Quote: (01-31-2019 02:40 PM)ilostabet Wrote:
Quote: (01-31-2019 11:42 AM)Avoy Wrote:
Quote: (01-31-2019 10:34 AM)ilostabet Wrote:
Good and evil and right and wrong however cannot be dependent on human inclinations (since they are ever changing, and often towards one's own benefit, or what we perceive as benefit), and they are not self-evident, we cannot discern moral principles from observation or from logic alone. They must be revealed to us.
If we only limit ourselves to what the bible states, we've hit a brick wall because we're relying solely on something that was divinely written by other men in the past. It's also a fact that Greeks and Romans had their own set of morals and virtues that were valued without a Christian/Jewish God. Islam has its own set of morals. FYI - I was raised Catholic (now non-practicing). Personally, I think any political party tying themselves to any specific religion is suicide. Should the right align themselves with Pope Francis and the Vatican? That's a big no from me.
I believe we can dictate what is right/wrong/best for a healthy society without being dependent on any specific religion. We're watching the progressive left do it as we speak. They need to be challenged. I mentioned Japan and South Korea earlier... they're predominately Buddhist, though most don't practice full-time. Somehow they still have their head on straight and know how to protect their people from outside influences. Both countries are also unapologetically nationalist and homogenous.
Well I can quote St. Paul and say that those who have not received the law can be the law unto themselves as the basic principles are written in men's hearts. This makes total sense to me as a Christian. But you wouldn't buy that.
But that's just it, I don't think any political movement can revert this trend. It takes a long time to build something good and beautiful, and only a little to destroy it. We are witnessing, not the destruction, but the trampling of the ruins. I don't see any politician, certainly not in democracy, being able to start building when everyone is still enjoying the trampling. It would take, in my opinion, a complete societal collapse and roll back of modern technology to start building something sane again.
As for aligning with the Pope and the Vatican, no. It has been degenerating for a long time - it's debatable since when, but I don't think that concept is coming back, and in my opinion it had the seeds of its own destruction. A relevant quote would be from The Brothers Karamazov: «Understand, the Church is not to be transformed into the State. That is Rome and its dream. That is the third temptation of the devil. On the contrary, the State is transformed into the Church, will ascend and become a Church over the whole world- which is the complete opposite of Ultramontanism and Rome».
And lastly, as I have written in another thread, I don't see how anyone can look at Japan and S. Korea and think "yeah, this is the society I want to have". They know how to keep foreigners out, great, I wish we did too. But other than that, I don't think there's any society more pathologically atomized and desintegrated than Japan and South Korea. Of course, I have never been there, but I can see the cultural artifacts, the societal trends and judge them. Not all, not all, not all. Obviously the rural communities, insofar as they are still far enough away from modern technology, are probably ok. But even then, they had tentacle porn and other disgusting sexual deviancy like that way before the Industrial Revolution. Hell, the Samurai had man-boy love as a rite of passage. Maybe it's the fact that Portugal is the furthest, most western part of the world as compared to Japan, but to me everything about their culture seems completely off and I would not like to emulate them. Perhaps if the US hadn't H-bombed the two major Catholic cities things would have been different, who knows, perhaps not. But when I look at those countries I see, not a proof of moral order without God, but the proof that it doesn't exist.
Cue the Japan fetishists.
Very well put . Great post.
A quick side-note : Samurai "traditions" don't belong to Japanese. They took it from the Ainu people , indigenous people from Far-East Russia / Kamchatka/ Japan , which then were killed or melt by Japanese (hence their very white skin).
The etymology of the word means "those coming from the River Amur" -
"s" "Amur" "ai" > sorry as i don't have a Russian keyboard.