Patrickal joker

Patrick said:

***QUOTE***

Steve,

Actually, Occamism isn't a third option with respect to the issue of Predestination. It's really just a position on reconciling foreknowledge and freedom, but I guess you don't realize that foreknowledge and Predestination are distinct, though obviously related, issues. Kind of makes your snide superiority seem pretty silly, doesn't it?

***END-QUOTE***

Wherever did I get the silly idea that the Occamist option might have anything to do with predestination? Hmm. Well, just for starters, the title of his treatise might contain a wee bit of a clue:

Tractatus de praedestinatione et de praescientia Dei et de futuris contingentibus (Franciscan institute publications [Philosophy series], 1945).

Hint? Hint?

You really wonder why Patrick keeps coming back to get slapped down again. Is he doing penance for venial sin or something?

***QUOTE***

As to your claim that I got all wobbly in the knees, all I can say is that I don't have the time to explain Thomism and Molinism fully to you.

***END-QUOTE***

Fully? You didn’t attempt to explain it at all.

***QUOTE***

But if you had any comprehension of either of those doctrines, you would not have any question as to how the good bishop could assert that "Mary could have said 'no,'" and simultaneously endorse the orthodox positions on foreknowledge and predestination. I would encourage you to read Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange's book _Predestination_ for a fine exposition of the Thomistic side of things, and to read Thomas Flint's _Divine Providence_ for a fine exposition of the Molinist side. Obviously, this is background reading that you very much need to do.

***END-QUOTE***

This is what I understand:

1.Since the good bishop didn’t assert either Thomism or Molinism, I’m not going to make a case for him that he didn’t make for himself—especially since I have no idea, and neither do you, whether he’s a Thomist, Molinist, Occamist, or something else.

What I do know is what he said, and the logical implications of what he said. To explain the known by resort to the unknown is not my idea of how to answer a question.

2.Thomism is consistent with divine foreknowledge and foreordination, but is inconsistent with Mary’s freedom to say “no.”

3.Molinism is consistent with Mary’s freedom to say “no”—in some possible world, rather than the actual world which God has chosen to instantiate, but is inconsistent with foreordination and foreknowledge.

4.I understand that Molinism tries to finesse a “mediating” position (pardon the pun), between Thomism and libertarianism.

I also understand that, like many a mediating position, this reduces to an unstable compromise.

If you think that Flint’s book is the final word on the subject, you’re the one who needs to brush up on the current literature.

5.Unlike you, I don’t simply believe the last thing I read. Unlike you, I distinguish between what a position may claim for itself and whether it can make good on its claims.

***QUOTE***

As to why I don't need to prove which doctrine--Thomism or Molinism--Chaput actually believes in order to show that his remarks do not actually commit him to openism, I really think this is a rather elementary matter, and I already covered it. Steve's failure to understand the nature of implication is not my problem.

***END-QUOTE***


1.Hear that muffled sound? That’s the sound of a toy-gun firing blanks. It is accompanied by a superfluity of smoke to cover intellectual retreat. If Patrick had an argument to give, he’d give it.

2.Suppose, for the sake of argument, that I don’t know what I’m talking about. The hardly absolves Patrick of responsibility to show that he knows what he’s talking about. He needs to show that to the readers of Triablogue. Puffing up his chest and stamping his feet is not going to do the trick.

3.As I pointed out before, his appeal is inherently absurd. Thomism and Molinism can’t both be true. They cancel each other out. At most, only one can be true. And both could also be false.

For Patrick to advise me to consult two mutually contradictory theories of providence—hey, read this book, then read that other book which denies what the first book affirms and affirms what the first book denies—has all the virtues of a circular firing squad.

Patrick must be practicing in front of a mirror to say this with a straight face.

***QUOTE***

As to the bit about the Sermon on the Mount, I don't have any interest in revisiting Steve's ignorant claims about St. Francis, nor do I have time to explain Catholic teaching on the spiritual life to him. However, consider the following quote: "Patrick has done absolutely nothing to show that, in traditional Catholic theology, the counsels of perfection did not implicate a higher spiritual calling than the lay lifestyle. Frankly, that’s the whole point of monasticism, which lays the basis for the treasury of merit." I would merely point out that Steve has done nothing to demonstrate his claims here, and I very much doubt that he could demonstrate them.

***END-QUOTE***

Yep, that’s the familiar sound of blanks going off again.

Okay, here are a couple of pieces of evidence: two of the Protestant Reformers were former monks: Luther and Vermingli. Luther also had a doctorate in theology while Vermingli rose to the rank of abbot and prior. Here are two expert witnesses on pre-Reformation monastic theology in theory and practice.

Now, what would Patrick like to put up against that?

***QUOTE***

If I may be permitted one more intial reaction...

***END-QUOTE***

Of course! Patrick is permitted to reply as often as he pleases.

***QUOTE***

Well, you see, in my world things work a little differently. You see, Steve Hays claimed that something Chaput wrote implied that Chaput was committed to Openism. I replied that if Chaput endorsed either Thomism or Molinism, then it is very easy to see that his comment would certainly not commit him to Openism. Steve wishes me to show which one Chaput endorses, to show that by endorsing that one he can avoid the commitment to Openism, and to show that the one that Chaput endorses is actually true. How bizarre.

As I say, in my world, when a person makes a claim like Steve's ("statement X commits Y to Z") and it is pointed out to that person that this claim overlooks certain possibilities, it is the responsibility of the person making the claim to defend that claim. That is, it seems to me that Steve ought to be trying to show (rather than simply asserting) that saying "Mary could have said 'no'" actually entails openism. Instead, he is attacking me for not demonstrating (what is obvious, anyway) that he (Hays) is mistaken. More sophistry. Why is the burden on me, when I'm not the one with the positive claim to defend? Why does Steve get to fling around odium theologicum and then, when challenged, attack the challenger? Doesn't basic intellectual honesty compel him to defend his (indefensible) claim, or else to retract it? In my world it does. But apparently in Steve's world things work differently.

***END-QUOTE***

The problem is twofold:

1.Patrick is taking for granted that “if Chaput endorsed either Thomism or Molinism, then it is very easy to see that his comment would certainly not commit him to Openism.”

Patrick is taking for granted that my claim “overlooks certain possibilities.”

This assumes that there really are certain possibilities in play. That certain possibilities are, indeed, possible—as viable alternatives.

And one of the problems is that Molinism and Thomism are incompossible. If one is possible, the other is not.

Patrick is also assuming that either of these would harmonize Chaput’s claim with divine foreknowledge and foreordination.

So he is advancing a positive claim. Hence, he has his own burden of proof to discharge.

As to my own burden of proof, I don’t regard Thomism and Molinism as on an equal footing. Molinism is simply incoherent. And that’s not just my own opinion. You need go no further that Roman Catholic sources to run up against the obstacles confronting a successful model of Molinism. So when Patrick has learned how to field the objections to Molinism within his own communion, he’s welcome to pay me another visit.

http://www.nd.edu/~afreddos/papers/molinism.htm

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/10437a.htm

As to Thomism, although I don’t have much use for his antiquated Aristotelian categories, yet I, as a Calvinist, am quite at home with his determinism.

In the Summa Theologica, for instance, he denies that the creature can ever resist the will of God. Cf. A. Pegis, Basic Writings of St. Thomas Aquinas (Random House 1945), 1:960-61.

But if Mary could say “no” to God, then she could resist the will of God.

Moreover, this is not merely my own interpretation of Aquinas. Patrick refers me to Flint. But Flint classifies Aquinas as a compatibilist rather than a libertarian. Cf. “Two Accounts of Providence,” Divine & Human Action, T. Morris, ed. (Cornell 1988), 174-75.

And that is incompatible with Mary refusing to participate in the plan of redemption.