Bargaining with the holey C
It seems to me there’s a considerable amount of bullshit in the UK government’s response to the petition urging it to tell the pope on second thought to stay home.
The visit is described as a Papal Visit with the status of a State Visit…
The Holy See has a global reach and so is a valuable international partner for the UK Government. Our relationship with the Holy See enables us to address jointly a range of foreign policy and development issues…
As with any bilateral diplomatic relationship, there are issues on which we disagree.
Lots of things have “a global reach”; that doesn’t necessarily make them worth treating as honored guests. Al Qaeda has a global reach; McDonald’s has a global reach; sexual slavery has a global reach. Some global reaches are perncious and tyrannical, and liberal governments should not give them standing by inviting them for state visits.
And talking about the relationship between the government of the UK and “the Holy See” as a bilateral diplomatic relationship just seems absurd. What diplomacy can the Vatican engage in? What point is there in it? What can the Vatican offer any real government that makes it worth treating as if it were a real government too? What is the reward that makes it worth turning a blind eye to “the issues on which we disagree”?
The reality is that the UK government had no obligation at all to treat the Vatican as a real state with a real government and real diplomats and real benefits to offer. So why is it doing it?
Yes, I thought something very like this when I read it a moment ago. But there is also something more. The Vatican has a global outreach all right. It reaches into every country where the Roman catholic church has a presence. It determines episcopal appointments, organisations and programs, schools and education, and in fact, in many cases, has a direct influence on the formation of law and the limitation of freedoms — as the petition pointed out. Earlier British governments held, rightly, that the pope has no jurisdiction in the realm of England. It is surprising and disturbing that the present government overlooks these vast influences and the overweening power than underlies them. Not only does the British government benefit not at all from a diplomatic relationship with the Vatican, the British people stand only to lose by such a relationship, and it is simply dishonest of HM government not to acknowledge this.
It’s slightly disquieting how the Prod attitude to the papacy is starting to look…almost sort of quasi-reasonable.
Given the population of Vatican City, shouldn’t the pope’s visit to the UK cost about the same as a visit from the Prince of Liechtenstein?
It was always quite (not only quasi) reasonable, and not disquieting at all. It is, I think, arguable, that the protestant revolt was the beginning of Enlightenment. It simply was not, in general, carried far enough. Protestantism actually made a nonsense of religion by vesting religious authority in the individual. However, since civil order was still dependent, so people thought (and some still think), on religious consensus, this authority was, for purposes of order (see Hobbes), vested in the state (church). As it became clear that this was not a functioning alternative to christendom (see Locke and the USA), religion had to be excluded, as religion, from the public square. Hence secular democracy. A lot of people want to take it all back, but we mustn’t let them. That’s why the protestant attitude to the papacy is still quite reasonable, whilst protestantism is not. There’s a little potted history for you, but I suspect it is largely correct in the main.
“So why is it doing it?”
To try to win 7% of the British vote?
I sometimes wonder why we dont have NOMA advocates for politics and religion?
B&W readers may care to http://www.fco.gov.uk/en/ministerial-feedback-form in order to make reasoned objections to the UK government’s craven acceptance of Mussolini’s shabby ruse, declaring the Vatican a ‘state’.
The theme for Pope Benedict XVI’s 2010 visit to the UK is Cor ad cor loquitur – Heart speaks unto heart. (Francis de Sales (1567-1622) Newman chose to put a painting of St Francis above the altar in his own Chapel at the Birmingham Oratory.
‘Heart speaks to Heart’ – who is speaking to who?
Pope Benedict XVI, told 400 priests in a closed meeting in Northern Italy that “God entrusted man with the responsibility of creation”. He also said that the destruction of the environment was primarily due to materialism: living in a “materialistic world” where “God is denied” has led to the environment’s current state.
I think they’re going after much more than 7%. The message they’re trying to send is the following: “Today we may be groveling before the leader of a religion you despise. But rest assured, tomorrow we will be groveling before the leader of your own favorite religion.”
Eric, great potting, I agree. This is in part, (I think) why I’ve been defending, what I see is the necessary work of reform.
I guess why I think I care is along the lines of “niche theory” in ecology. This is going to be shorthand, but many seem to want “religion” to “die out”. Some say however, that that just opens the field for the fundies, the way shooting all the wolves plays havoc with the elk.
here is an example of this argument, from the country where I reside:
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/fading-religion-fanning-fundamentalism-author-finds/2005/07/11/1120934188937.html#
I’m fascinated as well with Scandinavia, and how they have seemed to transitioned to a content free religion, that just serves people as a humanitarian outfit, and cultural majesty. Overwhelmingly, my Swedish friends baptize their kids, but it has zero content for them …
I’d be curious what people think about this angle …
I posted a very slightly different version elsewhere, but W.S. Gilbert should be an inspiration everywhere!
The pope’s visit is said to be costing 20 million pounds sterling, at a time when Britain is (forced to) mercilessly cut public expenditures. – PH
When England Really Ruled the Church
When England, groaning ‘neath the weight,
(In randy Henry’s time)
Of Rome’s unseemly influence —
Asserting power to dispense
All benefits divine —
Then randy Henry (number eight)
Revised the roles of church and state!
When England’s helm came to be manned,
By Henry’s daughter, she,
A woman mere, considered weak,
All virginal, she must be meek —
So thought the papistry.
But under good Queen Bess’s hand,
The romans were from England banned.
When James the first of Scottish fame,
Beset by Cromwell’s crew,
Found roman bibles wanting, then
He summoned loyal English-men
To write the book anew.
And then he authorized the same —
The book that bears King James’s name.
* * * * * * * *
But now the Queen creates a sore,
As Mussolini did.
She treats the pope just like a prince,
Her lavishness makes paupers wince
Her coffers have no lid!
So Papa Ratzinger will score
Some twenty million pounds or more.
In otherwords, Eric, what I hear Maddox saying is that by making religion “individual”, it has not made it a “nonsense” at all, but rather the wellspring of what we observe around us as protestant fundamentalism … in all its anti intellectual glory.
The supposed success of America’s secular democracy seems far from settled.
How bout this for a thought experiment: Is it “possible” that America could elect President Palin, and she could appoint Albert Mohler to be her science advisor?
Now how do we feel about Francis Collins?
Mohler certainly does not vest religious authority in the individual, that is not what he means by personal relationship with God.
In his theology, Men are definitely in charge of women.
Yeah, they are seemingly very valuable to each other.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/ni/2010/02/our_man_in_the_vatican_episode.html
It was interesting to read that Tony Blair was the first PM to appoint a Catholic ambassador and looked to Northern Ireland.
Scott, I’m not quite sure what you’re trying to say, nor am I sure what Maddox is saying. Mainline protestantism has decayed, no doubt about it. But is the kind of Christianity that is replacing it ‘highly individualised’, as Maddox is claiming, or is it a return to a dogmatic authoritarianism? The latter is how I would understand fundamentalism. The fact that it does not accommodate other religious traditions is not very surprising, since it grounds itself simply on faith assertions, rather than, as many forms of mainline protestantism tried to do, on a kind of reasoned consensus. The logical end-product of the protestant revolt, as I see it, should have been the gradual decay and disappearance of religion as a large-scale social phenomenon. Thus far my potted history.
Of course, that hasn’t happened, and for a very simple reason. Religions are not rational enterprises. They are systems of emotional wish-fulfillment which use, on the one hand, simulacra of reason and argument, and, on the other hand, forms of social/emotional reinforcement of beliefs which give individuals a sense of meaning and purpose. That meaning and purpose is only secure if they can convince more and more to accept their beliefs, which are, without such growth, very unstable. That is why, not only are they increasingly vociferous, they involve themselves more and more in the public square, and think they have a right to be there as social organisations. The reform which you desiderate was the protestant experiment. It has already happened. It was called the Reformation. It did not work, and we are watching, amongst those that Maddox calls fundamentalists, a reversion to type. There is very little difference between the effective force of fundamentalist beliefs and those of pre-Reformation Christianity.
As to the answer to the growing religious enthusiasm and its involvement in politics, I have no idea. Indeed, I think the only reasonable solution is to oppose religion as strongly as possible as a social poison. There is simply not much mileage left in the old protestant idea of religion as a rational pursuit. Governments can afford to ignore mainline church criticisms of government, because of the growth of know-nothing religious fundamentalism. The Prime Minister of Canada is such a Christian, and would, I believe, if he had a majority government, begin to implement Christian programmes that would limit women’s freedom, certainly, regarding birth control and abortion, as well as other areas where Christians feel that Christian morality should be respected. He is already working on new law and order policies, largely based on (Bush) Republican policies in the US, at a time when crime is actually decreasing. That this is not representative of the electorate as a whole is irrelevant to him since he can use the fundamentalist demographic as a swing vote to keep him in power.
What this shows is not the need for reform, but the real need for outspoken atheists and secularists to oppose the intrusion of religion into public space, and to keep it firmly in the private sphere where it belongs. Happily, Australia now has an atheist Prime Minister, and I hope Australians will be wise enough to elect her and her party to represent them, and to preserve the freedoms that are so valuable, and are growingly under threat in so many democratic countries. But it is quasi-rational organisations, like the absurd Ian T. Ramsey Centre for Religion and Science, as well as the Templeton Foundation, which are the real danger here, for in my view they lull us into the mistaken idea that religion is not a danger, that it is, in some sense, a rational approach to the world and life and morality, at a time when the danger from emotional fundamentalism is simply growing. The British government’s bias towards the insane organisation centred on the Vatican is another example of this widespread misunderstanding of growing religious involvement in public life. In the eighteenth century the form of religion now widely practiced was called ‘enthusiasm’, which was a term of abuse, and was contrasted with the ‘reasonable’ religion of people like Bishop Butler, Kant, or Schleiermacher. Advocates for religion no longer make invidious distinctions of this sort, which is why Albert Mohler’s views came as such as schock to Biologos. They should. They shouldn’t have.
I’m not sure I understand what Maddox is saying, or what the implication of it would be.
However, it seems representative of one argument that people give for state involvement with the church vs. strict american secularism.
It would seem to me that in Sweden for instance, the fact that there was “an official church” … and still is in a defacto sense, “keeps the fundies out” … just like predators keep the herd healthy.
Your response is helpful, and I have to think about it more … thanks, as usual your thoughts in this space are first rate.
OK, here is another whack at what I think Maddox, and those people who agree with Dawkins, but want him to shut up think …
http://www.newstatesman.com/200304210018
Ophelia, will you speak to what Dalrymple says? Will you? I’d really like to hear it.
http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/294738
“We have had a terrible happening in Ireland with the priests and monks and nuns all taking part in acts of disgraceful behaviour with young people, and we haven’t seen the Catholic Church taking a strong stand on this,” he told the BBC World Service.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/2/hi/northern_ireland/10484122.stm
I’m not a lover of Paisley, but I do have to agree with this statement.