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Showing posts from May 26, 2019

The Quality Of Life

Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves wide acceptance: Most of the people who blather on about other people's "quality of life" have never actually lived. I used to be scared to lose my mind, to get Alzheimer's, or some other dementia. But you know what? I don't need my wits; I just need my joy. And if I have no consolation from the gospel, my faith is enough. Faith proclaims what is true, even if it has no companions. If people say of me, "He believed, and he loved, and therefore, he lived," then it'll be a good life, no matter what I suffer at its end.

A Reductio Ad Absurdum Worth Considering

It is often claimed that individuals have the right to claim absolute sovereignty over their reproductive faculties; it is argued that frustrating, blocking, or even mutilating them is an indispensable part of freedom. Let's simply call this "reproductive freedom." If every man and woman actually chose this option, we would literally all die, and there would be no one to replace us. The human race would not survive. Let's put it in a syllogism:  Reproductive freedom is the right to regulate the natural human capacity for reproduction, up to and including the absolute prevention of conception (or the termination of the products of conception at will); If every person chose to exercise this right--in the direction of prevention of conception or termination--the human race would become extinct; It is not good that the human race should become extinct; Therefore, the right of reproductive freedom as described above is bad.

The Poison In The Well

I don't want to control uteruses; I want us to stop killing people, intentionally and systematically. But do you notice how we can't really have a conversation about anything else important, because the politics of abortion are so stark? Please don't tell me that "Until you..." support all these other policies, you don't trust my motives, because that's no way to have a discussion. Suppose, my liberal friend, that you were right on every other issue you brought up. It would still not be morally acceptable to intentionally kill a child in the womb. That's really the key, and it's why this well-poisoning isn't going to work. And you don't know me, or what I think about all the other issues of concern, because you didn't ask. I'd actually be a "liberal", in many minds. Perhaps you don't actually care, because you've decided that to be a good feminist is to support abortion. I can't imagine why. You know, we

I Didn't Order A Package (Confusedly Yet Passionately Loving Truth)

I need to start in an odd place: Mark Shea. If you talk to some fairly prominent "conservative" Catholics, they'll talk about how "sad" it is now, and they'll pretend that they aren't a bunch of unprincipled tribalists. On the other hand, I've tangled with The New And Not Improved Shea, and it hasn't been fun. Anyway, he still strikes me as that guy who got really justifiably upset at the numerous outrages and absurdities of the GOP primary,--Ted Cruz actually asserted that bombing an entire region indiscriminately based upon their religion was a good idea--and never had someone vaguely conservative go, "Actually, you're right. This is completely immoral and insane. This entire thing." And if someone is angry, and no one cares, they get more angry. I don't know about him, but I can't really think clearly when I'm really angry. I will turn a person I love into Pol Pot, and not even regret it, if no one tries to talk me d

What Is A Person? Further Abortion Thoughts

"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."  --- The United States Supreme Court, in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, widely attributed to Justice Anthony Kennedy (Author's Note: I can't find a juicy opposing quote. Find your own! I am neither a trained philosopher, nor an expert in Google, nor do I have an encyclopedic memory, despite some claims to the contrary. Who do you think I am, Bryan Cross? [No one would make that mistake.--ed.] I know, right? [At least you have hair.--ed.] For now.) When you ask a metaphysical realist philosopher--or better yet, someone schooled in the Catholic Philosophical Tradition (CPT) what's wrong with societies today, he or she might point to this quote right here. It's not merely because this case reaffirmed abortion-on-demand in Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton. Look instead at what it says about the nature of reality. We make ou