Baylor University Professor and noted author Alan Jacobs has some words of his own concerning Elizabeth Stoker Bruenig’s (ESB) polarizing article on Pope Francis for The New Republic. Jacobs mainly echoes criticisms already leveled against ESB’s overly broad and uncharitable caricature of conservatives (political and religious), before closing with this curious paragraph:
Elizabeth Stoker Bruenig’s (ESB) recent article on Pope Francis for The New Republic is receiving the critical pushback it deserves. Following last week’s posts which, inter alia, took ESB to task for castigating the Pope’s critics as fear-mongering reactionaries (see here and here), Professor Adam DeVille offered some hard hitting, but necessary, correctives over at Catholic World Report.
Now comes J. Arthur Bloom, an editor for both The Daily Caller and Front Porch Republic, to deliver what I hope amounts to a final blow against ESB’s sloppily composed, ill-researched article — one which has done little more than feed ongoing media myths concerning Francis, the papacy, and contemporary Catholicism. Bloom doesn’t hold back, and nor should he. For more than a year, orthodox Catholics have watched with understandable disappointment (if not horror) as the media has used its vast resources to craft a false narrative of Francis’s pontificate in order to set the stage for another liberal revolution within the Catholic Church. The fact secularists have engaged in these antics is understandable; to see a fellow Catholic engage in the same reckless behavior is lamentable. Bloom has done a great service for the truth, and I for one applaud him for it.
Time constraints prevented me from putting together a “Weekly Reading” post over the weekend. Had I been able to, topping the list of recommendations would be Professor Adam DeVille’s incisive critique of Elizabeth Stoker Bruenig’s article, “Fear of a Radical Pope.” (For my own critical comments on this rather troubling piece, see here and here). From DeVille’s piece over at Catholic World Report:
When I was a graduate student, a professor once said to me: “watch your adverbs.” I offer the same counsel here to Bruenig because her careless usage offers very fat targets ripe for ready rejoinder: wildly successful evangelism? Obviously superior approach? Relative to whom—the Westboro Baptists? Such lazy, tendentious and noticeably fact-free generalizations have no place in the writing of any would-be serious scholar—and the fact she’s writing for a once-popular magazine does not excuse this evidentiary burden.
Be sure to read the rest.
At some point along the way in America’s culture wars the fear card became commonplace. Perhaps no other camp has used it to such astounding advantage as the so-called “gay rights movement.” By dominating the nature of the discussion and the acceptable (or unacceptable) terms on which it would be carried out, homosexualists eliminated all principled opposition with one word: homophobia. A man can no longer say with a straight face that homosexual acts are immoral; he must rather confess that is afraid of gays, lesbians, bisexuals, transgenders, etc.
Yesterday’s post critiquing a recent article by Elizabeth Stoker Bruenig (ESB) triggered a fair amount of irrational hyperbole, though thankfully less than I originally feared. Taking to Twitter, ESB mocked me for using WordPress (she uses it too) and then claimed she was under attack from “white males” (no comment). No substantive point raised in my post was addressed. Others, however, noted that The New Republic should no longer be taken as a reliable source of thoughtful commentary on much of anything and that when it comes to things Catholic, mainstream secular coverage will almost always be lacking in depth and sophistication. While all of that may be very well true, it doesn’t change the fact that a writer, even a young writer, who previously traded on her academic credentials to position herself as a legitimate authority on Catholic thought should tread lightly when dealing with complex intra-ecclesial affairs. As noted yesterday, the Pope’s critics are not all of the same mind, and their respective relationships to mainline American conservatism oftentimes differ. This is neither new news nor an obscure factoid that might understandably be overlooked. So why was it? One has to wonder.
Elizabeth Stoker Bruenig (ESB) has had quite the year. After being received into the bosom of the Catholic Church last Easter, she proceeded to develop a loyal readership of mostly young Catholics who, like her, are fed up with economic liberalism, or at least some variants of it. In addition to writing a blog and weekly newsletter, ESB found time to publish articles in a diverse array of outlets, including The American Conservative, Salon, and Jacobin. She has since moved on to take a position as a staff writer at The New Republic (TNR), a former icon of American socio-political commentary which is struggling to restore its tarnished name, where, inter alia, she criticizes mainline conservatism, capitalism, and anyone else who doesn’t share her somewhat idiosyncratic take on Christianity. ESB also contributes to other places, including The Nation, which just published her excellent but disturbing piece on prison rape—a horrific problem that receives lamentably little attention from the mainstream media. At almost the same time as that story appeared, TNR ran “Fear of a Radical Pope,” ESB’s misaligned and difficult-to-follow polemic aimed at Pope Francis’s critics, real and imagined. Part autobiographical reflection, part historical and doctrinal mishmash, and part rant, the article is slated to appear on the cover of TNR’s next issue, which doesn’t bode well for that publication’s prospects for reputational restoration.
The tragic and brutal slaying of 21 Egyptian Coptic Orthodox Christians at the hands of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (popularly known as ISIS) has generated worldwide outrage, at least in religious circles. Setting aside the insane rantings of some evangelicals who deny these heroic souls the title “Christian,” the vast majority of Christians have lauded these men for “bear[ing] witness to Christ who died and rose, to whom [they] are united in charity” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 2473). Catholic, Orthodox, and Oriental Christians around the world have gone a step further, referring to these men as “New Martyrs.” Here are Pope Francis’s remarks on their death:
Just as I started to draft a post on the recent news that Fr. Fidenzio Volpi, Pope Francis’s Apostolic Commissioner in charge of unjustly dismantling the Franciscan Friars of the Immaculate (FFI), has been found guilty of defamation and ordered to apologize publicly while making restitution, a friend alerted me to a fresh piece by Steve Skojec: “Crypto-Lefebvrianism & the Willful Confusion Around the SSPX.” Though Skojec devotes only a single paragraph to the Volpi affair, his decision to turn his thoughts toward the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) and the problematic manner in which they are treated by the wider Catholic Church is one which I wish to applaud. Not only does Skojec highlight the disgraceful manner in which the Society has been rendered toxic by various ideologues within the Church, he forcefully proclaims a truth which the SSPX’s legion of critics wish to obscure:
In a series of articles which have appeared in The Angelus, Front Porch Republic, and The Josias, I have attempted to sketch a general outline of what John Zmirak broadly decries as “illiberal Catholicism” and what I now prefer to differentiate into two camps: “radical” and “integralist Catholics.” (Those interested in these and other “off-blog” pieces can find them linked in the “Writings” section.) After scanning through various remarks on these articles in comboxes, blogs, and social media sites, it appears that there is still some confusion about integralism generally and the project of The Josias specifically. Without wishing to drape myself in the mantle of being a spokesman for a movement to which I only contribute modestly, allow me to offer a few general clarifying remarks which may prove useful to those who have only recently come upon what I hope will be a sustained integralist turn in Catholic thought. None of these comments are intended to criticize those who may harbor some misunderstandings about what Catholic integralism is for or how it relates to other socio-political paradigms both within and beyond the Catholic tradition. I take full responsibility for any ambiguities, misstatements, or unwarranted generalizations which may have crept into my previous writings on integralism, just as I recognize that this blog entry will hardly amount to my final word on the subject.
The precise location of Aristotle’s immortal soul we know not. That he lived, philosophized, and died is the most we can say certainly; but with Dante we may dare hope that a pleasant place in eternity has been reserved for the man reverently known as the Philosopher. This awe before the might of his intellect and the high morals he was thought to exhibit on the basis of his philosophical reflection is in short supply today, for Aristotle, contrary to those who call themselves philosophers today, lived for truth. Unlike Socrates, Aristotle did not perish for the truth, but there is some evidence that he suffered late in life for it. Suffering for the truth, even natural truth, is a perennial phenomenon in human history, though we, sophisticated men of the 21st Century, pay such sacrifices little mind; and we are made aware of them, feelings of contempt suppress any glimmer of admiration. There are, so the story goes, so many things to live for today: consumption, clothes, iPads, sex, etc. All of life can and ought to be ceaseless entertainment and unprecedented comfort. To suffer is to have failed at contemporary existence, and to suffer for something as “contingent” and “fleeting” as truth could very well by called, by our dim lights, the grossest form of idiocy.
