(Untitled)

[fpb]

With the passing of years, I become more aware of the faults in my character; and especially of that savagery that enters my speech and behaviour every time I face something that is, in my view, really unacceptable. That I become, at such moments, quite offensive, is something of which I am more and more conscious; though I do not grow,

Comments

[izhilzha]

Okay, I see more clearly now where you're coming from with this. There's something similar in literary theory, which used to make me furious with some scholars, because if you're going to take the work to pieces in that particular fashion, what on earth is the point?

However. What I am trying to say, above all, is that "challenging assumptions" is, at best, an epiphenomenon or secondary result of looking for the truth.

I still disagree. It's not secondary, it's part and parcel of the search. Unless one is willing to measure what one knows or thinks one knows against what one is learning, there is no search for truth happening at all. It may well be the case that there is no disruption, that one can simply add more detail to what one already knows (I've been reading Brian Greene's The Elegant Univers, on string theory, and it has felt like that). But it's also true that some conclusions (not necessarily talking about theology here, but other things) may have to be abandoned once one learns more. If one is unwilling to consider that, then how can one learn anything?

Of course, it's possible that I see things this way mostly because I was raised to think things through in a little ignorant white-trash town where people make absolutely insane assumptions about things. *shrug* "Challenging assumptions," to me, is a necessary habit of thought to make sure I don't fall into sheer stupidity.

[fpb]

Well, I am part of a movement that is trying to avoid the poisoning of the Catholic Church. To me, taken, as the Jesuits of Boston college take it, by itself, rather than putting truth first - and not only first, but second, third, fourth, and fifth at least - it is a royal road to egotism, vanity, schism, heresy, and folly. Have a look at the Episcopal Church in your country if you want to see what I mean. And do not think that that sort of thing is restricted to moneyed suburban Episcopalians with memberships in the local country club and Rotary's. Similar temptations can be found among Evangelicals, Southern Baptists, Orthodox, people of all and no faiths. The Church has an old name for it. It is called Worldliness, and it is one of the three great tempters: the World, the Flesh and the Devil. The minds that seeks for the Truth first will have, to paraphrase the Gospel, all these other things given to them; but anyone who puts any other intellectual gift, endowments, target for achievement, standard, or value, before truth, will infalliby ruin him/herself.