The More Voices Start To Sound The Truth The More The Truth Will Grow Sound

Mandeville, LA – I am fond of saying, on-air, “that sin is easy, it requires no restraint no specific skills and ostensibly relieves that sinner of consequences for their actions. Now virtue and pursuing Holiness, that is difficult, requires near constant effort and humiliation and the consequences of its pursuit may not be enjoyed until eternity begins, so yeah, most people choose Sin.” In a similar manner, most “Christians” these days also choose the route of practicing a “Christian” religious life that is largely of their own making, practiced under guidelines so loose it is an an insult to the lineage of Faith to say they are guided. The most visible example is the casual, widespread acceptance of common law marriage and no-fault divorce. The could-be adulterous latter is made possible by the nearly canonical irreverence of the former. The same “Christian” is then left bewildered at “what has happened to our country” as though they/we had no part in secularizing the sacred; to the point where the Sacred’s identity and practice now identify one as a wall-flower, and, in the Catholic case, “a stupid papist”; as if the steroidal Protestant-like acts of the Holy See are drawn upon by the orthodox Faithful of the Church Militant.

In the twilight of this sad saga we are left clawing at straws, hoping that Beazelbub will be placed in check by Republicans after next election. This is precisely why modern ‘Murican man cannot find the instructions to living a moral order reflected in the depraved culture and society we call life. Some, like columnist Rod Dreher have proposed radical cloistering as a solution, he calls it the Benedict Option and more often than not Dreher is on the defensive from the same Justice of the Peace/civil authority married cited above. A reader of Dreher writes in to offer an explanation for this and while reading it I was struck that the writer is obviously Catholic and obviously offering Dreher some fraternal correction. There’s also a lot of wisdom in this letter that will sound familiar to Mike Church Show fans (no, I didn’t write it).

“I think the story goes something like this: In the first centuries of the Church, Christians were the minority and the outcasts, at times even enemies of the state. Over centuries, and through much toil and blood, we attained toleration. Eventually, that developed into acceptance. Finally, we were ascendant. Christianity became the faith of the Empire. Along with this came positions of power and influence for Christians, who no longer had to fear a conflict between their faith and carrying out the duties of state.

That arrangement more or less persisted for centuries. Obviously, for Orthodox Christians in the East it ended with the fall of the Byzantine Empire and the rise of Islam. In the West, however, the Church remained integrally involved with the state and persisted as a preeminent influence on culture.

Much good has come of this, most especially the influence of Christian anthropology on the arts, philosophy, and political theory. The Church, too, benefited from the need to articulate uniquely Christian understandings of aesthetics, ethics, and political philosophy. The greatest achievements of Western civilization all rest on this foundation laid by Christianity.

However, as has been much discussed, especially by you in connection with the Benedict Option, this longstanding position of power and cultural priority for Christianity has also enabled an, at times, unhealthy laxity within the Church. I’m talking about the propensity of Christians, after they have baptized the culture, to kick up their feet and relax, thinking they have constructed some sort of perpetual motion machine. Once Christianity has formed the culture, this unspoken thinking goes, the culture will perpetuate Christianity. The Church need only see to its rituals, acting as a sort of all-encompassing master of ceremonies for the culture as a whole.

The error in this, or least one prominent one, should be obvious: it ignores the Fall and the reality of sin. No culture will persist in virtue without the constant guidance, admonition, and even judgment of the Church. In the absence of these, the seeds of original sin will again sprout into tares that slowly spread and choke out the wheat of the culture.

This is essentially what has been happening to the West since around the time of the Reformation. And yet it has not been until recently that things have come to a head.

What is different now? Well, the Church has neglected the culture for so long that [the culture] now advocates for beliefs and practices that directly contradict the Christian faith.

This is where the difficulty begins, because Christians have gotten soft. We’ve gotten used to our positions of power and influence. When faced with the choice of keeping their faith or their cultural relevance, an increasing number of Christians have been choosing the latter.

This is not a controversial thing to say about those who have flip-flopped on same-sex marriage in order to avoid being cast a bigot. But I think it also applies to a certain caste of those still fighting in defense of Christian orthodoxy, but who also vehemently oppose the Benedict Option.

Why do they hate the BenOp? Well, if I may be cynical for a moment, it goes like this. These small-o orthodox Christians may not have power under the status quo, but there is at least a theoretical path to attaining it and, in the mean time, a simulacra thereof through participation in the think tanks and organizations aimed at charting that path. I think many peoples’ opposition to the Benedict Option derives from a deep-seated attachment to this framework, to the potential to have power.

Some people are weak enough to actually abandon their principles in order to retain power; these are better, insofar as they won’t abandon their principles. But, even when it has become clear beyond a shadow of a doubt that Christianity no longer has a hold on our culture, that Christians and mainstream society are not even speaking the same moral and metaphysical language, they are unable to take the step back that is necessary to save the culture and themselves.

Why? Because our current arrangement is the only framework they know for attaining power, influence, and relevance. This is what I think drives the more vitriolic and strawmen-laden objections to the Benedict Option. Because the BenOp does require no longer putting your hope in politics, and that likely means no more Georgetown cocktail parties (to use the cliched boogeyman) or invitations to the White House or meetings with Senators or–*gasp*–donations to your non-profit. It may even mean fewer clicks and ‘Likes’.

To put it another way, I think some anti-BenOppers would rather be the kid who doesn’t get invited to the party than live in a world where there’s no party to get invited to. Better to be out of power, but scheming to reclaim it, than to renounce worldly power altogether.

And, really, is this not what got us into this mess in the first place? This is nothing other than worldliness, a focus on reforming our faith to fit the mold of the world rather than the other way around.

Nearly the entirety of Christian spirituality is premised on the belief that, because of the Fall, we are more easily inclined to become attached to the things of this world, to power and material things. Consequently, Christian spiritual discipline is centered on mitigating and restraining such attachment. When that discipline get lax (after, say, a theo-political revolution divides the church by objecting to the bulk of narrative-forming practices that created its identity), guess which direction we inevitably head? And when that process results in a culture that abandons Christian teaching and eventually turns on it, guess which side so-called Christians are going take when forced to choose between prominence and principle?

TheKingDude

Host of the Mike Church Show on The Veritas Radio Network's CRUSADE Channel & Founder of the Veritas Radio Network. Formerly, of Sirius/XM's Patriot channel 125. The show began in March of 2003 exclusively on Sirius and remains "the longest running radio talk show in satellite radio history".

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