GK Chesterton on Modernity and Christianity

Ran across this fine quote from Chesterton from his book, The Man who was Thursday: A Nightmare.

"Do you see this lantern?" cried Syme in a terrible voice. "Do you see the cross carved on it, and the flame inside? You did not make it. You did not light it. Better men than you, men who could believe and obey, twisted the entrails of iron and preserved the legend of fire. There is not a street you walk on, there is not a thread you wear, that was not made as this lantern was, by denying your philosophy of dirt and rats. You can make nothing. You can only destroy. You will destroy mankind; you will destroy the world. Let that suffice you. Yet this one old Christian lantern you shall not destroy. It shall go where your empire of apes will never have the wit to find it."

There is brilliant insight here I think. That modernity creates things that are inherently temporary and ephemeral. I suspect this is true.

Paul Wood on Trump's Poland Speech

Loved this insight from Paul Wood at his blog, A Political Refugee from the Global Village. I think he is making a really good point--that President Trump is willing to recognize an obvious reality that neither Bush nor Obama were willing to acknowledge, or perhaps even able to see.

Here is most of the post:

Trump's speech yesterday at Warsaw was a very good one, though I have mentioned that I disliked him seeing the Assad regime and Iran as hostile.  

George W. Bush went to lengths to insist the West was not in conflict with Islam. He declared war instead on an abstract noun, terrorism, even though you can't win a war with an abstract noun. Barack Obama said the terrorist murders in Paris, several massacres ago, were "an attack on all of humanity and the universal values we share", even though values are not really universal.

Donald Trump yesterday at Warsaw declared that Western culture, not universal values, are under assault in Europe and the U.S. This is an important step forward.

Read the rest of it here. And do leave comments over there.

David Goldman: Islamic civilization is destroying itself

Very interesting and wide-ranging article here by the David Goldman (aka, Spengler) over at Asia Times.

Some choice morsels.

On Sweden:

Even in liberated, feminist, gender-neutral Sweden, there is something more horrible than rape, something horrible enough to persuade the political elite to sacrifice the physical and mental health of tens of thousands of Swedish women. That is the horror of social disintegration in the Muslim world. Sweden opened its borders to refugees twenty years before the migrant flood arrived on Germany’s doorstep, and the foreign born rose from 9% of the population in 1990 to 15.4% in 2012. Foreigners have a higher birth rate, so the percentage is higher including second-generation immigrants.

And an interesting point about the "character of the people" and the civil war in Syria:

The death of Muslim civilization is too horrible for the Germans to contemplate, because the bell tolls for them, too. And it is particularly painful for Germans to consider the possibility that the source of the terrible events that have driven millions to Germany is the character of the people themselves. Syria has torn itself to pieces not only because of the malfeasance of its leaders but rather because of the character of its people. 

Anyway, read the whole thing here: More Horrible than Rape.

The death of the West

R. R. Reno over at First Things really knocked it out the ballpark with this new article, 'Return of the Strong Gods.'

Check this out:

Our political struggles over nations and nationalisms are best understood as referenda on the West’s meta-politics over the last three generations, which has been one of disenchantment. The rising populism we’re seeing throughout the West reflects a desire for a return of the strong gods to public life. 

Or this:

[After WW2] many political and cultural leaders assumed that restoration of a more humane way of life in the West would require softening and weakening. 

And this:

Our present-day view of the good life “has the features of lightening.” All of this is summed up in his catchphrase the “weakening of Being,” which he sees as a happy unburdening of the West, for weakening promotes tolerance, peace, and freedom. If there are no strong truths, nobody will judge others or limit their freedom. If nothing is worth fighting for, nobody will fight. 

But do yourself a favor and read the whole thing. It is well worth your time.

"Europe is commiting suicide"

From Douglas Murray at The Sunday Times....

I mean that the civilisation we know as Europe is in the process of committing suicide and that neither Britain nor any other western European country can avoid that fate, because we all appear to suffer from the same symptoms and maladies.

And this:

So whereas European identity in the past could be attributed to highly specific, not to mention philosophically and historically deep foundations (the rule of law, the ethics derived from the continent’s history and philosophy), today the ethics and beliefs of Europe — indeed the identity and ideology of Europe — have become about “respect”, “tolerance” and (most self-abnegating of all) “diversity”.

Do let Mr. Murray how much you appreciate his excellent writing. He is telling the truth. But the ruling class of Europe hate it and will not even hear it...

Why the West is losing the War against Militant Islam

by Adam Borowski

1. No Culture - the West has no culture anymore. And while it would be great to live in a perfect world of harmony, there are predatory cultures on Earth that have rigid rules and those cultures have one aim and one aim only – world domination. The West is weak – and everyone on the planet sees it.

2. Western Values – discoveries. Education. Freedom of epression. Emphasis on an individual. Cherishing – revering even – intellectual feats. And many, many more. But that was in the past. In the era of peripatetic philosophers who devisedall the political systems we know today. Here are the new Western values: rampant greed. Careerism. Celebrity culture. Nihilism. Cheap Machiavellianism. Intellectual devolution. Censorship. Surveillance. Naive Tolerance--the symbol of which ought to be a refugee beating a woman who offred him water.

Read it all here.

Matthew Hanley: How Islam Set Back Western Civilization

Wow. Check this out and then read the whole article:

Pirenne stressed that the source of the Roman Empire’s vitality cannot be disassociated from its essentially Mediterranean character and orientation; that clearly remained intact for quite a while. Western trade flourished as before, connected with the great cities of the East – where prosperity, population, and learning were concentrated. The overall features of life throughout the region in 600 were similar to what they had been in 400.

It was not until the advent of Islam in the 7^th century, precisely then and only then, that destruction really arrived. Recurrent Islamic raids altered the very orientation of the littoral peoples; they fled the Mediterranean and for the first time looked to the north. East was severed from West, and the previously unified Mediterranean, “having become a Musalman lake, was no longer a thoroughfare of commerce and of thought which it always had been.”

Unlike the German invaders, wherever the Arabs went they ruled. This was a dimension of their religious claims. They sought not conversion per se, but demanded subjection, creating an insuperable barrier between the conquered and the Muslims: “What a contrast between them [the Arabs] and Theodoric, who placed himself at the service of those he had conquered, and sought to assimilate himself to them!” The whole region was thereby transformed, as the Arabs ushered in “a complete break with the past.”

Egyptian papyri, which had been widespread in the West (and a solid indicator of literacy), disappeared, as did distinctive coins that were in use right up until the Arab conquest – leading to the barter system. Despite the literary and archaeological sources, however, Pirenne’s arguments were dismissed in favor of the view that Islam had been (unlike “repressive” Christianity) an enlightening force.

A brilliant and important article. Read it all HERE.

Algerian Christian refused burial in public cemetery

A Christian family in Algeria has been refused permission to bury their son in the local public cemetery because he was not a Muslim.

“The leaders of the mosque demanded that I would have to follow Islamic burial rites if I was to bury my son in the cemetery,” said the father of 24-year-old Lahlou Naraoui, a University student.

Naraoui’s family, who live in Chemini in the Kabylie region of northern Algeria, said they could not follow the Muslim leaders’ demands and instead chose to bury their son on private land.

From World Watch Monitor. 

But really, in the end this is good. It means that Christians must form their own identity, including places of burial. And in terms of North Africa, this is most fitting, as the first Christians there achieved legal recognition as burial societies, and some of their first real estate was in grave yards.

In the end is my beginning, as TS Eliot said. Indeed.

Pope Francis and Islam

The pope recently released an encyclical, Gospel of Joy, and he has a few things to say about Islam in there. Jesuit father Samir Khalil Samir, an Egyptian by birth, takes a critical look at some of the statements in that encyclical. The whole thing is worth reading, but here is an example. He starts by quoting the encyclical, and then offering his own comments. This part is about evangelism:

The same theme is found in n. 251: "In this dialogue, ever friendly and sincere, attention must always be paid to the essential bond between dialogue and proclamation".

Sometimes, in dialogue, when it comes to proclamation, it appears to displeasure our partners, who immediately accuse us of proselytizing . Instead, it has nothing to do with proselytism. It is about love: out of love , I will proclaim the good news that frees me and gives me joy. And you too should offer me the good that you have encountered in your faith. We must rid ourselves of diatribes, of intellectual arguments and practices aimed at winning the other over, rather witness to truth with one another.

Amen! Thank your Fr Samir for this excellent writing. Read it all HERE.

Quotes from the brilliant Bernard Lewis

I really love Bernard Lewis, the great orientalist. I was just reading one of his books and thought I would share with you some of great, insightful quotes I found:

Lewis, Bernard. 1993. Islam and the West. Oxford.

“The imported idea of ethnic and territorial nationhood remains, like secularism, alien and incompletely assimilated.” (p 136) 

“Since for Muslims Islam is, by definition, superior to all other faiths, the failures and defeats of Muslims in this world can only mean that they are not practicing authentic Islam and that their states are not true Islamic states.” (p 136, 7) 

“…many of the extremist organizations tend to be Christian, for in the radical extremism that they profess, Christians still hope to find the acceptance and equality that eluded them in nationalism.” (p 144) 

“After a long period of secular, liberal, and nationalist ideologies and programs, the non-Muslim minorities are no longer conditioned to revert to their former position of inferiority. Some have sought a solution to their problem in emigration; some have resorted to radical politics; and some look anxiously, with decreasing confidence, for saviors from outside.” (page 146) 

“Humiliation and privation, frustration and failure have so far discredited all the imported solutions and made increasing numbers of Muslims ready to believe those who tell them that only in a return to their own true faith and divinely ordained way of life can they find salvation in this world and the next.” (153)

Bruce Frohnen on T.S. Eliot, culture, and secularization

Eliot’s salient point does not concern the process of secularization; it concerns the definition of culture. For, in Eliot’s view, culture is not and cannot be separated from religion. In the West, culture is part and parcel of the Judeo-Christian tradition. Ironically, our culture’s problem of secularization arises from one of its own defining characteristics: the higher law tradition. The separation of law—and those who would interpret it—from the king, is the source of liberty. That separation has its roots in a religious tradition; the Jewish tradition, in which kings, even when they existed, were viewed as men rather than gods, as servants rather than masters of the laws. Unlike their Gentile neighbors, the Jewish people held their rulers to a law higher than their own will; a law handed down by God and applied equally to all.

From the essay, TS Eliot and the Necessity of Christian Culture, by Bruce Frohnen.

Islam: A mono-lingual religious empire

At the police registries where Moroccans go to officially designate their childrens' names, non-Arab names like Jurgurtha and Messina -- the names of ancient Berber kings -- are blacklisted. Only Arabic names like Hassan and Ahmed are allowed.

"To Berber militants, this is a case of trying to completely eradicate any Berber heritage," Jalali Saib, a leading activist who teaches at Rabat University, told the BBC earlier this year.

The first language of most Moroccans is some form of Berber, generally called Tamazight, though there are a number of variants. But the constitution recognizes only Arabic as the official language.

Check it all out here.

Mark Bradley on Christianity in Iran

Bradley is one of the few people who has written on the current awakening happening in Iran. It is hard to get information related to it, and harder still to explain why it is happening in Iran, rather than in, say, Jordan or Syria, countries with great religious freedom (relatively speaking). Bradley proposes that the Shia-Sufi DNA of Iranian Islam is a key factor:

“The Shia faith instills the importance of a just Imam, who is willing to die for his people, yet still present to guide, and certainly determined to return to return in victory; and the philosophy of Sufism invites everyone to move beyond rigid religion, and embark on a journey where they deny themselves to experience the light. As disillusionment with the Islamic revolution has spread, so the appeal of a religion which shares so much with Shiism and Sufism has increased—especially when shed of its Western externals. Rather than being the enemy of Christianity in Iran, the dual religious identity of Iran might prove to be its best friend.” p. 22

Bradley, Mark. 2008. Iran and Christianity: historical identity and present relevance. London: Continuum.

If you are interested in the topic and want to read his ideas, that book I just quoted from is the more rigorous and detailed one, but it's hard to find and expensive. Rather, order his earlier and more basic (but much cheaper) Iran: Open Hearts in a Closed Country.

New Book: Lee Smith's 'The Strong Horse'

This looks like a very good book. I have some favorites on the topic of recent developments in the Muslim world. I like Viorst's 1995 book 'Sandcastles' quite a lot. There is also the under-rated Warriors of the Prophet.

But this new book by Lee Smith looks quite excellent. I would very much like to read it. Also if any of you do read it please let me know your thoughts on it. Here is a review over at the CS Monitor.

A section:

But just pages into the introduction, Smith, who is the Middle East correspondent for the Weekly Standard, shatters the stereotype evoked in the jacket’s photograph by stating that, “I give no credence to the idea that the Arab-Israeli crisis is the [Middle East’s] central issue.” Just one of a number of provocative assertions, Smith wastes little time in introducing a reexamination of Middle Eastern history that calls into question even the most conventional of American and Western beliefs.

To begin with, he argues that 9/11 was not an attack on America but rather the extension of an inter-Arab fight exported to the new battleground of lower Manhattan. “Bin Ladenism is not drawn from the extremist fringe but represents the political and social norm [of the Arabic-speaking Middle East].” Smith explains these two conclusions, as he does the Middle East’s political philosophy writ large, using the “strong horse” principle.

A Prophet Speaks: "The fall of Europe is close at hand."

The Cardinal of the Czech Republic, Miloslav Vick, is concerned about the fate of Christianity in Europe. He argues that Europe must return to its roots, if not the fate of the continent will be to become Islamic.

"Medieval Muslims tried to conquer Europe but Christians expelled them,” he said. “Today there is a similar war but with spiritual weapons. However, Europe lacks the tools and ability for a spiritual struggle while Muslims are well equipped," he says, adding that "the fall of Europe is close at hand.”

From HERE.

The day is coming when finding a practicing Christian in France will be as interesting and exotic as finding an Assyrian Christian in Iraq.

Pre-Christian pagans and post-Christian pagans and Newbigin

[Modern society is] a pagan society, and its paganism, having been born out of the rejection of Christianity, is far more resistant to the gospel than the pre-Christian paganism with which cross-cultural missions have been familiar.

--Lesslie Newbigin

Lyotard on the transition from Modernity to Postmodernity

He was writing in 1979, from ch. 5 of his 'the postmodern condition':

What is new in all of this is that the old poles of attraction represented by nation-states, parties, professions, institutions, and historical traditions are losing their attraction. And it does not look as though they wilt be replaced, at least not on their former scale, The Trilateral Commission is not a popular pole of attraction. “Identifying” with the great names, the heroes of contemporary history, is becoming more and more difficult. Dedicating oneself to “catching up with Germany,” the life goal the French president [Giscard d’Estaing at the time this book was published in France] seems to be offering his countrymen, is not exactly exciting. But then again, it is not exactly a life goal. It depends on each individual’s industriousness. Each individual is referred to himself. And each of us knows that our self does not amount to much.

This breaking up of the grand Narratives (discussed below, sections 9 and 10) leads to what some authors analyse in terms of the dissolution of the social bond and the disintegration of social aggregates into a mass of individual atoms thrown into the absurdity of Brownian motion. Nothing of the kind is happening: this point of view, it seems to me, is haunted by the paradisaic representation of a lost "organic” society.

The European Myth about the human essence and Talal Asad

The construction of civilizational difference is not exclusive in any simple sense. The de-essentialization of Islam is paradigmatic for all thinking about the assimilation of non-European peoples to European civilization. The idea that people's historical experience is inessential to them, that it can be shed at will, makes it possible to argue more strongly for the Enlightenment's claim to universality: Muslims, as members of the abstract category "humans," can be assimilated or (as some recent theorist have put it) "translated" into a global ("European") civilization once they have divested themselves of what many of them regard (mistakenly) as essential to themselves. The belief that human beings can be separated from their histories and traditions makes it possible to urge a Europeanization of the Islamic world. And by the same logic, it underlies the belief that the assimilation to Europe's civilization of Muslim immigrants who are--for good or for ill--already in European states is necessary and desirable.

— Talal Asad (Formations of the Secular: Christianity, Islam, Modernity)

Pius XII on Contextualization/Indigenization

This is the reason why the Catholic Church has neither scorned nor rejected the pagan philosophies. Instead, after freeing them from error and all contamination she has perfected and completed them by Christian revelation. So likewise the Church has graciously made her own the native art and culture which in some countries is so highly developed. She has carefully encouraged them and has brought them to a point of aesthetic perfection that of themselves they probably would never have attained. By no means has she repressed native customs and traditions but has given them a certain religious significance; she has even transformed their feast days and made them serve to commemorate the martyrs and to celebrate mysteries of the faith.

Pius XII, Evangelii Praecones §58

Claude Geffre on culture and religion

"The relationship between religion and culture is extremely complex, and the Westerners who pride themselves on the autonomy of a culture said to be atheistic often forget that is still a post-Christian culture."

Claude Geffre in Many Mansions? p 96