March 14th, 2013
The reason I missed the Veronica Mars stuff yesterday was, obviously, the election of Jorge Mario Bergoglio as Pope Francis. I don’t have any especially keen observations or thoughts about Francis–for that you should be following George Weigel.
But I do have a thought about part of the world Pope Francis is inheriting, and that is this: You cannot understand the real philosophical problems of the West–which have been mounting for 40 years–without reading Mary Eberstadt’s new book How the West Really Lost God.
Mary Eberstadt is one of the brightest minds in Washington. (By happy coincidence, she’s also one of the nicest people in D.C.) She’s been writing great stuff for as long as I’ve been in journalism, but this book is pretty clearly her masterwork. I got the galleys a couple weeks ago and what it does is basically take the demographic data and do really smart metaphysics with it. This is a many-splendored book, but the general thesis is that the decline of the family and the decline of religion aren’t just linked–the former is actually powering the latter.
You can read the introduction online now, but I’d highly recommend ordering a copy now. This is one of those seminal books which should change the entire discussion of demographics, religion, and the decline of the West.
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Thanks for the referral; I’m in the middle of reading her book Adam and Eve after the Pill, and it’s really given me a lot to think about.
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Phenomenal.
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I think the brightest mind in Washington is much like the winner of the decathlon in the Special Olympics.
Perhaps you should pick another superlative for your preferred Georgetown cocktail party companions.
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How cute — Joe thinks we go to Georgetown cocktail parties! : )
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You cannot understand the real philosophical problems of the West–which have been mounting for 40 years…
I am pleased to see that we both lay the blame for our current troubles at the feet of the Nixon Administration. This might be the first time I have wholeheartedly agreed with you about something!
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Ironically, it seems the Amish and Orthodox Jews are the best biologically adapted to our modern society, and they shall be inheritin’ some more of this earth. Specifically all those folks who by their inherited disposition feel inclined toward larger families are favored by the current climate. Due to social subsidies and modern medicine, never before in history can those who, like the Duggars, prefer larger families, actually achieve the biological success to which they feel compelled.
A Religious Reader March 15, 2013 at 9:21 am
Religion and family life do sort of reinforce each other… I was talking to my newly-married friend the other day. He and his wife, like me, are both college-educated and white. I playfully suggested that they have some children, salting the comment with compliments about how they are such intelligent, attractive people worthy of perpetuating themselves and how all the childbearing shouldn’t be left up to the cast of Jersey Shore. LOL. He became extremely defensive, saying he would wait ’til later in life to have children if he had them at all, and proposed to be like a couple we had met, who had no children, only pets. I told him bluntly that substituting pets for children is pathetic and that he knew that. And that I also want four (or more) children… his retort was I had always been a religious, “family-centered” person and that he was not. It’s some real cultural trends you’re tapping here Mr. Last…