Atheist Convert: R.J. Stove

Why I'm Catholic ^ | R. J. Stove

[ventanax5]

The upbringing I underwent in New South Wales, Australia —partly in Sydney, but mainly in the village of Mulgoa— was one of complete, although predominantly quiet and civil, atheism. Both my parents (who are now dead) spent their childhood as Presbyterians, but shed religious belief soon after attaining adulthood.

My father was the philosopher and political polemicist David Stove. During his undergraduate years, he fell under the spell of the militantly atheistic guru John Anderson of the University of Sydney's philosophy department. Except that "fell under" seems a much too gentle phrase to describe what my father and thousands like him experienced at Anderson's none-too-scrupulous—and, where females were concerned, lecherous—hands.

To those who, like myself, are too young to have known Anderson (he died in 1962, the year after my birth), the mystery of his charm to hordes of students will always be impenetrable. Certainly nothing in Anderson's viscous prose explains his charismatic appeal. It is only fair to add that by the time I was born, this crusading fervor on his acolytes' part had mellowed;

[BenKenobi]

Hmm? Were you addressing a perfect lady?

I thanked the threadstarter for posting this excellent testimony. I think that Christ will heal him and help him with his problems.

[RobbyS]

Psychology is a pseudo-science. All of its schools rely heavily on the observation of behavior, and treat human intelligence as not more than an epiphenomenon of bodily functions, and our personal behavior as driven by forces beyond our control, with intelligence exercising only a slight control. Yes, it can observe and classify, but so far as a predictor of OUR own behavior, of our own strengths and weakness, it is not much good. In short, it does not prepare us for tragedy. Maybe it is because it refuses even to ask those questions which are the concern of religion, or if it does, it disdains the answers that religion has produced.

[A_perfect_lady]

I don’t have a high opinion of psychology either, but I have noticed definite personality types, and rather than write them off to satanic influences or astrology, I’ll at least accept the descriptions offered by psychology.

[RobbyS]

Back in the ‘60s, the mental health industry pretty much gave up on psychoanalysis as a remedy. They use antipsychotic drugs. The theory behind it reminds me of the old theory of humors. :-). Yes, everyone has a different temperament, and it seems to be inborn. At bottom, however, is a kind of reductionism. The human being is thought of as a kind of organic machine. It is really just a variation on the old dualism, in which the spirit sort of inhabits the body. Aristotle had a different view, which is that the spirit is the form of the body and inseparable. The mind is something uniquely human, drawing from and working" with the body, and overall a spirit which holds it all together, a kind of nonmaterial envelop, you might say. But it exists in world of such spirits, or forms which in their "essence" are what are described perhaps mathematically. Think Pythagoras. Whatever one might think about such a "look" at the world, it is certainly very different from the world view of the psychologists.

[A_perfect_lady]

Yes. In the end, I have my own view which references but does not cleave to either Aristotle, nor the Bible, nor the APA. I go from my own observations. I don’t think humans are unique. I do see evidence of a more developed capacity for imagination, but in terms of the baser tendencies: our desires, our sentiments and reactions... pretty similar to the animal kingdom. Most of what I see in humans, I also see in my cats. I accept that the world of psychology has delineated certain personality types, and the words they use, depressive, obsessive, dependent, avoidant, seem useful enough for me. I accept that the religious world has designated certain activities as wrong, such as murder, theft, vice, and I agree with them on most counts. I accept that philosophers have tried to sort out the impulses of thought, feeling, and physical need, and I can understand why. But in the end, we all make up our own minds about it.

[RobbyS]

Pascal said that man is a reed but a thinking reed. He can ponder his own nature, but so far as we know, animals do not. They share much with us, but not all. For one thing they do not try to build towers reaching to heaven. To be sure, if we vanished, a visitor from another planet ten thousand years hence would have to dig deep to find any evidence of our existence. But we are here while we are here, and we do try to etch our names in stone to tell future readers we were.