Reclaiming Catholic Social Teaching: Post 2

Previous post here.


Chapter I: Man, in the Image of God

We continue the first week's work of reading through the introduction and chapters I and II.

Key points:

• A secular society which ignores God is a deeply flawed society because it misunderstands human beings and their nature.
• Such a society becomes dominated by irrational and inconsistent desires.
• Only in a Catholic society where unity is based on the unity of the Eucharist can human beings flourish fully.

My summary:

If we forget that human beings are made to enjoy God, any society based on such forgetfulness will be based on false principles and radically flawed. In particular, a society from which God has been banished will be subject to the 'domination of the passions' (p.26). Without Christianity -and in particular, without its source in the Eucharist- the bonds which link people to people in society will be lost.

My critical commentary:

 Esolen has in his sights here secularism. Although this is a term without any exact definition (and has been used in various ways in various contexts) one idea is that politics should be conducted without any religious content: that whatever we believe in private, as citizens we enter into a public space where public rationality excludes the introduction of views based on religious doctrine.

The problem with this is, as Esolen notes, if we believe that human beings are creatures whose happiness involves a relationship with God, any society that ignores such a relationship is not going to be well run. (It's rather as if, in constructing a society, we ignored the human need for food. It's just not going to turn out well...)

As well as this general point, Esolen argues for the specific importance of Catholicism. He takes The Angelus by Millet as an illustration of this.

[Image from Wikipedia. Details here.]

In essence, Esolen picks up from this painting a natural order (man/woman; labour/rest) in the context of the Church (the Angelus). Separate that natural order from Catholicism, and our understanding of it starts to fray.

What are we to make of this? Why should in principle truths be excluded from society simply because they are religious? (And what exactly is a religious truth as opposed to a common-or-garden one?) Certainly, if most people reject religion and especially Catholicism, then it's going to be difficult to persuade people in a democratic country to acknowledge beliefs restricted to those practices. But there are all sorts of truth that it might be difficult to persuade people of for all sorts of reasons...

On the other hand, isn't the truth of secularism that some things are quite obvious to all people (the human need for food and shelter) whilst some things are not (the human need for God)? Don't we have to compromise on what can be agreed, rather than what we might like to see agreed?

Esolen would undoubtedly reply here that, whatever the practical difficulties involved in convincing people of the truth about human beings, in the absence of such convictions, society will fare badly. Without at least the classical philosophical ideas of ordering our desires according to reason, society will be radically unstable as individuals pursue their whims.

Questions (please feel free to debate these or any others in the comments box below!):

• Are you convinced by Esolen's vision of an ordered society? Why? Why not?
• Philosophers such as Alasdair MacIntyre have argued that radical (and irresolvable) disagreement on values is part of the modern condition. If that is the case, are modern democratic states condemned to fail? 
• Does Millet's The Angelus provide a helpful image of a society in good order?

I'll post on chapter 2 (the final one of this week) tomorrow (Wednesday)...

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Writings of Leo XIII referred to in this chapter (in order of reference, page number in book given):

[No need to read these fully. Esolen usually provides extracts when discussing the texts. I have included these links to the full texts for those interested in pursuing further reading.]

Tametsi [1900] Here. (p15)

Rerum Novarum [1891] Here. (p.16)

Humanum Genus [1884] Here. (p.16)

Tametsi [1900] Here. (p17)

Aeterni Patris [1879] Here. (p.17)

Rerum Novarum [1891] Here. (p.18)

Au milieu des solicitudes [1892] Here. (pp. 21-3)

Humanum Genus [1884] Here. (p.23-6)

Affari Vos [1897] Here. (p.24)

Arcanum Divinae [1880] Here. (p.26)

Inscrutabili [1878] Here. (p.26)

Cum Multa Sint [1882] Here. (p.26)

Immortale Dei [1885] Here. (p.27)

Sapientiae Christianae [1890] Here. (p.27)

Tametsi [1900] Here. (p27)

Arcanum Divinae [1880] Here. (p.30)

Humanum Genus [1884] Here. (p.31)

Tametsi [1900] Here. (p.32)

Immortale Dei [1885] Here. (pp.32-33)

Mirae Caritatis [1902] Here. (pp. 33-34)

Pervenuti all' anno [1902] Italian version here. (p.34)

Libertas Praestantissimum [1888] Here (p.35)



















[Image: Wikipedia details here.]