Forward To The Past! — Return To 1950s Pathetic Goal For Anyone Claiming To Be A Christian
We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats’ feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar — T.S. Eliot, “The Hollow Men.”
By John Lofton, Editor
Paul Weyrich is a self-identified “Greek Catholic.” William Lind is a self-identified “Anglo-Catholic.” In addition, Paul, a long-time friend, is also Chairman and CEO of the “Free Congress Research And Education Foundation;” Lind is Director of its “Center For Cultural Conservatism.”
In an article by Weyrich/Lind (WL) headlined “The Next Conservatism” in “The American Conservative” magazine (2/12/07), they advocate, to save conservatism and possibly our country, something they call “retroculture.” They say “retroculture” is “a conscious, deliberate recovery of the past….good things from the past…. By making old things new, retroculture might offer a counterweight to the endless spiral downward that pop culture decrees in everything.”
OK, so what, specifically, are some of the “good things” W/L want to recover from the past? Well, they say: “Traditional cities and towns, passenger trains and streetcars, are examples of this tendency, which we label retroculture. The next conservatism should incorporate retroculture as one of its guiding themes, a basis for its actions beyond politics. Want to fix the public schools? How about Schools 1950? We already have retro cars such as Volkswagen’s New Beetle and the Mini. Why not retro manners and retro dress? It would be nice to see men’s and ladies’ hats again instead of kids’ underwear. By making old things new, retroculture might offer a counterweight to the endless spiral downward that pop culture decrees in everything. If fire is needed to fight fire, perhaps fashion should be used to fight fashion.”
The essence of “the next conservatism,” W/L say, is that: “It wants to restore the old ways of life, the ways in which the vast majority of Americans lived up through the 1950s. If it fails in this, if conservatives continue to win politically while losing the culture war, it will have failed in everything.” In a letter-to-the-editor of “The American Conservative” (3/12/07), W/L, responding to some of the comment on their previous article, “cheerfully” accepted the risk of being labeled “geezer conservatives.” They wrote, in part: “When we are asked, ‘Just what is it that you guys, as conservatives, want?’ our answer will be, ‘An America pretty much like the one we had in the 1950s.’”
But, why aren’t two men who claim to be Christians seeking to build/restore a Christian America?!
In their “Next Conservatism” article, W/L say their “starting point” is Russell Kirk’s “observation that conservatism is not an ideology. Rather, it is a way of life.” But, isn’t Christianity a way of life?! Indeed, is our Lord Jesus Christ not the way, the truth, the life?!And does He not tell us that apart from Him we can do nothing?! (John 15:5).
W/L say: “For at least a decade, the conservative movement has been on intellectual cruise control.” In Christian/Biblical terms, however — for a lot longer than a decade — this movement has been not on cruise control but out of gas — nothing in the tank, zero, zip, zilch, nada.
W/L say: “If conservatism is to be re-established as an intellectual force, and not merely a label for whatever the establishment does to its own benefit, it must first re-awaken intellectually. We need a new conservative agenda.” But, as a Christian, I don’t care about the kind of Godless/Christless/no-Bible conservatism being pushed by W/L. It is this kind of conservatism R.L. Dabney attacked when, more that a century ago, he said:
“Conservatism’s history has been that it demurs to each aggression of the progressive party, and aims to save its credit by a respectable amount of growling, but always acquiesces at last in the innovation. What was the resisted novelty of yesterday is today one of the accepted principles of conservatism; it is now conservative only in affecting to resist the next innovation, which will tomorrow be forced upon its timidity and will be succeeded by some third revolution, to be denounced and then adopted in its turn. American conservatism is merely the shadow that follows Radicalism as it moves forward to perdition. It remains behind it, but never retards it, and always advances near its leader. This pretended salt hath utterly lost its savor; wherewith shall it be salted? Its impotency is not hard to explain. It is worthless because it is the conservatism of expediency only, and not of sturdy principle. It tends to risk nothing serious for the sake of truth.”
W/L say: “Were conservatives to turn away from politics altogether—something to which justified frustrations with the Republican Party could lead—the result would be disastrous.” Really? More disastrous than the “conservatives” within the GOP who gave us George Bush who gave us the biggest, most expensive, intrusive, debt-ridden, lawless Federal Government in our history plus his murderous unGodly, unConstitutional, unnecessary war in Iraq? I think not.
W/L say: “The next conservatism…requires breaking the monopoly of professional politicians and two parties that are for the most part one party—the Party of I’ve Got Mine….The [conservative] movement’s main problem over all the years has been its tendency to subordinate itself to the Republican Party.” And this both-parties-are-really-one-party view is why W/L left the GOP and voted for Michael Peroutka for President in 2004, right? Oh, I’m sorry. Such political courage is for the next conservatism.
W/L say: “So the next conservative movement [should]….look beyond politics to lives well lived in the old ways, as lamps for their neighbors’ footsteps, as harbingers of a world restored, and as testimonies to the only safe form of power, the power of example. We might add, as gifts to God as well.”Well, no. Instead, we must follow: God’s way, the “old paths” (Jeremiah 6:16); His Word which is a lamp unto our feet; and His plan which is restoring the world right now. A return to the 1950s is no gift to God.
More than 60 years ago, in the Preface to his book “The Liberal Imagination” (1950), Lionel Trilling (a Liberal) gave his (accurate) assessment of the place occupied by Liberalism in American intellectual life. He said this: “In the United States at this time Liberalism is not only the dominant but even the sole intellectual tradition. For it is the plain fact that nowadays there are no conservative or reactionary ideas in general circulation. This does not mean, of course, that there is no impulse to conservatism or to reaction. Such impulses are certainly very strong, perhaps even stronger than most of us know. But the conservative impulse and the reactionary impulse do not, with some isolated and some ecclesiastical exceptions, express themselves in ideas but only in action or in irritable mental gestures which seek to resemble ideas” (emphasis mine.)
As I read and reflected on the W/L plan to return to the 1950s, I thought of what Trilling writes here, specifically the phrase “irritable mental gestures which seek to resemble ideas.” And I thought of this particular phrase because that’s what W/L have given us, “irritable mental gestures which seek to resemble ideas.”
So, after more than 40 years of being “conservative activists,” after more than four decades of eating, sleeping, drinking and breathing “politics” in Washington DC, things, for Paul Weyrich and William Lind, end with not a bang but a whimper, a call for a return to the 1950s.
As I read and reflected on the W/L plan to return to the 1950s, I thought of something else in addition to what Lionel Trilling wrote. I was reminded of “Statler” and “Waldorf,” the two elderly, clueless gentlemen in the balcony on the old TV program “The Muppet Show.” One thing they said is applicable here, however. In one skit this exchange occurred:
Statler: What would you do if you were a rich man?
Waldorf: I’d buy the network and cancel this show!
The temptation here is to say: “Good idea. And the conservative show should also be canceled” — except it was over long ago, when it began, without God up front, without Christ as King, without Scripture as its road map.
A footnote: In their “Next Conservatism” piece, W/L do say the “foremost task” of the next conservatism “is defending and restoring Western, Judeo-Christian culture.” But, (a) there is no development at all of this statement, no details given re: what this might entail. This assertion is clearly mindless, meaningless boilerplate. And (b) there is no such thing as a Judeo-Christian anything — these two faiths being directly at odds over the most important question in history: Who is Jesus Christ? Indeed, W/L say: “We can give honest reassurance to those Americans who fear that a vibrant cultural conservatism would impose some sort of Puritan theocracy on America.”
CATHOLIC HISTORIAN Christopher Dawson believed and wrote- ‘In the Beginning was the Word, and it is the creative and informing power of the Word that is the foundation of reality.’Now, over the years, when I have talked to some of my Roman Catholic friends the way I have written in the preceding part of this article, they have told me — smilingly, patiently, sometimes smugly and condescendingly — that, well, we have different “traditions.” Noting that I am (I’m paraphrasing) a literalistic, Bible-thumping, rather fundamentalistic, Puritanical/Protestant/Calvinist, they have said, in so many ways, that they are not into this.
But, even within their own “tradition,” there was a time when Roman/Anglo-Catholics were into talking about and writing about the necessity of building/rebuilding a Christian culture/society. For example, T.S. Eliot, an Anglo-Catholic, wrote a book “The Idea of a Christian Society” (1939) which was motivated by his concern that a growing secularism threatened the very existence of Western (Christian) civilization.
Eliot believed the real issue then was “between the secularists and the anti-secularists, between those who believe only in values realizable in time and on earth, and those who believe alsoin values realized only out of time… . The danger, for those who start from the temporal end, is Utopianism; settle the problem of distribution — of wheat, coffee, aspirin or wireless sets — and all the problems of evil will disappear. The danger, for those who start from the spiritual end, is Indifferentism; neglect the affairs of the world and save as many souls out of the wreckage as possible.”
In “Thoughts after Lambeth” Eliot wrote: “The world is trying the experiment of attempting to form a civilized but non-Christian mentality. The experiment will fail; but we must be very patient in awaiting its collapse; meanwhile redeeming the time: so that the Faith may be preserved alive through the dark ages before us; to renew and rebuild civilization, and save the world from suicide.”
Another example: the Roman Catholic historian Christopher Dawson (1889-1970). Most of what he wrote is well worth reading. In an article “Christianity As The Soul of the West,” he wrote: “The modern dilemma is essentially a spiritual one, and every one of its main aspects, moral, political and scientific, brings us back to the need of a religious (Christian) solution….The civilisation that denies God denies its own foundation. For the glory of man is a dim reflection of the glory of God, and when the latter is denied the former fades…. “In the Beginning was the Word, and it is the creative and informing power of the Word that is the foundation of reality. And if this is true of the world of nature, it is still more true of the world of society and culture. We must abandon the vain attempt to disregard spiritual unity and to look for a basis of social construction in material and external things. The acceptance of spiritual reality must be the basic element in the culture of the future, for it is spirit that is the principle of unity and matter that is the principle of division (emphasis mine.)…. “No secular ideal of social progress or economic efficiency can take the place of this. It is only the ideal of a spiritual order which transcends the relative value of the economic and political world that is capable of overcoming the forces of disintegration and destruction that exist in modern civilisation. The faith of the future cannot be economic or scientific or even moral; it must be religious….God comes first, not man. He is more real than the whole external universe. Man passes away, empires and civilisations rise and fall, the stars grow old; God remains. This is the fundamental truth which runs through the whole of the Bible….(emphasis mine.)…. “It is just this truth that the modern world, like the ancient world before it, finds most difficult to accept. You even find people who reject it and still wish to call themselves Christians. They water down religion to a series of moral platitudes and then dignify this mixture of vague religiosity and well-meaning moral optimism with the respectable name of Christianity. (emphasis mine).
Pope Leo XIII (1810-1903) also said many things that one would think Weyrich/Lind might find useful to guide their thinking and writing. In his encyclical “On The Origin Of Civil Power,” he wrote, regarding political power, “that it comes from God, for it finds this clearly testified in the sacred Scriptures and in the monuments of antiquity; besides, no other doctrine can be conceived which is more agreeable to reason, or more in accord with the safety of both princes and peoples.
“In truth, that the source of human power is in God the books of the Old Testament in very many places clearly establish. ‘By me kings reign … by me princes rule, and the mighty decree justice.’ And in another place: ‘Give ear you that rule the people … for power is given you of the Lord and strength by the Most High.’ The same thing is contained in the Book of Ecclesiasticus: ‘Over every nation he bath set a ruler’….
“To the Roman governor, ostentatiously pretending that he had the power of releasing and of condemning, our Lord Jesus Christ answered: ‘Thou shouldst not have any power against me unless it were given thee from above.’ And St. Augustine, in explaining this passage, says: ‘Let us learn what He said, which also He taught by His Apostle, that there is no power but from God.’ The faithful voice of the Apostles, as an echo, repeats the doctrine and precepts of Jesus Christ. The teaching of Paul to the Romans, when subject to the authority of heathen princes, is lofty and full of gravity: ‘There is not power but from God,’ from which, as from its cause, he draws this conclusion: ‘The prince is the minister of God.’….whatever there is of government and authority, its origin is derived from one and the same Creator and Lord of the world, who is God.”
Amen!
This point is reiterated in Leo XIII’s encyclical “On The Christian Constitution Of States”: “All public power must proceed from God. For God alone is the true and supreme Lord of the world. Everything, without exception, must be subject to Him, and must serve him, so that whosoever holds the right to govern holds it from one sole and single source, namely, God, the sovereign Ruler of all.”
Leo then addresses Godlessness and its results in a passage that describes the present political situation today: “The authority of God is passed over in silence, just as if there were no God; or as if He cared nothing for human society; or as if men, whether in their individual capacity or bound together in social relations, owed nothing to God; or as if there could be a government of which the whole origin and power and authority did not reside in God Himself. Thus, as is evident, a State becomes nothing but a multitude which is its own master and ruler. And since the people is declared to contain within itself the spring-head of all rights and of all power, it follows that the State does not consider itself bound by any kind of duty toward God. Moreover, it believes that it is not obliged to make public profession of any religion; or to inquire which of the very many religions is the only one true; or to prefer one religion to all the rest; or to show to any form of religion special favour; but, on the contrary, is bound to grant equal rights to every creed, so that public order may not be disturbed by any particular form of religious belief.”
He also says: “And it is a part of this (Godless) theory that all questions that concern religion are to be referred to private judgment; that every one is to be free to follow whatever religion he prefers, or none at all if he disapprove of all. From this the following consequences logically flow: that the judgment of each one’s conscience is independent of all law; that the most unrestrained opinions may be openly expressed as to the practice or omission of divine worship; and that every one has unbounded license to think whatever he chooses and to publish abroad whatever he thinks.” This, of course, is exactly the position of President Bush who has said repeatedly and proudly that what makes America great is that everyone here is free to worship or not worship, everyone can have his own religion, make up his own right and wrong. God has a different view saying, among other things, that that nation is blessed which has Him as Lord.
In his encyclical “On The Nature Of Human Liberty,” Pope Leo declared: “The eternal law of God is the sole standard and rule of human liberty, not only in each individual man, but also in the community and civil society which men constitute when united. Therefore, the true liberty of human society does not consist in every man doing what he pleases, for this would simply end in turmoil and confusion, and bring on the overthrow of the State; but rather in this, that through the injunctions of the civil law all may more easily conform to the prescriptions of the eternal law.
“Likewise, the liberty of those who are in authority does not consist in the power to lay unreasonable and capricious commands upon their subjects, which would equally be criminal and would lead to the ruin of the commonwealth; but the binding force of human laws is in this, that they are to be regarded as applications of the eternal law, and incapable of sanctioning anything which is not contained in the eternal law, as in the principle of all law. Thus, St. Augustine most wisely says: ‘I think that you can see, at the same time, that there is nothing just and lawful in that temporal law, unless what men have gathered from this eternal law.’ If, then, by anyone in authority, something be sanctioned out of conformity with the principles of right reason, and consequently hurtful to the commonwealth, such an enactment can have no binding force of law, as being no rule of justice, but certain to lead men away from that good which is the very end of civil society.
“Therefore, the nature of human liberty, however it be considered, whether in individuals or in society, whether in those who command or in those who obey, supposes the necessity of obedience to some supreme and eternal law, which is no other than the authority of God, commanding good and forbidding evil. And, so far from this most just authority of God over men diminishing, or even destroying their liberty, it protects and perfects it, for the real perfection of all creatures is found in the prosecution and attainment of their respective ends; but the supreme end to which human liberty must aspire is God.”
Now there’s a message to preach to all those in civil government at all levels!
Here are excerpts from other encyclicals by Leo XIII:
“On Christians As Citizens”
POPE LEO XIII repeatedly, and Biblically, attacked the Godless State for playing – not obeying – God.“From day to day it becomes more and more evident how needful it is that the principles of Christian wisdom should ever be borne in mind, and that the life, the morals, and the institutions of nations should be wholly conformed to them. For, when these principles have been disregarded, evils so vast have accrued that no right-minded man can face the trials of the time being without grave anxiety or consider the future without alarm….
“If, then, a political government strives after external advantages only, and the achievement of a cultured and prosperous life; if, in administering public affairs, it is wont to put God aside, and show no solicitude for the upholding of moral law, it deflects woefully from its right course and from the injunctions of nature; nor should it be accounted as a society or a community of men, but only as the deceitful imitation or appearance of a society….
“The very times in which we live are warning us to seek remedies there where alone they are to be found-namely, by re-establishing in the family circle and throughout the whole range of society the doctrines and practices of the Christian religion….
“It is a high crime indeed to withdraw allegiance from God in order to please men, an act of consummate wickedness to break the laws of Jesus Christ, in order to yield obedience to earthly rulers….True and legitimate authority is void of sanction, unless it proceed from God, the supreme Ruler and Lord of all….
“As St. Thomas maintains: ‘Each one is under obligation to show forth his faith, either to instruct and encourage others of the faithful, or to repel the attacks of unbelievers.’ To recoil before an enemy, or to keep silence when from all sides such clamors are raised against truth, is the part of a man either devoid of character or who entertains doubt as to the truth of what he professes to believe. In both cases such mode of behaving is base and is insulting to God, and both are incompatible with the salvation of mankind. This kind of conduct is profitable only to the enemies of the faith, for nothing emboldens the wicked so greatly as the lack of courage on the part of the good. Moreover, want of vigor on the part of Christians is so much the more blameworthy, as not seldom little would be needed on their part to bring to naught false charges and refute erroneous opinions, and by always exerting themselves more strenuously they might reckon upon being successful.
“After all, no one can be prevented from putting forth that strength of soul which is the characteristic of true Christians, and very frequently by such display of courage our enemies lose heart and their designs are thwarted. Christians are, moreover, born for combat, whereof the greater the vehemence, the more assured, God aiding, the triumph: ‘Have confidence; I have overcome the world.’ Nor is there any ground for alleging that Jesus Christ, the Guardian and Champion of the Church, needs not in any manner the help of men. Power certainly is not wanting to Him, but in His loving kindness He would assign to us a share in obtaining and applying the fruits of salvation procured through His grace.
“As to those who mean to take part in public affairs, they should avoid with the very utmost care two criminal excesses: so-called prudence and false courage. Some there are, indeed, who maintain that it is not opportune boldly to attack evil - doing in its might and when in the ascendant, lest, as they say, opposition should exasperate minds already hostile….They moan over the loss of faith and the perversion of morals, yet trouble themselves not to bring any remedy; nay, not seldom, even add to the intensity of the mischief through too much forbearance or harmful dissembling.”
“On Jesus Christ The Redeemer”
“The outlook on the future is by no means free from anxiety; on the contrary, there are many serious reasons for alarm, on account of numerous and long-standing causes of evil, of both a public and a private nature. Nevertheless, the close of the century really seems in God’s mercy to afford us some degree of consolation and hope. For no one will deny that renewed interest in spiritual matters and a revival of Christian faith and piety are influences of great moment for the common good….
“For what so necessary for our times as a widespread renovation among the nations of Christian principles and old-fashioned virtues?….the greatest of all misfortunes is to fall away from the World’s Redeemer and to abandon Christian faith and practice, they would be only too eager to turn back, and so escape certain destruction….For Christ is the fountain - head of all good….He left behind Him His Law for the protection and welfare of the human race….
“We are told that society is quite able to help itself; that it can flourish without the assistance of Christianity, and attain its end by its own unaided efforts. Public administrators prefer a purely secular system of government. All traces of the religion of our forefathers are daily disappearing from political life and administration. What blindness! Once the idea of the authority of God as the Judge of right and wrong is forgotten, law must necessarily lose its primary authority and justice must perish: and these are the two most powerful and most necessary bonds of society. Similarly, once the hope and expectation of eternal happiness is taken away, temporal goods will be greedily sought after. Every man will strive to secure the largest share for himself. Hence arise envy, jealousy, hatred. The consequences are conspiracy, anarchy, nihilism. There is neither peace abroad nor security at home. Public life is stained with crime.”
