All those Chesterton lovers experience themselves as having completed a long and thrilling philosophical adventure. But they can never remember the itinerary. What makes Christianity in the end so much more satisfying? The answer never sounds very convincing when Chesterton himself isn't saying it. He creates the feeling of philosophical achievement without the reality.As an anti-Chesterton(ian) irrationalist, I reserve the right to claim, without offering any ground or proof, that an inability to "remember the itinerary" is not finally damning, but all the power of this critique is in the phrase "philosophical achievement" anyway.
You could also say this sort of thing about people who revere Kierkegaard and Dostoevsky. Oh crap.
Update: Via Joe Carter, a pleasant defense of Chesterton from Michael Brendan Dougherty and from Matthew Anderson.
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5 comments:
Ha!
Dude, "Ha!" is not a philosophical achievement. More proof!
Neither is half the nonsense that flows from my keyboard, but I was unaware that I had a burden of proof. Man, that's going to make ordering coffee tomorrow that much harder.
Yeah, sometimes all the blood drains from my face in line and I become afraid that some cashier is going to see The Idiot not so inconspicuously hidden under my arm and ask me, "why Christ over the truth?" and I will first smirk and then stammer. And then I'll put it in a blog post and pretend that the expressions of disgust from readers are really just knowing smiles. And I will secretly think, "achievement," and lord it over the Chestertonians.
My expression of disgust is a smile, can't you tell?
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