By SHAUN KENNEY
Democratic Senators Kamala Harris and Maize Hirono have chosen to make membership within the Knights of Columbus a variant of a hate crime. Judicial nominee Brian Buescher’s pro-life bona fides notwithstanding, his cardinal sin against the bureaucracy isn’t his judicial temperament, but rather the fact that he is a practicing Catholic.
The post-Kavanaugh Democratic Party is showing few signs of remorse after the vicious slander of a good man on national television, an act that was more Salem witch trial than vetting process.
Yet as if to remind us all that secular religions have more force today than sacred religions, Harris and Hirono have absolutely zero qualms about imposing a religious test on prospective nominees — provided they are used to exclude those who might question their worldview of tolerance (or else).
There is something deeper at play here.
Many commentators lament the fact that Americans no longer know how to discuss ideas in the public square. In short, we stopped teaching grammar, logic, and rhetoric and traded it for the so-called liberal arts education.
Classical education focuses on what is called the trivium, whereas the liberal arts education focuses primarily on what is called the quadrivium — music, arithmetic, astronomy, and geometry.
Thus over the last four generations, we effectively reversed education in this country. Rather than learning how to think before learning what to think about, we have raised an entire polity to do practical, mercurial tasks with rhetoric, logic, and grammar being the reserve for the truly educated person.
No small wonder that we grip our identities with such fanatical fervor. We look for reasons to disagree as a means of sharpening who we are rather than seeking areas of agreement and looking for ways to contrast and communicate our differences in such a way that respects the dignity of the human person.
When those identities come into conflict? The result is simple. Two identities whose sole purpose is to define themselves in contrast to the other often results in conflict, violence, or worse. Fellow travelers turn into social abstractions, perceived opposition can be destroyed, and the more abstract the person — a politician, a child yet to be born, the poor, the marginalized, the sick and the weak — the more perceived legitimacy one has to eradicate what is hostile to the body politic.
Thus the little white blood cells of secular religions seek out the pathogens to the state, no less different than Stalin and his Black Marias frog-marching dissidents to the gulag in the Soviet Union.
Perhaps Harris and Hirono haven’t come to such conclusions — yet. But if history is any indicator, the only reserve that perpetuates civility and civilization in the public square is a proper education, not the servile substitute we seem to be drowning in over the last four generations.
Our problem is threefold. First, we continue to be pulled apart by the extremes. Second, the number of individuals who truly have an education to pass down are growing increasingly rare. Last and perhaps more important, there is a spiritual contest involved here where Catholics in the public square are increasingly targeted by the secular religions of every stripe.
Harris and Hirono, along with other leftist leaders such as Cory Booker and Dianne Feinstein are going to remind us constantly that “the dogma lives loudly” within us. So be it…and let’s have the courage to be martyrs in the public square for our faith. Not that we should go out of our way to seek martyrdom, but let’s not be afraid to see what is going on with clear eyes either.
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Mrs. DeM — writes to us about Our Lady of La Salette, who prophesied the Great Famine in Ireland to two young French girls. Our reader further writes that our Lady prophesied back in 1851 that “the seasons will be altered, the earth will produce nothing but bad fruit, the stars will lose their regular motion, and the moon will only reflect a faint reddish glow. Water and fire will give the earth’s globe convulsions and terrible earthquakes which will swallow up mountains, cities, etc.”
Now readers should be aware that Our Lady of La Salette gave two prophecies, one which is more generally known about keeping Sunday holy by refraining from work and ceasing to take the Lord’s name in vain. The second prophecy refers to a cataclysmic European war where Frenchmen will fight Frenchmen, Italians fight Italians, all in an era of wonders where people forget the honor of God.
It has been previously held that the first prophecy of Our Lady of La Salette was worthy of belief, while the second more dire prophecy was largely wondered about. Jimmy Akin back in 2000 wrote that because there was no great general leading great armies wrecking Europe countered by two brothers who defeated him for the glory of God, it is hard to say that the second prophecy was correct….And yet, St. Anne Catherine Emmerich’s Dolorous Passion, though apocryphal, is relied on in great detail by many of the Catholic faithful, including being relied upon for Mel Gibson’s film The Passion of the Christ.
Certainly a rereading of Our Lady of La Salette’s second prophecies reveals a good number of insights — “Everywhere there will be extraordinary wonders, as true faith has faded and false light brightens the people” — and yields fresh insights. Our Lady warns that the Holy Father will be besieged on all sides, echoing her later warnings at Fatima.
This isn’t to say one must assent to all the warnings from La Salette as a good Catholic. But it is to say that we are definitely being warned. One might certainly suggest that a reading of our Lady’s secrets and warnings during the Cold War would yield a different interpretation than today, where decadence is being met with global instability on a number of fronts.
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I received a marvelous series of little articles from Mr. K in Indiana that (with generous permission) I will be appending to First Teachers over the next few weeks. I hope you find them as enlightening as I did, or at the very least, find them to echo some of the same concerns we all feel about our postmodern times.
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As always, First Teachers welcomes letters from our amazing readers. Please feel free to send any correspondence for First Teachers to Shaun Kenney, c/o First Teachers, 5289 Venable Road, Kents Store, VA 23084 — or if it is easier, simply send me an e-mail with First Teachers in the subject line to: svk2cr@virginia.edu.
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