Philosophy

On Redistributing Wealth

July 31, 2011August 1, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

Christ in the House of Simon Poor Redistribute Wealth by James V. Schall, S.J. –
Greed, some say, is the main reason the poor are poor. It isn’t. We rarely take a close look at envy. Because someone is rich, it does not follow that he is therefore greedy. A poor man is free to be both greedy and envious. Envy is as much a generator of extra work as want, perhaps more so.

Mandeville’s famous notion, that our vices not our virtues cause prosperity, has a point. Usable wealth must first be produced and made available. The primary causes of wealth production are brains, effort, and virtue. The world was given to us in a raw state to see what we would do with it, yes, for one another.

At first sight, the oft-repeated lament that the world’s goods need to be “redistributed” for the benefit of the poor seems logical. Usually behind this apparently innocent approach is the idea of the limitation of the world’s “goods.” If the world’s resources are “limited,” then we need to establish a system of control of human behavior, of our “desires.” [Read more…]

Where Did Our Time Go? Typewriters and the Disappearance of Time

July 15, 2011July 15, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

Typewriter Time Orthodox by Fr Geoffrey Korz –
The natural limits of time and season, as defined by God’s created world, began to erode with the advent of candles and indoor heating. Gaslight, then electric light, extended the boundaries of civilized waking hours well beyond dusk. Television and other unlimited forms of personal entertainment presented a hundred excuses for putting off the hour of sleep well past midnight – and we became more and more tired. …

“Whoso keepeth the commandment shall feel no evil thing: and a wise man’s heart discerneth both time and judgment.” Ecclesiastes 8:5

If you are old enough to remember using a manual typewriter, you are also old enough to appreciate the convenience of not having to use one today. [Read more…]

Why We Have Enemies

July 12, 2011July 13, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

by Jason Bradley –
Contemporary Western thought and postmodern relativism compel us to explore our place in the world vis-à-vis other civilizations. The West’s legacy of reasoning is based heavily on thinkers such as Aristotle. The foundation he created implores us to consciously define and pursue an objective method to acquire knowledge. Where his philosophy was limited other thinkers came around and expanded this school of thought by use of Aristotle’s scientific epistemology. In other words, though his practice failed in some areas, his philosophical principles were sound in their fundamentals for the continuance in what we call Western thought.

It is on this foundation that we now seek the abstract and superimpose it over the idea of applied reality. Today’s thinkers exclude specific objects and dismiss concrete reality. Such is the case in when modern intellectuals study the question, “Why Do They Hate Us?” [Read more…]

How to Destroy a Culture in 5 Easy Steps

July 5, 2011July 8, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

by Joe Carter (First Things) –

In his book The Future of Marriage, David Blankenhorn, a liberal, gay-rights-supporting Democrat and self-professed “marriage nut,” offers this sociological principle: “People who professionally dislike marriage almost always favor gay marriage.” As a corollary, Blankenhorn adds: “Ideas that have long been used to attack marriage are now commonly used to support same-sex marriage.”

Blankenhorn provides almost irrefutable proof that this is the expressed agenda of many—if not most—professional advocates of same-sex marriage. Other scholars have noticed the same and have attempted to present the public with the facts about the less-than-hidden agenda to use homosexual rights to deinstitutionalize marriage and to separate sexual exclusivity from the concept of “monogamy.”

Since the agenda is an open secret, how has this anti-marriage program been able to advance to the level of public policy? And how did it happen so quickly? [Read more…]

Where We Dare Not Go

June 21, 2011June 21, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

past present future orthodox by Fr. Stephen Freeman –
My previous article spoke about the “moment” and the unique place it holds within our lives. It is strange, therefore, that the present moment is a place we seem to avoid – a place we dare not go. There are many ways to speculate about such an avoidance. In the experience of many, it is a place that seems almost impossible to read – which is strange indeed when we consider the fact that it is actually the only thing truly present to us.

The present moment, however, has some unique properties in human experience that make it a place we prefer to avoid. It is not past or future – and is thus much less subject to imagination. The imagination is a place where we find ourselves empowered, though the power we have is delusional and only destructive of the self. We may play mental games with the past, imagining that the truth is whatever we think it is, and imagine our own reactions as well. Never mind the fact that our imagination is most often quite wrong and our reactions utterly beside the point. The imaginary past becomes a “new history” which takes its place in the narrative of our lives. As such, our lives become a lie. [Read more…]

Father John: Spiritual Mosquitoes

June 9, 2011December 17, 2020 by Orthodox Editors

are random thoughts that just seem to pop into your head without invitation by Fr. John Moses –
It is a rare saint who attends hesychasm, or internal stillness. This may be due in part to the fact that most of us don’t take prayer and meditation very seriously or we allow the busyness of life to move prayer the the edges of our daily life.

I’m sure you’ve had this experience. You’re just about to fall asleep when suddenly you hear the tiniest of sounds go by your ear. You know immediately that a mosquito has targeted you for lunch. So, you cut on the light, but no matter how much you look around, you just can’t see it. So you cut off the light, and in just a little while you hear the buzzing again. You cut the light on, but nothing. So you cut the light off and try to ignore it. You know that sometime during the night, you’ll be donating blood.

It’s the same in spiritual life. You’re trying your best to be positive, to have some sense of spiritual progress, and then the mosquitoes start buzzing in your brain. Sometimes it seems that they have sucked all of the blood from your spiritual life. These spiritual mosquitoes are called logismoi. [Read more…]

Dependency and Votes

June 7, 2011June 7, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

by Thomas Sowell –

Those who regard government “entitlement” programs as sacrosanct, and regard those who want to cut them back as calloused or cruel, picture a world very different from the world of reality.

To listen to some of the defenders of entitlement programs, which are at the heart of the present financial crisis, you might think that anything the government fails to provide is something that people will be deprived of.

In other words, if you cut spending on school lunches, children will go hungry. If you fail to subsidize housing, people will be homeless. If you fail to subsidize prescription drugs, old people will have to eat dog food in order to be able to afford their meds.

This is the vision promoted by many politicians and much of the media. But in the world of reality, it is not even true for most people who are living below the official poverty line. [Read more…]

Is Owning a Pet Discriminatory?

May 18, 2011May 18, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

by Chuck Colson –

Do you own a pet? Well if you say you do, you are a purveyor of prejudice. At least that’s what some so-called “leading academics” are saying.

You see, according to the Rev’d Professor Andrew Linzey, director of the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics, we shouldn’t even use the word “pet,” because the phrase is demeaning to animals.

Instead, we should call a Labrador Retriever a “Companion animal.”

And please, don’t use the word “owner.” That’s demeaning to pets—I mean, to companion animals—as well. Instead, call yourself a “human carer.”

Ay-yi-yi. What’s another phrase for a “leading academic”? [Read more…]

Death by Liberalism

April 28, 2011April 29, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

Death by Liberalism - book by J.R. Dunn
Many AT readers are aware that I have been working on a book project for the past several years. I have mentioned it occasionally on this site, more often in the past few weeks as publication drew nearer. Now zero hour has arrived: Death by Liberalism. The Fatal Outcome of Well-Meaning Liberal Policies is available as of today. (Buy it here.) It’s the first publication from Broadside Books, renowned editor Adam Bellow’s new conservative imprint.

Simply put, DbL deals with the appalling and overlooked fact that liberalism kills. This is no metaphor, no exaggeration, and no mistake. Liberal policies put in place by liberal politicians to achieve liberal goals kill thousands of Americans each year. In the past half-century, liberalism may have killed up to 500,000 American citizens (and this is not even counting DDT or ethanol, which are responsible for a death rate orders of magnitude larger in the international sphere). We have known for years that liberalism is corrupt, wasteful, and futile. Now we know that it is even worse. Liberalism is lethal. [Read more…]

Distant Recall

March 19, 2011March 21, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

by Ken Myers –
In his 1983 Templeton address, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn began by recounting a memory from his childhood. “I recall hearing a number of older people offer the following explanation for the great disasters that had befallen Russia: ‘Men have forgotten God; that’s why this has happened.’”

As a telegraphic summary of the source of Russian ills under communism, it would be hard to improve on those four initial words. Since Solzhenitsyn spoke them, they have served many Christian pundits in the West as a description of the disorders within liberal democratic regimes. But while this slogan boasts a certain scrappy punchiness, it doesn’t offer us much help in figuring out how the memory lapse in question was provoked. [Read more…]