There have been attempts over the centuries to describe the human being as a particular kind of animal. Aristotle famously described the human being as the “Political Animal,” which was his way of saying that humans are not really animals because humans engage in politics and animals do not. Another ancient philosopher, Porphyry, described the human being as the “Rational Animal,” the “animal” which is able to reason. Ernst Cassirer, a twentieth-century philosopher, described the human being as the “Symbolic Animal,” the “animal” which is able to make and use symbols.
These are all true in their own way. Properly understood, they can be harmonized with Catholic Faith, which completes and perfects all true insights, to paraphrase St. John Newman.
I have come to the conclusion that another good way to understand ourselves, individually and collectively, is to see the human being as the “Guilty Animal.” A constant in the life of every human being is dealing with feelings of guilt in one way or another. We try to avoid feeling guilty, or we try to deal with the guilt we feel.
A fad (which seems to have waned) was to joke about having “Catholic Guilt.” I took those with their “Catholic Guilt” to mean that they regretted feeling bad about something they should not have felt bad about. They seemed to attribute their “Catholic Guilt” to an outmoded morality or habit from which they needed to be free. And I think they wanted to signal: “See, I’m freeing myself from that silly Catholic morality. I’m a ‘Recovering Catholic’ now.”
It seemed to me that, unbeknownst to them, they did not stop feeling guilty. They simply replaced “Catholic Guilt” with some other form of guilt. So instead of feeling guilty about missing Mass on Sunday, they felt guilty about using a styrofoam cup or a plastic straw. They had freed themselves from obedience to the pope or Catholic Doctrine . . . only to submit themselves to whatever had become popular or “enlightened” in an increasingly Leftist culture.
White Guilt
Now “White Guilt” seems to be taking center stage. John McWhorter has written one of the best pieces I have recently read on this topic, as he analyzes Robin DiAngelo’s book, White Fragility. In sum, “one of America’s favorite advice books of the moment (White Fragility) is actually a racist tract. Despite the sincere intentions of its author, the book diminishes Black people in the name of dignifying us.” That seems to me to describe not only DiAngelo’s book but also all the efforts to ground racism in “whiteness.”
For a good insight into the historical and psychological dynamics of what has been happening in American streets since the murder of George Floyd, I recommend Shelby Steele’s White Guilt, which remains relevant although it was published in 2006. Steele does not blame all White people for every problem of every Black person. As his subtitle says, we need to understand “how Blacks and Whites together destroyed the promise of the Civil Rights Era.” I like Carol Lanone’s caveat about Steele’s book.
Dear White Progressives, with all due respect, if you really want to assuage the guilt you feel from simply being White, if you really want to atone for your Whiteness, should you not show complete solidarity with Black people? Shouldn’t you move into a Black neighborhood? Shouldn’t you want to abolish all suburbs by merging them with cities? Shouldn’t you want to abolish all private schools, including Catholic schools, so that there are only public schools and state colleges? Shouldn’t you ask for a job demotion so a Black person can take your place? Shouldn’t you give away all your wealth and income that are above the Black median of wealth and income? If you wait for Reparations to re-distribute your wealth, aren’t you like Whites in the 1950s who were waiting until the “right time” to eliminate racial discrimination?
There is a better way. We will understand neither white guilt nor any other kind of guilt—and we will not alleviate true guilt—unless we get to the deeper and broader theological and philosophical dynamics of guilt.
The Mistaken Way of Being Guilty
I suspect that those who have rioted since the Floyd murder, and those who excuse the rioting, are pursuing a version of “social justice” with its social systems and structures so good that personal guilt and responsibility will be obsolete.
This takes many forms besides its racial form. Here are a few examples. Schools can be structured so that no student is ever at fault for not learning. The economy can operate so that no poor person is ever at fault for being poor. Sexual mores can change so that no adult who has sex with a consenting adult is ever at fault for sexual immorality.
Not that one who thinks about school that way also thinks about the economy that way or sex that way. We humans struggle to think systematically without ever contradicting ourselves. But all these forms have a common essence: the failure of a person is due to an unjust system, not due to the person. The logic seems to be, consciously or unconsciously: because the way to eliminate guilt is to eliminate failure, and because the way to eliminate failure is to create “just” systems and structures, therefore the way to eliminate guilt is to create “just” systems and structures.
What is at work in this effort to eliminate guilt is, deep down, the denial of Original Sin, which is at the root of Modernism and Postmodernism—the thinking (beginning with Descartes around 1600 AD) that replaced the Judeo-Christian consensus in general and Catholic Doctrine in particular. Modernism and Postmodernism are alive and well inside the Church as well as outside of it, inside the hierarchy as well as outside of it.
To deny Original Sin is to deny that the first humans (whether they were created in a special act or in an evolutionary way) sinned so radically that evil entered God’s previously all-good universe and to deny that humans consequently are in need of the salvation that can only come from God—to deny that the universe has fallen from Grace just as human nature has fallen from Grace. To deny Original Sin is to replace the Kingdom of God with a human-made utopia or panacea before the Second Coming of Christ.
The Catholic Way of Being Guilty
Catholics, and every other human being, should only feel guilty when they actually are guilty of an immoral action. The standard for knowing whether an action is moral or immoral is Catholic Doctrine. It is fruitless to work toward a society in which someone can always be without guilt since every human being cannot not sin due to our fallen human nature. The goal is not to avoid feeling guilty; the goal is to make every effort to avoid sinning and then repent when we do sin.
About guilt, the Devil tempts us a couple of ways. Of course, one temptation is to feel no guilt for sins—to be in denial about our sins. The Devil also tempts us to feel too guilty for sins—to let our awareness of our faults get us discouraged and despairing. Then we give up trying to be true to the right values, which make us feel guilty and change our values to those which no longer make us feel guilty. Another consequence of feeling too guilty for sins is that we simply remain discouraged, and then bitter or depressed. The Devil also tempts us to take God’s forgiveness for granted. He tries to persuade us that God is so loving and good that He really does not care if we sin, that sin is no big deal, that we will be treated by Him the way a spoiled brat is treated by an indulgent parent. To resist this last temptation, read the Gospels and count the number of times Jesus warns about Hell and damnation.
Though our sins are real, God’s love is more real. The most basic experience Christians can have in this life is to admit the real ugliness of their sins, but also experience the love and forgiveness of the one true Heavenly Father who sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to save them from their sins. “But God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). God hates sin but loves sinners. If we are the “Guilty Animal,” we are also the “Redeemed Animal.”
In order to be redeemed, we must respond to God’s love and forgiveness as He wants us to respond. Redemption does not simply consist of warm and fuzzy feelings. There are two sources for knowing how to respond to God’s love and forgiveness: classic Catholic philosophy and the Sacrament of Confession.
Reparation and Reparations
According to classic Catholic philosophy, rooted in the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas, one form of justice is reparative justice or retributive justice, which vindicates the rights of the offended (those who have actually had their rights denied, not merely their feelings hurt).
Reparative justice is different from revenge. Whereas the goal of revenge is an emotional pleasure from hurting the offender, the goal of reparative justice is repairing the situation so that it is restored to the way it was before rights were denied.
When rights have been denied (and not only feelings hurt), apologies are not good enough. There must be action to compensate the offended. If I steal your wallet, I should not merely apologize—I should give you your wallet back!
It almost goes without saying that the reparation should be proportionate to the offense, the “punishment should fit the crime.” Calculating proportion includes consideration of whether complicity in the offense is formal or material and proximate or remote, the explanation of which is beyond the scope of this column.
Complete punishment goes beyond reparation to include rehabilitation (improvement of the offender) and deterrence of others from committing the same offense. But rehabilitation or deterrence must never be a substitute for reparation. If punishment were merely rehabilitative, we could inflict any pain on the offender to improve him. If punishment were merely deterrent, we could inflict any pain on the offender to deter others from wrongdoing. Evil means must never be used for a good end.
So one Catholic way to respond to an offense is to apply these principles both to others who offend and to ourselves when we are offenders. For example, we should cooperate with just reparation when we are the offender.
The other source for responding to God’s love and forgiveness is the Sacrament of Confession. Suffice it to say that the pattern in the Sacrament of getting right with God—examination of conscience in light of Catholic Doctrine, confession of sin, absolution of sin, penance, and reconciliation—gives us a parallel for getting right with any human being we have hurt. We need to honestly reflect on what we did to the other person (examination of conscience). We need to admit to the other that we were wrong (confession), we need to ask for the other’s forgiveness (absolution). We need to repair the hurt (penance). Only then can there be real reconciliation—although the one we hurt could be more interested in getting revenge on us by rejecting our efforts to reconcile.
About the particular issue of Reparations for slavery and/or Jim Crow Others, others, such as Walter Williams, have written. A full treatment of Reparations would take into account all of the above.
Heavenly Father, help me to be neither under-concerned nor over-concerned about my sins—by knowing them, being sorry, and doing penance. Thank You for Your forgiveness, especially available in the Sacrament of Confession, so I can go on trying to live in accord with all Catholic Doctrine and prepare to meet You face-to-face. Amen.
