Who gets to define whom?

This is a really interesting post, Rod.

We have a new choir director at our church, and he said at practice that he wants to do all the musical Mass parts for Holy Week in Latin, and that he's hoping to talk our pastor into saying the Masses in Latin, too. He mentioned that Latin is the Church's official language, referred to Pope Benedict's wishes in this regard and also mentioned what a unifying thing it would be for both the English and Spanish parishioners to be able to pray together in one language during Holy Week.

To a woman in our choir who actually remembers the Mass in Latin from her youth, this was a somewhat upsetting idea, a turning back to a time when the Mass seemed more distant to her than it does now. To one of our college-age members, however, this was exciting news; she mentioned her disappointment when she realized how inaccurate our current English translation of the Mass is, in particular, as a reason to want to hear the Mass said in Latin. Both women are faithful Catholics who are very involved with the Church; but Latin is symbolic to one of everything that was wrong with the Church of her youth, while to the other it's almost a symbol of how to fix everything that's wrong with the Church today.

So here's a situation where within a culture itself you have two different groups divided around something that has taken on symbolic significance. If we do begin to see a greater use of Latin at Mass, though, and a return to the notion that our cultural heritage as Roman Catholics is deeply tied to the use of this language, it's hard to see how those Catholics who disassociate themselves from the use of Latin will *not* see the use of it as a put-down to them, and an overlooking of their sensitivities.

And that's *within* one specific culture; if it's this hard for two separate groups within a culture to resolve their disputes over a powerful symbol, how much harder is it for a resolution between a cultural group and the outsiders who are taking offense?

*Under what conditions can pride in one's own particular culture or group be recognized as such by outsiders, without being taken as a put-down of those who aren't part of that culture or group?*

When the symbol of that pride isn't the banner of an army that tried to keep your ancestors in servitude? I don't think this one's that hard.

With regard to the traditional Mass and the use of Latin, personally I think one of the purposes -- and, I hope, one of the results -- of Pope Benedict's Motu Proprio last summer, loosening restrictions on the use of the traditional Mass, was to de-politicize it. For many people the traditional Latin Mass has become a symbol of thing about the Church that they either want to do away with or want to bring back and preserve. And attendance at such as Mass had come to be regarded by many people as a political statement, an indication that one subscribed to a whole political agenda. I remember during the 1996 election campaign, when I was going to a parish in Ohio that had permission from the diocese to have the traditional Mass all the time, the parking lot was a vertitable forest of Pat Buchanan bumper stickers. I prefer the traditional liturgy mainly for historical and aethestic reasons, and I often felt uncomfortable with the assumption on the part of many of the parishioners that my presence there indicated that I accepted a whole laundry list of political positions.

I think that Benedict wants people to recognize that Latin and the traditional liturgy are part of the heritage of the Catholic Church, and that preference for them -- or lack thereof -- shouldn't be regarded as a kind of political banner of any sort. I hope that this is indeed one of the results of the Motu Proprio.

***

I have seen some people fly the real Stars and Bars, and I assume that they do so in order to fly a Confederate flag that many people don't recognize as a Confederate flag, which allows them to avoid unpleasant confrontations.

Really, now! In what other country would it not be illegal for even private citizens to display the symbols of the greatest armed rebellion against the government in the country's history? I think this says something about the various compromises by which we tried to put the Civil War behind us. Is this a great country, or what?

I've never been able to have that feeling - pride in my, take your pick: race, gender, family line, ethnicity, nationality, etc.

Growing up, it always confused me how people could feel pride in something they had nothing to do with. Maybe pride here means less like achievement and more like happy to be associated with?

I am proud of attending the U of Chicago - having entered of my own merit, but not of being a Scot - which boasts Clerk Maxwell, say, and Hume, or William of Wallace, or whatever.

How are we interpreting 'pride'?

Because I have never understood it if we mean by pride, the "I am proud of being Irish" bit, as if it bestows ... what? virtue? class? dignity? a rich heritage? I mean, what is it the people here actually do feel good about when they are a member of a given social category?

Interesting posts, David. Maybe you've been posting and I've not seen them, but I've missed them. I hope that you're well.

I don't know the answer to Rod's question. Sigaliris is correct when she says that some people are offended by anything that's different from what they like and know. But some symbols have taken on new meaning because of the terrible and hateful things that have been done.

The Confederate Flag is one of those symbols. You want to fly it with pride, then by all means, fly it with pride. But don't be offended when people who don't know you think that you're a bigot.

Same goes for a skinhead who wants to tattoo a Nazi emblem on his arm. It might represent something innocent, but I'm not going to be inviting that person to my son's Bar Mitzvah.

Ditto for Franklin's "none" for the same reasons.

I'd like to thank Rebeccat for sharing her perspective. It's hard to understand unless you've seen someone live it. Thank you for reminding me.

Now in answer to Rod . . . I'll admit I'm not feeling too serious or cerebral tonight - long week. But. . .
When sharing who you are you have to keep in consideration your cultural history and also find your sense of humor. In that light I think the Irish have it about right. No one seems to have trouble sharing in St.Patrick's and the parades of 'humble' Irish-Ams.

Did you ever start trolling the internet and find something unexpectedly good? Not talking about Rod b/c he's consistently good.
Well this is a story about God and Bankruptcy and Veggie Tales. [V.T. did a fairly good job of making their cultural P.O.V. acceptable to the main stream - that's my stretch for relevance - and lived an answer Rod's question.] So here's a little story about a man named Phil. I learned something. Maybe someone else will as well.
http://www.jellyfishland.com/about/story.html

The strange thing to me is that if you had super-normal willpower, say you had even superhuman willpower, then who would you be?

If you are a moody, sensitive person who had this kind of volition, then you could choose to 'over-ride' your innate moodiness and manifest an even keeled personality to your spouse and kids. If you were an angry, selfish person, you could choose to be temperate and selfless.

It's odd to me because the stronger your will, the less of an identity you would have, because any limits could be overpowered. If you settled on a given personality, it could always be overruled in the future. Conversely, you might say that rather than have no identity, you would have as many identities as you wanted; a plural, flowing self. Either way, no real, stable, enduring self. I guess this is just another way of stating that the freedom-from of the Enlightenment is empty, formal, pointless, directionless. (Because I am not this or that limit.)

Of course no one has this kind of volition. So it seems that we are who we are because of our very limits. There's a certain relief, I suppose, at being unable to escape our cages, our ascribed categories.

Say that relief became pride, gratitude. I suppose an honest answer to Rod's question would be that people aren't rational and they sometimes are proud of their heritage cages and aren't offended or ridiculing of others' cages. Others are.

If by conditions Rod is asking for some sort of rationale that would JUSTIFY said pride, well, the group membership would have to independently meet the individual's moral or normative criteria. "I'm proud to be an American not because my parents or I were born here, but because I agree with its ideals."

Still, if we are asking about Others looking from the outside in, and they do not share our pride... I could only imagine that they would not possess a trait that they would like to possess but don't, but also value. So, two groups value intelligence, one are physicists, the other janitors. The physicists are proud to be part of the group, the janitors envious, but not part of the group. Envious, but respectful.

But the trait the joins the two groups is in theory malleable to choice and merit. If Rod is only talking about ascriptive cats, then I think we're probably stuck with Mr. Evans' answer, if we want some sort of reason, as opposed to what people actually can and do feel in real life.

When you have sacrificed greatly for the successful liberation of another group, perhaps.

In which case the appropriate emotion is not pride, it is gratitude for the grace and opportunity, sobriety at the price, and joy at the accomplishment.

The material in the New Testament, was LITERALLY penned to define "who" and "what" is a "Christian" and "who" and "what" is not. (Marriage, for example, is clearly defined by Jesus, but somehow liberal theology discards that little fact.) Re-read Jude (or read it for the first time) and think of it as written today. Sounds so relevant. And Romans? Eery how much like today that is. Guess there were gay pride parades and HBO in Paul's day. But then again, truth is hardly relevant to many of our populace today. Hmmm, sounds very much like a Biblical "story."

My turn for multiple posts: as a proud American, I fully acknowledge that I believe that our form of government, and much that derives from it, is in fact better than other forms. Not perfect, not without faults, but better... and worth dying for.

Franklin Evans: "In a word: none. There are no conditions where an expression of pride due to an accident of birth or a serendipitously shared trait fails to imply that membership in the group of reference makes one better than others. It's part and parcel of the zero-sum game that masquerades as concern for a person's or persons' self-esteem."

And then later on...

Franklin Evans: "My turn for multiple posts: as a proud American, I fully acknowledge that I believe that our form of government, and much that derives from it, is in fact better than other forms. Not perfect, not without faults, but better... and worth dying for."

So if we follow your original logic, the accident of birth that made you an American is a great source of pride for you.

I wonder...do you stand, metaphorically, of course, with your feet planted on the necks of any vanquished foes?

I think the posts here have answered the question rather well. Frankin is right, there appears to be no instances where pride in the group one belongs to, either by choice or by accident of birth, does not lead to a put-down of those who are not members of that group.

Yet Rod's question also included another portion...who gets to define the group? Ideally the group should be permitted to define itself, but history shows that it is the majority that defines the group, and that the definitions are extremely subjective.

Symbols carry huge amounts of power. Whether that symbol is a noose in a tree, a Confederate flag, a cross, a star of David, a white hood, a red hand, or a host of others, we have given these symbols tremendous power.

Did the apostle Paul have it right when he wrote to the Corinthians:

1 Corinthians 10

31 Whether, then, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. 32 Give no offense either to Jews or to Greeks or to the church of God; 33 just as I also please all men in all things, not seeking my own profit but the profit of the many, so that they may be saved.

Should Christians exercise "their right" to use a symbol and let others be damned if they are offended? Or should Christians set aside their "rights" in favor of something greater?

Maybe people should take a lesson from the Serbians. Their greatest pride is for a stunning defeat at Kosovo in 1389: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Kosovo The recent flap over the Albanians in this region obtaining self-determination is, for this descendent of the Serbs, so ironic I'll be setting off metal detector alarms for the next week.

This reminds me of an observation a friend of mine once made: Beware of a people whose formative national experience is a defeat. It tends to instill into their national character a paranoid defensiveness combined with an aggrieved sense of entitlement. One could apply this not only to the Serbs, but also to the South (as the great-great-grandson of a Confederate veteran I`m allowed to say that), the Irish (ditto), and, FWIW, the Palestinians.

Watsy: Thanks for the kind words. I`ve been busy enough that I`ve been reading and posting only sporadically.

"because the war, as the south is tired of explaining, wasn't really about defending slavery, it was about defending an economic model that included slavery."

What? The ENGINE of that model was slavery, it didn't merely 'include' slavery on the periphery somewhere. The war was about slavery, we can just say it that plainly. The avg Southerner may have been fighting for his family or state, but the leaders of the South sure were fighting for their 'peculiar institution.'

The North won the war and lost the peace, the Lost Cause culturally triumphed up until very recently. Of course, American society was permeated with racism, and the North largely fought to preserve the Union, I fully grant you. A hundred years later, the South fought, self-righteously (!), against integration, every last step of the way. Just an incredible thing to behold. And I live in the South.

Anonymous poster at January 19, 2008 10:15 AM:

You seem to have carefully edited my text before quoting it. Any reader who cares to read the original, full post will see that I explicitly define the source of my pride.

In the meantime, I will show copious regard and respect for anyone who shows pride in a thing and defines the source of that pride as a personal investment into the thing. The fashionable boot snark, admittedly brief and capable of interpretation, was intended to criticize those whose only investment is the tearing down of a perceived foe. Crowing over the humiliation of another is right up there with (using a local example) Eagles fans lynching a Cowboys fan who dares to show his affiliation. Those Eagles "fans" belong in jail, and the Eagles organization rightly disavows their so-called pride in the team.

You do realize that the stars and bars was included in state flags as an explicit rejection of integration in the early 1960s, don't you? It is an explicitly racist symbol, and was intended as such.