Safe Haven

I don't want it. This is a non-negligible reason why I do not identify as conservative. Debate and the expression of contentious opinions, especially in anything as important as politics, can tend to get heated, even among friends. We all make mistakes; we all have an opportunity to apologize and reverse course. There is a difference, however, between a person who makes a mistake, and somebody who repeatedly misrepresents someone else's position. It is perhaps complicated by the fact that there are livelihoods and money involved, but it should be a first principle of reasoned debate to take your opponent seriously. More specifically, to take any representations of moral stands to be genuine, until proven definitively otherwise. If I see a bunch of white women marching in remembrance of George Floyd, and ostensibly advocating for changes in policing, the charitable assumption is that they mean what they are saying and doing. It's not "virtue signaling" if you actu...

I agree with the Roman Catholic Church that it is the Church that Christ founded. That's what she teaches about herself; more fundamentally, that's what she believes about herself. I suppose it could happen that a person becomes Catholic rashly, and is not entirely certain that they are submitting to the Church that Christ founded, and believing that what she teaches is revealed by God. Perhaps therefore, someone could leave without fault, and then return. There is nothing which requires me to believe that some other set of truths is equally as good as that proclaimed by the Catholic Church. In fact, it would be an error for me to do so. Our graciousness and generosity toward those outside comes precisely from the reality of who Christ is, the certainty of the truth which He is. My purpose, quite frankly then, is to remove the obstacles toward any one person's seeking full communion with the Catholic Church. Anything that we have in common I regard as a bridge to the re...

I suppose I am in the mode of revisiting expressions of popular culture as they relate to race, given our present situation. We have a lot to think about, to pray about, and a lot positive that we can hopefully do, in the near future to make things better. I rewatch this film a lot, as someone who had a brief interracial relationship in the past. In this film of course, the sexes are switched. A white man loving a black woman has other aspects of complexity, most of which I was not frankly aware of at the time. I love this film, although let me start with the weaknesses. Firstly, John Prentice is the archetype of the perfect black man. Perhaps it was done this way intentionally, but in reality, it's the way you would have to do things--especially in 1967--to get some segment of your audience used to and comfortable with the idea in itself. If you don't know the story, Joanna "Joey" Drayton comes home from a college break (or something) telling her family that sh...

That's what Candace Owens is missing. Eric Garner died for selling loose cigarettes. George Floyd apparently used a counterfeit $20 bill. Michael Brown apparently stole something. How "savory" do you have to be, to keep breathing? Frankly, it's the defensive reaction of white people at the mention of the protests against these excesses that clues me in to a racial dimension to the discussion. I either have principles, by which I say, "these actions in these situations permit uses of force x, y, and z," or I justify my own comfort after the fact. Some of us would frankly just rather not deal with the fact that someone entrusted with the public safety probably murdered a man in cold blood. As I saw a video of a Black Lives Matter protester invited to speak at a Trump rally,--this is as weird as it sounds--I nevertheless thought about how easy it is for someone to justify the death of Michael Brown, or Trayvon Martin, and others, by pointing out that they w...

I just saw this film from Ryan Coogler. It tells the story of the final day in the life of Oscar Grant III, a man who died on New Year's Day of 2009. I'm not going to tell you anything about the story, but some friends and I wanted to be more aware in some small way of the black experience here in America. We had heard that this film was well-regarded, and it has launched the careers of Coogler, and Michael B. Jordan. You may recall that this director also gave us Black Panther, and the "Creed" series of "Rocky" spin-off films (also starring Michael B. Jordan). I wept at the injustice of these tragic events. Oscar is somebody that you root for, even though you know he's made bad choices in the past--which the director doesn't hide from us, with flashback cut scenes--so the end is hard to take. I understand why people are marching in the streets all over our country. I understand a little better why the group of friends went in the other direction...

We have established that I'm a big dork. Or maybe I'm a big nerd. In any case, I would go to a political philosophy conference the day after the worst night of my life. Well, what am I going to do? Cancel the trip? I'm going to drop a name right here, because that's just what you do, when you are an obscure writer, and nobody cares what you have to say. I shook Jake Meador's hand at that conference. I sat right next to Wendell Berry for six hours. No, I haven't read him much. But if he writes anything like he talks, he's a good egg, just like everyone says. If it's true that Obama likes him, good for Obama. He bloody well should. I had this strange feeling that a lot of our categories were completely meaningless. It's just like when I go to the Front Porch Republic conferences; I don't know what categories to use. We are in some general sense like-minded, but me from eight years ago would've called the lot of them a bunch of Commies and c...

I don't want to write a history tome here today, but the government promised newly freed slaves 40 acres and a mule. It never came. Someone recently pointed out that the equivalent of 40 acres and a mule today would be about $60,000. I'm no math guy, but that would be a lot of money. We might not be able to do that, even if we should. It's not like racism simply vanished, even at the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. And the effect of this ongoing racism in economic terms--in practical terms--is the prevention of the accumulation of intergenerational wealth. We'll come back to that. Yeah, there are racist attitudes floating around in the Republican Party, and in the conservative media ecosystem. Of course there are. The GOP absorbed the Dixiecrat South within a period of about 20 years. We would have at the very least absorbed racially insensitive attitudes as a function of partisanship, when I was there. It's worse now, because talk radio rose up in the la...

Phil Lawler over at Catholic Culture criticized the Bishop for his criticism of Donald Trump, because the president stopped by one of our shrines in DC. He also announced some religious liberty protections while he did that. You know, it's possible to be opposed to whatever the new Democratic administration will do with respect to religious liberty, and to be opposed to the president's photo opportunity stunt. Their principal desire seems to be the imposition of their reproductive and sexual ideology upon anyone who does not agree. Perhaps the problem for Donald Trump is that he's a bad politician, so he always looks like he's pandering, which he is. Perhaps the problem for Phil Lawler is that the preservation of a so-called Catholic culture has been bound up with the success or failure of Donald Trump. If anyone had bothered to speak in plain terms about what was right and what was wrong, maybe a few more of us wouldn't be so tempted to jump on the opposite end o...

It's been kicking around in my head for days now, but Professor Cross was musing on Facebook about the run-up to the Iraq war. In his judgment, the standard for just war was not met, because there was no threat of an imminent attack. That observation has been made in many quarters for a long time now, and is not in itself controversial anymore. Yet he went on to say that the decision to engage in a preemptive war, based on the possibility of horrific attacks in the future, has legitimized the preemptive use of force by police against citizens. The professor said in effect that we were facing the consequences of our own philosophy. As much as I hate to admit it, I think he's right. While I'm at it, I think the good professor would enjoy watching a film called, "Minority Report". It's about this sort of preemptive consequentialism. It's also a theological reflection on sovereignty and free will. [You only like it because it has Tom Cruise.--ed.] In any c...

About 2 years ago, I saw most of "Roots." It was on one of my local sub-channels. There were moments I wept. And not necessarily at the obvious injustices. Mr. LeVar Burton played Kunta Kinte in that film. Fans of the blog note that he is even more famous for playing Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge, the Chief Engineer of the Enterprise, on "Star Trek: The Next Generation." He has also inspired multiple generations of kids as the host of the educational program, "Reading Rainbow." I don't know if LeVar Burton took that role on "Roots" because he was a struggling actor short on cash, but I get the sense from reading interviews with him that in fact, he is well aware of his own blackness, and his part in the story of the African-American experience here in the United States. What I can tell you is that the sins of systemic racism, and the social impact of racial bigotry, are better explained by that film than by mountains of academic papers. A...

I realized several months ago that this presidency is like Las Vegas. It's bright and shiny in places, and it can impress you if you're not paying attention. When you dig underneath the glitz and glamour, it's all fake and kind of sad. But now that trashy fakeness turns violent, as tear gas and rubber bullets are fired at peaceful protesters, and journalists. I don't intend to give a rousing defense of all journalists at all times, as if I am Bob Woodward. This is still supposed to be America, and we don't physically attack journalists here. Forcibly removing protesters with police in riot gear, so that Trump can hold a photo op in front of a church that doesn't want him there, is peak Las Vegas. For their part, they were helping peaceful protesters stay healthy and hydrated. I saw somewhere that they got forced off their own patio. I feel obliged to mention that extremist elements are using the legitimate outrage over the death of George Floyd to start ri...

I keep thinking especially of the film version of this story though I have read the Grisham novel as well. I would say the movie is a good movie, with great parts in it. Matthew McConaughey plays the lawyer Jake Brigance, who defends a black man, Carl Lee Hailey, who took revenge on the men who raped his young daughter Tonya. It's a little bit different than some of the real-life cases we've seen lately, in that Carl Lee is definitely guilty, and it's a story about jury nullification, as well as about racism and revenge. I think of one scene before Jake's closing argument, where he's visiting Carl Lee in jail and he tells Carl Lee that he's not going to win the case. Jake starts complaining about how the jury sees Carl Lee, versus how they see him. Jake ticks off a couple of cultural and socioeconomic reasons, and then Carl Lee interrupts, saying, "Or you're white and I'm black! See, that's why I picked you, Jake. You just like them… Oh, you t...

I got some pushback on my last post from a good friend, to the effect that I was denigrating all cops, and perverting the notion of justice. Let me say this clearly, and as clearly as I can: I recognize that the radical suggestion I proposed would not be fair, in an individual sense. But don't we tell our children, "Life's not fair"? If we have a major structural problem, such that a recent black Atlanta police chief can express his opinion that 20% of his own department is racist, the inconvenience of losing a job ought to be worth it for the sake of overall justice. I don't think we're ready to consider the idea as white people that this problem is much bigger than we ever thought. What if the problem is not at the margins? What if our attitudes about those who raise their voices against police brutality are more formed by a desire for stability, than for justice? I do not intend to suggest that I know the hearts of every police officer in America. I do no...

I'm not going to waste your time mourning; I have no performative emotional displays left for anyone or anything. I only know that the harassment or indiscriminate murder of a black person seems to happen with disturbing regularity. What is more disturbing is the pattern I see in some of my fellow whites. There will be a superficial acknowledgment that something has gone wrong. Then there will be a plea to "let all the facts come out," which is the precursor to finding some justification for the killing. Do we honestly believe that the world would fall apart if we fired every police officer in America, and started over? Do we believe that the morally ordered universe would simply fall apart, if we decided that such a radical change was necessary? I think the comedian Chris Rock was right about us. He said that for most whites, we passed the Civil Rights Act in 1964, and decided that every injustice was righted at that time. No other protest or complaint would be accep...

The title is a fair warning that this will not be a happy post. I looked up "ennui" in the dictionary. It doesn't mean what I thought it meant. It doesn't describe what I'm feeling. I'm not bored; I'm angry. I'm angry that I'm not necessary. I'm not needed by anyone, for anything. I'm angry that 80% of the people that are like me--with a physical disability--aren't working. In this meat grinder of a society, where we judge people by what they do, use them up, and toss them aside, I'm not even one of the disposables. I have 2 degrees, and I nearly got a third. I'd like to think I'm fairly intelligent, with something to offer. But we don't treat disabled people with respect in this society; we don't even treat them like poster children. We treat them like posters. Something to look at, while we celebrate ourselves. And another group of you, who go on about making a Catholic and Christian society, I've got somethi...

I can remember the beginning. The early days with Jesus, and even before that, when I was simply curious about God, without knowing anything about Him. There is an idea, or set of ideas, that gets a bum rap in Christian circles these days; it's called, "moral therapeutic deism". The basic idea is that God exists, but he exists to make us feel better about ourselves. Religion itself exists in this conception as the atheist says it does: to provide us comfort and sustenance through the hardship of this life. You can see how bunch of Christian leaders could get all bent out of shape about this, when they realize that their sheep know nothing about doctrine, or endurance, or obedience. On the other hand, I may be the only person who has been helped by the prevailing culture of moral therapeutic deism. I knew that God existed, and I knew that he had to be good. I knew that the multiple tragedies of my young life made God sad, if there is such a thing. [There is. Jesus wept.--e...

Deneen begins this chapter by giving us a basic rundown of where our notions of "liberal" and "conservative" originated. Even in its European context, it makes a certain sense, as two sides of two fairly fundamental human dispositions: one oriented toward equality, progress, and social and economic justice, while the other values a respect for authority, hierarchy, and nostalgia for the past. He gets around quickly to saying that while these two dispositions seem to be locked in intractable battle, that they are actually united more fundamentally at the philosophical level. They are united he says, in the fundamental assumption that the individual ought to be liberated from all that encumbers his absolutely free choice in every situation. The progressives, it goes without saying, quickly recognize today the harm in conceiving of the good life in individualist terms, frequently castigating both their erstwhile opponents and friends for perpetuating especially individ...

It seems to me that considering David Frum or Jennifer Rubin, or any number of other "Never Trump" Republicans "tiresome" depends entirely upon one's thinking about the presidency of Donald Trump. For those of us who were sad and outraged at his election--and have been vindicated by events--we do not tire of criticizing President Trump, or hearing or reading the criticism of others. It is precisely because the character of Donald Trump has not changed that I refuse to accept him, or to consider the alleged "extremism" of his opponents as a reason to change my assessment. It's not a binary choice; I don't suddenly decide a baby is not a person, simply because I have decided that letting Joe Biden win is the best thing for the country, and at the very least, I won't be standing in the way. One can always find an enraged college professor, or a campus activist, or an actor, who will say something dumb. This has nothing to do with the moral c...

I'm not feeling any conflict or disagreement with the suspension of public Masses; I'm at risk, more than the rest of us. I miss being near the altar as well, but not enough to risk catching the virus, or spreading it to someone else. Quite frankly, I think people can get possessive about the sacraments, as if the sacraments themselves belong to us as a birthright. At times like these, it is good for us to remember that the sacraments are the means--even the primary means--of loving God, and being loved in Him. That being said, they are not the only exclusive means. For me, even the thought of putting one of your loved ones at grave risk, even for the consolation of receiving Holy Communion, seems selfish. I don't live for the consolations of God, but for God Himself. I serve a good and holy Bishop here, who understands the great family privilege of the sacraments, the gifts of grace and salvation given to us by Christ himself. Yet even if I did not, I would not dare to...

I exercise my cheeky option to write a post only vaguely related to what I'm actually talking about! Yet as I sit here in between writing emails and applying for jobs, I am struck by the goodness of God, just in the very fact that I am alive. That zest for living that gets us out of bed each morning committed to "accomplishing something"--granted, with its own pitfalls and idolatries--is part of the handiwork of God. I am part of the handiwork of God, even if I commit myself to dissolute living. It is a scandal and a tragedy, but I am no less His handiwork. For what it's worth, I felt God smiling at me. I daresay I don't like myself as much as he does. What else is new? I guess that's why I am telling you; maybe you forgot, in your own case. "I haven't done this, and I haven't done that, and I haven't beaten that vice, and I never feel satisfied." Will we ever, until we are in the Beloved? I taught RCIA the other night,--over the phon...