I think this explains an underlying reason of declining birth rates and why every country around the world is failing to turn it around. It is a “spiritual” problem at its core. Been thinking about the Japanese, super developed, but can’t turn around their birth rate decline. Apparently economic/materialistic incentives don’t work. Must be a deeper reason, meaning/spiritual?
Not everyone has declining birth rates. Muslims and 3rd world Latinos have very high birth rates, and that is leading to a tremendous clash of civilizations. Latinos are mostly Catholic, and the fundamentalist Muslims are closer to satanic than godly. And here we, in the West, are in the middle, being pressed from both sides. Here in the US, the entire culture is changing. Of course, there is a cure.
As PBD said, “Why aren’t you home, making babies?” That’s a fair question for both the secular, the Christian, and the Jew in the West.
Great letter, Spencer. Your thinking inspires. I think if God exists, He wants us to strive and be curious about his world. It’s the freedom that the Grand Inquisitor is trying to shut down and that Christ answers with a kiss. The chasm of doubt created by the Scientific Revolution is real, to the extent that it is felt and anguished over, but it is still only a word and an image (we imagine an abyss). But we embrace that doubt with new striving, and where that striving is, is where the soul is.
I was once like CS Lewis, a casual acquaintance of Christ’s. I was a believer, satisfied that my feet were on the right path with only occasional side excursions, doubts, that led me off the path. But blessedly, I would find my way back to trudge along anew with other fellow pilgrims. Life wasn’t always easy or kind but I persevered. My voice could be heard in theological debates, I prayed daily and my Bible study contented me that I was living as Christ’s salt and light. Until the day Christ cornered me. Until there was nowhere to go, no one else to look to. It was just Him and me and I was compelled to look into His peerless face. What I discovered that day turned everything I thought I knew 180°. For like Lewis, I too had an epiphany and as he shared in a 1951 letter written in Latin to Father Calabria,
“[D]uring the past year a great joy has befallen me. Difficult though it is, I shall try to explain this in words. It is astonishing that sometimes we believe that we believe what, really, in our heart, we do not believe. For a long time I believed that I believed in the forgiveness of sins. But suddenly (on St. Mark’s Day [April 25]) this truth appeared in my mind in so clear a light that I perceived that never before (and that after many confessions and absolutions) had I believed it with my whole heart. So great is the difference between mere affirmation by the intellect and that faith, fixed in the very marrow and as it were palpable, which the Apostle wrote was substance…It is bidden us to ‘rejoice and always rejoice’. Jesus has cancelled the handwriting that was against us. Lift up our hearts!”
So, to me, it all boils down to two things—truth and grace. Both of which, according to the Holy Spirit in the words of the Apostle John, can be found in one person,
“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth….And of His fullness we have all received, and grace upon grace. For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” John 1:14–17
To your point, Muslims and the Latinos still have a religious spiritual belief, more than the secular west. Lends credence to my point, is a robust spiritual belief necessary to increase birth rates? Looks like it may. We, the US, completely defeated the Japanese and their culture. Then we rewrote their religion. Perhaps they have not been able to replace it.
You are probably correct. Religious people understand that children at the greatest gift from God, after life itself. Certainly, a good many of those who believe life ends with death have no reason to leave anything behind—neither wealth nor children.
It is amazing to me that Christianity was the basis for the quest for knowing that led to the Scientific Revolution and to the developing world we know today. Was it the forbidden fruit or the realization that we are made in the image of God that spurred us on? The reality of God IN us gives us the confidence that knowing, discovering, inventing is possible.
"approaching the natural endpoint of our five-hundred-year crisis of unknowing"... but what do we want to end? The "unknowing" of what we thought we knew before the enlightenment, or the "crisis" about not being able to know? I'm really asking. Whence mystery?
“Gradually what this did was open up a chasm in the heart of man, a dividing line between body and soul: there were physical facts, known by the senses. And there were pure ideas, known by the mind. That middle space, the region of the embodied soul—that vale of soul making you wrote about and that living word I mentioned—that crucial third term was lost from the equation.
And I think that’s about where we are: approaching the natural endpoint of our five-hundred-year crisis of unknowing, where brains abstracted into code will toy with bodies of meat and steel. The devil’s offer was an offer to gain knowledge that would make us like gods. But it has made us unlike ourselves, and cut us off from the true God. Our salvation must lie in becoming ourselves again, those creatures who live in the meeting of spirit and flesh.”
You can not simultaneously know yourself precisely and what progress you are making; “the Klavan uncertainty principle”
Sounds suspiciously like Werner Heisenberg’s principle about the fundamental principle of the universe. Any ideas who made the universe (rhetorical question)
Pharmacology is also how we abstract our bodies. It occurred to me that God's law in us is why most people hate ball players caught doping. And I fear its more urgent than how we define fairness in sports. Luther Ray Abel wrote his interesting opinion over at National Review a few months ago. During that string of Navy Seal fatalities found to be related to steroids, he argued the Navy should let all recruits use steroids. If use is permitted it can be monitored for safety and efficacy. But that leaves to us defining what is human, can we have a class of warriors to fight for our safety? When does the warrior become inhuman? What do those who reject that way owe to the warriors? Spencer, were Spartan's human?
Spencer and Andrew, sticking with it. These letters are so boring. I have hidden depths of shallowness and only like my philosophy delivered via Tom Clancy novels. However, like kale, I believe this is good for me, so will continue to support and read. But, can we have some werewolf detectives sprinkled in?
I think this explains an underlying reason of declining birth rates and why every country around the world is failing to turn it around. It is a “spiritual” problem at its core. Been thinking about the Japanese, super developed, but can’t turn around their birth rate decline. Apparently economic/materialistic incentives don’t work. Must be a deeper reason, meaning/spiritual?
Not everyone has declining birth rates. Muslims and 3rd world Latinos have very high birth rates, and that is leading to a tremendous clash of civilizations. Latinos are mostly Catholic, and the fundamentalist Muslims are closer to satanic than godly. And here we, in the West, are in the middle, being pressed from both sides. Here in the US, the entire culture is changing. Of course, there is a cure.
As PBD said, “Why aren’t you home, making babies?” That’s a fair question for both the secular, the Christian, and the Jew in the West.
Great letter, Spencer. Your thinking inspires. I think if God exists, He wants us to strive and be curious about his world. It’s the freedom that the Grand Inquisitor is trying to shut down and that Christ answers with a kiss. The chasm of doubt created by the Scientific Revolution is real, to the extent that it is felt and anguished over, but it is still only a word and an image (we imagine an abyss). But we embrace that doubt with new striving, and where that striving is, is where the soul is.
…grace upon grace…
I was once like CS Lewis, a casual acquaintance of Christ’s. I was a believer, satisfied that my feet were on the right path with only occasional side excursions, doubts, that led me off the path. But blessedly, I would find my way back to trudge along anew with other fellow pilgrims. Life wasn’t always easy or kind but I persevered. My voice could be heard in theological debates, I prayed daily and my Bible study contented me that I was living as Christ’s salt and light. Until the day Christ cornered me. Until there was nowhere to go, no one else to look to. It was just Him and me and I was compelled to look into His peerless face. What I discovered that day turned everything I thought I knew 180°. For like Lewis, I too had an epiphany and as he shared in a 1951 letter written in Latin to Father Calabria,
“[D]uring the past year a great joy has befallen me. Difficult though it is, I shall try to explain this in words. It is astonishing that sometimes we believe that we believe what, really, in our heart, we do not believe. For a long time I believed that I believed in the forgiveness of sins. But suddenly (on St. Mark’s Day [April 25]) this truth appeared in my mind in so clear a light that I perceived that never before (and that after many confessions and absolutions) had I believed it with my whole heart. So great is the difference between mere affirmation by the intellect and that faith, fixed in the very marrow and as it were palpable, which the Apostle wrote was substance…It is bidden us to ‘rejoice and always rejoice’. Jesus has cancelled the handwriting that was against us. Lift up our hearts!”
So, to me, it all boils down to two things—truth and grace. Both of which, according to the Holy Spirit in the words of the Apostle John, can be found in one person,
“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth….And of His fullness we have all received, and grace upon grace. For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” John 1:14–17
Such grace, eloquence and wisdom in your writing. Thank you!
Thank you.
To your point, Muslims and the Latinos still have a religious spiritual belief, more than the secular west. Lends credence to my point, is a robust spiritual belief necessary to increase birth rates? Looks like it may. We, the US, completely defeated the Japanese and their culture. Then we rewrote their religion. Perhaps they have not been able to replace it.
You are probably correct. Religious people understand that children at the greatest gift from God, after life itself. Certainly, a good many of those who believe life ends with death have no reason to leave anything behind—neither wealth nor children.
That last paragraph was very well put, your entire essay was wonderful but that really encapsulated the entire discussion for me. Thank you.
It is amazing to me that Christianity was the basis for the quest for knowing that led to the Scientific Revolution and to the developing world we know today. Was it the forbidden fruit or the realization that we are made in the image of God that spurred us on? The reality of God IN us gives us the confidence that knowing, discovering, inventing is possible.
"approaching the natural endpoint of our five-hundred-year crisis of unknowing"... but what do we want to end? The "unknowing" of what we thought we knew before the enlightenment, or the "crisis" about not being able to know? I'm really asking. Whence mystery?
This is so good, Spencer.
“Gradually what this did was open up a chasm in the heart of man, a dividing line between body and soul: there were physical facts, known by the senses. And there were pure ideas, known by the mind. That middle space, the region of the embodied soul—that vale of soul making you wrote about and that living word I mentioned—that crucial third term was lost from the equation.
And I think that’s about where we are: approaching the natural endpoint of our five-hundred-year crisis of unknowing, where brains abstracted into code will toy with bodies of meat and steel. The devil’s offer was an offer to gain knowledge that would make us like gods. But it has made us unlike ourselves, and cut us off from the true God. Our salvation must lie in becoming ourselves again, those creatures who live in the meeting of spirit and flesh.”
You can not simultaneously know yourself precisely and what progress you are making; “the Klavan uncertainty principle”
Sounds suspiciously like Werner Heisenberg’s principle about the fundamental principle of the universe. Any ideas who made the universe (rhetorical question)
Pharmacology is also how we abstract our bodies. It occurred to me that God's law in us is why most people hate ball players caught doping. And I fear its more urgent than how we define fairness in sports. Luther Ray Abel wrote his interesting opinion over at National Review a few months ago. During that string of Navy Seal fatalities found to be related to steroids, he argued the Navy should let all recruits use steroids. If use is permitted it can be monitored for safety and efficacy. But that leaves to us defining what is human, can we have a class of warriors to fight for our safety? When does the warrior become inhuman? What do those who reject that way owe to the warriors? Spencer, were Spartan's human?
Spencer and Andrew, sticking with it. These letters are so boring. I have hidden depths of shallowness and only like my philosophy delivered via Tom Clancy novels. However, like kale, I believe this is good for me, so will continue to support and read. But, can we have some werewolf detectives sprinkled in?
Mr. May, you actually have made me laugh. I imagine the Klavans value your truth-telling.