4 July, 2021
Dear Reader,
This article by celebrated Nigerian novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie deserves top billing.
Here’s a snippet:
In certain young people today… I notice what I find increasingly troubling: a cold-blooded grasping, a hunger to take and take and take, but never give; a massive sense of entitlement; an inability to show gratitude; an ease with dishonesty and pretension and selfishness that is couched in the language of self-care; an expectation always to be helped and rewarded no matter whether deserving or not; language that is slick and sleek but with little emotional intelligence; an astonishing level of self-absorption; an unrealistic expectation of puritanism from others; an over-inflated sense of ability, or of talent where there is any at all; an inability to apologize, truly and fully, without justifications; a passionate performance of virtue that is well executed in the public space of Twitter but not in the intimate space of friendship. I find it obscene.
AN AUDIT OF WESTERN CIVILISATION
From time to time we need to take stock. The history of mankind was not a smooth progression, but more like a series of steps, sometimes short, sometimes long, separated by risers that may be shallow or dramatically steep.
Looking backwards we took many steps that now seem with hindsight to have been obvious and intuitive, but that were extraordinary and revolutionary when they were taken, greatly challenging their societies at the time. We are indeed dwarves on the shoulders of giants, cocksure and proud of our great elevation and far-sighted vision, but in truth highly dependent on those who went before us.
Here are a few examples: the wheel (of course!); using wind to power ships and mills; training horses and other animals; systematic agriculture and storage of crops; living in towns and thereby enabling specialized skills to develop; learning to navigate by the stars; sharing and preserving knowledge by writing it down.
Those are steps common to most of humanity. There are many more that have thrived and enjoyed peculiar success in the so-called ‘Western’ or Christian world.
Random examples include: complex musical modes and scales; several new branches of literature including epic poetry, tragedy and the novel; accurate perspective in painting; printing with moveable type; the scientific method; the piston engine (steam and petrol-powered); harnessing electricity; radio and electronics; anaesthetics; the notion of the unity of the human race, and as a consequence the pursuit of justice, equality and democracy, and profound awareness of the monstrousness of slavery.
I save for last the liberation of women. It has been one of those very steep steps. Yes, there was precedent for it in Roman law, the Hebrew scriptures and the New Testament, but the truth is that for centuries the talents of most women were denied fulfilment, simply because they were women. Now more than half of our doctors and teachers are women, as well as a huge proportion of our lawyers and vets and political representatives and writers. In the latter category women novelists have been particularly outstanding. It is all a very good thing.
But all this good is being undermined by radical gender theory, absurd notions of sexual fluidity, a growing hostility between men and women, and an intolerance of contrary opinions.
This brings me in a roundabout way to the handling of the current pandemic. Anybody who questions current practice, particularly in relation to vaccination, is likely to be categorized as a conspiracy theorist. It is not uncommon to hear politicians accusing such people of being ‘anti-science’ (a very common form of abuse, particularly on the lips on non-scientists!) and I predict that calls for the legal restraint of anyone judged to be a dissenter are likely to grow louder.
The Dawson Centre is not into conspiracy theories, but we are very much in favour of free and open discussion and we deplore the escalating tendency to silence unpopular opinions. For a daring unorthodox view of the pandemic and its remedies listen to at least the first ten minutes of this podcast. The speakers are Bret Weinstein and Sucharit Bhakdi.
COLLOQUIUM 2021
Our annual conference took place on 25–26 June.
The theme was secondary education, with a particular focus on the development of the spiritual and religious dimension of human nature.
It attracted nine excellent papers. There would have been three more if it hadn’t been for Covid: two people were locked down in Sydney and one in Melbourne. One of our speakers was held at Hobart airport pending an appeal, which was unsuccessful. He and his wife were forced to fly home the same evening. I am appalled by the arbitrariness of governments and the effect of such measures on our federal constitution. The guest speaker at the Closing Dinner on Saturday night managed to run the border: he was Prof Robert Carver, inaugural Director of the Western Civilisation Program at the Australian Catholic University in Sydney.
All papers, whether delivered in person or in absentia, will be proudly published. Watch this space.
‘A LIFE OF RARE WISDOM’
This new book by Wanda Skowronska recounts the life of a priest-scholar whose love for Christ constantly impelled the tasks of his everyday life. Fr Stenhouse saw God’s mystery threading the universe and never ceased speaking about it, teaching us to challenge the ideologies of the day and see through the post-modern fog!
Order copies ($30 each, posted) direct from author, Wanda Skowronska:
BSB: 062 907
Account: 00609681
SUMMER SCHOOLS 2022
10-14 January – Medieval and Ecclesiastical Latin – a one-week intensive reading course for people with some Latin, or a willingness to undertake some self-instruction or brushing up beforehand. Guided readings of pieces from the Bible, Sts Ambrose, Augustine and Thomas Aquinas, as well as poetry both sacred and secular, and good Latin narrative prose. This will be the Hobart Latin Summer School’s 30th year!
By the way, many people insist that Latin is not only dead but unnecessary. Charles Moore quite rightly strikes a blow for its abandonment:
‘I am trying to stamp [Latin] out by constructing a lingua franca purged of hard-to-understand terms from the snobby old Romans, e.g. circus, video, doctor, bonus, exit, femur, stet, quantum, trans, memorandum, focus, alumnus, camera, conductor, radius, maximum, minimum, major, minor, senior, junior, media, gratis, post-mortem, ego, versus, data, species, penis and vagina…It is much better to use good old English words like hoi polloi.’
17-21 January – Western Civilisation – an Overview. This is a pilot venture. We shall cover five major areas: History (Greece, Rome, the emergence of the modern world), Literature (Homer, Virgil, Dante, Shakespeare), Philosophy (Plato, Aristotle, the Scholastics, ethical theories), Theology (the person of Christ, Scripture, Sacraments) and Art (painting, Sculpture, architecture, music). Lectures by Xavier Young, Dr David Moltow, David Daintree.
Write for further details about either of these short courses.
A beginners’ course in New Testament Greek will be offered from 24 January if there is sufficient interest.