A Europe of Nations, A World of Nations: Dawson's "Movement of World Revolution"

by David Pence


These essays written separately for periodicals by Christopher Dawson (1889-1970) were published as a book in 1959. Three of the most penetrating essays were published a couple years earlier as a separate book: The Revolt in Asia. Bringing these essays together in this CUA publication allows us to consider with Dawson that "world history as it is understood today is an entirely new subject." He starts the opening essay ('The Relevance of European History') with an acknowledgement that "if we wish to study world history we must pay as much attention to China and India and Islam, not to mention Indonesia and Africa, as to Europe." Just as quickly he objects to a view that European history is hopelessly parochial and "ethnocentric." He does not agree with the historian who thought the victory of the Russians at Stalingrad had made all European history a "thicket of dead ends offering no line of advance." The good Marxist demanded instead a "history that is truly universal, that looks beyond Europe and the West to humanity in all ages and times." Dawson answered not to "kick away the ladder of European historiography. Only by a return to European history is that long-held dream of a universal history possible."

                       

He further explained: "For the last thousand years four civilizations have had different views of what shapes world history: China, India, Islam, and Europe (or rather Christendom because the division of western civilization and its great eastern neighbors has always been religious, not geographic). These four civilizations are not themselves worldwide but live amidst humanity as islands in an ocean of darkness."

Dawson does agree that students of Europe spend too much time on intramurals without attending to the epoch-changing ability of European culture to "break down the isolation of the ancient civilizations and bring the unknown outer world into the light of history." Three actions -- the Europeanization of Russia, the establishment of an autonomous western civilization in North America, and the conquest of India -- "penetrated the hearts of the American and Asian continents... with the influence of European culture." These actions rested on another triad of European achievements: the seagoing talents and discoveries of Portuguese and Spanish sailors, the rise of the sciences, and the development of technology. None of these, though, is the "Revolution" spoken of in the title.                              

Any revolution to Dawson must be about social organization based on the structure of fundamental loyalties. In the Reformation and the Renaissance he explains the setting of the stage for the rending of Christian Europe. A northern Protestant covenantal Old Testament character as "hard as iron and irresistible as a steam hammer would be the spiritual power behind the new economic order." A southern Catholic mixture of humanism, drama, and baroque art in popular culture with the intellectual Thomistic synthesis would set two highly "different and irreconcilable" religious cultures against each other. The revolution ('Rationalism and Revolution') occurred when two opposing forms of Christianity bloodied the public square so severely that the secularization of Europe became the unintended consequence of two deeply religious movements. Brad Gregory's book of that phrase ponders this seminal question, as does Dawson who places the priming locus of this peculiar development in the France of Henry IV and Cardinal Richelieu. Interestingly, the historian James Hitchcock answered that the most surprising thing he learned in writing his one-volume history of the Catholic Church was "the role of the Jansenists in pre-revolutionary France" fomenting the secular revolution. (Here is a laudatory take on Richelieu and his role in establishing the nation of France).

Richelieu (d. 1642)

The nation-state became the instrument of secularization and is criticized by Dawson for organizing all loyalties in subservience to it. However, it would be a fatal error to think the atheistic anti-nationalist sentiments of the European Union are spoken in the same voice as Dawson speaks. One must follow Dawson into the five chapters that comprise the second half of his book, Asia and the West. Here he comes to the same conclusion that Henry Kissinger has been emphasizing since he wrote his 2011 book on China. The fundamental form of polity in the East is the nation-state.

Dawson is incisive in his analysis of this phenomenon ('The Rise of Oriental Nationalism') and, like Kissinger, understands its profound significance. Unfortunately many of Dawson's greatest admirers seem uninterested in such real political-military forms, which make up the historical world of politics and religion. Dawson explains the fall of the Oriental Empires and the schizophrenia of anti-colonialist movements championed by such obvious Western offspring as Marxist political parties. He sees many benefits of oriental nationalism as "an educational movement," and as the vehicle for the "emergence of a state of political consciousness, self determination, and full citizenship... It was the nationalists who destroyed the Caliphate and the Chinese monarchy." He quotes President Sukarno of Indonesia: "For us, nationalism is everything. Though nationalism in the West may be out of date for many, for us in Asia and Africa it is the mainspring of our efforts." The nation was the most effective form to live out the fraternity of citizenship for many indigenous Christians, such as Sun Yat-sen -- the father of Chinese nationalism. The Catholic personalism and nationalist history of Vietnamese Catholics like Ngo Diem, his brother Ngo Nhu, and father Ngo Kha, confirms and deepens the broader truth Dawson points to in this chapter. At the same time, Dawson warned there were other opposition nationalist parties that were neither secularist nor occidental nor open to Christianity. In India there was the Mahasabha, representing orthodox Hinduism; in Egypt, the Muslim Brotherhood; and in Pakistan, the Islamic Party opposing Ataturk. All three of these countries since Dawson's warning have been ruled by governments representing more indigenous and religious-based forms of nationalism. These trenchant chapters of analysis must be especially responded to by men who wish to continue Dawson's project, not simply admire his legacy.

The re-publication of Christopher Dawson's works has come at a pivotal time in the Catholic Church's life amidst the nations. French political philosopher Pierre Manent asks if the nation is still the proper political form. America's premier Catholic political intellectual, Russell Hittinger, argues that Catholic tradition has been sparse and vague in understanding the polity as a corporate body with its own common good. He argues that while papal teachings have warned the state not to tinker with the sacral institutions of marriage and the Church, there is no recent vigorous defense of the polity as a corporate body with a common good of its own. At Vatican I (1869-70), the Church relinquished the sword of the state. But the nation-state is alive and well and holds its proper sword for better or worse. Enemies of the Church, the nation, and marriage roam about the world seeking the ruin of all three institutions. Where is the sword of spirit that shall fight them?

Christopher Dawson should not be recruited too glibly against the nation. His work on the oriental nations is about the real political bodies in which men live and love. Dawson has a big enough spiritual framework that he does not cringe in facing the nation-state, for he has seen it do both good and bad. In a practical tone he reminds us, "The work of penetration has already been done by the secular forces that created the new Oriental nationalism. New experiments and new techniques can best be dealt with, I believe, on a national rather than cultural basis. It is now a matter of making an approach to each nation individually." While he approaches the nations as nations, he approaches them as if he has something more to give their union. "Religion is essential to humanity and can not be banished from this world. " It is precisely Christianity, he says, that "has a universal spiritual mission. We are not just one religion among many."

He sees the development of national forms in the East no longer based on Indian caste or Chinese exclusivism as an opportunity. The movement of world revolution has constructed a certain stage and nations are full-throated actors upon it. But entering, also, is a resurgent universal spiritual institution -- the Catholic Church calling herself the "light to the nations." The globalization of the central form of Biblical polity -- the nation-state -- has arrived just as the Church gains her equilibrium from the Second Vatican Council called to address the world in a more forthright biblical idiom.

The caliphates, European atheists, and Marxists blame the nation for many sins and argue for its extinction. Many bishops and Anabaptists join in their cry. There are none who champion the nation in its naked form. As Dawson said ('The Rise of Oriental Nationalism'): "As a means of evoking common loyalty and common action within a single society, there is no denying the value and efficiency of nationalism. But as the ultimate principle of human action, it is morally inadequate and socially destructive. Left to itself it becomes mass egotism and self-idolatry which is the enemy of God and man. All the great civilizations admit the existence of a higher law above that of tribe or nation. There is a consensus of principle that unites all the world religions and all the great civilizations of the past alike in the East and the West. All agree that the social order does not exist merely to serve men's interests and passions. It is the expression of a sacred order by which human action is conformed to the order of heaven and the eternal law of divine justice."

In this dangerous world, it is necessary that free men forge the fraternal military bonds of the nation, but they must be cast in a spiritual crucible. Christopher Dawson believed in Divine Providence. He had an unshakable confidence in the cultural primacy of religion. He suggested that nations are the forms we should approach in making spiritual bonds with Adam's sons in the East. Let us abide his prudence... and let us obey our Lord who did not command us to bury the nations, but to baptize them.
ADDENDUM: OCT 2017 The Paris Statement: A Europe we Can Believe In

Country singers from TEXAS

[first published July 6, 2016]



                                                 

We begin with Bob Wills (born in Limestone County, TX), whose father was a champion fiddle player. Bob was a leader in fusing elements of country with big band jazz.

He suffered a coma while in the recording studio with Merle Haggard, and died a couple years later in 1975. Check out this tune.



Here is George Jones (born in Saratoga) singing the greatest country western song of all time.

                                         

Jones as a young troubadour

Listen to George Strait (born in Poteet) on the rodeo cowboys driving through the night to the next circuit stop. And his unforgettable "Write This Down."

                  

Here is one of the hits of THE HIGHWAYMEN. Composed of four superstars, they stayed together for a decade:

• Willie Nelson (born in Abbott), here performing "Seven Spanish Angels" with Ray Charles
• Kris Kristofferson (born in Brownsville)
• Waylon Jennings (born in Littlefield) did the theme for the "Dukes of Hazzard"
• The fourth member, Johnny Cash, was from neighboring Arkansas.

The first number-one song by Mark Chesnutt (born in Beaumont) was 'Brother Jukebox.' 

In the world of country western, words matter. A fine example by Don Williams (born in Floydada).

Catholic Sociobiology: Fraternity as a Political Category—will Latin America be the source Church?

by David Pence


There is a significant intellectual movement in Europe and South America to transcend the liberty and equality preoccupations of liberal political discourse. It seeks to reintroduce "the forgotten principle" of the French Revolution’s triptych—FRATERNITY as a political concept. The deep human bonds that unite cities, nations and political communities cannot be reduced to an administrative state regulating autonomous individuals asserting their rights. The publication (2006) in Argentina of Italian Antonio Baggio’s edited series of essays, The Forgotten Principle: Fraternity in Politics and Law, is considered a seminal event in launching seminars, other anthologies, and a University Network for the Study of Fraternity (RUEF) in South America. The movement has captured the attention of more than the laity. The Argentine Pope Francis made fraternity the chief theme of the Day for Peace in 2014.
                                   

Juan Perón (1895 - 1974)

Dr. Rodrigo Mardones of Chile seems to be the organizing force in South America. He has written a good review of the movement, as well as a more particular study of fraternity in Catholic Social Teaching (LOGOS journal, spring 2016). This movement is dealing with the same problem that Russell Hittinger addresses as the theology-polity problem in Catholic Social Teaching. Political community must have a deeper dimension of solidarity and social bonds to truly manifest the Trinitarian social nature of man. Hittinger directly addresses the animus toward fraternity in much of 19th-century Catholic thought. This was highlighted in the anti-Masonic sentiments of the Vatican, but the anti-fraternal thinking has deeper roots than that.

Unfortunately, almost all of this revival literature shares a distressing similarity to The Meaning of Christian Brotherhood by Pope Benedict XVI. There is no discussion of fraternity as a particularly masculine public kind of covenant. The present movement is influenced by the worldview of Chiara Lubich (d. 2008). She was a Catholic laywoman and founder of the Focolare Movement, which aimed for peace and unity through radical communitarian lives of men and women in service to others. Her movement began as a group of laywomen during the bombing of northern Italy by Americans during WWII. It has had a globalist, multi-religious, and pacifist sensibility. There is a separation of sexes in tasks, but the leadership is female. Unity is considered its chief charism, and love its greatest weapon.

The most important civic manifestation of fraternity is the territorial nation, but there is only one mention by Baggio of the national bond, with a quick warning it may devolve into "discrimination and hate for the foreigner." There is little historic appreciation for the fraternal movement toward universal male suffrage, nor the masculine understanding of citizenship that accompanied all the great republican movements arrayed against monarchy. There is no sense of male groups, no mention of police stations and fire departments or shared military protective duty as a fraternal bond. Neither is there an analogical reflection on the masculine apostolic bond, which gave the Church her name as Brethren. There seems no remembrance of the fraternity of male citizens who comprised the Grande Armee that defended Lady Liberty in real-life republican France, as well as Delacroix’s famous painting of 1830. Simon Bolivar had a much more masculine and military set of mind. His idea of American Unity was a "confederation of republics" with republics maintaining their "national" identities. His military was much darker skinned than the whole peoples he freed. The republican idea was a body of men bound fraternally by law and duty. This bond of male adults was the republican relationship that replaced the unnatural hereditary relations in which a man might be subservient to a boy king or a teen age noble.     

In our own essays we have often called masculine fraternity the missing icon in understanding the public nature of both ecclesial and political communio. We hope someday to have a good dialogue with those who seek a return to the fraternal roots of political life. But for now there seems something exhausted, something very academic, and something very politically correct about the discussion. Let the Latinos bring some Latin to the table. Machismo should be baptized, not suppressed! A source Church should not apologize for maintaining sexual distinctions in an age of gender confusion and death. Both Pope Benedict and the Aparecida statement of Caribbean and Latin American bishops have hinted at a need for a deeper anthropology of men as men to truly evangelize our age and its social crisis. The synodal movement in church governance of Vatican II revitalized by  Pope Francis is an  expression of trust in the fraternal relationships of brother bishops. Pope Francis has urged bishops to avoid pressure groups and writing campaigns and rely on manly dialogue. Multiple times he has urged bishops to speak and disagree, but "act like men... face to face."

Any adequate anthropology of men, as men, will observe the unique human capacity for wide-radius male agreement. Territorial fraternity is a sociobiological characteristic of humans developed in a qualitatively more profound manner than in any other animal group. Bounded territorial communities need not be interpreted as a Darwinist prescription for endless war. Christ ordered his apostles (a band of brothers from Galilee) to baptize the nations, not dismiss them as hopeless instruments of division and war. It is both a residue of Marxism and a peculiar post-WWII European bias to ascribe such a negative character to the civic form that transforms kinship and tribal identities into territorial commonwealths.
             

The political form of the fraternal nation resonates deeply with the biblical narrative of men recovering from the fratricide of Cain and Abel. They must pass through the fraternal trial/bond of circumcision. and become the twelve reconciled sons of Israel before culminating in the Apostolic Fraternity of the Church. Humanity is restored by a maturation of protective community under Christ. Aristotle tells us that man (and he meant males) is only perfected in the super-familial egalitarian relationship of the polis. Saint Paul tells us we will only be perfected in Christ as his Body, and it is a sacred brotherhood that is the foundation of that Church Body. All of this has profound implications suggesting fraternity (male civic friendship) as a principal political category forming nations. It is a godless cynicism which imagines only perpetual war for nations. The Church is the super organism of patriarchal fraternity. She establishes a separate sphere of authority encouraging bridging agreement among the nations which does not obliterate their spiritual identities. Just as the concept of fraternity must be brought out of the dustbin to articulate this vision, so new men of more theocentric and territorial  personalities must emerge to forge fraternity in public life. They will be neither trapped in the ideology of class warfare, nor atomized by the libertine atheism of modern capitalism. Their biographies will more likely be as soldiers, athletes, or builders than as academics or party organizers. They will not look for careerist feminists to lead them.

As Pope Benedict told the bishops at Aparecida: "This being a continent of baptized Christians, it is time to overcome the notable absence—in the political sphere, in the world of the media, and in the universities—of the voices and initiatives of Catholic leaders with strong personalities and generous dedication, who are coherent in their ethical and religious convictions." We have seen Castro and Chavez. We have suffered through Ms. Fernandez de Kirchner and Ms. Rousseff. Now let us meet a Catholic Bolívar who could awaken the men of a continent to a new political order through piety to God, protective authority amidst his countrymen, and solidarity among the nations.

Map on Monday: SOUTH AMERICA'S NATIONS IN THE NORTH

The Emergence of South America's Nations in the Continent's North

by A. Joseph Lynch

The northern regions of South America were brought under Spanish rule through a series of six military expeditions led largely by the conquistador Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada between 1537-1543. Named the "New Kingdom of Grenada," the vast area was placed under the jurisdiction of the Viceroyalty of Peru (located at Lima to the southwest). Communication between Lima and Bogota - the region's political center - along with the region's large size necessitated an administrative division. In 1717, it was declared a viceroyalty in its own right: the Viceroyalty of New Grenada.

New Grenada's first Viceroy, Jorge de Villalonga, arrived to find limited roads and infrastructure, along with a struggling economy. Due to his strong recommendation to return New Grenada back to Lima's control, the Viceroyalty of New Grenada was abolished in 1724. After 15 years of development, however, Spain reestablished the viceroyalty in 1740 and added Panama to its territory.

The Viceroyalty of New Grenada was not a politically homogeneous region. While it grew economically during the period, culture and geography helped bring about national sentiments that would one day lead to the creation of many nations in the region. In 1777, two areas gained limited autonomy within the Viceroyalty of New Grenada. One area was the Captaincy General in Caracas, which would later become the capital of an independent Venezuela. The other was the Audiencia of Quito, later to emerge as the nation of Ecuador (see map at top).

Battle of Boyacá - August 7, 1819

With the American and French Revolutions and Napoleon's political machinations in Spain, independence movements began to rise in South America. The great military commander, Simon Bolivar, who witnessed Napoleon firsthand, played a central role in the region's independence. In June 1813, Bolivar received the title "El Libertador" (the Liberator) after the successful conclusion of a campaign to drive the Spanish out of Venezuela. On August 7, 1819, the Spanish were definitively defeated by Bolivar's forces at the Battle of Boyacá (in modern day Columbia).

From this great victory came the newly independent Gran Colombia. Simon Bolivar would be its first president. Gran Colombia, however, remained politically divided along emerging national lines. Gran Colombia was in reality three nations held together by the leadership of Bolivar. Despite his successful military career, Bolivar was ultimately unsuccessful in keeping Gran Colombia united. His death in self-imposed exile in 1830 quickly led to the emergence of an independent Columbia, Venezuela, and Ecuador in 1831. Panama remained part of Columbia until in 1903, when, under pressure from the United States for the creation of the Panama Canal, Panama formally became an independent nation. Guyana, the only South American country with English as its official language was settled as a Dutch and then English colony. Her border with Venezuela and the region is disputed.

Flags of Gran Colombia's successor states: Columbia, Ecuador, and Venezuela

For more Maps on Monday related to South America, see:

• Map on Monday: CENTRAL AMERICA
• Map on Monday: SOUTH AMERICAN NATIONS 

Religion and Geopolitics Review: Saturday, April 1

by Dr. David Pence and A. Joseph Lynch

I. THE WEEKLY BRIEF

Rethinking Our Relationship with Russia and President Putin. From the indomitable Hillsdale College comes an incredible  talk on the significance of President Putin and Russia.

Christians in Iraq overwhelmingly favored the election of Donald Trump in the 2016 election. They actively intervened in the election with prayer and fasting. They believed President Trump when he said we should protect Mideast Christians. They do not want to be refugees to the US. They want to be safe in their own country, First and foremost they need security. An articulate searing interview by the National Catholic Register with a priest active in Iraq, We must remember Israel and Saudi Arabia are treating Iraq as an enemy because of their Shiite ties to Iran. Meanwhile American Christians, especially Catholics, seem locked in their own intramural debates as an intellectual class.

II. ISLAM AND THE MIDDLE EAST

FIRST TRUMP-SAUDI MEETING: Maybe it will take a Trump presidency for the political left to talk straight on the Saudis. This first meeting was sweet, but Trump's Russian and Syrian policy is not the Saudis. How this "alliance" is worked out will be one of the crucial questions of an America First foreign policy.

SEBASTIAN GORKA: His biography and summation of his argument on Jihad - a video. This speech is at a David Horowitz event. Horowitz sponsors the writings of Robert Spencer who puts out a daily compilation of terror events called Jihad Watch. It is very useful. However, Spencer is so deeply colored by hatred of Islam that he is incapable of the distinctions needed to fight THIS war.

Not so Mr Gorka. He says clearly (to the chagrin of some of the audience shaped by the Horowitz-Spencer polemics): "We are not at war with Islam!" Gorka's formulation is that the enemy are global jihadis which is a totalitarian ideology. Gorka is heavily influenced (and instructed) by the experiences of his father in the Hungarian fight against Communism and the Soviet Union. He asks who tore the Berlin Wall down. He answers, "It was East Germans." In the same way it will be Muslims who eventually are the faces and arms who will defeat the jihadists. He cites, especially, the leaders of Egypt and Jordan -- both of whom are devout Muslims. He doesn't make as many distinctions between Salafist Sunnis and others in this talk as one might look for, but his vigorous outline of the struggle is a refreshing contrast to the failed formulations of Obama/Brennan "Don't mention Islam," and Horowitz/Spencer "Islam is the enemy."

A REVIEW OF BEST BOOK ON THE SPIRITUAL ARDOR AND FIGHTING HISTORY OF IRAN'S MILITARY INSTITUTIONS: The reviewer is more negative about Iran than the author, but all agree this is the book to read to best understand the military/religion link that makes Iran such a powerful nation in the Mideast. "Vanguard of the Imam" is by Afshon Ostovar (2016).

ISRAEL'S NEXT BIG WAR: This is the most troubling scenario in the Mideast and there is no indication yet that the Trump administration is avoiding it.

ISRAEL AS A CRUSADER STATE WITH A CENTURY, MAYBE, OF EXISTENCE THEN OBLIVION: "The Arab, Muslim, and Palestinian countdown until the end of Zionism and the State of Israel reflects the prevailing view that Zionism is a historical aberration that will not last. Any Israeli effort to end the military occupation in a manner that would bring it peace and security thus clashes with the Muslim, Arab and Palestinian view that no place for compromise and agreement exists that would grant legitimacy to Zionism and the State of Israel and that would accept its permanence. After all, if the Crusader state lasted 88 years, then in 2017 - when Israel will mark 69 years - all the Arab Palestinians have to do is wait a mere 19 more years until the second Crusader state will disappear." Dr. Einat Wilf, a senior fellow with the Jewish People Policy Institute, is a former Knesset member.

CHINA AND THEIR MUSLIM PROVINCE: A good review.

III. PRESIDENTIAL POLITICS

AN INTERVIEW WITH REX TILLERSON: Something new is happening. The new adults running American foreign policy want long-term agreements with the great powers -- not a coalition of partners surrounding and threatening a new war around every corner.

A PROGRESSIVE LISTENS TO CONSERVATIVE CATHOLICS IN CONFERENCE: NCR reports on a Trump Tower conference of rich Catholics and clergy.

THREE MOVIES TELL WHO THE TRUMP PEOPLE ARE: Especially the Hunger Games.

'NY TIMES' ON DRONES: As always the conclusion of their commentary is how Donald Trump is going to make everything horrible, but there are some useful first paragraphs in which we find: a review of Obama numbers.

'NY REVIEW' ON THE NEO-MARXISTS OF THE FRANKFURT SCHOOL: Distinctions that can be made only from inside the world of the left. Great summaries of key players and a very good short questionnaire on the "authoritarian personality." Another 2017 article that has to end with a paragraph reminder that fascism has reared its head in America with the Trump election.

IV. CULTURE OF LIFE, CULTURE OF PROTECTION

IN ARGENTINA THE PRO-ABORTION ANTI-MARIAN FOCUS IS CLEAR: Anti-feminine, anti-Marian. This is feminism.

DRUGS, HAPPINESS, ADDICTION AND TRANSCENDENCE: An excellent essay.

SHIPMATES - A NEW BOND: 16% of women sailors on ships are pregnant.

GEORGE ELIOT'S NOVEL ON THE COSMOPOLITAN OR NATION QUANDRY OF JEWS AND ALL OF US: Daniel Deronda.

DO WE HAVE A DRUG PROBLEM?

V. AROUND THE WORLD: NATIONS R$G ROUND UP

HINDU GAINS IN INDIA:  Priest leader in India's biggest province as Modi consolidates rule.

IS AMERICA A COMMUNAL CHRISTIAN NATION OR AN ENLIGHTENMENT SOCIETY SEEKING INDIVIDUAL AUTONOMY: Michael Novak (1934-2017) argues against those who say our founding was fatally flawed.

ARE THE IRISH WHITE? One of the most astute political writers of our time is Pat Buchanan, who helped found 'The American Conservative' blog. He was in the Nixon White House and has a profound grasp of both practical politics and history. He understood the Trump candidacy far better than the liberal media and his colleagues at TAC. What I have never understood about Buchanan is his attachment to "ethno nationalism" and his peculiar notion that as an Irishman he is one of the white guys. Here is a St. Patrick's day reflection by an Irishman -- American Patrick Walsh. Who will tell Mr. Buchanan he isn't white. If he doesn't believe us, he might ask a Boston Brahmin.