I’m just dipping my toe into the boundless sea that is online graduate study, and I got involved in a discussion the other day that I thought I’d post something about. The instructor wanted us to share our feelings about the Enlightenment.

The Enlightenment, in case you haven’t brushed up your history in a while, was an intellectual movement that flourished in the 18th Century. Thinkers like Rousseau and Voltaire were leading lights. It was a reaction against the religious passions that had caused so much death and suffering through religious wars like the Thirty Years’ War. We religious types had made ourselves look pretty bad, and decent people began to think we’d all be better off if we jettisoned God entirely. But on what would we base our morality, without a God?

Oddly enough, Isaac Newton (himself a devout, if unorthodox, Christian) gave them their answer. Newton discovered what looked like absolute, immutable laws in the universe. Everything could be explained in terms of mathematics. Ultimate truth, for the fervid Newtonian, was mechanical, impersonal. Obviously morality was also a matter of eternal rules. Identify those rules and that was all the revelation you needed. Human nature was ultimately simple too, and soon we would know how it worked. Then we’d be able to establish a rational government which would permit everyone’s natural goodness to blossom like a flower.

The problem with the Enlightenment was that it was over-simple. Human beings just aren’t that neat (neither is the universe, as we’ve learned since). Human beings, and the universe, are like Doctor Who’s Tardis, bigger inside than outside. As you go deeper in, you discover new levels of complexity.

This, I think, explains the horrors of ideology in the centuries since the Enlightenment. Every tyrant thinks he’s found, at last, the simple key to human nature. It’s economics (Marx). It’s frustrated sex (Freud). It’s race (Hitler). Despot after despot tries to impose his simple solution on the people he rules, and the people stubbornly refuse to respond in a scientific way. So he’s forced to kill them, and to try to find some better people.

The difference between post-Enlightenment horrors and pre-Enlightenment horrors, it seems to me, is the industrialization of evil. The religious fanatic may kill you because he considers you evil, a tool of Satan. But the statist kills you without caring who you are. You’re just in the way, like a tree in a building zone.

Michael Coren, at Catholic World Report, comments on the case for G. K. Chesterton as a saint. I as a Protestant don’t have a dogma in this fight, but it’s a great piece, in particular because Coren, as a man of Jewish ancestry, addresses the issue of antisemitism (which I’ve written about here, but with less expertise).

He did make some hurtful and thoughtless comments, in particular after his brother’s death, but when the testing time came—the rise of the Nazis—he was as active as he was angry. While many on the left were unsure how to respond to Hitler’s pagan racism, and some even sympathetic, Chesterton demanded that the Jewish people be protected and rescued. He was vehemently anti-Nazi before it was fashionable and before it was safe.

Tip: Daniel Crandall.

By “Th. F.”

I translated the article below from Norwegian for my uncle, who told me about his great-granddaughter, who was named “Sophie” after my grandmother, his mother. He tells me she takes after her namesake in several ways. This reminded me of this article, taken from a Norwegian-language almanac published in Minneapolis. The distant relation who sent it to me told me that the subject of the article was a mutual ancestor, also named “Sofie.” Judging the description, my grandmother was one in a line of godly Sophies.

(From Folke Calender 1932, ed. by D. C. Jordahl, published by Augsburg Publishing House. I have translated the word røkstue as “smoky cottage.” In old times in Norway, it was common for people to live in houses with a fireplace built into a corner, but no chimney. The smoke would simply vent out into the room, and escape through a hole in the roof. lw)

Deep among the many miles of fjords in the southern part of the Bergen diocese, there lies a pretty little farming community. Here there is an inlet on one bank of the fjord, and in the curve of the bay is a ring of beautiful farms on either side of a frothy river that descends from the mighty mountain in the background. Just at the mouth of the river may be seen the white-painted local store building, and a little further up on a terraced hillside stands the church, whose spire points to heaven, speaking silent words to the residents round about, reminding them now and then, amid the business of the day, to turn their thoughts to higher things. But when Sunday comes it seems that it cannot be content with this silent witness – the bells begin “calling the young and old to rest, but above all the soul distressed, longing for rest everlasting.”

It was in my younger days that I first came as a school teacher to this beautiful little community. The schoolhouse stood on a farm called Vika, a farm which, with its many residents, all of whom followed the old custom and usage of building their houses close together, looked almost like a little village. In the midst of this cluster of houses stood a small cottage with a turf roof. Its door was so low that one had to bend to go inside, and its window was so small that the light of day could hardly force its way in. This was a “smoky cottage” (røkstue) in the genuine old style. The ceiling and the wainscotting within were black as coal from smoke and soot, but the upper areas of the walls all around had been coated with a kind of clay or chalk compound, whose gray-white color was intended to make things brighter and more cheerful inside the cottage. On the lower part of the white area a number of decorations had been drawn, consisting of triangular figures, dots, and flourishes, all made of that same chalky compound. It did not look so terribly bad, and was at least a testimony to how the desire for beauty, inborn in every person, must be expressed, even through the most primitive means.

Unprepossessing and small as the cottage was, for me holy and precious memories are bound up with it. It was a little “Bethel,” a house of God, for in it dwelt one of “the quiet in the land,” a widow of more than sixty years of age, a true Anna who “never ceased to serve God night and day.” Sofie was her name, and although in all probability she did not herself know that her name meant “Wisdom,” she nonetheless answered well to it. Indeed, seldom has a name better suited the person who bore it. For God’s wisdom dwelt, in rich measure, in that simple old Christian soul. Continue reading "The Old Widow in the Smokey Cottage" →

Thor as C. S. Lewis fell in love with him. Arthur Rackham illustration from The Rhinegold and the Valkyrie, 1910.

A disagreement arose today, on a Facebook page where I participate, about modern heathenism – particularly the adoption of the old Norse gods by modern people, most of whom were raised Christian. I’m reluctant to argue these things in public, but here – just between you and me – I’ll share my thoughts.

I first encountered Thor in the pages of some kind of anthology in an elementary school classroom. I found a story called “How Thor Lost His Hammer,” read it, and found it a lot of fun. When the teacher called for volunteers to read a story to the class, I volunteered to read that one. But I told my fellow students that Thor was a Greek god, because the Greek ones were the only small “g” gods I’d ever heard of.

Later I discovered that Thor and company were in fact the gods of the Norse, my ancestors. I borrowed Padraic Colum’s The Children of Odin from the library and was fascinated (Willy Pogany’s excellent stylized illustrations didn’t hurt). As the years passed, my interest expanded to include the whole Viking world, and (as C. S. Lewis said) “I reveled in my Nibelungs.”

I’m one of those who believe that Norse mythology beats Classical mythology like a rug. I’ll grant that, simply because of longevity, the Greek and Roman gods informed more – and greater – works of art. But in themselves the Mediterranean gods are kind of second (or third) rate. They start out interestingly enough, with Chronos eating his children and the wars with the Titans, but then the gods just settle down to meddling in mortal affairs and catering dei ex machina.

The Norse gods, on the other hand, have a story arc. Their myths actually improve as they go along, until in the end they achieve the level of the tragic and the epic. Ragnarok, the fall of the gods, is one of the most romantic themes in the world. Richard Wagner, in spite of his many personal sins, recognized this and did it something like justice. Wagner’s music swept the young C. S. Lewis away and inspired his creativity and (eventually) his Christian faith. Continue reading Monotheistic meditations →

You may have noticed (though probably not) that I haven’t had a column published at The American Spectator Online for a while. This doesn’t mean I’ve been banned there, or that I’ve gotten into a dispute with the editor or anything. It’s just that, ever since the last election, I’ve had almost nothing to say, on any subject having to do with culture or politics, that I think is worth asking to be paid for, even at the Spectator’s rates.

I won’t deny it. The election shook me. It wasn’t primarily the reelection of the president that disheartened me (though that was part of it). It was the results of the referendum on same sex marriage in my own state of Minnesota. Up until that moment I was able to hang on to the believe that “the silent majority” still held to traditional moral values. But the referendum failed, and failed big. Minnesota’s social conservatives got put in our place.

Sometimes I tend to talk like a prophet. I shouldn’t do that. I don’t have a line on God’s plans any more than anybody else who reads the Bible. But I do belief that righteousness exalteth a nation. I do believe that those who turn their backs on the plain words of Scripture will suffer consequences – and because much has been given to those who have access to Scripture, much will be demanded of them.

The other day our friend Gene Edward Veith linked to a Buzzfeed article by McKay Coppins, in which he notes how the “traditional values” fight has shifted ground (which is another way of saying “lost ground”). It used to be that we struggled to teach our neighbors what God’s rules are, and to try to convince them to adopt them, for their own good and that of society. Now we are in a situation where the best we can do is to try to carve out a little cultural reservation where we’ll still be allowed to live the way we choose, without being forced by the government to conform to its morality.

The surging Libertarian movement – and there are an increasing number of Christian libertarians out there – see little problem with this. It doesn’t matter, in their view, how the populace behaves, just as long as taxes are kept low.

But I believe actions have consequences. I believe that redefining the central, organic institution of society (marriage) to the point where it has no objective meaning, will mean inevitable horrific consequences over time. I am not happy to watch my country descend into social chaos and the inevitable expansion of government which must accompany social chaos.

I just don’t know how to make that argument at this moment in history.

“The world will always laugh at the gospel of the cross. . . . The theology that teaches men are sinners before God and need a sacrifice to die and atone for their sins is deemed primitive in our culture,” observes John P. Sartelle, a senior minister of Tates Creek Presbyterian Church in Lexington, Kentucky. In his essay in Tabletalk, April 2009, he offers this challenge:

“Many of us evangelicals deny that we know Jesus by taking the emphasis away from the cross as we speak to His disciples and present our gospel to the world: ‘Follow Jesus: He will straighten out your marriage. Follow Jesus: He will make you better parents. Follow Jesus: He will make you financially solvent. Follow Jesus: He will enrich your relationships.’ Now, that is a Jesus who is easy to like and easy to follow. It is easy to stand in the world and be proud of that Jesus. To attract the world we say, ‘Come, drink coffee and hang out with Jesus. Be comfortable with Him. Kick back with Him. He is anti-institutional. He is anti-authority. Living with Him is a cool ride.’

“Dear reader, if we would recapture the gospel we must return to the ignominious cross. ‘For the bodies of those animals whose blood is brought into the holy places by the high priest as a sacrifice for sin are burned outside the camp. So Jesus also suffered outside the gate in order to sanctify the people through his own blood. Therefore let us go to him outside the camp and bear the reproach he endured’ (Hebrews 13:11-13).”

We might keep this in mind as we pray for other’s salvation and discipleship in Christ. The gospel is the hope we all stumble over or break ourselves on. May the Lord have mercy on us and those near us.

Today I was reminded of an incident back when I was attending a Lutheran college in the Midwest (go ahead and guess which one; I went to three). I was in an English Literature class. The teacher was a very pleasant woman. She was openly liberal, and liked to season her lectures with provocative ideas to challenge her students’ beliefs, but she wasn’t a hostile person.

I remember her describing a story she’d read that was “controversial.” But it was a very good story (she said) one that raised important questions. I don’t recall the title or the author. I don’t recall whether it was a short story, a novel, or even a play.

She said the dominant character in this story was a remarkably difficult woman. Other characters tried various methods for coexisting with her, and she frustrated every one of them. “In the end,” my instructor said (and I’m quoting her exact words here) “there was nothing you could do about this woman except rape her.”

I sat there listening to this, and I immediately rejected it. I felt very provincial and callow in doing so, of course, because I knew I lacked my instructor’s sophistication. But I couldn’t think of any circumstance in which rape would be appropriate. I’d just have to accept, as I had many times before, that I was an unsophisticated hick from the farm.

Years have passed, more than 40 of them, and if that instructor is still alive, I suspect she’s changed her opinion of that story. Sophisticated people no longer consider rape an edgy, taboo subject to be explored. Rape is evil, the foul fruit of male social domination.

My point is that I didn’t have to wait for fashionable opinions to change in order to see rape as categorically wrong. My liberal instructor did.

I was following the North Star. She was listening to voices in the dark.

Photo credit: Andy Dingley

I don’t know why I imagine anyone wants to know what I think. And yet I send out these posts, like a man throwing small stones into the ocean. Perhaps it’s just for the sake of the mental discipline it takes to put my thoughts in organized form.

Anyway, in case you’ve been waiting for my opinion of the recent Supreme Court rulings on same sex marriage, here it is. I hear the sound of a “click.”

That click is the noise of a ratchet. The metaphor of the ratchet, not at all original to me, is a very good one, I think, for understanding social change.

A ratchet does not move smoothly. Sometimes it stops, and every now and then it goes backwards for just a moment. But the main movement of a ratchet is always in one direction.

The Supreme Court decisions on same sex marriage were a ratcheting up of the mechanism. We lost another half inch or so that we’re not likely to get back. Continue reading The sound of a click →

Carl Trueman reviews Candida Moss’ book, The Myth of Persecution: How Early Christians Invented a Story of Martyrdom.

Her argument is simple: the myth of the persecution of Christians has fuelled a paranoid victim mentality on the political Right that imperils intelligent civil discourse. Ironically, as she makes this case, she herself engages in precisely the kind of myth making that she rightly decries. On page 252, she recounts her shock at hearing two students at Notre Dame expressing no sympathy for a nine-year old rape victim who had had an abortion. She was right to be shocked; but if her point is that the Christian mythology of persecution polarizes the world around and destroys civil discourse, then she herself here provides a good example of how alternative myths do much the same.