A few notes to PZ Myers and his supporters:
- Yes, we Catholics regard the Eucharist with reverence that appears foolish to those who don’t share our faith.
- Yes, we expect even those who don’t share our beliefs not to desecrate it.
- Therefore, we make it pretty hard for them to do so. We keep the Eucharist locked up in tabernacles in Churches, and only take it out during Mass. We treat it with extraordinary reverence ourselves.
- It would be extraordinarily difficult for someone to accidentally desecrate the Eucharist. A non-believer could quite easily live his entire life without coming into contact with it. In fact, he would need to go out of his way to acquire it, hence the need for Prof. Myers to solicit volunteers to “score” him some of the Blessed Sacrament. Even if one attends Catholic Mass, one must also go up to communion in order to receive the Eucharist.In short, we are not asking non-believers to walk on eggshells to avoid being, in Dr. Myers’s words, “rude to a cracker.” One must go out of one’s way in order to encounter a consecrated hosts. I am not terribly insulted if you fail to get out of my way in the street and bump into me. But if you come to my house and punch me in the nose in front of my family, I’ll get a bit more upset.
- Thus, it is not a stretch to conclude that if someone is desecrating the Eucharist, he is doing so with malicious intent, not making an innocent and ignorant mistake. Prof. Myers’ post makes such a conclusion even more difficult to escape.
- Yes, Bill Donahue is a blowhard. That doesn’t mean he’s always wrong.
- That Prof. Meyers has received death threats is unfortunate, and I condemn them. Nevertheless, a professor at a public university should be held to a higher standard than a sampiling of those on the internet who send e-mails in response to a provocation. Prof. Myers meant to be provacative, and he was.
- It does not take particular talent to provoke an angry response. We hold the Eucharist sacred; we have never pretended otherwise. That we would respond angrily to someone publicly and deliberately planning to desecrate the Eucharist is utterly unremarkable. I could go around stepping on people’s fifth toes, and then laugh about how stupid it is that people are so attached to stupid limb that doesn’t serve much of a purpose and may evolve away in a number of generations. I would not consider that an intellectual accomplishment I should be proud of.
My normal reaction to Myers’ stunt would be to ignore it, but a number of people seem to think that because Bill Donahue is on the other side, and Myers has received death threats, it’s all good.
No, it’s not.
Obviously, the First Amendment gives Myers the right to say and do as he pleases without criminal prosecution. I have no particular brief for or against academic freedom and tenure, and figure it’s the University of Minnesota’s call wheter they wish to continue to employ Dr. Myers; I’m not inclined to write them to pressure them one way or the other.
But can’t we agree that our public discourse is not improved by these childish, immature, intentionally insulting stunts? And responding to them with “support” for the person making the insults because some people on the other side are really mean is going to generate more of the same. (BTW, I would say the same thing for Mark Steyn).
I think we can stand against death threats and for the principles of free speech without “supporting” Prof. Myers.
UPDATE: It now occurs to me that this post would have worked better in “Conversations with a Strawman” format.
SECOND UPDATE: Corrected the spelling of Dr. Myers’s name, after it had been pointed out to me.
