Run That by Me Again

Selected Essays from "Absolutes" to the "Things That Can Be Otherwise"

James V. Schall

• Publisher: TAN Books
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781505111347
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Literary Essays
• Index: Literature

Over a span of six decades, Fr. James Schall has been one of our foremost thinkers and cultural commenters. A distinguished professor, the author of more than thirty books, and writer of countless essays—his favorite literary form—Fr. Schall has made a life of pondering the most important questions of this world and beyond.

Now, in Run That by Me Again, Fr. Schall himself has selected more than fifty of his essays on the most intriguing, urgent, and sometimes difficult topics. These are things we want to—need to—think about again and again, and Schall, with his concise, readable style and teacher's heart, has a knack for explaining lofty ideas to all.

Here, Schall ruminates on:

• language, Wodehouse, cooking, music, and putting Jesuit donkeys out to pasture (you'll just have to read it);
• abortion, marriage, Christian persecution, and other issues that continue to gnaw away at our Christian culture;
• Christ and his nature, what it means to be human, sin and its origins and consequences;
• and the Cosmos, the South, English departments, and other mysterious places.

The common threads are a love of God, a thirst for wisdom, and a desire for a life well-lived.

Whether this is your first time considering the questions posed and answered in these pages or if you are revisiting them with fresh eyes and a renewed spirit, it is well worth the time to sit with Fr. Schall—one of the greatest thinkers and teachers of the past century—and ponder the great mysteries and truths of life.

CHAPTER 1

ON ABSOLUTES

THE past participle of the Latin verb absolvere is absolutus. It means “freed from any restrictions.” Modern man wants no “absolutes.” He wants to be loosed from things binding for all times and places. An “absolute” refers to lines not to be crossed. Moral absolutes, however, can be crossed. Of course “thou shalt not kill” does not mean that no killings will take place. It means that, if crossed, “absolute” consequences, either in the here or hereafter, will follow. All things not forgiven remain with us. Indeed, they remain with us even if they are forgiven. Our deeds and words form the character into which we have made ourselves. We are always a “this someone” who, in the days of our mortality, did or did not do this or that.

It is easy to imagine why we might want to rid the world of absolutes. Their elimination would, presumably, free us to do whatever we wanted to do with no fear of untoward repercussions. But let us suppose that we want to deny the existence of absolutes; how would we go about doing so?

No doubt, if I want to eliminate the prohibition against murder or stealing, I want it removed only for my own case. I do not want it universalized. I do not want others to feel perfectly free to wipe me out or, with impunity, to abscond unscathed with my hard-earned goods. We cannot have it both ways. So, viewed from this angle, we really do not want absolutes abolished except as convenient for ourselves.

But if we still insist on abolishing absolutes, we might approach the issue from the angle of authority. Who says that any absolutes exist? Scripture, for instance, has a couple or pretty hefty “thou shalt nots.” But why should we bother about Scripture? Who knows what was actually said? Who was around to check the accuracy of its recorded prohibitions? Even then, perhaps the “thou shalt nots” held only in that ancient time or in those strange customs.

Someone like Descartes even worried that maybe the devil was deceiving us so that we could not rely on our senses to tell us anything reliable about what is going on in the world. But if no God exists, or if we cannot figure out who said what, it is senseless to trust any authority that sets down absolutes. When Christ pardoned the lady caught in adultery, he told her, “Go and sin no more.” Wasn’t he violating her “rights” to live the way she wanted to live?

Still, if we find no divine authority capable of defining or enforcing absolutes, what about the state? Can’t it enforce whatever it wants? Isn’t that what Hobbes taught? Civil authority seems to be pretty much absolute. But states differ. They can change from day to day what they consider absolute. Opposites can be absolutes on given days.

Likewise, scientifically inter-related absolutes seem to exist. If they did not hold, the world would not stay together. No one wants to change the speed of light or the fact that we human beings are born with hands and brains. The range of sound waves that we can and cannot hear seems pretty absolute.

When we come right down to it, the number of absolutes that we might want to change are few. The only way an outfielder can catch a fly ball is if a) the ball is not made of lead, b) a batter hits the fly, c) the ball comes down on an arc, and d) the legs, eyes, and hand of the fielder are so coordinated that they are there where the ball comes down. If these absolutes are not permanent, don’t bother to take me out to the ball game.

If the world were not full of absolutes, we could not live in it. Indeed, we would not want to live in it. The problem that we human beings have concerns only a few absolutes. These are the absolutes that indicate what we are and how we ought to live, even when we do not observe them.

The annoying trouble with absolutes usually shows up when we do not observe them. For some reason, all sorts of unwelcome things happen to ourselves or others that we are reluctant to attribute to the absolutes. We develop a whole rhetoric that usually ends up reassuring us that what we did was just fine. The fact is that no one can violate any absolute without trying to give some reason why it is quite all right.

Where does this leave us? We usually end up proving the existence of absolutes by seeing that our reasons to prove them wrong actually prove them right. The witticism that no good deed goes unpunished deserves one addendum: “No bad deed,” as Plato said, “goes unpunished either.” That too is an absolute.

CHAPTER 2

ON ABUNDANCE

THE dominant contemporary “feeling” is that we live in a parsimonious world. Nature is running out of gas. Natural resources are scandalously “used up,” never to be replaced. Besides, too many people exist on the planet consuming everything in sight. Species of birds and bugs die out. “Consumerism” knows no bounds. The great enemy of mankind is man himself. He is out of control. Survival prospects for even a small number of gaunt human beings are grim. We must act now, decisively, before it is too late.

This doomsday scenario is found in schools, media, governments, churches, and businesses. In the minds of its advocates, its validity is stronger than any faith. To question its tenets approaches blasphemy. Mother Earth is finally unveiled as a vengeful goddess. Many find meaning in this collective panic over presumed decreasing resources. It provides an urgent mission. We can now venture forth in a mighty cause to save the world from itself. Evil is now defined not by sins but by our greedy use of spare resources. Governments are empowered with the welcome task of controlling man by drastically limiting the goods needed for his long-term survival down the planetary ages.

Is there an alternate vision? Why does not the evidence incline us to look at the world’s extraordinary abundance? How is it possible that already so much was available to us for so long? The word abundance means overflow, plenty. It comes from the Latin word for wave (unda). When a wave crashes over itself, the sea is filled, full, surging with overflowing waters. The more puzzling thing about the world is not that it contains too little for its purposes, but, astonishingly, way too much, as if it had another purpose in mind.

The initial question is not: “How many resources do we have?” But, “Do we have sufficient and more than sufficient resources for the purpose of our existence on this earth?” Calculations about what might be needed and what is given have little direct relation to the reason why man exists on this planet. No reason can be found to think that, when man ends his stay on this planet, resources to support him will have run out at the same time

Panic about sufficient resources usually arises from the assumption that members of the human race are to remain on this planet for as long as the planet survives. The projections of scarcity are based on this doubtful premise. The destiny and purpose of humanity on this planet are not primarily geared to keeping a few of its billions of members alive down the course of time. Almost all ecology theories about resources and man are premised on the dubious supposition that man has only a this-worldly purpose for his existence. Thus keeping some of the race alive for as long as possible becomes man’s only intelligible end.

The second presumption of the scarcity syndrome is that human beings do not have brains, or, at least, brains that can deal with their problems as they arise. When I use the word abundance to describe what is available to us, I include the human mind’s capacity to learn both what is actually there in reality and how it might be used. We do not know what kinds of technology will be available to us in a century or two. If we predicted the twentieth century based on what men knew in the year 1900, it would never have included the computer, space exploration, or plant research. It is no accident that a hostile relation exists between the limits to growth school and science/technology.

If we approach our lot on this earth from the viewpoint of abundance, we will see that the availability of resources is itself a function of our knowledge plus the enormous riches that are already found on this planet. Nature and mind are not simply the result of some accident. With mind and nature, we are given much material abundance to fulfill the purpose for which we are created. This purpose is not for some few members of the human race to be alive when the earth finally burns out, or only to transport themselves to some other planet and continue on ad infinitum.

The purpose of the human race, itself also part of nature, is that each of the finite numbers that God had created is free to reach or reject his transcendent end. The earth is man’s dominion wherein he is to achieve an end that is not simply keeping the planet garden-like. But the caring for the earth is a sidelight to caring for one’s own soul and those of others. Revelation is clear that our inner-worldly end will come when God chooses, when we least expect it, not when we run out of abundant resources.

CHAPTER 3

ON THE WHOLE HUMAN RACE

THE word man (homo, in Latin, with equivalent words in most languages) is the name we give in English to an abstract concept designed intelligibly to include every existing human being who ever lived, could live, or will live. It states what they have in common and what distinguishes them from other beings. It does not deny that each person who ever lived is embodied in a way that distinguishes and separates him from everyone else who ever lived.

Individual persons cannot be predicated of each other. I cannot say Tom is John, but I can say John is a man; Tom is a man. Here, by “man,” we do not mean “male” (vir), which is also a valid abstract concept that, like female, designates and distinguishes many individuals of the same kind. The mind is luminous, flexible. It can understand different meanings to the same words or many words in different languages for the same concept. Learning properly to distinguish and remember is what intelligence and education are all about. Intelligence is what makes us more than ourselves, makes us able to know what is not ourselves.

If there were a race of rational beings on some planet in a distant galaxy, would we include them? Probably. What about every human being conceived (note the word) on this planet from the first appearance of man? Yes, it would include them all. What if this human race set up a camp on Mars or some other non-earthly spot and it succeeded to continue there, would it include them? No problem.

The human race, as such, does not include the gods or the animals, even though these may exist in abundance and be necessary for continued human existence. If some asteroid crashed into our Earth to destroy it, would that be the end of the human race if none of this species had managed to exist elsewhere? Yes, probably. But the concept of what-it-is-to-be-a-human being would remain the same if any mind to think it existed. We hear talk of a race of clones or hybrids of animal and man. These are things that we may possibly bring forth although, in fact, we ought to have sense enough not to do so.

Does “the whole human race” have a purpose other than as intelligible? No, only individual human beings have “purposes.” The concept “man,” however, does enable us to think of our lot, to think about what we all are. The “whole human race” does not exist in one time or in one place. It exists sequentially and scattered across the planet and in different eras.

This race speaks some seven thousand different languages, which themselves come and go, change. If men come across a language they do not know, they figure out what it is saying. Generally speaking, all languages can be made intelligible to all other languages. This capacity implies that human beings have some capacity to live together, to understand each other, however difficult it may be for an Englishman to speak Mandarin or Zulu. Translating one language into another is a major industry. And yes, we miss a lot in translation.

We see estimates that, thus far, something over a hundred billion people were born on this Earth. Some seven billion are still alive. The population of the dead thus is huge. How many remain yet to be born? Many modern ecological theories claim roughly to know this figure by extrapolating on existing resource availability. Much doomsday speculation lies in such theories combined with bad economics and bad science.

It is highly doubtful that the human race exists for no purpose. If we begin with the theological premise that each conceived person is created for eternal life, we conclude that the human race exists so that each person reaches this transcendent end. It can only be reached through death. Aquinas held that the number of human beings intended to exist was finite. This limit means that the actual race is not intended just to go on and on in this world.

So the primary purpose of the human race is not simply to keep itself going in time and space for as long as possible. The purpose of the human race is not separable from the purpose of each of its individual members. That is, the end includes a personal eternal life within a “city” that includes God and other beings likewise made for this end.

This end, however, has to be individually chosen. Unless it can be rejected, it would not be worth having, for it would not be freely accepted. How does one go about rejecting it? By choosing not to observe the commandments. You’re kidding? Nope, dead serious. Such is the drama of the whole human race.

CHAPTER 4

ON BLASPHEMY

CHRIST was often accused of blasphemy. Usually, the accusation occurred when he performed a miracle, say, on a Sabbath. Christ never condemned the Jewish laws against blasphemy. What he did rather was, by his works, to show that he was God. He did not mock Yahweh. He did not blaspheme his Father. He and the Father were one.

Christ was executed according to the Roman Law, by crucifixion, not Jewish Law, by stoning. The effective charge was blasphemy, the claim that he was God. His crucifixion was justified by the blasphemy charges. The Romans, who cared little for Jewish quibbles, decided to overlook validity of these accusations.

What appears in the news almost daily are alleged violations of Muslim laws against blasphemy. To “insult” or “mock” Allah, Mohammed, or the Qur’an is said to merit death. It does not matter under what civil jurisdiction the presumed blasphemy occurs—in Saudi Arabia, Amsterdam, Syria, Pakistan, Paris, or wherever. Every Muslim is somehow designated to enforce the law. It claims universal jurisdiction.

Western “hate-speech” laws are a secular version of blasphemy laws, only what we cannot talk about is not God but certain men or issues. Laws of calumny, libel, or slander mean that we are required to speak the truth about God and man. Free speech and free press, however, also belong to blasphemy considerations. Finding the truth of some accusation or claim is not always easy. Some things should be ridiculed. The classic word is “tolerate” possible errors. The people who least want to be investigated are sometimes those who should be investigated.

To deny the existence of God or Allah is not blasphemy. Blasphemy laws remain, apparently, even if there is no God or Allah. What causes the problem is not the blasphemy itself but the dangerous way people react to it. Several writers have mentioned that Charlie Hebdo also mocked Christ and the pope, not just Allah and Mohammed. The difference was that no Christian thought it all right, on that basis, to shoot anyone. Many Muslims evidently do not see it that way. It is the crossing of that line where the problem lies with Islam.

The notion of limits to free speech is ancient. Aristotle said that if our wit hurts others, it should be moderated. On the other hand, an obligation also exists to the truth. It is one thing to ridicule something that is true, another something false and dangerous. If nothing can be mocked, everything is “true.” Few had problems with mocking Hitler, Stalin, or Khomeini. We can be so sensitive that we cannot say anything about anyone. The whole industry of political cartoons and satire is a noble one. Never to have a cartoon prodding us is a sign of indifference to what we are about.

I think that the current anti-hate laws are very dangerous. In the case of Islam, they prevent an honest discussion of what Islam is about. Such laws allow a government to define what can and cannot be freely and properly discussed. Anti-racism, anti-gay, and anti-feminist laws fall into this category.

On the other hand, we find a general silence about murders of Christians. Our government and media in the recent past seem to have a policy of seldom mentioning any relation between “terrorists” and Islam. Yet they never really acknowledge in any detail that Christians are killed by Muslims. Few people even know the extent of today’s Christian martyrdom.

In an Interview in Le Figaro, Rémi Brague pointed out that, when it comes to abortion, we insist on calling it something else, a “procedure” or “aiding health of the mother.” The “what is aborted” is ...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Halftitle Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Preface
• Chapter 1: On Absolutes
• Chapter 2: On Abundance
• Chapter 3: On the Whole Human Race
• Chapter 4: On Blasphemy
• Chapter 5: “Et, Tu, Brute?”
• Chapter 6: The Road to “Reunion” Examined
• Chapter 7: On Creation
• Chapter 8: On Realism
• Chapter 9: On Contradiction
• Chapter 10: On the Fate of Jesuit Donkeys
• Chapter 11: On the Future
• Chapter 12: The First Day of Spring
• Chapter 13: On Reconsidering the Southern Cause
• Chapter 14: Common Good and Uncommon Evil
• Chapter 15: On the Aborted
• Chapter 16: The Great Thirst
• Chapter 17: What Is Music?
• Chapter 18: The Trinity
• Chapter 19: Welcome Number 9,000,000,000!
• Chapter 20: A “Declaration” of Voluntarism
• Chapter 21: On Fools
• Chapter 22: Two Truths Revisited
• Chapter 23: What Is Political Prudence?
• Chapter 24: What Am I?
• Chapter 25: What Exactly Is Easter?
• Chapter 26: De Animali Ambulante
• Chapter 27: On the Word Religion
• Chapter 28: On Heresy
• Chapter 29: On Funerals
• Chapter 30: On the Origin of (Good or Bad) Actions
• Chapter 31: On Multiculturalism
• Chapter 32: On Determinism
• Chapter 33: On the Beheading of Christians
• Chapter 34: The Epicurean Option
• Chapter 35: On Being Satisfied With God
• Chapter 36: On the Death of a Brother-in-Law
• Chapter 37: Note From the Present Underground
• Chapter 38: On What Is Not Found in English Departments
• Chapter 39: Schall in Outer Space
• Chapter 40: On “Completely Tabulating” the Universe
• Chapter 41: On “Divine Knowledge”
• Chapter 42: On the Human Art of Cooking
• Chapter 43: On Libraries
• Chapter 44: On What Fools Look for in History
• Chapter 45: On Unity
• Chapter 46: On Evil
• Chapter 47: A Secular Easter
• Chapter 48: On Play and Seriousness
• Chapter 49: On Falsity
• Chapter 50: On Universal Citizenship
• Chapter 51: “Hope Beyond Thy Sight”
• Chapter 52: On Preventing War
• Chapter 53: “Not a Philosophical Speculation”
• Chapter 54: On Cocktail Time
• Chapter 55: The Nativity: God Made Visible
• Conclusion
• Bibliography