"Conservatism and Catholicism"
Simboli, Brian
"CONSERVATISM" AND CATHOLICISM BY BRIAN SIMBOLI 1 n college in the early '80s, as I studied the social tradition of the Roman Catholic Church, it was obvious how different this set of beliefs was...
...Many conservatives will describe its preferential option for the poor as "liberal?' These tidy labels divert attention from the more important issue: what does the tradition actually teach...
...The Catholic tradition beckons us to prescind from our culture's pressure to sort issues into liberal and conservative boxes and to ask the more substantive, prior question: what is rational and good to affirm...
...Currently one spends as much time worrying about Marxism as about being hit by a meteorite...
...28 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR • JUNE/JULY 2003...
...Many who might otherwise take seriously the pro-life position are put off at least in part because it is regarded as a "conservative" view...
...Catholicism is too rich to be boxed in with crude categorizations...
...JUNE/JULY 2003 • THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR 27 what happened when William Buckley announced, in reaction to the social doctrine of Pope John XXIII, "Mater, si...
...But Catholics should only do so in a spirit of retaining a distinct identity, lest they allow the tradition to be hijacked by whatever passing fad of political "thought" happens to prevail...
...Some conservatives praise the moral vision of the Catholic Church's magisterium, but selectively underemphasize its conflict with their free-market leanings...
...NARAL Pro-Choice America (for-merly the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League) is aware of this efficacy, which it insidiously exploits in billboard images that read, "Imagine a country without choice?' and depict consumer goods such as an automotive stick-shift on which the options read "R?' and a faucet with two handles, each of which reads "hot...
...Political rhetoric in this country is now the spectacle of twocurrents of political opinion, each providing a moving target for the other and each bearing a label that says little of the underlying reasons—if any—why the wearer has chosen it...
...Magistra, no...
...They may also neglect to recognize how philosophical liberalism historically defined itself partly in opposition to the Aristotelian social ontology transmitted by the church...
...It provides a rich, internally consistent conceptual framework for well-reasoned discourse and analysis...
...There is a risk of the tail wagging the dog in the sense that prior commitments to political agendas take precedence over a responsible reading of the magisterium...
...Conservatism" in particular has created an unfortunate de facto linkage in many minds between laissez-faire capitalist ideology—with its associations of privilege and plutocracy—and opposition to abortion...
...More often than not, the label "conservative" merely describes a conflicting set of ill-humored responses to whatever "liberals"—who have their own parallel problems of definition—happen to profess at the moment...
...Liberals will describe its pro-life positions as "conservative...
...His most recent books are Irving Howe—Socialist, Critic, Jew (Indiana University Press) and Classical Liberalism and the Jewish Tradition (Transaction Publishers...
...This aspiration is partly expressed in the principle of subsidiarity, which posits that no larger organization should usurp the responsibilities of a smaller one...
...This denial of a significant strain of Catholic teaching took its toll—no accident, given that Catholic doctrine constitutes an organic whole...
...And what to make of that exotic creature, the pro-choice Republican...
...Calling it "conservative" fails to describe the many pro-lifers who regard themselves above all as Catholics...
...Neither label is adequate...
...Contrast this with the comically splenetic ranting and rhetorical sophistries of fast-talking, late-night political pundits, bereft of the depth of perspective and intellectual moorings provided by two thousand years of tradition...
...The Catholic vision is one of interlocking societies, organizations, and communities that mediate between the twin dangers of monolithic statism and atomizing individualism of capitalism gone awry...
...This is not an argument against alliances with anyone who affirms views in accord with the tradition of the church...
...Some conservatives will celebrate the activity of a Toll Brothers home-building company as a legitimate expression of market forces, while others will lament the impact of sprawling suburbs on the culture and on existing local communities...
...The question is ridiculous...
...If I focus primarily on the "conservative" end of this polarity, it is only because that label likely attracts far more doctrinally serious Catholics than the label "liberal:' My main point is that Catholics need to find a framework for analyzing social and moral issues in their own tradition, without the co-opting influence of "liberal" or "conservative" agendas...
...Achieving this ideal is a difficult task, but not one that should be influenced by external agendas, whether they emanate from "liberalism" or "conservatism...
...A large number of students were "liberals," imbued, consciously or unconsciously, with Enlightenment-inspired philosophical liberalism of various stripes...
...One-half conservative...
...In contrast, Catholic social doctrine is one epiphenomenon of a rich philosophical and theological tradition on which the thought of Aquinas and Aristotle had a profound impact...
...I suspect this is Brian Simboli is a writer living in Easton, Pennsylvania...
...CONSERVATISM" AND CATHOLICISM BY BRIAN SIMBOLI 1 n college in the early '80s, as I studied the social tradition of the Roman Catholic Church, it was obvious how different this set of beliefs was from others represented on campus...
...Indeed, the pro-life cause is the civil rights movement of our day...
...Three quarters...
...Consider, for instance, those conservatives who look to philosophical liberalism, even as many of its contemporary heirs affirm views about abortion, the novelties of the biotech playground, or, say, the redistribution of wealth that are unpalatable to many conservatives...
...On the other hand, "conservatism" and "liberalism" retain a simplifying allure for Catholics as for everyone else...
...The conservative/liberal polarity also diverts attention from the important task constantly before the church: how to forge a viable alternative to economic individualism on the one hand, and Marxist statism on the other...
...Or look at conservatives of a libertarian bent, who exalt the free market, but apparently do not notice that the tired phrase "freedom of choice" is so efficacious in the realm of morality, at least in part because it capitalizes on our society's exaltation of economic freedom...
...There were a few hard-core "conservatives?' Then there were the self-professed Marxists and "critical theorists?' with their cigarette-stained fingers and angst-ridden scowls...
...1, Edward Alexander is professor of English at the University of Washington...
...Only if they do so can they make their own distinctive contribution to American politics, economics, and culture...
Vol. 36 • June 2003 • No. 3
