Have you been following the fight at the Corner between John Derbyshire and Ramesh Ponnuru over religion and relativism? A friend who tipped me off to it writes, "How long are these two going to be able to remain on the same blog?"
Commenting on one of their previous jousts, Father Jape found that the Derb-Ramesh clash illuminated tensions within modern conservatism. Excerpt:
In sum, Derbyshire is a scientific materialist who approaches issues of politics and reason as a tribalist, while Ponnuru is a Christian who approaches politics and reason as a universalist. Derbyshire has no practical belief in God, thinks religion is functionally necessary as crowd control, thinks moral truth is hokum, and relies almost exclusively on accumulated tribal prejudices and protections for social cohesion and order. Ponnuru, on the other hand, is a committed Catholic, thinks the Catholic natural law tradition provides clear moral guidance to everyone reasoning rightly, and relies on a Lockean (which is to say liberal) notion of a procedural pluralism to provide social cohesion and order.
Jape believes the solution lies in Christian Derbyshirism -- that is, that Derbyshire's got the more plausible basic understanding of the way the world works, but that he ought to Christianize it. IOW, we need people to argue from Christian particularism, not Enlightenment universalism.
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'I observe some Christians using "fallen nature" as an excuse for lack of progress (those next steps), as a way to "explain" negative things without explicitly acknowledging that they should not continue to happen -- for those things over which we have explicit control, I hasten to add.'
Full agreement with you here -- in many manifestations of modern American Christianity the idea of the ascetical has been completely removed, for a variety of reasons. There is either no concept of a Christian having to struggle with his "fallen nature," or else that struggle is laid out in legalistic terms. I'd argue that according to historic traditional Christianity, this is an aberration, and you are correct in seeing it as problematic.
In that case, Rob, does that satisfy as clarification? I hesitated to use that comparison point, but if it works for you around the notions of explanatory and starting points, how does that work as a foundation for the half-empty/half-full concept I posit?
From a Christian standpoint, it doesn't, if I'm understanding you correctly. In our view even the most holy, pious ascetic never completely overcomes the effects of the Fall in his or her earthly life. He or she always remains 'fallen.' So in that sense it can never really be a half-empty/half-full concern. Please advise if I'm misunderstanding you.
I think we have a good common ground, Rob. From my POV, your last post represents the final "sticking point"; your rejection of the half & half concept is quite clear -- and understood -- in that context.
"Christian Derbyshirism"? How about "Christian Derbyshiria"? :D
Sorry, I just couldn't resist.
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