More Money = More Theology

More Money = More Theology

Recall some maxims from William James:

Religion basically means something solemn or serious.[i]

Spiritual ideas are based on instincts, not intelligence.[ii]

We adopt creeds only when they make us feel happy.[iii]

Today at The American Conservative, Rod Dreher writes:

At the present moment, the literature professor, Dante scholar, and orthodox Catholic Anthony Esolen is under severe attack at his own institution, Providence College, for having recently written a couple of essays criticizing the present conception of “diversity” on his Catholic campus, and reflecting on the persecutorial phase of our culture (here’s one, and here’s the other)….

But where would he go? I can think of a few colleges that would love to have him on faculty. Ten years from now, will they? Besides, what about the younger orthodox Christian scholars who, unlike Tony Esolen and James Davison Hunter, don’t have tenure?

Do oRTHODOX Christian plumbers, truck-drivers, oil rig workers, insurance salesmen, and bank tellers, feel the same urgency?

Or is this only a worry for Christians affluent enough to attend universities in the first place?

Do the forgotten citizens of New Orleans’ Ninth Ward or Houston’s Fifth Ward really feel the same threat from Social Justice Warriors and Moral Therapeutic Deists as those who live in the Woodlands and send their sons and daughters to private universities like Baylor?

It is an unfair simplification to be sure, but, as an outsider to most things theological, it often seems like in America, the more complex and rigid the theology one believes, the more money one’s got in their wallet.

Let us return to some words from William James:

We despise any one who elects to be poor in order to simplify and save his inner life.[iv]

NOTES

[i] James, William. The Varieties of Religious Experience, “Lecture II,” 1902. NY: Modern Library Classics. 2002. p. 44.

[ii] James, The Varieties of Religious Experience, “Lecture III,” p. 85.

[iii] James, The Varieties of Religious Experience, “Lectures IV & V,” pp. 90–91.

Following the thought of Gregory Bateson, I abide that explorations are self-validating, and therefore, nearly always successful. Or in Bateson’s words, explanation is “the mapping of description onto tautology,” and this is probably what Thoreau was getting at when he remarked, “whether we travel fast or flow, the track is laid for us.” (Bateson, Mind and Nature 139; Bateson, “Toward a Theory of Schizophrenia.” 82; Thoreau, Walden, “Chapter I: On Economy.”)

[iv] James, Varieties of Religious Experience, “Lectures XIV and XV – The Value of Saintliness” 401.