Francis Berger
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Too Negative To Be Profound

8/29/2019

3 Comments

 
Evil exists. No denying it. And, yes, recognizing Evil and informing others of the traps it lays is immensely useful, but to see Evil everywhere while being utterly blind to the Good is a sign that we have been led astray – that we have fallen into the most subtle trap Evil employs. Fighting monsters is a noble endeavor, but we must remember Nietzsche’s warning and avoid becoming monsters ourselves when we engage in battle. Without doubt, bad news is ubiquitous, but what do we accomplish if report only bad news at the expense of the Good News?

What service have we offered if we have done nothing but paint it all black? When we leave those we seek to help submerged in open water without a shred of hope and encouragement to which they might be able to cling? Yes, I understand this is reality and about calling a spade a spade. To be sure, this no time for rainbows and soap bubbles. The rose-colored glasses most certainly must come off. And yes, I understand we simply can’t sugarcoat most of what we see. I also understand that reporting anything too positive would strip our messages of any profundity, but have we considered the reverse? That what we communicate to others is often too negative to be profound?

In our yearning to provide hope, may we actually be sparking fear and despair? To return to Nietzsche – we write of the things we see as we stare into the abyss, but are we aware of the abyss staring back at us? And if we are, do we believe that it has eclipsed the Good entirely - that nothing else exists?
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No, let us be done with undiluted doom and gloom. Let us be done with courage that discourages and moralizing that demoralizes. Our perpetual pessimism peddling places us in unpremeditated partnerships with the pernicious. Let us abandon temptation of being too negative to be profound and focus instead on being too profound to be negative. 
3 Comments
Bookslinger
8/30/2019 01:17:27

Riding in the car through wooded areas in the fall, the kids see the pretty leaves. Dad, at the wheel, sees the roadkill.

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Susan-Anne White link
9/11/2019 21:22:48

Sir, I discovered your blog today via a link on The Thinking Housewife. My husband and I are Evangelical Christians living in Northern Ireland. I cannot understand why you would quote anything Nietzsche said because he is known for stating that "God is dead." Your otherwise worthy post is undermined by the inclusion of the Nietzsche quotes.

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Francis Berger
9/12/2019 06:45:01

@ Susan-Anne White - Nietzsche correctly diagnosed the virtual collapse and corruption of Christianity in the West and gave dire warnings of the nihilism and chaos that were sure to follow. He deserves respect for his perspicacity.

Nietzsche was vehemently anti-Christian because he regarded Christianity as a religion of the weak, a religion guided by what he called a slave morality.

I would tend to agree with his assessment of Christianity in the nineteenth-century, and, to be frank, I myself would not have followed (and still do not adhere to) that kind of Christianity. Unfortunately, in his often accurate criticisms of Christianity Nietzsche essentially threw the baby out with the bathwater when he rejected God and the God-Man in favor of the Uber-Man, which was obviously the wrong path for the further metaphysical development of humanity.

In "Ressentiment", Max Scheler claims Nietzsche's rejection of Christian morality was actually flawed. In essence what Nietzsche criticized was more aligned with bourgeois values than Christian values, which is an interesting perspective. Scheler's book can be found online and downloaded free for those interested.

All in all, I believe people, Christians especially, are too callous and superficial in their outright rejection of Nietzsche, who is incidentally also reviled in leftist circles of thought. Nietzsche understood the death of God was a terrible thing and made attempts to find a path forward. His attempts were wrong and misguided, but his understanding of the problem and his yearning for a cure should not be dismissed lightly. Besides, in the end, I have a feeling Nietzsche saw the light, and when he did, he was more than happy to embrace it.

The link below provides an interesting take on Nietzsche's rejection and ultimate acceptance of Christianity as true.

https://charltonteaching.blogspot.com/2019/08/jc-powys-gets-to-bottom-of-nietzsche.html

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