Friday, October 04, 2024

Dashed Off XXIII

 love, joy, and peace as three aspects of solidarity

The only justice that is complete is the justice that is ordered to beatitude.

Human beings are organized hierarchically because they are hierarchical internally.

Pride is a greater corruption than other vices, but by the same token shows more of the spiritual glory that it corrupts, as in a caricature or parody.

Permissions are context-sensitive; A permitting X and B permitting X will often be very different kinds of action. This becomes very obvious if A and B have very different levels of knowledge about X, or if A and B have very different duties with respect to X, but it happens elsewhere and in other ways as well.

narrative vs schematic classification
detection-based classification vs rule-based classification

space and time (history) as themselves systems of alternate possibilities

The Gospel of Mark emphasizes the failures of all of Jesus' followers.

Citizens of the Kingdom of God are armigerous, bearing spiritual arms in their spiritual citizenship.

Living organisms are complex material systems that can be considered immaterially, in varying degrees depending on the kind of life.

clothing as passive tool use

true - intellect - wisdom
good - will - love
beautiful - ? - happiness

being
1. actuality
-- -- 1a. immutability
-- -- 1b. simplicity
-- -- 1c. eternity
2. modality (perseity)
-- -- 2a. necessity
-- -- 2b. immensity
-- -- -- -- 2b1. with respect to place
-- -- -- -- 2b2. with respect to time (atemporality)

Historical explanations involve explaining in terms of causes-in-readiness, showing that there are such causes in readiness and showing that effects emerge out of this ready reserve of causes.

classification, imputation, ordination

The root of human dignity is so because it is our capacity for sacramental and social union with God.

Scientific inquiry is an intrinsically social endeavor.

rites as means of customary law

the Transfiguration as the model of all iconography

Nothing is more inclusive than hell.

Acts 9:32-35 Aeneas as a type of Rome

Acts 9:36-42 on the order of the widows

1 Cor 11:12 & Mary as New Eve

substituting signs vs guising signs
uniforms as vestments serving as guising signs

language as index, as icon, and as symbol of reason

signs that are instruments of what they signify

autonomy as a work of grace

Myths work themselves out into rituals.

Ritual is a means of thinking outwardly and experiencing inwardly.

The adjective 'real' often designates a priority or superiority in likeness to the paradigmatic.

'Man' and 'woman' have generic functionality in the life of the human species; this generic functionality is given customary specification in a society.

Love only justifies to the extent it converges on divine love.

spiritual power directly serving spiritual ends
spiritual power cooperating with the temporal power's indirectly serving spiritual ends
temporal power cooperating with the spiritual power's directly serving spiritual ends
temporal power directly serving temporal ends and indirectly serving spiritual ends through them

Every experience of actual regularity suggests a greater possible regularity.

Spiritual ends require indirect as well as direct means.

the Church's right to non-interference in sacramental and doctrinal matters

All fallen human loves are interwoven with betrayals, although some much more, and much more seriously, than others.

deacon : baptism :: priest : confirmation :: bishop : ordination
--> There seems something to the analogy, but it is difficult to identify any unified principle of relation.

Both the spiritual and the temporal powers may delegate power to each other, for mutual benefit.

philosophy qua field as the field where all fields meet, the field between all fields

the importance of avoiding political agnosticism

Descartes's infinite perfect being as a way of talking about God as the infinite intelligible

mosaic as a symbol of providence

The existence of a contingent thing implies the existence of a broader system, however loose, of which it is a part or a consequence or both.

God is not a deceiver = What is purely intelligible involves no falsehood.

obstinacy as penalty

Doing things out of love is not inconsistent with doing them out of a motive of duty; love takes duties and transfigures them.

No one has acceptance without exception.

Every political scheme eventually reaches the stage of pathology.

the legal organization of the natural capabilities of the human race

traditionally recognized excuses for criminal responsibility: automatism, infancy, insanity, involuntary intoxication, duress, entrapment, mistake of fact, mistake of law

"The notion of a role has built into it a notion of some conduct as appropriate." Dorothy Emmet
"...casuistry is a necessary excercise in trying to determine the limits of principles in regard to new and varied circumstances, and in trying to resolve conflicts of principles."

Literature, art, & experimentation presuppose people operating in relevant social roles.

habitus as role carried around with us

mystical experiences as limit cases of ordinary cognitive experience

memory as anticipation of present

elections as creating 'interference patterns' in results

"Do not think, he says that you are destined for easy struggles or unimportant tasks. You are the salt of the earth." Chrysostom

Human beings have no intrinsic title to the life of another human being; the extrinsic titles are:
(1) personal self-defense
(2) defense of another's life
(3) defense of public good (just punishment).

God has intrinsic title to anything to which any created being has extrinsic title; this title is creation.
--> This explains many dispensations.

covenant -> free will

-- the relevant titles for each of the Ten Commandments

Political power is exercised by patterns of exclusion.

Oppression is not a system in the proper sense; it is incoherent.

Conservatism always eventually dissipates; progressivism always eventually eats itself.

Knowledge is something we do not discover by considering our experience alone but by considering what is shareable among many.

"Errasse humanum est, et confiteri errorem, prudentis." Jerome (Ep 57.12)
"Humanum fuit errare, diabolicum est per animositatem in errore manere." Augustine (Serm. 164.14)

The law is a sign and symbol of grace.
-- Torah and grace are both expressions of divine wisdom.

Actions do not float free from the powers or capabilities of which they are exercises, and apparently similar descriptions of actions that are expressions of different capabilities  does not make the actions the same.

Human beings grow into their hierarchies, shaping them in various ways as they go.

promise -- verity -- memorial

In the sacrament as convenantal act, there is simultaneously promise, fulfillment, and memorial.