Virtue Quest

I’ve been a bit wiped out the last few days, but I wanted to point out this Guide to Virtue (PDF) that I found over at True Manhood.

A couple caveats: the whole site is focused on masculine spirituality, so it really plays up the manly side of things. (Not that you hadn’t noticed that already from the site’s title!) Second, it’s much more of an outline than a guide. When I first saw it I had hoped for a “how-to.” Still, it’s an excellent summary of the virtues from the Thomistic tradition.

So, I hope it’s useful!

A friend pointed me to a post on one of her favorite blogs, The Gnosis of Now. The author makes an excellent point about a primary aspect of the “American experiment”: that our society is, in a sense, founded on pluralism. The U.S.A. is not a single people, but a collection of peoples. Our social and governmental structures are meant to allow persons from any and every cultural background to live together in peace.

The fact that this ideal has never, even from the very beginning, found full realization raises the question of whether it is at all possible. One could ask whether this is an impossible goal that should be abandoned, or rather an ideal to strive for despite the fact that it is always beyond perfect attainment. One could also argue that, over the past two centuries, a distinctive “American people” and “American culture” has in fact grown and taken root, and that the opportunity for this pluralistic ideal has passed (though the constant influx of immigrants – both legal and illegal – provides new opportunities every day).

In any case, it’s a good reminder to someone like myself who is delving into my medieval and Catholic roots that the Founding Fathers had an entirely different set of problems they were addressing. I’m trying to grow toward personal virtue and social unity; they were trying to find peace and safety for their plurality of faith and cultural traditions.

I suppose I should pray that these are not incompatible goals.

Tomorrow, that is, on the first day of July, I will awaken as a published author.

Sure, this blog is a publication of sorts. But I’m of the old school that believes you’re not really published until someone else – indeed, someone not related to you or biased by friendship – decides your work is worth putting out there. For me, that will happen tomorrow.

Where? you might ask. In a small on-line journal called This Great Society. It’s a quirky little corner of the internet, and well worth a read. I hope that recommendation includes even my own contribution to the issue.

My essay is entitled “Following Distance” and is a kind of meditation on the psychology of driving. I note that the space that separates cars on the road is also a medium of communication, and that giving another driver room is a sign of respect.

This message could not arrive at a more perfect time for me. On Monday, as I was driving home from work, I got in a fender-bender. I rear-ended the car in front of me. Fortunately, no one was hurt and the damage seemed minimal. (I left a pair of dimples on the other car’s bumper in the exact shape of the bolts holding on my front license plate.) And although the other driver called the police, I didn’t receive a ticket. The officer let me off with a warning, for “following too close.”

Anthony Esolen has a fascinating little article at First Things on how out-of-step Bill Shakespeare was with the sexual mores of his contemporaries.

Apparently, Elizabethan times were just as bawdy and lustful as our own, and while Shakespeare liked to make pelvic puns aplenty, he also held the virtue of chastity in much higher esteem than most other writers and entertainers of his day.

That gives me a bit of hope for our own day. All we need is another Shakespeare.

Hat tip to John C. Wright.

Mike Flynn, author of a few speculative fiction novels, including the fascinating Eifelheim, asks the question in the style of a medieval academic debate.

A quick summary, as I understand his argument: classical virtue theory provides a basis for morality among atheists; but most atheists these days reject, not only God, but also any notion of natural good. Therefore, atheists can act morally, but have largely destroyed their own philosophical basis for doing so.

My take: most of us, with or without God, are hypocrites. I do all sorts of stuff I know is wrong; and when I do good things, I don’t always have good reasons for it. So I would separate out the question into two parts:

1. Can atheists act morally? Yes. Experience shows that most atheists do good stuff most of the time.
2. Do atheists have a philosophical basis for moral behavior? That’s a question we can leave to the academics to debate.

For myself, I find my own motivation for acting morally is usually based on what other people will think of me, rather than religious motives. Not that that’s the best reason for doing anything; but at least it’s good to know how weak my moral reasoning can be.

Quick link to a BBC story on how the EU and various other national and international bodies are considering internet access a fundamental human right.

In the fourth paragraph comes a crucial distinction:

“The right to communicate cannot be ignored,” Dr Hamadoun Toure, secretary-general of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), told BBC News.

Now, the right to communicate, I think, can be argued as a fundamental human right. And, as a correllary, the right to ordinary means of communication. But much of the article blurs this distinction, and speaks of internet access as if it was a human right in and of itself.

So, anyone living before the late 1980s was deprived of a fundamental human right? One cannot be fully human without the internet?

I don’t think so.

First off, gotta say, some days it’s good to be Catholic. Here’s a report on Pope Benedict having lunch with the poor of Rome. My favorite part:

The poor — around 200 people — and the Pope enjoyed a meal of lasagna, meatballs, lentils and mashed potatoes. Candies brought by the Pope formed part of dessert and there was a toast with sparkling wine.

That’s right: Catholics know that the poor need good vino!

Next, just so’s you know, my recent post about faith wasn’t meant to say “My God can beat up your god” or anything like that. Yes, many of us (including myself on occasion) fight for some kind of victory and try to cover it with the banner of truth. But I don’t think we should let the antics of the childish distract us from the value of seeking what is true.

More on new year’s resolutions: psychologist Jim Taylor advises such things as developing good habits and overcoming bad ones, especially growing in courage and faith. Hmm… sounds vaguely familiar….

For the economics file: some links on a move to restrict payday loans, which usually charge exorbitant interest rates. Also, tangentially related, an article on why banks want us to use our debit cards like credit cards.

Okay, that’s all for now!

Some practical insights from The New Haven Register: Make the new year a clean, fresh start.

And, credit where credit is due, Peter Singer also advises Aristotelian practicality and realism, as opposed to Platonic mind games.

This may be the last time you ever see me recommend anything by Peter Singer, whose sole virtue seems to be his logical consistency. But, being the main voice of the “personal consent as the sole criterion of goodness” camp, I cannot respect his premises. The good is not something I make up in my mind, or that I simply “prefer”. What is good is based on what is. Being precedes goodness, and defines goodness. A rock and a snake and a woman and an angel, because they have different natures – different ways of being – have different goods; but they all share the fundamental good of fulfilling their actual objective nature.

In other words, a diet of all ice cream all the time will make you fat and miserable, no matter how much you “like” ice cream. And murder kills, not only another human being, but your ability to relate to other people – no matter how “worthy of death” you may deem your victim.