The Revenge of Conscience, pt. 1...

I'm still reading J. Budziszewski's book, The Revenge of Conscience, but I thought I'd throw out a couple of paragraphs for you to chew on. At the end of Chapter 4, Politics of Virtues, Government of Knaves, J.B. writes, "The point I am making concerns the Church as well. Not only does the modern state interfere with family in the name of family, it interferes with faith in the name of faith. Whenever it is not scolding the church in fear of her challenge, it is whispering to her in hopes of making her pregnant with its purposes. So intent on seducing the Bride of Christ is Mr. Clinton, still President at the time of writing, that during his candidacy he tried to imitate her Husband's voice. Identifying himself with the Redeemer, he called his program the New Covenant, then misqoted Scripture to support it: "No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has imagined what we can build," he prophesied at his convention. The way this runs in Scripture itself is, "No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him." (I Cor. 2:9, NIV, quoting Isa. 64:4). The biblical passage gives sovereignty to God. Although the President's language still sounds biblical, it gives sovereignty to Man. Subsidiarity, then, does not mean that the state flatters, seduces, or absorbs the true teachers of virtue. It means it gets out of their way, and keeps other things from getting in their way. The state gets out of the way not by raising taxes and putting all mothers on the dole, but by reducing taxes so that they do not have to work; not by making sex a compulsory subject in the schools, but by letting families choose their own schools; not by keeping children from ever hearing a public prayer, but by keeping them from ever hearing a public obscenity; not by calling for a "politics of meaning," but by honoring the Meaning which no politics made, that Glory which even the heavens, though soulless, declare." Great stuff! But before you conservatives gloat, I think he'll be addressing our side of the fence in the next chapter...