Jordan Cooper, SSPX, and the Collapse of Civilisation

https://justandsinner.libsyn.com/a-response-to-an-sspx-priest-on-luther

In this podcast Cooper provides a capable defense of Luther and his legacy and offers some helpful critiques of Roman Catholicism and the Protestant Reformation's opposition to it.

But in terms of his arguments and interactions with the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) apologist, he falls into a series of non-sequiturs and struggles to explain how Luther did not play a role in the Traditionalist narrative regarding the collapse of the West. Cooper tends to focus narrowly on Luther and questions of justification and yet largely misses the critical point made by Traditionalists – that Luther and the Protestant Reformation destroyed the social consensus, the epistemological 'glue' that held the West together.

Expanding on the question of justification, Cooper focuses on antinomianism and the moral collapse of society but this isn't the primary issue. And we all know Luther stood with the princes in the crushing of the German Peasant's Revolt. For Traditionalists the problem was Luther unleashed epistemological chaos and once society was broken it couldn't be put back together again. The ensuing chaos of the next century forever shattered Christendom and while the Holy Roman Empire would survive until 1806, it was effectively dead as of 1648. It no longer possessed any catholicity as Protestantism was now firmly entrenched and with the rise of über-Protestant Prussia, the entire German world was sundered.

From the standpoint of Traditionalists it was this fallout from the Reformation that led to new epistemological inquiries, new political theories, and the rise of science – all of these forces tending toward secularisation. It's an oversimplified reading but they do have a point.

This is not to concede anything to Roman Catholicism which has been a false church for well over one-thousand years. Christendom is an error, a heretical manifestation and a vile parody of Christ's Kingdom. New Testament Christians do not lament its fall. But in terms of history, Luther and the Reformation did play their part in sowing the seeds of its destruction. This is troubling for the children of the Magisterial Reformation because like Traditionalist Catholics they glory in Christendom, root their identities in it, and want to see it restored and flourishing. It's too bitter of a pill to swallow to admit their movement played a significant role in creating the conditions for its collapse.

The Roman argument though valid to a point is also guilty of reductionism. They can't blame it all on Luther because he appeared in a context – a very Catholic context. Apart from the Renaissance, the fallout from The Great Schism (which was still being felt a century after its 1415 resolution), and late medieval Nominalism – there would have been no context for Luther and the Magisterial Reformation. These things all go to together. Some realize the Luther angle is too reductionist and thus they make Ockham the great villain. There is much that can be criticized with regard to Ockham, and this especially depends on how one understands what he was trying to do. Was he trying to dismantle Christendom and the basis for philosophical knowledge? Some see it that way. Others argue that he was at war with Scholasticism and the way it had been used but his purpose was not to undermine the basis of the Christian faith – rather to reorient it in supernaturalist terms.

Regardless, Ockham cannot be wholly blamed either. The Gregorian Reforms led to the Imperial Papacy which was resented by large sections of the political order within Europe. This led to social, political, and theological tensions.

Scholasticism was exhausted and being unbiblical was bound to ultimately collapse. As I have long argued, such epistemological approaches will always self-destruct in the end. Their methodology is eventually turned in upon itself and it begins to break down internally.

Society was changing, the nature of knowledge was changing, economics were rapidly changing, and accompanying these dynamics were phenomena such as increased trade, voyages of discovery (and the finding of the New World), and knowledge flowing into Europe from the Islamic and collapsing Byzantine worlds. There were protest movements before Luther and yet with the events subsequent to 1517, the formula proved effective. The combination of factors, including the political dynamics between Rome and the Empire – all of these things allowed Luther to succeed and the already extant tensions and changes to take root.

I think Cooper demonstrates that for those committed to the Magisterial Reformation this question of the Reformation's sundering of Christendom is a thorny problem to say the least. I think strong arguments can be made from the Catholic side.

The response is not to defend Luther but rather to debunk the assumptions – the premise of the argument over the fiction of Christendom. I say fiction in terms of the claims of Christendom when compared and contrasted with New Testament doctrine. It was a historical and cultural reality albeit unbiblical to its core. This is where everything goes sideways and becomes confused and the arguments become meaningless as the parties effectively duel over a rotten corpse.

I have digested these Catholic arguments for years and reflected on them. They have a socio-historical point and yet they're still wrong in terms of New Testament doctrine. And yet this would be one of those points that a proto-Protestant position can actually find more resonance with the Catholic world than that of the Magisterial Protestant. We too lament the secularism that emerged in the wake of the Magisterial Reformation. The world it created (by design or inadvertently) of republics, capitalism, and the scientific worldview which functions as materialistic atheism in the day to day life of the West must be condemned. But the answer isn't found with Rome, but in a pre-modern world that embraced supernaturalism, and a Christianity that took seriously the call to a pilgrim-Kingdom life.

I look forward to Cooper's follow up on this topic. It's an interesting discussion. I don't usually agree with him but on points such as this, I'm interested to hear what he has to say.

There's a warning contained in this discussion. Though the breakup of Christendom is not the issue of our day – we too are witnessing a collapse in social consensus. In seventeenth century Europe this reality set within a particular political context led to the Thirty Years War – a European civil war. While the consensus of our day was never Christian to begin with, it did in its own limited capacity hold society together. We're witnessing its collapse. As outsiders we don't lament this as some Christians do. However, wherever we stand on these issues we must live within this chaos, raise our children in its context, and if civil war comes, we will suffer in its wake.