Luke Burgis: preference

Transcript context

…Now, you and Ross Douthat, you both self-identify as Catholics. He’s been on this podcast several times. We’ve talked about religious issues. If you had to pin down exactly where your religious vision of Catholicism differs from his in as fundamental a manner as possible, how would you describe that? He might take more of a rationalist approach than I do. And I believe in faith and reason, as John Paul II said, are like two wings by which one rises to the contemplation of the truth. It goes back, for me, I mentioned, aesthetics and beauty, so it’s the witness of the saints that initially attracted to me. It was the beauty, it was the tradition, the continuity of the church and the world through such a long time. Reading the lives of the saints as a witness, for me, that has always been the first step, not trying to think my way to it. I think Augustine had this beautiful phrase of faith seeking understanding. What I’m not saying is that we should not see—because the church has a wonderful intellectual tradition—but I’m less of an apologetics guy, maybe. I think the best chance that I have to help somebody see what I see in the church is not to try to convince them of the argument of why Christianity is true, which is the only good reason to be Christian, in my opinion. It’s to take them to Rome, and bring them inside a beautiful church to witness a beautiful mass, to drink a lot of good wine, and have conversations late into the night about the good, the true, and the beautiful. That, to me, is the more circuitous route. Maybe it’s not the fastest route, but I would say it’s more of an aesthetic approach. If the world today is enchanted, or we should think of it as enchanted, what are the most literal manifestations of that? Of course, it would be the world itself, but specific things. Are there miracles happening commonly, or how do you think about specific events within that framework?…

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