Today, a new essay, "Ice," under Essays in the website.  FK

I couldn't help it - after several weighty books, I had to go to my favorite genre - autobiographical accounts by people who have nearly died and in the process have gone to heaven.  I love them for several reasons: there is usually a redemptive factor involved - that is, the person is changed for the better - often MUCH to the better; the stories are light, easy reading;  and, most important, they give one hope, if even only at the "wish fulfillment" level.  

That latter part does have a downside, I have learned.  There is a Jehovah's Witness who comes to my door regularly (I know, I know; my wife has a true tale of me talking with a Witness for so long that he had to excuse himself from me!) and with whom I have become fiends, although I am not always happy to have my breakfast disturbed  on a late Saturday morning.  Anyway, he once told me WHY he became a Witness.  At about the age of 60 he suffered a massive heart attack and went into a coma for several days.  The experience was frightening in that he at no time ever saw the light, went into the tunnel, spoke with his relatives or any of the life -after- death good stuff reported by such writers.  Instead, there was nothing - or, worse than nothing, an uneasy and meaningless gray.  On the other hand, Jehovah's Witnesses expect heaven to appear here on earth, not in some clouds or another dimension.  They expect the real to be made perfect and the dead to be raised - in its proper  time.  And so his experience was only natural - the end times have simply not come.  Otherwise, he felt that there was no hope for the Heaven he had learned of from his youth.

He might want to know that NDE's occur in only about 20 to 30 % of such cases.  Why this is so, nobody knows.  And, as many have pointed out, even if you are clinically dead, if you come back in the hospital, it is usually not from a miracle, but  from the fact that you were not REALLY dead.

In any case, such stories give me - well, hope is not the only word.  It is also faith - and a comparison, too.  The book I have just finished - it took two nights only - is called "Flight to Heaven" by Dale Black.  He is a pilot who at age 60 is looking back on a horrible accident he had in an airplane when he was 19.  He was the sole survivor, and this alone was a miracle.  Further, he made a full recovery,something the best doctors had thought impossible.  This is all fact.  But it wasn't until months after his accident that he recalled his time in heaven, which was one of harmony, love, colors and music and so on.   I don't mean to demean by the brevity; it is only that the accounts are almost always the same.  Anyway, and this is the faith part - it is in his struggle that he comes to grips with his god (Christian) and learns to "hear" His will - and be humble enough to accept it.  This cuts to the heart of my own problem - how to hear the will of heaven, for it seems so undercut by my own desires that I cannot ferret it out.  When I read such accounts, I see how it is done - and understand it is mostly by faith.  That these people are  successful gives me hope in faith.


The other part is comparative; for at odd moments and in meditation, this sense of perfection - of heaven - has often hit me, although not as dramatically as those with ND experiences.  In this book - good overall, although some might be put off by the author's extremely forthright Christianity - he describes heaven in an excellent way, for it is not only sound and colors and loving feeling, but a permutation of perfection and perfect love, of a timelessness in time.  When I read the description, and others like it, it always hits me: yes, I've been there.  I cannot often pinpoint when, but I know it, and I can know by the description if they have it right (in my humble opinion).  This book, as I have said, does; and so have the last two I have read, by both doctors with no need for additional glory or income - as is the case with this man, a successful pilot and business man.  


In the other two, however, neither of the doctors were particularly religious, one being a self-professed agnostic, too busy to decide if there was a god or not.  That lends additional credulity to the accounts.  Still, the story of the pilot rings true.  A great feel-good book that will help strengthen faith of any sort, I would think - and documented to be true.  


Beyond the book, who wouldn't want to know if they are on the right path?  This is not only a Christian or People of the Book notion - it runs throughout cultures both complex and primitive.  Are you conducting your life by the will of heaven - or, if you prefer, by your true Being?  It always comes back to faith and a certain surrender - a surrender that takes far more bravery than its refusal.  The shaman plunges down or up to the realm of the spirits, the Christian to Christ and heaven, but all only on faith and the courage that they require.  But, as these books tell us emphatically, it is worth it.  It is, this surrender, in fact the only way to truly live a life.  FK   
   

To conclude with "How the West Really Lost God," this morning I read (once again) about the correlation between prosperity, low crime, and the make-up of the family.  Most are probably familiar with the statistics, which are that intact, natural families fair better both economically and socially in all categories (drug use, violence, single teen mothers, etc) and educationally; and that people with higher educations have, naturally, higher incomes, but also are much more likely to marry and remain married.  The link makes sense, but only in a "common sense" sort of way; for, although it is obvious that  two parents can make more money than one, why the differences in crime?  And why the difference between divorced and remarried families with children and those of the natural family?  

The book works to correlate religion and the family, claiming that they form a positive feedback - that is, each supports the other.  Again, we see the correlation, but mostly in a common sense way.  Religion stresses self-sacrifice and denial for the good of others as a moral, God given imperative, which can mean only good things for the duration of the family - and vice-versa, as both call for the same perspective.  But couldn't a single mother stress these virtues all by herself?  The statistical answer is "no."  This does not mean that some don't, but as a whole, religion and intact biological families promote what we most consider to be good social values.

Why this is so depends on an inherent, or deep, understanding of what it means to be religious and a family member.  That the idea of a transcendent and unmoving force legitimizes this lends tremendous weight to behavior and the sense of obligation.  As the author of our book shows, tear one away from the other - or alter one (as was done at he Council of Lambeth for religion - or in changing divorce law or the availability of contraception for family, with both religion and family intertwined) and both are weakened.  And with that, so are the recognized social goods mentioned above.  That this happens is not readily understood by logic - it does not 'have to be, ' but it is.  

For those of us with spiritual bents (such as myself), we see the importance of spirit in our lives, but this is not necessary to recognize the importance of the natural family and religion.  The stats are clear.  And yet - why are so many pushing to alter the fundamentals that have been with us for centuries?  I believe it is from a short-sighted individualism (as opposed to a wise individualism - there is a profound difference), and it seems this attitude is in the ascendant.  And as the author points out, the notion of family and faith are learned primarily in the family.  Once people are taken out of that context, it may be that for many, the notion is lost - forever.  These are things that cannot be taught, but which are deeply experienced.  For instance, in the traditional marriage, cooperation, sharing, and sacrifice, especially for the children, is taken for granted - but it is NOT part of the law.  One can also be selfish and parasitic in a marriage.  We all know that is not how it should be.  But this is learned, and can be lost.

It appears to me that as we irrevocably weaken the meaning of marriage and the solemnity of faith, we are headed down a certain path that has been trodden before: the development of a stronger and stronger state to make up for the absence of the family (financially) and family values (educationally and behaviorally), together with an expansion of personal varieties in life styles.  It is, as the author points out, what the world had under the Roman Empire, although now we have means for an even more intrusive government and greater personal idiosyncrasies.  This is, from my perspective, a negative direction.  From the libertarian and libertine perspective, the negatives are not necessary, and again this is right logically; but statistics (again) disprove this optimism. There is something about the choices made from a simple individual perspective that separates them from those taken from concepts of a bedrock right and wrong and a conviction of responsibility.

If this seems a little too "church lady" for the reader, I understand - it does to me, too.  But there are the numbers - and, more to the immediate point, the examples of the slippery slope.  I would wish a truce at this point in the culture wars, but that does not seem possible.  As one thing changes, a phalanx of people rush in to change others, building on the precedent.  Now there appears to be an avalanche in this direction.  

If only we could fly into the future!  On the other hand, I always recall a phrase from "The Teachings of Don Juan" (decidedly NOT a traditional work).  At one point, Don Juan tells our ignorant author, (paraphrase) "when the Spanish came, the knowledge of sorcery (what we call magic) was brought crashing down.  But that was a good thing.  It had gotten soft and was abused.  Now that it has to be done in secret, those few left must be absolutely impeccable. There is no room left for institutional laziness."  So will those few left from the old school of "God and Family" become better practiced at it?  I don't know.  Sometimes things, like the many arts and sciences of Rome, simply disappear with the culture.  Our descendants will most certainly find out.  FK                            

Back to Mary Eberstadt's book, "How the West Really Lost God;" a fascinating exposition of the links between the social, the economic, the family and religion, but much too complicated for a blog.  It is not that it is difficult to understand, but so complex.  But I can take one example to portray the overall logic in the book.  

The Lambeth Council of 1930  - I had never heard of it, but it was a meeting of the "mainstream" religious organizations to determine the future face of Protestantism.  The initial impulse was this: in the wake of modernity and the changing family, and after the downfall of the monarchies in WWI and a strong revival of democratization, the churches decided it was time to smooth over the harsher aspects of faith and emphasize the good stuff - compassion and acceptance over hard dogma.  As part of this, they decided to soften on the teachings against contraception.  Before, they, like the Catholic Church, had not accepted ANY form of intrusive birth control (as opposed to natural methods of rhythm and abstinence).  Now they were willing to accept it in cases of genetic deformities, possible complications for the mother and so on - all very reasonable.  But to do this, they had to change the concept of sex itself for theological reasons.  Before, it had been viewed solely from its procreative function.  But here, to allow some to have sex with no intention whatsoever of having children, they decided to allow that sex was a "gift of pleasure" valuable unto itself, without the possibility of procreation.  

At the time, the book tells us, many ministers were in open protest about this.  Yet by the early 1950's, many were coming out in favor of universal birth control with some - Billy Graham among them - saying shortly thereafter that contraception was a blessing to reduce population pressure.  In the mainstream, that led to universal acceptance by the late 1950's - just in time for the Pill.  


The Pill is another matter; sticking closely to contraception in general, we are shown that a rule to grant a few the moral right to contraception necessitated a change in philosophy, which led to universal approval only a generation later.  This is because sex was both detached from procreation while being (necessarily) attached to "God-given pleasure."  This was to have only been for a few, but the slippery slope had been overstepped.  If "pleasure" was a principle of God apart from the biological function, why not gay sex? Unmarried sex?  And if the latter, why not gay marriage?  And so it has become, from the slight wavering of clerics in 1930.  Coincident to this, exception given to women who might be at risk also led to another right - abortion.  If women could be excused from procreation to protect their life, why not their emotional well -being?  There is a leap here, but with the ideological push of radical feminists, it became so.  


Reading this illuminates the intransigence of the Catholic Church on these matters.  While such things are too complex to explain to the general public in a Papal address, the leaders are well aware of the slippery slope of Lambeth.  And so, this is something of an answer to Cal Roeker's musings about contraception and abortion as considered by the Catholic Church.  There is little question that abortion is seen as a far greater transgression than contraception, but I am not sure if the Church views them differently officially.  They understand all too well that to give up on one will lead to another - and abortion to the Church is, in most cases, murder.  I believe that they keep the small things intact to protect the large.  Theological pin points came become very large, as they well know in the Church.


These connections run throughout the book, and for the most part I must agree - we were taught in anthropology that even the smallest things in a culture might be of great importance to its overall function, once exposed.  That being said, I am often shocked by the advocacy of many intellectuals towards certain favored causes and changes in our society, including from anthropologists.  We do not really know how a change to age-old customs - gay marriage, for instance - might affect the entire society a generation or two later, but we must assume that such fundamental changes WILL affect us, and, as they most often come willy-nilly, probably in a negative way.
At bottom I suspect an odd form of ethnocentrism - a belief that we, the people of the modern West, are somehow beyond culture, and as such we can change things as we like.  This was Nietzsche's message.  But we are not - and we are not supermen.  

A finishing touch on this book tomorrow, FK 

   
        

Poor Sister Luc-Gabrielle, aka, the Singing Nun.  In the last essay, I had mentioned her record, with the still-famous song, "Dominique," and had then nearly forgotten her again.  But in telling my wife about the comedic incident in childhood that involved her record, she said, "She ended so sadly.  She left the convent and couldn't make it on her own, and I think she committed suicide."  

I was floored - no, not the Singing Nun!  I have for decades kept her image in mind, not often but now and then, as the perfect, beautiful woman, like The Virgin, so wonderful that she was beyond the the grimy mawing paws of mere mortal men like me.  Suicide?  So I looked her up on Wikipedia and found that it was true, and more.  For a short synopsis:

Jeanine Decker, or Sister Luc-Gabrielle, a Belgian, was encouraged by her Dominican order to bring the music she made to a producer, and managed an arrangement with Philips Records in 1961.  By 1963, the year my essay takes place, her album, thanks to the hit "Dominique" (which was in French originally, but had English, too, when I bought the record) had sold over 2 million copies.  Philips had kept most of the profits, while the remainder went to the Order, as is the custom with orders with vows of poverty.  This is a fact summed up by the English words to "Dominique" : "never looking for reward, he just talks about the lord."  The Singing Nun knew.

She left the convent in 1966, to do social work with the lay Dominicans; by her own statements, she left because the order wouldn't let her write any songs that were not happy and uplifting. Once out of the order, she resumed her career, but because she could not use the name contracted with Philips (the Singing Nun) perhaps because she was no longer a nun, she gained no traction.  After this failure, she had a nervous breakdown and then underwent 2 years of psychotherapy.

At about the same time, she moved in with an old classmate, Annie Pechan, with whom, as the blurb puts it, she developed a "VERY close relationship - apparently of a sexual nature.  She had a brief revival in the early 70's, teaming up with a Catholic charity, but that quickly fizzled.  Trying to make a comeback with "Dominique" in the early 80's, she (unbelievably) tried to make a Disco version.  It failed.  Meanwhile, her companion's school for autistic children also became bankrupt.  At that time, the Belgian government began harassing Jeanine for back taxes, even though she had not made anything for herself from her one successful album.  In 1983, the two took overdoses of barbiturates with alcohol, leaving behind a note that stated financial difficulties.  By request, they were buried together in Belgium.

The piece in Wikipedia printed two pictures - one of the Singing Nun with guitar and the other of the tombstone of Jeanine and Annie.  In the first, Jeanine is seated with her guitar - sans nun garb - wearing heavy -rimed glasses.  She is, overall, homely, not alluring to this man at all.  Although she appeared in the Ed Sullivan Show in 1965, I do not recall this homely rendition.  The other picture shows a beautiful stone and memorial to the women, well attended and flourishing with flowers.  Obviously, she has maintained a steady fan base after her death.  

The ironies and idiosyncrasies of her life are many, but two things (besides her disappointing portrait and her love life) strike me most: her continuation of care for social ills, and her need for fame.  

It might be that her need for fame was really a need for cash, but why the nervous breakdown?  Also, hers was not a country of starvation, and she had at least passing skills in several areas - at the very least, of caring for people.  No, I think she needed the limelight as she had once briefly had it.  The irony is that she had already dedicated herself to poverty; and even after leaving the order for artistic reasons, she continued with her prayer and human aid.  She was not a Mic Jagger by any means, and probably a better person in life than I will ever be.   It is probable that she suffered from depression - but suicide for a woman who believed it to be a mortal sin?  And over lack of funds?


I think her position mirrors many of our own: we cherish family and love and life over possessions, yet are driven by social prestige to have more and to need more.  In relation to this, I have discovered something in my readings and in life about the workings of Providence: that it hardly if ever is concerned with wealth at all.  Instead, it is focused on development, not of any kind, but of spiritual development (my Kingdom is not of this earth).  If that is your path, you will be helped - but watch out.  Do not accept that path and expect an easy life, as many successful preachers tell us.  God or "Being" sees, as they say, the Big Picture (to say the least).  This may mean failure from the social standpoint, or illness or any other number of disasters.  In eternity, these are small things.  


I think it can best be stated: if you want wealth, do not expect to get anything besides wealth; and if you want love and/or spirit, do not expect to get anything more, either.  But most of us- myself included- want both.  I expect Sister Luc-Gabrielle did, too.  But our designs, our wants, cannot run against the way things are, anymore than praying for the ocean to part will accomplish anything (unless there are bigger purposes afoot).  I suppose we can decide on one and hope for the other, but they are not equivalent.  Wanting and even working hard for material success will not always bring it; but wanting and working hard for spiritual success I think will always bring positive results in that direction.  For that reason alone, it is obvious as to which side Providence is on.    


My poor Singing Nun.  In my essay, I for once eschewed the darker things for a brighter story of Christmas, which was true to the time it took place.  Yet everything - the life that we in my family would live afterwards, the future of America, and even the future of the Singing Nun - would come to have a darker side.  It is always the case, as it is in reverse as well.  It is the law of Yin and Yang, and the underlying thesis to the practice of Buddhism.  Do not, as the Buddhists would say, depend on anything but Being, that which is beyond all transience.  For those of the West, this would mean: do not depend on anything but God.  And I would add, expect nothing more but what God knows is important in your life - and trust in "It" to find this for you.  Such is the moral found from another of those countless real-life tales, that of my poor Singing Nun.  FK              
           

For today, a new essay, "The Night My Father Shot Santa," under "Essays" in the website.  FK 

Ho boy - half way through "How the West Really Lost God," and it already strikes to the heart of the culture wars - and clears, for me at least, why the sides on the debate have certain attitudes toward the family.  Eberstadt, the author, has already shown that it is not only that religious families have more children, but that people with firm families with children are more religious.  There is something about the traditional family, she is veering, that makes them become religious, and she will soon show us why.  However, at this point we have enough to work with to get into deep trouble with political ideologues.  For instance: as abortion and contraception are generalized, people have less children, and so are less religious.  Without family and later, children, people are forced more and more to look to outside institutions for support in times of unemployment, sickness, and old age.  Without religion, that institution would be the state.  Thus we have set the table for the culture wars we see in this country.  Simply put (and in this, not all bases are covered), for those who believe that the state should supply people with the necessities, their natural enemy would be religion, and by relation, the traditional family.  The converse would also be true - the religious would want - beyond the dogma of their church - a strengthened church, and a concomitant weakened state.  If we were forced to simplify these warring factors as such, could it be any clearer? 

What is interesting is that this cuts across dogmatic lines.  Only Catholics are forbidden to use the standard birth control devices and drugs - and yet those of other religions have more children than the non-religious.  From another angle, feminists are ostensibly about women's liberation or equalization (as they see it), yet are more often than not in favor of state control over voluntary religious control.  Atheists, who are supposed to be for a rational approach to the "superstition" of God, are also universally, as far as I know, for the liberalization of what is meant by "family" - and supportive of state control.  The pieces of the puzzle fit remarkably well from her perspective - which has made me think: is her perspective as new as she thinks?  

There is on my satellite radio a religious program called "Focus on the Family" which sees precisely the relationship between family and religion in just the sort of feed-back loop that our author does.  I have further to go in the book, but how much more can she show the relationship of family and religion than this program?  On the Family channel, the idea is precisely this: that a successful family is about self-control and obligation, as well as love - which in turn creates children with that same attitude towards the world - which creates people ready to voluntarily sacrifice money, effort, and certain pleasures to become members of their church - which is a family writ large under the same dynamics as the biological family.  The family channel is also against the socialist state - not because of higher taxes, but because the aid of the state weakens the dependence of family members on one another -which weakens the family, and thus the church.  

It is also clear that such progressive organs as The New York Times like the idea of the "alternative" - or loose - family.  In a recent article, one of their reporters claimed that the traditional family "of the 50's TV fantasies" was dead.  This was not a lament, but a sigh of relief.  The strong, dependent family is more religious and in far less need of state support than the broken family.  The progressives thus naturally see the traditional family with children as an impediment to their ultimate designs.

I will briefly show what might be a prejudice here, although it appears to me to be logical: it seems that the means of the religious are far more moral than those of the progressives; that is, the family-religious do not look forward to a state of chaos to achieve their goals.  The progressives would not see it this way, I know.  They would not see that their necessary means - the breakup of traditional family and religion - promotes chaos, but it is apparent that it does; to compare the crime rates of 1950, for instance, with anything past 1970 is to compare apples and oranges - clearly greater chaos has ensued, to the overall detriment of society.  

To be fair, the progressives site the suffering of those who cannot fit in - the homosexuals, the militant feminists, the poor who are poor by circumstances - to support their goal and means.  Still - how to help the poor, who have always been among us - is up for considerable debate.  When, for instance, does help become an entitlement, and so lesson the chance that the poor might help themselves?  And at what point should the people who cannot fit into one of the many moral-religious systems control the lives of the great majority who do?  Should we be the first society on earth controlled by the non-conformist behavior of small minorities?

I knew this book would take us here.  I have a feeling it will take us further still.  Interesting and ultimately practical - for we should know the greater world we are creating by our individual choices.  More to come, FK 
               

             

A new book - and one that should provide much food for thought: "How the West Really Lost God" by Mary Eberstadt.  It begins with the question, "has the West really become more secular?" which is something that I took for granted, but the author wishes to leave no stones unturned - and in doing so, brings several researchers in to dispute this common belief.  "No" they claim, "the West has not lost god, but merely replaced him with images or ideas other than those from traditional Christianity."  These ideas, they say, include certain forms of politics (ie, communism) as well as the biggest of all, environmentalism.  For these apologists - some of them surprisingly from fields such as neurology - Man has proven to be Homo religiousus - that is, resistant to the press of secularism, even in the face of overwhelming proof against many religious beliefs.  Some have taken to look for the "religion gene," with the belief that religion has must have served a positive function in human evolution to continue to endure, and so must be embedded in the gene code.   It is not that these people are pro-religion, but rather surprised by the evidence.  Any readers of science in the late 19th century will find that the "sensible" man believed that religion held the last traces of superstition  for modern humans - and would soon cease.  That it has not has made these theorists believe that it must have something to do with encoding, for why else would an otherwise practical man still hold such fantastical beliefs?

But the author knows better - that the religions indigenous to Europe are on the sharp decline, and those that might be thought to replace them cannot really be called "religions" in the traditional sense.  The remainder of her book will show how the decline of religion is paralleled precisely with the decline of the traditional family - and how each provides feedback to the other.  

I will certainly write more of her thesis in the coming pages - for it will raise such ideas as the State serving as the new family head - and put additional light on such things as abortion, divorce and gay marriage.  But here I will speak of my own immediate reaction to her belief that the new notions of spirituality are, indeed, rejections of religion, not merely changes.  

It is in Scandinavia, for instance, where we find the greatest decline in traditional religious participation and belief; but are the Scandinavians godless?  With my anecdotal reaction, I had to say "no" - rather, that they had instead followed the same path as a collective that I had done personally - that is, rejecting church teachings and church attendance while still thinking of themselves (and myself) as "religious" or at least spiritual.  For me - and I like to think for them as well - we were rejecting the authoritarian nature of the Church, while keeping the inner nature of, if not Christ, at least of "spirit."  And, although the implosion of Christianity in Europe began in the 1960's (one author put it precisely at 1963), in my own life, it really began earlier, with my parent's generation.  Married, decent, liberal and religious church goers, they never-the-less believed that many of the customs of the Church (ours was Catholic) were either outdated or cruelly unfair.  Was a man or woman to be damned for having sex outside of marriage (or, say, oral sex inside of marriage)?  Or the unwed mother made a pariah, or the woman so desperate that she has to have an abortion to be destined for hell?  And hell - would a good god even have everlasting damnation?  And so on, bringing us up with such questions - questions that were and are good ones.  

At this point in my readings, I still believe what I did last night - that it is not spirituality, at least, that is being lost, but dogmatism in an age of liberal thought.  I will revisit this again.  I have, though, already begun to question this democratization of religion.  My parents gave me doubts about the authority of the Church, but not about the existence of some sort of god (not in youth, anyway), and never the idea that the morality preached  by Jesus was anything but sacrosanct.  But will these generalized notions continue to exist with the loss of prestige and credibility of the churches? 

"God" is already a word, if not a notion, that is seldom proclaimed in public without a sense of embarrassment.  And of morality - it is not only church attendance and confession that are mandatory for Catholics, but also fidelity in marriage and the bedrock notion of the sanctity of life of the unborn.  In Scandinavia, if not quite yet the US, both are already considered antiquated ideas, or marginal at best.  What else might be considered "antiquated" without the constancy of church teachings?

Abbey Hoffman, a '60's radical, wrote a book called "Steal This Book," with the idea that theft is a GOOD thing, as it destroys the capitalist (as he sees it) notion of property.  Killing the unborn has slid towards euthanasia, where in Holland some of the old or infirmed are killed without consent - for their own good.  And we can continue down the list of the Ten Commandments with like examples.  

Is individual conscience enough?  Is a nation run by notions held for the hour good enough for the ages?  That is, are we wise enough on our own, and as a democratic agglomeration, to rewrite the rules of morality for good and long-lasting effect?  More later, FK       

Just a note that an essay was posted late yesterday under "Essays."  For those who are fans, it is a long one.

On Ron Berg's comment: why did the US not go the way of Germany in the 1930's?  A huge question that historians have pondered for decades, and it is huge because of the nearly infinite variables involved.  We had lots of people of German decent in this country, but they were not the majority, in either numbers or power; we had a depression, but not to the extent of Germany, burdened with reparations from WWI, as well as a corrupt, inefficient government.  We both had loud calls for change, followed by lots of change, but we did not go the route of communism (then the most powerful it has ever been) or of Huey Long because...of what?  The list of differences could go on and on, and one might speculate: if Southern Whites had had more power, would we have had an apartheid government, as the Nazis had with the Jews?  If northern WASPS had firmer control, might we have a plutocracy like, say, Arabia?  But they did not - and instead we got big changes without a quintessential change.  

Perhaps we were just not that  bad off.  Or perhaps - it just wasn't in our zeitgeist.  I have mentioned before in this blog that I consider not two factors in creating who we are - environmental and genetic - but also a third, one that I think of as "spiritual."  That  could involve karma, or it could involve a higher power's need, or desire, for certain forms.  However it might be, I believe we have all seen it: the nasty kid from an otherwise decent family, or the reverse; or the spectacular diversion of personality between identical twins.  In an individual it is a mysterious thing, but in a people at large - a unity that is commonly embraced - one might see that the "spirit of the people" arises from certain conflicts and comforts that have long beset these people, setting up common goals and prejudices.  On the "spiritual" level, I might say that these goals and prejudices are often unknown to the people themselves - that is, that they come from the shadow side of shared history.  Germany had hatred of France, distrust of the Jews, hatred of Russia, and a strong belief in their own superiority, among other factors.  Hatreds and dislikes might be hidden if they are considered by common convention to be forbidden - but they still exist.  In Germany, in might have been Hitler who exposed the underside to light, under extreme conditions of resentment in the people, and who then made these prejudices not only acceptable, but laudable.  

Our society is much more diverse than Germany's was in  the 1930's, and so I used examples of sections of our society above.  If certain groups  were to gain firm control of America, would not their unvoiced, even unrecognized prejudices come to the fore?  

On a different note, another tidbit from GK Chesterton: "The beginnings of a decline, in every age of history, have always had the appearance of being reforms."  One might ask: was that true of FDR's reforms?  It certainly was true of Hitler's.  Or of Reagan's or of Obama's?  The trouble with the quote, of course, is that it is a "truth" looking for an example (ie, what does not preclude decline would not then be a reform), but I love Chesterton anyway, and not just from his wit.  He is so conservative - so antiquarian, that he would be hated by both liberals and conservatives of our era.  He hated capitalism as much as he hated socialism (and forget Marxism!).  His view gazes over all of European history, and as such, he has found certain ways that must be truth for the West - among them, privacy, property, and dignity.  Capitalism takes away dignity, and socialism the other two.  It might be that his reference to Christianity as something "never tried" - at least not enough - shows us his better world - a Christianity that has been tried, and at last tried enough.  FK       

Today an essay, "Tyler Mill Road," under the Essay section of the website.  FK