Christian Realism & Christopher Dawson: THE FRAGMENTATION AND EMASCULATION OF POLITICAL THINKING

[first published February 11, 2016]


by David Pence


Religion, language, and nations shape the communal identities of men who are the principal actors in the Providential unfolding of history. To understand God’s designs in nature, one must study physics, chemistry, and biology. To understand God’s design in history one must study Scripture, geography, and the history of religion, language groups, and the nations. It is an indictment of Christian intellectual life that so few serious Christian scholars understand the "stuff of history:" geography, military history, economics, and the development of linguistic, ethnic, and religious loyalties among the nations. The overspecialization and fragmentation of knowledge in modern universities has its echo in Christian circles. Catholic philosophers and theologians are abysmally ignorant of the rudiments of the physical sciences as well as the basics of geography, military history, and the communal life of nations. We are a long way from the greatest natural scientist of his day, Albert the Great, teaching natural philosophy to his scripturally-saturated student: Thomas Aquinas. This fruitful interaction of teacher and student  brought forth a man in full who could transmit the drama of the gospel with the authority of man who had a profound apprehension of nature's wholeness.
               

The loss of all-male colleges and graduate studies programs as well as the feminization of military culture and education has left American men without a working knowledge of the communal accelerants of world history. Communal masculine groups under great leaders are central to the spread of Christianity, the rise of nation states and the development of peoples. The emasculated academy hears of male groups and sees Nazis and jihadists. They cannot imagine there are other large groups of men who can join in disciplined communal actions for a common purpose. Look at any great bridge or highway, any skyscraper or church. Enjoy the fruits of a male group at work.

It was also male groups in sports and the military that led the way in racial integration. The integration of American sports with the likes of Jackie Robinson, Bill Willis and Marion Motley made all those sports better. This great tradition has been betrayed and retarded by the unnatural movement to eliminate all male working groups and protective associations in the name of gender ideology. The artificial elevation of Madeline Albright, Condoleezza Rice, Hillary Clinton, Victoria Nuland, Susan Rice, and hundreds of feminist careerists in the formulation of American national security policy has impoverished the field. Does anyone claim that there has been any elevation in the profundity or clarity of foreign policy since the baby-boomer project of female empowerment has elevated these women over more qualified males toiling in the  military and foreign services?

Christian Realism is an invitation to American men to think together about America’s place among the nations. The goal of universal brotherhood among men passes through the territorial brotherhoods of the nations. This is the form of masculine-ordered love that Christ directed the all male apostolic fraternity to baptize. If we can inspire a fraction of men to devote our communal attention and affection to the role of America amidst the nations as diligently as other men engage over fantasy football teams, we are confident that both the evening news and American foreign policy will become more comprehensible.