2007-04-16T18:31:00.001-07:00

The Full Correspondence Between Myself and Mark Shea:
(To Correct Mark's Public Misrepresentations of My Views)

Mark's words will be in red font throughout.

Shawn:

"If your brother sins (against you), go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have won over your brother."

Joe D'Hippolito rather delightedly forwards to me some complaints you have about me. And as I look at your site, I see that these are not new. However, you've never said a word of this to me.

I'm in the book. I even live within driving range if you'd like to come to my house for supper. I don't bite (except my supper).

Mark Shea

(Sent March 6, 2007)

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Hi Mark:

Sorry for the delay in responding...time is short and what I composed below only touches on the subjects involved.

On 3/6/07, Mark Shea wrote:

Shawn:

"If your brother sins (against you), go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have won over your brother."

Joe D'Hippolito rather delightedly forwards to me some complaints you have about me. And as I look at your site, I see that these are not new.

There is both explicit as well as even some implied matters which involve a host of people (you among them) and some which involve you specifically. The problem is, without knowing what specifically is being mentioned, I would be commenting in a vacuum and I do not intend to do that. Therefore, if you could forward what Joe sent you, I will know what he referred to and be in a position to better discuss those matters with you.

Speaking of Joe D., though I have my own opinions on the matter -and they are not shoehorned neatly into any one side of the issue- I am not interested in delving into the disputes you and Joe have had at this time so kindly do not tangent into that subject as it will only get this thread offtrack from the issues and into personalities. My criticisms of anyone whomever they are (including Joe D at times) are based on principles and not personalities or opinions.

However, you've never said a word of this to me.

Well Mark, (i) after observing the problems that Catholic apologists have had in general in dealing with inter-church differences of view, (ii) having certain Catholic apologists paper over problems over the years and play "shoot the messenger" with me personally, and (iii) observing the fashion in which you have dealt with criticisms from others, I concluded that the only way to get to the root of a lot of the problems I have seen is to approach either in an indirect fashion or in the general scope of what is wrong with Catholic apologetics in general.{1} It is part of the latter to some extent as far as specific complaints go, I certainly have a few. But a significant one is the propensity you have demonstrated towards taking a neo-ultramontaine approach to theological matters where there is no one Catholic position and then treating those with principled disagreements with you as either somehow unorthodox or with contempt.

I also noticed that you have not scrupled to assassinate the characters of certain public figures through gross misrepresentation of them and from all objective manifestations, this has been both deliberate and malicious on your part. This is contrary to the most basic canons of traditional Catholic charity and thus inexcusable for a public figure such as yourself. One should never rashly place an bad interpretation on the words and actions of another but you have done this many times. After a while of observing this or having others bring it to my attention, it became evident to me that you were beyond a simple correction on these matters and I have no desire to be called a "liar" and publicly smeared because of an apologist confusing their subjective intentions (however noble they claim said intentions are) with the objective reality of what their words and statements convey. (Even when one strives to give the benefit of the doubt on these matters as I do, it gets to a point where this is no longer feasible to do.)

Another factor I have noted and for quite some time is that your approach to theological issues was artificially constrained. This would not be a problem if your approach to those with differing views was more irenic; however, it was anything but that on not a few issues. Take for example the whole torture subject.

There is a lot more to this matter than the superficial approaches that were commonly taken by not a few different people. But particularly revealing (and frankly noxious) was when you realized that Jimmy Akin and you were on opposite sides of this issue to some extent. Prior to that point you had venomously upbraided a bunch of people who took issue with you and your questionable (to put it nicely) interpretation of certain magisterial texts. (By logical extension, I too would have been one of those so implicated.) But when Jimmy did not agree with you in toto, you basically told him -who took in substance the same view as many of those you had venomously upbraided- that shucky darn all was fine and dandy after all!

The reason this was so noxious Mark is simple: by every general impression given by you, Jimmy's view was okay because Jimmy had it but when others prior to him had manifested a similar view, you were scathingly condemning of them for it. This whole episode told me it was a matter of personalities and not principles with you. To watch you upbraid Victor Morton, Chris Blosser, Chris Fotos, Joe DHippolito, Fr. Brian Harrison, Greg Mockeridge and others as you did was unacceptable. I despise this attitude taken by a lot of Catholic apologists who then kvetch about non-Catholics who act the same way.

The bottom line is this: either principles are right or they are wrong and who holds a given principle does not determine its intrinsic value or lack thereof. Disagreements (even strong ones) are hardly cause for creating that kind of public acrimony Mark. I will not go into at this time Jimmy, Karl, and others in that clique's scandalous silences on these kinds of incidents over the years by Catholics while they complain about the James White's and others of the non-Catholic fold acting the same way. This approach is in principle a violation of the law of non-contradiction because either said approach is okay or it is not in and of itself, not by virtue of whether "our guys" do it or "their guys" do. Failing to recognize this principle is a kind of defacto modernism where there is a denial of objective truth intrinsically and as a Catholic that should be the last thing you would ever want to say or in anyway logically infer as you have (whether you realize it or not) done.

I'm in the book. I even live within driving range if you'd like to come to my house for supper. I don't bite (except my supper).

Perhaps we can discuss some of this in person at some point. Right now I am too swamped to say more than I have noted above -though if you want to respond to the above via email, I will be glad to oblige in kind as long as we approach this (i) privately and (ii) in a fashion that is congruent with authentic dialogue as it is properly understood and apart from the kinds of polemical agitprop methodology which are sadly not uncommon and which should have no place amongst brother Catholics. Have a blessed and fruitful Lent.

~Shawn

Note:

{1} To make a list of various threads which covered directly or otherwise these kinds of problems as they are manifested by not a few personages (including in some cases yourself) would take far too long. For that reason, I prefer to deal with specific points brought to my attention -such as (perhaps) the ones you claim Joe D forwarded to you.

(Sent March 15, 2007)

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I don't have Joe's letter anymore. It was sent to me with an accompanying note to the effect of, "Here's what a bastard you are. Shawn McIlhenny thinks so too." I tend not to save such correspondence. I was simply surprised that you thought this about me and that, upon examination of your blog, it was apparent you had lots of things to say about me publicly that you never told me about.

Your note below seems to be an exceedingly wordy way of saying, "No. I preferred attacking you on my blog, and I don't want to talk to you face to face as Scripture says I should do." That's your choice.

Contrary to your charge, I made quite plain the reason for my different approach to Jimmy on my blog back in December. It has nothing to do with personalities and everything to do with the manner of his approach to the question. The fact is, I disagree with him, but he has not given any indication to me that he dismisses the Church's teaching on torture or refers to those who take Veritatis Splendor seriously as "fundamentalist proof texters", or labors to pretend that torture is impossible to define, or performs all the other postmodern gymnastics that the Coalition for Fog have performed to defend our abuse of prisoners.

Instead he does a thought experiment and arrives at, I believe, wrong conclusions. But he seems to me to arrive at them in good faith. The reason he arrives at wrong conclusions is because he is starting with the wrong question: "What is torture?" One can ask that question in good faith (like Jimmy) or in bad faith (like the Coalition for Fog and it's endless attempts to make it impossible to distinguish between legitimate coercion and torture with all the "So! You're saying underwear on the head is torture!" tropes. Jimmy arrives at the notion of proportional pain infliction, which he thinks distinguishable from torture, in the "ticking time bomb" scenario. It's not a surprising conclusion, given the premises.

The problem with Jimmy's analysis, it seems to me, is twofold. First, he's addessing a hypothetical that virtually never happens in real life. That means he's not addressing the issue, which is a *policy* of torture by the Administration that has been applied far beyond mythical ticking time bomb scenarios and which has even included innocent men. Hard cases make bad law.

Beyond this, he is overlooking the fact that the Catechism doesn't *just* forbid torture as intrinsically immoral. His argument depends on the notion that hurting a prisoner isn't torture if it's "proportional" to some remote hypothetical situation that only happens on "24". I don't blame him for starting from this mindset much, because that's how the debate has been framed typically. We're at war with desperate rogues, therefore in interrogating them, we are faced with urgent situations. Only we're not typically. And in many cases, we don't even know if we are interrogating desperate rogues. Sometimes we are interrogating people who happened to be in the wrong place during a police sweep. And we are torturing them, not because we know they have the info we want, but because we *don't* know if they have any info or not.

Meanwhile, the Church says "torture is intrinsically immoral. Don't do it." More than that, she says, "Treat prisoners humanely." That means the question "What is torture?" is a red herring and the whole debate has been framed wrongly. The question is not, "How much pain can we inflict short of torture?" The question is, "How do we treat prisoners humanely and still get the intelligence we need?"

I said all this on my blog, so it shouldn't be news to you. And, as I say, I'm in the book if you want to talk about it or pay me a visit. But don't kid me or yourself that you have behaved justly toward me in this matter. If you had a complaint, you should have come to me with it, not written catty complaints about some mythical Apologetics Oligarchy. I don't blame you for being too embarrased to face me now, but I do hope you will at least take it to confession. You are still welcome for supper anytime and I'm happy to hear your grievance against me. I promise I still will not bite.

And before you ask, I'm not planning to attack you or call you a liar on my blog, despite what you write below. Indeed, I will not bring up your blog at all.

Mark

(Sent March 15, 2007)

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On 3/15/07, Mark Shea wrote:

I don't have Joe's letter anymore. It was sent to me with an accompanying note to the effect of, "Here's what a bastard you are. Shawn McIlhenny thinks so too."

I have noted that there have been problems in some areas in your stuff but I have also said that on other subjects you cover them very well. I do not play this, "Mark is evil cause he is so obviously wrong on one point" kind of game. I find it repugnant actually.

I tend not to save such correspondence. I was simply surprised that you thought this about me

Well, I do not have that view at all. That does not mean that some problems do not exist in how you cover certain subjects mind you. But I have said more than once that I quite like you personally Mark -those factors notwithstanding.

and that, upon examination of your blog, it was apparent you had lots of things to say about me publicly that you never told me about.

I explained my reasons below. They were noted in a few places even on Christopher Blosser's blog either in main postings of his or in combox threads where we both posted stuff. It was not a secret by any stretch what I was saying and why.

After a few attempts at cordial discussions with fellow Catholics of an apologetics sort on incendiary issues blowing up into public spats which were not edifying, I did not want to see that happen again. If I had seen anything indicating that you would act differently than the others in my experience did, I would have reconsidered my view on the matter. And I would have taken even the smallest hint of a possible difference to have reconsidered this Mark. Unfortunately, if anything it pointed to more of the same if not worse.

I was appalled at how you went about handling the whole subject of torture Mark. It made more sense to me (in light of how you had treated others on these matters) to deal with the issue as indirectly as I could but I did end up mentioning your name a few times in the three part thread I did on torture and general norms. (This was done because you were the most prominent public figure taking the position that you did.) Considering all the harranguing of people publicly that you have done (and based on what some have sent me, have continued to do), my approach was quite tame overall.

Your note below seems to be an exceedingly wordy way of saying, "No. I preferred attacking you on my blog, and I don't want to talk to you face to face as Scripture says I should do." That's your choice.

What is it with the apologetics mentality that presumes that a disagreement on principled grounds constitutes an "attack"? Why on earth should I think that my requests for people to define the terms they use (which goes to a lot more people than just you by the way) would be handled by you any differently when I had seen with my own eyes the way you had treated others who had made the same requests in substance that I did? Is it "okay" to treat those you cannot see differently than those you can (or those you have seen)?

I had observed your approach on these issues for a long time either personally or via a number of people sending me threads to your more shrill stuff and asking for an opinion on them. (Of which I sometimes provided but very little of that ever made it to public viewing.) When I did not see a single example of you treating those you were disagreeing with in a fashion denoting an a priori position that they could (possibly) hold their positions in good faith, I calculated that any interventions by myself would be likely to see the same attitude taken.

If you want to claim that I was wrong in making that assumption, perhaps I was. However, one has to make assessments based on rational observation which is grounded on objective criteria Mark and that is what I did. One can rationally conclude that if they see no record whatsoever of a person treating those who disagree with them as possibly disagreeing with them in good faith (except for Jimmy and I will get to this in a moment), that there is no compelling reason to presume that anything different will happen if another person disagreeing on principle happens to weigh in on the matter.

Contrary to your charge, I made quite plain the reason for my different approach to Jimmy on my blog back in December. It has nothing to do with personalities and everything to do with the manner of his approach to the question.

Why is it okay for you to act all dyspeptic on issues that inflame you and yet others who do so are to be condemned by you? Is there some double standard here that I am not aware of? You have enough experience in public discussions to know that people at times are passionate about their views and that sometimes results in a less-than-ideal way of approaching it.

The fact is, I disagree with him, but he has not given any indication to me that he dismisses the Church's teaching on torture or refers to those who take Veritatis Splendor seriously as "fundamentalist proof texters", to pretend that torture is impossible to define, or performs all the other postmodern gymnastics that the Coalition for Fog have performed to defend our abuse of prisoners.

Mark, the fact is, you are presuming without warrant that certain parties (i.e. Victor Morton and company) reject or dismiss church teaching. If you took the time to familiarize yourself with the CDF Instruction on the Ecclesial Vocation of the Theologian, you would notice (I would hope) that there are legitimate and illegitimate ways to approach difficult issues. I covered these matters in my own posting on torture and general norms last year. But you should have already been familiar with it and it is clear that the mind of the Vatican on how to approach delicate and complex issues (and yes, this issue is not a simplistic one by any means) does not support the interpretation you have imputed to the Coalition For Fog (CFF) among others.

The basic canons of charity (which I referred to a posting of in the last note) should also mitigate against such tendencies. Believe it or not, it is quite possible to come to completely divergent interpretations of a lot of issues (read: matters not de fide) and to do so within the bounds of Catholic orthodoxy. It is also possible to traverse the boundaries but I saw no evidences by Victor or others at CFF on this matter that they did the latter. (Even if I did not agree with some of what they had to say or how they approached these issues.)

As far as "pretend[ing] that torture is impossible to define", I noticed a lot of people asking you to define the term and you continually engaged in evasion on the matter. And this whole notion of what you call "post modern gymnastics" happens to be what all people do in trying to make sense out of apparent paradoxes who do not accept arbitrary or untraditional approaches to these matters. It is not always easy to do but this whole casual approach that one line from an encyclical letter (or one paragraph of mixed stuff from a pastoral constitution) constitutes either a definitive teaching or otherwise requires religious submission is not how theology works Mark and it never has.

Too often those of an apologetics mindset pretend that magisterial texts are perspicuous much as the fundamentalists presume the Bible is. I ran into a similar situation recently on a discussion list with a rather insistent young earth creationist Catholic who took the same approach with Genesis that you did with Veritatis Splendour. I even got an email from a self-styled "reluctant atheist" who similarly viewed matters and my approach to Genesis in responding to him was no different than the one I used in responding to people of your outlook on Veritatis Splendour. My approach was thoroughly orthodox and theological as the latter is properly understood.

Now, that does not mean that my position is ipso facto correct of course -only that it is an orthodox and acceptable hypothesis{1} and that is all that really matters here. Others who arrived at the same position through various means should not be presumed to be in bad faith any more than you and those who approach these matters as you have should be. (Your seeming obliviousness to the whole of the Church's historical and theological witness to these matters prior to 1965 notwithstanding.)

Instead he does a thought experiment and arrives at, I believe, wrong conclusions.

Why do you seem to presume that no one else did any thinking on these matters Mark? Is Jimmy the only one capable of such matters? Or is it simply that you did not care to give anyone else the same benefit of the doubt that you willingly (and properly) gave to Jimmy?

But he seems to me to arrive at them in good faith.

What criteria do you use to determine this? Jimmy gives no external indicators whatsoever that differ from Victor and company of having a special claim to arriving at views in good faith. Granted, some parties may have reacted in a shrill or obnoxious manner but that could be due to your treatment of them and not necessarily a sign of bad faith. Certainly it should not be presumed as such without substantial warrant to do so Mark and of an objective nature not merely cause Jimmy works for a company that pays you for projects on occasion. Or as one of those who emailed me in the past year on the decline of your once very excellent blog:

During the entire two years in which CAEI has descended from careless philosophical innuendo into slander and demagoguery, the only sustained course correction I have ever observed is when he noticed an objection by the guy who basically writes his checks at Catholic Answers.

More people have made this kind of observation than you may realize.

The reason he arrives at wrong conclusions is because he is starting with the wrong question: "What is torture?" One can ask that question in good faith (like Jimmy) or in bad faith (like the Coalition for Fog and it's endless attempts to make it impossible to distinguish between legitimate coercion and torture with all the "So! You're saying underwear on the head is torture!" tropes).

You are doing it again Mark. You say Jimmy "seems to you to arrive at them in good faith" and then claim that the others do not. What is your objective criteria for this assessment? The spiritual masters of the Catholic tradition are quite clear that there should be a presumption of good faith at all times unless there is substantial objective evidence to the contrary. It is well and good that you took this approach with Jimmy but you should also have extended it to the others as well. The principle is not only applicable with those you do like (i.e Jimmy) whereas those you do not like (i.e. Victor, "Torquemada", etc) are given another standard by you altogether.

Jimmy arrives at the notion of proportional pain infliction, which he thinks distinguishable from torture, in the "ticking time bomb" scenario. It's not a surprising conclusion, given the premises.

I do not recall offhand all the intricacies of Jimmy's analysis.

The problem with Jimmy's analysis, it seems to me, is twofold. First, he's addessing a hypothetical that virtually never happens in real life.

Abuses of a principle do not mean the principle itself is to be rejected. To claim that it does (even by implication) is to give ammunition to what many of the radical extreme "traditionalist" sorts who savage the Pauline Missal on the same grounds.{2}

That means he's not addressing the issue, which is a *policy* of torture by the Administration that has been applied far beyond mythical ticking time bomb scenarios and which has even included innocent men.

You refer to a "policy of torture" but you do not explain what torture is. I will therefore ask you Mark:

--Would any and all attempts to coerce someone to reveal information they may not want to reveal when dealing with captured prisoners of war in a time of war be categorized by you as "torture"?

But more importantly:

--Why do you continue to throw the word "torture" around without bothering to define in a workable sense what the term means?

Definitions I remind you are the tools of thought and failure to define terms is...well...I think you get the idea.

Hard cases make bad law.

Of course since you do not define your terms, all of this is a nice picture hanging on a nice hanger attached to a solid peg which is hammered into nothing. (To paraphrase an analogy you used in one of your books in years past.)

Beyond this, he is overlooking the fact that the Catechism doesn't *just* forbid torture as intrinsically immoral.

Mark, the Catechism is a wonderful source but it is not without certain faults -among them putting prudential judgments into the text on occasion as if they are magisterial when they are not. And yes, one can say these things without "rejecting the catechism" as the Vatican itself explained to theologians in the aforementioned magisterial text explaining (primarily to theologians) how one can engage in critical inquiry and what one can say on these matters without being "in dissent" from Church teaching.{3}

His argument depends on the notion that hurting a prisoner isn't torture if it's "proportional" to some remote hypothetical situation that only happens on "24". I don't blame him for starting from this mindset much, because that's how the debate has been framed typically. We're at war with desperate rogues, therefore in interrogating them, we are faced with urgent situations. Only we're not typically.

Well, we have at times gotten vital information out of Al Queda operatives that has helped us quash plans for additional 9/11 style mayhems. I am not claiming that this is the case with all detainees of course but it has happened. There is also the fact that when a nation is at war, there are certain freedoms that are enjoyed in peacetime that cannot be advocated in a time of war. This is a principle which has been recognized in many parts of this nation's history with the introduction of sedition acts to corral what in peacetime is perfectly acceptable speech. It is called protecting the common good of society against those who are endangering the public order. I hate to say it Mark but some of your excesses to me appear to be doing just that -giving aid and comfort to the enemy. I do not believe you intend this but there is something known as the "law of unintended consequences" and I advise you to kindly reflect upon that a bit.

And in many cases, we don't even know if we are interrogating desperate rogues.

They are people taken off of the battlefields in Iraq fighting our troops are they not?

Sometimes we are interrogating people who happened to be in the wrong place during a police sweep. And we are torturing them, not because we know they have the info we want, but because we *don't* know if they have any info or not.

I doubt anyone would claim that there has been a perfect handling of these matters by the present administration. But the problem Mark is this: we are at war and when at war certain practices are acceptable which under ordinary circumstances would not be. One of these is interrogation and the latter can take many forms. The question therefore has to turn on what is and is not torture because not every attempt at coersion is intrinsically evil and to claim that it is so presents not only serious logical problems but it also would impinge on the issue of church indefectibility. This is a serious issue Mark and it is not done proper justice by the manner in which you have treated a bunch of people who have realized the seriousness of the issue involved and have have proposed various hypotheses to address it. (Some of which are better than others.) If you are going to claim that torture is "intrinsically evil" and refer to Veritatis Splendour, then I have a question to ask you:

--Are "substandard living conditions" and "deportation" also intrinsically evil?

A literalist reading of VS on those issues would have to render a positive verdict and that is absurd -as absurd as those who think the earth is 6000 years old because " Genesis says so." Furthermore, the church traditionally encouraged a lot of kinds of mortification and did so universally and across time in a diachronic fashion. By your reading of Veritatis Splendour, the church could very well have been recommending and promoting "intrinsic evil" as a means of attaining greater mastery of the body's impulses. I say "could well have been" because one would have to be Kreskin to know what you mean by the word "torture" Mark. The only way to avoid the various cans of worms that your approach involves is to ask the question Jimmy and not a few others asked:

--What is "torture"?

The problem Mark is that you are appearing to approach this from a disdain for the Bush Administration or certain persons who support the military endeavour in Iraq. You appear to have a problem with the question because of viewing it as those who support the war as "making excuses" for interrogation rather than recognizing the principle which should be viewed as valid regardless of whether people you like use it or people you do not like do: what does a given term mean?

A lot of people are looking at the broader picture here Mark and not playing a game of presuming that a sentence from a pastoral constitution (which is quoted in a different context in a later encyclical letter) thereby can cancel out everything that came before it. This whole premise --which I might add seems to be one you operate from-- is one that creates no small degree of doctrinal shipwreck.

Furthermore, as I noted in my posting on torture and general norms , Church teaching recognizes the principle that at times the civil authority may have to suppress certain manifestations of claimed "religious liberty" when it involves an undermining of just public order and the common good of society. The same principle applies to all legitimate freedoms. Obviously how this is best undertaken is a matter of prudence and people can have differing opinions on the matter. But to refuse to explain what you mean by the terms that you wield and to then attempt to tar and feather those who request a modicum of dialogual honesty from you in explaining how you understand said terms is to make it impossible for proper and authentic dialogue and is a method guaranteed to waste time and unduly provoke people.

Meanwhile, the Church says "torture is intrinsically immoral. Don't do it."

What is torture Mark? What does it consist of or not consist of? Words mean things and this equivocation on your part is frankly disingenuous and has gone on for far too long now. Are you going to actually explain yourself this time? The word either has meaning or it is merely a prop in a game of tarring and feathering rhetorically people you do not agree with by calling them "proponents of torture."

So what we have is you (i) using a word you do not bother to define in a workable sense{4}, (ii) referring to sources or texts which place the word in a certain context but do not explain what it means in doing so, and (iii) belittling those who have sought to explain in various ways what the word means or does not mean.

How DARE you shirk like a coward from putting such tags or implications on others without explaining the term's meaning. God is watching you Mark and I cannot imagine He Whom is the Apex of Reason and Logic can possibly approve of such sophistic actions. I implore you to meditate and reflect upon a spiritual instruction on charity I blogged over three years ago. The book I excerpted it from went through 25 editions in over two hundred years and this section is indispensable for understanding how we should in general treat one another.

More than that, she says, "Treat prisoners humanely." That means the question "What is torture?" is a red herring and the whole debate has been framed wrongly.

Does the Church also say "deportation is intrinsically immoral" Mark? What about "substandard living conditions are intrinsically immoral"? You are claiming that the Church once sanctioned something that was intrinsically immoral (as opposed to being merely imprudent or not the wisest course of action, or whatever). There are serious problems with this presumption from a theological as well as a logical standpoint that impact directly on the dogma of indefectability. You cannot escape this as long as you approach these issues in the fashion that you do so it would behoove you to face up to it and recognize that whatever you think of Vic and the others, they take this very seriously. Unfortunately, it appears that you do not and I hope that in time you will realize the logical extension of a lot of what you have written on these matters.

The question is not, "How much pain can we inflict short of torture?" The question is, "How do we treat prisoners humanely and still get the intelligence we need?"

What is torture Mark?

I said all this on my blog, so it shouldn't be news to you. And, as I say, I'm in the book if you want to talk about it or pay me a visit. But don't kid me or yourself that you have behaved justly toward me in this matter. If you had a complaint, you should have come to me with it, not written catty complaints about some mythical Apologetics Oligarchy.

There are two things here Mark, specific issues pertaining to you and also more general and broad problems with apologetics in general. The reference to the apologetics oligarchy was briefly noted in the last email in these words:

I will not go into at this time Jimmy, Karl, and others in that clique's scandalous silences on these kinds of incidents over the years by Catholics while they complain about the James White's and others of the non-Catholic fold acting the same way. This approach is in principle a violation of the law of non-contradiction because either said approach is okay or it is not in and of itself, not by virtue of whether "our guys" do it or "their guys" do.

And whether you like it or not, this has been happening for a long time and many Catholics are sick of it. There is nothing "mythical" about it -if anything your email response is a classic example of precisely what I am talking about with your double standard with Jimmy and the others.

I don't blame you for being too embarrased to face me now, but I do hope you will at least take it to confession.

Let me know when you take your slanderous false witness against public figures (such as the frequently-lied-about Michael Ledeen) to confession Mark. Let me also know when you confess the charade of the whole "I am going to accuse people of dissenting from Church teaching and then when they ask me to define terms (such as torture) I will refuse to and continue to accuse them of dissent" schtick.

I have nothing to apologize or to confess for what I did in your situation and I have no embarrassment whatsoever. But this is Lent and I would be remiss to not admit that (if anything) I should confess (among a number of my failings) that I did not step up and be more proactive on this matter a long time ago despite a number of people requesting it of me. I honestly did not view it as "my fight" so to speak because I was not directly involved. In retrospect, I made a mistake there.

You are still welcome for supper anytime and I'm happy to hear your grievance against me. I promise I still will not bite.

Well, I outlined a fair amount of it in this note. As Lent is a time for spiritual reappraisal for us all, I hope you accept what is written in that spirit.

And before you ask, I'm not planning to attack you or call you a liar on my blog, despite what you write below. Indeed, I will not bring up your blog at all.

I did not presume that you would. But notice what happens when people's approach is based on presuming ill-will rather than presuming good-will. I will take you at your word Mark. Would that you extended the same respect to others over the months that this public pissfest had taken place.

Lest I digress further, I do wish you and your family a blessed and fruitful Lent. I do like you Mark despite what the above note may appear to imply.

~Shawn
http://rerum-novarum.blogspot.com

Notes:

{1} For a differentiation between thesis, hypothesis, and theory, see the above thread response to the Creationist which I relink to these words.

{2} If they accept it at all they claim it is great in theory but because it fails the lions share of the time in practice; ergo the problem is the missal and not those who fail to follow the rubrics. (Precisely what you are claiming ironically enough.)

{3} One clarifying text I have come to believe should be required reading for all Catholics who write on issues in the public square and elsewhere -particularly those who consider themselves "apologists."

{4} Neither I nor anyone else that I am aware of has asked for a mere abstractual dictionary definition from you. (At least I never did.) What has been asked is to give a workable definition or something that can be applied to various circumstances. If you are going to tar and feather people who have sought to take into account the totality of the Church's tradition (over and against the kind of magisterial postivism you have implied in your approach to these matters), then you have a responsibility to explain yourself.

(Sent March 20, 2007)

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Mark thus far has not responded to the thread above in any of its particulars.

Oligarchy Delenda Est