Sacrilege and Cupidity; M. E. Bradford

Sacrilege and Cupidity A PLEA FOR PERSPECTIVE M. E. BRADFORD THE SOCIAL GOSPEL is old hat. Its shiny newness has long since worn away; and even in theologi cal circles it has experienced an embarrassing interrogation. But it is by no means dead. After apol ogizing for the doctrinal excesses of some of its early champions, and after developing a new and conciliatory idiom for use on the theological and political conserva tive, it now sits comfortably in the councils of Christendom, its essentially political and utopian character effectively masked. Tele vision programs and books have been recently devoted to its re surgent influence. And, in fact, that influence has never been di minished. All we can say is that, for a time, it was checked. The heterodox order of priorities it represents has long been a pulpit commonplace. And it is with ref erence to that order of priorities that I here propose to examine Mr. Bradford is assistant professor of Eng lish at Northwestern State College of Louisi ana at Natchitoches.

38 and define the origin of social gos pel as a political force. For it is this politics cum faith that pre sents American conservatism with its most serious challenge. It is by no means easy to debate with men who insist they speak for God. American liberalism (whose theological voice the social gospel is) has always had a plenti ful supply of adherents who speak for God; and they have, I am sorry to admit, had no monopoly in this business of sacrilege; American politicians of various persuasions have claimed a pipe line to the deity. By now Ameri can conservatives should have learned that this is a degrading strategy - and that the very na ture of their position makes it dif ficult, if not impossible, for them to "play the game" this way. And what is more important, they should have learned how to answer the latter-day bogus "thus saith the Lord," on its own theological ground.

1966 SACRILEGE AND CUPIDITY: A PLEA 39 The Rhetoric of Love The backbone of the popular brand of the social gospel is what I call "the rhetoric of love." Its argument goes something like this: "God is love; God has given us (we, the liberals) a clear defi nition of what he means by love; those who oppose what we urge are the enemies of love." No nor mal American will admit that he is against love (or deficient in it); and the American conserva tive, when charged with such an enormity will "crawfish," "hedge," or perhaps try to "outlove" his op ponent. In brief, he will do any thing but insist that there is such a thing as an excess or misplace ment of love. He knows in his bones tha t man is indeed prone to excess in all things (including love) ; and a reluctance to indulge excessive impulses is part of what we mean by conservative. But he is unwill ing to examine political .and phil osophical sentimentalism (by de finition, expression of emotion out of proportion to its occasion) in its theological dimension. And he must do so if he is not to fall vic tim to the rhetoric of love.

The good old theological name for this excessive or misdirected love is cupidity; it was the orig inal sin and has, since Adam put the love of Eve before the love of God, been among the most fre quently repeated. And it is the error into which good men and true fall most readily. Assuredly, it is the sin into which the social gpspel should lead us through the rhetoric of love. For this rhetoric makes no distinction among the objects of love. It sees all objects as equally worthy and thus abol ishes all order of priorities in our obligations. For example: American grants of aid to free nations may at times prove wise, necessary, or even suc cessful. But the conservative maintains that the virtue of any foreign aid program is conditioned by its effect on our economic and military posture. The rhetoric of love may call for greater and grea ter largess in the name of humanity; but the theologically grounded answer to its insistence is that our obligations to preserve our own economy, and with it our capaci ty to assist and protect those nations which depend upon our strength, is greater than our obligation to relieve completely any single nation in its distress.

When compassion outreaches judg ment, cupidity is the result. And the political voice of the social gos pel is short on judgment. It is with reference to a form of the doctrine of cupidity that we may define excessive liberty as license, excessive tolerance as in difference, excessive or forced equality as anarchy. In its name 40 THE FREEMAN February we may, in the face of the rhetoric of love, reject sociological, senti mental juggling of the letter and intent of the law done in the name of "civil rights"; impious "non violence" in the streets done in the name of brotherhood; and sur render of national sovereignty called for in the name of world u nity.For it is cupidity to put even the honest demands of minority groups for redress of grievances they "suffer" before the mainte nance of the integrity of a consti tutional system or a hard-won and slowly evolved social order. And it is even more of an inversion to surrender national sovereignty in the name of world peace when only our 'sovereign strength preserves that peace.

Love Some Persons or Things More 'han O,hers None of the answer to the social gospel is very difficult. Most of it may be had out of Aristotle, John Adams, Calhoun, or Burke. But the best reply to the rhetoric of love is a general theological reply. We must love some things, some men, more than others. The love of God and of the general well-be ing of a number of men often pre cludes the perfect love of individ ual .men. Our obligation to our own family or "clan" is greater than our obligation to the faceless multitude. As Burke said, "N0 cold relation is a zealous citizen. We begin our public affections in our families." Our obligations move outward in a circle from the near to the remote. For if we un dermine the ground of our own being, our integrity and capacity to act responsibly in our own proper affairs, we are of no use to any man. Thus replied to, the social gos pel - which I suspect grew out of the clergyman's deep-seated dis trust of providence and the "other worldly" promise of his own faith - returns to its place; and then the pulpit ceases to be a political tool of a "this-worldly" eschatol ogy based on a denial of the tran scendental character of the faith it should draw upon for support.

Thus answered, the sacrilegious mask of the rhetoric of love can be torn from the face of the quasi totalitarian liberal will-to-power, and the conservative can return the dialogue of American politics to a ground where the odds are in his favor. For without the advan tage of his mask, the politico curn prophet is merely the aggressor in a power struggle, not the "agent of the Lord." And even though they may differ about the merit of various programs for achieving the common good, Americans and other civilized Westerners do not like a bully - especially a sancti monious bully! ~ HENRY HAZLITT THE ADVOCATES of foreign aid be lieve that it helps not only the country that· gets it but the coun try that gives it. They believe, therefore, that it promotes world wide "economic growth.". They are mistaken in all these assumptions. I should make clear at the be ginning that when I refer here to foreign aid I mean government-to government aid. Still more specif ically, I mean government-to-gov ernment "economic" aid. I am not considering here intergovern mental military aid extended either in wartime or peacetime.