Foundations bree kenneth simon, center for american studies. We welcome to the b. Kenneth Simon Centers 2023 russell kirk lecture featuring. Bishop Robert Barron of the diocese of winona, rochester, minnesota. I have the task of introducing bishop bear in the night a task made difficult by the fact that his publications media, teaching and leadership exemplify faith and reason, courage and humility, along with tremendous insights. Our cultural situation and how we might best engage it. What is true for me and, i know for many of you in attendance tonight, is that his writings and lectures and and podcast and interviews have become our regular companions instructing us in the gospel as the Old Testament prophets catholic social thought the meaning of great literature and philosophy, contemporary culture and of course the finer points of doctrine. So tonight Bishop Barron will address the topic of, the breakdown of the talk pavilion prior to his 2022 appointment as the bishop of winonarochester. He had served for seven years as auxiliary bishop for the archdiocese. Los angeles Bishop Barron, also the rector of mundelein seminary, chicago, where he taught for several but most him as the foremost evangelist of roman catholicism in america globally, even he is the founder of word on fire catholic ministries, which uses, quote, media both old and new to proclaim the gospel of christ. On that front, Bishop Barrons work is nothing short of spectacular. His Award Winning ten part series, catholicism offers an amazing presentation of the church through its sacraments. Saints Church Architecture history. He is a number one amazon bestselling author. He has published numerous books and articles on theology and the Spiritual LifeBishop Barrons website word on fire dawg reaches millions of people each year and is one of the most followed catholics on social media. His youtube have been viewed over 90 million times, but what is noteworthy this regard is the quality and manner of his engagement. He is at the forefront of the effort to reconnect socalled nones are persons of no religious faith. Christianity, a segment americans that grows every year, a phenomenon not limited roman catholicism and, one that is slowly changing our and not for the better. What Bishop Barron stresses is that the most significant cause of the growing of nones that were never taught seriously their faith begin with translation. This is an important business in an age of unbelief, not hostility towards christianity. Bishop barron urges the recovery of the Church Fathers the bible, the lives of the saints classical philosophy and literature, and the record of learning in the church stretches over centuries. Bishop barron responds to the new atheists that he agrees with them in terms of the god they dismiss and their arguments. He too doesnt in a god who is merely highest being or the top most item in the universe, a god that succeeds by making us his puppets or demanding irrational god, Bishop Barron argues, is transcendent the creator through whom everything comes to be in the world. The god is the sheer act of being itself. The fear is that god wants to dominate us and diminish us to controlling us. He asks, what if its the exact Bishop Barron repeatedly quotes the second century saint saint erroneous of the owens observation quote the glory of god is man fully alive. We become what we love and what we praise, right . Praise manifests itself in a wellordered, joyful and flourishing. In a recent with jordan peterson, Bishop Barron was repeatedly asked why so many in countries continue to fall away from religious belief, including catholicism. Why are you in . Peterson inquired. And bishop responded that his sense of mission in life was fired for him at an early age. The culprits were Thomas Aquinas cosmological argument for the existence of god and Thomas Mertons wonderful seven Storey Mountain. In their own way, these authors had some at him, too a profound mission for his life. The third part of Bishop Barrons offered the example of father walter chiswick, the Young American who spent 20 years in soviet prison camps. 15 of those years in siberia as a young seminary student heard pope pius the 11th call, quote, for heroes to go under russia. And he decided to train for mission. But following call led to severe for him. And his book with god in russia. Father chozick said that the two decades he spent in prison involved accepting gods will and doing what good he could. He decided to quote, be christ and bear the sufferings around. Me. He blasted russia when he was finally evacuated. But we too need heroes to go into many areas, pursue and disciplines to save our country to recreate the world with the seeds of renewal. And there is no one better to instruct us in that call. Bishop barron. Welcome. To what god bless you all. Thank you for that lovely introduction. Thanks for reading me so carefully. The years and drawing out the themes that really are central. I think to my to my writing and teaching. I want to apologize in advance for my somewhat scratchy voice. I mean, what hope are the last stages of a bad cold. And i just got through an all day meeting the usccb. We started at 830. We ended at five. So this is a relief from that experience of now that im bishop of diocese especially, i dont have time to prepare more serious lectures. I, i try to take maybe one or two a year that i can really sink my teeth. And when i received this invitation, i said, thats what i really want to do. Because of my respect for the Heritage Foundation and my deep respect for russell kirk someone that ive studied and whose writings used for many, many years. So it inspired me to do some work on this, on this paper. As everybody in this knows, the issue of the relationship between liberal democracy and the Catholic Church has long been a vexed one. If one consults catholic leaders in the 19th century very much including the popes who dominate the second half of this century, namely pius the ninth and leo the 13th, more refined, vigorous condemnations of and the liberal order. Moreover, if one surveyed the writings of leading figures within the american policy of that same century, one would discover sharply worded critiques catholicism as a system alien to the american way of life. For a particularly good example, take a look at. Ulysses s grants appraisal in 1875 that catholicism prove more divisive in america than the confederacy itself had been. And if one harbors any doubts whether, this attitude survived well into the 20th century. When he look further than the ruminations of Woodrow Wilson and the warnings of a slew of cultural at the prospect of a catholic president in 1960, at the end of the beginning of the 20th century, a number of catholic ecclesiastic, including james gibbons, the archbishop of baltimore, john ireland, the archbishop of saint paul, commenced to advocate for rapturous between catholicism and american democracy. Subsequently, toward the middle of the last century, catholic academics such as john murray and john ryan began articulate in a more rationally manner the points of contact between classical, catholic, political philosophy and the principles of modern liberalism. The ruminations, both ecclesiastical and academics, often around the importance of tolerance and religious liberty and. Indeed, the vatican to document dignity. This humanae largely penned by cortney murray, made the american to the rapport between objective religious truth and freedom of conscience, part of the official teaching of the catholic. Then, in the years following vatican two, a plethora intellectual players within the Catholic Academy in the United States emerged to continue and deepen this line of thought. One thinks of george weigel, michael novak, George Robert sirico, and perhaps especially of richard john neuhaus. Their influence upon saint john paul. The second became unmistakably in the great popes 1991 encyclical letters a. Z. Moss, which was simultaneously celebration of leo the 13th groundbreaking rare novarum and a thoughtful consideration of the of 1989. In the course that letter, john paul enthusiastically endorsed the market economy and form of liberal democracy that obtained generally in the west. Now if we look more deeply into the arguments presented by this school of thought, refer todays fusion ist since it appreciates the tight connection, catholicism and political modernity. We notice a number key themes. First, the insists that the liberal democratic emphasis upon the dignity of individual is unintelligible from biblical assumptions. Thomas jefferson implied much when he said in the prolog to the declaration that all people are quote endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights. If rights are granted by the state. They can be withdrawn when its convenient for the state to do so. If theyre a function of cultural consensus, they can disappear when that consensus even essos history. Of course provides numerous examples of precisely those moves. Furthermore, equality, one of the most foundational liberal political principles is similarly grounded in a theological vision of things. For as the ancient political theorist with such clarity, we human beings are in almost every regard, radically unequal in size, strength, beauty, moral virtue, etc. Point of fact, the political systems proposed by both plato and aristotle are predicated upon the assumption of irreducible among the members of the polis. For plato, everyone in the city falls into one of three altogether distinct social classes. For aristotle, only a small of property intelligent males are permitted to partake of authentically life. Once again, jefferson gives away the game when claims as selfevident. The assertion quote all men plea to they were producing classes and aristotle a small contingent of properly intelligent males were permitted to public life. Once again jefferson gives away the game when he claims the assertion quote all men are created equal. Despite our enormous inequalities in every respect we are indeed all equal the children of. Created by his choice to share eternal life with him. Take on the future becomes difficult to defend this principle of the democratic polly. In the a little upon the notion of limited government typical inspiration. Thymic and the profits remind israelite kings of their obligation to follow torah and those potentates stand whether they like it or not under the judgment of. This means the law is over the whims and private designs of anyone including especially kings. The severed tip that applies to scope and the power of any earthly rule are strictly limited hemmed in by the demands of moral law. You might refer to this context to make in at the same criticism of the corruption of kings in a speech given by the profit samuel. True, indeed i think it is, why did so many reflective people . Am i . Do just bigots . I mean, there were plenty of bigots, both sides of the divide. But there are also a lot of reflective people who felt that the two systems, the catholic and americans, were incompatible. Well, to provide a fully adequate response to that question would take me far beyond the confines of this paper. But permit me to explore just a few angles. Antiliberal catholic theorist would have drawn attention to the roots of liberalism in thought of Thomas Hobbes and john locke, and would have remarked how those thinkers represented a radical rupture from the classically catholic understand ing of both the political and moral orders. In this regard, of course, hobbes particularly instructive, consciously breaking with the long tradition of political philosophy that preceded him. Hobbes endeavor to articulate a science of politics like inform and purpose to the physical sciences that were beginning to emerge in his time. This amounted to a setting aside of causality and questions of moral aims in an embrace of efficient causality alone in the political order. Accordingly, set out to explore what actually motivates beings to act as they do in reductionistic conclusion was that the efficient cause of our behavior is at bottom, i should say the efficient causes of our behavior are at bottom. The accompanying the desire to preserve and to avoid violent death. This quotation from chapter 11 of leviathan signals the sea change that hobbes represents. Im quoting directly from this the original english of leviathan, the felicity of this life not in the repose of a mind satisfied, for there is no such finish ultimate, ultimate aim nor suman bonhomme greatest good as is spoken of in the books of the old moral philosophers, close quote the complete relative izing of truth and goodness in the hobbesian program. Clear. Furthermore in this passage from the sixth chapter of the violent and im quoting again whatsoever here is the object of mans appetite or that it is which he for his part, call with good and the object of his hate and aversion. He call it evil, close quote. Whereas classical politics was predicated upon keen sense of objective, moral value and indeed a highest good which all people aspire by nature. Hobbesian politics was predicated upon the preservation of biological life. Now, any collectivity of individuals, all motivated, a selfish desire to live and to avoid violent death will necessarily come into conflict. And the result will be, in hobbess famous phrase, a life that is, quote, solitary nasty, brutish and short. Close quote. It is to avoid this intolerable situation that human beings resolve to enter a social contract by which they surrender their rights and prerogatives to the leviathan and state the practically Unlimited Authority granted to the sovereign. Paradoxically, in the selfinterest of each party to the contract that was at least hobbess assumption. Once again, hobbes would insist that the sovereign remains utterly indifferent to matters of moral excellence or, spiritual attainment. Rather his purpose is to protect warring individuals from one another. And this touches upon a deeper matter, namely hobbes, is unambiguous assumption that patchy practically the entire tradition of political philosophy that came before him we are not by nature politico or social. We are only artificially and by means of a contractual contrivance. Relatedly, were not natural, good or ordered to friendship. Just the contrary, the entire hobbesian program rests upon the conviction that our natural state is one of utter selfinterest and hostility to our neighbors. Thus, in his pithy formula, the state of nature is the state of war. Now, hobbes, his program was in essentials adopted by john locke. The locke softened it in many. For instance he opined that a kind of natural moral law even in the pre political state of nature. And he held that one exert that state by means of two contracts. Not one is in harms, thus allowing, for the possibility of rebelling against a corrupt state without reverting ipso into the state of war that was decisive for jefferson. But the amoral 90 teleological conception of life remained in place. Thus, for locke, rights are. But a function of our desire to preserve life, avoid violent death. It is language. We have the right to those things that we cannot not desire. Namely, life itself. And its necessary covenants, liberty and property. Any of a transcendent good to which human life is properly or of a common good that goes beyond the mere physical wellbeing of the members. The Political Society is the hobbesian manner missing . The government, which secures these rights, remains if i may put it this way, protective rather than directive the citation from letter on toleration is apposite. Im quoting now from locke. The commonwealth seems to to be a society of men constituted only. And thats his his own italics. Only for the procuring, preserving, advancing of their own civil interests. Civil interests. I call life liberty and health of the body and the possession of outward things such as money, lands, houses furniture and the like. Close. The lockean suspension of the metaphysical good becomes even clearer when we venture of lockes explicitly political writing and turn to his epistemological masterpiece, an essay on human understanding. In this text he lays out revolutionary idea of will as primarily an active power of selfdetermination. Whereas, on the traditional a good outside will prompts that faculty respond, unlocks the will, has primacy, and remains undetermined by anything outside of itself. Heres his account and quoting again for that was determines the general power of to this or that particular direction is nothing but the itself x exercising the power that it has in particular way. Close quote in a radical departure from the standard interpretation, locke holds that the direct object, the will is not a thing but an action, namely its own. Rather than appreciating the will in the to mystic manner as extending itself into reality, the being lured by the good locke effectively shrinks its area of concern. Heres his own extremely clear and illuminating formulation quote the will or power of volition is conversant about nothing but our own actions terminates there and no further close quote. So concerned is he to maintain the control that the will has over itself. Locke argues that the self quote that only begins its act of will from itself alone. But that movement likewise ends exclusively in the self as the wills proper object. Close quote. Were a continent away from from someone like aristotle aquinas in that whatever connection eventually obtains with the world outside of the dynamics of the will remains secondary and extrinsic subordinate the sovereignty and sufficiency of the choosing self. No, this treatment of the thought of locke me to quote the man for whom this lecture series is named. Throughout his russell kirk remained disquieted by the manner in which locke departed from the classical political tradition. Instead being created in the image of god. Man is unlocks interpretation simply. Economicus. And his purpose is not to do the will of god or pursue the common good, but rather to protect his property. Im quoting kirk. There is, he concluded. No