Comments for Give Me That Old-Time Toleration at http://www.thecatholicthing.org , comment 1 to 9 out of 9 comments http://www.thecatholicthing.org Sat, 25 May 2013 08:04:46 +0100 FeedCreator 1.7.3 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2009/give-me-that-old-time-toleration.html#comment-1619 "But one target has remained the same. Those papists again. They are truly the one part of this universe that endures." I'm surprised, Prof. Arkes, that you should see this as a uniquely Romanist trait. There is another group--a group with which I believe you have some association--that seems to have been ordained to be present and to be opposed in every age. Of course the church claims to be an adopted daughter of Israel, but sometimes the parallels are hard to ignore. - Coemgenus Mahwahvensis Fri, 01 May 2009 22:09:51 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2009/give-me-that-old-time-toleration.html#comment-1604 No discussion of religious tolerance in 1650 should exclude Roger Williams, the founder of Rhode Island on principles of religious freedom. Independent farmers of that time would never submit to a single religious yoke, and through their fortitude (and expansive lands for escape) our religious freedom grew. Catholics seeking freedom need never play the victim, neither then nor now. In Williams words: "God is too big to be put under one roof." His is our legacy; not one of intolerance. - Dan Biezad Fri, 01 May 2009 08:22:10 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2009/give-me-that-old-time-toleration.html#comment-1595 "The New Tolerance disclaims any monopoly on truth, moral or religious, and in fact it disclaims any ground of knowing anything reliably about the things that are right and wrong." - This is an extraordinary, even bizarre, claim of moral agnosticism for the NT. How does this square with "I am the way, the truth, and the life, no man comes to the Father but through me"? Or Jesus' instruction to the rich young man to follow the commandments to achieve perfection? Or the Sermon on the Mount? - Thomas Gillespie Thu, 30 Apr 2009 16:44:06 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2009/give-me-that-old-time-toleration.html#comment-1592 Isn't the inexorability of public condemnation and coercion of religiously pertinent actions and words--even in the regime whose very explicit raison d'etre is absolute religious tolerance--reveal that politics must, according to some ineradicable natural law, be based upon some indisputable sacred center, some particular religious establishment, some intolerant "comprehensive doctrine" (Rawls' term)? I think it does. If so, then Catholicism should be that sacred center, not religious pluralism. - Thaddeus Kozinski Thu, 30 Apr 2009 10:38:52 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2009/give-me-that-old-time-toleration.html#comment-1589 Thanks for an excellent essay! Good comments PD. Joseph de Maistre speaks beautifully of Protestantism in its real sense in an essay against the French Revolution. Tolerance today so poorly misunderstood because, as JPII explains of freedom disconnected from Truth, tolerance disconnected from truth destroys itself. There is pleny of evidence of this in today's relativistic society. - Achilles Wed, 29 Apr 2009 15:47:45 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2009/give-me-that-old-time-toleration.html#comment-1590 Methinks it is a good time to be a Catholic. We already have many opportunities to do His work, and if present cultural trends continue, the number of opportunities may well be increasing. Pax et bonum. - Keith Töpfer Wed, 29 Apr 2009 15:47:27 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2009/give-me-that-old-time-toleration.html#comment-1588 Was it G.K.Chesterton who said that "tolerance is the last bastion of the truly intolerant"? - Joseph Puglielli Wed, 29 Apr 2009 13:47:20 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2009/give-me-that-old-time-toleration.html#comment-1587 While this is clearly a Protestant legacy, Catholics are just the largest, not the only religous group targeted. Mormons and other sects are also out. - Bruce Roeder Wed, 29 Apr 2009 13:47:07 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2009/give-me-that-old-time-toleration.html#comment-1585 A fine essay. Dare one ask further whether what you describe here may be a logical development within Protestantism itself (not to impugn many Protestants who are very fine people). That is, when the authority of interpretation of God's word - and ultimately the religion itself - is vested in the individual, then the expected outcome is the retreat into private judgment and the claim that there can be no authoritative public judgment. Everyone can do as they list - except judge. - Patrick Deneen Wed, 29 Apr 2009 09:18:17 +0100