The Liberating Balance Published in First Things Online blog On The Square May 4, 2010 May 04, 2010 :: Filed in: First Things
In his great book The Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism, Daniel Bell argued that capitalist systems are composed of three complementary but distinct social systems: the political, the economic, and the moral/cultural. That their values are mutually complementary makes their unity possible. That they are distinct institutions with competing interests enables them to act as checks and balances upon each other. But sometimes one system becomes too strong for the other two. When this happens, the poor are the primary victims.
We see something of the effect of this new imbalance in the current economic crisis. There seems to be virtually universal agreement that the crisis began in the U.S. housing bubble. But what caused the housing bubble? Which of the three systems overpowered the other two?
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They Recognized Him in the Breaking of the Bread For Hadley Arkes, on the day of his Baptism, April 24, 2010 April 24, 2010 :: Filed in: Other Selected Articles
Imagine the Loss of the Christian Holy Places Published in the First Things blog First Thoughts April 19, 2010 April 22, 2010 :: Filed in: First Things
On Easter Sunday, I was able to sit in prayer for a while at the Shrine run by sweet Italian nuns on top of the Mountain of the Beatitudes, the most famous of Sermons. It was infinitely peaceful, and I needed it.
Later it hit me: What if the mad leader of Iran fulfilled his pledge to wipe Israel from the map with the Iranian nuclear weapon, coming soon? What would we Christians do without the Mount of the Sermon?
Without Capernaum? Without Nazareth? Without Cana?
Without the lovely and mystical city of Jerusalem–without Golgotha, and the Mount of Olives, the Garden of Gethsemane, and the Tomb?
Without Bethlehem?
Without the Sea of Tiberius (the Sea of Galilee), where Jesus after his Resurrection had Peter and the others cast their net on the other side of their boat?
Relocating temporarily from Washington, D.C., to Florida from January 10 to February 20 was a kind providence. True, Florida had its coldest weather in 50 years, but don’t cry for me, northern America. Down there, “cold” means about 45 degrees Fahrenheit early in the morning, rarely below that. Some afternoons it hit 70 degrees. Meanwhile, Washington had some three feet of snow. My visiting nephew had to have the flat part of Karen’s studio roof shoveled after each of the two storms, lest the weight of the snow and backed-up ice do serious damage.
But the great joy for me was not the weather. It was teaching a mini-course on “Religion and the U.S. Founding” at Ave Maria University. It reminded me that my true vocation, next to writing, is teaching young people. I loved all ten of the “kids” in my seminar. We covered much ground in a short amount of time (and they got it), and we had good talks including a weekly lunch. They took down clear outlines of key points, and had a lot of laughs at my stumbling efforts to recover old skills at teaching. (I meander more than I used to.) Each student wrote two papers — for extra credit, some wrote a third — and they were all really quite good.Read more »
On Loving Karen Published in First Things Online February 14, 2010 February 14, 2010 :: Filed in: First Things
Thank you, lady, for reminding me what it was like
To fall in love with Karen
Fifty years ago.
It was her eyes that did me in,
Blue as the sapphire stones
She bought along the Indian Ocean.
Blue, with sadness deep behind them,
And merriment like candle's flames on golden foil.
Eyes incapable of malice,
Radiant from her heart.
We talked and talked, newly met,
Though we had known
Each other ever since forever.
We knew the darkness and the night —
That may have been our deepest bond.
We weren’t afraid of night.
A woman who has suffered much, as Tolstoi wrote,
Inflames a lover's heart.
Professor, Artist, Editor, Publisher, Translator, Holy Man, Gentleman, Friend to a Multitude, and a Helluva Companion for Laughter and Story Published in The Catholic ThingFebruary 1, 2010 February 02, 2010 :: Filed in: The Catholic Thing
Our friend Ralph has slipped behind the clouds, out where the Sun is brightest. He will still be with us.
I can't think of any man in our time who accomplished more in one lifetime, in more different spheres, with a wider array of talents. He seemed to be laughing all the time. No one was so steady a gusher of puns, not least in the titles of his novels: On This Rockne, Frigor Mortis, The Emerald Aisle . . . even in his introduction to the philosophy of St.Thomas Aquinas, his guide for “Peeping Thomists.”
A dinner with Ralph was a feast of stories. Also, probes by him to follow up on his curiosities. Also, seeking your opinions. Tales of the latest “progressive” outrages, followed by kind words for the particular persons being singled out. New projects he was thinking of, and what do you think of this? Puns, of course, and an endless appetite for new funny stories and the telling of the latest of his own
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On Christmas, For Karen Published in First Things Online January 13, 2010 January 13, 2010 :: Filed in: First Things
ON CHRISTMAS, FOR KAREN
December 25, 2009
Full of grace!
Full of grace.
Full of grace . . . !
Mother, who this day
brought us Our Love
and our Redeemer
Take into your care a mother like yourself,
Our much loved, so-loved Karen.
Honor her for her self-sacrifice
Who gave her life for us
And especially for me
She gave up too much art
So dear to her for mine
She did not count on dying first
But left so much she longed to do unfinished.
Please embrace her and comfort her
And speak to her with love
Remind her of her words of you
As she watched “The Passion,”
Scrubbing harder with her tears
The dearest blood of your dear Son.
And how she loved your “Magnificat.”
Please, Good Lady, Mother,
Speak to her with tender love
As for ages you have been known to do,
Take her by the hand to those she loves,
John Paul the Second, Father Richard,
Irving, Bill, Clare, Avery and Eunice,
And, God willing that he’s there,
Oskar Kokoschka, who called her
“My little darling Karen,” and singled out
Her talent and her promise for all to hear.
Take her, too, to all the others whom she loved.
Sts. Thomas, Teresa, John o’ the Cross,
And John of the Apocalypse,
T.S. Eliot, Rilke, Dostoevsky,
And all of those with whom she long communed.
Take her around, dear Mother, honor
Her self-sacrifice.
If Heaven is a conversation, dearest Hostess,
Take her kindly where she will be happiest –
For her, that is, where she can learn the most.
Shepherd her, protect her,
But do not think she is too shy–
Give her your smile and let her go her way.
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The First Enlightenment Published in National Review Online blog The Corner December 25, 2009 December 25, 2009 :: Filed in: National Review Online
Those of us who are of Catholic mind do not believe that the Enlightenment began with Kant (“What is Enlightenment?”), or Locke or Newton, or even with Descartes. We cherish Plato, Aristotle, Cicero. But the first Enlightenment began with Christ Our Lord.
It was only with the Christ that EQUALITY meant every human being, barring none. From then on, no one was “barbarian.” Each bore in his own soul the mark of being called to be a dwelling of the Father and the Son — being called beyond all other calls a son of God. Neither mother nor father, neither civil society nor state, can answer to this call for you or me. None has any deeper bond or precedence than the relation of Creator and human creature. It is a bond of Spirit and Truth.Read more »
The Truths Americans Used to Hold Part III: “Confirm Thy Soul in Self-control” Published in First Things Online December 18, 2009 December 18, 2009 :: Filed in: First Things
To be free as a human being ought to be is to be able to discern, not only what one desires to do or is impelled by passion to do, but also, and even more clearly, what one ought to do. To be free in this way is to have the honor guard of virtues that are necessary to bring such a choice into clear focus and give one the courage to act on such discernment. In short, in the American ideal—which is modeled, to some degree, on the ancient and medieval ideal—liberty is not the capacity to do what one wishes but the capacity to do what one ought. It is, in short, to be capable of self-government, self-mastery, and self-control.
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The Truths Americans Used to Hold Part II: A Metaphysics of American Ideas Published in First Things Online December 17, 2009 December 17, 2009 :: Filed in: First Things
There’s a joke going around among American ninth graders: Want to scare your parents? Tell them the teacher put up a map of the Western Hemisphere and called on you to point to Mexico, and you couldn’t find it. Among young Americans, ignorance of basic facts about our nation’s geography, history, and principles has become legendary. Many cannot locate New York on a map of the United States or place the Civil War within a hundred years of its actual dates.
Yet it is young Americans’ ignorance of the founding ideas of our republic that is most disturbing. The vast majority of college students have never read The Federalist, the Constitution, or the Declaration of Independence. No one has taught them the basic convictions about the real world without which the American republic cannot be understood. No one has taught them—to borrow that ancient, but newly serviceable word—the metaphysics behind the truths Americans used to hold. Our generation is the first in history to leave its children ignorant of their intellectual patrimony. How long can a nation based on unique ideas survive not only its citizens’ ignorance of these ideas, but also their neglect and disparagement?
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The Truths Americans Used to Hold Part I: Where’s the Yeast? Published in First Things Online December 16, 2009 December 16, 2009 :: Filed in: First Things
The Dietrich von Hildebrand Legacy Project recently sponsored a conference on philanthropy and the importance of fundamental ideas. In the keynote address, Michael Novak urged the many philanthropists present to attend urgently to the failure of our cultural institutions to teach the young (for the first time in American history) the basic principles of the American Republic—the ten, twelve, fifteen new propositions without which American Exceptionalism cannot be understood and without whose personal appropriation by each generation in succession this exceptional republic cannot stand. That Dietrich von Hildebrand was held up as a model for this conference seemed appropriate. He was a young man so grounded in “first things” that he was one of the very first—often alone—to stand publicly against the Nazi movement. If ever a demonstration were needed of the importance of rock-bottom ideas in times of ideological confusion, hardly a better model that von Hildebrand can be found. Here, in the first of three installments, Novak reflects on “The Truths Americans Used to Hold”—and why it is crucial now to take emergency steps to teach them to the young.
Yeast in dough. That is the image our American ancestors saw when they thought about planting the germs of beauty and nobility in their new culture. One only has to look at L’Enfant's original plan for the buildings and parks of Washington, D.C., to grasp how much attention our nation’s founders paid to splendor and simplicity, to virtue and nobility and beauty. The founders’ dream was to build a republic that would live long, prosper, and inspire a noble spirit in its citizens. The public buildings of the capital city as built solidly lift up this dream.
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Three Precisions: Personal Liberty Published in First Things Online December 3, 2009 December 03, 2009 :: Filed in: First Things
What Is Personal Liberty?
“By its liberty, the human person transcends the stars and all the world of nature,” Jacques Maritain once wrote. No one has reflected more deeply on the phenomenology of the human person than Karol Wojtyla—John Paul II. The person, in his view, is an originating source of creative action in the world. The human person is able to reflect on his or her own past, find it wanting, repent, and change direction. He or she is able to reflect on possible courses of action in the future, to deliberate among them, and to choose to commit to—and take responsibility for—one among those courses.
Only the human person is free to choose which among his or her many impulses to follow. An animal’s freedom is to do what simple instinct impels. A human’s freedom is to discern a higher, more complex, and more demanding rationality in the field of action. A human person is free to become a gentle master of all his or her instincts, so as to choose appropriately among them. He or she is free, in short, to do what a person ought to do.
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Three Precisions: Common Good Published in First Things Online December 2, 2009 December 02, 2009 :: Filed in: First Things
What Is the Common Good?
A number of years ago, at the Human Rights Commission in Bern, a misuse of the term common good poked its head through the clouds like an Alp. I had prodded the Soviet delegation to recognize the right of a married couple, one of whom was from one nation and one from another, to share residence in whichever nation they chose. The Soviets staunchly resisted the idea—and did so in the name of the common good. The Soviet Union, they insisted, had invested great sums of money and much effort to educate each Soviet citizen, and the common good demanded that these citizens now make comparable contributions in return. The Soviet partner in such a marriage could not, therefore, leave the Soviet state. Individual desires must bow to the common good of all.
Before this experience, it had never entered my mind that anyone could use the term common good to override the rights of free persons. I could understand the willing surrender of one’s own life or lesser goods for the sake of the common good. But the enforcement of the common good as a weapon against individual rights—or, to put it more exactly, against the rights of the free person—had not occurred to me as a subject for such abuse.
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Three Precisions: Social Justice Published in First Things OnlineDecember 1, 2009 December 01, 2009 :: Filed in: First Things
Three of the terms used most frequently in Catholic social thought—and now, more generally, in much secular discourse—are social justice, the common good, and personal (or individual) liberty. Often, these terms are used loosely and evasively. Not a few authors avoid defining them altogether, as if assuming that they need no definition. But all three need, in every generation, to recover their often lost precision. Otherwise, the silent artillery of time steadily levels their carefully wrought strong points and leaves an entire people intellectually and morally defenseless.
I have tried, in three short essays, to find some precision in these three realities and to define them in terms as dear to the left as to the right—that is, in ideologically neutral ways. If I have failed in that task, perhaps someone can do it better. The more of us who try, the better.
I will start, today, with social justice.Read more »
On October 11, 2009, at the invitation of former President of the CzechRepublic Václav Havel, Michael Novak delivered the following keynote address at Forum 2000, an annual conference held in Prague to map the globalization process and to note its positive results as well as the perils encountered by an increasingly interconnected world.
This year’s theme of Forum 2000 is “Democracy and Freedom in a Multipolar World” – in a word, “Democracy After 1989.”
That theme is too rich for a brief introduction. Surely, though, one of the dramatic differences between 1989 and 2009 is the new salience of nearly all world religions in matters of democracy. As Jürgen Habermas wrote after September 11, 2001, the notion that the world is secular, and becoming more so, is no longer tenable. In fact, after September 11, secularism seemed to Habermas like a small island, surrounded by a sea of turbulent religion.
Accordingly, I will make four points this evening on the bond between religion and democracy.
December 08, 2009
Radio Appearances
On Monday, December 14 at 3:00pm EST, Michael will be on the internet-radio show God's Work in Progress to discuss Business as a Calling with host Jeff Pelletier.
Then on Tuesday, December 15 at 8:00am EST, Michael will be on Radio Peace (WLVJ 1040AM in South Florida) to discuss No One Sees God with host Dennis O'Donovan.
November 18, 2009
Portrait Unveiling
On November 8, 2009, Ave Maria University unveiled a portrait of Michael Novak, the first trustee of the University, completed by world-renown artist Igor Babailov. The portrait now hangs in the Ave Maria University Library. You can watch the unveiling ceremony here, and make sure to check out the rest of Babailov's work here.
No One Sees God
