Politics, Economics and other Stuff

German Political Party Secularism

Formatting problems with tables...

Short version without tables is that I looked at the polling at the World Values Survey, a reputable outfit, for Germany in 2006. 16.6% of CDU voters agree that ‘Politicians who don´t believe in God are unfit for public office.’ 5.6% for SPD voters, 14.3% for FDP voters (!), 8.9% for Green voters, 6.8% for Linke voters, 3% for NPD or Reps.  However around 36% of all Germans who go to church once a week believe this. But that is only 8.1% of the population, compared with 36.2% in the US. 

For comparison, the US polling data from the same source for ‘Politicians who don´t believe in God are unfit for public office’ has 26% of Democrats agreeing, 46% of Republicans, 28% of Independents.

Universal Health Insurance as objectively detrimental to American Religious Fundamentalism

via 3QD, a summary of a paper in Evolutionary Psychology:

Gregory Paul argues that high religiosity is not universal to human populations, and it is actually inversely related to a wide range of socio-economic indicators representing the health of modern democracies. Paul holds that once a nation's population becomes prosperous and secure, for example through economic security and universal health care, much of the population looses interest in seeking the aid and protection of supernatural entities. This effect appears to be so consistent that it may prevent nations from being highly religious while enjoying good internal socioeconomic conditions.

National level statistics suggest that strong mass religiosity is invariably associated with high levels of stress and anxiety, which are created by impoverishment, inequality, or economic security, related to high levels of societal dysfunction. These relationships are largely consistent when the United States, an outlier amongst advanced democracies in the high level of both religious belief and social decay, is removed from the comparison.

Church-State Relations

CT New Junkie reports

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Bridgeport filed a federal lawsuit against two state ethics officials Friday after the officials told the church it needs to register as a lobbyist to hold rallies at the state Capitol and use its Web site to oppose legislation.

The lawsuit claims that the diocese was compelled to “oppose unconstitutional legislation that struck at its right of religious self-governance,” when it undertook the action the state officials deemed to be lobbying.

The two defendants, Thomas Jones and Carol Carson, from the Office of State Ethics were unable to be reached for comment Friday evening.

The legislation, which drew the church’s ire because it “would have deprived Roman Catholic Bishops and pastors of voting membership on the governing bodies of corporations that control parish property in Connecticut,” was withdrawn before even receiving a public hearing, but heightened tension between the church and the state.

Six weeks after the diocese bused thousands in for a rally on the steps of the state Capitol, it was contacted by Jones who informed it that he was conducting an evaluation to ascertain whether the diocese had violated Connecticut law by failing to register as a lobbyist. The lawsuit says that Jones also informed the diocese that statements on its Web site regarding a bill related to same-sex marriage may also be construed as lobbying.

The threat of civil penalties against the diocese for participating in the rally and conveying its opposition to legislation on its Web site is “chilling” to the diocese’s constitutional rights, the lawsuit alleges.

However, Rep. Chris Caruso of Bridgeport who is a Catholic and is the former chairman of the legislature’s Government Administration and Elections Committee, said the church has a right to rally and assemble and the state has the right to regulate it. He said the church can’t have it both ways.

“If you want to come up and lobby, then you have to be held accountable,” Caruso said. “Give unto Cesar, what is Cesar’s.”

According to the lawsuit Jones sought to find out how much it cost to bus the thousands of Catholics to the Capitol March 11 for a rally against the bill which would change how church finances are governed.

The lawsuit claims that Jones informed the diocese that spending over $2,000 would require it to register as a lobbyist. While Jones conveyed this to the diocese, the lawsuit says he has not referred the matter to the Chief State’s Attorney’s Office for criminal violations of the state’s lobbying statutes, but the diocese “nonetheless faces that possibility.”

The lawsuit is just the latest in friction between the church and the state over a number of issues from same-sex marriage to emergency contraception to the church corporation bill.

What are the legal issues here?  Not clear to me how the Catholic Church is exempt from general laws here, since they don't seem to impose a undue burden on any fundamental rights the Church might have.  It would be nice to know more.  Has this come up before?  How do other states handle it?  If the Catholic Church or none of its subentities has never registered as a lobbyist, how have they done this?

Our kids go to school with the kid of a registered lobbyist (though it is for Common Cause).     

Update #1: at least one Catholic Church has registered as a client of a lobbyist in the city of San Diego, California.  Some states, for instance Idaho, have rules stating that

The following persons are exempt from registering and reporting: ....A person who represents a bona fide church (of which he is a member) solely for the purpose of protecting the constitutional right to the free exercise of religion.

Not clear that CT state law has this exemption -- I assume not, since the suit is in Federal Court and state courts interpret state law.  So this seems to call for an undue burden test and I cannot see how the Diocese of Bridgeport can show that registration is an undue burden on the free exercise of religion for it. 

Representing God at the statehouse: religion and politics in the American states by Edward L. Cleary, Allen D. Hertzke (2005) touches on some of these issues.  It seems state cultures vary a lot, but that Catholic Church dioceses do hire registered lobbyists in many states.  The issue here seems to be if state law can fore a diocese to register as lobbyist itself if its employees do the lobbying directly. 

Ascension Thursday

One of the great days of the Christian calendar.  And a work day right here...

Interreligious Dialog in Germany

The FAZ reports:

Karl Kardinal Lehmann, der frühere hessisch-nassauische Kirchenpräsident Peter Steinacker und Salomon Korn, Vizepräsident des Zentralrats der Juden in Deutschland, werden am 5. Juli den Hessischen Kulturpreis erhalten. Hinter dieser Nachricht verbirgt sich ein kleines deutsches Trauerspiel - oder ein Lehrstück über die gegenwärtige Lage der Idee einer „toleranten, weltoffenen und zukunftsgewandten Perspektive der deutschen Gesellschaft“, wie es das Kuratorium des Kulturpreises ausdrückt. Denn es fehlt ein Vertreter des Islam, den man ursprünglich ins Auge gefasst hatte.

Im Dezember des vergangenen Jahres las man die ersten Meldungen über den Preis, der am 22. März verliehen werden sollte. Darin stand noch der Name von Fuat Sezgin, einem hochverdienten Wissenschaftshistoriker, der an der Frankfurter Universität Quellen der arabischen Naturwissenschaft analysiert und herausgibt. Aber Sezgin zog sich, wie das Kuratorium des Kulturpreises nun bekanntgab, auf eigenen Wunsch zurück. Aber auch die zweite Wahl hatte sehr gute Gründe für sich: sie fiel auf den Schriftsteller und Publizisten Navid Kermani. Kermani ist ein Autor von hoher literarischer Sensibilität - und das Preiskuratorium hätte sich keinen besseren Träger für die Auszeichung suchen können.

Meditation über das Kreuz

In Rom hatte Kermani einen Artikel für die „Neue Zürcher Zeitung“ verfasst, der zum Stein des Anstoßes werden sollte. Es handelte sich um eine Meditation über das Kreuz, in der Betrachtung von Guido Renis Altarbild in der römischen Basilika San Lorenzo in Lucina. Für die Muslime, die Jesus als Propheten anerkennen, aber von einer Sohnschaft nichts wissen wollen und den qualvollen Tod für einen bloßen Schein erklären, stellt das Kreuz eine große Herausforderung dar. Und von dieser sprach Kermani in sehr deutlichen Worten in seinem Artikel: „Kreuzen gegenüber bin ich prinzipiell negativ eingestellt.“ Aber seine Ablehnung der „Kreuzestheologie“, die er in scharfe Worte fasste, war doch nur der Anfang einer Gedankenbewegung. Er las aus den Worten des sterbenden Christus - „warum hast du mich verlassen?“ - etwas wie eine Klage, vielleicht eine Anklage im Namen der Menschheit gegen die Gottheit. Und plötzlich fand er vor dem Altarbild „den Anblick so berückend, so voller Segen, dass ich am liebsten nicht mehr aufgestanden wäre. Erstmals dachte ich: Ich - nicht nur: man -, ich könnte an ein Kreuz glauben.“

Aber nun begann der interreligiöse Dialog, den man doch fördern wollte, zu stottern. Kardinal Lehmann und Peter Steinacker fanden in Kermanis Gedankengang nicht die kühnen Reflexionen eines Muslims, der vielleicht nahe daran war, an seinem eigenen Bekenntnis irre zu werden, sondern einen „so fundamentalen und unversöhnlichen Angriff auf das Kreuz als zentrales Symbol des christlichen Glaubens“, dass sie den Preis bei gleichzeitiger Vergabe an Kermani nicht annehmen wollten.

Nun hat man entschieden, den Preis den beiden Christen und Salomon Korn zu verleihen. Kermani erfuhr erst durch einen Anruf der F.A.Z., dass er inzwischen gestrichen war - was nicht für jene Kultur des „Respekts“ spricht, in deren Namen man zu handeln vorgibt. Am 5. Juli wird die Auszeichnung verliehen. Der vielbeschworene „Dialog“ hat sich diesmal selbst ad absurdum geführt, indem sich zeigt, wie wenig gerade seine lautstärksten Vertreter, zu denen Kardinal Lehmann und Peter Steinacker nun einmal gehören, in Wahrheit zu ihm bereit sind. Es gibt da ein paar gute Leute, die Freunde der allgemeinen Toleranz und des Friedens. Diese guten Leute scheinen zu glauben, dass ein Gespräch dann besonders fruchtbar ist, wenn von Anfang an alle einer Meinung sind.

Too bad they found a prominent Jewish German to substitute for a Muslim German. Oops, that not what happened: Fuat Sezgin refused to accept the prize with Salomon Korn in protest over what Korn had written about the Gaza war. 

Here is the offending NZZ article.   The offensive phrasing seems to be, not quoted by the FAZ, the bolding below:

Für mich formuliere ich die Ablehnung der Kreuzestheologie drastischer: Gotteslästerung und Idolatrie.  

written after explaining that

Gewiss stösst mir die Lust, die katholische Darstellungen seit der Renaissance an Jesu Leiden haben, auch deshalb so auf, weil ich es von der Schia kenne und nicht kenne. Ich kenne es, weil das Martyrium dort genauso exzessiv bis hin zum Pornografischen zelebriert wird, und ich kenne es nicht, weil genau dieser Aspekt der Schia in Grossvaters Glauben, der mehr als jeder andere Bezugspunkt meine eigene religiöse Erziehung bestimmt hat, wie ich bei der Lektüre seiner Memoiren feststelle, keine Rolle spielte, ja als Volks- und Aberglauben abgelehnt wurde, der die Menschen davon abbringe, die Welt zu verbessern, statt nur ihren Zustand zu beklagen.

Kreuzen gegenüber bin ich prinzipiell negativ eingestellt. Nicht, dass ich die Menschen, die zum Kreuz beten, weniger respektiere als andere betende Menschen. Es ist kein Vorwurf. Es ist eine Absage. Gerade weil ich ernst nehme, was es darstellt, lehne ich das Kreuz rundherum ab. Nebenbei finde ich die Hypostasierung des Schmerzes barbarisch, körperfeindlich, ein Undank gegenüber der Schöpfung, über die wir uns freuen, die wir geniessen sollen, auf dass wir den Schöpfer erkennen.  Ich kann im Herzen verstehen, warum Judentum und Islam die Kreuzigung ablehnen. Sie tun es ja höflich, viel zu höflich, wie mir manchmal erscheint, wenn ich Christen die Trinität erklären höre und die Wiederauferstehung und dass Jesus für unsere Sünden gestorben sei. Der Koran sagt, dass ein anderer gekreuzigt worden sei. Jesus sei entkommen.

Nope, we can't have a cardinal or Kirchenpräsident stand on the same stage with somebody who writes that. Or the FAZ is leaving out important context. 

The NZZ also reports, in particular about Cardinal Lehmann's stance:

[U]nter Verweis auf den NZZ-Artikel schrieb der Bischof (oder sein Sekretär) einen harschen Brief an die Staatskanzlei. Glauben wir einem, der den Brief gelesen hat, so stand dem Sinne nach darin: Die Äusserungen Kermanis über das Kreuz Christi seien von einer derart schockierenden religiösen Intoleranz, dass es dem Kardinal unmöglich sei, in Gemeinschaft mit Kermani aufzutreten und den gleichen Preis entgegenzunehmen. ....

Unsere Bitte um Klärung, wodurch genau sich Navid Kermani als Preisträger disqualifiziere, beschied das Bistum abschlägig: «Kardinal Lehmann wird zu Ihrer Anfrage keine Erklärung abgeben», teilte man uns schriftlich mit. Wir sollten uns an die Hessische Staatskanzlei als Zuständige wenden. Die brach ihr Schweigen gestern am späten Nachmittag und gab bekannt, dass sie Navid Kermani dem bischöflichen Einspruch opfert (freilich drückt man es diplomatischer aus). Den Brüskierten eher zu informieren als die Presse, hielt die Staatskanzlei nicht für nötig.

Update #1: Deutschlandradio interviews on of the peace prize jury members, Helmut Seemann:

Karkowsky: Und das wollen wir noch mal erklären. Sie hören Helmut Seemann, den Präsidenten der Stiftung Weimarer Klassik, er sitzt in der Jury des Hessischen Kulturpreises, hat die Preisträger mit ausgesucht. Herr Seemann, Navid Kermani wurde ja vor allen Dingen von Kardinal Lehmann abgelehnt, weil er sich in der "Neuen Zürcher Zeitung" kritisch über das christliche Symbol des Kreuzes geäußert hat. Ich zitiere: "Gerade weil ich ernst nehme, was es darstellt, lehne ich das Kreuz rundherum ab. Nebenbei finde ich die Hypostasierung des Schmerzes barbarisch, körperfeindlich, ein Undank gegenüber der Schöpfung." Weiter sagt dann Kermani sehr differenziert, ihn stört die Anbetung des Schmerzes auch im schiitischen Islam. Zitat: "Ich kenne es, weil das Martyrium dort genauso exzessiv bis hin zum Pornografischen zelebriert wird." Und am Ende des Textes versöhnt er sich sogar mit der berückenden Darstellung Jesu am Kreuz, wie in Guido Reni auf seinem Gemälde "Kreuzigung" zeigt, und sagt: "Erstmals dachte ich: Ich - nicht nur man - könnte an ein Kreuz glauben." Finden Sie diesen Text anstößig im Sinne Kardinal Lehmanns?

Seemann: Nein, ich habe eine vollkommen andere Haltung dazu, was deswegen - ich sage das sonst nie, aber in dem Zusammenhang muss ich es, fürchte ich, jetzt doch sagen -, ich selber katholisch bin und deswegen über die Äußerungen von Karl Kardinal Lehmann wirklich entsetzt bin, weil sie zum Ausdruck bringen, dass er einen Text nicht verstehen kann. Und das finde ich eine ganz schlimme Sache, wenn es um einen Kulturpreis geht, wiederum. Denn hier sehen wir einen Menschen, der sich über ein Ärgernis - und das Kreuz ist gerade auch nach christlichem Verständnis ein Ärgernis - ärgert und nun im Anblick der Kunst sich mit diesem Ärgernis in einer sehr differenzierten Form verständigt, vielleicht sogar aussöhnt, das bleibt ein bisschen offen. Das ist ein hochinteressanter Text auf der Grenze zwischen Religion und Kultur und ist deswegen exakt das, worum es eigentlich bei diesem Preis gehen müsste. Und das wird nun von einem anderen Preisträger, von dem ich geglaubt hätte, dass er hermeneutisch über die Grundausstattung eines kulturellen Menschen verfügt, wird dies zum Anlass genommen, sich gegen Kermani auszusprechen. Ich finde das wirklich ganz schlimm. Und ich kann mir auch eigentlich nicht vorstellen, dass es der einzige Grund ist, der Kardinal Lehmann leitet, denn dieser Text ist nach meiner Meinung nicht in irgendeiner Weise blasphemisch, sondern er bringt etwas zum Ausdruck, was zum Beispiel auch Goethe zum Ausdruck gebracht hat. Ich bin ziemlich sicher, Kardinal Lehmann würde einen Goethe-Preis nicht deswegen nicht annehmen, weil Goethe in bestimmten Zusammenhängen schon auch mal vom Scheißkreuz spricht. Das kann ärgerlich sein und das ist es auch in der Geschichte immer wieder gewesen, und schon Jesus Christus hat es im Evangelium als Ärgernis benannt. Das heißt, an welcher Stelle des Verstehens stehen wir denn hier?

Karkowsky: Wie verhält sich denn die Jury jetzt? Die könnte ja im Prinzip komplett zurücktreten, weil die Idee eines Toleranzpreises der Religionen mit diesen Preisträgern nicht möglich war. Stattdessen findet die Preisverleihung statt, und zwar nur mit zwei Christen und einem Juden. Ist das richtig so?

Seemann: Ja, also das ist jetzt eine politische Entscheidung, die Ministerpräsident Koch so vorgeschlagen hat.

Not clear to me what the Goethe reference here is. 

Update #2: There is still the question why both Steinacker and Lehmann are doing this, thought it isn't too puzzling the Koch supports their position.  Playing to the base would be the obvious political interpretation -- but it is still interesting the both of them seem to see mobilizing a shrinking base as their best option and are willing to pay for this stance in public opinion.   

Biblical Inerrancy Again

Not that I'm going to say very much about it here and now, but it is quite impressive how well more literal types of Christianity do given their source material.  For instance, what does do with one of the central passages at the end of Matthew, at 24:29-35, especially 24:34?  Jesus speaking to the disciples:

29 But immediately after the tribulation of those days THE SUN WILL BE DARKENED, AND THE MOON WILL NOT GIVE ITS LIGHT, AND THE STARS WILL FALL from the sky, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

30 And then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the SON OF MAN COMING ON THE CLOUDS OF THE SKY with power and great glory.

31 And He will send forth His angels with A GREAT TRUMPET and THEY WILL GATHER TOGETHER His elect from the four winds, from one end of the sky to the other.

32 Now learn the parable from the fig tree: when its branch has already become tender and puts forth its leaves, you know that summer is near;

33 so, you too, when you see all these things, recognize that He is near, right at the door.

34 Truly I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place.

35 Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will not pass away.

For the most part it seems like fundamentalists just ignore 34 and focus on the immediately subsequent

36 But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone.

37 For the coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah.

38 For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark,

39 and they did not understand until the flood came and took them all away; so will the coming of the Son of Man be.

40 Then there will be two men in the field; one will be taken and one will be left.

41 Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken and one will be left.

Okaaay, just focus on 36 which talks about nobody knowing 'day and hour' but not 34 which talks about 'this generation'.  Or you get the otherwise, as I understand, biblically inerrant literalist  and bestselling Tim LaHaye reasoning along the lines of 'well in this case we cannot take the bible quoting Jesus seriously since, well, that would be unfortunate for us':

Now, why does “this generation” in Matthew 24:34 (as well as Mark 13:30 and Luke 21:32), not refer to Christ’s contemporaries? Because the governing referent to “this generation” is “all these things.” Since Jesus is giving an extended prophetic discourse on future events, one must first determine the nature of “all these things” prophesied in verses 4 through 31 to know what generation Christ is referring to. Since “all these things” did not take place in the first century, then the generation whom Christ speaks of must still be future. It’s as simple as that. (Tim LaHaye and Thomas Ice, The End Times Controversy [Eugene, OR: Harvest House Publishers, 2003], p. 92.)

It would be funny if it weren't so sad. 

And I'm just trying to quickly read some Bart Ehrman books, as suggested by Jody.  And I keep having these jaw dropping moments...don't let these guys anywhere near power or you'll soon learn that no legal norms mean what they seem to mean because they know what they actually mean (and even that changes quickly and opportunistically)...and then they complain a lot about activist liberal judges making up stuff about the law...

Update #1: And when things start becoming really difficult aroud 100 CE with 'this generation will not pass away until all these things take place' -- since the generation of the apostles is pretty much all dead -- you can just insert the backdated and pseudepigraphic Second Epistle of Peter with its 3:9

The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. 

Worshiping your own Ignorance

I do have the anti-theist Less Wrong and Overcoming Bias on my blog reader, and Less Wrong today points to an old Overcoming Bias post today, specifically quoting:

If I am ignorant about a phenomenon, that is a fact about my own state of mind, not a fact about the phenomenon itself. A phenomenon can seem mysterious to some particular person.  There are no phenomena which are mysterious of themselves. To worship a phenomenon because it seems so wonderfully mysterious, is to worship your own ignorance.

Not there is necessarily anything wrong with that, especially given the alternative objects of worship. 

Biblical Inerrancy as Legal Positivism?

Biblical inerrancy sure looks like a version of legal positivism applied to Christianity.  A bit of an ironic situation given the strident critiques and denunciations of legal positivism in some religious circles.

Update #1:  Riever T., who I don't know, comments:

Given the argument, wouldn't it also be appropriate to posit, for example, that orthodox judaism and much of islam also constitute applications of legal positivism? If not, then why not? Are the various branches of xianity that embrace inerrancy unique in some significant way?

One issue is that I didn't lay out an argument above but just stated my current impression of one possible interpretation of biblical inerrancy given my recent reading.  And that reading has been on Christian self-understandings, not Islamic or Jewish self-understandings.  I suspect the analogy between biblical inerrancy as understood for Christianity works better than for the analagous claims in Islam or in Judaism, but I'd need to explain that further.  And it might work for Islam and Judaism as well, but it depends what 'works' means, which I would need to spell out.  

Finally, the irony in 'biblical inerrancy as legal positivism' comes in part from the energy the Catholic Church spends denouncing legal positivism and positing itself as the necessary cure for this ill, which the other two faiths probably have broader targets for their self-justification in contemporary society.

Mostly just throwing a thought out here. 

The Atheist Overcount in Britain

via MR, the BBC reports:

About 390,000 people listed their religion as Jedi in the 2001 Census for England and Wales. In Scotland the figure was a reported 14,000.

The Office for National Statistics did not recognise it as a separate category, and incorporated followers of Jedi with atheists.

Testimony of Dr. E. Calvin Beisner to the Subcommittee on Energy and Environment of the Committee on Energy and Commerce of the United States House of Representatives Wednesday, March 25, 2009

via Deltoid, the Testimony of Dr. E. Calvin Beisner to the Subcommittee on Energy and Environment of the Committee on Energy and Commerce of the United States House of Representatives Wednesday, March 25, 2009, which I ran across since I was googling for information on today's Climate Change hearings with Al Gore and Newt Gingrich:

I am convinced that policies meant to reduce alleged carbon dioxide-induced global warming will be destructive, devising mischief by decree. As Lord Monckton points out in his own testimony today, the best, most recent empirical scientific discoveries have shown that even the mid-range scenarios of the IPCC exaggerate the warming effect of increased CO2 by at least seven times; atmospheric CO2 concentration is rising at a fraction of the rate forecast by the IPCC; and Earth has been cooling for the last seven years at a rate of 3.5F per century.

These findings, opposite the expectations of the IPCC, are consistent with the Biblical world view. The naturalist, atheistic world view sees Earth and all its ecosystems as the result of chance processes and therefore inherently unstable and fragile, vulnerable to enormous harm from tiny causes. The Biblical world view sees Earth and its ecosystems as the effect of a wise God’s creation and providential preservation and therefore robust, resilient, and self-regulating–like the product of any good engineer who ensures that the systems he designs have positive and negative feedback mechanisms to balance each other and prevent small perturbations from setting off a catastrophic cascade of reactions. The IPCC’s work rests on the naturalist, atheistic world view. Every one of its computer climate models, without exception, assumes that positive feedback mechanisms vastly outnumber and outweigh negative feedbacks, which is the root of fears of a runaway greenhouse effect and a “tipping point” beyond which there is no return.

The IPCC exaggerates the rate of carbon buildup because it doesn’t recognize the capacity of Earth’s plants and oceans to absorb vast amounts of carbon from the atmosphere and turn it into the building blocks of life. But that is precisely what has been happening, with wild and cultivated plants growing larger and more numerous because of increased CO2, and raising crop yields (and so lowering food prices. And the IPCC exaggerates the warming effect of CO2 in the atmosphere largely because its computer models all assume that clouds are a positive feedback–that they respond to rising surface temperature by trapping still more heat. But University of Alabama climatologist Roy Spencer, using data from NASA satellites, has shown the opposite: warming clouds diminish as surface temperature rises, allowing more heat to radiate out to space. The system works like a thermostat, keeping surface temperature within a narrow range well suited to human and other life on Earth.

But empirical observation–the very soul of scientific method–has shown otherwise.  The Biblical world view prepares us for just such findings. When God finished His creation, “God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good” (Genesis 1:31). Do you think he would have judged a fragile system biased by unidirectional feedbacks toward destruction that way? No, He would not. Indeed, the global destruction of the Flood required His supernatural intervention (Genesis 6–8), after which He promised Himself, “I will never again curse the ground on account of man . . .; and I will never again destroy every living thing, as I have done. While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease” (Genesis 8:21–22)–the repeated pairs of opposites being the poetic device called merism, implying that God had committed Himself to ensuring that all the cycles needed for human (and other) thriving would continue.

Deltoid comments: "In other words, if climate sensitivity to the doubling of CO2 is 3 degrees, there is no God."  Hm, I think god may just test Beisner's faith -- isn't that what god does?   

My wife comments that her study of the bible shows that god has a long history of smiting societies run by idiots.  God may hate Republicans, which puts us all at risk. 

Update #1: to the extent that Beisner believes in god guaranteed self-regulation of the earth, there are lots of ways this could occur that are quite destructive to normal conceptions of human welfare, such as the plague and economic collapse.  Not to forget war.  Why does this god guaranteed self-regulation have to occur via non-human biological processes (all the extra plant growth) and not the decline of human civilization as punishment for bad stewardship over the earth?  Punishing societies that have deviated from god's plan isn't unheard of in the bible.  Or are we simply relying on the second coming to bail us out if necessary?  

Update #2: What's the deal with Beisner's claim that 

The IPCC exaggerates the rate of carbon buildup because it doesn’t recognize the capacity of Earth’s plants and oceans to absorb vast amounts of carbon from the atmosphere and turn it into the building blocks of life.

The IPCC spends lots of time discussing terrestrial carbon sinks (for instance Chapter 7.3.2 of the 2008 Summary), including plant growth, a difficult to measure and model phenomena with lots of heterogeneity across many dimensions.  I could see how Beisner might claim that the IPCC underestimates these carbon sinks, but how can he claim that the IPCC "doesn’t recognize" them? 

What about the claim, often mentioned by Republicans, that

Earth has been cooling for the last seven years at a rate of 3.5F per century.

Even taking the 3.5F per 100 years (i.e. 0.25F over seven years) as true, this does not look to me like a statistically significant deviation from the IPCC's trend warming projections given the variability of global surface temperatures.  For instance, here is the National Climatic Data Center's data on mean world surface temperatures (land and ocean -- it would be worthwhile to look into how these are constructed and sampling errors over time and space, for instance do better sampled locations get more weight?) as a deviation from the 1901-2000 average temperature for each month.  The statistical significance is even less that it appears, since there is, it seems, some positive autocorrelation in temperature even more than a year out, after taking out the trend.  And 3.5F per century sure isn't statistically different than 0F over a seven year period. 

 
Not clear to me what the basis for the claim that

atmospheric CO2 concentration is rising at a fraction of the rate forecast by the IPCC.

I've seen this claim before, but never with much documentation or citation of specific IPCC projections, the main claim being that CO2 concentrations seem to be growing linearly and not exponentially in the last decade or so.  And even if true, the interpretation Beisner puts on it seems odd. 

The Infallible Word of God vs. Cap-and-Trade

via Steve Benen the views of Rep. John Shimkus (R-Ill.):

Belief in the Second Coming of Christ

from Pew --- what about the 21% of Christians who don't know or don't believe?  Is this a Christianity without a Second Coming or a non-believing (social?) Christianity?   Which large organized Christian groups hold this view? It is a bit hard to figure out what Unitarians are supposed to believe, but as the Christian denominations I'd join if I'd had to join one, it is not too surprising to find something along the lines of

We do not await or expect the second coming of Christ to bring about the world of our dreams. We do not rely on the miraculous intervention of God. To the extent that God works in the world, it must be through humanity. The only hands that God has are ours, our hands.

Here is the Pew poll:

Atheist/Jewish Materialism vs. the Catholic Spiritual-Ethical View

I've been obsessing a bit about the current Catholic Church's attack on atheists.  My current state of mind is:

1. The Catholic Church ought to extend its ecumenical process to cover atheists as well, if it hasn't already done so.  The Church's current stance seems driven by caricature and distortion to an extent that isn't generally acceptable in ecumenical relations.  The Church ought to review how it is handling this matter to come up with a more truthful stance that lives up the the Church's aspirations.

2.  It strikes me that the Church's stance on atheism and atheists is reproducing some of the features of Catholic and also Protestant antisemitism in the 19th and first half of the 20th century.  While before 1945 German Christians could get worked up about Jewish Bolshevism as opposed to just Bolshevism, and then use this association to go after all Jews (or at least the annoying ones) in Germany, we now have the Catholic Church talking about atheist Communism and atheist Nationalsocialism, to use this against all atheists (or at least the vocal ones) in Germany.  As for the strengths of the association the Church is constructing here, the association between Communism and Jews is at least as strong as the association between atheists and Nazis (i.e. very partial: some Jews became Communists and Communism was much stronger in their lives than Jewish religious heritage, and most Communists were not Jews, similarly most Nazis were not atheists and those that were atheists were most shaped by Nazism and not atheism). The motives for the Churches and social elites for adopting this constructions of Jews appears in part to be the creation of polarization against a perceived enemy, to better create internal cohesion in the face of a changing environment and internal dissidents ('nationale Sammlungspolitik' before 1945), presenting reaction as the only possible response to social change, not one of many options (i.e. taking socialism and liberalism, both seemingly  compatible with non-reactionary versions of Christianity,  off the table). 

The contrasts drawn between Jews and Christians or Atheists and Christians are very similar, to the extent that I can tell from my limited exposure.  On the one side Jewish materialism or atheist materialism, on the other side the Christian spiritual-ethical world of love, creation and salvation by the one true god.  On the one side Jewish rule-bound clannish materialism or atheist scientistic materialism vs. Christian spiritual universal love.  We also have the contrast between the cosmopolitan Jew or atheist vs. the deeply rooted man with his local organic and necessarily Christian culture.  It would be nice to look into the exact parallels and differences in how these constructions work and where they come from, but it would take some actual reading to do so.  Paul Lagarde seems to be one of the leading lights for these constructions that were picked up widely in the second half of the 19th century.  

3. 19th and 20th century Antisemitism was explicitly conceived as a protest against social change perceived as imposed from the outside on communities and the Jews who took advantage this change to give themselves upward social and economic mobility and access to the public sphere (journalism, science and academia).   Current Catholic anti-atheism seems similarly conceived, as a protest against unjust and externally imposed capitalist and unethical change and the people who defend and promote it, as well as use these changes for upward social and economic mobility and access to the public sphere (journalism, science and academia). 

4. I'm not claiming that the Catholic Church has a history and doctrinal base that necessarily requires it to construct these distorted demonizations of Jews and atheists, but it is a possible construction the Church seems open to.  The Church could go elsewhere as well, I hope.  It might be worth giving it a try, though it might take more work to tread new ground that to rehash the past under a new heading. 

This post clearly needs more work, in particular trying to figure out more what is true beside just being plausible, but I thought I'd put it up.  One final issue: the fact that Christian and German antisemitism ended in a ethical and political disaster for Germany isn't an argument the the Church got its antisemitism fundamentally wrong, it could instead be that only elements malfunctioned in unforeseen circumstances, but that the strategy is actually superior to others available to the Church.  Nor does the analogy I construct above between the structure of antisemitism and anti-atheism, in itself, prove anything about the Church's anti-atheism.  Instead, this is all just a pointer to where to look further. 

The Zentrum Party and the NSDAP

Not that I'm going to write it up now, but Mixa's Easter sermon did inspire me to read around a bit about the Zentrum party in the 1928-33 period, though I'd like to read more.  The party faced a significantly challenging environment, but in terms of how things came out they don't look good, with a turn in a clerical right wing direction by 1928, before the Great Depression, and a tendency towards 'Nationale Sammlungspolitik' in concert with the NSDAP as the other large non-socialist party and a refusal to work with less strong bourgois parties against the NSDAP when push came to shove.  Anti-communism, anti-liberalism and anti-atheism ('Sittlichkeit' and all that, a Volksempfinden shared with large parts of the NSDAP is seems, phrased as anti-Jewish materialism in both cases) the desire to preserve and secure the Church's organizational powers, especially its presence in public schools, came far above support for a failing electoral democracy or a desire to keep the NSDAP out of power by non-democratic means.  At the same time the Church was very aware that the NSDAP was deeply problematic and pronounced bans on Catholics becoming members of the Party, but gave up on this stance and blessed the new order in 1933.  So we have complicity and compromise in the face of a good awareness of evil. 

I can see why things came out this way, but it is deeply ironic to be then subjected to Easter sermons about how the Catholic Church is the foundation for ethical choice while atheists are doomed to evil and error. 

And then there are the post-WWII ratlines to help seemingly bad parts of the Nazi regime establish new identities, run by Catholic clergy pretty openly doing this job.   It would be nice to know more, especially about how these clergy and the Church saw their role and purpose here.  This includes enough people that it is more than a few exceptions, for instance:

• Adolf Eichmann
• Franz Stangl
• Gustav Wagner
• Erich Priebke
• Klaus Barbie
• Edward Roschmann
• Aribert Heim
• Andrija Artuković
• Ante Pavelić
• Walter Rauff
• Alois Brunner
• Josef Mengele

Also it appears lots of connections between Rom and fascists remnants in Croatia. 

Again, I can see how these things happen -- running the Catholic Church in Europe 1914-50 is a hard and difficult job --, but they ought to develop a better story line about what happened than what Mixa is propagating.  This sort of thing makes me wounder how the Church learns, or fails to learn, from its history. 

Atheism in Europe

When the Catholic Church goes after atheism as evil (see Mixa below or Mueller, what appears to be a widespread talking point in the Catholic Church right now), it is no longer going after a small minority.  For instance, from a 2005 Eurobarometer poll, showing believers in god are now a minority in Germany, with 25% not believing in god, with the rest believing in non-Christian god-like forces or refusing the take a stance.  Again, it would be nice to break out West and East Germany.  There are strong age, sex and education gradients in Europe overall, with more young, male and educated atheists, so atheists may now even outnumber theists among the young and educated in Germany (but it would be nice to see the crosstabs for Germany).  So it looks like the Catholic Church may face a losing struggle to in maintaining that Germany is a Christian country with entrenched privileges for the large Christian churches and what most people understand as a fundamentally Christian culture (as opposed to say a post-Christian culture). 

For context, here is Bischof Dr. Gerhard L. Müller trying to claim Germany is a necessarily Christian nation (which suggests why Muslims building mosques is seen as so scary by some):

Unsere Kultur ist eine christliche Kultur. Sie ist aus den Tiefen der Geschichte, aus den christlichen Grundüberzeugungen heraus gewachsen und lebendig in unserer Gegenwart. Unsere Kultur ist nicht eine Zivilisation, die von Technokraten am Reißbrett entworfen worden ist, sondern wir verdanken uns einer geschichtlichen Herkunft und sind durch unsere Vorfahren, ihr Tun, ihre Verkündigung und ihr gelebtes Zeugnis mit unseren Wurzeln verbunden.

Das Christentum in unserem Kulturraum besteht – das ist historisch nachgewiesen – seit dem 3. und 4. Jahrhundert. Die römische Festung Castra Regina, Regensburg, hat über Kaufleute und Soldaten das Christentum aus dem Mittelmeerraum empfangen. Nach dem Zusammenbruch des römischen Reiches ist der christliche Glaube in unserer Heimat aber nicht erloschen. Vielmehr ist er durch große Missionsbischöfe aus der schottischen und angelsächsischen Mission ganz neu in unserer Gegend aufgeblüht – bis hin zur kanonischen Gründung unseres Bistums im Jahre 739 durch den heiligen Bonifatius. So ist unser christlicher Glaube gewachsen und hat die gesamte Kultur geprägt und geformt.

„Kultur“ leitet sich vom lateinischen Verb „colere“ ab, das soviel bedeutet wie „bebauen“. Wir erinnern uns an die symbolisch zu verstehenden, aber als wahr auszulegenden Worte der Hl. Schrift, wo Gott den Menschen am Morgen der Schöpfung in einen Garten hineinsetzt und ihn beauftragt, diesen Garten zu bebauen, zu hegen und zu pflegen (vgl. Gen 2). „Bebauen“ – dieses Wort bezieht sich zuerst auf den Ackerbau. Es beinhaltet meist mühsame Arbeit, damit dem oft so kargen Boden – wie er gerade auch bei uns ist – etwas abgerungen werden kann. „Bauen“ ist aber auch noch tiefer zu verstehen: Gemeint ist das Bauen von schönen Häusern, die Pflege der Landschaft und ähnliches. Wenn man heute morgen von Regensburg hierher nach Tirschenreuth fährt, dann sieht man wie herrlich diese Landschaft ist! Wie die Wälder und Felder wachsen, wie sie blühen, wie das Grün und die leuchtenden Farben der Blumen unser Herz erfreuen. Überall in den Ortschaften steht in der Mitte eine wunderschöne Kirche! Man hört die Kirchenglocken grüßen, wenn man aus dem Auto aussteigt und einen kurzen Weg in den Wald hineingeht. Von überall her klingt es, ist es prächtig und schön. Das alles ist der Ausdruck unserer christlichen Kultur. Die Menschen, die hier ihre Heimat fanden und Wurzeln geschlagen haben, sind sich bewusst, dass sie diese Synthese aus Natur, Kultur und Glauben letztlich dem Wirken Gottes verdanken.

Update #1: Malta, the country with the most religious population in the Europe, still has this in its constitution, Article 2:

(1) The religion of Malta is the Roman Catholic Apostolic

Religion.

(2) The authorities of the Roman Catholic Apostolic Church

have the duty and the right to teach which principles are right and

which are wrong.

(3) Religious teaching of the Roman Catholic Apostolic Faith

shall be provided in all State schools as part of compulsory

education.

"Eine Gesellschaft ohne Gott ist die Hölle auf Erden"

Die Welt reports on bishop Walter Mixa's -- chief Catholic Priest of the Bundeswehr -- Easter sermon:

Der Augsburger Bischof Walter Mixa hat vor einem zunehmend aggressiven Atheismus in Deutschland gewarnt. "Wo Gott geleugnet oder bekämpft wird, da wird bald auch der Mensch und seine Würde geleugnet und missachtet. Eine Gesellschaft ohne Gott ist die Hölle auf Erden", sagte der Militärbischof in seiner Osterpredigt in der Augsburger Marienkathedrale.

Atheisten versuchten die Realität der Auferstehung von den Toten und der Erlösung vom Bösen in das Reich der Mythen und der Fantasie zu schieben. Wer aber dem Menschen den Glauben an Gott nehme, nehme ihm das Wichtigste im Leben, sagte Mixa. Wer den Glauben an den menschgewordenen, am Kreuz gestorbenen und von den Toten auferstandenen Christus leugne, wende sich letztlich gegen das Heil des Menschen.

"Die Unmenschlichkeit des praktizierten Atheismus haben im vergangenen Jahrhundert die gottlosen Regime des Nationalsozialismus und des Kommunismus mit ihren Straflagern, ihrer Geheimpolizei und ihren Massenmorden in grausamer Weise bewiesen", sagte der Augsburger Bischof. Immer seien in diesen Systemen die Christen und die Kirche besonders verfolgt worden.

Auch in der Gegenwart würden durch gottlose Verhaltensweisen in allen Teilen der Welt Menschen wirtschaftlich und moralisch ausgebeutet, wenn etwa Kinder zum Kriegsdienst oder Frauen zur Prostitution gezwungen würden, wenn gerechter Lohn verweigert werde oder Menschen an Hunger sterben müssten. Ohne christlichen Glauben gebe es dauerhaft keine wahre Menschlichkeit, sagte Mixa.

Also

„Ohne Gott ist alles erlaubt“, zitierte Mixa den russischen Dichter Dostojewski. Wo der christliche Glaube schwinde, komme deshalb nicht das „helle Licht irgendeiner fröhlichen Aufklärung“ zum Vorschein.

I'm never sure what to make of stuff like this.  At some level you'd expect the Catholic Church to claim that all atheists are inherently and essentially extremely evil, but still...it does raise the question about what one should do when an institution and its leaders, even or especially if it is because they are confused about how the world works, put you on their enemy list. 

Finally, to be picky (and I'd be happier if I had the full text of the sermon, not just press accounts), what's the deal with 

Immer seien in [den gottlosen Regimen des Nationalsozialismus und des Kommunismus] die Christen und die Kirche besonders verfolgt worden.

What special persecution of Christians as Christians and the Church is Mixa talking about?  I can see incidental persecution of Christians and a general suppression of the autonomy of large non-Party organizations, but 'special' persecution of the Church?  How about the special persecution of the Handwerksverbaende?  I'm sure parts of their leadership were taken down as well. Indeed, the Third Reich seems to have carved out a special zone of autonomy and cooperation with the two main Christan churches, more so than for any other non-Party organizations. 

And since Mixa cannot claim Hitler was a philosophical atheist -- a bad and fallen Catholic maybe, or a charismatic leader of a new form of religion, but that doesn't amount to philosophical atheism--,   Mixa calls Hitler a 'practicing atheist' despite the fact that the appeals in Nazi Germany to faithless rationalism were, well, limited.  Nor is there isn't any evidence I'm aware of that Hitler denied, as Mixa puts it, 

den Glauben an den menschgewordenen, am Kreuz gestorbenen und von den Toten auferstandenen Christus leugnete.  

though there are pretty strong indications that Hitler didn't like what the Catholic Church made of Jesus. Hitler doesn't deny Jesus' divinity, he was going to take it away from the Catholic Church.  But he did not get there by 1945. The vast majority of Nazis were Christians in the two main German Churches and never considered themselves atheists, philosophical or practical. 

Dealing with fascism wasn't the Catholic Churches most glorious hour -- which doesn't make the Church particularly bad compared to other organizations, but it seems odd to try to claim a special heroic victim role here. In 1933 fascism does appear to be seen by the Catholic Church as less of a threat than communism and less bad than the now apparently vanquished liberalism.   In 1933 the Catholic Zentrum party in the Reichstag voted 72 out of 74 for the Ermächtigungsgesetz, providing the biggest pro-Hitler voting block after the NSDAP and a sufficiently large voting block to have voted down the law, with Zentrum suspicion about the NSDAP and Hitler in part overcome by sympathy for their anti-communist actions and in part by promises of Church autonomy in the new regime, as well as a recognition of the new power realities in Germany.  Indeed, I'd not be totally surprised if even by the late 1930s many high level Catholic functionaries still thought of godless liberalism and communism, not fascism, as the main enemy of faith, though by 1937 Hitler seems to be setting off the Church's alarm bells quite strongly, especially as a result of Catholics leaving the Church in Germany, but this is not due to the abolition of democracy in 1933 but rather due to the radicalization of nationalism and the threat this posed the supranational Church in subsequent years. Some more evidence would be nice, but that's my sense of it.   And what was the Church's stance on Franco's Spain?  From all that I know the Church only started complaining about the lack of political parties or lack of electoral democracy after Vatican II. 

See the 1937 Pius XI.'s  Enzyklika Mit brennender Sorge for the Church's complaints at the time.  (Englich version)  The Church does seem quite alarmed by the movement to bring German Catholics into a 'positive German Christianity' beyond Rome. 

To finish, when did electoral democracy become something the Catholic Church deems obligatory or which the Church strongly suggests?   Or does it depend on circumstances -- which would be an understandable view? 

Shorter Mixa: vote for Hitler as a deeply problematic but necessary ally in the struggle against atheist communism in 1933 and then complain about how atheists caused the Nazi problem. I can see how the Catholic Church would support a vote for Hitler in 1933, but don't turn around and then blame me for it. 

Update #1: why not quote Hitler's speech on March 24, 1033, on the passage of the Ermächtigungsgesetz:

Gleichlaufend mit dieser politischen Entgiftung unseres öffentlichen Lebens wird die Reichsregierung eine durchgreifende moralische Sanierung des Volkskörpers vornehmen. Das gesamte Erziehungswesen, Theater, Film, Literatur, Presse, Rundfunk, sie werden alle Mittel zu diesem Zweck sein und demgemäß gewürdigt. Sie haben alle der Erhaltung der im Wesen unseres Volkstums lebenden Ewigkeitswerte zu dienen. Die Kunst wird stets Ausdruck und Spiegel der Sehnsucht und der Wirklichkeit einer Zeit sein. Die weltbürgerliche Beschaulichkeit ist im raschen Entschwinden begriffen. Der Heroismus erhebt sich leidenschaftlich als kommender Gestalter und Führer politischer Schicksale. Es ist Aufgabe der Kunst, Ausdruck dieses bestimmenden Zeitgeistes zu sein. Blut und Rasse werden wieder zur Quelle der künstlerischen Intuition werden. Es ist Aufgabe der Regierung, dafür zu sorgen, daß gerade in einer Zeit beschränkter politischer Macht der innere Lebenswert und der Lebenswille der Nation einen um so gewaltigeren kulturellen Ausdruck finden. Dieser Entschluss verpflichtet zur dankbaren Bewunderung unserer großen Vergangenheit. Auf allen Gebieten unseres geschichtlichen und kulturellen Lebens muss die Brücke von dieser Vergangenheit zur Zukunft geschlagen werden. Die Ehrfurcht vor den großen Männern muss der deutschen Jugend wieder als heiliges Vermächtnis eingeprägt werden. Indem die Regierung entschlossen ist, die politische und moralische Entgiftung unseres öffentlichen Lebens vorzunehmen, schafft und sichert sie die Voraussetzungen für eine wirklich tiefe Einkehr religiösen Lebens. 

Die Vorteile personal-politischer Art, die sich aus Kompromissen mit atheistischen Organisationen ergeben mögen, wiegen nicht annähernd die Folgen auf, die in der Zerstörung allgemeiner sittlicher Grundwerte sichtbar werden. 

Die nationale Regierung sieht in den beiden christlichen Konfessionen die wichtigsten Faktoren zur Erhaltung unseres Volkstums. Sie wird die zwischen ihnen und den Ländern abgeschlossenen Verträge respektieren. Ihre Rechte sollen nicht angetastet werden. Sie erwartet aber und hofft, dass die Arbeit an der nationalen und sittlichen Erneuerung unseres Volkes, die sich die Regierung zur Aufgabe gestellt hat, umgekehrt die gleiche Würdigung erfährt. Sie wird allen anderen Konfessionen in objektiver Gerechtigkeit gegenübertreten. Sie kann aber nicht dulden, dass die Zugehörigkeit zu einer bestimmten Konfession oder einer bestimmten Rasse eine Entbindung von allgemeinen gesetzlichen Verpflichtungen sein könnte oder gar ein Freibrief für straflose Begehung oder Tolerierung von Verbrechen. Die Sorge der Regierung gilt dem aufrichtigen Zusammenleben zwischen Kirche und Staat; der Kampf gegen eine materialistische Weltanschauung, für eine wirkliche Volksgemeinschaft dient ebenso den Interessen der deutschen Nation wie dem Wohl unseres christlichen Glaubens.

Hitler sounds more in concert with Mixa than with materialist atheists to me. 

Update #2: I googled to see reactions to Mixa's speech, and the response is pretty close to 100% negative.  There are potential supporters out there who just post the news report of the speech without comment, but I didn't see any support. 

I do see the comment that Mixa claiming that

Atheisten versuchten die Realität der Auferstehung von den Toten und der Erlösung vom Bösen in das Reich der Mythen und der Fantasie zu schieben.  Wer den Glauben an den menschgewordenen, am Kreuz gestorbenen und von den Toten auferstandenen Christus leugne, wende sich letztlich gegen das Heil des Menschen.

is somewhat anti-semetic and anti-Muslim as well, not just anti-atheist, since Judaism and Islam deny the resurrection of Christ (though not the coming resurrection with the Day of Judgment) as well. 

This whole episode reminds me of the view that institutions seeking the one and only way to human salvation or "das Heil des Menschen" are a dangerous and potentially totalitarian project, be they Nazi, Soviet or Christian. I'm up for institutions trying to solve human problems while leaving dubious 'this way is the only way' salvation projects to the private realm. 

To close, one of those aggressively atheist cartoons:

Religion Update

Less Wrong writes:

Religion is what you get when you push totally for non-evidential memetic success. All ties to reality are essentially cut. As a result, all the other dials can be pushed up to 11. God is not just wise, nice, and powerful - he is all knowing, omnibenificent, and omnipotent. Heaven and Hell are not just pleasant and unpleasant places you can spend a long time in - they are the very best possible and the very worst possible experiences, and for all eternity. Religion doesn't just make people better; it is the sole source of morality. And so on; because all of these things happen "offstage", there's no contradictory evidence when you turn the dials up, so of course they'll end up on the highest settings.

This freedom is theism's defining characteristic. Even the most stupid pseudoscience is to some extent about "evidence": people wouldn't believe in it if they didn't think they had evidence for it, though we now understand the cognitive biases and other effects that lead them to think so. That's why there are no homeopathic cures for amputation.

I'm not sure if this is totally true -- religions seems to face lots of constraints on what they can claim, including evidential ones.  Evidence just doesn't work quite the same the way as in other fields, but the differences are a lot subtler than described here -- what is the best way to describe how it does work? 

Quality of the Catholic Priesthood

Sullivan writes without supporting evidence

The quality of the Catholic priesthood has also drifted downward: the next generation of priests is more orthodox, but also more insular and less engaged with the wider world.

Do we have any evidence on this issue?  Who does enter the priesthood and how did they do in school?