I suppose it comes down to the difference between a trial and a mere evil, the latter of which is totally pointless. I don't know that it's possible to distinguish one from the other on this side of the cosmic area rug, although it is often helpful to consider the bad tidings as a trial -- again, up to a point.
It would be difficult, for example, to have survived communist tyranny by reminding oneself that it's "just a trial" for the purpose of a transmitting a spiritual lesson from which one will emerge stronger or wiser: one death is a tragedy, but a hundred million deaths is an unparalleled opportunity for spiritual growth!
We're all familiar with the insipid happy-talking Flanderian Christian who regards everything as "God's will," out of which some gooey goodness will emerge.
I don't like this idea, for it makes God complicit in evil. The fact that, say, the great good of the state of Israel emerged from the unspeakable evil of the Holocaust doesn't make the latter any less horrific. Evil is evil and is never permissible, no matter what good may spring from its ashes. Besides, it's hard to find so ill a wind that it doesn't blow a little good someone'e way:
Such is the complexity of every historical event that we can always fear that from a good an evil might be born and always hope that from an evil a good might be born (Dávila).
Also, it's always easier to look at someone else's evil as an abstract trial, and one's own trial as an concrete evil. New York is no doubt being tried. But then, I'm 3,000 miles away. Or, for them it's a trial by fire. For me it's a trial by water. Big difference -- like the difference between meditating on death vs. a life-or-death confrontation.
Similarly, consider how global warmists have no compunction about wrecking the global economy for the sake of mitigating their abstract evil, since poor people in far off countries will suffer the most. We will suffer such inconveniences as more expensive energy, diminished wealth, and a reduced standard of living, while those in developing countries will suffer the concrete evils of disease, famine, and inescapable poverty.
Some people are saying this pandemic is a cleansing fire that will burn the progressive rot from our midst. Nothing reveals more the deadly plague of identity politics than a deadly plague. That would be nice, but still, I'd prefer that it be accomplished via ideas rather than plagues.
Others are proclaiming that the Progressive Moment has arrived, and that finally the scourge of capitalism will be vanquished. Me? I say the rot will always be with us in one form or another so long as man walks the earth. For
The progressive forgets that sin frustrates any ideal he longs for; the conservative forgets that he corrupts any reality he defends (Dávila).
Schuon writes that
A trial is not necessarily a chastisement, it can also be a grace, and the one does not preclude the other. At all events: a trial in itself not only tests what we are, but also purifies us of what we are not.
Perhaps the most we can do is ask ourselves how we might make some good come from this. I have this feeling that "things will never be the same," but one often feels this way in the midst of a confrontation with the Ultimate, only to revert back to isness-as-usual once the storm has passed. Soon enough people will once again take for granted the unmerited gift of toilet paper. Yes, our sleep is occasionally disrupted by the intrusion of reality, but never underestimate man's somnambulistic abilities.
Come what may, we should "look straight ahead and let the world be the world" (Schuon). For what choice does one have? Regardless of our hopes, fears, and wishes, the world is going to be the world, and although it is created good, there are other nonlocal forces and wills at play in it. Nothing we can do about that:
The whole purpose of our life lies before us, and [this] is one of the meanings of the injunction not to look behind when one has put one's hand to the plow. It it is necessary to look towards God, in relation to Whom all the chasms of the world are nothing.
Yes, of course there are aphorisms that speak to this existential moment:
The imbecile does not discover the radical misery of our condition except when he is sick, poor or old.Modern man believes that death is “natural” except when he approaches dying.
Death must not be the object of our meditations, but rather the foundation of all of them.
I suppose one could say that for the person who is truly in touch with reality, the blows of reality should never really come as a surprise. Indeed, the more plans we make, the more fate and contingency bellow with laughter. But Serenity is the fruit of accepting uncertainty.
18 comments:
Predictions about climate change would be highly regarded if previous predictions about too many other things didn’t turn out to be completely wrong. Eventually we learn to consider the source and ignore those predictions.
Today’s climate change scientists do not waver off their core predictive “science”, but climate change deniers are all over the place. For the latter, one day it’s sun spots, the next an oligarchic green conspiracy, the next scientific groupthink. Truth doesn’t usually waver all over the place. Nor does truth try to desperately grasp at anything plausible. Exxon has been far more accurate. They lie when the truth will ruin their profits, then they claim they can save the day with their new carbon capture technologies.
I completely agree with the potential to ruin the worlds economy with poorly thought out green mandates, though. Hold on. Strike that. Replace “poorly thought out mandates” with “corporate lobbied into dysfunctional directions mandates”.
Yes, our sleep is occasionally disrupted by the intrusion of reality, but never underestimate man's somnambulistic abilities.
After 9/11, how many imagined that there would be mosque-building at ground zero? America certainly changed, but not all in good ways.
Come what may, we should "look straight ahead and let the world be the world" (Schuon). For what choice does one have?
Indeed. Though we might hope that one benefit of the current situation may be that people will stop telling the young they must change the world; many are learning that most of the time, all you can do is focus on the task at hand.
Time will tell.
Hello Dr. Godwin and readers:
This skillfully-written post manages to touch on so many salient points it could be called an embarrassment of riches; well done.
I'll just pick a couple items to joust around with, for instance this paragraph:
"Similarly, consider how global warmists have no compunction about wrecking the global economy for the sake of mitigating their abstract evil, since poor people in far off countries will suffer the most. We will suffer such inconveniences as more expensive energy, diminished wealth, and a reduced standard of living, while those in developing countries will suffer the concrete evils of disease, famine, and inescapable poverty."
You must have picked this up somewhere rather than doing your own research. Also see Anonymous 1:24 PM well-crafted comment. Only corporations which will lose money on the needed changes can gum things up, which they will certainly try to do and say "see? we told you so." Meanwhile the "poor people in far off countries" are leading the charge toward the needed and sensible changes, because they make money doing so. You've swallowed the corporate Kool-Aid, Godwin. Barf now before its too late. Or try to hold it in. Someday you will wake up and look at a news clip of some hell-hole like Bangalore and realize "Hey, that doesn't look so bad. Is that a freaking bullet train?" That's right, they are catching up fast.
In the end it won't matter because clean practices will turn out to be more practical/profitable; time marches on, and dirty practices will go the way of Kodak film.
Here's another: "Others are proclaiming that the Progressive Moment has arrived, and that finally the scourge of capitalism will be vanquished."
There might be something to that.
What the present situation shows is that life goes on if non-essential workers stay home. There are a lot of non-essential workers. They are an artifact of capitalism, which states "You must work to receive pay." This has been the rule for centuries.
The new paradigm should be "You do not need to work to receive pay."
It is more practical to just pay people to do nothing than to struggle to uphold the whirring, clacking monstrosity which is the non-essential work sector. Sure, this sector "functions" and keeps people busy, but any catastrophic situation where it can't go on demonstrates how expendable it is.
It goes on as a sop to an old moral code "You can't get something for nothing."
It will be hard to let that go; it has been with us since Mesopotamia.
So there's my two cents, yes I argue but do you really want your readers to just Bob their heads, or give you what you deserve, which is a rigorous examination. You decide.
-Climax Change Denier
Jesus did once tell us to give up everything and follow him. Actually, I think he said it dozens of times. Would now be a good time to loudly advertise that?
I hereby challenge the richest amongst us, the 1%ers who own half of everything, to give it up to the rest of us and have their treasure in heaven.
Any takers?
The diffusion of a few drops of Christianity into a leftist mind transforms the idiot into a perfect idiot.
Exactly. You will not find a single wealthy person willing giving it up to set an example for Christians and Christianity. Everybody knows this and this is why modern Christianity is failing. Prosperity gospel can be seen as one of its last gasps.
Whether it's wanting that forbidden apple, or needing ten yachts, greed is more than just a sin. It destroys the spiritual soul.
Davila BTW, was born and died wealthy. Yet, throughout human history millions of Christians were happy and fulfilled living very simple lives. And those at the very bottom found much hope, even under governments which cared nothing for them.
What makes you think anyone here is a 1%er? And even if anyone is, why should they act to meet with your approval? Has it never occurred to you that the Lord uses even the wealthy for His purposes? Or did Joseph of Arimathea have nothing to offer on the day of Christ's burial?
You have no idea what sort of lives any of us live, nor whether any have ever given anything up in God's name. None at all. Nor, for that matter, whether the current circumstances are causing anyone's entire life trajectory to change even at this moment.
If being in poverty for Christ is your calling, go and do so and be blessed. Do not presume to know the ways in which the Lord calls his other servants. No two walk the same road.
Relative to history and to most of the world today, nearly all Americans are in the 1%. Nevertheless, gratitude cannot coexist with metaphysical victimhood, and envy can only be eliminated from within.
On occasion a person will offer up all of their worldly treasure and follow a spiritual call. There were some religious communes in the 19th Century that had that going on a lot.
The trouble now with "giving it all away" is that maintenance of the physical needs then becomes problematic.
In other climes and times the mendicant with his begging bowl was a social fixture and the mendicant need not fear the bowl would go empty.
Where I live now, you cannot be penniless without risk of heat or cold exposure, lack of food, or incarceration.
So the injunction could be, give most of our treasure away but conserve enough to meet our maintenance needs. Otherwise you will become a burden on the taxpayer.
-Thus Spake Zarathustra
Julie, nobody accused anybody of anything, and especially not here where quite clearly nobody is even remotely wealthy. And nobody's demanding any commie statist mandates either. Just sayin' that this might be a good time for a few wealthy Christians to set some biblical examples is all.
But Davila... was clearly rationalizing his wealth with his aphorisms. Plus that "What the hell are you doing all alone in that room all day already?" situation. The aphorisms might be to prove that he wasn't just playing with himself.
Petey, if it ain't in the Bible, it's rationalization. I didn't write God's rules. And neither did you. And no, I don't believe that metaphysical superpowers are being doled out based on quality of faith. God's way too busy blessing the wealthy.
Reducing another’s thought to his supposed motives prevents us from understanding him.
"If it ain't in the Bible, it's rationalization."
I can't find that statement in the Bible. Perhaps you can direct me to where Jesus mentions that.
Anonymous 4:55 wrote in part "...nobody's demanding any commie statist mandates either."
Well I am demanding commie statist mandates. I want martial law. Bring on the NG.
As for wealth the Bible reveals a mixed bag of viewpoints: Be prudent with wealth, not too attached, but don't distain it either, tithe to the Church about 10% or more if needed, and give to charity as well. Moderation, financial moderation. Not too greedy, but also not too disinterested. The appropriate word would be "Stewardship." Be a good steward to wealth, as if it was God's wealth and you were God's account manager. The Bible says all that but it would be tedious to find supporting passages so you are on your own with that.
Jesus had a different take on money because he was a Messiah, that's a line of work where you have to be indifferent to money. Did Jesus mean for all to share his same attitude? I don't think so, or the world economy would not function correctly. It takes some financial reserve to run a sheep-herding or grain farming operation, for example. You just can't run a business hand-to-mouth, or you'll go under if you have the a downturn.
Alright girls keep your hands above the b-b-b-b-blankets and stay cozy. Unlimited Tea and Scones for all.
-Benign Trollop
I can't find that statement in the Bible. Perhaps you can direct me to where Jesus mentions that.
Because John 8:44. Some 1 John 3:8. And of course what people most conveniently forget, the all important John 14:6.
Of course modern conservatives conveniently forget these things. Jesus is whatever they want him to be. As for limited government, they'll chant "Build that wall!" one day then hire illegals to paint their house the next. And yeah, I see that kind of hypocrisy in meatspace reality all the time. Modern conservatives rarely ever practice what they preach.
Of course, most liberals don't either. The only people I trust anymore are true progressives and the true fiscal conservatives who honestly fact check them.
I whine because I remember better times. Plus I know what happened to Rome after Marcus Aurelius. Corruption really does trickle down. The Chinese are our future barbarians at the gate. But who cares about the children as long as we got ours, right?
Of course, around here this is just whining, since there's not a single damned thing any of us can do about it.
If Nicolás focused on practical street smarts, I'd be all in. But I see him as a rich kid who rationalizes why he's spending all his time alone in his room.
Not that I'm not jealous. I'd love to be that way. But I have to get out there amongst all the rabble to survive.
"The all important John 14:6" has precisely no bearing on the doctrine of sola scriptura except to contradict its very premise.
-Benign Trollop,
I really don't think Jesus was being "Lock her up" Trumpian with his Matthew 6:24 quote from his famous sermon. I don't think he ever came back later to say it was all just good theater that plays well before an election and we don't care anymore now do we?.
When Julie says that "the Lord uses even the wealthy for His purposes" it only makes sense when they give away their money to reputable caretakers like the Catholic Church instead of giving away other peoples money (their jobs) to mostly atheist nations. If God has a purpose for these wealthy, maybe now's the time for them to set that great inspirational example?
I think with either the monkery or the nunnery you get a warm bed and three square meals a day. Plus all the spiritual goodness you'll ever need for one lifetime. Is that really all that bad?
"The all important John 14:6" has precisely no bearing on the doctrine of sola scriptura except to contradict its very premise.
You talk to your children with that mouth?
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