular the problem of primacy, which is solved in different ways precisely for the reason of differences in ‘theological ways’?

A. I have had to answer questions about the preparation of a Pan-Orthodox Council more than once. This preparation has been carried out for half a century now, sometimes intensifying, sometimes standing stock-still. Positions of Local Orthodox Church on a number of items on the agenda have been harmonized. Today we have revisited the question of what the Council should be, in the course of inter-Orthodox dialogue. And it should be said that this discussion is part of the conciliar process which can be crowned by the Council itself.

Perhaps, some disputable problems, on which consensus has not been reached as yet, should not be posed before the Council but rather be left for the future. It concerns also the problem of primacy in the Orthodox Church as well as related issues of the granting of autocephaly and the problem of diptychs.

As far as the problem of primacy is concerned, serious studies have been carried out on this theme by the Synodal Biblical and Theological Commission. On the basis of an historical, canonical and theological analysis, a document will be drafted which, after its approval by the Supreme Church Authority, will express the position of our Church.

Q. The Biblical and Theological Commission as related to Russian theological schools is actually one that ‘commissions’ projects and personnel. In your view, what fields of theology experience the most acute shortage of specialists?

A. The members of the Synodal Biblical and Theological Commission are authoritative and competent theologians and church scholars but as the need arises we involve experts in various fields including young theologians.

Among our researchers and specialists there are many people who are engaged in patristic studies, both Eastern and Western. This concern should be developed since reliance on the patristic heritage is an important and strong aspect of the modern Orthodox theology. It is insufficient though.

We still have few highly qualified specialists in canon law, an area in which the Russian church scholarship used to be up to the mark in the pre-revolutionary period.

Matters stand better in Bible studies. In the Commission, a biblical group has been set up, involving both members of the Commission and invited experts. Orthodox Bible studies however need to be developed. This requires not only consolidation of resources but cultivation of a new generation of scholars.

There is another need, of course, – the need for systemic theologians. To meet this need is not an easy task because it takes specialists not only with enormous erudition, not only theological at that, but also with a philosophical, general cultural and really systemic thinking and with a literary gift as well. At this stage we are still to reach the level of such Russian dogmatists as Metropolitan Makary (Bulgakov). I hope that in the gradual development of various theological disciplines we will see the emergence of people capable of offering theological works of systemic nature.

Q. Speaking about theological academies and chairs of theology in secular universities, what is your vision of the calling of each of these academic schools so different structurally and administratively?

A. The theological academic tradition is an integral part of the Russian higher theological education, I its core and solid foundation. The principal task of a theological academy is to cultivate highly educated clergy, hierarchs and pastors. And here we have not yet reached the pre-revolutionary level either, because at that time the academic education had a solid general scientific and general humanitarian component.

Theological units such as chairs, departments and faculties in secular universities represent a new experience but their emergence is dictated first of all by the tasks of religious education and mission facing the Church today. These units should be developed with the use of advantages they enjoy as to their status, that is, their being part of a university. This involvement does not only make it possible to restore and assert theology as a legitimate and integral part of education and culture; it also makes it possible for theology to enter into dialogue and cooperation with secular sciences, especially humanitarian ones. This will contribute to the development and enrichment of our theology and to its ability to speak with the world. In doing so, it is necessary of course that the so-called ‘secular theology’ should not lose living relations with the life of the Church. This danger does exist, and we should always remember it, because Orthodox theology outside the liturgy and spiritual life is doomed to become emasculated.

Q. The Synodal Biblical and Theological Commission has come to prominence through theological conferences organized by the Russian Orthodox Church. They were attended by the best theological scholars from all over the world. Will this tradition of holding such conferences continue or will the format of these conferences be changed?

A. The tradition of holding international church-wide theological conferences will certainly continue. The papers of previous conferences constitute an important contribution to our theology and reflect the dynamics of its development. At present, a collection of papers from the latest conference on ‘Life in Christ: Christians Ethics, Ascetic Tradition of the Church and Challenges of the Modern Time’, which took place in November 2012, are in the press.

As for the format of the conferences and their thematic structure, changes are possible here. This matter will also be discussed at the plenary session of our Commission.

Q. In conclusion, allow me, Your Eminence, to hear your wish to the editors, contributors and readers of the Bogoslov.ru website, precisely in your capacity as chairman of the Synodal Biblical and Theological Commission.

A. I wish that the editors and contributors of the Bogoslov.ru portal always remember the responsibility placed on those who address the theological word to such a broad audience and steadily raise the scientific theological level of the materials it publishes. And to readers I wish that introduction to the portal’s materials help them not only to broaden their theological horizon but also assert them in their Orthodox faith.

From Fr Patrick Reardon:

…my real concern here is not for modern philosophers but for those modern Christian apologists who set a premium on scientific certainty and endeavor to establish the credibility of the Gospel by making the Gospel claims as scientific as possible, with the intent of attaining a culminating state of certainty.The certainty they seek, however, has a compulsive quality. It is presented to the mind as an imperative—Tanquerey’s credendum est. That is to say, the implicit model in this kind of apologetics is mathematical; it works through a progression of demonstrated theorems, in which inferences are recognized as true, because they must be inferred.The knowledge of God in Christ, however, to which we hope to bring the unbeliever, has nothing to do with this type of certainty. Christ our Lord spoke of certainty as a liberating knowledge:“You will know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:32).The knowledge of God in Christ is personal knowledge, freely given and freely received. Still, to embrace it is to attain what the Apostle Paul calls plerophoria polle,“complete certainty” (1 Thessalonians 1:5).  If this is the case, let me suggest that a proper apologetic procedure for Christians—in the hope of arriving at the truth in Christ—will endeavor, as far as possible, to beckon the mind, to lure the heart, by the sustained presentation of a vision, a vision of goodness and glory.Since Holy Scripture describes the knowledge of God in Christ as an experience of liberty and a beholding of glory, we should suppose that the path to it will also involve both freedom and the perception of beauty.

via Preachers Institute.

Charles J. Chaput is archbishop of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia:

The [Obama] administration prides itself on being measured and deliberate. The current HHS mandate needs to be understood as exactly that. Commentators are using words like “gaffe,” “ill conceived,” and “mistake” to describe the mandate. They’re wrong. It’s impossible to see this regulation as some happenstance policy. It has been too long in the making.

Despite all of its public apprehension about “culture warriors” on the political right in the past, the current administration has created an HHS mandate that is the embodiment of culture war. At its heart is a seemingly deep distrust of the formative role religious faith has on personal and social conduct, and a deep distaste for religion’s moral influence on public affairs. To say that this view is contrary to the Founders’ thinking and the record of American history would be an understatement.

Critics may characterize my words here as partisan or political. These are my personal views, and of course people are free to disagree. But it is this administration – not Catholic ministries, or institutions, or bishops – that chose the timing and nature of the fight. The onus is entirely on the White House, which also has the power to remove the issue from public conflict. Catholics should not be misled into accepting feeble compromises on issues of principle. The HHS mandate is bad law; and not merely bad, but dangerous and insulting. It needs to be withdrawn – now.

via HHS mandate insulting and dangerous.

True EcumenismPublished Friday, February 10, 2012 A.D. | By Donald R. McClarey

I must confess that I have never been a great fan of Ecumenism, as a drive for greater Christian unity, as it has played out in the Catholic Church since Vatican II.  Too often it has resulted in “dialogues” with non-Catholic faiths that seek to paper over theological chasms that divide us from them.  If the price of Ecumenism is any watering down of the Catholic Faith, please count me out.However, there is a true Ecumenism which I interpret as the banding together of people of different faiths to accomplish some great good in the name of God.  A striking example of what I am referring to was the action of the four chaplains of the USS Dorchester on January 22, 1943, a Catholic priest, two Protestant ministers, and a Jewish rabbi, who gave up their life jackets so other men could live, and died together, arms linked, praising God to the end.  Go here to read their story.In my 29 years of work in the pro-life cause, I have often encountered such true Ecumenism.  Each month I pray with members of the board of directors at the crisis pregnancy center which I have had the honor to be the Chairman of for over a decade.  I am the only Catholic on the board and I have found much to inspire me by the faith and the goods works of the evangelicals and other Protestants I have encountered and worked with over the years.In the face of the HHS mandate in regard to contraception and abortifacients, I have been heartened to see how many people of good will have been standing shoulder to shoulder with the Church in opposition to this villainous assault on our common heritage as Americans  of religious liberty.Rick Warren of the Saddleback Church, who gave the invocation at Obama’s inauguration, has announced that he is ready to go to jail rather than follow the HHS mandate.  The Orthodox Bishops in the United States  have vigorously condemned the HHS mandate. Dr. Richard Land, President of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptists, has raised his voice against the mandate.   Many other American religious leaders have spoken out, including Leith Anderson, president of the National  Association of Evangelicals; Colby May, senior counsel of the American  Center for Law and Justice; Tom Minnery, senior vice president of Focus  on the Family; Stanley Carlson-Thies, president of the Institutional  Religious Freedom Alliance; Nathan Diament, executive director for  public policy of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America;  Abba Cohen, vice president for federal affairs of Agudath Israel of  America; Samuel Rodriguez, president of the National Hispanic Christian  Leadership Conference; Ron Sider, president of Evangelicals for Social  Action; and Paul Corts, president of the Council for Christian Colleges  and Universities.  These are just a very few of hundreds of non-Catholic individuals and groups I could name who have spoken out.This is one Catholic who will never forget that when the Church in America stood up to defend Her religious liberty, She did not stand up alone.

via True Ecumenism | The American Catholic.

You may have noticed that I have not posted much the last 2 or weeks. The reason for this is that His Beatitude Metropolitan Jonah asked me to do some pastoral work in Texas. From now until the end of May I’m serving Holy New Martyrs of Russia in Georgetown, TX on Saturday and Sunday. During the week I’ll be helping at St Seraphim Cathedral in Dallas. I am looking forward to both parts of my assignment. Mission work is always a joy. As for St Seraphim’s, this was the first Orthodox church I attended here in America.  Please remember me and the communities I’m serving in your prayers.

On a personal level I’m glad to be back in Texas. I was born in San Antonio and I attended college in Dallas so I have many friends and family in Texas. So all in all, a delightful and welcomed assignment (aside from living away from my wife for 4 months).

Two other projects have been keeping me busy.

First is my preparation of an upcoming Liberty Fund event (Liberty and Responsibility in Modern Environmental Thought) this weekend in Tucson, AZ. Doing the reading for the seminar I was impressed with how overtly religious, albeit not in a theological sense, is the rhetoric of the founding thinkers of the contemporary environmental movement.  While this might seem as if it offers a natural home for Christians and other religious believers, I think this is a false conclusion. Yes, theological religious language can be twisted to ideological ends. But secular religious rhetoric is already ideological.

What especially drew my attention was the distinction drawn in the secular literature is between the natural world and the artificial or man-made world. Humanity, in this model, is somehow NOT a part of nature and is even seen as a threat to the integrity of nature.

The biblical and patristic witness is very different. Here while there is a like distinction between nature and humanity this relationship is situated within the larger relationship of that which is between the Creator and the creation. Or in patristic language, between the Uncreated and the created.

Seen in this context, humanity and non-human creation share a common origin and goal: the Most Holy Trinity. This means that neither the human community nor the non-human creation are themselves the source of their own being or meaning; again these are both found in God and so come from outside and as a gift.

Further, and this is what often seems to infuriate secular (and even Christian) environmentalists, the human and non-human realms are related to each other hierarchically.  In this relationship God calls all humanity to serve as both the stewards and masters of creation. Included in this is the vocation of each human person to be a wise steward of his or her own life through ascetical self-mastery.

At the center of our relationship of the person’s relationship with God, his neighbor, the natural world and self, is ascetical struggle. Our relationships with the world of self and others (Divine, human and non-human) is foundationally a moral relationship whose divinely authored meaning is gift to be received in gratitude.

Secular environmentalism and its unwitting Christian collaborators reject out of hand humanity’s call to fill the earth and subdue it through the twin creative works of procreation and labor. For those who embrace an ideological understanding of environmentalism procreation and humanity’s use of the created order (i.e., human labor) is precisely the problem. To be fair we have not always used the myriad good things of creation—including our own liberty—wisely. Why we will be any wiser in our use of creation by abandoning the Christian tradition and embracing secular environmentalism is not something I’ve ever understood. Maybe I just need to read more but secular environmentalism seems to me to be utopian.

My second project has been a forthcoming article on Charles Murray’s new book, Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010 that will appear shortly for the Acton Institute. I’ll post the article here after it appears on Acton’s site.

For now though, I would like to welcome you back and say I am looking forward to continuing our conversation here and at Acton and AOI and one or two other blogs where I will be posting essays in the near future.

As a quick aside, I now and then get email suggesting that I shouldn’t write for conservative think tanks or blogs. I don’t. I write for those groups that will publish—and typically pay—for what I write. My interest is exploring the relationship between the Christian life and the social and human sciences.  I am happy to write for anyone who is willing to give me the opportunity to do so.

In Christ,

+Fr Gregory

Related articles

• Triangulations : Buddhist Creationism (triangulations.wordpress.com)
• Purpose & Prosperity: Linking Christian Ideals with Sound Public Policy (wesleygant.com)
• The Fall in Patristic Thought (theologicalarsenal.wordpress.com)
• Seeing the wood fot the trees, Christianity and the ecological crisis (vatopaidi.wordpress.com)
• Jacques Maritain on the “the liquidation of the modern world” (insightscoop.typepad.com)

(Source: Roman Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh).

The Most Rev. David A. Zubik, Bishop of Pittsburgh has issued a powerful statement about President Obama’s attack on religious liberty, the 1st Amendment, and the Catholic Church. Some excerpts (and, no, I am NOT making this up):

[...]

Kathleen Sebelius and through her, the Obama administration, have said “To Hell with You” to the Catholic faithful of the United States.

To Hell with your religious beliefs,

To Hell with your religious liberty,

To Hell with your freedom of conscience.

We’ll give you a year, they are saying, and then you have to knuckle under. As Cardinal-designate Timothy Dolan, archbishop of New York and president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops responded, “in effect, the president is saying that we have a year to figure out how to violate our consciences.”

As I wrote to you last September, with this mandate the democratic process is being ignored while we are being ordered to ignore our religious beliefs. And we are being told not only to violate our beliefs, but to pay directly for that violation; to subsidize the imposition of a contraceptive and abortion culture on every person in the United States.

It is time to go back to work. They have given us a year to adapt to this rule. We can’t! We simply cannot!

Write to the president.

Write to Secretary Sebelius.

Write to our Senators.

Write to those in Congress.

[...]

This mandate can be changed by Congressional pressure. The only way that action will happen is if you and I take action.

Let them know that you and I will not allow ourselves to be pushed around (or worse yet) be dismissed because of our Catholic faith.

Let them know that you and I will not allow our religious freedom to be compromised.

Let them know that you and I will not allow our religious liberty to be rescinded.

Nobody, not even the president of the United States or anyone who represents him, has the right to say to you and to me as U.S. citizens, as Catholics, or as both: “To Hell with You.”

The president and our elected leaders need to hear from you and me and to listen to us NOW.

[...]

h/t: Fr Z of WDTPRS