Catholic Lens

    What is your worldview? We don’t use the word “worldview” in common discourse, but perhaps it’s time to introduce and emphasize this term. We frequently discuss religion, politics, morality, and other spheres of our common human experience with one another and in all of the forms of media. However, we often find ourselves talking past one another since we don’t always mean the same thing by these terms and/or the discussion remains at a superficial level. Furthermore, by compartmentalizing these aspects of life, we miss an opportunity to delve into important underlying perspectives, which ought to be openly recognized and fully confronted.

    So what is a worldview? A good working definition is ‘a comprehensive philosophy or conception of reality and of human life’. A key attribute of a worldview is that it is comprehensive. It is the perspective from which our views of politics, morality, etc derive. A worldview has something to say about all of reality, including the most basic questions about what and who we are. For instance, a worldview takes a position on what we are: purely physical organisms produced from an aimless and random process of evolution; unified physical and spiritual beings created in the image of an Almighty, Loving God; or something else.

    So you say you don’t have a worldview? Many of us never really think about our ‘comprehensive conception of reality’. Furthermore, upon reflection, we will quickly find that our thoughts and actions point toward a mixture of worldviews that are sometimes contradictory. Forming, discovering, and coherently living a worldview is a very difficult and lifelong process. However, we must deal with an unavoidable fact – our perspectives and actions can be linked to one or more worldviews, even if they weren’t consciously derived from them. Therefore, whether you consciously think about it or not, you are living out worldview(s) in your daily actions. As a consequence, in a battle for worldviews, each time you act, you are in some small (or large) way taking sides.

    What battle of worldviews? We are in a battle for the dominant worldview of the United States and the western world in the 21st century. We see the polarization manifest itself in various forms, surrounding various issues: right vs. left, secularists versus Christians, pro-life versus "pro-choice", etc, etc. Underpinning this polarization is a steady erosion of the classical western worldview with a replacement by a secular humanist worldview. The classical western worldview, which is that of the founders of our great nation, holds that Almighty God created everything that is (regardless of precisely how he did it), including man. Furthermore, man is a material and spiritual being created out of love and in God’s image and likeness, and as such has a transcendent dignity and a goal of eternal bliss with God. From these foundational worldview tenets, all that we think and do ought to be shaped.

    The opposing worldview holds that all that is, just is. It was not created, but just is. Furthermore, there are no reasons for things. Man is simply a material being, like other material beings, born out of chance. With no transcendent purpose or objective moral guidelines, what we do and think ought to be ordered to the maximization of pleasure and minimization of pain. The notion of human dignity is simply one of pragmatism; society “works better” this way. There is no fundamental reason to assign dignity to any purely material being, including man. Therefore, violation of pragmatically assigned dignity (versus an inalienable, intrinsic dignity) may be necessary to adhere to the principle of maximizing pleasure and minimizing pain.

    Is this too simple a contrast between worldviews? No. There are variations on the two themes; however, these represent the root anthropologies that penetrate all aspects of the human experience and define the battle of worldviews. These anthropological ideas have profound consequences (for each of us personally and for society), even when we don’t consult them before everything we do or say. They are the slow-moving currents that carry us toward their logical conclusion even though we may often temporarily oppose them in small actions.

    We are in a battle. The centuries-old current of the Christian worldview is being overcome by an opposing secular worldview in the western world. The result is that the western world is dying, leaving in it’s wake a very dark, meaningless, and brutal world. The battle between these worldviews is an inherent part of our human existence. There is no sideline in this battle. Nobody can choose or live your worldview for you. Consciously or not, you are living it every day. Is it the one you really believe? Is it the one you want to hand on to generations to come?

    Where do you stand?