While We’re At It

♦ Yiddish proverb: Truth never dies, but it leads a miserable life.

---

♦ Over the last few years, Canada has rolled out a program of doctor-assisted suicide. Originally restricted to those facing “reasonably foreseeable” natural death, in 2021 it was expanded to those whose illnesses need not be terminal. The Canadian government is considering an expansion of this program to cover “mature minors,” including those as young as twelve, who are deemed “fit” to make a decision to end their lives. These policies are widely popular. Polling suggests that 86 percent of Canadians approve of a “right” to die. We should not be surprised. As Leila Mechoui explains in Compact magazine (“Euthanasia Is Liberalism’s Endgame”), “State-administered euthanasia on-demand is the logical endpoint of a society built on secular humanism and utilitarianism. These frameworks preclude any appeal to an absolute authority beyond the individual. The ultimate expression is as a state-protected ‘right’ to a ‘dignified’ death.” The future of the West: a culture of death under the sign of choice.

---

♦ Moderate statements about the importance of renewing patriotic bonds and reconsolidating our country’s unity have earned me accusations of promoting “blood and soil” nationalism, or at least of failing to be sufficiently ardent in opposition. I’m not surprised. Anyone who fails to cheer “diversity” and other multicultural slogans eventually gets denounced as a racist, as I note above in my discussion of Matthew Crawford’s analysis. The accusations are surreal. Land acknowledgements, so favored by those who adhere to multiculturalism and its platitudes, seem to be pure expressions of “blood and soil” nationalism. Here’s an example: “The Denver City Council honors and acknowledges that the land on which we reside is the traditional territory of the Ute, Cheyenne, and Arapaho Peoples.” Blood has mixed with the soil, and it makes metaphysical demands.

---

♦ I was saddened to hear of George Cardinal Pell’s death in January. George Weigel, who knew him well, penned a wonderful tribute (“Cardinal George Pell: The Encourager”). “He was a courageous man who ‘­en-couraged’ others—who gave others courage, or, perhaps better, drew out of others the courage they did not know lay within them.” May he rest in peace.

---

♦ The Pillar asked Archbishop Charles Chaput why Pope Benedict XVI and Cardinal Pell were seen as polarizing figures. His answer: “Speaking the truth is polarizing. It got Jesus killed. Bad people with bad ideas dislike good people trying to do good things. And that accounts for the contempt, resentment, and outright lying directed at both men over the years, including from people who describe themselves as Christians; people within the Church herself.”

---

♦ National Review writer Nate Hochman reported on the ways in which powerful progressive business interests in South Dakota have succeeded in blocking socially conservative legislation in that state. One moral of the story: Big Business is the enemy of socially conservative voters. The other moral: It does not cost very much to buy the South Dakota governor and state legislature.

---

♦ The Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter (FSSP) is a society of apostolic life that seeks, among other things, to celebrate the traditional Latin Mass. It is interesting to note that during a fundraising campaign launched by the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, St. Vitus in San ­Fernando, an FSSP parish, was the largest source of donations, outstripping larger and wealthier parishes. A mid-November report on the campaign’s progress shows that the parish had donated more than three times the parish goal set for it by the archdiocese. In view of this generosity, a tangible sign of vitality, it is not hard to see why so many American bishops are less than enthusiastic about implementing Pope Francis’s strictures to limit the celebration of the traditional Latin Mass.

---

♦ The Huns are invading! Florida governor Ron ­DeSantis has appointed six new board members at New College, a small, quirky liberal arts school founded in 1960 that is part of the Florida university system, and the new appointees are—gasp—“conservative.” Among the barbarians is First Things contributing editor Mark Bauerlein, who holds the dangerous view that education ought not be a course of study in how to be a social justice warrior.

---

♦ New College is troubled. Student enrollments are disappointingly low. Which is why the uproar over Mark’s appointment sent me back to C. P. Cavafy’s “Waiting for the Barbarians.” The poem depicts a city’s elite preparing for the arrival of rough marauders. But the barbarians do not come, and their non-arrival creates a despairing confusion that is perhaps worse than the previous dread. “Now what’s going to happen to us without barbarians? / Those people were a kind of solution.”

---

♦ More than one thousand subscribers receive First Things on their Kindles. They do so by subscribing through Amazon. Unfortunately, the e-commerce behemoth is dropping First Things (and many other publications). No new subscriptions or renewals will be allowed after March 1, and the monthly subscription service will be shut down by September 2023. The company wants customers to pay a monthly fee for Kindle ­Unlimited, which provides access to its entire library. We’re not sure that First Things will be invited to be on the menu. Therefore, if you are a Kindle reader, please secure access directly through firstthings.com/subscribe.

---

♦ Last month, I spoke of Christmas as the feast of the Incarnation. A reader sent an incredulous note: “Does Rusty Reno believe that the Incarnation of our Lord took place at the birth of Christ?” Your humble scribe is properly shamed, doubly so because he has an advanced degree in theology and should not be making basic mistakes of this sort. Christmas celebrates the nativity of our Lord, and though we “see” the Incarnation for the first time in the swaddled Christ Child, the Word becomes flesh in the womb of the Virgin Mary at the ­Annunciation.

---

♦ Robert Todd and Lester Prosper of Bloomington, Indiana, would like to form a ROFTERS group. You can join by getting in touch with Mr. Todd at r.todd1@mac.com.

---

♦ Clyde Taylor is the new leader of the Chicago ROFTERS group, which is always eager to welcome new members. You can reach him at clydeataylor@gmail.com.