The Enlightenment Has Mutated and is Threatening Our Civilization

[blackbird]

Has our society become a hedonistic and pagan spectacle, supported and promoted by liberal and leftist (Jesuit) ideology?  A number of our Prime Ministers were schooled in the Jesuit run Laval university.  Does this have something to do with liberal ideology?

From an article in National Post  by Conrad Black  March 31, 2017.
 

Quote

Quote 

Readers will recall that I concluded last week with a promise to try to develop some thoughts that emerged in that column but which there was not space to complete. After my expression of reservations about severely condemning people for minor errors of conduct, I referred to a wider sociocultural problem of what has become a great schism in our civilization.

The Middle Ages were generally an age of faith, which ended with a combination of the Renaissance, the Reformation and Counter-Reformation, and broadly, the Enlightenment. For a time ecclesiastical and secular authority collaborated, as between Henry VIII and his great chancellor Cardinal Wolsey, and Louis XIII and Cardinal Richelieu, founder of the modern French state and of that continuing monument of the Enlightenment, the French Academy. I made the point that while the Enlightenment did not begin as being atheistic, the concept of reason was quickly subsumed into skepticism, and the Enlightenment has generally evolved over five centuries toward the complete dismissal of religion as contrary to reason. 

The schism is that the great majority of people in the West, and certainly in Canada, believe that there is some sort of supernatural spiritual force or intelligence, whether they translate this into religious practice or not, but that the academic communities, the media, and the higher levels of government are all almost entirely in the hands of atheists, and in many cases, aggressive atheists. Recruitment to the clergy in the Roman Catholic and Evangelical Churches are increasing, and attendance at their services is steady or rising, but in the salons of the publicly influential, any reference to religion, other than as an antiquarian superstition, causes anyone who raises the subject to be stared at as if he or she had two heads.  Unquote

Quote  As I wrote last week, the problem with atheism apart, from its illogic, is that it incites the inflammation of the human ego. Man becomes perfectible and takes the place of God; knowledge is deemed to be finite and every day we are progressing towards a plenitude of knowledge. And all shortcomings in this dangerously egocentric system are made up by naivete or cynicism, Kerensky or Stalin. Unquote

Quote   Much of the present leftist deference to Muslims is really implicitly a ridiculing and defaming of all religions, in the guise of exaggerated tolerance. Unquote

Quote  Exceptions are made for the Muslims and Canada’s native people. Parliament has passed a motion praising the civilizing value of Islam and claiming that there is a “rising climate of hate and fear” in Canada, which is nonsense. The Supreme Court has accepted to hear out a 25-year controversy that has been comprehensively addressed by the British Columbia courts, that a ski area development in the Kootenays may banish the spirit of the grizzly bear and, according to a private revelation to a deceased elder of a band of 900 people many years ago, thus prevent the practice of their religion. The truckling to Islam, I believe, apart from cowardice and societal self-hate, is itself a mockery of religion, since there are few religious denominations which, by their rites and texts, atheists are more likely to despise. Unquote

http://news.nationalpost.com/full-comment/conrad-black-the-enlightenment-has-mutated-and-this-threatens-our-civilization

What do you think?  Are we past the point of no return?  Is there even such a thing as a Canadian culture or values or is it all whatever or whereever the establishment takes us?

Edited April 3, 2017 by Charles Anthony
added quotation mark-up

[hot enough]

52 minutes ago, blackbird said:

From an article in National Post  by Conrad Black 

Is that the convicted felon Conrad Black?

Edited April 3, 2017 by hot enough

[blackbird]

8 minutes ago, hot enough said:

Is that the convicted felon Conrad Black?

He was found not guilty or the the charges were dropped of most of the charges but was convicted of one charge I believe.  He served his time in the U.S. and has since made a comeback to television and newspaper commentary.  He is an excellent writer.  I would recommend his thick book about the history of the United States which I read.  He has a perspective which is different from the usual CBC type left wing journalists.

Edited April 3, 2017 by blackbird

[kimmy]

52 minutes ago, blackbird said:

What do you think? 

I give him high marks for his extraordinarily high word count and for the pomposity and grandeur of his language, but low marks overall as he fails to present a coherent argument.  He flails around miserably from topic to topic failing to deliver the goods on any of them.

Perhaps the closest he gets to making a point is when he complains about our culture's cowardice in the face of condemning Islam and our appeasement policy in regard to native claims. I think Argus has written better posts on both of those issues using a tiny fraction of the words that Mr Black employs.

 -k

[hot enough]

Who is the more ardent racist?

[blackbird]

5 minutes ago, hot enough said:

Who is the more ardent racist?

Yes, anybody who doesn't go along with the Liberal or NDP agenda is a racist or Islamophobe.

Now can we have an intelligent discussion with those that think a little deeper?

Edited April 3, 2017 by blackbird

[hot enough]

13 minutes ago, blackbird said:

Yes, anybody who doesn't go along with the Liberal or NDP agenda is a racist or Islamophobe.

Certainly not all, but there are lots of them out there. And they always seem to rally around the conservatives.

[blackbird]

1 minute ago, hot enough said:

Certainly not all, but there are lots of them out there. And they always seem to rally around the conservatives.

Why don't you read the article so you have something to discuss?  You seem to be on a crusade to oppose everything.  What's the point?

[bush_cheney2004]

Mr. Black's verbosity aside, he competently relates a garden variety western civ story arc that has been told many times, particularly whenever the "Huns" were at the door.   He invokes the popular American political term "silent majority" (Harding/Nixon) and has faith that they will once again rise up to meet the challenge.    If gun sales in Canada are any indicator, he may be right.

[Moonlight Graham]

Quote

Intellectually, the problem is that religion is essentially reasonable and atheism is unreasonable

Whatever you say Conrad.

I think he's more interested in sounding intelligent by using a thesaurus to insert obscure "elitist" words that nobody, especially the "silent majority" he's vouching for, will be able to understand.  This makes his argument honestly quite incoherent.

It's not that believing in a higher being is irrational, what's irrational is believing that humans like Moses or Mohammed or John Smith have personally spoken to this higher power(s) and have written down stories and rules that explain how this higher power(s) wants us to run our lives.  So it's not the belief in God that stupid, it's the belief in these human-made religions.

The Enlightenment has made reason triumph religion & superstition.  The problem is that all of us, without exception, has a moral philosophy we use to run their lives (to know right from wrong), and religion provides a ready-made moral philosophy humans can follow...which is easy & super-convenient because that requires zero intellectual effort on our part.  The problem is that without religion, people now must replace religious moral philosophy (what's right vs wrong) with their own philosophy, which requires reason & intellectual effort.  This is exciting because it frees us from archaic beliefs & we can form our own beliefs of right/wrong by debating & philosophizing, but it can also be dangerous because we can fill this morality with any beliefs we choose, like selfishness and cruelty and greed etc.

If Conrad disagrees with moral relativism, then he is free to use logic to argue why it's irrational.  That's much more sensible than making an argument based on Bible verses.

Edited April 3, 2017 by Moonlight Graham

[blackbird]

10 hours ago, bush_cheney2004 said:

Mr. Black's verbosity aside, he competently relates a garden variety western civ story arc that has been told many times, particularly whenever the "Huns" were at the door.   He invokes the popular American political term "silent majority" (Harding/Nixon) and has faith that they will once again rise up to meet the challenge.    If gun sales in Canada are any indicator, he may be right.

Trouble is in Canada the lefties (Liberal, NDP, Greens) have emasculated everyone.  It is illegal to use a gun to defend yourself, your property, or your family from any criminals threatening your life.  This might fit in with the globalist agenda to disarm everyone and then set up a one world dictatorship.

Edited April 3, 2017 by blackbird

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, blackbird said:

Trouble is in Canada the lefties (Liberal, NDP, Greens) have emasculated everyone.  It is illegal to use a gun to defend yourself, your property, or your family from any criminals threatening your life.  This might fit in with the globalist agenda to disarm everyone and then set up a one world dictatorship.

I don't think it's illegal to use a gun to defend yourself or your family from criminals threatening your lives.  Is it?

[blackbird]

10 minutes ago, blackbird said:

4 minutes ago, bcsapper said:

I don't think it's illegal to use a gun to defend yourself or your family from criminals threatening your lives.  Is it?

You might want to check into that.  I thought it was illegal but I could be wrong.  Thought that was a big debate years 25 or 35 years ago.  I think the first thing you might be charged with is illegal use of a firearm, before you even get to being charged for manslaughter or second degree murder.  I'll try to google it.  It's essentially left to a the police how they decide to charge you and up to a judge to examine the details.  But the person defending himself becomes a defendant in court.   Also the question of whether you used excessive force comes into question.

 

Edited April 3, 2017 by blackbird

[Guest]

Just now, blackbird said:

 

I understand one would probably have to justify one's actions, but I think it's probably legal, if the situation was I described. 

I do hope so, anyway.  

[blackbird]

2 hours ago, Moonlight Graham said:

Whatever you say Conrad.

 

If Conrad disagrees with moral relativism, then he is free to use logic to argue why it's irrational.  That's much more sensible than making an argument based on Bible verses.

Moral relativism would be a very poor guide for anything.  That's what we have now.  It is subject to pressures of different kinds and can be made to bend to anything.  Didn't the Nazis use moral relativism?  What about Stalin?   What about all the dictators in Africa and other countries?  Moral relativism are just words than mean whatever you want to believe.

[blackbird]

8 minutes ago, bcsapper said:

I understand one would probably have to justify one's actions, but I think it's probably legal, if the situation was I described. 

I do hope so, anyway. 

I recall hearing many years ago that if you shoot a criminal breaking into your home make sure he is dead because if he is alive and goes to court, your chances are slim of getting off.  His word against yours.  What if he says he was breaking in because he was starving or had taken some drugs and thought it was his own home?   I'm not recommending this;  just saying what I heard about it.

Edited April 3, 2017 by blackbird

[hot enough]

7 minutes ago, blackbird said:

Moral relativism are just words than mean whatever you want to believe.

You have stated your moral relativism here, blackbird. Why do you think, how could you possibly think that you, or the felon, can decide for others, how they should live their lives? You and the felon ought not to be pointing fingers at the Nazis and Stalin when you support the US/UK in their huge misdeeds, that are every bit the equal of the Nazis.

[hot enough]

7 minutes ago, blackbird said:

I recall hearing many years ago that if you shoot a criminal breaking into your home make sure he is dead because if he is alive and goes to court, your chances are slim of getting off.  His word against yours.  What if he says he was breaking in because he was starving or had taken some drugs and thought it was his own home?   I'm not recommending this;  just saying what I heard about it.

That would be an example of moral relativism that I could see Conrad supporting. And you?

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, blackbird said:

I recall hearing many years ago that if you shoot a criminal breaking into your home make sure he is dead because if he is alive and goes to court, your chances are slim of getting off.  His word against yours.  What if he says he was breaking in because he was starving or had taken some drugs and thought it was his own home?   I'm not recommending this;  just saying what I heard about it.

Well, you did mention life threatening.  I might think twice about shooting a starving junky.  That's what the Louisville Slugger is for. 

[blackbird]

1 minute ago, hot enough said:

You have stated your moral relativism here, blackbird. Why do you think, how could you possibly think that you, or the felon, can decide for others, how they should live their lives? You and the felon ought not to be pointing fingers at the Nazis and Stalin when you support the US/UK in their huge misdeeds, that are every bit the equal of the Nazis.

I should have known you would come on with that comment.  You never disappoint to mention that nonsense.

[Omni]

23 minutes ago, blackbird said:

This might fit in with the globalist agenda to disarm everyone and then set up a one world dictatorship.

You could become a spokesman for the nra with comments like that.

[hot enough]

5 minutes ago, blackbird said:

I should have known you would come on with that comment.  You never disappoint to mention that nonsense.

That unspeakable truth that can't be spoken is all substantiated by fact.

[blackbird]

Another thing Conrad is getting at is that our civilization is being threatened by the ideology (which includes moral relativism) that encourages militant atheism to control all the levers of power and the media, thus banishing anyone with religious ideas.  We see that all the time.  There are some on here like that.  They probably don't realize they are contributing to the destruction of civilization.  It's too large and deep a concept for them to comprehend.

 

This is another reason why many people voted for Trump.  Many are tired of the atheistic left controlling the agenda and forcing it down every one else's throat.  Telling people they have to let their kids share a washroom with transgender people and which puts them at risk of being abused.

Edited April 3, 2017 by blackbird

[Omni]

5 minutes ago, blackbird said:

Another thing Conrad is getting at is that our civilization is being threatened by the ideology (which includes moral relativism) that encourages militant atheism to control all the levers of power and the media, thus banishing anyone with religious ideas.  We see that all the time.  There are some on here like that.  They probably don't realize they are contributing to the destruction of civilization.  It's too large and deep a concept for them to comprehend.

I guess Conrad found god while he was in prison eh? Everything that opposes his ideas are now "militant atheism. As long as we continue to keep church and state separated we'll be fine.

[blackbird]

3 minutes ago, Omni said:

I guess Conrad found god while he was in prison eh? Everything that opposes his ideas are now "militant atheism. As long as we continue to keep church and state separated we'll be fine.

Why doesn't Trudeau keep church and state separate.  He is keeping the church from having any say while sucking up to Islam. He visits mosques.  He brought in M103 and wants to give Islam special status.   Conrad is correct.  Liberals want to drive all other religions away and exalt Islam with special Sharia to protect it against criticism.   Sometimes where Trudeau is making a public announcement he brings in Muslims for the backdrop.  Aboriginal religion (whatever that is; it hasn't been made clear)  is to be promoted and paid for in native schools as well.  Conrad is correct.  Our Judeo-Christian culture is to be given short shrift while he pushes ahead with his own favourites.