As a Franciscan I might suggest there be more to the idea of natural illumination, that is, a greater emphasis of the relative and not absolute autonomy of the natural order in respect to man. Scotistic thought would follow this route. G.M. Hopkins loved Scotus, e.g., because he realized that the subtle doctor would have appreciated his theory of aesthetics, which attributed more than a purely “natural” dynamic to poetic inspiration.
The question is what is it if anything that stands between nature and grace, and in what way are such things explained and acted upon, when the relative autonomy needs to be preserved without canonizing subjectivism.
I believe this is part of what the Council attempted to address when speaking of religious liberty, and one of the reasons why the question is so problematic.
My remark about “good government” contains the very same caveat. Hence, my insistence on prudence; such boundaries in practice are influenced by conditions in which our counsels are not certain. No pat answers will work. No imposition of rigid norms as though every person, place and situation were the same. You’re argument is precisely an argument for the necessity of prudence, to which there is absolutely no substitute. This is precisely what I mean by “good government.”
5) What I meant was that in regard to “reigning things in a bit” I would be satisfied with just enforcing the existing canons. I am not looking for a reactive police state in the Church, nor do I have any affinity for the philosophies behind them.
It seems to me we are more or less in the same place, though our primary concerns may be different. Very clearly, I hold that modesty is objective, but that not all men of good will are going to agree in every application, and they should be free to disagree.
As both JPII and DvH make clear, modesty is not only exterior on the part of the woman (usually) but also interior on the part of the man (usually). The burden is not entirely on the woman.
I am of two minds concerning objective norms. On the one hand prudence can be aided by means of the use of rules of thumb, but they need to be understood as such, otherwise they easily become wooden and get imposed as moral law. The real key is the ability to govern, and the particular kind of prudence that is necessary for that job is even more rare than the generic kind. I have found that dealing with matters of modesty can indeed by tricky business, and have never experienced any good effects from high-handed manners, unless you consider the thrill of some of those in the pews who have been waiting for the hammer to come down a good effect, which I do not.
Much can be said on this topic, but I will limit myself at this point to say that when those who govern are kind and not afraid or insecure of their authority, and of course are prayerful and humble, and where in general the state of catechesis and spiritual formation is good, that moral standards, including modesty, go up. In addition, if the pastor is encouraging souls who are trying to live a spiritual life, to focus on their own conversion and be of good will and hospitable toward others, that more good is done than by means of coercive tactics in matters of modesty.
I have found that a gentle written reminder in a vestibule, combined with a general atmosphere of reverence and consistent catechetical preaching goes a long way.
1. I could have been clearer. My remark about persecution concerned the question of religious liberty and the way in which it touches the human person in the context of modernity. I was not referring to Vatican II as a whole. However, there is whole gamut of issues that are involved with religious liberty, not just the matter of the persecution of Christians. In any case, the Council dealt with these questions in a way that was fundamentally ordered to produce practical solutions.
On the issue of modernity, I agree with you up to a point, but I would add to the “articulation and appropriation of its central achievements,” a correction of its aberrations as well. This is an essential point, and sifting through the differences in regard to policy and pastoral practice no easy task.
2. I agree with you.
3. Again, I agree with you, as is suggested by my reference to Newman’s notes. Specifically, in regard to TOB, there can be no question, in my mind that it is a development of doctrine. However, I am not aware that anyone has made an attempt to show that the work of Christopher West is a development of doctrine. Of course, West claims that he accurately interprets the pope and that TOB is, in fact, a development, but I am not aware of anyone having submitted West’s writings and conferences to the test. I would love to see someone attempt to but West’s work under the scrutiny of the seven notes. But this not likely to be done, because while it is claimed that TOB is a development, it is also claimed that it is a “revolution” and a “time bomb.” These are two very unfortunate terms, even if they do not mean what they suggest, which I do not believe for a second, because they are anti-developmental. A revolution is an overturning, and in doctrinal/moral terms that is upheaval, termination and rebuilding, not development. Time bombs are planted to later explode and destroy what had up until then existed. Again, anything but a development. No, West’s work will not stand up to the seven notes. I challenge anyone to prove me wrong. I submit it is very unlikely that anyone in his camp will ever attempt the project. Liberty in matters of theological speculation is never a wide-open field.
4. Once again, as with the question of prudery, I do not deny for a second that clericalism and paternalism are problems, but I would say fatherlessness is a far, far greater problem, and I think it is indisputable that this particular problem has affected the Church. Furthermore, there is, IMO, a verifiable tendency among religious people to presume, on the one hand, that freedom means freedom to be more or less arbitrary, and on the other, that licentiousness is to be countered all kinds of secondary and tertiary rules. Why are there so many priest’s who are incapable of being fathers, or so many who lord it over the flock, and why is it that in spite of Vatican II, so many of the lay faithful have not been adequately formed? Because the priests themselves cannot distinguish between the essential rules and matters of prudence. They either are arbitrary or rigid. They are imprudent and, therefore, incapable of teaching prudence, which teaching is their role as shepherds of Christ. That is a generalization, but I think it is generally true.
5. One of my very favorite spiritual writers is St. Francis de Sales, who was a vigilant bishop but who exercised authority without desiring to press for conformity when obedience could not be rendered out of love. Even so, my mind goes to Archbishop R. Burke, who seems to me to be gentlest of men, but who knows, prudentially, where to draw the line. I don’t want to go off on a tangent, but canon law exists for a reason. I would hate to be responsible for anyone’s being lost because I did not use (if it were mine to do so) the Church’s God given power (literally) to discipline the incorrigible who are leading the little ones astray. That is not paternalism; that is the work of a father.
6. Or as St. Augustine says: “In certain matters, unity. In doubtful matters, liberty. In all things charity.” Again, just to clarify by way of example. In matters of modesty, for all I have to say about C.W., I certainly do not advocate the imposition of the norms of Pius XII or the reduction of a solution to preoccupation over external norms of any kind. And this is precisely my point. It does little good to define modesty, or on the other hand to advocate for liberty in charity and truth, if people are not given the tools by which they may learn to make better judgments. West eschews almost completely any objective norms of modesty and continues to speak as though modesty were purely relative. The result is necessarily arbitrariness and its defense is that anything other than what he advocates is prudery. This is just sheer nonsense. It is not liberty. It is not modesty. It is not prudence. It is not good judgment, and it certainly does not spring forth from or lead to truth and charity.
It’s been a while. I thought I would jump in on this one because it touches on something I have discussed with you in a different context.
I believe one must remember that Vatican II was addressing religious liberty in a historical context, one in which the history of religious persecution against Catholics was real and ongoing. It was also dealing with the progressive secularization of civil society, even in Christian Europe. This process has been nearly completed in our own day, e.g. in the new secular super-state that is the European Union.
One can argue as to whether Vatican II and documents like HD contributed to the secularization or addressed it. We know the arguments from the different camps on the matter. My purpose here is not to resolve that problem.
In any case, as we know, Vatican II’s primary purpose was pastoral and its fathers did not shrink from some fuzzy definitions in order to address, for better or worse, many pastoral problems. In the end we have to fall back on what P. Benedict has called the hermeneutic of continuity in order to make sense of it all. But this does not always resolve the pastoral problems.
One of those problems is the question as to what do we do about the secular states that are persecuting Catholics if we do not defend religious liberty, which is, as you say, based on the obligation to follow one’s conscience. Steve is correct in saying that an erroneous conscience, when it flies in the face of the divine law, has no objective right. However, the question always remains on matters concerning human judgment, how do we get from the principle to the application. There is a real distinction and while we may and should agree in terms of practical principles, the application of those principles are sometimes more complex and more debatable. For example, what is to be our policy relative to religious liberty when in secular states that no longer take the Church seriously Catholics are being persecuted and the same states are bending to the will of Muslims to impose sharia law?
Christ and the Church have rights that rise far above the assertions of states and politicians, but the Church no longer wields secular power. So the question remains, if an erroneous conscience has no objective right, what should be the limits of secular or ecclesiastical power to coerce the offender, when the common good is at stake?
My own view is that sometimes this problem is treated flippantly and sometimes with oversimplifications. I also believe that the fathers of Vatican II were trying to deal with real problems, but that their success in the matter can be debated. In the end their work dealt with very important theological principles and suggested a manner of application to complex problems in which misinterpretation was almost inevitable.
And this brings me to the reason why I decided to jump in the problem of conscience is tied closely to the virtue of prudence, and this seems to me to be one of the most, if not the most neglected virtues. The Council really did not concentrate on definitions and principles as much as point a direction in which prudence might be exercised with some measure of liberty in a world which was becoming ever more complex and dangerous.
Some would say that no such liberty should have been granted. Others say that anything that is not tied down by dogma is a matter for unfettered speculation. I disagree with both, and BTW, as I am sure you know, Ven. Newman’s seven notes on the development of doctrine absolutely demolish the idea that undefined matters are wide open for speculation.
I think the problem is that while the council indicated a direction, the necessary formation of the faithful that was needed to help them make good faith judgments and progress in making better judgments by sound spiritual training and by learning from their mistakes was never provided. So people just claim the freedom and act arbitrarily or never learn from their mistakes, or both.
So, IMHO, we have the side of liberty that clamors for soft evangelization and for syntheses of Christianity and secularism (pardon me, TOB ala West), and some traditionalists that promise a restoration if we just tighten the reigns once again and repudiate the last 40 years. (Katie and Steve, I am not suggesting anything about your own positions.)
Actually, I am all for tightening the reigns a bit. Let’s say we just enforce canon law. I would be happy with that.
The fact is no virtue can be practiced without prudence and prudence is impossible without freedom of conscience. There is a real distinction between principles and their application, goals and strategy. Where no such distinction is in play it is the responsibility and duty of the magisterium to intervene.
Chesterton once remarked that “there never was a time in the whole history of the human race when it was more necessary to defend the intellectual independence of man that this hour in which we live.” I agree. And I believe that right now we do need the intellectual freedom to devise creative solutions to the immense problems we face. But the context of Chesterton’s remarks concerned “culture and the coming peril,” which he defined as “vulgarity.” Guess what? The peril has landed. The problems that the traditionalists face squarely, to debatable effect, are not going away any time soon. What we need is liberty at the service of the hermeneutic of continuity.
This is, BTW, why I so strongly disagree with Christopher West, in spite of the good that he does. IMO, He does not really respect liberty of conscience, because he pretends to know more or less how mature purity will look in the average person, when in fact his views are based on his own personal speculation, not that of John Paul II. He extrapolates right and left from the writings of the pope, going way beyond anything the pontiff actually said, and then pretends he knows when a person is being modest and when he or she is being a prude. Of course, in case of any doubt, his presumption is the latter. It seems to me what he is really doing is suggesting that we should follow his conscience. I, for one, dissent.
I agree with much of what both of your, Katie and Lauretta, are saying. Even so, I would have to disagree, to a certain extent, with your characterization of West’s work. It is not only about cultivating custody of the heart it is about fascination with sex and the body to the point of a radical minimization of external modesty. I think the charges of pansexualism stick.
My argument, IMO, is a rather modest one. It is not a blanket condemnation. It is specific. But the mistaken teaching is contains a very serious error.
I agree with much of what you have to say. I understand that the various distortions regarding sexuality have to be addressed directly and sometimes explicitly. And while I might disagree with a certain presenter as to his or her method and content, I am willing to agree to disagree in most cases. These are prudential judgments and there will never be perfect agreement.
This has never been the focus of my critique, nor have I felt compelled to criticize everything Christopher West writes and says. He has obviously done some tremendous work.
I will also agree with you that custody of the heart is not all about custody of the eyes and forcing thoughts out of one’s head. I have even been on board with the idea that a greater spontaneity and freedom in these matters should be the result of progress in the spiritual life and the redemption of the body. However, as I have indicated before, there is more at work in West’s presentation than all this. Heaven’s Song is a case is point. That book is about a holy fascination with the body and with sex. It is not simply about the beauty of the nuptial mystery.
In my critique of West’s response I point out that his work has two movements, the one which you defend and with which, for the most part, I agree, but the other has to do with the idea that the more one is redeemed the more the necessities of modesty cease to apply, as if it were appropriate that the body unveiled because it is so good. On the contrary, prescinding from any argument about what standards of modesty ought to be adopted, it is fitting that the body should be veiled because it is so good.
In this context, West does minimize modesty and continually confuses prudery, Manichaeism, shame and holy bashfulness as though they were all the same thing, which they simply are not. Furthermore, within the framework of this faulty analysis he interprets Church doctrine, the writings of the saints and the liturgy, in addition to making pastoral applications to people on the basis of his false assumptions.
I also agree with you that our presentation of chastity should help deliver souls from morose guilt and shame over being sexual persons and having desires and even temptations. To reiterate, I believe TOB can be very helpful in this matter. But there is another way in which people can be made to feel guilty for the wrong reasons.
If you tell people that when they move forward in the spiritual life they will experience, as a rule, less temptations and find themselves more at ease in the presence of exposed flesh, to the point that eventually modesty should become passé, then if, as a rule, that does not happen, the conclusion must be that there is something wrong with them. Now if that rule is true, then they have reason to feel guilty, but if it is not true, then the promotion of that rule is irresponsible. In such a case, the ones promoting the rule, if they refuse to correct themselves, make themselves snake oil salesmen, no matter what other good work they may do.
As I say, I agree that progress in the spiritual life will generally also manifest itself with respect to the way one experiences their own sexuality, but human experiences are psychologically and spiritually complex. (We have not even touched on a major factor in this matter, which is much more difficult to deal with theoretically, viz., diabolic influence.) Certainly, progress should eliminate prudery and Manichaeism, but one must be careful not to minimize the wholesomeness of holy bashfulness and shame. There is no calculus by which you can say to someone: “You think that a short skirt is inappropriate? Really? You need to look into your heart and ask yourself why you are troubled by it.” This is snake oil spiritual direction. And it is even worse, if in the process the promoter actually recommends the lowering of all veils for those who have achieved the more perfect way, as though nothing is fittingly veiled.
Now if as you say:
[when] one is successful in this untwisting, the result will be that one will CEASE undressing others with their eyes and begin to see others as persons with dignity rather that as merely an object to potentially satisfy their disordered sexual desires,
then it seems to me that you must admit that it is not fitting for a man to look upon the nakedness of a woman who is not his wife, regardless of his spiritual progress. If you do not admit that, then I cannot see why you would object to a perfectly redeemed man undressing women with his eyes. After all, all things are pure to the pure and the human body is God’s masterpiece. Or would it only be acceptable if the woman were also perfectly redeemed and only exposed herself to men that were also so redeemed? If one follows the logic, one finds that the minimization of modesty is inherently problematic. And that is so because it is false. It is snake oil.
Finally, in regard to the relative effect of women’s dress on men, and whether provocative fashions have more effect on men than modest ones, I will be respectfully frank. It is certainly true that men can be tempted by women wearing any kind of clothing, and that pigs will make mud wherever they find water. But that fashions have little effect on men’s perceptions is naïve.
I do not mean this personally. No matter how many times men talk to women about this they still underestimate it. And this time, I am sure, will be no exception.
There may be rare cases in which a man is more or less immune, but those are anomalies. There are also times when men have few temptations for whatever reason, and for a period easily guard their heart. But that women’s provocative dress has little effect on red-blooded males as compared to modest dress is ludicrous. I know this to be false, patently false and most dangerously false.
All comments by: frangelo
As a Franciscan I might suggest there be more to the idea of natural illumination, that is, a greater emphasis of the relative and not absolute autonomy of the natural order in respect to man. Scotistic thought would follow this route. G.M. Hopkins loved Scotus, e.g., because he realized that the subtle doctor would have appreciated his theory of aesthetics, which attributed more than a purely “natural” dynamic to poetic inspiration.
The question is what is it if anything that stands between nature and grace, and in what way are such things explained and acted upon, when the relative autonomy needs to be preserved without canonizing subjectivism.
I believe this is part of what the Council attempted to address when speaking of religious liberty, and one of the reasons why the question is so problematic.
Re:
What is conscience?
Date:
Mar 28 at 11:36 am
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Bring it on! ;-)
Re:
What is conscience?
Date:
Mar 28 at 11:20 am
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Katie,
My remark about “good government” contains the very same caveat. Hence, my insistence on prudence; such boundaries in practice are influenced by conditions in which our counsels are not certain. No pat answers will work. No imposition of rigid norms as though every person, place and situation were the same. You’re argument is precisely an argument for the necessity of prudence, to which there is absolutely no substitute. This is precisely what I mean by “good government.”
Re:
What is conscience?
Date:
Mar 28 at 11:18 am
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Katie,
Nice to see that for the most part we agree.
5) What I meant was that in regard to “reigning things in a bit” I would be satisfied with just enforcing the existing canons. I am not looking for a reactive police state in the Church, nor do I have any affinity for the philosophies behind them.
That would mean we basically agree on all points!
Re:
What is conscience?
Date:
Mar 27 at 6:03 pm
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Steve and Katie,
It seems to me we are more or less in the same place, though our primary concerns may be different. Very clearly, I hold that modesty is objective, but that not all men of good will are going to agree in every application, and they should be free to disagree.
As both JPII and DvH make clear, modesty is not only exterior on the part of the woman (usually) but also interior on the part of the man (usually). The burden is not entirely on the woman.
I am of two minds concerning objective norms. On the one hand prudence can be aided by means of the use of rules of thumb, but they need to be understood as such, otherwise they easily become wooden and get imposed as moral law. The real key is the ability to govern, and the particular kind of prudence that is necessary for that job is even more rare than the generic kind. I have found that dealing with matters of modesty can indeed by tricky business, and have never experienced any good effects from high-handed manners, unless you consider the thrill of some of those in the pews who have been waiting for the hammer to come down a good effect, which I do not.
Much can be said on this topic, but I will limit myself at this point to say that when those who govern are kind and not afraid or insecure of their authority, and of course are prayerful and humble, and where in general the state of catechesis and spiritual formation is good, that moral standards, including modesty, go up. In addition, if the pastor is encouraging souls who are trying to live a spiritual life, to focus on their own conversion and be of good will and hospitable toward others, that more good is done than by means of coercive tactics in matters of modesty.
I have found that a gentle written reminder in a vestibule, combined with a general atmosphere of reverence and consistent catechetical preaching goes a long way.
Re:
What is conscience?
Date:
Mar 27 at 5:57 pm
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Katie,
Here is my reply point by point:
1. I could have been clearer. My remark about persecution concerned the question of religious liberty and the way in which it touches the human person in the context of modernity. I was not referring to Vatican II as a whole. However, there is whole gamut of issues that are involved with religious liberty, not just the matter of the persecution of Christians. In any case, the Council dealt with these questions in a way that was fundamentally ordered to produce practical solutions.
On the issue of modernity, I agree with you up to a point, but I would add to the “articulation and appropriation of its central achievements,” a correction of its aberrations as well. This is an essential point, and sifting through the differences in regard to policy and pastoral practice no easy task.
2. I agree with you.
3. Again, I agree with you, as is suggested by my reference to Newman’s notes. Specifically, in regard to TOB, there can be no question, in my mind that it is a development of doctrine. However, I am not aware that anyone has made an attempt to show that the work of Christopher West is a development of doctrine. Of course, West claims that he accurately interprets the pope and that TOB is, in fact, a development, but I am not aware of anyone having submitted West’s writings and conferences to the test. I would love to see someone attempt to but West’s work under the scrutiny of the seven notes. But this not likely to be done, because while it is claimed that TOB is a development, it is also claimed that it is a “revolution” and a “time bomb.” These are two very unfortunate terms, even if they do not mean what they suggest, which I do not believe for a second, because they are anti-developmental. A revolution is an overturning, and in doctrinal/moral terms that is upheaval, termination and rebuilding, not development. Time bombs are planted to later explode and destroy what had up until then existed. Again, anything but a development. No, West’s work will not stand up to the seven notes. I challenge anyone to prove me wrong. I submit it is very unlikely that anyone in his camp will ever attempt the project. Liberty in matters of theological speculation is never a wide-open field.
4. Once again, as with the question of prudery, I do not deny for a second that clericalism and paternalism are problems, but I would say fatherlessness is a far, far greater problem, and I think it is indisputable that this particular problem has affected the Church. Furthermore, there is, IMO, a verifiable tendency among religious people to presume, on the one hand, that freedom means freedom to be more or less arbitrary, and on the other, that licentiousness is to be countered all kinds of secondary and tertiary rules. Why are there so many priest’s who are incapable of being fathers, or so many who lord it over the flock, and why is it that in spite of Vatican II, so many of the lay faithful have not been adequately formed? Because the priests themselves cannot distinguish between the essential rules and matters of prudence. They either are arbitrary or rigid. They are imprudent and, therefore, incapable of teaching prudence, which teaching is their role as shepherds of Christ. That is a generalization, but I think it is generally true.
5. One of my very favorite spiritual writers is St. Francis de Sales, who was a vigilant bishop but who exercised authority without desiring to press for conformity when obedience could not be rendered out of love. Even so, my mind goes to Archbishop R. Burke, who seems to me to be gentlest of men, but who knows, prudentially, where to draw the line. I don’t want to go off on a tangent, but canon law exists for a reason. I would hate to be responsible for anyone’s being lost because I did not use (if it were mine to do so) the Church’s God given power (literally) to discipline the incorrigible who are leading the little ones astray. That is not paternalism; that is the work of a father.
6. Or as St. Augustine says: “In certain matters, unity. In doubtful matters, liberty. In all things charity.” Again, just to clarify by way of example. In matters of modesty, for all I have to say about C.W., I certainly do not advocate the imposition of the norms of Pius XII or the reduction of a solution to preoccupation over external norms of any kind. And this is precisely my point. It does little good to define modesty, or on the other hand to advocate for liberty in charity and truth, if people are not given the tools by which they may learn to make better judgments. West eschews almost completely any objective norms of modesty and continues to speak as though modesty were purely relative. The result is necessarily arbitrariness and its defense is that anything other than what he advocates is prudery. This is just sheer nonsense. It is not liberty. It is not modesty. It is not prudence. It is not good judgment, and it certainly does not spring forth from or lead to truth and charity.
Re:
What is conscience?
Date:
Mar 26 at 11:49 pm
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Hi Katie,
It’s been a while. I thought I would jump in on this one because it touches on something I have discussed with you in a different context.
I believe one must remember that Vatican II was addressing religious liberty in a historical context, one in which the history of religious persecution against Catholics was real and ongoing. It was also dealing with the progressive secularization of civil society, even in Christian Europe. This process has been nearly completed in our own day, e.g. in the new secular super-state that is the European Union.
One can argue as to whether Vatican II and documents like HD contributed to the secularization or addressed it. We know the arguments from the different camps on the matter. My purpose here is not to resolve that problem.
In any case, as we know, Vatican II’s primary purpose was pastoral and its fathers did not shrink from some fuzzy definitions in order to address, for better or worse, many pastoral problems. In the end we have to fall back on what P. Benedict has called the hermeneutic of continuity in order to make sense of it all. But this does not always resolve the pastoral problems.
One of those problems is the question as to what do we do about the secular states that are persecuting Catholics if we do not defend religious liberty, which is, as you say, based on the obligation to follow one’s conscience. Steve is correct in saying that an erroneous conscience, when it flies in the face of the divine law, has no objective right. However, the question always remains on matters concerning human judgment, how do we get from the principle to the application. There is a real distinction and while we may and should agree in terms of practical principles, the application of those principles are sometimes more complex and more debatable. For example, what is to be our policy relative to religious liberty when in secular states that no longer take the Church seriously Catholics are being persecuted and the same states are bending to the will of Muslims to impose sharia law?
Christ and the Church have rights that rise far above the assertions of states and politicians, but the Church no longer wields secular power. So the question remains, if an erroneous conscience has no objective right, what should be the limits of secular or ecclesiastical power to coerce the offender, when the common good is at stake?
My own view is that sometimes this problem is treated flippantly and sometimes with oversimplifications. I also believe that the fathers of Vatican II were trying to deal with real problems, but that their success in the matter can be debated. In the end their work dealt with very important theological principles and suggested a manner of application to complex problems in which misinterpretation was almost inevitable.
And this brings me to the reason why I decided to jump in the problem of conscience is tied closely to the virtue of prudence, and this seems to me to be one of the most, if not the most neglected virtues. The Council really did not concentrate on definitions and principles as much as point a direction in which prudence might be exercised with some measure of liberty in a world which was becoming ever more complex and dangerous.
Some would say that no such liberty should have been granted. Others say that anything that is not tied down by dogma is a matter for unfettered speculation. I disagree with both, and BTW, as I am sure you know, Ven. Newman’s seven notes on the development of doctrine absolutely demolish the idea that undefined matters are wide open for speculation.
I think the problem is that while the council indicated a direction, the necessary formation of the faithful that was needed to help them make good faith judgments and progress in making better judgments by sound spiritual training and by learning from their mistakes was never provided. So people just claim the freedom and act arbitrarily or never learn from their mistakes, or both.
So, IMHO, we have the side of liberty that clamors for soft evangelization and for syntheses of Christianity and secularism (pardon me, TOB ala West), and some traditionalists that promise a restoration if we just tighten the reigns once again and repudiate the last 40 years. (Katie and Steve, I am not suggesting anything about your own positions.)
Actually, I am all for tightening the reigns a bit. Let’s say we just enforce canon law. I would be happy with that.
The fact is no virtue can be practiced without prudence and prudence is impossible without freedom of conscience. There is a real distinction between principles and their application, goals and strategy. Where no such distinction is in play it is the responsibility and duty of the magisterium to intervene.
Chesterton once remarked that “there never was a time in the whole history of the human race when it was more necessary to defend the intellectual independence of man that this hour in which we live.” I agree. And I believe that right now we do need the intellectual freedom to devise creative solutions to the immense problems we face. But the context of Chesterton’s remarks concerned “culture and the coming peril,” which he defined as “vulgarity.” Guess what? The peril has landed. The problems that the traditionalists face squarely, to debatable effect, are not going away any time soon. What we need is liberty at the service of the hermeneutic of continuity.
This is, BTW, why I so strongly disagree with Christopher West, in spite of the good that he does. IMO, He does not really respect liberty of conscience, because he pretends to know more or less how mature purity will look in the average person, when in fact his views are based on his own personal speculation, not that of John Paul II. He extrapolates right and left from the writings of the pope, going way beyond anything the pontiff actually said, and then pretends he knows when a person is being modest and when he or she is being a prude. Of course, in case of any doubt, his presumption is the latter. It seems to me what he is really doing is suggesting that we should follow his conscience. I, for one, dissent.
Re:
What is conscience?
Date:
Mar 26 at 8:56 pm
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I agree with much of what both of your, Katie and Lauretta, are saying. Even so, I would have to disagree, to a certain extent, with your characterization of West’s work. It is not only about cultivating custody of the heart it is about fascination with sex and the body to the point of a radical minimization of external modesty. I think the charges of pansexualism stick.
My argument, IMO, is a rather modest one. It is not a blanket condemnation. It is specific. But the mistaken teaching is contains a very serious error.
Re:
Continuing the TOB discussion
Date:
Nov 14 at 1:38 am
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entrycomment
Lauretta,
I agree with much of what you have to say. I understand that the various distortions regarding sexuality have to be addressed directly and sometimes explicitly. And while I might disagree with a certain presenter as to his or her method and content, I am willing to agree to disagree in most cases. These are prudential judgments and there will never be perfect agreement.
This has never been the focus of my critique, nor have I felt compelled to criticize everything Christopher West writes and says. He has obviously done some tremendous work.
I will also agree with you that custody of the heart is not all about custody of the eyes and forcing thoughts out of one’s head. I have even been on board with the idea that a greater spontaneity and freedom in these matters should be the result of progress in the spiritual life and the redemption of the body. However, as I have indicated before, there is more at work in West’s presentation than all this. Heaven’s Song is a case is point. That book is about a holy fascination with the body and with sex. It is not simply about the beauty of the nuptial mystery.
In my critique of West’s response I point out that his work has two movements, the one which you defend and with which, for the most part, I agree, but the other has to do with the idea that the more one is redeemed the more the necessities of modesty cease to apply, as if it were appropriate that the body unveiled because it is so good. On the contrary, prescinding from any argument about what standards of modesty ought to be adopted, it is fitting that the body should be veiled because it is so good.
In this context, West does minimize modesty and continually confuses prudery, Manichaeism, shame and holy bashfulness as though they were all the same thing, which they simply are not. Furthermore, within the framework of this faulty analysis he interprets Church doctrine, the writings of the saints and the liturgy, in addition to making pastoral applications to people on the basis of his false assumptions.
I also agree with you that our presentation of chastity should help deliver souls from morose guilt and shame over being sexual persons and having desires and even temptations. To reiterate, I believe TOB can be very helpful in this matter. But there is another way in which people can be made to feel guilty for the wrong reasons.
If you tell people that when they move forward in the spiritual life they will experience, as a rule, less temptations and find themselves more at ease in the presence of exposed flesh, to the point that eventually modesty should become passé, then if, as a rule, that does not happen, the conclusion must be that there is something wrong with them. Now if that rule is true, then they have reason to feel guilty, but if it is not true, then the promotion of that rule is irresponsible. In such a case, the ones promoting the rule, if they refuse to correct themselves, make themselves snake oil salesmen, no matter what other good work they may do.
As I say, I agree that progress in the spiritual life will generally also manifest itself with respect to the way one experiences their own sexuality, but human experiences are psychologically and spiritually complex. (We have not even touched on a major factor in this matter, which is much more difficult to deal with theoretically, viz., diabolic influence.) Certainly, progress should eliminate prudery and Manichaeism, but one must be careful not to minimize the wholesomeness of holy bashfulness and shame. There is no calculus by which you can say to someone: “You think that a short skirt is inappropriate? Really? You need to look into your heart and ask yourself why you are troubled by it.” This is snake oil spiritual direction. And it is even worse, if in the process the promoter actually recommends the lowering of all veils for those who have achieved the more perfect way, as though nothing is fittingly veiled.
Now if as you say:
then it seems to me that you must admit that it is not fitting for a man to look upon the nakedness of a woman who is not his wife, regardless of his spiritual progress. If you do not admit that, then I cannot see why you would object to a perfectly redeemed man undressing women with his eyes. After all, all things are pure to the pure and the human body is God’s masterpiece. Or would it only be acceptable if the woman were also perfectly redeemed and only exposed herself to men that were also so redeemed? If one follows the logic, one finds that the minimization of modesty is inherently problematic. And that is so because it is false. It is snake oil.
Finally, in regard to the relative effect of women’s dress on men, and whether provocative fashions have more effect on men than modest ones, I will be respectfully frank. It is certainly true that men can be tempted by women wearing any kind of clothing, and that pigs will make mud wherever they find water. But that fashions have little effect on men’s perceptions is naïve.
I do not mean this personally. No matter how many times men talk to women about this they still underestimate it. And this time, I am sure, will be no exception.
There may be rare cases in which a man is more or less immune, but those are anomalies. There are also times when men have few temptations for whatever reason, and for a period easily guard their heart. But that women’s provocative dress has little effect on red-blooded males as compared to modest dress is ludicrous. I know this to be false, patently false and most dangerously false.
Re:
Continuing the TOB discussion
Date:
Nov 12 at 2:34 am
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Thanks, Katie.
I still look forward to your post on modesty.
Re:
Continuing the TOB discussion
Date:
Nov 11 at 11:11 pm
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