Philosophy And The Catholic

Peasant Times-Dispatch Issue 28

What is philosophy for the Catholic but the way intelligence lives its faith?

- Don Colacho

A Return of Don Colacho

After some time away, we return now to Don Colacho, also known as Nicolás Gómez Dávila. He is a Colombian philosopher and he wrote several books, his most famous being collections of aphorisms which he called “Annotations from an implicit text.”

This quote is #471 on the list I found.

The Problem of Philosophy

The poet Alexander Pope gave us this wonderful verse:

A little learning is a dangerous thing;
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring:
There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,
And drinking largely sobers us again.

It is a warning, and a paradox. You’ve no doubt heard the cliché that someone ‘knows enough to be dangerous’—this is what the poem describes. Only by understanding something deeply does our knowledge return us to sanity. It is for this reason it can be hazardous ground to begin to learn something knew.

A good example of this is “Green Zeal”. When I was first entering the Catholic Church, I was flooded with wonderful information. I wanted to impress my new friends with my understanding, and I wanted to confront strangers with their lack of it. I had found the True, the Good, the Beautiful Church! Surely this was a good thing to shout from the rooftops!

—Only, I had barely begun to scratch the surface. My practice of faith was still faltering and insufficient, I had only barely begun to intentionally conform my life to a life of virtue. My brain was outpacing my life, and new understanding was not resulting in immediate gains in new living¹.

In the years since I came into the church, my thought has evolved. I don’t spend as much time studying philosophy as I used to—I know enough to know that I’m dangerous, so usually I defer to others with surefire expertise, like the Saints. But Don Colacho says studying philosophy is how intelligence lives its faith—what am I trying to tell people in this post? Study philosophy, or don’t study philosophy?

Living Faith

When we talk about living one’s faith, we’re talking about a set of practices. If, for example, I pray morning, noon, and night; if I go to Mass on Sundays and the other days of obligation; if I read the lives of saints, these are all ways of living my faith. They are “living” because they are actions, they are ways of feeding my spiritual life and not neglecting it.

The intellect is the active part of our interior lives, this is what Don Colacho refers to as “intelligence”. The intellect must be exercised to stay healthy, just as the body must be exercised to stay healthy, just as the soul must be exercised with regular sacraments to stay healthy.

It’s important to pause here so I am not misunderstood. An intelligent mind is not necessarily a holy mind. Furthermore, intellectual graces are not evenly distributed. There are many people far smarter than I who are capable of understanding high philosophy. There are many people far smarter than I, who are capable of understanding high philosophy, who choose to reject the truths of the Church. Further still: there are souls in heaven who were illiterate in life. I say again: intelligence is not holiness. To whom much is given, much is expected.

I think that’s the key idea here. To whom much is given, much is expected. If you have a great mind capable of understanding great truths, you ought to use it. It’s like having a Lamborghini and only looking at it and never driving it—an unused tool is a useless tool; an unused gift is a wasted gift. God gives us gifts so that, like the parable of the talents, we can multiply them.

In a previous iteration of this post, I emphasized how the intellect is analogous to an appetite, and like eating food we ought to be able to recognize when we are hungry for more learning and when we have had enough. The virtuous mean lies between the excess (pride in ones vast knowledge) and defect (complacent ignorance). Something was missing though, and it is this: Exercising the intellect must be undertaken under the supervision of a spiritual director.

I think in modern society we tend to think of our spiritual lives as solitary affairs. When we think of obedience, we think of it abstractly as obedience to precepts and not necessarily to people. Obedience as a virtue gets us out of a lot of trouble we might otherwise get ourselves into on our own. Obedience is the concept this post was missing². If we want to undertake a project like studying philosophy, it is good to seek out a spiritual director, a teacher, or a mentor to help us navigate the ground. Many people, studying on their own, can easily fall into error even with (or maybe even because of) their own vast intellect. Having teachers, director, or mentors helps us share ideas, have someone else help monitor us as we learn something new, and helps us ensure that we are still yoked to the Church and not off on a wild trail³.

Illiterate Saints

I want to return to the idea of the illiterate saints in heaven. Faith can be fed by philosophy, but faith is not ONLY philosophy. An intelligent soul (without a spiritual director) can misuse philosophy and devolve into a skeptical, cynical sophistry. The sacraments are unfalsifiable. The foundation of our faith is prayer and the sacraments.

We live in an age where, if we are not careful, we are called to consume anything and everything, where there is a firehose of information into our brains. As peasants, we need the sacraments more than we need philosophy; we need prayer and penance more than we need to resolve the mind-body problem or the problem of evil. Like a newly converted Scoot, studying all these things can be great but if I am struggling with the basics of my faith, something is out of alignment. I needed then, and need now, to remember the illiterate saints—what did they do so well to get to heaven? How can I emulate their lives?

I discovered philosophy early in my faith journey, and explored as far as I could go, but I found my life of faith was struggling. I had to stop, and take care to get my house in order, before I continued my journey. You, too, may feel the call to a deeper understanding of philosophy; you may be abundantly endowed with intellectual graces. It is good to exercise your intellect with knowledge of philosophy. It is even better to do so under the supervision of a spiritual director. It is best to know when to drink deep, and know when to taste not. If you can do these things, you will be well served by a lively and healthy intellect.

Photo by Christopher Lowe on Unsplash

Thank you for reading! God bless!

AJPM

1. A note about Green Zeal: This pattern plays out with almost every new convert (and quite a few I see around Substack). Now that I am on the other side, almost 7 short years removed from my own conversion, I can only sit back and smile and gently correct if circumstance and situation allow for it. It’s partly because of how OCIA is structured—we naturally race to the finish line, and soak up everything we can once we commit our souls to this great new endeavor. But after our confirmation Mass, then what? We have a whole life ahead of us—and that life tempers our Green Zeal into the embers of a burning faith: hot, unquenchable, lasting. Green Zeal, in short, isn’t an error to be corrected—it is a consolation for those who have committed to the journey, they are easy wins that keep them going. The long and lonely life of faith beyond that moment has it’s own consolations, and they are of a different nature. This Green Zeal does not and cannot last forever.

2. I woke up the morning this article was supposed to post, fretting about how I didn’t like where it stood. It’s 8am as I write this and I’m revising before it publishes at 11am. My brain wouldn’t turn off until I fixed it. Then I can have more coffee.

3. If you read this and, with exasperation, think “How can I get a spiritual director/mentor/teacher? There is no one around!” please reach out to me via email or DM. I am not suggesting I will be your mentor, but if you NEED one, I would be happy to do my utmost to connect you with one. There is a crisis of mentorship in the world today, in my opinion. I need them, most people need them, you might need them. Let’s talk and figure something out.