Making Light:  Misanthropy at the grimy end of winter ::: March 27, 2005, 08:47 PM

Nicole J. LeBoeuf-Little:

  ...What gave me pause was, the rebuttal "[You're] wrong" seemed
  aimed, not at a statement about Catholic doctrine, but at Dan Hoey's
  opinion about his own soul.  "You're wrong about what Catholics
  believe" is par for the course; "You're wrong because you disagree
  with Catholic belief" is, however, not something I'm used to reading
  here....

I take the denial of what I know about my own soul--coming as it does
without reasoned argument, and from someone I have never met--to
be a statement of faith.  Not necessarily "You're wrong because you
disagree with Catholic doctrine" but "You're wrong because what you
say denies my deeply-held religious belief".  The distinction is
important because, doctrine to the contrary, most Catholics do not
believe in every doctrinal point taught by the church.  Whatever its
nature, James D. McDonald is welcome to his faith, and I will not argue
with him further on its points, for all my faith in its incorrectness.

I think it might be more polite for him to be more explicit about the
source of a belief based on his faith, but that may be too much to
ask.  Many people cannot distinguish between what they know from
observation and what they know from faith, and there are cases on the
border between these that are hard to categorize.  In addition, I am
not exactly an expert in politeness, so my analysis of this nicety is
suspect.

In sum, I don't hold any animus against JDM, and I rather regret the
somewhat intemperate nature of my outburst.  I felt his statements,
as applied to my soul, to be degrading and false, but I'm sure he
doesn't mean them to be.  And whether or not he does, that's life
in a multisectarian society.