“Confusing” JPII: on mistaking Description for Prescription

When I first began my advanced degree in JPII studies from the John Paul II Institute out of the University of Saint Thomas, Houston, I was frustrated with the frequency in which both Descartes and Kant showed up in readings. Descartes was a personal nemesis of mine in my undergraduate, and I spent a considerable amount of effort writing against his absurdities. I blamed him - rightly so - as premising much of the individualistic, pseudo-autonomous, relativism of the modern world. And as for Kant, well I saw him as someone who did the best he could with the faulty premises handed to him; he tried so hard to reintroduce metaphysics and morality into a revolutionized world, and as far as anyone could have was successful. In a world of thinkers too timid to speak beyond their individual isolation of perception and arrested by the notion of things being mere, “names (nomina) we use to group similar individual entities [but which entities nontheless] do not have any independent existence outside the mind, (“Realist Tradition and Wojtyla,” p. 3),” Kant exhibited the courage to tackle absurdity on its own terms.  In the world of idealists, “uncertain about objective reality [and who] feel more comfortable talking about ‘perception,’ (“Realist Tradition and Wojtyla,” p. 1),” Kant tried to return the world to coherent order. His failing, I thought, was his premise: sound logical progressions using reason and informed by belief may stumble across truth at one point or another, but the conclusion is bound to be wrong nonetheless.

In one small sense (and, as it turns out, subconsciously), I actually found myself turning towards JPII as a way to move past the description of Descartes’ radical skepticism and the prescription of Kant’s moral imperative. Wojtyla’s (and, later, JPII’s) philosophy has not disappointed - although it has done so in a surprising way.  Whereas I believed and earnestly desired JPII to turn back the clocks on modernity and relativism, there is no ignoring several hundred years of inherited philosophy. We are, after all, simultaneously formed by and form the culture we live in. Rather, JPII acknowledges the radical subjectivity emphasized by the post-Cartesian world, accepts the Kantian idea of a moral imperative, but inserts these principles into the framework of classical Thomistic/Aristotelian (and not absurd) philosophy.  This unique dichotomy of the new world with the old is clearly outlined in the opening pages of Love and Responsibility, where he posits out front that the world is objective and that we can know it - though it is we who know it. And so, while initially frustrated with the appearance of thinkers I had discarded as simply wrong, JPII has not disappointed the expectations with which I turned to him.

Yet, while I personally have found closure and direction through his writings, many disagree with me.  The at times dubious language of Vatican II, sexual and Liturgical abuses, bad appointments of Bishops are all evidence against his value to the world and Church, some say. What is more, his writings are at times confusing and not definitive.  While proclamations and edicts create some sense of prescriptive clarity to the faithful (as in, how do I live my life through action), JPII spent much of his writing on descriptive topics: relaying the framework for coherent philosophical and theological thought in the face of hundreds of years of inherited error.  The difference is subtle, but immense. And, if his writings are not approached with this in mind, the stage is set for a confused and dissatisfied Faithful.

There is a difference between descriptive writing and prescriptive writing.  One says how the world is, the other says what does that mean in my daily life.  And JPII does both. However, he does a lot of work reclaiming the descriptive worldview which allows for rational thought.  And, unfortunately, the modern Church and world in general has been subjected to so many years of absurdist policy and philosophy, it can be easy to see someone like him trying to enter into this argument as playing by their rules. 

I understand and sympathize with the desire for edicts, decrees, and proclamations. I do. It gives a sense of simplicity and straightforwardness to my life if I can just trust someone else to formulate what “right action” looks for me. However, that’s also a very inhuman way to live. It is a modern world, with over 300 years of modern philosophy informing world politics and global economies. If we are ever to return to a coherent world, we must eventually have a body of actors willing to engage the world as it is now - and not how we want it to be.  We need thinkers now more than ever.  And, we need a body of Faithful willing to engage with philosophers like Wojtyla who seek to address the problems of the modern world on the personal level.  Only then will we return to a world capable of rational discourse.