None rejoice in Easter-tide less than those who have not grieved in Lent.  This is what is seen in the world at large.  To them, one season is the same as another, and they take no account of any.  Feast-day and fast-day, holy tide and other tide, are one and the same to them.  Hence they do not realize the next world at all.  To them the Gospels are but like another history; a course of events which took place eighteen hundred years since.  They do not make our Savior's life and death present to them: they do not transport themselves back to the time of His sojourn on earth.  They do not act over again, and celebrate His history, in their own observance; and the consequence is, that they feel no interest in it.  They have neither faith nor love towards it; it has no hold on them.  They do not form their estimate of things upon it; they do not hold it as a sort of practical principle in their heart.

This is the case not only with the world at large, but too often with men who have the Name of Christ in their mouths.  They think they believe in Him, yet when trial comes, or in the daily conduct of life, they are unable to act upon the principles which they profess: and why? because they have thought to dispense with the religious Ordinances, the course of Service, and the round of Sacred Seasons of the Church, and have considered it a simpler and more spiritual religion, not to act religiously except when called to it by extraordinary trial or temptation; because they have thought that, since it is the Christian's duty to rejoice evermore, they would rejoice better if they never sorrowed and never travailed with righteousness.

On the contrary, let us be sure that, as previous humiliation sobers our joy, it alone secures it to us.  Our Saviour says, "Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall he comforted;" and what is true hereafter, is true here.  Unless we have mourned, in the weeks that are gone, we shall not rejoice in the season now commencing.  It is often said, and truly, that providential affliction brings a man nearer to God.  What is the observance of Holy Seasons but such a means of grace?

-- St. John Henry Newman

I am not going to take a position here on whether Mr. Trump is a genius, a madman, or something in between.  I do want to criticize the notion that he “acts on whims” and is “volatile.”

How he gives such an impression is easy to see:  In negotiating with both friends and enemies, he blows both hot and cold, depending on time of day.  What those who think he is acting on whims overlook is that he believes in blowing both hot and cold.

Consider the game “Rock, Paper, Scissors.”  If the other player knows you will always play Rock, then he will always play Paper, and he will always win.  But if you play Rock one-third of the time, Paper one-third of the time, and Scissors one-third of the time, so that he can't predict what you will do, then he won’t be able to gain an advantage.

In the mathematical theory of games, playing Rock all the time is called a “pure” strategy, and playing each of the three moves one-third of the time is called a “mixed” strategy.  It can be shown that in the sort of winner-take-all game in which there is no advantage to cooperation, there is always some best strategy, though it may not be one which will always win.   Often the best strategy is a mixed strategy.

This is intuitive.  Keep ‘em guessing.  In fact, keep ‘em guessing not only about what you are going to do, but even about some aspects of what you know and believe, and who you listen to, and what it would take for you to change course.

Needless to say, not all purely competitive games are like Rock, Paper, Scissors.  In that game, the best strategy is to play each move with equal probability, but in another kind, the best strategy may be different – say, to play Move A one-quarter of the time, Move B one-quarter of the time, and Move C one-half of the time.  It depends on how the game is set up -- and also on the situation on the board. 

On most issues, Mr. Trump’s long-term preferences are known.  For example, he has been talking about tariffs for decades.  When he blows hot and cold, I think he is playing a mixed strategy.

Mixed strategies are hard to play in a political system which requires consensus.  The reason is that in order to keep the other side guessing, one has to play one’s cards close to one’s chest.  Since one’s allies might leak, one may have to keep them just as much in the dark as one’s adversaries are.  Being in the dark, they might panic.  They might withdraw their support.  Markets may roil.  For all these reasons, the game one is really playing (whether he knows it or not) may be much more complicated than the game one may seem to be playing, and it may even change as it’s going along.

You might argue that Mr. Trump is playing the right game or the wrong one, or with the right mixed strategy or the wrong one, or that he is playing it well or playing it badly.  But I don’t think it persuasive to suggest that he is volatile or acting on whims.

Whatever you may think of the DOGE up in Washington, we need something like a DOGE purge at the Vatican.  This will require a strong pope who is utterly committed to the defense of the faith.

He will have to overhaul Vatican finances, but that’s only the beginning.

He will have to cut waste in the Vatican bureaucracy, encourage the bishops to do the same in their dioceses, and back them up in doing so.

He will have to eliminate offices and dismiss people not in accord with Catholic teaching.

He will have to deny the name "Catholic" to schools and organizations which violate Catholic doctrine, and press the bishops on this point too.

Finally, he will have to forbid organizations of the Church from accepting direct government money, such as subsidies to administer programs the state approves.  Such funds are inherently corrupting.  Not only are they addictive, but they always come with strings attached, both visible and invisible.

Gentle readers:  Years ago, I used to write a monthly column called “Office Hours” for an online magazine for Christian college students published by an Evangelical Protestant organization.  From time to time, I still receive letters from people who tell me how much the column helped them get through their college years and young adulthood.  Some of you may know that this website provides links to a number of the dialogues, but many are missing, and all need a bit of revision.  Lately I’ve been fixing them all up, with plans to upload all of them at once.  That will take quite a chunk of time, in between other work, but every now and then I will post one of the revised ones here in the blog.

Typically, the column was a dialogue between an imaginary professor, M.E. Theophilus, and his students.  Theophilus is an anomalous member of the PMS Department (for Post-Modern Studies) at Post-Everything State University.  If you like riddles, it may amuse you to figure out what “M.E.” stands for, but no, the answer is not “me.”  The column below, one of those I happened to revise just this week, is a little different than most, because Theophilus isn’t having a conversation, but giving an invited speech to a student organization.  There is a little back-and-forth chat at the end.  Sometimes he’s a bit of a smartass, but I hope you find him an interesting smartass.

+++  +  +++

Madame Procurator, members of the Pontius Pilate Society of Post-Everything State University:  I’m honored to have been invited to speak to such a distinguished student organization.

Looking up, I see that you’ve placed my podium beneath a banner bearing your motto, the Roman procurator Pilate’s famous query, “What is truth?”  It was a great question.  I hope you will not be angry with me if I say that he did himself no credit by asking it.  Not everyone who asks “What is truth?” wants to know the answer.  Governor Pilate asked the question not to begin a conversation, but to end one.  Perhaps he thought that it had no answer.  It was the last sentence he addressed to his prisoner, Jesus of Nazareth, before turning on his heel and walking out of the room.

I propose not to end a conversation, but to begin one.  That requires several things.  One is that we desire the truth; the other is that we honor the truth we have.  If we desire the truth, then we must reject the obstacles to its attainment.  If we honor the truth we have, then we must be honest with each other about the obstacles that arise.

That is why I plan to speak tonight about three false beliefs which hinder the search for truth.  I call them myths.  These myths, along with many others, are so entrenched in Post-Everything University that they could almost be considered part of the curriculum.  Although they hinder the search for every kind of truth, I will be giving special attention to how they hinder the search for truth about God.

I do not imagine that in a single brief talk I can persuade you to accept everything I say.  My hope is more modest:  perhaps I can “connect the dots” between my claims and some other things that you probably believe already.  I also hope to provide points on which I might be challenged.

Myth No.  1 is the idea that thinking you know the truth is arrogant and intolerant.

Is it really so arrogant and intolerant to think you know the truth?  Let’s start with simple cases.  I happen to know that the potato salad is spoiled, and the last three diners got sick just from eating it.  Would it be arrogant for me to warn the others?  You happen to know that the public library is this way, but the motorist who asked me for directions is headed that way.  Would it be intolerant for you to suggest that he turn around, and tell him why?

Of course no one takes this line about potato salads or highways.  On the other hand, people do take this line about who God is and how to live.  “God and how to live are matters of opinion,” they say.  “Where things are and what you can safely eat — those are matters of fact.” Yes, of course concern facts, but they are opinions about the facts.  After all, people may have different views about just what the facts are.  The other diners might be of the opinion that the potato salad is wholesome.  The lost motorist might be of the opinion that his general direction is correct.  Surely that wouldn’t make me arrogant to contradict them.

Differences of opinion arise even in the sciences.  Paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould is of the opinion that Darwinian evolution is a fact; biochemist Michael J.  Behe is of the opinion that it’s not.  Each scientist says that he’s right; each scientist says that the other is wrong.  Does that make him arrogant or intolerant?  Not necessarily — although, of course, he might be.  The rule is that each one should offer evidence for what he thinks, listen to the evidence offered by his opponent, and not try to shut him up.  That’s how science is supposed to work.  Arrogance doesn’t come from having convictions; it comes from having the wrong convictions about how to treat people who don’t share them with you.  Humility doesn’t come from not having convictions; it comes from having the right convictions about the importance of gentleness and respect.

What gives the myth of the intolerance of knowing truth its strength?  Its power comes from a picture — not a photograph or a painting, but an image many people carry in their minds.  In the picture, a man is being burned at the stake.  He’s there because other people, who say they have the truth, are angry with him for saying that they don’t.  I agree that such a thing should never happen.  But in my mind is a different picture.  In mine a man is also being burned at the stake — I almost said, being hung on a cross.  He’s there because other people, who say there isn’t any truth, are angry with him for saying that there is.

Myth No.  2 is the idea that the important thing in life isn’t having truth, but searching for it.

You’re more likely to hear this particular myth from burned-out teachers than from other students.  One form it takes is that the good life is a life spent seeking the good life.  But do you notice something fishy about the statement?  The speaker is talking in circles.  On one hand, he says he already knows what the good life is — it’s the life spent seeking the good life.  But if he already knows what it is, then he doesn’t have to seek it.  In fact he can’t seek it, because he has it already.  But if he can’t seek it, then he doesn’t have it, because seeking is what it is.  So he has to seek it.  Do you want to know what I think?  He needs to seek somewhere else.

Would you listen for even a moment if someone tried to tell you it was better to itch than to scratch, to be hungry than to eat, or to seek friends than to have any?  No?  Then why would anyone believe that it’s better to seek truth than to find it?  Why should this desire and search be different than any other?  The purpose of any search is to find what you are looking for.  We search for truth not for the sake of searching, but for the sake of truth.

May I tell you what I think is at the bottom of the second myth?  I think God has given us two different kinds of desire for truth — one for truth with a little “t,” and another for truth with a capital “T.” Truth with a little “t” is abstract knowledge.  The desire for this kind of truth is satisfied by knowing things like what makes a great poem beautiful, what stars really are, how plants and animals are made, and how many gods there are — good knowledge, some of it even crucial knowledge, but the kind you can write on a blackboard.  Now Truth with a capital “T” is something else altogether.  It’s God Himself in person.  The desire for this Truth can be satisfied only by personal knowledge, living knowledge — the greatest knowledge, but the kind you can have only through relationship with Him, and ultimately, with beholding Him face to face.

Some teachers and scholars burn out because they confuse the two desires.  They try to satisfy their longing for Truth with a capital “T” merely by piling up more and more truth with a little “t.” The problem is that although truth with a little “t” has its own satisfaction, it can’t give you that satisfaction.  Confusing the two desires is like trying to relieve an itch by eating a hamburger! If you keep on asking from truth what only Truth can give, eventually it can’t even give you what it gave before.  The only sweetness left to you is the sweetness of the memory of the longing itself.  So you tell yourself, “Now I understand.  The important thing in life isn’t having truth, but searching and longing for it.  We long for the sake of longing; we search for the sake of the search.”

And then you tell your students.  And then you tell your friends.  And then you write it in your books.  But it’s wrong.

Myth No.  3 is the idea that faith hinders the search for truth because it gets in the way of reasoning.

This idea itself hinders the search for truth.  It stands facts on their head, for reasoning itself depends on faith.  Most of you here in the Pontius Pilate Society describe yourselves as skeptics.  You pride yourself that you take nothing on faith, and depend only on reasoning.  A proper skepticism is good, and I myself try to be a skeptic in the proper sense.  For example, I am skeptical about the idea that it is possible to reason without taking anything on faith.  Suppose someone were to say to you, “All reasoning is baloney.” He would be wrong, of course, but could you prove it?  Guess what?  You couldn’t do anything of the kind.  The only way to prove your point would be to present an argument, but arguments themselves depend on reasoning.  So your argument would beg the question — it would assume what it was supposed to prove, that reasoning isn’t baloney.  Where does this leave us?  We reason not because the validity of reasoning can be proven, but because we take its validity on trust.  We trust that the consequence relation — “if this, then that” — corresponds to something in reality.  And trust is another word for faith.

Reasoning depends on trust, on faith, in other ways too.  How do you know the moon is made of rock instead of cheese?  You say people have been there and found out.  But did you go along to make sure it really happened?  Of course not; you just trust that they were telling the truth.  If you’re scientifically inclined, maybe you’ll add that the moon doesn’t reflect light in the same way as cheese.  But have you compared the reflections from rock and cheese yourself?  Of course not; you just trust that someone has.  What if I speculated that on the moon, cheese reflects light like rock does on earth and rock reflects light like cheese does on earth?  Maybe you’ll answer that the laws of physics don’t change from place to place.  But have you personally checked all the places in the universe to be sure?  Of course not; you just trust that nature doesn’t play tricks.

I’m not saying that all kinds of faith are reasonable; I’m saying only that they can’t all be unreasonable.  The plain fact is that unless you have some faith, you can’t even reason at all; unless you have some faith, you can’t even decide what to doubt.  In order to know anything, you have to believe something.

So whether to have faith isn’t an issue.  You will have faith in something.  I don’t know what it will be:  if not God, then something else.  The only real question is which kind of faith to have.  The wrong kind will hinder the search for truth — the right kind will help.

MODERATOR:  Thank you, Professor Theophilus, for presenting your -- unusual point of view.  I think all of us here can say that we have never heard anything like it.  Interrogators, have you any questions?

THEOPHILUS:  Interrogators?

MODERATOR:  In honor of the Procurator, Pontius Pilate, that is what we call ourselves.

INTERROGATOR #1:  Professor, you’ve presented some interesting arguments, but it seems to me that they all rest on a fallacy.

THEOPHILUS:  If they do, then I will have to correct my thinking.  What is the fallacy, please?

INTERROGATOR #1:  All of your arguments about the search for truth take for granted that there is a truth to be found.  I maintain that there is no truth.

THEOPHILUS:  My goodness.  Could that possibly be true?

INTERROGATOR #1:  I think so.

THEOPHILUS:  Then you concede that there is truth.  But in that case your statement, “There is no truth,” must be false.

INTERROGATOR #1:  Let me rephrase.  I don’t claim to have a truth.  It is only my belief that there is no truth.

THEOPHILUS:  Forgive me, but that doesn’t let you off the hook.  A belief is about a state of affairs.  To say that you believe that there is no truth is to say you believe that it is true that there is no truth.  You are still in same pickle as before.

INTERROGATOR #1:  But a belief isn’t about anything.  It’s just a feeling.

THEOPHILUS:  If your statement was not about anything, then it could not have been about my arguments, so you have said precisely nothing.

MODERATOR:  Next question.

INTERROGATOR #2:  Professor Theophilus, I deeply respect your beliefs, but I think truth is whatever a person sincerely believes.

THEOPHILUS:  I’m impressed.  You must be a powerful magician.

INTERROGATOR #2:  Excuse me?

THEOPHILUS:  If you sincerely believe you’re a large diet coke, will you be one?  If you sincerely believe the onion rings are fries, will they be fries?

INTERROGATOR #2:  I wasn’t talking about those kinds of things.

THEOPHILUS:  Of course not.  Nobody falls for the “truth is whatever you sincerely believe” gimmick when the subject is fries and diet coke.  But if your magic doesn’t work even on little things like fries and diet coke, then I should think it very unlikely that it would work on big ones like right and wrong and God.

MODERATOR:  Next question.

INTERROGATOR #3:  Truth is just whatever works.  If your beliefs work for you, great.  I’m not interested unless they work for me.

THEOPHILUS:  You’ll have to help me out, because I don’t know what it means for a belief to “work” for you.  Do you mean it comforts you, that it motivates you, that it makes you a better person?

INTERROGATOR #3:  Any of those things.  I’m not going to dictate my own definition of what it means for a belief to work.  What works for me may not work for you.

THEOPHILUS:  Well, I don’t see what any of those things has to do with truth.  If I have a tumor, I may be comforted by the belief that I’m in perfect health, but the tumor is still there.  If I’m driving in the wrong direction, I may be motivated by the belief that I’m driving in the right one, but Chicago is still the other way.  If there aren’t any fairies, I may become a better person because I believe that they’re watching me, but they really aren’t.  Working doesn’t make a statement true.

INTERROGATOR #3:  Then what does?

THEOPHILUS:  To ask whether a statement is true isn’t to ask whether it works, but whether it’s accurate, whether it’s factual, whether what it says is so.  I don’t think the idea “Truth is whatever works” is a way to get to the truth.  More often it’s a way to shut truth out.  I may know someone who used to have ideals but now cares for nothing but money.  Is that really all that matters?  “Hey, it works for me.” You may know someone who gets fried every weekend and has started to use drugs on the weekdays too.  Does it really make sense to destroy himself?  “Lay off, it works for me.”

MODERATOR:  Next question.

INTERROGATOR #4:  If you don’t mind, I’d like to follow up on what you said to the first two interrogators.

THEOPHILUS:  Please do.

INTERROGATOR #4:  You said we can find out some truth.  I agree.  And you implied that there is a difference between little things and big things.  I agree about that too.

THEOPHILUS:  Thank you.  What is the problem?

INTERROGATOR #4:  There’s no doubt that we can find out some truth.  I just don’t think we can find out any truths about the biggest and most important things, like God.

THEOPHILUS:  Except one.

INTERROGATOR #4:  Pardon me?

THEOPHILUS:  I said, “Except one.” You do believe you know one truth about God.

INTERROGATOR #4:  I’m not aware that I believe that.

THEOPHILUS:  Nevertheless, you do believe it.  The one thing you think you know about God is that you can’t know anything else about God.

INTERROGATOR #4:  I see what you mean.  Yes, of course I believe that one thing.  But I don’t see how it makes a difference.

THEOPHILUS:  My question for you is this:  Why should that one thing be an exception?

INTERROGATOR #4:  An exception?

THEOPHILUS:  Yes.  If you can’t know anything else about God, then on what grounds can you know this one thing about God?

INTERROGATOR #4:  You make it sound as though I have to know a lot of things about God in order to say that I can’t know any other things about God.

THEOPHILUS:  That’s exactly what I do think.  I mentioned a little while ago that in a certain sense I am a skeptic.  One of the things I am skeptical about is complete ignorance.  Don’t you in fact have a rather elaborate picture of God in your mind, full of all sorts of colorful details?

INTERROGATOR #4:  How could that be?  What details do you mean?

THEOPHILUS:  One detail, I’d guess, is that you think of God as infinitely distant — because otherwise you wouldn’t be so sure you couldn’t know anything about Him.  Another is that you think of Him as unconcerned about you — because otherwise you’d expect Him to have provided the means for you to know Him.  Third, you must picture Him as completely unlike the Biblical portrayal — because in that account He does care about you and has provided the means for you to know Him already.  Should I go on?

INTERROGATOR #4:  No, I see the point.  I concede that I believe quite a few things about God.

THEOPHILUS:  The only problem, you know, is that you have no good reason for believing the particular things about Him that you do.

INTERROGATOR #4:  How could you possibly know that?

THEOPHILUS:  Because until a moment ago, you didn’t even know that you did believe them.  This would be a good time to begin an inquiry.

INTERROGATOR #4:  How can I —

MODERATOR:  Thank you, Professor Theophilus.  Our time is up.  Interrogators, don’t forget:  Next week we discuss Matter:  Why It’s All There Is.  Good night.

Copyright 1999 J.  Budziszewski.  All rights reserved.

Query:

I have a short question for you.  What should the commitments of the faithful be towards papal temporal authority?  In particular, may I disagree with what Pope Boniface’s bull Unam Sanctum said way back in 1302 about the superiority of the spiritual to the temporal authority?  Keen to hear your thoughts.

Reply:

Unam sanctam scandalizes a lot of people.  I do understand it to be binding on the faithful when understood correctly.  This is difficult, and I am way over my head here.  However, it seems to me that most of the difficulties people have with Unam sanctam come from failing to distinguish those things it holds to be true in principle, which are always and everywhere the same, from the juridical arrangements these true principles require, which may vary.  People read its remarks about the superiority of the spiritual to the temporal power as though it were about the latter.  I think it’s mostly about the former.

Concerning what is true about government in principle, I reconstruct the teaching of the bull as follows:

1.  There are two different “swords” or powers, temporal and spiritual, which are, and should be, wielded by two different sets of officials, civil and ecclesiastical.

2.  However, it is logically absurd to maintain that neither power has greater authority than the other in any sense, because then we wouldn’t know what to do when their orders come into conflict, as they inevitably will.

3.  Which power then is superior?  Here’s the scandalous part:  Spiritual authority is superior to temporal authority – I think for two reasons.  One reason is that our spiritual good is incomparably greater than our temporal good.  The other is that the spiritual power is more incomparably more reliable within its own domain, because of its charism.

4.  But the term “superior” gives rise to endless difficulties, and theologians are not usually very good at the kinds of distinctions which political philosophers demand.  What does the bull actually mean by the superiority of the spiritual to the temporal authority?  One part of the meaning is that civil officials have the spiritual obligation to exercise their authority on behalf of the Church and for its protection.  The other is that ecclesiastical officials have the spiritual right to stand in judgment on civil authorities and declare when they have erred.

Now concerning the juridical arrangements these principles require, matters are more obscure.  A careless reading of Unam sanctam may give impression that the spiritual obligation and right to which I have just referred are always to be given civil or constitutional effect, so that, for example, the Church may put an erring magistrate in prison.  “Do this, do that!  Jump!” But I don’t think that reading is even close to correct, and here’s why.

In the first place, I take the point about the authority of the Church to declare when civil officials have erred to include only moral and doctrinal errors, not poor prudential judgments.  So, for example, the Church may condemn the WW2 German government for carrying out the Holocaust and for persecuting the Church herself, and she may even absolve her members of obedience to tyrants.  But she has no business telling the government how best to reduce air pollution.  She may demand that illegal immigrants be treated with fairness and compassion, but she may not demand, in the name of fairness and compassion, that states neglect to enforce their borders, or that they are not to deport any violators.

In the second place, we must distinguish between two states of affairs:  Do the citizens and temporal authorities acknowledge the truth of the faith, or deny it?  As a matter of principle, it is far better for them to acknowledge it -- as was the case during the era during which Unam sanctam was promulgated.  But it is also a matter of principle that if the state and citizens are recalcitrant, they must not be compelled to acknowledge its truth.  As St. Hilary of Poitiers said, “God does not want an unwilling obedience.”  The proper way to bring about the agreement of citizens and state to the faith is evangelism, moral persuasion, and witness, even at great sacrifice and risk.

And in the third place, the circumstances in which the faith finds itself make a difference.  Suppose the citizens and temporal authorities of a certain land do acknowledge the truth of the faith.  It still doesn’t follow that the Church should have civil power in that land.  In many cases, perhaps almost always, the spiritual authority of the Church will have greater effect when it is backed up only by spiritual sanctions.  I don’t say that this is so in every case whatsoever:  For example, I am sure Gideon acted rightly in pulling down the Asherah poles and destroying the altars of Ba’al.  But most of the time, giving temporal enforcement powers to the spiritual authority would harm the Kingdom of God rather than advancing it.

So is the spiritual power superior in principle?  Yes.  But does that mean it ought to have an actual political check?  Not necessarily.

I may be way off, and I say all this subject to correction.