False Hope in the Neutral, by Carol Robinson

False Hope in the Neutral

Most of the naturally good reforms mentioned earlier are "neutral"; that is, they are good in themselves and standing alone. The question arises whether we ought not to try to put them into effect as soon as possible without waiting for the world to become Christian. It seems like a much more ambitious project to restore all things to Christ than to get young people to do folk dancing or to make and distribute whole wheat bread to malnourished people. Besides, many non-Catholics, not ready to join the Church, are willing to cooperate on these naturally good projects. We also belong to this world, it is argued, and owe it to our citizenship to work for good temporal ends.

Now the illusion here is that it is easier to bring about a good natural order through natural efforts than it is to obtain the rectification of the natural order through the reorientation of the world to Christ.

It is possible to obtain temporarily certain objects in the natural order, but by and large this naturally good world is impossible, and therefore unrealistic, whereas the ordering of the world to Christ is our mission and may perhaps be closer to realization in our day than it has ever been.

The reason the naturally good order is impossible is, theologically, owing to Original Sin. A naturally good society is impossible to fallen man.

But apart from theological considerations we should learn by our own experience and analysis. Our great hopes are always failing us. We think we can create wonderful citizens if only everyone gets an education - but human virtue keeps declining. We think we can create good interracial relationships by non-religious means, but we do not succeed. We think we can clean up political corruption by the right use of our franchise, but the change is only momentary, or apparent, and the situation continues to worsen.

One difficulty with "neutral" means is that being neutral, they cannot sustain their indeterminism and will thus become an instrument of atheism, avarice or idolatry if we decline to impregnate them with Christianity. The Communists use folk dancing to better advantage than we do, the British cooperatives are huge capitalistic enterprises, and lots of people worship wheat germs.
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My Life With Thomas Aquinas

The "Good Natural", by Carol Robinson

The "Good Natural" Not the Christian

If it were possible to achieve all these natural reforms by natural action, which it is not, the result would not be a Christian society. We have to say this because many people confuse a Christian order with a naturally good order. They are as different as day from night. Christ's own life centered in the mystery of the Cross, so His society also can be expected to bear an analogous resemblance. Christ's life was a contradiction, so His order can be expected to contradict the world too. Consider the illustration, how different the humanist's "ideal man" is from the saint. He has culture, refinement, learning. His natural gifts are all developed. He is courteous and clean and interested in the common good rather than in his own advancement. Obviously it is an ideal which rests heavily on natural endowment, material and social advantages.

Sanctity, in contrast, can use any human base, wise or simple, rich or poor. It completely fulfills its subjects, even intensifying their natural gifts, but by ordering a man's whole life to charity. a certain transformation and elevation of his nature takes place, within which the nature is perfected but not with the finality one finds in the humanist. St Francis of Assisi was a talented and charming youth before his "conversion." He gave up all promise of human development and achievement. Yet who can say that the saint lacked any fulfillment of his nature? His charm was still there, mysteriously magnified. He was a leader of men above anything he could have hoped for in war or politics. Furthermore what Francis became he could never have become by first perfecting himself in the natural order. The transformation and elevation of his faculties demanded as prerequisite their radical subordination to a higher principle. Francis the saint was so different from what would have been Francis the fully developed man that the quality of the two would have to be submitted to a different measure. One of the most striking contrasts would be in external appearance, that is, in the material aspect.

The same thing holds true with the social order. It is not only in the hearts of men that the difference lies between the naturally good man and the Christian; it is even more sharply evident in the temporal embodiment of the two ideals. We build housing projects and garden suburbs and fancy sometimes that we are making Christian communities, or at least communities waiting for and adapted to Christian groups. But these natural embodiments of natural standards, such as good garbage disposal, attractive houses and private garden plots turn out to be sterile and lifeless and to act as a natural constraint rather than encouragement of the life of mutual charity. It is not the goodness in these projects that condemns them, because Christianity incorporates all the good things like space and air and gardens and family-size units. But it does it in a different way and one which cannot be foreseen by merely technological considerations. Perhaps the best way to express it is to say that the naturally good thing is dead, like a corpes, or frozen, whereas the Christian thing is alive and vital and warm. Or maybe the difference is in the hierarchical structure of a community, a housing project, a political order. Or perhaps it lies in the fact that the naturally good scheme is "perfect" in a narrow, materially realizable way, whereas the Christian social order, being an embodiment in sinful mankind, is imperfect and perfect at the same time. Just as St Francis' clothes were beggar's rags and his body was sickly, so a Christian realization in a social order is unlikely to achieve new paint on all the houses or perfectly paved roads. But as St Francis lent a beauty to his very garments so these Christian things will take on a beauty which will transcend and transform the material element. Needless to say it will not be the beauty of the glass-brick kitchen advertised in the Ladies' Home Journal.
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My Life With Thomas Aquinas

The Impotence of Purely Natural Action, by Carol Robinson

The Impotence of Purely Natural Action

Because the devil's synthesis destroys the natural order, it is tempting for Christians to look to the restoration of the natural order as the antidote, or at least the primary and preliminary action demanded by circumstances. The fact that the natural law is binding on all men, not only on Christians, and that human reason is capable of being persuaded of its truth, is a further inducement to place emphasis on this level.

Reforms of various sorts are suggested organic farming, return to a wholesome nutrition with "whole" foods, banishment of usury from the financial world, the breakdown of large cities, distributism, folk dancing and culture, clean government, the reappreciation of women's nature and domestic role, credit unions, cooperatives, study groups of all sorts, creative work and recreation, housing reform. All these are good, most of them are also necessary, but none of them singly nor all of them collectively has the power to wrest the world from the devil, as they stand, without being ordered to a higher end.

Here is where the theology of nature and graces enters the picture again, to remind us that in one sense the "good natural" is just as far from the supernatural as is perverted nature - for they are both infinitely removed from it. "Without Me, you can do nothing."

There are several illusory positions to be dealt with.
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From "My Life With Thomas Aquinas"

Forgiveness - St Philip Neri

"If a man finds it very hard to forgive injuries, let him look at a crucifix, and think that Christ has shed all His Blood for him, and not only forgave his enemies, but prayed the Eternal Father to forgive them also."