The Way the World Thinks

How did we get to this point in the world in which the basic concepts of right and wrong, or the foundational truths of the family and society were rejected? Where has this chaos come from? The second question is – what should we do about it?

We are all in relationships with people who don’t accept objective truth. This meditation is designed to help you understand where they’re coming from so that we are better situated to help them.

Let me explain 500 years of philosophy and political thought in 5 brief points to see where the crazy ideas of today originated.

Five thinkers – one for each decade.

one

We begin in the 16th century with Machiavelli and a book called The Prince, which is a book on leadership and power.

Essentially Machiavelli says a successful leader must learn to not do good. Yes, you heard me correctly. A successful leader must make efforts to deceive, to be ruthless, duplicitous, and give the appearance of virtue but establish deeper levels of vice. You can use evil to bring about your goals. Machiavelli was infamous for directing leaders to appear religious and humane in the public eye, while at the same time working to undermine virtue and religion. I don’t know if anyone comes to mind who says “I am a very religious person and a devout Catholic.” While at the same time works to undercut goodness, virtue and family life? While at the same time their actions do not reflect what it means to be Catholic. Well, that is classic Machiavelli.

two

In the 17th century, Rene Descartes.

Descartes basically taught that you must doubt and reject as untrue anything you can imagine having the slightest doubt about. Well, we can imagine doubting everything. So Descartes says all religion and all morals clearly must be doubted because these are things we don’t have scientific certainty about. Descartes solution was his saying, “I think, therefore I am.” According to this messed up logic, the whole universe is dependent on his subjective understanding. His proof for God is that He can think about God, therefore, God must exist. That is upside down. Descartes exists , not because he thinks about God but because God is thinking about him and holding him in existence, not the other way around! So, Descartes calls into doubt right and wrong presented by religion and divine revelation. 

three

Next we have the English philosopher Thomas Hobbes.

Whereas Descartes calls into doubt right and wrong, Hobbs will flat out and say – there is no right and wrong based on human nature and certainly not based on God because Hobbes believed there was no God. Hobbes begins the idea that you deserve everything. And it is the responsibility of the Government to protect your right to anything and everything. Hobbes will say, “I have a right to this or that simply because I desire or prefer it.” What you desire you have a right to. Does that sound like anything today? Hobbes says there is no objective right and wrong – and you have a right to what you desire. And the responsibility of the Government is to get you what you say you have a right to without any logical justification.

four

Then we have John Jacque Rousseau in 18th century

His main idea was that Man started as an isolated noble savage, peaceful, loving and full of virtues. Then what happened? Women and relationships. Relationships happened. Man met woman, they made a commitment and family came about as a result - further complicating things. Then we had to form society, a further complication. And that is where everything went wrong.

Rousseau also held that sexuality was an impulse that had to be responded to, however there should be no relationship between love and sexuality and certainly no relationship between sexuality and responsibility. Could that sound familiar to ideas since the sexual revolution of 1968? So, for Rousseau the goal was to get back to the way things were before relationships, to get isolated again and remove relationships and commitment. 

Rousseau also had a disdain for Government because he saw Government as simply made up of those people who had united in power to protect what they had from those who did not have. It was the haves against the have nots and the Government was there to protect the haves. Therefore, Rousseau was against private property. His solution to the problem was for those who have not to violently overthrow those who had. That is why he is the father of the French Revolution.

five

Now this All this culminates in Marx and Engels in 1848.

Marx will say all of history is just a class struggle between the Bourgeoisie, the owners or the capitalists and the proletariat, the workers. The haves and the have nots.

Let’s use the analogy of a family that has difficulties. The only way to fix this family is for the kids to overthrow the parents and no longer have family because the family is the cause of the injustice. Apply that idea to modern society. The problem is capitalism, the problem is that people own private property, land, means of production and so on. To fix society we must overthrow those people who have and take it away from them and do away with it. Basically, Marxism aims to overthrow through mass movement all oppressive systems like private ownership, the family and the Catholic Church because these are what keeps people oppressed so they too must be eradicated.

Furthermore, Marx thought technology would perfect society to such a degree that the proletariat, the working class would all be equal once we got rid of owners of private property and the oppressive structures like religion and the family.

Ideas have consequences. These ideas we’ve outlined cause death and destruction. Vladimir Lenin and Stalin put into practice 500 years of this crazy thought and it resulted in the murder of about 180 million people. Those who were adults prior to the Fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Iron Curtain saw what this experiment meant - disaster. But People in the West today have forgotten this.  And that is why so many people are returning to the demonic errs the last 500 years produced.  Simply put, 500 years of erroneous philosophy and political thought have led to this – men have forgotten God. The only solution is to return to God. That is why Our Lady comes!

If you would like to learn more about this I encourage you to watch the You Tube videos by Dr. Mark Miravalle

Or for a longer study see the book The Love of Wisdom by Ronda Chervin