On this episode, Chris is joined by thinker and writer Jack Gist (ft. on Ep. 25, Disputatio and the 1619 Project) to discuss a new essay from Jack, “Individualism, relativism, and the most extreme form of idolatry.” Jack unpacks the thought of Nietzsche and Duns Scotus, and helps us understand the “both/and” of the amazing beauty of being an individual, uniquely unrepeatable as a creation of God, while at the same time being made for participation in a “higher unity”, that is, the whole of mankind made for communion with God. Contemporary movements tend to skew one way or the other, either suppressing the individual to emphasize a group, or obscuring the whole for the sake of the individual. Jack highlights the deeply Christian sensibility of the founders in seeking to safeguard an individualism rightly understood, in right relation to the whole.
Faith & Politics
F&P Episode: 101 – Labor and Leisure in a Fragmented World
On this episode, Chris hosts Dr. Michael Naughton professor of Catholic Studies at the University of St. Thomas and author of Getting Work Right: Labor and Leisure in a Fragmented World. They discuss 'leisure'....and no, they're not talking about polyester wide-lapeled suits from the 70's. Drawing from the definition articulated by the 20th century German Thomist Josef Pieper, leisure is "an attitude of the mind and a condition of the soul that fosters a capacity to perceive the reality of the world" as it truly is. Mischaracterized as "wasting time," it is fundamentally about being, not doing, in a way that our hearts and minds become more open to the good. At the core of leisure is Sunday, the Lord's Day. In order to get Monday right, Dr. Naughton argues, we must first get Sunday right. The conversation draws on Pieper's famous 1947 book, Leisure, the Basis of Culture.