Neville Chamberlain is Alive and Well

Spare me a moment to indulge in a bit of growling in the general direction of one Oliver Thomas for his recent contribution to the The Forum page of USA Today, "Is Secularism Saving Marriage?" (Monday, September 14, 2009)

My views and opinions on ecclesiastics should, by this point, be well known to any person who has taken the time to familiarize themselves with my writing. Furthermore, I dislike finding myself in the position of sending negativity in the direction of person who might otherwise consider themselves to be allies...or at least sympathetic to certain of my opinions. However, I can't allow myself to agree that non-antagonistic faith-heads are not also part of our collective social malfunction right alongside their more vehement and violent Brethren.

O. Thomas's pondering about marriage and his conclusions (such as they are) while not immediately offensive still carry the distinct tenor and odor of condescension that generally raises my hackles. I am prepared to let pass unchallenged his general mystification that secularism does not lead to the "other half" of society getting divorced; I can easily grasp that recognizing that false conclusions follow logically from false premises isn't easy for someone who assumes their premises are inerrant to begin with. What irks me is firstly his assertion that religious institutions should be heeded because they "have constructive things to teach us" about marriage. The breezy citing of the X-ian admonishment against adultery grates however; can he honestly expect any intelligent person to think that a prohibition against pursuing another person's mate is somehow unique to religion? Or is it simply that he supposes the rest of us are too stupid to understand, instinctively, that such behavior would be disruptive, to say the least?

Less definite but more important is the generally magnanimous tone of the article; how generous and conciliatory of him, to acknowledge that it could be possible that good and socially proper behavior might follow from so wayward a source as human behavior which is, in his own confessed opinion, inherently sinful. No doubt he feels both quite clever for seeing such connection and inclusive for expressing it, openly, and even endorsing the way this contributes to the religious argument.

I admit freely that Mr. Thomas most probably means well. It does not escape me that I may very probably be allowing my own bias to color my perception. I have history on my side however and I defy anyone to demonstrate that my growling and pacing is unjustified.