Inconsistency is not Orthodoxy

Listening to Mary Eberstadt of the "Ethics and Public Policy Center" this morning I was at the end struck by the incredible gaps in her thinking, and the logical non sequiturs and other fallacies (mostly of causation) she managed to fit in a very short interview.

She pressed for cleaving to "Orthodoxy" rather than becoming a bellwether of the wider society because it is necessary for  "families of a certain size to carry on the Christan Tradition." (I suppose the Holy Family wasn't big enough. She also tipped her hat in favor of continuing the celibate priesthood rather than giving in to pressure to change from so-called Catholics, deploying an example of the "No True Scotsman" fallacy.)

She noted the "graying" and "few children" among mainline Protestants, and the booming "Orthodox" evangelicals. (Has she considered it might be the music and atmosphere, rather than the doctrines? Are Pentecostals "Orthodox"?) She made the telling observation that "If you water down Christianity by telling people to be nice to each other.... people figure out they can be nice at home..." So it isn't really about the central moral teaching of Jesus, focusing on how you treat others, but about, as the English say, "bums in pews."

But wait... When faced with the decline in the Roman Catholic Church she then ended all of this with the astounding assertion that "It's not a numbers game; it's a Truth game..."

After building up an entire argument about numbers, it's really about Truth. So why was the bulk of her talk devoted to family size and demographics?

No thanks, Mary; you can keep your incoherent "Truth." This is not Orthodoxy, but Conservatism.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

Update: and here's some evidence of the wrongheadedness of Eberstadt's argument. The Pew study shows that, yes, "strong" protestantism is on the rise, but in addition to Roman Catholicism's general decline, there is a particular decline among "strong" RCs, in relation to the total population.

Calling Out

I was very pleased to see a letter in the December 18, 2011 issue of The Living Church, rebutting the misrepresentations and straw-man arguments which the Rev. Dr. Philip Turner raised in response to the "liberal" or "expansionist" authors of the House of Bishops Theology Committee report on sexuality, published in the Winter 2011 ATR. As the Rev. Robert MacSwain, the author of the letter, demonstrates, Turner assailed the gay-marriage-urging authors for a position they explicitly rejected. The argument he attacked is that gay and lesbian marriage is a move towards personal self-satisfaction and sexual happiness. The argument actually made in the papers is about the hard discipline of marriage as a form of sanctification towards holiness — just as for mixed-sex couples. Careful readers will note the resonance of this argument with my own work on the subject.

But why is it that someone as bright as Turner feels the need to concoct such a misrepresentation? Does he truly not perceive the difference? I begin to think that some "conservatives" may in fact have such a blind spot.

That is in part because I have been experiencing something similar over the last few weeks. An obviously intelligent and well-read anonymous blogger posting in the comments section of Peter Carrell's Anglican Down Under criticized me for adopting arguments in defense of same-sex marriage which I have not made, and persistently attempted to paint a picture of a kind of liberal modernism that is very far from my work (as any who have read it know). Let me hasten to add that I do not find Peter himself to be guilty of this sort of reaction, and regard him as a model interlocutor!

Then, over at Titus One Nine, another anonymous commenter declared that I was responsible for leading the charge in trying to depose Bishop Mark Lawrence, and that in a "raging and fulminating" way. That really surprised me, as I was not aware of any rage or fulmination, or even much by way of comment or interest, in or on the subject. When challenged, this person proudly produced three shorter than 50-words each comments separated by over a year — one from the House of Bishops / Deputies list-serve and two from blogs. None of these three line comments called for action against Bishop Lawrence, and the two most recent merely noted, as a point of canon law, that were action to take place it would likely be because of property concerns. As far as I know, and I've done the Google search, these are the only things I've said in reference to the good Bishop of South Carolina in the past year. I assured this irate denizen of Kendall Harmon's comment stream that were I intent on pressing a case against the Bishop I would certainly do more than make three three-line comments over the course of a year!

The point in all this is, What is it with "conservatives?" (Not all, just some.) Does their own upset with how they perceive things to be going blind them to what is actually happening? Is it simply a want of charity that takes everything someone dubbed "liberal" says at its worst possible, and often wrong, interpretation? Is it perceptual set, or a form of neuralgia and heightened sensitivity?

In this season, I plead for better understanding and calm. There are sane and sober "conservatives" out there, able to converse across even strong disagreement. I have had many such conversations so I know this to be true. The key, of course, is listening, and being able to describe to someone with whom you disagree their own position in ways they can recognize and affirm, and especially not telling them what they "must have meant" when they explain that they didn't. Kendall always espoused that, and I admire him for it; and I wish some of the folks who populate the comment-streams at his blog would follow his example. As to Turner, I hope he will re-read the essays which he misrepresented with newly opened eyes and attempt to wrestle inwardly with the arguments as they are actually made. He may still not agree with them but at least then be able to do them the courtesy of responding to them on their own terms. And that may advance the discussion.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG