Mind and Heart

Had a good conversation with a friend of mine who invites me to turn to atheism as a progressive step. His view is that religion was useful once but holds us back now (and by some 600 years or so) from true progress. He's got a lot of truth-seeking energy and I think he could become an evangelical Catholic given the chance. One of his recommendations is to look at Sam Harris and his study of the emotional experiences that he thinks are what keep Christians devoted. He probably hasn't been exposed to Catholics for whom emotional aspects, while important, are not the one thing that matters. This bit from this article on Thomism and the new evangelization hits the mark for me:

How does the intellect provide for our deepest happiness? By giving us ultimate perspective. If you know where your true good lies, you can love that good, and in loving that good, you can remain at peace, even in the midst of the storms of life.

Amen.

Supply and Demand in this Woolworths branch

So there's this branch of Woolworths in Dortmund, Germany, where shoppers were told that Christmas merchandise will no longer be sold there (at least this year), and the story goes viral because a staff member said,

"We are a Muslim business, we don’t want to sell Christmas articles”.

But that's not the problem. It's a business, so it has to move with the demand, and there was apparently little demand for Christmas merchandise. And why is that?

That's the story, I think.

Inevitable clash

Professor Anthony Esolen saw it coming and it did not disappoint. The clash is inevitable because the conflict in principles is that of fundamentals. Christianity, specifically, stands in the way, incompatible with what really looks like an odd mix of Marxist and self-indulgent ideologies.

Really reminds me of the Old World empire that flooded the whole world in Terry Goodkind's Sword of Truth novels. Only those committed to fight against it made its defeat possible. Today it's not evident that Christians are committed to fight against the growing hostility against Christianity and its heritage.

Many of us in the Catholic Church have a tendency to be too passive. Where is that nonviolent but unyielding power with which Jesus of Nazareth overcame the world, holding to the truth to the end about who he was and what was wrong with the world? We sort of expect our bishops, especially our Pope, to be bold in proclaiming the truth in season or out. I think Professor Esolen is doing a fine job of it.

What about me?