August 23, 2005
HIS DARK MATERIALISM:
The rejection of materialism (Dennis Prager, August 23, 2005, Townhall)
The Marxist worldview is based on a materialist understanding of life. In popular jargon, "materialism" means an excessive love of material things. But philosophically, "materialism" means that the only reality is matter, that there is no reality beyond the material world.That is why, for example, to most leftists it is a great wrong that amid Latin American poverty, the church would build expensive cathedrals. In their view, all that gold and treasure should be spent on the poor. To a person with Judeo-Christian values, on the other hand, while feeding the hungry is a primary value, there are many other values, including the need to feed the soul. Moreover, the fact that many of the world's poor people would prefer having a cathedral to distributing whatever money selling such edifices would provide has disturbed the Left since Marx. To a materialist, the notion that poor people would place non-material concerns over material ones is absurd, if not perverse.
The recent best seller What's the Matter with Kansas?: How Conservatives Won the Heart of America, by liberal author Thomas Frank, perfectly illustrates this point.
The main reason that the three bearded-godkillers failed in their task was because each based his ism on a falsehood, unlike Judeo-Christianity which originates in the obvious truth of the Fall. Posted by Orrin Judd at August 23, 2005 6:15 AM
And it perfectly falls into the standard refrain from Democrats/The Left on how the people keep "voting against their interests". It would seem they are voting against their interests if the only interests you acknowledge are material ones. But if you acknowledge other concerns, concerns of morality, of the soul, of emotion, then maybe not addressing those concerns is against the true interests of the people.
I mean, if it's all material ism, how do you explain sports fans? And no, the old "opiate of the masses" statement shows your disdain for the concerns of others, not an attempt to actually understand. It turns your materialism into another dogma.
Rather foolish behavior from the "reality based community", no?
Posted by: Mikey at August 23, 2005 9:24 AMEveryone worships. The only question is what they choose to worship.
Posted by: Gideon at August 23, 2005 10:35 AM...there are many other values, including the need to feed the soul.
Which of course can only be done within a multi-billion dollar cathedral. I guess all those poor Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians, Quakers, Mennonites, Adventists, and Pentecostals are all soul starved up there in the USA. Must be why North American culture has lagged so far behind South America.
Posted by: Shelton at August 23, 2005 12:03 PM...the obvious truth of the Fall.
That may well be truth, but it is not obvious.
Posted by: Brandon at August 23, 2005 12:37 PMFor where your treasure is, your heart will be also. Luke 12:34
Matt 26:7-11. A woman came to Jesus with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, which she poured on his head as he was reclining at the table. When the disciples saw this, they were indignant. "Why this waste?" they asked. "This perfume could have been sold for more than a year's wages and the money given to the poor."
Aware of this, Jesus said to them, "Why are you bothering this woman? She has done a beautiful thing to me. The poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me."
Posted by: Gideon at August 23, 2005 12:46 PMBrandon:
You don't think Man has a Fallen nature? You're living in a nation that's premised on it.
Posted by: oj at August 23, 2005 12:53 PMThere are a lot of nations that are not premised on it, ipso facto, it's not obvious. And no, I don't think man has a fallen nature. I don't think it was ever at a higher place from which to fall.
Posted by: Brandon at August 23, 2005 2:55 PMWhy do you have "judeo" in lower case?
Posted by: Joseph Hertzlinger at August 23, 2005 3:49 PMbecause I'm a crappy typist
Posted by: oj at August 23, 2005 3:53 PMOJ,
The belief that they're failing doesn't make a fallen nature obvious.
Posted by: Brandon at August 23, 2005 4:37 PMBrandon:
That the ones that stop organizing around it fail doesn't make it obviously true?
Posted by: oj at August 23, 2005 5:22 PMI'm not disputing the true part. I'm disputing the obvious part. If it was obvious, all nations would organize around it at all times. They don't. So it's not obvious.
Posted by: Brandon at August 23, 2005 5:59 PMBrandon:
No, they wouldn't. For one thing it's unflattering to acknowledge that truth. For another it's difficult to organize around it. Far easier to deny it and build an amoral welfare state.
Posted by: oj at August 23, 2005 6:26 PMBrandon: Most nations are ethnic groups. They're organized around the principle of ethnic identity. The US is unique in that (1) it has always been made up of multiple ethnic groups, (2) it was part of the British empire, which did a better job than any other ethnic state of respecting the inalienable rights of man and the rule of law, and (3) it gained its independence from Britain relatively early in its political development, and was more free than any other country to develop along non-ethnic lines. If you can't "organize" your country on ethnic lines 'cause it's not an ethnic group, you have to find a non-ethnic idea to work from.
Posted by: Mike Morley at August 23, 2005 7:46 PMBrandon, one of the first consequences of having a fallen nature is to deny that one's nature is fallen.
Posted by: at August 23, 2005 8:15 PM