Sunday, April 08, 2018

Reading assignment

People need to read C. S. Lewis's Meditation on the Third Commandment. Over, and over and over, and over, and over. 

Christianity will make you uncomfortable with the ideology of ANY party. If you are completely comfortable with the ideology of any party as a Christian, you are not thinking clearly.

10 comments:

Starhopper said...

Which 3rd Commandment? The Catholic one (concerning the Sabbath), or the Protestant one (about taking the Lord's name in vain)?

W.LindsayWheeler said...

Yes, I would like the answer to that as well. I didn't see any mention of the third commandment there as well. What is he referencing.

Starhopper said...

Whichever it was, Lewis was spot on in his warning against confusing Christianity with any particular political ism. That's why I always tune out anyone who says nonsensical things like "liberals/conservatives/Trump supporters/whatever cannot be Christian" or "If you consider yourself to be a Christian, then you MUST vote for the [fill in the blank] party." (Which - no surprise - is always the party the speaker belongs to. How convenient.)

Now I don't know which commandment such an attitude is violating, but it's certainly one of them!

bmiller said...

FYI

Lewis called his essay "Meditations on the Third Commandment", because a Christian party runs the grave risk of blaspheming the name of the Lord:


Link may not work

Joseph Hinman (Metacrock) said...

Whichever it was, Lewis was spot on in his warning against confusing Christianity with any particular political ism. That's why I always tune out anyone who says nonsensical things like "liberals/conservatives/Trump supporters/whatever cannot be Christian" or "If you consider yourself to be a Christian, then you MUST vote for the [fill in the blank] party." (Which - no surprise - is always the party the speaker belongs to. How convenient.)

amen!

Kevin said...

VR: "Christianity will make you uncomfortable with the ideology of ANY party."

Absolutely right, which is why I can't in good conscience vote for either party. "Vote for the candidate" falls apart when he simply votes along party lines the vast majority of the time.

A few questions that I welcome anyone to answer, assuming you agree with VR in the above quote.

1. How do you vote for either party in good conscience if part of what they stand for conflicts with how you live as a Christian?

2. What makes you believe any given candidate is honest and cares about more than his own career and power? When they get caught in an egregious lie - and they all do - how do you continue to support them when they just lied to you to benefit themselves?

3. What makes you so passionate about defending one party and attacking the other side if your own side makes you uncomfortable? (If you don't do this, you have my respect - you're an increasingly rare breed!)


I ask these because from what I have learned, both parties suck and are filled with rich liars who excel at fearmongering in order to whip the sheep into a frenzy. I trust no media source to tell me the full truth or even what I need to know, and the owners and journalists are very often buddies with the politicians. So basically I'm just disconnected from the entire political process beyond watching and finding more flaws. To vote is to decide which values I want to compromise in favor of others, and which way I want to make life worse for my kids over another. I don't see how anyone who is truly uncomfortable with Democrats votes Democrat, and same for Republicans.

Starhopper said...

"How do you vote for either party in good conscience if part of what they stand for conflicts with how you live as a Christian?"

I'll answer this question for now, and mull the others over for a while.

A Christian can vote for the lesser of two evils with a pristine conscience. Had I been a Russian alive in 1941, I would have cheerfully fought for Stalin against Hitler.

I recall a gubernatorial race here in Maryland several years back. The candidate for one party was clearly incompetent, but his opponent was an absolute lunatic. Despising them both, I voted for the incompetent over the lunatic.

W.LindsayWheeler said...

Link works. The link was quite informative. If one reads further down the page, it says:

Lewis can be described as a liberal...

Liberals prefer liberals. Gnostic prefers Gnostic. While reading the previous pages of the link and that particular page, it states that Lewis takes Mills arguments for certain things.

That "Mill" is J.S. Mill an atheist.

The Bible teaches in the 1st Psalm, "Blessed is the man who has not listened to the counsel of the ungodly". Atheists are ungodly. All of our politics of today, of Americanism, of democracy, is the product of the so-called "Enlightenment". The so-called "Enlightenment" was A MOVEMENT OF ATHEISTS! Here are Christians debating and talking about something formed by Atheists! There was NOT a single Orthodox Catholic Writer of the Enlightenment! The one, Abbe Gassendi, a French priest, was actually an Atheist! What is going on today, all this rights talk, all this talk of democracy, parties, government, limited government and so on---all come out of the Enlightenment, which is Atheistic.

America is the product of Enlightenment, right? Who are the authors and instigators and movers of the Enlightenment? Atheists and about 20% were "Deists". Thomas Paine---the biggest motivator, the instigator, an FFofA, was an Atheist. A Hard Core Atheist.

All or your stances and conclusions---are based on faulty foundations built by Atheists!

And who made common cause with the Atheists? Protestants!

And now the Atheists are disenfranchising the Protestants, tearing down America's Protestant (WASP) culture! And you Protestants are crying about "Bigot bombs"?

America is a false construct. America's foundation is built on Atheism and Masonry. Both errors. Atheists Hate Christianity. What makes you think you can live with Atheists? Your tolerance and diversity is nonsense. It has NO value for the other side. They don't care. What is the true nature, telos, of the Enlightenment? Liberal, tolerant state?

No! Totalitarianism. Marxism. If Liberals can not judge, that everything is tolerated. Then, you can not protect society from evil. That is just logical. Liberals can not protect anything because there is nothing dogmatic about Liberalism.

You even label America as a "propositional nation". Well----there is nothing solid about propositions. One can change them like one changes diapers. One opinion can be swapped out for another opinion. America's original proposition is being switched out for another proposition. So Liberalism gives way to what is dogmatic. Marxism is dogmatic. Multiculturalism is Dogmatic. It is funny to see Liberals attach themselves to Dogmatic Multiculturalism!

Liberals create junk societies and America is proof positive of it. Europe is dead. America is dead. It's over. Gone. finito. The Social Compact is gone in America.

There is a reason we are NOT SUPPOSED to read Infidels and the Ungodly. And J.S Mill, Thomas Paine, Thomas Jefferson are the Ungodly.

Starhopper said...

I have only one question for you, Wheeler. Where do you shop for your tinfoil hats? Or do you cut out the middleman, and just make them yourself? (I know, that's two questions.)

W.LindsayWheeler said...

C. S. Lewis wrote: "I am a democrat because I believe in the Fall of Man," he remarked in the Spectator. "Mankind is so fallen that no man can be trusted with unchecked power over his fellows." (From: Article title: Politics from the Shadowlands: C.S. Lewis on Earthly Government. Contributors: West, John G., Jr. - Author. Journal title: Policy Review. Issue: 68 Publication date: Spring 1994. Page number: 68+. © Hoover Institution Press. COPYRIGHT 1994 Gale Group. Questia.com Online Library. {I'm a member of Questia})

But St. Robert Bellarmine had this to say: "Because of the corruption of human nature we judge a monarchy blended from aristocracy and democracy better at this time." He is talking about Mixed Government which is Classical republicanism. Sparta, Rome, and Tudor England had this form of Government. C.S. Lewis was born and raised under the last true republican form of government.

St. Thomas Aquinas said: "For this is the best form of polity, being partly kingdom, since there is one at the head of all; partly aristocracy, in so far as a number of persons are set in authority; partly democracy, that is, government by the people, in so far as the rulers can be chosen from the people, and the people have the right to choose their rulers." The last part is error. King David was NOT selected by the people---but by God.

What St. Bellarmine and St. Thomas Aquinas argue for are caste/hierarchical government.

Democracy naturally nullifies that. Socrates and Plato were both misodemoi, i.e. haters of democracy. Why? Democracy is "Hates all divisions and loves a large mass". Democracy is against Nature.

C.S. Lewis outs himself as a Leftist. All people who promote, advance democracy are Leftists. Rush Limbaugh who calls himself the "Doctor of Democracy" is a leftist. The term "conservative" in the Anglosphere means liberal. The cultural war in America is between hard liberals and soft liberals. You are all liberals squabbling about this-n-that.

The term "right", and by the way "conservative", was coined for Monarchists and those that hated democracy. The term "conservative" was a French term coined for political use for the Monarchists and Catholic parties IN France that upheld the Old Order.

St. Robert Bellarmine and St. Thomas Aquinas are not anti-hiearchical and propose the true answer, Mixed government. It is not against Nature. Democracy is against Nature and hence against God. Democracy shows itself inherently Gnostic with its hatred of hierarchy and its actions for its bloody removal.

Christianity is tied to Christendom. Christendom is tied to Throne and Altar. That is Christian government. Victorian England was the last of the Christian governments, a mixed government of king, aristocracy, and commons allied to the Church of England.

It is purposely stated on the Seal of the United States, Novus Ordo Secularum. New Order.

That New Order is Atheist.

What is the Christian's duty? To the Old Order. C. S. Lewis is arguing in the culture of the New Order.