The theodicy of federal
government seeks to defend the goodness of government in the face of tragedy.
So just as some religious groups might blame a weather event on insufficient
fealty to the relevant god, some progressives blame — before we actually know
what is even going on in a given tragedy — insufficient fealty, sacrifice, and
offerings to the relevant god of federal government. And so they explain that
the god of good government would have been able to take care of us if only we’d
given it sufficient power to do so. In this case, that power is gun control.
Progressives tend to believe that government — if made to have sufficient size,
scope, and proper management over the affairs of man — will fix or at least
seriously mitigate the problem of evil in the world. Conservatives tend to
believe that human nature is flawed and inclined toward bad things.
Conservatives believe that government, being made up of humans, will also be
inclined toward bad things, and therefore it must be restrained and not given a
dangerous amount of power. They tend to see greater success for fixing problems
in society with voluntary associations and institutions, such as families and
community and organizations. Progressives tend to believe that man can be
perfected, and perfected through government action. These almost cartoonish
denunciations of prayer we saw yesterday, combined with the implicit praises of
government action, are best understood as a sort of primitive religious
reaction to the problem that growth of the state still hasn’t fixed the problem
of evil in the world….
Now, many gun control advocates said they
weren’t disparaging prayer — however much that was exactly what was going on —
so much as calling for other action. It’s good to remember that prayer is
action. But whether your God is God or the FBI (or whatever agency you hope
will seize up to 300 million guns in the country), it’s also true that there is
no conflict between praying to God, who, as the Founders put it, creates us and
endows us with certain inalienable rights, and other action. That could be
working within a community to change people’s hearts and minds from violent
ideology. It could be working with your neighbors to help them avoid choices
that lead to dangerous social isolation. It could be teaching Sunday School or
otherwise inculcating children in the faith. It could be managing your family
well. It could be gun control or efforts to help families with adult members
with mental illness. It could really be any number of things.
There is no conflict between praying to God
and other action.
What’s wise is to understand that there are
many options for working to improve society. If, like so many journalists, your
particular religious denomination is the one that’s fundamentalist on gun
control, fine. But understand that not everyone is part of your religious sect
or shares your assumptions.
The bizarre outpouring from journalists of
anti-Christian sentiment yesterday was not becoming. And some of it was
downright alarming. But consider that many journalists didn’t really understand
what they were doing. They are bad at understanding the religious practices of
much of the country, of course. But they’re not particularly good at
understanding their own theodicy and its attendant rites and rituals either.
