Chris Hubbs had a blog post with several interesting quotes from Thomas Sowell. Many of these dealt with politics, how politics are discussed, issue clouding, and what not.

This struck a cord with me, especially “A good catchphrase can obscure analysis for 50 years.”. I’m reminded of the Fathers of the Church (who I’m reading a fair bit of), and how they had to deal with contentious issues. Discussions took YEARS. Some of the discussions between Sts. Jerome and Augustine took years because it took at least 6 months for their letters to reach each other, and that’s only if someone was leaving on that journey that month. More often they heard about each others responses as each of their ‘letters’ were published in one city, and taken to another, and copied/published there… until it had covered North Africa, and all of Palestine. Then the other would respond, and the response would take the same tortured trip back.

I think modern discussions are a lot like that, especially with blogs, discussion groups, etc. The only differences are 1) the speed of communication 2) We don’t have a luminary like St. Augustine to respond in a gentle, thoughtful way (St. Jerome could barely compose a gentle reply if his life depended on it… he’d fit right in).

This speed of communication seems to mean only that we can all reach errors very quickly. We can’t seem to find truth, in this insane search for the sound bite.

We as a people don’t seem to have the patience for true analysis. We don’t have the time to think. Heck, as I’m writing this, I’m avoiding working on an important wedding issue.

The demand for an instant opinion will leave us as a society ever more paralyzed in inactivity.

I just remembered a quote from The Pilgrims Regress by CS Lewis:
John: “What would happen if you would die if you didn’t know the answer?”
Reason: “Then you’d die.”

Reason goes on to praise the gift of not knowing an answer, and of allowing yourself to exist in not knowing. It’s very freeing to do so (we go on to learn that Reason has two younger sisters: Philosophy, and Theology… great book).

So I loved these quotes, I loved the sentiment behind them, and I hope and pray for more reflection on the issues facing us as a society. more…