"Empty" arguments and their uncanny resemblance to Fundamentalist cant (part 1)
12/31/2002 10:32:56 AM
When I wrote a post on December 17th ("Did The Holy Spirit Bring About an ‘Unrelived Disaster’?") criticizing an article by Patrick Buchanan, I didn’t expect to start a minor firestorm on Encore and raise the ire of dozens of Buchanan supporters, Vatican II-bashers, and assorted enemies of "neo-Catholics" (aka, liberals, fools, and Kung Huggers). How naïve of me.
(A quick note about terminology: It has recently become popular to use the term "Lidless Eye Crowd" to describe sedevacantists, SSPXers, and those self-described "traditionalists" who question the validity and value of the Second Vatican Council. However, I’m going with the term "Empty/Empties," based on "MT," which stands for "militant traditionalists." Since the Empty Crowd uses empty arguments in attacking Vatican II and Pope John Paul II – and always see the proverbial glass as half empty – I think it is an accurate, albeit informal, descriptive. Whether or not it is helpful or clever I will leave to the judgment of history and the judges of "American Idol.")
Anyhow, someone latched onto my post and put a link to it on Diocese Report. It wasn’t long before the e-mails started pouring in, most of them full of the sort of warm and fuzzy sentiments one dreams of reading immediately before Christmas. I had obviously touched a raw nerve or three. In fact, I was being initiated into the world of Disgruntled, Angry Catholics Who Think Vatican II Really Stunk It Up and Cannot Stand Anyone Who Disagrees With Them.
As I read the several dozen e-mails, I noticed how strikingly similar they were in tone and content to e-mails I have received from angry anti-Catholic Fundamentalists. I recalled how a friend of mine who spent twenty years in an Empty schismatic group described his former way of life as "Protestantism with smells and bells." It was only after several years of historical study and reading Vatican II documents (and, of course, being brainwashed by "liberals") that he left that group and came back into communion with Rome.
A few of the e-mails I received were fairly mellow and thoughtful and contained worthwhile questions and comments (some of which I’ll respond to soon, in a less acerbic fashion). But most of the Empty E-mails were filled with angry, reactionary, and not-so-logical attacks and retorts. A comparison to Fundamentalist correspondence revealed the following general observations:
1. Both groups attack, attack, and attack, but as soon as you defend yourself and call their arguments into question, they act as though you just napalmed their neighborhood and dumped their garbage can into the street. In other words, they seem to be very thin-skinned.
2. A lot of time is spent attacking comments you never made (e.g., "Every word of Vatican II is formal dogma."), deriding thoughts you’ve never had (e.g., "I want to lock every Empty in the new cathedral in Los Angeles!"), and slamming actions you’ve never committed (e.g., memorizing the works of Karl Rahner). Straw men are very popular and, of course, are cheap and easy to build.
3. Both groups assume you are an idiot, a liberal, a moral failure, a hypocrite, a moron, and a brainwashed fool, and work from those comforting premises.
4. Both groups claim (without ever having met you) that you know nothing about history, theology, philosophy, or what really happens in the basement of the Vatican. Of course, they know everything about these topics, and have comic books and tracts detailing the activities in said basement. Thus, Baptists have the Trail of Blood, and Empties have the Freemason/Illuminati/NASDAQ Connection.
5. Both groups are sure they know what is really going on in the Catholic Church and let you know that any evidence to the contrary only proves that you have been fooled, duped, brainwashed, and even lobotomized.
6. Both implicitly hold that they have final say in matters of faith and morals. For Fundamentalists, this is based on their pristine and objective interpretation of Scripture. For Empties, this is based on their pristine and objective interpretation of Tradition.
7. Most folks from both groups believe Pope John Paul II is a liberal, pantheistic, New Age, pseudo-Catholic who is in apostasy, and probably kills insects and listens to Beatles records just for the fun of it.
8. People from both groups tend to be very humorless. Which means a post like this will anger them to no end. Ain’t it grand?
I’m sure there are other fascinating parallels, but that should upset plenty of people for now. In the next part of this riveting exposé, I’ll provide the Top 20 Empty Zingers, culled from actual e-mails, with bonus commentary added for no additional charge.
