Evolution and the Theory of Evolution

I want to speak about the theory of evolution in the main, here, and the fact that it can be recognized as a viable creationist theory... mostly because people keep asking me to do so. The whole purpose for doing so is that in the land of fundamentalism, Protestantism, and Puritanical fearmongering, a.k.a. the United States of America, the word (evolution) has become anathema, even amongst Catholics and the Orthodox. Further, any benefit that Christians of every stripe might have gained from peering into the mysteries of evolution is corban (given to God), and if that is so, what benefit could possibly be gotten by taking up the query again since it has been laid at the foot of faith? They would take St. Thomas Aquinas out of context and use him as a buckler and say,"To one who has faith, no explanation (of creation) is necessary. To the one without faith, no explanation is possible (about how God did it)." Just let it roll. Stand your ground! Don't be ashamed to insist upon a literal translation of what the bible says in Genesis (because that is the same as taking the rest of it literally, right?)! It is the word of God! Well, I would suggest the exact opposite of that nonsense.

So, first things first. I want to give you a few quotes that are not out of context from dear St. Thomas Aquinas. Now, understand that I am not trying to prove evolution on St. Thomas' authority. I'm not making an ad verecundiam argument for, not by any means. But hear what he has to say," The truth of our faith becomes a matter of RIDICULE among the infidels (NON-BELIEVER) if any Catholic, not gifted with the necessary scientific learning, presents as dogma what scientific scrutiny shows to be false." Well, what does that sound like? It's awfully familiar isn't it? That sounds exactly like the environment in America, doesn't it? And when the creationist gets ridiculed for his rejection of scientific fact, and for his hackneyed offerings he learned from one of the so-called 'Christian' pseudo-scientists, who is really often a sophist, he reckons himself a martyr. It truly is a cause for ridicule. It's sad, verging on pathetic.

Here's another quote from St. Thomas Aquinas," Beware the person of one book." That's rather ominous. Who does that sound like? It sounds precisely like the people who have fomented the divide between science and Christianity. It sounds like the children of the man who said," Reason is the enemy of faith." Martin Luther said that. In the recent years many Americans have given themselves to hating Islam, because Islam is unreasonable. Why is it unreasonable? Because they are a people of one book, a divine book, an eternal book: The Quran. When the Muslim looks at his life, or at the world, or the lives of others, and what he ought to do and believe his question is one," What does the Quran say?" or more exactly," What do I interpret the Quran to be telling me?" Do you know what the American Christian often says to himself, or herself, inflated with their individualism, intimidated by the authority of puritanical fundamentalism," What does the Bible say?" or more exactly," What do I interpret the Bible to be telling me?"

Understand this: Fundamentalism is the enemy of humanity. Man is a rational animal. Without reason he is merely an animal. His reason is part of the image of God in which he was created. His reason gives him dignity. Without it he cannot live. Man does not have claws, or fur, or a powerful sense of smell, nor does he have any peculiar strength, to survive by. It is reason by which man lives and thrives. Man literally could not survive without reason. So, isn't it a sign of the diabolical when the highest expression of man's dignity, his faith, excludes what makes him a man? Let me say that better: Isn't it evil if someone's religion destroys their humanity? And I'm not talking about holy mortification. I'm talking about a fundamental negation and ban on the exercise of what gives dignity to the hand-crafted creation, the only hand-crafted creation, which is man. When the angel Gabriel announced to Mary that she would bear a child (Jesus), she replied back to him not in doubt, but in wonder (which is the desire for knowledge)," How can this be???" In a fundamentalist religion like Islam, that would be received a bit like this," How dare she! She is a woman! How dare she question the holy angel who is only permitted to speak by the will of Allah!" But in Christianity, true Christianity, her inquisitiveness is honored and recognized as an extension and expression of the dignity God gives humans, and the angel Gabriel gives her the reply she seeks. One is hateful to reason, the other embraces, encourages, and satisfies it. And I bring all this up because the general attitude is something like that there is an inherent impiety about evolutionary science. Nothing could be further from the truth.

So, I want to talk about what evolution is not. It is not a possibility. It is a fact. We know that evolution happened. There is no question. No matter what any creationist snake oil salesman says, no matter if Billy Graham himself objects, we know that evolution happened. We know this with the same degree of certitude that we know we live in a heliocentric universe. We know that evolution happened with the same degree of certitude that we know the moon travels around the earth and not visa versa. It is a scientific fact. And this must be clearly understood. There is positively no question, whatsoever, that evolution is a fact in the teleology of the present. It is as fiduciary as the sunshine.

 What is not scientific fact is exactly how, or why, and sometimes when, evolution occurred. This is the theory. And there is nothing Godless about the theory. Unless you think that a theory that lacks a 'Far Side' character God walking around with a loud speaker calling things into existence and making man out of play-dough  circa 7,000 b.c. The theory of evolution is a forensic effort to put together the pieces of a puzzle 4.5 billion years in the making (the span of life on earth). Sometimes we make mistakes concerning this step or that, and an amendment in the theory is required. The theory of evolution is evolving itself as more comes to light. We've a lot to learn, to discover. It's really not so different from archaeology. All it is, ALL IT IS, is bringing the past to light, and nothing more. It is not some global scientific conspiracy to push God and his followers out of society and off the reservation. And neither is saying that there is no ocean above our heads, or that the world doesn't stand on pillars, which is the opposite of the fundamentalist-creationist assertion which insists upon a literal translation of Genesis. You don't dishonor God or stop being a "real" Christian because you believe in evolution, any more than you would cease to be one for denying that we have oceans over our heads and pillars under our feet.

"So then, apart from the fundamentalist fearmongering, which everyone else does, but not me and my friends/church... what's the problem with evolution? What's the big deal? Because I don't know anyone like you've described." Yeah. Okay, so the big deal is when this otherwise neutral science gets used in a charged way. Because of their intransigently anti-intellectual posture, America Christians have pigeon-holed themselves as idiots. There, I said it. And for a minority like atheists, your opponent is going to be the majority. In America, that means Protestant-Evangelicals. The argument over evolution is the nut-shot, the sucker punch. "Hit'em hard, hit'em fast. Things will get better from there." There is no way to recover from this once employed. There is no way for the traditional creationist to come away from the argument without looking like an idiot when it comes to the empirical. It automatically lumps you into the category of people who believe the earth is flat, or moon landing deniers. That is why the next thing you see in such debates is the Creationist trying to take the moral high-ground. What follows then is the atheist presents the problem of evil, theodicy... which the creationist cannot answer satisfactorily by any means. This leads to equivocation, which gives way to absurd abstraction and analogies being hurled against each other. The creationist starts quoting from the bible, which is like quoting Santa Claus to an Atheist, and therefore an exercise in stupidity. The atheist, starts demanding empirical, quantitative, evidence of God, which is stupid because God is said to be immeasurable, because he is not a creation in space-time. And the lowest common denominator reveals itself... the disagreement over whether or not God really exists. The debate was never about the veracity of evolutionary theory. It turns into a feud between people, who quite frankly deserve each other, and it all gets out of hand really fast.

So, set that aside, because that isn't part of the big deal. All that is mere drama, between two groups of fundamentalists who hate each other. There is really only one thing for a Christian to be on guard about, one question, one assertion: Polygenesis. Poly meaning many, and genesis meaning beginning: Many beginnings. That is the only thing that a Christian cannot budge on, that the human race has one origin: the hand of God. And that man has one set of parents: Adam and Eve. All other things in evolutionary theory may pass, but if any theory arises about humanity having many origins, it cannot be accepted. Well, what luck! because the science states just what the Christian professes to believe. Evolutionary science has narrowed down our beginnings to a single family. How about that! The handiwork of God, which is the evidence evolutionary science looks at, and His word agree. Science and faith in harmony. Who would have guessed it? There is literally no good reason not to believe in evolutionary theory apart from that one person or another might posit that they think polygenesis is viable. But that assertion doesn't make or brake the theory. You can reject that part. But there is absolutely NO reason to reject evolution itself.

I want to go a step further and talk about the difference between form and essence. The essence of man is that he is a rational being with a spiritual soul. When we hear that man is made in the image of God what do we think that means? Do we imagine that God has need of food, or that he grows, or that he needs to relieve himself from time to time, or that he sleeps? By getting offended at the notion our physical forms come from some evolutionary process, because our design comes from God's own image... well it's a thoroughly pagan concept. We are making out God to be like us. On the other hand it is quite the opposite if we speak so about the essence of man. We are merely affirming that man is like God, and not that God is like man.

Interesting to note that God breathes life into the man after his form is made. God is Life, Itself. "I AM the Way, the Truth, and the Life." He is Love, Itself. Now, you think about that. If we are willing to concede that  the sky isn't a separation between two oceans, or that the world was made in seven 24 hour days, or that the  dry land isn't standing on pillars, and adopt what science has proven concerning those things, perhaps we can  afford to not be so intransigent on man's origins. There seems no reason at all to not accept that the form of humankind is a kind given by evolution and therefore nature, and therefore by God... and that at a later time when that form had become what He intended it to be He vested it with a spiritual soul. Or where did Cain find his wife? How is it that he was able to found a city, when it was explicit in his curse that he would never settle amongst men (his own kind)? How is it that he was afraid that whomever he should meet would slay him (because he was without a people) unless there were other people? How do we account for the fossil record unless there were others? But the true fact of all of it is that we don't know precisely what happened. What we do know is that the genealogy which begins with Adam does not go back as far as the fossil record does. Further, we know that there is a distinction in evolution between homo sapiens and homo sapiens sapiens, viz. wise man, vs. wise wise man. It is not a genetic distinction, it is an artifact distinction. It is a distinction made between mans ability to use his problem solving and tool making at one point and another. It's the difference between cavemen, and modern man. It's the difference between man surviving, amongst the animals, and man thriving due to an actualization of his reason.

I want to point out again that it is all a mystery, an unfathomably big story, one that was being told 5,000 years ago. Remember the words of St. Thomas Aquinas," A thing (in this case a story) is received according to the nature of the recipient." How would they receive the literal account? It would be unintelligible. What sort of creation account would make sense to them? Perhaps one like we see in Genesis? It is the job of science to unpack the Genesis account as far as it can be unpacked. That does nothing against faith. For all that, remember the shame the whole Church got because a few anti-intellectual loud mouths denied the heliocentric universe because the bible says in a poetic psalm that the center of the universe is earth. Remember the shame the Church got because a few hotheads destroyed the library of Alexandria. And recall the glory the Church got itself by devising the 'Big-Bang Theory.' And keep in mind that Fideism is a heresy, before you let your proclivity to be loyal to the bible imprudently overpower the actualization of your reason which is your God given dignity. In learning as much as we can about creation, we can understand something about the Creator and His plan for us. And that is a pleasant thought.

Every art and every inquiry, and similarly every action and choice, is thought to aim at some good; and for this reason the good has rightly been declared to be that at which all things aim. ~Aristotle~

An Exposition of Love- Part I

That all people are drawn to God is evident in the saying: God is Love. In one way or another, at some time or another, each one of us evidences that they love Love itself. We are the product of Love itself, by our love of things, namely beauty. We are in love with beauty, and at the same time we are attracted to love because of its own beauty. It’s almost become a cliché to say that Love is an action. But love really is a work, the highest expression of human dignity and to negate it is to extinguish a very real part of our humanity in who we are essentially.

            One of the greatest temptations in modern society is the temptation to negate work while obtaining its ends. It’s a paradoxical problem, for love in particular, because while it is yet so concomitant to the formal and essential existence of mankind and the individual person we’ve deceived ourselves into thinking that the act of love can be left aside while getting at things such as sexuality which in truth is a beautiful expression of love. In reality, love, while being a labor in itself to various goods and ends, is not merely sought for these ends but for the sake of itself. And here is the proof of it: What is family without love? What is friendship with out love? What is sex without love? What is work without love? What is patriotism, or religion, or anything besides without love? We all know the very simple answer, which is that it is all vain drudgery. There is no enlightening that takes place in any of these apart from love. They become purposeless and base, essentially aimless, when existing only for the sake of themselves. Love alone is that which in existing for itself, exists for all things.

            We cannot have things like family, friendship, sex, or vocation, as we really desire them, apart from love. Love itself is essential to the fabric of what we desire as human creatures. Therefore, apart from love, we cannot hope to obtain those things which make us human. It’s really quite profound that we cannot realize our humanity without the presence of love in society and in our own individuality. That’s why we call that which lacks love, inhumane, in the schema of human relations. Just as profound, while realizing our own humanity in love, our individualism and our communal identity bleed into one in the context of love. We are willing to do more than guard the integrity of our individual identity, sacrificing ourselves for that which would sacrifice itself for us, even aside from the knowledge that it is the case. In other words, we are loving before it is requited, when loving purely. This is where the greatest magnanimity of the human spirit is seen: unconditional and selfless love.

            Much of man’s pain arises from the fact that he is awash with internal and communal paradoxes. It’s often said that people do the most horrible and senseless acts because they are afraid. That can be a difficult concept to grasp, and at first may not ring completely true. However, upon examination, we can unravel a perhaps a more articulate exposition of this truth, which is that man is in a state of seemingly hopeless despair. His despair comes from his inability to reconcile these paradoxes with each other and with what he knows and believes to be right and true. His despair comes from his quest to find himself, as he really is and to provide for that real man in accordance with his real needs. As stated early, man cannot realize himself as he truly is apart from love as it truly is.

            Imagine the great psychosis we are all under to some degree. How often does time reveal our needs to only have been wants? How many things have we and do we view as essential that later prove only to be ancillary? In the course of life, how often do we cast ourselves upon fashion hoping to find ourselves therein, only to realize as we get older how shallow of a substitute those fashions were to something more real? This species of bewilderment and beguilement which man labors under also stems to greater things, such as ideology, politics, and economical systems. In a great irony, we begin to see clearly how hardly man sees at all. We are suddenly inclined to say with Socrates,” I am only [truly] aware of the fact of my own ignorance.”

            There is one paradox in which man can hope to be lost in addition to the knowledge of his own ignorance, however, and that is his ability to while receiving divine love and attempting to share it in its fullness as he receives it, to give something genuinely to activate that participation; that ‘something’ is his very self. Participation with this divine love must be more than active, just as it must be more than an emotion. It must be active as an extension of something real within him. That is to say, love acted out in the form of charity and compassion, must be love from man’s inner intention finding extension in the world.

            Herein, we see that practiced love is only half the matter. No amount of self giving or communal giving for the temporal and psychological needs of our neighbor could ever replace the true intention of the inner man. This is where love becomes hard. Man co-suffers with his neighbor when he truly loves, and he obtains this schematic from God who is Love. For this reason, it could not have been any other way, except that God override his justice with his mercy, to fulfill love, to co-suffer with his beloved, mankind. So, just as he as Love itself was called to co-suffering with his beloved, we are required by love to co-suffer. This engages our whole being, which is why Christ commands us,” You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. And you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Naturally, we put at the disposal of our own pursuit of happiness all of our faculties. If we are to belong to God, we admit that we belong to love, and in belonging to love it is incumbent upon us to obey this command of co-suffering.

            It is an arduous path to choose to love, over and over, because in light of our concern for self, which is ever present, it does not appear to us initially as the choice to love. On the contrary! This choice appears to us as the choice to suffer, and in such a fashion that it is to someone else’ good, or perhaps more pertinently that we do not suffer to our good. Similarly, we see ourselves suffering if we are selfish. This, however, is at least to what our own psychosis esteems as our pleasure and our good. Therefore, essentially the decision to act becomes the decision to suffer for someone else’ good or our own.

            Much of mans inner dialogue centers around this very choice of preferment. In reality the choice is to suffer for the real good of others or the imagined good of ourselves. The only real good we can hope to achieve for ourselves comes from suffering for others. It’s a great mystery, but a very present and clear one. It’s a part of the paradox man may rightly hope to lose himself in. The conversation between mans passions and his conscience is evidence of his great nobility and dignity, and wherever his conscience is rightly informed and wins out he is noble and dignified. However, wherever his conscience surrenders to his passions he experiences degradation, while inflicting degradation upon his community as well, because at least in himself he is a part thereof.

            In many ways, modern society has compounded mans proclivity to find the easiest route to pleasure and success. His genius, intellect and cleverness are part of his identity, and when in conjunction with his conscience and selfless love, do manifest the most noble of paradigms. But when out of the context of morality and conscience his genius loses its inherent nobility. It is important to note that the nobility of mans genius is inherent to its goodness, and that the divine meaning of his genius is more important than the genius itself. We see that love is the source of life, and not only, but good and abundant life. The nobility of genius, which it gets in the context of conscience and morality, subordinates it to love. Apart from love, the ends of genius become the bait of proverbial rat traps.

            Without love, genius is dehumanized. If we look back to a time when the field of psychology had no substantive ethics, we see human genius misguided. In the attempt to understand himself and to gain knowledge that would be advantageous for mankind, we see psychologists engaging with some frequency and notoriety in positively atrocious experiments which degraded human beings into mere objects of experimentation. We see these victims of inhumane genius offered up, as it were, to so-called progress. We see the same sort of depraved medical experimentation, even more dramatically and horrifically, carried out by Nazi doctors in concentrations camps. In the attempt to obtain scientific and medical progress, these intellectuals who represent the apex of society made shipwreck of conscience in the name of society’s welfare.

            We do the same thing as individuals when we choose to degrade other human being for our own pleasure, profit, and welfare. For instance, abortion, pornography, child labor, and unjust wages to name a few prime examples. The love which we owe our fellow man, the love which is incumbent upon us to give to our neighbor, our family, is negated in these. Humans are very adept at identifying goods, and I use that term not only in a tangible sense, but also psychosocially and metaphysically. These goods drive us, as an incentive to participate in the excellence of love. One of the most exemplary models of love, sex itself, is one such good. In the modern time, when man has been lead to believe that through various means he may obtain the ends of work, the goods, without work he is particularly susceptible in his sexuality. He is prone to believe that apart from the work of love, sex can be his. It’s the cheese on the rat trap, a trap that can only contribute to the destruction of who he really is, because who he really is can only be realized through the work of love.

            Hitherto, we seem reaffirmed in the notion that the arduous path of love in which man realizes his true self is a choice. Not only, but that it is the highest expression of his dignity and that all things pertaining to him are concomitant to it. The only way to love, then, is in the context of this notion that all things are subordinate to love, making all life subordinate to love. How sad then that love has been turned into a game, that people, the young especially, are encouraged to treat it like a game. Even worse that they are given license by modern society to love with gravity as many as they see fit, capitulating the most sacred part of themselves in dating. Herein, whether or not sex is present, a confusion and obfuscation of love, of an immense order, is fomented. All this under the pretense that some how they will learn how to love, or the true meaning of love, through exercising their sexuality in perennial relationships with members of the sex to which they are attracted.      

Every art and every inquiry, and similarly every action and choice, is thought to aim at some good; and for this reason the good has rightly been declared to be that at which all things aim. ~Aristotle~

Against Calvinism

I have in mind to set out plainly what I often say to those who have been deprived, sometimes robbed of an authentic faith, by the heresy of Calvinism. It is the case that often people will feel overwhelmed by the semantics, the conflations, the prevarications, the assumptions, and the general confusion of Calvinism. Not to mention the perplexity the paradox, the heresy of Calvinism brings to the human mind, because of its cruelty and its mercilessness, its uncompromising absolutism. Many people feel a slave to Calvinism, some are never at rest in their own faith and theology (and they ought not be), others don't know how to refute and therefore defend themselves from the blight of this heresy, still others don't know how to save their loved ones from this insidious error. I intend to lay many of these refutations out in the form of syllogism, as it seems most concise, and most effective. So much then for Calvinism and explanations.

The first place to begin is with God, and it seems reasonable to start at the beginning. The greatest question in regards to Calvin's heterodoxy is God's sovereignty. What does it mean? The onus is on the Calvinist to prove that double predestination is a necessary accident of the qualities of God. Further, the onus in on the Calvinist to prove that by predestination it is meant 'double predestination,' and not something more observable, demonstrable, and reasonable.

In order to talk about God's sovereignty, we must talk about what he can do, what he must do, and if there be anything that he cannot do, we must find that, too. We will, we must, take for granted, as a preliminary, that evil is the lack of some good, virtue, or knowledge. This is the classical form of evil, the working model, the very model used by the scholastics and therefore, by John Calvin himself. Indeed, it has always been the view of evil held by Christianity, and therefore does not need to be explained.

So, let us begin briskly, by getting to the quick of it, and saying that God can do anything good, and that he is the cause of every good. Everything which actually exists, or may actually exist owes itself and it's cause to him. Further, let it be stated that all these are accidents of God, not necessary to God: for God is sovereign and without needs. Indeed, nothing can be added to him or taken away. Everything in nature must exist for the sake of itself, God receiving full glory. So much then for what God can do.

For the question of what he must do, the answer is similar. He must do what is right, which is different than what is just. Otherwise, he would not have the capacity for mercy. Therefore, being a just and merciful God, he must do what is right. Being omniscient and benevolent, he can do no wrong, and is without error. But if he predestines all things, then his will is synonymous with the actions, thoughts, and intentions of man, whom Calvin says is 'totally depraved.'

The Calvinist will reply to that sorry fate of the one predestined to be 'a vessel of wrath,' predestined to damnation, without a choice or a chance, other than that of farce," God is sovereign. Who are you to question his ways. And will the pot question the potter, as to why he made it thus?"  Then, to add license to this vulgar argument, they will make it an ad verecundiam, implicating St. Paul as the main progenitor of such vulgarity. All this, when it is clear to see that God is merely saying through his servant," I will have mercy upon whom I will have mercy." For it is not always right and good to have mercy, least of all upon the unrepentant, nor in the case of the man who will profit more from punishment.

None of this, however, hides the most saline point that if God predestines all things, because he necessarily must as an omnipotent God (if that be an accurate reckoning of what omnipotent implies and means), then it follows necessarily that he is complicit to all the evil of man. But God cannot do nothing, because he is actual. In him there is no admixture of potentiality, so that he is weaker in one moment and stronger in the next; there is no variation in God, and he cannot be weak. Ergo, God cannot do evil, which is the lack of something. So, that God predestines all things, to include the wickedness of man and evils, such as plagues, famines, droughts, death, and damnation is a necessarily false statement.

It seems good to reiterate what I am often saying, here, in this refutation. That is, it is in order to expound on what Almighty God 'cannot' do. Technically, God can do all things, because he is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent: He is 'Almighty.' But because of the weakness of our language, bear with me if I say there are things which God cannot do; in particular certain things which cannot be conceived of. God cannot do true paradoxes, he cannot engage in something necessarily false. For instance, God cannot make men who are women, married bachelors, things that are green all over and red all over at the same time, and square circles. God couldn't make a population that is both greater than and less than a given population of other things, nor could he make a universe where there is an unmovable object and an unstoppable force. God cannot make the proposition of this sentence true," This sentence is false." and neither can he make it false. God cannot do true paradoxes, because they are necessarily false. But because they are false, they do not exist, and because they do not exist, they cannot be done or occur. Ergo, by not being able to bring them about, God's sovereignty and omnipotence are not diminished or delimited.

So, it doesn't follow that God predestines all things; and the fact that he doesn't, does not delimit his sovereignty. In fact, the opposite is necessary for God to be God. Let me not delay then, in being more practical and straight to the point:

.1.) Depravity is evil.
:2.) Evil is the lack of something, viz. a 'good.'     
.:3.) Existence is something, and therefore a 'good.'
/.:4.) Therefore, to be 'totally depraved' is to be non-existent.

Again...

.1.) Depravity is evil.
:2.) Evil is the lack of something.
.:3.) The total lack of something is nothing.
/.:4.) Therefore, for man to be totally depraved is for man not to exist, at all.
.5) Man exists.
/.:6.) Therefore, man is not totally depraved.

Also, it may be said, according to Catholic orthodoxy, and in opposition to Calvin's heresy...

.1.) Man is not perfectly man, because he is fallen.
/:2.) Therefore, man is depraved.
.:3.) Man cannot be totally depraved, because of the aforesaid syllogisms.
/.:4.) Therefore, it is rightly said that man is depraved in all of his parts; because the body is not man, but the body of a man. Likewise, the soul is not man, but the soul of a man. Hence, he is only totally depraved in relation to the idea that each of his parts is depraved, in particular.
//.:5.) Ergo, no part of man is completely depraved, or that part would not exist. Without each of his parts, man does not exist. Therefore, no man is totally depraved, not even in one of his parts. We've no reason to despair of anyone's salvation, and the whole man may hope in Christ.

Further...

.1.) God is good.
:2.) God is the source of every good.
.:3.) God is not evil.
::4.) God is not the author of evil.
.::5.) Depravity is evil.
/:::6.) Depravity is not of God's authorship.

Also...

.1.) God is the author of predestination.
:2.) God is not the author of depravity.
/.:3.) God does not predestine anyone to depravity.

And, to borrow from a previous writing of mine...

1.) Damnation is justified (right)= Damnation is willed by God.
2.) What God wills is right. (substantive & synthetic)
3.) What God wills is willed by God. (trivial & analytic)
4.) Proposition 3 is identical to proposition 2.
5.) Proposition 2 is both analytic & not analytic (i.e. synthetic). *contradiction, i.e. an untrue statement..) 
6.) Damnation is right =/= Damnation is willed by God.

Something which is analytic cannot be synthetic, because an analytic statement is necessarily true all the time and in all possible "worlds," whereas a synthetic statement merely tells us about something that is dependent. So for instance: All bachelors are unmarried males, is an analytical statement. Whereas, to say Scott is a bachelor, is synthetic, because bachelorhood isn't necessary to Scott's existence; it isn't necessarily true. Otherwise, if Scott got married, he would die! He would cease to exist and become a non-person, yeah? So, the Calvinist proposition cannot be true, because it says that," What God wills is right." is both analytic and synthetic, which is contradictory and therefore the conclusion of the premises is false. It can be analytic or it can be synthetic, but it cannot be both.

So, the Calvinist, faced down with all these contradictions and paradoxes, which are necessarily false, may not make himself out to be a martyr of faith, at the murderous hands of reason. It has been demonstrated, and is the case, that God is not lawless, but that because of his own qualities certain ends and causes follow naturally and logically from his person. And the Calvinist may not now despise reason, which they previously attempted to use in their own cause. Calvinism, like all heresies, is devoid of reason. True paradox is the mark of all heresy. If then, faith is all that is left, guilt of another heresy is present, that of fideism. Faith and reason constitute orthodoxy, not one or the other. If we have reason only, we are nothing. And if we have faith only, then we are like the other heresies of Mormonism, Fundamentalist Islam, and Fundamentalism Protestantism.

   
"Every art and every inquiry, and similarly every action and choice, is thought to aim at some good; and for this reason the good has rightly been declared to be that at which all things aim." ~Aristotle~

Enlightenment

There is a great continuity throughout excellent things, that is easily noticed to the mind that desires to see, to the mind that can see. Enlightenment is a wonderful term, though it has taken on a dubious and inconstant meaning. For the common person the term enlightenment might bring with it notions of the Eastern religions of Hinduism, or Buddhism in all its forms. For a more eurocentric mind the term enlightenment might bring to mind 'The Enlightenment,' or positivism and Darwinism. However, these things do not possess or predicate enlightenment. Enlightenment was not birthed from loins of the religious, nor of intellectuals. It is not an accident of their beliefs, their thoughts and ideas. Enlightenment is something that happens; to be enlightened is to be illuminated with the truth.

So, we must naturally wonder what the purpose of enlightenment is. Why does it happen, and what if it does not happen? What are we to do once we have been enlightened? The light itself is pure, but it comes to us in variation. Whoever sees the light sees the same thing. Let me show however, if I may, a reason for the vicissitude and variability of enlightenment. For, not all who are enlightened are enlightened in the same way or to the same extent, neither do they agree on all things. Imagine that you, being turned away from the sun look into a pane of glass and seeing the sun. Is it truly the sun you see? Are you not rather looking and seeing the sun's reflection? Or imagine those who fixate on sun dogs. If they don't know what they are looking at, is it not possible that they might be confused? Further, if we look upon the sun itself at it's zenith, do we truly see the sun? Or is it not more correct to say that we see the sun's rays? And those who look upon the sun at dawn are likely to see a different sight than those who look upon the sun at noonday or dusk. All the while, the great light itself, the sun, remains unchanged and constant. And while it seems to changes place through the sky throughout the day and the seasons, it never leaves it's perfect place at the center.

Is it any wonder then, that if we should be so prudent as to liken the Truth to the sun, and understand the variance we seem to see in the sky, that we quickly and innately begin to understand why the enlightened do not always agree, and that they are not all enlightened to the same extent? Therefore, let us continue to use this picture for a while. Now, knowing that they all look upon the sun, someone imprudent might say," They are all just different views of the same thing!" In a way they are right, but they leave off the greater portion of knowledge when they make that declaration. Will we not all agree that the one who has seen the sun best is the one who has seen it on the clearest day at a perfect zenith in the center of the sky, when it is at its highest point in the year? Of course we will all agree very quickly. We will say so, even in spite of the man who has seen the sun many times larger as it rises over the ocean or the desert, because we acknowledge that its light is diminished, and for that he sees the sun larger, but because he sees through far more atmosphere which has dimmed and magnified it.

So, who is that man? Who is the man who has seen the sun at it's zenith on the longest day? That man is the one we can trust above all others. We are certain to find him in agreement with the others, because what they know in part, he knows in it's entirety; and because they only know in part, they cannot agree with him entirely. These other men, they might have the knowledge that the sun is round, and bright, but some of them who have seen it on the shortest day are likely to say that it is not overly hot, and at that point they would be incorrect. So, it's very important not to say," They are all just different views of the same thing!" and leave it there. Not if we are to be in perfect possession of the truth. It is paramount that we find that man.

How can we know who is most enlightened? Is it possible to know, while we are yet in darkness? I say it is, and that the way to know is reason. But it all must begin with the sure faith that the enlightening object exists. "Faith seeking understanding." Now, reason is not reasonable if it is not altruistic. To understand that, we must first understand what it really means to be altruistic, by getting a good, fundamental understanding of virtue. Understanding justice would be the beginning of that. By understanding justice, much of the harshness that one sees as gratuitous and cruel in nature, is revealed in fact to be justice. The understanding of the other virtues leads one to see how justice is kept on their side. Finally, there is a revelation of contingent mercy, the greatest altruism.

By focusing on these things carefully and frequently, and letting them flower in the mind, the human intellect builds a framework of conscience, a schematic for what 'the good,' the enlightening factor, might look like. The mind and the heart will, or ought to, recognize the most enlightened religion, the most enlightened philosophy at its first appearance. Such a person will not recoil from them once they've found them due to the presence of mystery, and not because he is imprudent and over happy. Rather, he will be reassured by the mystery that he availed himself properly to those whom he ought. Look at it like this, if we can once more use the sun as a type of 'God.' The man who sees the sun best looks at an orb, but sees a disk; what he sees is not circular, but spherical. Similarly, the enlightened one looks upon one God, but it is a Trinity of persons. This is not only a great mystery, it is the greatest mystery! The man who has truly found it, will be assured by this greatest of mysteries, because he will know that if he can comprehend it, then it is not God. Just as the man who has seen the sun the clearest knows that if you can gaze upon it indefinitely, then you have not seen it clearly.

As soon as that one is enlightened, he will remember those who are still in darkness. He will be driven by the desire to enlighten them. They are likely to hate him for it, just as a person in the dark immediately exposed to brilliant light will hate the person who threw open the door or pulled off their hoods. And if that man gets into the habit of running around yanking the hoods off of the many, they will catch him and punish him for enlightening them. They have always been this way, the both of them, because the good and enlightened man would rather suffer any torture and even death than to let his kin and countrymen stumble around in the darkness trapped in a miserable existence, comforted and crippled at once by the pleasures of the senses. And they would rather kill him, than let him bring them all to suffering, all at once. That is why they killed Christ and Socrates, and all the martyrs since the beginning.
         
Whoever becomes enlightened and does this work that his mind and his heart and his goodness which he has gained from God implores him to do is a Prometheus, a better friend to mankind than Prometheus. But we can learn from Prometheus, if we notice that he started out with a little flame. St. Francis of Assisi said," It is better to make a little light, than to curse the darkness." How true! If we can but show them a little light, a flame, we might find them willing to share fire. And if we are patient and pass the night with them, they may even consent to the dawn. That's the gracious way, the patient way, the way for most who are enlightened to share the light. By showing them the light, you show them the whole world, and they can discover wonderful things, wonderful things to do in the light, things that were not possible in darkness, things they did not, could not have imagined. The enlightenment and salvation of the human race is the task of the Church given to it by the Father of Lights through the 'Light of the World,' who is Christ, in the Spirit of Truth. "In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it... the true light that enlightens every man was coming into the world." (John 1:4-5,9) And it has come to pass, and you know that, that Light is the life of men. So, you also ought to know that He came not to condemn, but so that mankind might have life and life more abundantly. You must go to make sure that they have it, working in whichever ways are best.

"Every art and every inquiry, and similarly every action and choice, is thought to aim at some good; and for this reason the good has rightly been declared to be that at which all things aim." ~Aristotle~

Platonic Principles

Principle of Commonality- Whatever several things are F, this is because they participate in or initiate a single idea (form) of F.

Principle of Separation- The idea (form) of F is distinct from all things that are F.

The principle of Self-Predication- the idea (form) of F is itself F.

The Principle of Purity- The idea (form) of F is nothing but F.

Principle of Uniqueness- Nothing but the idea (form) of F is really, truly altogether F.

Principle of Sublimity- Ideas (forms) are everlasting, they have no parts and undergo no change, and they are not perceptible to the senses.

"Every art and every inquiry, and similarly every action and choice, is thought to aim at some good; and for this reason the good has rightly been declared to be that at which all things aim." ~Aristotle~

Mary for Evangelicals

It is tedious to even point out that the veneration of Mary by Catholics and Orthodox is condemned by American Evangelicals. However, because the evangelicals think that Marian veneration and devotion is a matter of idolatry, I'm writing this in the hope that it will provoke an attitude of reason in them. So, I am not here to convince anyone that Mary was sinless, or that she is a virgin. The point of this blog entry is to perhaps reveal to the evangelical Mary's role in the order of grace, so that having laid aside their bigotry against Marian devotion and momentarily adopting a critical and unbiased approach they may arrive through their own reason at a new appreciation for Mary. Hopefully, having a new found appreciation for her, they might be more fair handed when reasoning about Catholics, and what it means to be a Christian.

I used to attend a college house church in California when I was a Protestant Evangelical. One night there were about 20 of us gathered in the living room talking about 'what if's.' One girl said," What if a Christian found the Garden of Eden and the Tree of Life? Could they enter and eat?" And naturally, I shouldn't wonder, I said," No, the angels wouldn't let you pass." So she said," But what if you told them that you had the authority to, because of Christ?" At that I said," Then, you would be acting in opposition to the will of God. We all have Original Sin, and sin is death. To eat would be to eat unto eternal death. That is why God banished man from the garden, because in his mercy he was saving man from living eternally in that fallen state and everything that entails." They all agreed 

In the Gospel, we hear the angel Gabriel's salutation to Mary," Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb." (KJV Luke 1:42) The 'Hail Mary,' much denounced, mocked and condemned by Evangelicals is in fact mostly Gabriel's own salutation, the message given to him by God," Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou amongst women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus..." Now, naturally when looking at the bible we take certain ancient things to be signs of new things. Moses says," The LORD thy God will raise up unto thee a Prophet from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me; unto him ye shall hearken." (KJV Deuteronomy 18:15) and we naturally take that to mean the Christ.

In Numbers chapter 35 we read about how the death of the high priest absolves all man-slayers in the land and the land itself of bloodshed,"And the congregation shall deliver the slayer out of the hand of the avenger of blood, and the congregation shall restore him to the city of his refuge, whither he was fled: and he shall abide in it unto the death of the high priest, which was anointed with the holy oil." This we naturally take as a sign, not only for the redemptive work of the Cross (death of the High Priest), but the work of the Church (refuge cities of the priesthood), which is also the work of the Cross.

In the words of St. Augustine of Hippo," The New testament is hidden in the Old." How many times does Christ himself confound the Pharisees and Sadducees by showing how he is the fulfillment of prophecy with the scriptures? How many times does he appeal to Isaiah alone? It is undeniable, that the old was a sign of something else.

When evangelicals think of Mary, they usually just imagine that she was selected by God as arbitrarily as possible for no other reason than that she was capable and willing to participate in God's plan, and that she possessed the genealogical prerequisites necessary to fill the slot. And for this she is to rightly and heartily receive a kindly pat on the head, before she is buried under Pauline epistles and the bulk of the New Testament. She was the envelope that God sent his Word in, and can be disposed of. They give more honor to St. Paul, a reformed murderer than they do to Mary! St. Paul gave us words, but Mary gave us 'THE WORD.' And so some sort of account has to be given for the disregard Evangelicals have for Mary, and their aversion to giving her, her appropriate place in theology.

At this point, any Evangelical or Protestant might be already sliding back into the mire of objections. Again, we aren't here to discuss doctrines that defend Mary's sinlessness or her perpetual virginity; but we are here to discuss Mary's queenship. This, too, has been misrepresented tremendously by fundamentalist 'bible Christians,' as they like to call themselves. They attempt to conflate Mary's natural queenship with the Canaanite 'Queen of Heaven' so they can tell people that Catholics worship demons. And many of you have been hearing that pathetically shabby argument for years now. So, I ask you to simply for a moment repress your prejudices, do not allow your reason to be clouded by passion, and maintain a rigid unbiased attitude. Then, judge for yourselves what the argument bears out. But until then, please don't let what you are reading be drowned out by ready made fundamentalist objections. "It is the mark of an educated mind to examine an idea without believing in it." Plato said that, and I think he has a point.
 
So, let us look at scripture a little further. "It seemed good to me also, having had perfect understanding of all things from the very first, to write unto thee in order, most excellent Theophilus, that thou mightest know the certainty of those things, wherein thou hast been instructed." (KJV Luke 1:3-4) Also, please notice that I have taken the trouble to only use the King James Version, and not the real bible of Nicaea used by the Catholic Church. In this passage, we see the evangelist Luke addressing a certain Theophilus. Now, as many people are aware, the name 'Theophilus' is a Greek name meaning 'friend of God.' This particular Theophilus is also a type of all 'Theophili'... all the friends of God. We can read the opening passage of the gospel as if it were addressed not only to a particular man, not only to a particular kind of man (Christians), but to ourselves, and we can do so without any kind of hesitation. In fact, to do so is only intuitive.

When Christ talks to his disciples, he is also talking to us; that's why the bible is relevant to our lives. Now, I wouldn't try to conflate anything intentionally, so I won't do so here. There is a universal meaning of scripture, and then there is what many Evangelical Protestants are so fond of calling 'Rhema,' that is, a private revelation. In other words, the bible means one thing and one thing only for all Christians, but it might and does have a special meaning for individuals in how it relates to their lives. One corresponds to the communal revelation of Christ in and through the Church, and the other corresponds to the personal relationship one has with God. I would be remiss if I didn't point it out, because in just a moment you will need to have this very thing in mind.

At the foot of the cross the beloved apostle John stood with Mary the mother of Our Lord, and the scripture reads," When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple standing by, whom he loved, he saith unto his mother, Woman, behold thy son! Then saith he to the disciple, Behold thy mother! And from that hour that disciple took her unto his own home." (KJV John 19:26-27) What is meant here? Obviously, from a historical and empirical view point, it means that Jesus wanted his best friend to take care of his mother, and not just but he said that Mary was his mother and that John was her son.

Do you think that Christ's words were only meant to suffice some Jewish legal minutia, having to do with ownership, like a improvised last will? Do you think that the Apostle John wrote this down because he thought it would be important for the whole world to know that he looked out for his own mother, as if we wouldn't have naturally concluded, even without this scripture, that someone as holy as Christ wasn't derelict in his duty to family? No, that would be superfluous, and the apostle wasn't trying to boor people with irrelevant facts. It has a deeper significance.
   
What is Christ's possession on earth? It's the Church; and who did Christ put in charge of the the Church? The Apostles. Mary, like Theophilus, isn't merely a particular person in this passage, she is an amalgamation of the Church at large, the society of all Christians; and likewise the Beloved isn't merely John in particular, the Beloved is an amalgamation of all those who are beloved, Christian individuals. It's also interesting to note that Christ gives his mother to the beloved before he gives his Holy Spirit at Pentecost, and thereby gives them also his Father as their Father. He gives us not only his Father, but his mother, too. Therefore, Mary is the mother of every Christian, in the order of grace.

Christ initiated us into his family first through his humanity, which he received from Mary, by giving us to Mary; and then he initiated us into his divinity, by giving to us his Holy Spirit. Christ's apostles are troubled and ask him at the Last Supper where he is going and he says,"And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know." (KJV John 14:4) Well, what is the way? The way is,"...the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth." (KJV 1 Timothy 3:15) Because Christ says to them two verses later in John 14:6," I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life." And the Church is the Body of Christ, and Christ is the head; they are one and the same. He is the groom, the Church is the Bride, and they are become one in the Holy Spirit. We go to Christ the same way he came to us, by the Holy Spirit, through Mary who is the sign of the Church. As long as we abide in the Body we have life. Because he says again," I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing." (KJV John 15:5) Abide in Christ's Body, abide in Holy Mother the Church, in Mary's example... the perfect 'yes' to God's will.

That kind of brings us back to the beginning, when I was talking about my experience in California at that house Church. Who then can be called the Tree of Life; who is that tree a sign of? It's Mary! She is the Church, and the fruit of her womb is Christ, he is the fruit that grants eternal life, and yet Christ is also the tree because the Church is him, his very body. This isn't the first time we see him doubling responsibilities either! He was the lamb of sacrifice, and yet also the priest who offered himself for us. This is a great mystery! In the mystery of Mary's ontological role we see how truly and irrevocably intertwined our humanity has become with Christ's divinity, through his incarnation, death, and resurrection, and the gift of adoption by the Father through his Holy Spirit. We are all fruit on that Tree, as he is, if we are obedient, because the apostle Paul says," For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren." (KJV Romans 8:29) Therefore, Mary is our mother in the order of grace. It is an active role, and because she is our mother in the order of grace, she is also the figurehead of the Bride of Christ, the image of the glory which God has planned for us, the Queen of Heaven. 

But one last bit of argument, for now. The apostle Paul calls Christ 'The Second Adam.' The first Adam fell into a deep sleep and God fashioned for him a bride from his side. The scripture reads," And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh." (KJV Genesis 2:23-24) Christ's bride was also taken from his side," But one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there out blood and water." (KJV John 19:34) The water being baptism, and the blood being the sacraments, which together are the Church and all those who participate in them. The Second Adam's bride was also taken from his side. And she is called after him "Christian," just like woman is called after the man. But who then is the 'Second Eve?' Is it not Mary, as we have shown, flesh of his flesh, bone of his bone? Are we not all her children according to grace, just as we are all natural children of Eve? 

Perhaps, given the time to ruminate these ideas, you will finally find yourself fulfilling your own part in Mary's prophecy in Luke 1:48," ...henceforth all generations shall call me blessed!" Perhaps, you will know that Christ has also given you a mother, and that she is the paradigm of obedience to Christ and what we ought to be. And perhaps, finally, you will not be so hostile to those Christians who do venerate her as a mother, and even as the Queen which it pleased the Holy Trinity to make her, so that we would hope more strongly in his promises.

"Every art and every inquiry, and similarly every action and choice, is thought to aim at some good; and for this reason the good has rightly been declared to be that at which all things aim." ~Aristotle~

Apology For Impartiality

Lately it seems that I have stepped on a few toes by being impartial. I constantly find myself a gadfly, when I am merely looking for someone to commiserate this charged climate with. However, to my surprise, I find that impartiality, truthful critique, and satire are all quite unwelcome wherever it goes. Further, it seems that the truth has a rather inflammatory effect, and I can only conclude that this is because some see the truth as defamatory, or because they conflate the particular and the general. They heap symbolism on particular cases, and if you tell the truth about the particulars, then they are at your throat as if you attacked the sacred general, and to be honest, I am not like Voltaire. Voltaire prayed for his enemies to seem ridiculous, and that is far from me. Envisioning anyone as my enemy seems contrived, especially these people who are my own kindred in sacrament and blood. But it seems that I've disturbed them, and for that I must give account, which is precisely what I mean to do.

Socrates, the dear man, played with people, and naturally they thought ill of him. Socrates had done more good for the lot of them than any other and helped secure their place in history. The man pulled back the great eyelid of Greece and let the sun shine deep into the recesses of the eye, and the people liked it none too much. Half scarcely thanked him, and the other half wanted to murder him. Socrates never took the time over the years to make an apology occasionally, for his behavior and his ideas. A defense that is. Socrates was the most benevolent of his countrymen and one of uprightness and probity. He was most altruistic with the application of his intellect and his reason, and munificent and beneficent with the goods of his genius, though he was a pauper. It is a shame that the man was so ill thought of, but that is the way of things. At any rate, he might have done better to, from time to time, graciously defend himself in the form of an apology, but he only did so at the end, and to no immediate avail.

Well, I'm no Socrates, and it is unlikely that any of you will benefit so greatly from me as Athens or the world did from him, neither will I secure your place in history. Yet, taking his life as a lesson, it seems like a good thing to take the time to defend my demeanor, and my proclivity to be candid and impartial. Especially, since it is not strangers to whom I will make the apology, but my own friends, who I perhaps naively assumed understand me at all times.

To be fair, I have a habit, and perhaps it is an annoying one, of treating everything the same. I will, without inhibition expose everything without grace and go to reasoning about it. It seems natural that anyone might be offended by such treatment, especially when both our trivial and monumental beliefs are treated as equals. I will talk about politics in the same manner as I talk about religion, and philosophy the same way as I talk about theology. This is because I consider them linked. Likewise, I tend to treat the particular and the general in the same fashion, not that I conflate the two, but that I examine them under the same set of principles. It happens in life that we hasten along, acquiring beliefs and ideas as expedience would require, and we find ourselves allied with certain folks out of necessity. Finding sufficient utility and harmony therein, we take the truth, fecundity, and of these acquisitions for granted and becoming very comfortable with them. We begin to rely upon them and derive our identity from them, and perhaps rightly so, but perhaps not rightly in every case. So, when a pest like me comes along and begins questioning these things without the approbation of those who believe in them, those very people who feel one and the same with these ideas and belief they feel attacked. Further, they are twice indignant, because they sense that it is their own friend attacking them. To them it's as boorish of me as if I were to accost them argue about the color of the sky, and as rude as if I were to tear their clothes off and begin judging their anatomy.

We all are very want to have reasons for what we believe, and perhaps it is my burden to have an inquisitive nature beyond the norm. Perhaps, I am more offended than most when I am compelled to believe something without reasons. It might be the case that for the sake of their comfort alone that those around me would seek to abridge by peering into all manner of things. This is certainly a possibility. Or, also, maybe it is that some don't want me starting down paths they don't have the time, desire or ability to go down. All these might be the case, but it's not vain. I believe that nothing is in vain for those who love God, because," All things work to the good of those who love God." Still, it seems that somehow others have reaped shame and resentment from my inquiries, which is not my intention at all, and I seek to put an end to it, if possible, with this apology.

I am not favorably inclined to being in any one 'box.' I am a Catholic because I think it corresponds to reality, and one cannot escape reality. For me to not be Catholic would be like giving up my humanity. Someone might say I am certainly in the 'Catholic Box,' but to my mind that would be like saying that I am in the 'Human Box,' because they both correspond to the reality of the material and immaterial. So, such a saying is puerile. What I mean by that I have an aversion to boxes is not that I love being unique, or crave being the 'Devil's Advocate,' or that I am so pathetic as to need to be the center of attention and have recourse to being petulantly contrary; rather what I mean to say is, I heartily attempt to avoid being devoted to or defined by the concepts of others. At least insofar as the finer things are concerned. Though, I am certainly not opposed to giving credit where credit is due and agreeing with them on certain things, even many things. I am politically homeless, I don't care much for novelties, I have no devotion fashion, and I find all the divisions made by humans concerning the natural to be tiresome. I am no partisan, and people seem to know that about me. However, when they realize that includes their partisans, they think," What a mentality!" and attack me or try to justify themselves.

I strive at all times to judge no one, and judge everything. As it is written," Judge not..." and also," He who is spiritual judges all things." Things, you see. I dare to say that I have the endorsement of St. Paul, in the matter, and that I am at least trying to do what is right. However, there come times when we encounter certain things that are so concomitant to individuals, and due to the limitations of our vocabulary to convey ideas, it can happen that it is necessary to make statements regarding individuals. For instance, we might observe someone behaving hypocritically and another being honest, and we might say," If put to it I would choose the honest man over the hypocrite." People might scold, and say that you just judged the two men, but do they do so for the righteous man or the hypocrite? Certainly, for the hypocrite! Who knows why, too. Perhaps, because it is expedient for their own hypocrisies. And do they scold you rightly? No, they do not. You were merely making a statement concerning the pattern of behavior explicit in one, you were not damning him, or indicting everyone from his country, family, or religion. Neither were you suggesting that such a disposition is implicit in the later three. It is perception confined to the particular, not shared by the general.

As stated earlier, however, people who feel quite invested in certain groups are frequently inclined to conflating the general with the particular. They take statements pertaining to the particular to be indictments of the general, and throw down the gauntlet with a sense of righteous indignation. They would be very right to, if the two were conflated in such statements, but it is they who are doing the conflating. They would be right because it would be unjust, for obvious reasons. In either case, they might try to correct you or try to silence you, and if you don't fall silent or don't seem so easily persuaded, they might even attack you or abandon you. Then, only after a great labor of pointing out how you are misunderstood and misrepresented by them, will they grudgingly turn away, as if you shamed them or are a troublemaker, when in truth an apology is due you. They who imagined themselves to be misrepresented, who so vigorously demanded a retraction, make no retraction of their own in the end, though it was they alone who did the misrepresenting. That's not very fair at all, but something I've become accustomed to. It seems there is little in this world quite so as rare as an apology. As St. John Chrysostom said," No one has disturbed thee. You have disturbed thee." I find that proven daily by all.

Impartiality is necessary for contemplation. If you would see what really exists, and if you would know what you really know, you must be impartial. Still, expedition is necessary in human thought. We need not set about reproving ever single thing that supports a specific thing. For instance, we needn't reestablish that God is One, whenever we talk about God. We reason it to be so. However, we must be and should be ready with a defense of the same should one doubt, or should the need arise. We should strive to arrive at the truth by reason, even if we arrived there by other means. That is, if you arrived at a true faith because of sheer hope and a leap of faith, shouldn't you later reason about it and have reasons why it is true? Outside of your emotions and personal experiences, that is. Won't it help you? Certainly. And to do this you must be impartial.

I find it disconcerting when people take impartiality as a sign of disloyalty in friendship. Am I supposed to be loyal to them and not the truth? What do they make themselves out to be? Are they greater than the truth? No, and they wouldn't come out and say so either, but because of insecurity and impatience this is precisely what they do say by distrusting or chastising those who think, speak, or act impartially. Impartiality coupled with reason will arrive at the truth, and if they do not stand in that same spot in their opinions and their actions, then they should be obliged to move themselves to wherever the truth may be. And if there is any doubt about what the inquiry bears out, then they should try again, and again if necessary. Further, it is a very sorry and rotten thing, too, if they should begrudge the person who compelled them to inquiry, or compelled them to move by pointing to whatever a true inquiry bears out.

Finally, most absurd to me is sophistry. I am refreshed to have never seen anyone of my friends engage in it, at least that I can remember. Often a person will chime in on a discussion, as though they know something about the subject, and so you question them on what they know, and they turn out not to have the very knowledge they claimed to be in possession of. And being overly embarrassed by themselves, and often feeling stupid, they hate you for asking for the proof, or the knowledge, as though you were a troublemaker! Sometimes, they are so precipitous as to assume that because you were asking them questions, you yourself knew the answer all along and abusively toyed with them for your own amusement, or worse, for the amusement of an audience. They should be angry with themselves! for soliciting that which they did not have. Again, I can say with some confidence that none of my friends have ever been so reckless as to behave this way; at least with me. If they did, I would be sure to see if they had what they claimed to have, and if not I would reveal their ignorance to them. Why? Because that is true friendship. Friendship pertains to the soul, and there is no friendship in darkening the intellect, or allowing a friend's soul to remain shackled by ignorance in the dark, only in enlightenment and maintenance of the same.

Impartiality, sobriety, moderation, inquisition, and unconditional positive regard... these are justifiable and lead to good things. Every friend owes them to one another, as much as one owes them to himself, because," True friendship is one soul in two bodies." And so I am devoted to these things, because they are prudent, kind and owed. Anyway, it's not my desire be a menace; I only hope that we might correct our mistakes, sober up, and gain the grace of true self-knowledge, and see more accurately how far we have to go. And that's the truth of it.   

"Every art and every inquiry, and similarly every action and choice, is thought to aim at some good; and for this reason the good has rightly been declared to be that at which all things aim." ~Aristotle~