The Rambler Vol. 10, No. II

rambler the

Veritas Ensis Noster.

Restoring the Sense of Urgency November 11, 2012- Vol. 10, No. II

In This Issue...

Rambler: Pronunciation: \ram-blər\ Function: noun Date: c. 2002 1. A student organization determined to present truth and withhold nothing, discussing a variety of subjects such as administration, morality, literature, politics, and faith.

the rambler

An Independent Student Journal Christendom College Veritas Ensis Noster

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Matthew F. Naham BUSINESS MANAGEMENT Charles J. Rollino; Peter Spiering LAYOUT EDITOR Theresa R. Lamirande NEWS & POLITICS EDITOR Colleen A. Harmon SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY EDITOR Thomas A. Ferrara FAITH & REASON EDITOR Katie E. Brizek ARTS & CULTURE EDITOR Theresa R. Lamirande

News & Politics 5 ON EQUAL WAGES IN THE WORKPLACE

by Matthew Naham

7 MACHINE MIND

The Last Word 19 NACHO BAR

8 A FOLD ACROSS DIMENSIONS

by The Editorial Staff

by Sarah Furth

Faith & Reason

FRONT COVER Restoring the Sense of Urgency

12 THE NATURAL GUARD

by Peter Deucher

14 OPUS DEI

COPY EDITOR Matthew F. Naham

Arts & Culture 16 SAINTS WITH DIRTY TOENAILS

by Cate Thomas

CONTRIBUTORS Maria Bonvissuto Peter Deucher Sarah Furth Cate Thomas

Cover photo by Theresa Lamirande

Our Mission Statement

2 | two

by John Jalsevac

by Thomas Ferrara

by Maria Bonvissuto

The Rambler and its staff are dedicated to training the next generation of Catholic journalists and intellectuals. We prize the liberal arts education received from Christendom College and write about the news, arts, culture, faith, and reason from this gained perspective. We believe we will play an essential part in a renaissance of new leaders, journalists, and communicators for the 21st century.

10 SENSE OF URGENCY

Science & Technology

FACULTY ADVISOR Dr. Patrick Keats

CREATIVE ASSISTANT Maria Cintorino

Feature

To Contact The Rambler:

134 Christendom Drive Front Royal, VA 22630 E-mail: rambler.editor@gmail.com Web: www.therambleronline.org Follow The Rambler on Facebook!

Subscribe:

COLLEGIATE-NETWORK

An eight issue subscription to The Rambler may be obtained through a donation of $25 or more. All contributions go to support The Rambler.

Editor’s Corner

Dear Readers,

There is no doubting that Modernity has left Catholics less and less room to live as they ought; sadly, many

have succumbed to the pressure and traded moral conviction for social space, comfort, and “change.” As Catholics, we believe that we are all called to a degree of sainthood, and as the Hebrew word kadosh and the Greek word hagios denote, to be saintly means not merely holy, but “set apart”. It seems that the time has come for Catholics to draw a firm line in the sand, and ask themselves: “Am I physically and spiritually prepared to be set apart from society, to allow my convictions to be carried out to their logical ends, and endure all that entails?” Under the Obama administration’s watch—one that has been guaranteed for another four years—the plight of God-fearing people today is a far different struggle than the struggle of Catholics hiding in the Catacombs of Ancient Rome or ones resorting to recusancy in Tudor-governed-England: the struggle today is more of an intellectual struggle than a physical one.

When Catholics are marginalized because of their beliefs, in a country dedicated to absolute

freedom—in so far as one does not hinder the lives, liberties, the pursuits of happiness, or the opinions of others—then we have an intellectual problem on our hands. There is nothing in the Catechism of the Catholic Church which pertains to anything other than life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, or the freedom of speech for our beliefs are geared towards living well, being inviolate of our free will, being ever in pursuit of the happiness we regard as final beatitude, and speaking the truth in all things, spreading the Gospel unceasingly. The great author C.S. Lewis once said “I didn’t go to religion to make me happy. I always knew a bottle of Port would do that. If you want a religion to make you feel really comfortable, I certainly don’t recommend Christianity.” Lewis’ quote illustrates that being Catholic today ought not to make us feel comfortable in a worldly sense.

To be comfortable in this world is not necessary for a Catholic: what is

necessary is to be comfortable in the next. We know that President Obama has made it mission-critical to the spread of his agenda that “words speak louder than actions”. As Catholics, we believe that “faith is dead without works”(James 2:26) and that our actions define us and have meaning and purpose in this world and the next; they are done with a mind not only for ourselves but for those who will come after us and respect for those who came before. Do we negate the heroic deeds of martyrs, great saints—who set themselves apart as witnessed to God and examples for us—by conforming, settling, and watering down our beliefs so others cease to scorn? Do we effectively deny the Christ who picked up the Cross we are too weak to uphold or do we head off our fear, reject our comfort zone, and realize nothing we hold true is designed to make us feel comfortable in this life? Though the answer to these questions is a resounding no, I urge you to be vigilant; please refrain from falling asleep at the wheel like certain apostles—who shall remain nameless—at the Garden of Olives: now is not the time to sleep.

In Jesu et Maria,

Matthew F. Naham Editor-in-Chief

3 | three

News Briefs

College President Dr. Timothy O’Donnell addressed the College and shared his reflections on the recent presidential election. He expressed that although he was “bitterly disappointed” in the election results, that the College must persist; he has called upon on us all to persevere into the future with confidence and conviction, starting here and now with the “Year of Faith.”

Pope Benedict XVI issued a decree on Saturday creating a new pontifical academy for Latin in an effort to foster renewal of the official language of the Church; presumably this is a further measure to ensure that Church tradition endures as it battles to prevent the faithful from straying in today’s increasingly secular world.

Apparently, Hampden-Sydney College didn’t take the election results very well; according to reports, about 40 students at the small all-men’s college in Virginia shouted racial slurs, threw bottles and set off fireworks outside the Minority Student Union within hours after President Barack Obama’s re-election. One can only hope there won’t be more incidents like this.

While Hurricane Sandy and the “Frankenstorm” were kind to the Shenandoah area, they ravaged many others. But there is promising news. Though they still can’t visit the Statue of Liberty, New Yorkers will once again be able to see the beloved American icon of Lady Liberty shining bright after sunset in New York Harbor, a small consolation but a consolation nonetheless.

It has been reported that Iran fired on an unarmed US drone conducting routine surveillance over the Persian Gulf. While the drone was unharmed, the motivations behind the attack remain unclear, as the drone was 16 miles outside of Iranian airspace, and posed no actual threat.

4 | four

The Chester-Belloc Debate Society recently held a momentous ceremony for the induction of new members into its ranks. Celebrating the sixth anniversary of CBDS’ restoration at Christendom, the reprinting of an article by one of the Founding Duma, John Jalsevac, appears on page ten of this edition.

News & Politics

OnIn Equal Wages the Workplace

By Matthew Naham, ‘13

I

n modern American culture, the heightened level of consciousness over issues of social justice and injustice is at once a great gift and a great curse. More often than not, Americans become so enraptured with the idea of preventing injustices like racism and sexism that they create problems where none exist and gloss over the specifics. In the long run, counter-racist and counter-sexist knee-jerk reactions become commonplace, and especially when it comes time for elections, when politicians attempt to incite the passions of an audience all too ready to raise torches and pitchforks in the name of justice. One such issue that generates much political grandstanding is that of the rectification of wage inequality between men and women. Statistical wage gaps in favor of men are often blamed solely on the basis of discrimination.

For example, President Barack Obama, in an official Proclamation on National Equal Pay Day of August 2011, was quoted on the matter: “I call upon all Americans to recognize the full value of women’s skills and their significant contributions to the labor force, acknowledge the injustice of wage discrimination, and join efforts to achieve equal pay.” This statement presupposes discrimination as the efficient cause of wage gaps and inevitably proposes that ensuring that everyone makes the same salary is the answer. This, however, violates individuality, the nuances that make each worker unique, but also actually helps perpetuate discrimination in the long run, which we will get to in a moment. Everyone getting their “fair shot”, the wealthy “having to pay a little bit more”, and this statement on wage inequality all reek of the same political odor.

Lest we fall victim to that weighty, haranguing monolith of counter-sexist rhetoric, let us keep in mind an often quoted aphorism of Mark Twain’s: “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.” Keeping this in mind enables us to remember that while numbers never lie, humans do lie about numbers.

It is preposterous to imagine that every business mogul—the typical corporate fat cat—broods in his office, biting down hard on a stogie, and slamming fine stationery on his desk repeatedly while he denounces women as the sole scourge to the labor force at large that ought to be taught a lesson by being paid less. Somehow this is a real perception of the American businessman. Note well it costs money to discriminate! It is not something that employers can do without consequence. Esteemed economist Thomas Sowell notes that “an employer who refuses to hire qualified individuals from the “wrong” groups risks leaving his jobs unfilled longer in the free market,” which means “he must either leave work undone and orders unfilled or else pay overtime to existing employees to get it done, losing money either way.”

He further notes that the solution of setting wages artificially higher

than they otherwise would be, say to achieve equal pay, negatively affects supply and demand, creating a surplus of applicants that are all roughly a bunch of identical paychecks. Rather than workers using distinct skills and experiences to present themselves as such valuable assets that an employer would have no choice but to hire—regardless of gender, race, religion, or anything—equal pay opens the door for unjust personal preference. In short, equal pay lowers discrimination costs of employers to nothing! The act of artificial wage adjustment between men and women actually results in the opposite effect intended: more discrimination.

It is self-defeating to assert that discrimination against women has never occurred in the workplace or that it doesn’t presently occur at times. However, it is equally self-defeating to use pure statistics on salary gaps between men and women to demonize corporations and endorse the artificial fixation of perceived injustice.

“ ” What needs to be understood is that statistics cannot gauge intangible differences between the sexes and sometimes commit sins of omission on tangible things.

In fact, there are legitimate human and economic considerations that adequately explain perceived problems—and these have nothing to do with discrimination.

What needs to be understood is that statistics cannot gauge intangible differences between the sexes and sometimes commit sins of omission on tangible things. As Sowell points out, it is of capital importance to distinguish “discrimination from difference of qualifications,” a task he admits “is not easy in practice, though . . . fundamental in principle.” He argues that statistical data “seldom contain sufficiently detailed information on skills, experience, performance, or absenteeism, much less work habits or attitudes.” Skills, experience, performance, and absenteeism can be defined as tangible realities, while work habits and attitudes are qualities of the human psyche that vary from individual to individual and are distinct between men and women by virtue of human nature. Generally speaking, the kinds of skills, experience, performance, or absenteeism we find in an individual is a result of intangible factors.

According to Forbes, via the Bureau of Labor Statistics, “fulltime working women earned 81 percent of what full-time working men earned in 2010 (the most recent data available), leaving a “gap” of 19 percent between the sexes.” Where does this gap come from and what does it mean?

(Continued on page six) 5 | five

News & Politics Equal Wages : Continued from page five

The statistic is a blanket statement meant to create alarm; it does not tell us whether men and women working in the same industries with the same qualifications are making different salaries, which is the real indicator of the degree of discrimination in an economy that we are looking for.

In fact, Sowell’s statistics show that, as far back as 1972 “women who worked continuously from high school through their thirties earned slightly more than men of the same description, even though women as a group earned substantially less than men as a group.” The idea that unjust pay differences are more of a problem now than 1972 is ridiculous when you consider the exponential increase of women in the workforce. Thus, more often than not, the gap we find is a by-product of intangible needs, distinct to women, playing a role in the kinds of skills they develop, the kind of experience they achieve, and the amount of absenteeism that occurs; but these intangibles do not merely affect women, they sometimes affect men inversely and to the woman’s statistical “detriment”.

Forbes shows that “Women tend to seek jobs with regular hours, more comfortable conditions, little travel, and greater personal fulfillment” and that “often times, women are willing to trade higher pay for jobs with other characteristics that they find attractive.” One practical consequence of this, according to The Department of Labor’s Time Use Survey, is that “the average full-time working man spends 8.14 hours a day on the job, compared to 7.75 hours for the full-time working woman … Men working five percent longer than women alone explains about one-quarter of the wage gap.” Only one small statistic and the gap has shrunk from 19 to 14 percent.

That many women desire that their jobs have more comfortable conditions and less stress also plays a large role in statistical pay differences. Forbes notes that men, in contrast to women “often take jobs with less desirable characteristics in pursuit of higher pay” and “work long hours and overnight shifts. They tar roofs in the sun, drive trucks across the country, toil in sewer systems, stand watch as prison guards, and risk injury on fishing boats, in coal mines, and in production plants. Such jobs pay more than others because otherwise no one would want to do them.” Sowell corroborates this point when he shows that “although 54 percent of the workplace is male, men account for 92 percent of all job-related deaths.” Thus, considering that men statistically work longer hours and more dangerous jobs, we have two specific explanations for the wage discrepancy statistic.

In relation to the comfort over conflict tendency, women tend not to negotiate pay well—if at all. In 2010 COO of Facebook, Sheryl Sandberg cited that “Women do not negotiate for themselves in the work force. [Of all workers] entering the workforce out of college, 57% of men are negotiating their salary and only 7% of women [are].”

This is a fact Michael Harmon argues has much to do with comfort zones: that “key personality traits . . . are ‘needed’ in order to reach an agreement in pay” and that “many of these characteristics are associated with male traits, including more aggressive interview tactics, less reluctance to share accomplishments, and competiveness.” These traits, 6 | six

Harmon argues, cause women to“consistently choose to opt out of aggressive negotiations in order to avoid a social divide in the workplace and” instead “choose to be agreeable and accommodating throughout the process.” It appears then that much of the wage problem has to do with a lack of aggression for fear of backlash than it does outright discrimination.

Another important consideration working “against” women— on top of working less hours, working less dangerous jobs, and the lack of initiative in pay negotiation—is the reality of absenteeism or the mere prospect of absenteeism given the reality of children. What this means for women is the interruption of their careers! Sowell says that “these interruptions . . . cost women workplace experience, and seniority, which in turn inhibits the rise of incomes over the years relative to that of men who have been working continuously. “ In addition to this hamstringing of long-term income prospects in relation to men, men also inversely benefit by the prospect of children. While women “who have children or plan to have children tend to be willing to trade higher pay for more kid-friendly positions” and are forced to adjust their careers men with children on the way or born, as Forbes indicates, “typically seek to earn more money in order to support children, sometimes taking on more hours and less attractive positions to do so.” Thus, many men already working longer hours and more dangerous jobs are seeking to do even more while women are losing valuable on-the-job experience at the same time.

Now given that, as of 1991 “women without children earned 95 percent of what men earned,” says Sowell, the remaining gap is attributable to “different occupational choices.” Though it may seem like mere conjecture, it is not unreasonable to subtract 8-10 percent more of the wage gap from the already lessened 14 percent, as, again, the amount of women in the workforce has increased! This would leave us with women making 4-6 percent less than men—placing the status quo statistic and what we find in 1991 on a comparable plane. This is a far cry from the 19 percent difference originally cited in the raw wage gap statistic. What this means is that there is not gross injustice or large scale discrimination oppressing women, as they are making roughly the same salaries—if not more in some cases—than their male counterparts in the same industries, given that the qualifications are the same. While there is some small room to use the statistic to blame discrimination, as injustice does in fact exist in the world, the overwhelming majority of the gap has concrete explanations.

Hence, when it comes to wage gap statistics there is much more than meets the eye, and asserting discrimination can only go so far. The sooner we acknowledge that the inherent, natural differences the exist between men and women play a role in differing career choices and career trajectories the sooner we will realize that the idea of equal pay is nothing more and nothing less than a political charade, championed for its emotionally charged potential. If you encounter someone on the street campaigning for equal pay, do ask them why they are doing so. If they answer “it’s simple statistics, men make more than women . . . its science, numbers never lie!” Please interject, “Ah, but people do.

Science & Technology

Machine Mind Silicon Soul

By Thomas Ferrara, ‘13

I

t may have been humility that prompted IBM researchers to name the Jeopardy-playing computer Watson, an implicit concession to a Sherlock. But such a possibility was not reflected in the media hype surrounding Watson’s Jeopardy outing. Humans, we were told, were soon to have synthetic company in the rational arena. This is an idea that has circulated in fiction for decades: artificial intelligences that think, feel, and act like us. “AIs” are is ubiquitous in science fiction, as oppressors and oppressed, as companions and enemies, roles played out in humanoid robot bodies. It remains to be seen whether the features and foibles of the human experience are really so easily transposed into circuitry.

Gordon Moore, co-founder of Intel, the world’s biggest and largest computer chip manufacturer, authored an article in 1965 concerning a trend in chip development. In this paper, he noted that the number of transistors in computer chips, the parts used to perform computational operations, had doubled every year for the last twelve years. He predicted, modestly, he thought, that this trend would continue for at least ten more years. Although he later modified this principle, which we now know as Moore’s Law, to two-year increments, it has been extremely accurate, even after 45 years. This exponential increase in processing power lent an industrious optimism to the computer industry, spurring astronomical growth. This optimism about hardware extends to software as well, and with good reason. We are in a race that not only increases in speed, but one that changes direction and conveyance.

“

”

No matter how realistic a model it might seem, the artificial intelligence nonetheless remains a mere reflection in a mirror made of silicon.

It seems, then that we ought to be able either to build a thinking program or model one after the human brain. This computer would have so much memory, so much processing power, that it could think and reason just as a person, with authentically self-generated thought processes. It would not simply repeat a set of instructions on reasoning, but would be powerful enough to make conclusions from a few given principles by itself. Watson was able to correctly understand the drollest of Jeopardy puns without hearing them beforehand, a most tentative engagement of machines with the risibility of man. This provides part of what a machine needs to exhibit in order to assimilate into humanity: not raw mathematical force, but thought. Enter the Turing Test.

The Turing Test is a hypothetical scenario designed to circumvent the trouble of defining “thought” in universally acceptable

terms. Alan Turing instead proposed an imitation game, in which a tester interviews a human and a computer through text messages, without seeing the test subjects, and attempts to distinguish the computer from the human. If the tester cannot determine which respondent is the computer, the computer will have exhibited intelligence equal or at least apparently identical to human intelligence. The test obviates the need for a set of objective criteria for thought by asking that the computer only be able perform identically to a thinking being.

If we maintain the rate of computing power growth, we should ostensibly be able to create machines capable of passing the Turing Test, and eventually move to programs replicating the human mind. These programs would have consciousness, just as we do, would be able to think and judge for themselves with direction or input, and perhaps be awarded the same rights as humans, though why robots might receive personhood while fetuses may not is an interesting question for another time.

The idea of true artificial intelligence has two critical flaws in the philosophical and technical aspects of such an enterprise. The first problem is the current state of artificial intelligence programs. The Turing Test is a clever evasion of defining thought, but in doing so loses the ability to judge thought correctly. The Turing Test not does determine “human thought” but “appears to be human thought.”

Machines must be programmed to make spelling errors and to delay replies in order to conceal their nature. The machine must not appear to possess encyclopedic knowledge or inhuman mathematical ability. This is not human intelligence; it is a pretense of it. Further, the computer is not truly speaking to the interpreter, it is manipulating what it is told are meaningful bits of characters into what is understandable to us. There is a fundamental difference between a computer printing “hello world,” and a person greeting the universe.

A computer decides according to criteria we program into it.

No matter how confusing or surprising a program’s behavior is, there is always an explanation for it in the code a human programmer compiled.

In order for a computer to achieve self-consciousness, it must perform actions not coded into it by a human. A self- conscious computer would have to code “perform an action I do not have the code for.” But a computer action is executing code. Thus a self-conscious computer would have to say “execute code I do not have code for,” or in simpler terms, “execute code I do not have.” As Aquinas would say, this is an absurdity.

On the other hand, there are technical limitations for artificial intelligence. In one sense, we already have computers smarter than us, capable of completing enormous tasks in seconds.

(Continued on page nine) 7 | seven

Science & Technology

A FOLD ACROSS Dimensions

By Sarah Furth, ‘16

W

hen you put a crease in a piece of paper, you are essentially changing the memory,” says Eric Demaine, origami theorist researching at MIT. “Manipulating the dynamic 2D plane of origami paper got me thinking. As an artist I never think twice about whether my creations will work. A pot somehow rises effortlessly off the wheel; a 2D square forms into a paper crane with a few folds. These are purely aesthetic results that I take for granted, but what exactly makes these things work? On delving into this question I began to see a direct parallel between the way these dimensional structures and organic systems are formed and the way they function. Take origami and protein folding: These are artistic and biophysical fields that, when married, support research in protein folding to make advances in drug design. Scientists become artists, and artists become scientists as mathematicians, molecular biochemists, physicists and origami theorists work toward cures for HIV, cystic fibrosis, and Huntington’s disease through use of origamic algorithms.”

It all comes down to a fold. If artistic origami leads to development in computer science to assist biochemists, physicists, mathematicians and nano-technicians in studying protein structure for drug design, there must be something common to all these fields.

A tree is, to me, the most beautiful inanimate structure, and yet the only way it can hold its shape is through its material composition.

There is one primary base shared in all organic objects that causes their dimensionality. We know this through biochemical research into the global energy minimum, or the primary building block for carbonbased dimensional structures: the protein.

Protein is more than nutrients in the meat we eat: proteins are the smallest objects in biology and have enough stability to maintain their 3D structure while retaining the flexibility to perform simple tasks.

Some scientists postulate that proteins follow a specific path that guides them to their native state through biological evolution. In other words, proteins fold to a unique state determined by their amino acid sequences. Through a process of transcription, four base pairs of DNA can have enough variety in their sequencing to create an infinite number of codes. Everything we examine in this universe has the potential to become smaller or bigger due to the folding nature of its base units, including organic compounds.

We are not talking about a Honey I Blew Up the Kids or Honey I Shrunk the Kids scenario, but more practically about research advances across many different scientific fields. Space science has accomplished useful feats with origami principles, such as designs for foldable satellite lenses. Furthermore, medical science has combined origami, nanotechnology, and biochemistry to develop nucleic acid hybridization, the technique in which single strands of DNA or RNA 8 | eight

are allowed to interact to form hybrids, as advancement in possibilities for drug design. This all winds back to the simple idea of a fold.

While we have applied folding patterns found in origami to designs of inanimate structures such as buildings, we are now using the same process for organic molecular structures. We see this at the forefront of medicine and biotechnology research as development in protein folding is directed toward attacking viruses and genetic defects such as HIV, cystic fibrosis, and Huntington’s disease.

“

”

As technology progresses, we have ever more sophisticated methods of observing this organic origami in smallest parts of the world.

In the past, molecular biology uncovered the 2% of genetic material in DNA specific to sequential encoding of instructions on how to string amino acids together to make polypeptide chains or proteins.

Today we are using this information to chart the folding processes specific to the many different types of proteins in the body. The type of fold necessary for a given protein is based directly off of a series of folds or algorithms specific to origami. By tracking their biological evolution, in a step-by-step mapping process, we can determine what functions the folds are able to serve within their system. Subsequently, when the folding of these peptide chains takes place, scientists are collecting the algorithms specific to each folding process in computer data basis.

We also study folds from outside our bodies and record their interaction with each other. Dr. Lang, origami theorist, says: “An algorithm that origami artists had come up with for the design of insects [is] the right algorithm to give the creases for flattening an airbag.” By studying these existing folds in nature and our own bodies, we can learn to reapply them elsewhere in medicine or technology.

As technology progresses, we have ever more sophisticated methods of observing this organic origami in smallest parts of the world. Data-driven chemistry has lead researchers to develop computer programing that converts data gained from observation with electron xray refraction into scale models of molecular structures. The incredible cross-pollination of ideas between origami, molecular geometry, biochemistry, and physics is manifest in these reproductions: scale models are computed into origami templates, which can be printed out on paper and folded into scale models of the actual protein structures being imaged. In this way we can manually study their specific forms and functions, and reconcile them with existing disciplines.

Anatomy teaches us that something bends due to rigidity. It is impossible for something to fold without force acting upon it, whether

Science & Technology the force interior or exterior. The muscle acts upon the tendon, which draws the fingers in to fold over the palm. Proteins fold in the same way, with chemical “muscles” causing structural changes, as we have discovered through computer programs including RasMol, SwissModel, and Brookhaven’s protein data bank. Proteins, like our limbs, have rigidity that allows for certain folds in certain places along its structure, which can be exploited once we know how to activate certain folds.

One way we can use this information is in creating synthetic proteins, or lab proteins, for drug design. When injected as drug formulas, the synthetic proteins enter the body as small molecules that attach themselves to genetic proteins according to their fold programming. These synthetic proteins are designed according to the models of naturally occurring proteins, but with specialized amino acids. The amino acids are specifically paired to enable the protein to fold into a form that dictates its function as an inhibitor.

A protein folds on its own, but in the lab, we are designing amino acid chains programed through biochemistry to fold over rogue proteins within our body. Basically, these synthetic proteins work

as inhibitors to the proteins causing genetic mutations such as cystic fibrosis, by destroying their function. When an inhibitor follows entry vectors, natural or artificial, into the body, and attaches itself to its hosts, it shuts down its ability to fold properly. The function in a protein, including a malignant one, is lost when you unfold it using methods of altering PH to effect a loss of rigidity. It is the same in origami: when we miss a step or unfold a creation, it fails to reach its proper form. The synthetic proteins used in drug development cause toxic proteins to lose their structure rendering them incapable of further damage to the body, before the malicious proteins themselves unfold healthy proteins.

In allowing our curiosity to breach the surface of the purely aesthetic world, we have discovered the base unit for dimension in organic structures and solved problems in the technical and medical worlds as a result of manipulating the fold. There is little that could convince me that nature at its core isn’t elegant; a certain transcendence arises from the discovery that a simple fold traverses every known dimension. Computer science, physics, biochemistry and medicine have all benefited from capitalizing on the elegance and beauty of nature’s origami.

Protein Folding

Machine Mind : Continued from page seven

Please imagine how much this very magazine depends on technology for layout, compilation, and printing, and where the Rambler might be without modern computers. But we more specifically reap the benefits of computer from their software, not their hardware.

To understand theconsequences of this for AI, we need to consider the mechanical limitations of Moore’s Law. Hardware will continue to improve only if we can also overcome heat dissipation, access speeds, and the physical limits of miniaturization.

The extreme complexity of the human brain does not lend it self to computerized reproduction, and the software necessary to model it is far beyond our current computing capacity. In 2007 a team of scientists leveraged the maximum power of modern computing to digitally recreate a mouse’s brain. Or at least, half of a mouse’s brain, working in slow motion, for ten seconds. The scientists believe they detected patterns in the simulation similar to the patterns seen in neural scans of living mice. Half a mouse’s brain contains around eight

million neurons; a human brain contains over a hundred billion. We can imagine how much progress there is to be made in technological development before human neural simulation can take place.

Putting aside restrictive realities for a moment, let us suppose that we could model a fully functional digital human brain existed.

Despite the anxious hope of trans-humanists and futurists, this would not be human mind or rational being. It would remain a facsimile, a very excellent one, but ultimately not a genuine intelligence. It might communicate to us, to convince us of its humanity, but we would expect that any realistic simulation would not present itself as such. It would not be an accurate model of the human brain if it acted like a computer program. But it would still be a computer program, producing digital data, even if that data reflects the function of real human brains. No matter how realistic a model it might seem, the artificial intelligence nonetheless remains a mere reflection in a mirror made of silicon.

9 | nine

Feature

Restoring the

Some thoughts on overcoming intellectual [This essay was published in The Rambler shortly after the Founding of the Chester-Belloc Debate Society.

It captures many of the original motivations of the founding Duma. This re-publication aims to illustrate how far we have come and how far we have yet to go as a college.] by

John J. Jalsevac, Alumnus

B

elloc once said, very wisely, “Every man has an instinct for conflict: at least, every healthy man.” Indeed, conflict is the mother of all good things. For it is only in strenuous opposition to some opposing thing that the mind is confirmed in conviction, and in conviction discovers the desire to effect conversion, and through the desire to effect conversion, obtains courage. As courage is the most invigorating of the virtues, vitality itself is imparted to the soul through conflict.

This sense of conflict is necessary for education (and also for the development of the spiritual life, which will be addressed separately towards the end of this article), if the desire and purpose of educators is to educate courageous and vigorous intellectuals and not mere automatons. Conflict is especially necessary for Christendom College, where it is so rare. Indeed, at least according to Belloc’s standards, Christendom is not healthy. We have little instinct—or rather, we stifle our instinct—for conflict, and our muscles and bones are withering without it. These purported “crises” at which we students occasionally take a stab (the modesty crisis, the liturgical crisis, etc.) are merely the dying twitches of our natural instinct for conflict. We students need something to fight, some noble cause to champion, and so we attack the dim shadows on our own campus.

A deliberate effort, therefore, must be made on the part of students and faculty alike to encourage a proper sense of conflict on campus. Thus will we be inspired to channel our natural energies for conflict outwards, instead of impotently inwards; thus will we find the inspiration and means to develop intellectual and spiritual excellence, as well as the courage necessary to put to use that excellence as effective apostles of truth in the midst of the modern world.

One preliminary problem I see, however, in the fostering of a healthy sense of conflict on campus, and the development of its corollaries of intellectual curiosity and courage, is that Christendom has adopted almost exclusively a lecture style of education. If this continues, or at the very least if the lecture style employed is not conscientiously modified to more frequently introduce the sense of conflict into lectures themselves, it will prove to be detrimental to our intellectual, and derivatively, our spiritual life.

The lecture is intellectual television (and here I speak not 10 | ten

about the lecture at Christendom College, but in general). It tends to transform the mind into a passive receptor of discrete ideas, offering little encouragement to the viewer to penetrate beneath the surface into the fundamental significance and the interrelatedness of things.

Further, the lecture format of pedagogy tends to foster an unhealthy comfort with one’s own role in the order of things. Within the limits of the lecture, faculty members are infrequently challenged to extend too far beyond the carefully drawn borders of their prepared lesson plans. If they wish, they may even eschew intellectual discourse with their fellow faculty members by restricting their intellectual pursuits entirely to the classroom, and therefore, to exchanges with those of inferior knowledge and ability (their students). The students are similarly safe, for they need only memorize their notes and repeat their professor’s every word on the next exam.

As such, within the lecture the students or faculty are rarely ever brought to bear with the full extent of their ignorance, particularly their ignorance of the arguments of their intellectual opponents. Ignorance is most effectively exposed through spontaneous discussions that do not follow the strictures of a prepared lesson plan, which, no matter how clever or clear, necessarily restricts the possibility of diversion into the dark alleys of our carefully concealed areas of nescience. The awareness of one’s ignorance is, however, a necessary catalyst for a healthy intellectual curiosity, that is, for wonder. Without wonder true education cannot occur; without wonder education is rote memorization. It is dead.

In conclusion, within a pure lecture system that does not deliberately weave conflict into the lecture itself (which is best achieved by the in-depth analysis of various competing arguments and viewpoints within the lecture), there is rarely any need for faculty or student to contemplate in any noteworthy depth the information offered, to synthesize the information learned in various disciplines, and to give life and vitality to ideas. Instead, ideas can safely be treated as words strung together in a particular order on a page. One less obvious consequence, perhaps, is an academic program that sometimes seems based more upon the following of strict rules— a legalistic adherence to attendance policies, an absurd focus on formatting (Turabian) over content, the assigning of an impossible quantity of academic grunt work, etc.—than a true penetration into and love for the material.

Feature

Sense of Urgency:

and spiritual boredom at Christendom College

Thus the academic life becomes but a series of exhausting exercises that do nothing to inculcate the students with a sense of passion for true learning. Under this method a student may easily achieve summa cum laude by carefully adhering to the letter of the law, and yet not have developed a particularly coherent or profound intellectual world-view.

It seems, therefore, that either the sole use of the lecture ought to be abandoned as harmful for the intellectual life of the college, or else active efforts ought to be made to augment lectures with other intellectual and artistic extra-curricular activities that encourage greater levels of discourse and interactivity.

As one solution I suggest that we as a campus ought to engage in more (indeed, dare I say any) public disputation. If we profess a desire to imitate the scholastics, especially St. Thomas (as we do), then we ought to put some effort into imitating them. The scholastics were not passive receptors of the musings of their masters. Undoubtedly St. Thomas understood and put into practice the virtue of docility better than any of us, but he was not passive. Docility, which is a necessary and admirable virtue, is not pure passivity. Rather, pure passivity and docility are as mutually opposed to one another as night and day, or oil and water.

“

”

We also ought to restore the sense of urgency to our education by reminding ourselves, often, that Christendom College is an anomaly within the world.

St. Thomas and his contemporaries frequently engaged in the public (and sometimes heated) exchange of ideas. In the spirit of the scholastics I submit a friendly challenge to the faculty to infuse a healthy sense of conflict into the intellectual life on campus by engaging in public intellectual disputation. The good that would come of two professors at this college engaging one another in a public debate on a matter that admits of legitimate disagreement is exciting to consider.

It would be beneficial enough if it were intra-departmental, but unthinkably exciting if it were an inter-departmental debate. For a full week before and after such a public exchange there would be no end to fascinating discussions about the topic debated—at dinner tables, in the halls, in the dorms—as I have witnessed happen every time an even mildly controversial figure has spoken as a major speaker.

The burden of the responsibility to infuse life into the intellectual life must not, however, fall upon the faculty. The students themselves must cultivate a lively intellectual atmosphere on campus. This means making the active effort to eschew frivolities from time to time, and instead

to conscientiously develop intellectual and spiritual friendships. This means making the explicit decision to gather with a few close and respected friends on occasion in order to discuss a particular text which you have found difficult or intriguing. Scripture in particular comes alive in a surprising and refreshing manner when it is discussed freely amongst friends. One admirable consequence of implementing these sorts of informal discussion groups is that one’s friendships will swiftly grow in intimacy and depth.

The project that in many ways clinched my decision to write this article is the recently restored Chester-Belloc Debate Society, which is a fine example of what I am getting at. If there is any example of what conflict can accomplish in abolishing intellectual tedium and complacency, it is this Society. Indeed, we participants in the debates have all felt our minds startled from their typical drowsy stupor into alert wakefulness by the inspiriting specter of a cogent argument posed by the opposition. The two debates that we have hosted have set a match to the intellects of the participants and observers, and have revealed our unfortunate ignorance of many things, including our knowledge of how to speak convincingly extemporaneously. I strongly encourage students to attend and participate in these debates. These past few years I have detected something of an intellectual and spiritual staleness on campus, to which I myself have sometimes succumbed, against my dearest wishes. It seems to be a staleness borne of an intellectual complacency, and a lack of a sense of urgency, the sense of urgency that is fostered best by conflict. Undoubtedly, therefore, we need to introduce conflict, and its accompanying sense of urgency in some of the various ways I have already enumerated.

In addition, and perhaps most importantly, we also ought to restore the sense of urgency to our education by reminding ourselves, often, that Christendom College is an anomaly within the world—that the world, indeed, is extremely confused. Not only must we remind ourselves that the world is confused (which alone can lead to the particularly dangerous insularities of self-congratulation and elitism), but we must remind ourselves about what the world is confused. In addition, and most importantly of all, we must also frequently remind ourselves that that about which the world is confused is not so obviously wrong as we sometimes tell ourselves—that in many cases it needs subtle and extremely difficult arguments (not to mention the action of grace) to overcome the world’s falsehoods.

We must, therefore, put particular emphasis in our education on understanding the arguments of our opponents better than they themselves understand them (a skill that St. Thomas was extraordinarily adept in). . .

(Continued on page fifteen) 11 | eleven

Faith & Reason

The Natural Guard: Strength for the Sake of Beauty by

Peter Deucher, ‘15

T

he last edition of The Rambler printed a beautifully written article on beauty by a beautiful lady, Miss Katie Brizek. In it she reflected on the special sort of beauty inherent in women, a beauty that is first found in the soul and then expressed by the body. I would like to further pursue Miss Brizek’s thoughts on womankind and then turn to men by considering the origin and end of their sex’s distinct trait, strength. To do this, it is best to start by asking how men and women are similar and how they are different. The most fundamental similarity between man and woman is their common human nature.

They are both composites of body and soul, and what a soul!

That soul enables man to grasp abstract truths and act with volition, two astounding capabilities. In the words of the estimable philosopher Dietrich von Hildebrand, man and woman are “two different expressions of human nature.” Thus, both men and women are rational beings. Two well-known, if not widely accepted, myths about what makes the sexes different must be addressed. For some reason, women have been branded as less rational than men. In contrast, men have somehow managed to earn fame for being insensitive and cold. The dumb blonde and the heartless hulk stereotype the sexes in a shamelessly absurd fashion. These then are the two myths: that women are irrational because they are prone to emotion, and that men are not compassionate because they are dispassionate. As erroneous as these notions might be, both are seasoned with at least a grain of truth. Women are, on average, more prone to give way to strong emotions, at least ostensibly so. Whether they are actually swayed and governed by those passions is another matter. The idea of women’s irrationality is a misunderstanding, albeit an understandable one. Similarly, the fact that men show fewer emotions than women provides some ground for those who label them as heartless.

Many men are indeed apathetic bores. But I protest the assertion that a man is little more than a lump of lead in the form of a biped. We have feeling. We have emotions. This misunderstanding of males is caused both by men hiding their feelings and by others, especially women, failing to understand the masculine language. Men use actions and objects more frequently than words when expressing themselves. This is why husbands traditionally present their wives with flowers and perhaps why the Three Wise Men came bearing gifts, not

12 | twelve

verbal compliments or hugs. So just as the mind of woman is in fact rational, the heart of man is, indeed, movable.

There seems to be some truth behind the two previous errors that earns them the title of understandable misunderstandings. The underlying truth that both these sickly stereotypes attempt to trace is this: men approach things more objectively while women regard things more subjectively. This does not mean that men see things the way they are, whereas women do not. It simply means that men tend to focus on the actions of an individual while women pay heed to the individual persons themselves. In short, men have an eye for objects that balances women’s concern for subjects. Or, as von Hildebrand puts it, any given man has “a specific capacity to emancipate himself with his intellect from the affective sphere.” It is because of their objectivity that men are sometimes insensitive, and it is on account of their subjectivity that women occasionally seem irrational. So it is arguable that if you want justice pure and undefiled, males are the men to go to. But if you seek compassion springing from an understanding of your personal plight, find a woman. I speak from my own familial experience.

When I did something wrong or had a special favor to ask, I would always go first to Mom simply because I knew that Dad would not really understand, at least from my point of view. Mom would usually take my side, at least partially, and end up forgiving or giving, even if I did not deserve it. Without a doubt, man’s objectivity must be tempered with woman’s subjectivity, and vice versa.

Indeed, men need women and women need men to balance out their tendencies to justice and mercy. When that balance is reached, when mercy seasons justice without obliterating it entirely, then the differences between the sexes truly complement each other and unbury the riches of human nature. In order for man and woman to benefit from the other’s peculiarities and thrive, they must live together in the context of a certain milieu of mutual respect.

What does this sort of respect look like? It most certainly does not take on the absurd form of the equalizing movement known as feminism, which attempts to ignore all differences between the sexes beyond the physical. Feminists are right if they say that a certain respect is due equally to all on account of their human nature, which is formed in the image and likeness of God. But this respect for human nature

Faith & Reason

must be deepened by a reverence for gender. Men and women must enter this deeper reverence by recognizing the valuable differences found in each other.

Miss Brizek’s article has already begun the hunt for feminine value. Women have a beauty that goes beyond the aesthetic to make them, in every case, precious. This great beauty arises from the close-knit union of mind and heart found in women. Rather than complaining about women for dragging their emotional baggage into every situation, we should thank them for alleviating the burden of an existence devoid of feeling. Like the beauty found in the product of any art, be it in the handiwork of Monet, Michelangelo, or Mahler, womanly beauty comes from her Creator, who inextricably intertwined the components of her nature into a cohesive whole. Unity, that’s what makes her beautiful.

But what could there possibly be to like in men? Given the fact that men too have emotions, are not men just as beautiful as women since they invigorate thoughts in the mind with feelings from the heart?

The answer is no and the reason why has already been stated. Men have a knack for taking off from the affectual sphere in their intellectual plane. What men do with their ability to supersede their emotions is the next, and indeed the most crucial, question asked in this article. It seems reasonable to say that it takes strength to override and set aside one’s feelings. Strength, then, is a quality inherent in man’s makeup. So to put the last question more simply, why are men strong?

The answer is obvious: to protect the vulnerable. Now vulnerability has at least two possible sources, weakness or delicacy.

Man is strong so that he can defend those who are too weak to defend themselves. Children come to mind. Like children, some women need physical defense. But all women, on account of the delicate equilibrium of their closely united mind and heart, need to be preserved. Because beauty is fragile and all too easily destroyed, woman is by nature in need of a guardian. What is more, she is intrinsically worth guarding since her particular beauty deserves love and admiration. Since man is innately equipped to make the sacrifice of disregarding his personal feelings so that a thing of value might endure, he is the natural guard. Men must protect women from the careless and the lustful, who either have no concern for beauty or wish to exploit it. A garden can bloom only when a stone wall is present to fend off careless feet and hungry mouths. The worst problem men face is that unlike that wall, they may themselves become a threat to women. Who can deny that a man careless with his love can wreak debilitating emotional havoc among the myriad ranks of pretty maids? Or worse still, how many men can easily go the way of King Henry the Eighth, who originally lived an ostensibly good life but finally succumbed to the reign of his sexual passions? The greatest protection any man can give women, and indeed, the first protection he must give every woman, safeguards her from himself through selfcontrol.

Like all things of value, masculine strength and feminine beauty deserve a certain kind of response in those who encounter them. Beauty should lead men to compliment and cherish women not only with words but especially with actions. Conversely, women

ought to show appreciation for what protection they receive by trusting men with the safety of their precious selves. Men need not be suckups and women need not submissively grovel. Both must find ways to acknowledge the value in the other.

“

”

It is arguable that if you want justice pure and undefiled, males are the men to go to. But if you seek compassion springing from an understanding of your personal plight, find a woman.

In closing, it must be noted that both men and women need courage to properly fulfill their roles. Since it takes bravery to abandon oneself, only the brave man fulfills his duty as protector by being ready and willing to sacrifice himself and his own interests. The same courage empowers women to be selfless enough to trust in the protection of men. Once both sexes find the courage to play their parts, the garden of human life flourishes with an even greater strength and beauty than those found separately in man and woman alone. For this new strength endures because now it has a purpose, and she grows more beautiful each day.

13 | thirteen

Faith & Reason

Opus Dei:

Secret Cult or Saintly Society? by

Maria Bonvissuto ‘15

M

urderous monks. Assasinations. Political intrigue and underground gatherings. All of these have at one point or another been associated with the Catholic organization called Opus Dei. This institution has generated a lot of controversy and curiosity, especially since the emergence of Dan Brown’s infamous book, The Da Vinci Code.

Many Catholics know that the claims contained in the novel are erroneous, but that’s about as far as their knowledge of Opus Dei goes. So what exactly is this mysterious association, that has been a source of speculation of society as a whole and even in many Catholic circles?

Simply put, Opus Dei, sometimes known as “The Work,” is an international, Catholic lay organization that seeks to enable all people to attain sainthood by sanctifying their everyday lives, particularly in the workplace. Founded by St. Josemaría Escrivà in Spain in 1928, this personal prelature of the Catholic Church primarily offers spiritual formation for its members through classes, retreats, spiritual direction and opportunities for apostolic service work.

Both clergy and laity make up the body of Opus Dei, which is headed by a Prelate, Bishop Javier Echevarría. However, the majority of its members are not priests or religious. There are three types of lay Opus Dei members—numeraries, associates and supernumeraries.

Numeraries and associates voluntarily live celibate lives, in order to devote themselves more fully to serving the apostolate of Opus Dei. They help to run most of the formation events that Opus Dei offers, while at the same time holding jobs of their own in the workplace.

Supernumeraries make up the biggest portion of Opus Dei and are ordinary laity, oftentimes married, who strive for sainthood by offering their daily work to God.

It is also important to note that Opus Dei has received the endorsement of the Church, and several Popes have spoken highly of it.

In a 1964 letter to St. Josemaría, Pope Paul VI declared, “We consider with paternal satisfaction all that Opus Dei has done and continues to do for the kingdom of God…” Throughout its existence, Opus Dei has worked hand in hand with the Church to form saintly generations.

Now that a few words have been said about what Opus Dei actually is, let it also be perfectly clear what it is not:

14 | fourteen

Opus Dei is not a secret society.

The organization is a universal apostolate, and quite a few of its spiritual and apostolic activities, such as retreats and classes, are open not only to those belonging to Opus Dei, but also non-members.

Opus Dei does have “centers” situated all across the world. These are not special houses where clandestine meetings or fascinating intrigues take place; rather, they serve as homes for the numeraries in a given city or town and offer a location where the laity, including those not in Opus Dei, can come to receive spiritual formation and fellowship and participate in service activities.

In order to become a member of Opus Dei, no exclusive qualifications, secret rites or blood oaths are required. Anyone who has a serious desire to grow in holiness in his everyday life can join. Of course, members do make certain commitments when they enter Opus Dei. These include receiving spiritual and doctrinal formation from Opus Dei, following a spiritual plan of life, which includes daily Mass, Rosary, personal prayer and spiritual reading, and devoting some time to apostolic work. However, these requirements are nothing out of the ordinary for a faithful Catholic and in no way alter one’s ordinary life.

“

Opus Dei is a spiritual and apostolic organization. If one forgets this fundamental fact, or refuses to believe in the good faith of the members of the Work who affirm it, it is impossible to understand what we do.

”

The Prelature has also been viewed with suspicion because it does not publish a list of its members’ names. In a 2004 article for the Catholic League’s journal Catalyst, several Opus Dei officials responded to this criticism, saying: “The Opus Dei Prelature publishes the names of all its priests and all its international and regional directors. Like dioceses and parishes, it does not publish lay members’ names. Neither do health clubs for that matter, and people surely deserve as much privacy in their spiritual affairs as they do in medical matters. Members, however, are more than happy to tell you of their membership and what Opus Dei is all about.”

Faith & Reason

St. Josemaría himself emphatically denied all claims made about cultlike or secret practices in Opus Dei. During a press interview he stated, “Opus Dei is a spiritual and apostolic organization. If one forgets this fundamental fact, or refuses to believe in the good faith of the members of the Work who affirm it, it is impossible to understand what we do. And this very lack of understanding can lead people to invent complicated stories and secrets which have never existed.”

Opus Dei is not a political society.

The prelature does not have a political agenda of any kind. It is firmly faithful to the Magisterium and the Holy Father and follows the example of the Church by not endorsing any particular political view.

Members of Opus Dei can belong to any political party they choose.

The Opus Dei website declares that, “In these opinionable matters, Opus Dei members make their own decisions just like other faithful Catholics. But you won’t understand Opus Dei until you realize that politics– whether civil or ecclesial – just isn’t its institutional focus. Opus Dei’s focus is on providing spiritual guidance to help people deepen their faith and integrate it with their daily life.”

In the realm of politics, Opus Dei has an opinion only insofar as it concerns itself with following Church social teaching. It never has been and never will be affiliated with any particular political figure or organization.

Opus Dei is not a controlling organization that restricts its members’ freedom.

For Opus Dei, personal freedom is paramount. As a result, a person’s choice to enter the organization is completely voluntary, and he does not take any vows when he enters. He may also leave at any time.

Opus Dei puts special emphasis on encouraging a free and family-like atmosphere in all of its activities.

St. Josemaría had this to say about the role of freedom in Opus Dei: “All the activity of Opus Dei’s directors is based on a great respect for the members’ professional freedom. This point is of capital importance. The Work’s very existence depends on it, so no exceptions are admitted.”

When all these facts are taken into consideration, the shroud of confusion and myth surrounding Opus Dei falls away, to reveal its true identity as an organization simply dedicated to sanctifying all people. Secrecy and conspiracy hold no part in this institution—after all, its primary goal is to spread the news that sainthood is possible no matter what walk of life a man may come from.

Certainly, Opus Dei has enemies who cast harsh criticisms against it. But then again, so does the Catholic Church. Despite its naysayers, Opus Dei continues to fight the good fight and produce men and women who faithfully follow the Lord’s call to be in the world but not be of it.

“Deo Omnis Gloria”

Sense of Urgency : Continued from page eleven this necessitates practicing granting a certain amount of credence to opposing arguments prior to discrediting them, instead of merely brushing them aside as unorthodox before giving them their full due.

Thereby we not only understand these arguments from the inside out, but are also enabled to attack them from the inside out, to devastate the very foundation of falsehood.

And finally, we must remind ourselves, often, that this college is only a temporary haven and a training ground, and not an end. The world is confused, and we, and no one else, are precisely the ones who are entrusted with the task of dissipating the confusion and restoring to the world the stability of the eternal truths. The responsibility that weighs upon our shoulders is heavy, but invigorating. In reminding ourselves of this we set up the proper opposition in our mind, the sense of conflict that will inspire us to develop the intellectual acuity, spiritual strength, and overall courage necessary to put to use our Christendom education in order overcome the particular falsehoods of the present

“

age—to “bring Christ to the world,” as Dr. Carroll repeated so often at his speech a few weeks ago.

Thus will we find the inspiration and means to develop intellectual and spiritual excellence, as well as the courage necessary to put to use that excellence as effective apostles of truth in the midst of the modern world.

”

Let us, therefore, through the introduction of the healthy conflict of intellectual and spiritual disputation, throw open the windows of the campus, and let in the cool, crisp breeze that will startle into wakefulness our minds and souls, the breeze that will blow out the dust and cobwebs of intellectual and spiritual restlessness and boredom.

15 | fifteen

Arts & Culture

SAINTS WITH DIRTY TOENAILS: Or, why I pray to by

Baroque Paintings

Cate Thomas, ‘13

A

few years ago I had the opportunity to take an art history course for fun at my local community college. Our midterm assignment was to write an essay on a work of our choosing on display in Kansas City’s Nelson-Atkins. And for some inscrutable, wonderful reason, my art museum—in the middle of corn country, USA— happens to be the permanent residence of one of the world’s most beautiful Caravaggios, one of his many takes on St. John the Baptist. Making my choice of artwork was one of easiest things I have ever done. Completing that paper, however, was not.

That assignment required us to analyze an artwork and argue why it represents the time period or artistic movement to which it belongs. Fair enough. But trying to explain St. John the Baptist in the Wilderness in purely non-spiritual, historical terms proved more of a challenge than I had previously thought. Perhaps you can imagine how difficult it was to write that paper without making overtly triumphant remarks about the cultural impact of the Catholic Counter-Reformation, or why the Baroque period pretty much kicked the Renaissance in the fig leaf. Okay, I exaggerate; the Renaissance was great too in its way, and writing an unbiased paper is not an impossible task. Yet even now, I still find it somewhat difficult to think solely about the history of this Caravaggio, because it was and is more to me than a historical artifact. I can’t help it; I think about it differently than I do the Chinese swords on the museum’s upper level.

I went downtown to visit this painting several times after the required trip. I went long after my paper was done, because this painting was not Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, quoted in John L. Varriano, Caravaggio:

1

The Art of Realism (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2006), 42.

16 | s ixteen

yet done with me. In this essay I aim to elaborate on two of the reasons why I continue to look at it from time to time, especially in Advent and Lent. In so doing, I also hope to persuade you to take similar advantage of the work of great artists who area also your brothers and sisters in Christ.

Two of the things that make this painting characteristic of its time and its creator are Caravaggio’s realism and his trademark tenebrism, or use of dramatic lighting. Aside from being interesting facts that may make you sound cultured at a cocktail party, these two aspects of the painting also offer ample material for contemplation. In particular, they suggest the presence of beauty and hope in a fallen world.

The gritty realism of this picture is likely the first thing that takes hold of the imagination upon first sight.

Unless you read the title of this work first, it might be difficult to identify the subject as St. John the Baptist. He does not stand at attention like a saint in a church window. Instead, he slumps to one side and looks down at the ground, like a typical angst-ridden teenager.

There is dirt under his toenails, but no halo. These things are undoubtedly so because Caravaggio often employed lower- or working-class boys as models, and because he was adamant about imitating the things of nature well—or, to use his own words, “imitar bene le cose naturali.”1 But these must not be taken as flaws in his portrayal of the saint by any means. The fact that St. John appears young, sullen, and ordinary is fascinating, for surely the saint must have looked this way at some point in his life. Authenticity like this is crucial in the art of the Catholic

Arts & Culture

Faith, the Faith of saints who are human, of those who believe in grace perfecting nature, not eradicating it.

St. John’s solitude also emerges as particularly striking.

He does not stand amidst a crowd or even baptize Our Lord, as we commonly imagine him. The “voice of one crying in the wilderness” is utterly silent; the famous preacher, completely alone (Jn. 1:23). Instead, he appears lost in private thought, and very serious thought by the look of it. It is as if we have happened upon him in a moment of prayer, contemplating the sad state of the world before Christ, and how deeply necessary is repentance. One can easily envision this figure impressing onto a crowd the mortal urgency of making straight the way of the Lord, of clearing out the wilderness of our hearts to make room for Him. Yet it would be a mistake to take his severe expression for pessimism, as some art critics have done.

“

”

John’s message acknowledged man’s sinfulness, but it was by no means a cynical message. Rather, it was one of joyful anticipation, because it saw beyond the present state of mankind.

Catherine Puglisi, for one, suggests that Caravaggio’s later Roman works, of which this St. John the Baptist is a part, “project a sombre and brooding mood that shares the essentially pessimistic Augustinian view of humanity after the Fall.”2 By “pessimistic Augustinianism” here Puglisi means not the thought of St. Augustine, but something closer to Martin Luther’s idea of total depravity. (On a side note, her comments about how Caravaggio’s paintings also reflect a belief in justification by faith alone are also somewhat eyebrowraising.) But alas, this assessment of Caravaggio’s later paintings leaves much to be desired. The Council of Trent strictly forbade artists from creating “images conducive to false doctrine, and furnishing occasion of dangerous error to the uneducated.”3 Producing questionable Catholic art simply was not good business at this time. It is preposterous to suppose that Caravaggio, under the patronage of devout Catholic layman in the case of this painting, which was to be hung in a church Catherine Puglisi, Caravaggio (New York: Phaidon Press, 2010), 251.

2

oratory, meant to present St. John or human nature in a way contrary to Catholic teaching—and Catholicism is the farthest thing from pessimism that there is. According to the Faith, St. John the Baptist’s message signifies nothing but the coming of Christ. His is not a message calling for the wiping away of sinful humanity, or remaking it, but something infinitely more wonderful: redeeming it. Just because Caravaggio’s painting is somber in tone does not mean it expresses hopelessness. In fact, I argue that it suggests just the opposite.

Perhaps those art critics who have difficulty understanding this piece find Caravaggio’s realism too different from the movements that preceded him, Renaissance classicism and Mannerism. This is an understandable mistake, but a mistake nonetheless. Religious art from each of these periods sought to glorify God in their depiction of man.

A great deal of Renaissance art emphasized the beauty and order in the human form so as to indicate and appreciate man’s divine origin. All well and good. Mannerism, which the work of El Greco typifies, went even farther than that. Religious artwork from this movement did not have nature as its standard. They sought above all to emphasize the spiritual, but at the expense of reality. As a result, abnormally elongated figures and unnatural colors run rampant in Mannerist paintings. Not in so the early Baroque, which is a bit more nuanced than either of these previous schools. Caravaggio and his contemporaries make no effort to idealize man. In fact, Caravaggio exemplifies the Baroque tendency to showcase the most dramatic and unsightly truths of humanity. At the same time, neither can this movement be termed anti-man, deploring humankind as hideous and depraved. More precisely, it falls somewhere in the middle. This painting of St. John the Baptist, profoundly holy and unmistakably human, exemplifies this very Catholic attitude towards man and sanctity. The works of Caravaggio and other realistic Baroque artists therefore offer a better likeness of humanity and a more amazing fact to contemplate: We are imperfect, but Someone finds us beautiful anyway.

For reasons similar to those pertaining to the painting’s realism, Caravaggio’s use of light in this painting also demands attention.

(Continued on page eighteen) Council of Trent, Session 25, December 4, 1563, Touching the Invocation,

3

Veneration, and on Relics of Saints and Sacred Images, trans. Theodore Alois Buckley (London: George Routledge & Co., 1851), 214-215.

17 | seventeen

Arts & Culture

Saints : Continued from page seventeen Caravaggio made tenebrism, juxtaposing extremes of light and darkness, extremely popular in his day. It is not hard to see why. Many cultures and religions associate light with divinity, knowledge, inspiration, truth, hope, or grace. Christianity does so more and better than any other group. Critics rarely misunderstand this feature of Caravaggio’s work, so universal and basic a symbol is light. However, by using light and darkness in their extremes in his paintings, Caravaggio stresses the radical nature of the hope Christ offers mankind—for the hope He offers is unlike any other hope in the universe. Here I echo my original point about St. John’s mission of preaching Christ to the world.

John’s message acknowledged man’s sinfulness, but it was by no means a cynical message. Rather, it was one of joyful anticipation, because it saw beyond the present state of mankind. The contrast between light and dark in this picture suggests a truth St. Paul later expressed to the Romans—“where sin increased, grace abounded all the more” (Rom. 5:20). This painting of the Baptist remains a work of great Catholic art because it reveals that in a fallen world, mercy is a reality. Quite literally, it suggests that “the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (Jn. 1:5).

18 | eighteen

“

”

By using light and darkness in their extremes in his paintings, Caravaggio stresses the radical nature of the hope Christ offers mankind—for the hope He offers is unlike any other hope in the universe..

I hope that I have made some of my feelings about this painting chiaro. Its realism should not occasion despair but wonder and hope, as should its dramatic interplay between light and dark.

Visiting an art museum can obviously never compare with receiving the Sacraments or praying with God’s inspired Word, but I think paintings can also be effective means of learning about God, if not channels of grace themselves, and I know that this painting has been so for me.

The Last Word

Thumbs

Another opportunity for presenting our opinions on campus occurences. Agree? Disagree? Have an opinion of your own? Let us know!

NACHO BAR:

WAITING IN LINE #2 by the editorial staff

Christendom happily welcomes Fr. Mark Byrne, our new Assistant Chaplain! Assigned to the College by the Society of Our Lady of the Most Holy Trinity (SOLT), Fr. Byrne will be staying with us for the 2012-1013 academic year.

The Sacred Grounds coffee shop has replenished its supply of fine beanery!

Be sure to stop by and drink your fill at this quality establishment.

Lady Windermere’s Fan, performed by the Christendom College Players, was a box-office hit. The stellar performances evoked standing ovations from the audience.

The East vs West and women’s Powderpuff double-header thrilled viewers last weekend. Though the East and Senior/Sophomore powder-puff teams reigned supreme, everyone cheered for a Christendom victory.

STOMACH FLU BUGS CAMPUS: Those insected, erm, I mean infected, were quarantined. And those uninfected... are now infected. The epidemic continues.

I am in the Commons, standing in line for dinner on a Friday night. I’m in line #2. That is, Nacho bar, line #2. I stop to talk to some people behind me, but when I resume my forward facing position, two people have stepped into line in front of me. Assuming that they saw the opening in line without noticing me, or the ten to fifteen people standing behind me, I decided not to say anything about it. As the line inched closer to the final destination (the station that produced the cheesy nachos covered with salsa and yummy non-meat toppings I desired), two more people came and joined their friends in line directly in front of me, ignoring not only me, but the hungry people behind me who had been waiting in line for no less than twenty minutes. How does this happen?

Cutting in line is not necessarily malicious. However, why people feel justified or entitled to cut in front of others is unclear. Perhaps you think yourself better than those standing behind you in line and feel that you don’t need to wait in the back like everyone else? I hope that this is not the case.

I find that the most common case is, rather, that people cut in line so that they can stand with their friends and not have to stand in line by themselves.

However, by cutting with your friends in line you are: 1) ignoring the people who are standing behind you and have been waiting patiently, 2) demonstrating an insecurity to associate with those at the back of the line, and 3) giving off the impression that it is more important for you to get what you want, and sooner, than for the people behind you to. You are cutting in front of others; cutting to “get ahead,” instead of waiting at the back of the line like everyone else.

Now, there are times when people have to go to work or to a meeting and they would not be able to get dinner unless they cut to the front of the line.

However, with this example, these individuals take the time to explain their situation to those around them and demonstrate the courtesy of asking if it is alright to cut; a gesture I have rarely seen of other people who cut in line.

I’m sure at this point, many of you are thinking this is a silly article in which the author has old-fashioned ideas about cutting and waiting in line, but I believe that there is a principle behind this example. Growing up, I was taught never to cut corners; whether it was in school, in sports, or in other areas of my life, and I think it’s a very important principle. There is something noble about waiting for something, and doing it the hard way; about having an end in sight, and acquiring it by the right means.

It is much easier to cut in line with friends than to wait at the end of the line by yourself, but if you have the mentality that you are willing to wait for something because you know that it is good and “worth it” and that you will not take short cuts to achieve this goal, you will have the incentive to work hard for it, you will pursue it even when it becomes difficult, and will appreciate it that much more knowing what it took to achieve it. You will be ahead in the long run, able to carry this principle into all areas of your life.

I now bring this “last word” to a close in the hopes that these words will resonate with you, dear reader. Perhaps with these thoughts in mind, the next time you are thinking about cutting in line with your friends in Nacho bar, line #2, maybe, just maybe, you’ll make the noble decision to walk to the end of the line and wait with everyone else.

19 | nineteen