I was having some excellent conversations this evening with a couple of friends who keep me up far too late on work nights. But it really is too difficult to leave for the discussions are pure, honest, and sincere in their willingness to be open to the truth of the other side. This leads to an authentic search for truth and authentic dialogue happens. It is really a lot of fun (though I'm sure I won't be saying that when I wake up in 5 hours!)
Anyways, there was a point in my discussion tonight that I just could not let pass and had to write it down.
It was to do with Canada and Culture.
We have talked about this a couple times over the past few days, the ideas of what it means to be Canadian and if there really is something called a "Canadian Culture". If there is, why don't we know what it is, and we should go back into history and search it out. If there isn't, is it possible to create one authentically and organically 140 years after the institution of the country?
These are answers none of us have at the moment, from our conversations, and it has at least inspired me to research it at greater depth.
What really interested me, however, was that I also saw Canada being at a crossroads. There is a great hope I see for the future of Canada, and the Church plays nothing but an essential role in this. Where this is coming from is my generation. My generation has had the desire for a true expression of the human person. They have been exploring the riches of the Western Tradition to see this and have found it. Now, my generation is beginning to grow up and take an active role in society.
The question is, can what we see to be a culture worthy of the human person come out of an organic desire in a country that seems to have no unified culturally identity? I think my generation is beginning a great cultural renaissance. They are engaging all aspects of life, from the arts, the intellectual realm, the universities, politics, business, health care, etc. They see that the only way for having a robust and excelling culture is if it is rooted in a faith in God and strong moral conditions. Unfortunately, these are 2 conditions missing from the foundations of a Canadian culture at this point in history.
This just leads me to further pondering, but I will have to do that on my bed as I am passing out! Is it possible to renew a culture if we don't know what our cultural identity is? Is it possible to organically create a true cultural expression? Is there really any hope in Canada? These are important questions that I think we honestly need to ask ourselves.
Showing posts with label Catholic. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Catholic. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
CCCB and the Principle of Subsidiarity
I swear, I'll stop posting at some point today!!
I am reading for Tertio Millennio right now and am reading an excellent article about the Church and its change in its stance towards Democracy over the past 150 years.
At this moment in time, I'm reading about the definition of the Principle of Subsidiarity. It is something I have pondered for a bit, and am looking for feedback.
Essentially, my question is: "Does the CCCB (Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, or any conference of Catholic Bishops) defy the Principle of Subsidiarity?"
For those who don't know, essentially, the Principle of Subsidiarity is that whatever the individual can do within its community, one ought to let that individual do it. Larger organizations are only necessary when the smaller organizations (down to the organization of the one person) cannot do it themselves. For example, our Government runs the military because it is something we cannot run on an individual basis.
But this has got me wondering about the Conferences of Catholic Bishops. Essentially, the way a Bishop runs his Diocese is susceptible to the democratic (I use the term loosely here) functions of the CCCB.
This seems to circumvent the role of the Bishop, as the head of his local Church.
For example, the local Bishop is required to have the same lectionary as the rest of the Bishops in Canada. But what if the local Bishop wants a better translation (trust me, anything is better then the current one...needless to say "Catchers of People" makes me want to vomit!)? It seems that it is something he is capable of doing himself, why must he be subject to a larger bureaucracy if he is able to do so himself?
I would be interested in feedback, but it really seems to me that the Conferences of Catholic Bishops essentially are not serving the purpose they were created for. To my knowledge, the conferences were essentially created for the purpose of creating a sense of collegiality and unity (that is, fulfilling the principle of solidarity within the community of Bishops) and of creating one voice. Yet it is obvious that this is not happening, but instead has become a bureaucratic body in which the Conference makes all the decisions for the local Bishop. This seems to contradict the Principle of Subsidiarity, an essential tool in Catholic Social Thought.
I can see one objection already. "The Principle of Subsidiarity is to be applied to social circumstances only, and is not applicable to the Church". To my knowledge, however, that has never been formally defined as part of the principle.
So, I am interested to hear your feedback.
-Harrison
I am reading for Tertio Millennio right now and am reading an excellent article about the Church and its change in its stance towards Democracy over the past 150 years.
At this moment in time, I'm reading about the definition of the Principle of Subsidiarity. It is something I have pondered for a bit, and am looking for feedback.
Essentially, my question is: "Does the CCCB (Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, or any conference of Catholic Bishops) defy the Principle of Subsidiarity?"
For those who don't know, essentially, the Principle of Subsidiarity is that whatever the individual can do within its community, one ought to let that individual do it. Larger organizations are only necessary when the smaller organizations (down to the organization of the one person) cannot do it themselves. For example, our Government runs the military because it is something we cannot run on an individual basis.
But this has got me wondering about the Conferences of Catholic Bishops. Essentially, the way a Bishop runs his Diocese is susceptible to the democratic (I use the term loosely here) functions of the CCCB.
This seems to circumvent the role of the Bishop, as the head of his local Church.
For example, the local Bishop is required to have the same lectionary as the rest of the Bishops in Canada. But what if the local Bishop wants a better translation (trust me, anything is better then the current one...needless to say "Catchers of People" makes me want to vomit!)? It seems that it is something he is capable of doing himself, why must he be subject to a larger bureaucracy if he is able to do so himself?
I would be interested in feedback, but it really seems to me that the Conferences of Catholic Bishops essentially are not serving the purpose they were created for. To my knowledge, the conferences were essentially created for the purpose of creating a sense of collegiality and unity (that is, fulfilling the principle of solidarity within the community of Bishops) and of creating one voice. Yet it is obvious that this is not happening, but instead has become a bureaucratic body in which the Conference makes all the decisions for the local Bishop. This seems to contradict the Principle of Subsidiarity, an essential tool in Catholic Social Thought.
I can see one objection already. "The Principle of Subsidiarity is to be applied to social circumstances only, and is not applicable to the Church". To my knowledge, however, that has never been formally defined as part of the principle.
So, I am interested to hear your feedback.
-Harrison
Frustrations Part 3 - Irrational
So far we have discussed the frustrations of the terms applied to religious believers as "fanatics" and "fundamentalists". The third issue I would like to now confront is the label of "irrational".
Before I get started on that, I would like to state that it seems that these are labels that can be applied to a small minority. Unfortunately, however, it seems that such terms are then labelled on all religious believers because there is a minority of them.
Now, I cannot speak for all faiths in this regard. However, Catholics, I can guarantee, are incredibely rational.
If you look at the history of Western thought, it is largely dominated and guided by the thought of Catholic greats. The first and foremost is St Augustine who guided the ideal of faith seeking understanding that has taken root and has since been a staple of Catholicism.
From there we can go into greats such as Boethius, St Thomas Aquinas, St Bonaventure, Bl. John Duns Scotus, and so on and so on. I know I'm only naming a couple, but the fact of the matter is that the list is endless.
Even in our modern times we have great thinkers like the Servant of God, John Paul II and Benedict XVI.
The idea that people of faith are irrational utterly confounds me to be perfectly honest. It is a result of great Catholic thinkers that we think the way we do about the world! The Empiricist ideal of "There is nothing in the mind that is not previously perceived through the senses" is essentially a scholastic principle.
Pope Benedict XVI has been confronting the idea of irrationality in religion head on. One need only read his Regensburg lecture to see this.
However, I may like to throw the challenge the opposite direction. Many claim that all religious believers are irrational because of the idea of faith in their lives.
The Pope's Regensburg lecture, however, seems to turn the table around. He is not stating that all secularists, for example, are irrational. What he is claiming, however, is that the West is losing "faith in reason".
You see, faith is an essential property to reason. I would argue that there is a hierarchy of faith. We all have faith in the world, some are more basic and less "risky" then others. The highest form of faith is of course faith in God.
However, there are lower forms of faith as well. Faith, for example, is present in reasoning. We have to have faith in Logic. That is to say, stating that "Logic is true" is an axiomatic belief we must all hold. You see, the value of "true" is a logical statement. Thus to say that logic is true, and to try and prove that through reason, would be circular because it is logic that we use to make reasonable arguments. Hence, one must accept as an axiomatic belief that "Logic is true".
Instead of people in the West saying why religious people are irrational, it seems instead, unfortunately, that many are angry at religious people. Look no futher then the writings of Richard Dawkins and company. I am yet to see reasonable argumentation in their writings. Instead, I see anger and contempt, which is unfortunate.
And so this is happening more and more as relativism and the socialist ideal of man slowly seeps its way into way man thinks of the world. Trying to convince someone who is a relativist that the Principle of Non-Contradiction is an essential principle to stand by is like pulling teeth. Because they are a relativist, they see that anything can contradict anything, because there is no universal truth.
This brings me to the absolutely frustration position of relativism. They claim that truth is relative. Following that, then, so is language. Language is built upon the nature of logic, and so if truth is relative, then logic is relative, and thus language is relative. This leaves us with no universal language in which to communicate our ideas because words can mean whatever one "feels they ought to mean". Thus, there is no way to discuss because "chair" (yes, I am using the chair example, you can tell I got a Philosophy degree) can mean "something in which someone uses to sit on and is built specifically for that person" for one person and for another can mean "a person who is sleeping". Chair can mean whatever one wants it to mean. Language becomes obsolete, and so does the human person.
This post is more of a vent against the world who claims that religious people are irrational. I ask, however, why the many in the west are irrational about things.
Faith is something that is inharent to the human character. It is not something that we can deny. For some it is simply stating "I have faith that my experiences are true", for others, such as myself, it goes deeper, to the claim that the Nicene Creed and all that follows from that is true.
I would like to end with a quote from St Anselm, one of my favourite quotes:
"I believe so that I may understand, for this too I believe, for unless I believe, I cannot understand".
-Harrison
Before I get started on that, I would like to state that it seems that these are labels that can be applied to a small minority. Unfortunately, however, it seems that such terms are then labelled on all religious believers because there is a minority of them.
Now, I cannot speak for all faiths in this regard. However, Catholics, I can guarantee, are incredibely rational.
If you look at the history of Western thought, it is largely dominated and guided by the thought of Catholic greats. The first and foremost is St Augustine who guided the ideal of faith seeking understanding that has taken root and has since been a staple of Catholicism.
From there we can go into greats such as Boethius, St Thomas Aquinas, St Bonaventure, Bl. John Duns Scotus, and so on and so on. I know I'm only naming a couple, but the fact of the matter is that the list is endless.
Even in our modern times we have great thinkers like the Servant of God, John Paul II and Benedict XVI.
The idea that people of faith are irrational utterly confounds me to be perfectly honest. It is a result of great Catholic thinkers that we think the way we do about the world! The Empiricist ideal of "There is nothing in the mind that is not previously perceived through the senses" is essentially a scholastic principle.
Pope Benedict XVI has been confronting the idea of irrationality in religion head on. One need only read his Regensburg lecture to see this.
However, I may like to throw the challenge the opposite direction. Many claim that all religious believers are irrational because of the idea of faith in their lives.
The Pope's Regensburg lecture, however, seems to turn the table around. He is not stating that all secularists, for example, are irrational. What he is claiming, however, is that the West is losing "faith in reason".
You see, faith is an essential property to reason. I would argue that there is a hierarchy of faith. We all have faith in the world, some are more basic and less "risky" then others. The highest form of faith is of course faith in God.
However, there are lower forms of faith as well. Faith, for example, is present in reasoning. We have to have faith in Logic. That is to say, stating that "Logic is true" is an axiomatic belief we must all hold. You see, the value of "true" is a logical statement. Thus to say that logic is true, and to try and prove that through reason, would be circular because it is logic that we use to make reasonable arguments. Hence, one must accept as an axiomatic belief that "Logic is true".
Instead of people in the West saying why religious people are irrational, it seems instead, unfortunately, that many are angry at religious people. Look no futher then the writings of Richard Dawkins and company. I am yet to see reasonable argumentation in their writings. Instead, I see anger and contempt, which is unfortunate.
And so this is happening more and more as relativism and the socialist ideal of man slowly seeps its way into way man thinks of the world. Trying to convince someone who is a relativist that the Principle of Non-Contradiction is an essential principle to stand by is like pulling teeth. Because they are a relativist, they see that anything can contradict anything, because there is no universal truth.
This brings me to the absolutely frustration position of relativism. They claim that truth is relative. Following that, then, so is language. Language is built upon the nature of logic, and so if truth is relative, then logic is relative, and thus language is relative. This leaves us with no universal language in which to communicate our ideas because words can mean whatever one "feels they ought to mean". Thus, there is no way to discuss because "chair" (yes, I am using the chair example, you can tell I got a Philosophy degree) can mean "something in which someone uses to sit on and is built specifically for that person" for one person and for another can mean "a person who is sleeping". Chair can mean whatever one wants it to mean. Language becomes obsolete, and so does the human person.
This post is more of a vent against the world who claims that religious people are irrational. I ask, however, why the many in the west are irrational about things.
Faith is something that is inharent to the human character. It is not something that we can deny. For some it is simply stating "I have faith that my experiences are true", for others, such as myself, it goes deeper, to the claim that the Nicene Creed and all that follows from that is true.
I would like to end with a quote from St Anselm, one of my favourite quotes:
"I believe so that I may understand, for this too I believe, for unless I believe, I cannot understand".
-Harrison
Thursday, June 14, 2007
Frustrations Part 2 - Fundamentalism
So my last post ended off with my frustrations that religiously inclined people are fanatics and what that word entailed.
I would now like to focus on the next stereotype people generally use to refer to anyone who seriously practices their faith.
Fundamentalism
Unfortunately this is a word that is thrown about without many people knowing what exactly it means.
The term "fundamentalism" and "fundamentalists" emerged in the early 20th century. It is a Christian movement that tried to get "back to the source" of Christianity, basing their beliefs on the 5 "fundamentals" which is where the name comes from.
These 5 fundamentals are:
I am of the opinion that the fundamentalists (not all though, this is my basic experience though of many) is that there is this idea of imposition of will and lack of dialogue that is in Christian Fundamentalism that is definitely present in Jihadist Islam.
This similarity leads me to the view of what people see as fundamentalism. Fundamentalism is seen as anyone who believes in what they see as obviously false views and is willing to do whatever it takes to ensure that the entire world submits to this view. This is, really, though, fanaticism as discussed in the previous post and nothing else.
However, people look at Fundamentalist Christians now and paint them as fanaticists who, if they could, would lay siege to the whole world to ensure that everyone submit to Christ to be saved.
First, that is a false perception of Fundamentalist Christians that has been tainted by a false understanding of fundamentalism that has been attached to them through Jihadist Islam.
Secondly, Fundamentalist Christians that I have known, and I can really only speak from experience here, would not be the type to kill you if they could if you would not submit to faith as they have.
This brings me now to the view that all religious people who hold views contrary to the norms of culture are fundamentalists and bad.
However, as shown in the previous post, Christians and Catholics are not fanaticists. They want to propose their truth to the world. Christianity is about proposition through the aid of reason.
I bet you if you ask anyone who labels and devout Christian as a fundamentalist, they would be prescribing the word "fanatic" over "fundamentalism".
The other big issue is that many non-Christians believe that "fundamentalists" are dangerous because they don't think and base all they believe on a literal interpretation of the Bible.
First, I would like to point out that Catholics do not take the entire Bible literally. We do not think that God created the Earth in 7 literal days.
But this leads us to a deeper, perhaps the deepest, objection to Christians in a pluralistic society. Christians, they say, are people who don't think, they lack the true use of reason.
This will bring me to the 3rd topic which I hope to write on Friday. Are Christians reasonable?
-Harrison
I would now like to focus on the next stereotype people generally use to refer to anyone who seriously practices their faith.
Fundamentalism
Unfortunately this is a word that is thrown about without many people knowing what exactly it means.
The term "fundamentalism" and "fundamentalists" emerged in the early 20th century. It is a Christian movement that tried to get "back to the source" of Christianity, basing their beliefs on the 5 "fundamentals" which is where the name comes from.
These 5 fundamentals are:
- The inerrancy of scripture
- Christ was born of a virgin and is Divine
- One is saved by faith alone through grace alone
- Christ rose from the dead
- Christ's miracles and life are all true events.
I am of the opinion that the fundamentalists (not all though, this is my basic experience though of many) is that there is this idea of imposition of will and lack of dialogue that is in Christian Fundamentalism that is definitely present in Jihadist Islam.
This similarity leads me to the view of what people see as fundamentalism. Fundamentalism is seen as anyone who believes in what they see as obviously false views and is willing to do whatever it takes to ensure that the entire world submits to this view. This is, really, though, fanaticism as discussed in the previous post and nothing else.
However, people look at Fundamentalist Christians now and paint them as fanaticists who, if they could, would lay siege to the whole world to ensure that everyone submit to Christ to be saved.
First, that is a false perception of Fundamentalist Christians that has been tainted by a false understanding of fundamentalism that has been attached to them through Jihadist Islam.
Secondly, Fundamentalist Christians that I have known, and I can really only speak from experience here, would not be the type to kill you if they could if you would not submit to faith as they have.
This brings me now to the view that all religious people who hold views contrary to the norms of culture are fundamentalists and bad.
However, as shown in the previous post, Christians and Catholics are not fanaticists. They want to propose their truth to the world. Christianity is about proposition through the aid of reason.
I bet you if you ask anyone who labels and devout Christian as a fundamentalist, they would be prescribing the word "fanatic" over "fundamentalism".
The other big issue is that many non-Christians believe that "fundamentalists" are dangerous because they don't think and base all they believe on a literal interpretation of the Bible.
First, I would like to point out that Catholics do not take the entire Bible literally. We do not think that God created the Earth in 7 literal days.
But this leads us to a deeper, perhaps the deepest, objection to Christians in a pluralistic society. Christians, they say, are people who don't think, they lack the true use of reason.
This will bring me to the 3rd topic which I hope to write on Friday. Are Christians reasonable?
-Harrison
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
