SINCE RIGHT-WING, even fascist Catholics dominate the Supreme Court and have been high up in Republican-fascism, I think it is important for people to have some understanding of one of the dominant intellectual sewers feeding that, the resurrected cult of neo-inegralism. Entirely less known than "white evangelical" Protestantism, it is probably at least as dangerous among those who will actually rule a Republican-fascist state, the Supreme Court's recent program of destroying the progress made in the 20th and even 19th century towards egalitarian democracy is a good example of how elite-prep->Ivy-League->ruling class white collar gangsters are at least as dangerous as middle-class Trumpsters and lower class fascist gangsters are. I, however, will say that I don't think their Catholicism is very Catholic, certainly less than it is Republican-fascist.
Michael Sean Winters has written a two-part review of a book by Kevin Vallier that sets out a lot of the danger of the neo-integralists. I recommend reading both as an introduction to the public. I have not read the book - I will have to wait for copies of it to show up on ABE Books - but I was familiar with it both in its original form and in its more recent and more recent retread version which is, I think, far more dangerous for the United States. Protestant anti-Catholicism ruled in its previous heyday.
You should especially note three things, that Winter's article points out that integralism is pretty much entirely at odd with Catholic social teaching:
The chapter on "Transition" exemplifies this problem with the book, the precise and thoughtful analysis of what is, in the end, insanity. Vallier makes the argument that the transition from a liberal state to an integralist one would require the integralists to violate the very Catholic moral norms they claim to want to embed into the body politic.
He notes that the value of democracy, which has become central to Catholic social doctrine in the post-World-War-II era, is abandoned: "Integration from within attempts state capture," he writes. "The goal? Install integralists in powerful positions in a liberal nation-state. As liberalism falls, integralists seize the state and turn it toward religious objectives."
The second is that you have to understand that "liberalism" has so many varied meanings, I would certainly not include my understanding of liberalism in the traditional American meaning of the word has any relevance to the integralists' rantings about it, though I'm sure they would oppose my liberalism based in Scripture and the Gospel as much as they would 18th century "enlightenment" notions of liberalism, which they more directly rail against. My liberalism is probably even more opposed to what they want.
The third is what's in this passage from his second article which will give you an idea of why it's so dangerous when the Ivy-league training schools for elite gangsters teach this stuff. I ASK YOU TO KEEP IN MIND HE'S ON THE FACULTY OF HARVARD LAW SCHOOL, WHICH HAS PROVIDED MOST OF THE SUPREME COURT AND MANY OF THE LEADING REPUBLICAN-FASCISTS IN THE CONGRESS AND AMONG OTHER REPUBLICAN-FASCISTS LAWYERS AND JUDGES.
In addressing Harvard University's Adrian Vermeule's approach to transition specifically, Vallier observes:
As Vermeule so evocatively claims, we must "sear the liberal faith with hot irons." It must not rise again. Only a strong state combined with a strong church can complete this urgent task. Vermeulean protectors must become conquerors. They must rule with an iron rod. And, so, however much Vermeule wants to avoid coercion, he is stuck with it. Integralists must exercise hard power.
Images of the Jan. 6 insurrection flood the mind, only led by the cross and nationwide. It is too horrific to contemplate, and Vallier is right to insist we must not avert our eyes.
In this same chapter, Vallier provides a useful, concise history of the development of the "thesis-hypothesis" theological framing of church-state relations. In an effort to "soften the blow" of Pope Pius IX's condemnation of liberal regimes, the great Bishop Félix Dupanloup of Orleans, France, argued that the pope had articulated the "ideal" situation of the state supporting the Catholic Church as a "thesis," but that the "hypothesis" governed situations where Catholics were in the minority or where, for particular reasons, the ideal could not be realized. In the latter situation, such as in the United States, religious liberty could be embraced.
Vallier goes on to note, "This distinction, designed to save liberalism, later became an obstacle." This is a useful reminder that we ought not abstract issues from the times in which they were debated.
Vallier makes many other intelligent, incisive remarks about a variety of topics in his treatment of "Transition," exposing flaws in the integralist approach.
But every few pages you come across a sentence like this: "The specter of the pope authorizing crusades anew will create global controversy." And you remember that, notwithstanding all the fine distinctions being drawn, the whole topic of integralism is bonkers.
And that's just a tiny fraction of what these Ivy-league thugs and gangsters are proposing as a mere "transition" to their neo-fascism. Harvard having such a person on its faculty. How dangerous it is becomes apparent in what Vallier writes, himself. For example from his own article Railliement: Two Distinctions.
Naive vs. Strategic
The first distinction goes to the goals of ralliement. I believe there are actually two distinct ways to understand those goals, which — entirely tendentiously — I will call the naive and strategic versions. In the naive version, Catholics seek a genuine long-term rapprochement with liberal-democratic political orders, hoping to baptize them from within and even to recall liberalism to its best self, while otherwise retaining the regime’s outward character. Speaking in very broad terms, one might see the project of European Catholic Democracy after World War II in this light, although there are obviously many qualifications to be discussed here.
In the second, strategic version, Catholics deny that liberalism has any best self to which it might somehow be recalled. They work within a liberal order towards the long-term goal, not of reaching a stable accommodation with liberalism, even in a baptized form, but rather with a view to eventually superseding it altogether. Pater Edmund Waldstein sees this strategic version as the one Leo XIII himself favored: “For Leo the ralliement was meant as a stage towards an integral restoration of Christendom. That is, Catholics were to work for the common good in the current un-ideal framework of a state that did not recognize the superiority of spiritual over temporal authority, but the hope was that this would lead eventually to a restoration of an integrally Catholic state.“
"In the short run, there are superficial similarities between the two approaches. After all, both reject visions in which Catholics retreat from politics into thick local communities. But in their long-run aims, the two versions of ralliement are entirely different, indeed diametrically opposed. Here let me quote with approval an analysis of the difference between Ross Douthat’s backward-looking version of ralliement and my own: Neither Douthat nor Vermeule retreats into gated communities or enclaves … in the bayou. Indeed, in both men’s visions, you will see intelligent Christians educated at elite schools entering the service of the regime. Some will go into government, some will go into the institutions the government serves, like finance, and others will go back into elite schools to prepare the next wave. In time, perhaps not a very long time, you will see the regime get better. But this is where Vermeule and Douthat’s visions diverge sharply. At a certain point, Douthat and those who agree with [him] will [say that] “Liberalism is itself again.” Vermeule will say, simply, that we are well on our way to our goal."
Parliamentary Democracy vs. Bureaucracy
The second distinction goes not to the goals of ralliement, but to the institutional context in which it occurs. An important objection to ralliement holds that participation in liberal institutions tends to suborn those who do the rallying, in part by forcing them to participate in public practices and discourses that can only ever be cast in liberal terms, and that will bind the ralliés to liberal presuppositions. On this view, “the procedural principles liberal strategies are based on, being the only common ground, the only language anyone can use in public, quickly become the only acceptable creed.” . . .
This is only an introduction to what is, truly, among the most dangerous of the Republican-fascist sewers that are well advanced in their plans to destroy egalitarian democracy in favor of a very fascist form of gangster governance. And, as you will certainly understand, now, is by plan inserting those "intelligent Christians educated at elite schools," into the highest positions of power, especially in the Senate and on the Supreme Court. I will note that Notre Dame, where Coney-Barrett comes from, is another strong hold of integralism. This is the Ivy-league acceptable, clean, fingered, well dressed front of American fascism. They will take advantage of the rag-tag January 6 style thugs or, as I suspect, fully end up in concert with them as their lunatic ideas for a Catholic-fascist government fail to materialize.
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