This ministry needs your financial support! Donate now!
Posted by Anthony on April 28, 2010
I was reading CS Lewis’s The Four Loves and came across the quote below. Obviously, Lewis is not specifically addressing universal health care or liberalism or the question of using the government to administer love. Even Christians can be found thinking that it is a noble expression of a loving society to have the government do the loving… and this with no apparent thought to the actual effect that this ‘loving’ will have on the people ‘loved’ and the attitude it fuels in the people-government doing the ‘loving.’ The most important thing seems to be that, well, people’s intentions are good, and it’s better to do something rather than nothing. Here is the quote:
This [is] Gift-love, but one that needs to give; therefore needs to be needed. But the proper aim of giving is to put the recipient in a state where he no longer needs our gift. We feed children in order that they may soon be able to feed themselves; we teach them in order that they may soon not need our teaching. Thus a heavy task is laid upon this Gift-love. It must work towards its own abdication. We must aim at making ourselves superfluous. The hour when we can say “They need me no longer” shall be our reward. But the instinct, simply in its own nature, has no power to fulfil this law. The instinct desires the good of its object, but not simply; only the good it can itself give. A much higher love- a love which desires the good of the object as such, from whatever source that good comes- must step in and help or tame the instinct before it can make the abdication. And of course it often does. But where it does not, the ravenous need to be needed will gratify itself either by keeping its objects needy or by inventing for them imaginary needs. It will do this all the more ruthlessly because it thinks (in one sense truly) that it is a Gift-love and therefore regards itself as “unselfish.” (pgs 50-51)
Some discussion.
In the conversations I found myself in objecting to health care, I heard repeatedly how selfish I was being. In the comments on blog entries I saw the same thing. “If you really loved people you would support this bill. You’re just selfish. You just don’t want to pay taxes.”
I oppose universal health care, especially when put forward on secular grounds, precisely because I do love people. I do not believe it is in the best interest of most people in either the short term or long term. The Lewis quote above alludes to some reasons why. Read the rest of the entry… »
Posted by Anthony on November 5, 2009
Apparently a gent named Michael Laws, a politician in New Zealand, has advocated that the solution to child abuse and neglect is to pay the ‘underclass’ not to have children; this would be accomplished by $10,000 and sterilization.
This is a perfect example of the Malthusian Mind that I discussed in my Worldnetdaily.com column not too long ago, Christians Beware the Malthusian Mind. http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=111412
He writes, “it would be far better for this appalling underclass to be offered financial inducements not to have children, given the toxic environment that they would provide for any child in their care.”
Critics repudiate his position later in the article, saying, “It’s hard to comprehend that an intelligent man who’s leading a city is making such reprehensible suggestions.”
Ha! I find it ‘hard to comprehend that an intelligent man’ who is Obama’s Science ‘czar’ (John Holdren) has made even worse suggestions! Read the rest of the entry… »
Posted by Anthony on September 5, 2009
This essay is long- some 2,000 words. But I think it is worth reading. Print it out if you like if that makes it easier.
————————
‘Individualism’ has a bad rap, even among Christians. To be fair, there are things in ‘individualism’ that I think are unhealthy or even immoral, too, but the key thing to remember is that any opposite of ‘individualism’ is not necessarily preferable. If we’re going to raise up ‘inter-connectedness’ (a neutral term, I hope) it must be done thoughtfully, and it cannot obliterate that which is moral or good in ‘individualism.’
The only folks that I’ve ever heard defend ‘individualism’ are the Objectivists- the offspring of Ayn Rand, that spunky atheist who escaped the clutches of communism. Rand’s views on the individual seem to be expressed most succinctly, and passionately, in her little book Anthem
, which is a favorite of mine. There is a flaw in her book however: the intrinsic value of the individual is assumed; no basis for it is provided.
And no wonder. In atheism, no basis for the value of the individual human can be provided. At best, the individual human values himself, and then out of concern for his own interests forges a social compact with other individual humans not hurt him. That is secular humanism at its core. But this can only go so far. Once ‘social compacts’ are on the table, the ‘good of society’ becomes an obvious next step. “The most good for the most people.”
I won’t explore the inevitable progression from there (“Someone must decide what that good is”) and discuss the history of abuse that consistently emerged within these systems. These are not the point of this post, but you can find comments on it on this blog and the issue is discussed in my fictional book series, Birth Pangs.
The point, here, is that within secular humanism and atheistic systems, the only thing that lasts from one generation to the next is the State. Society and the State become the ‘highest’ level organism, and the individual a mere cell within it. From the point of view of the State, the individual has as much value as a skin cell which can be scraped off and safely discarded. Naturally, more valuable cells you want to keep around- while they have utility- but the ‘brain cells’ never lose sight of the fact that the cell’s value is strictly in what it can contribute to the ‘body.’ Read the rest of the entry… »
Posted by Anthony on August 20, 2009
There are plenty of folks about insisting that there is a universal right to health care. Obviously, health care is a hot topic right now, but the question of ‘rights’ permeates many other areas of our existence, so I thought I would address it. I doubt I break any new ground, but it’s on my chest and I want it off.
We have no rights. At least, not strictly speaking. If there is a God, he has as much ‘right’ to destroy us as to sustain us. If there isn’t a God, we have no more rights than an antelope being chased by a lion. Whether there is a God, or isn’t, we have no rights.
However, if there is a God, we can have rights relative to each other, if also God has bestowed them. In this case, for all practical purposes, we do have rights, and no one of us can change that, though we can refuse to acknowledge it. The rights are not intrinsic to ourselves but are imparted from a higher authority and no lower authority can abolish them. If there is a God, we might plausibly talk about something like health care being a ‘universal right.’
Many of the people insisting that health care is a universal right don’t believe in God. Read the rest of the entry… »
