The Antidote To Trashy As Classy

I recently read a book called Nobility and Analogous Traditional Elites by Professor Plinio Correa de Oliveira, the founder of Tradition, Family, and Property. It was an interesting work on several fronts.

First, there is the structure. It began with a general discussion of Church social teaching but with a focus on what the author calls the "preferential option for the nobility," which is really just another way of saying the Church's attention to the care and formation of the noble classes for the betterment of society and the salvation of souls. It then moves on to the particular allocutions delivered by Venerable Pius XII to the Italian nobility, as well as comments made by other popes on the same theme. Finally, it moves into a summary of American and Brazilian history from the perspective of the aristocratic types of the citizenry. The rest is largely reference material supporting the overall argument.

Second, that overall argument has enormous implications for our here and now. Professor Correa makes the point that, in any given society, a certain group will inevitably be granted a higher station relative to others. After demonstrating this, he offers that much effort must be exerted to make sure that this group is of a sort that will focus on the common good and be a worthy model to the lower classes. It has a sort of Thorsten Veblenish ring to it in that sense.

Anyways, what we have done in our civilization, is to become so obsessed with egalitarianism, that we have shelved the values of greatness in the common good and instead allowed the worst of every sort to rise into these aristocratic positions, all the while denying that such positions exist.

Think about it. How is it that the Kardashians are still on TV? Why does anyone listen to what someone like Lady GaGa has to say about anything? In what sort of culture are the features of TMZ actually newsworthy? Why are so many professional athletes scumbags, yet worshiped by the masses?

It's because we've traded elevating the virtues of true greatness and the acknowledgement that those who exercise those virtues to a high degree should be honored for the crass, the crude, and the sensational. When that is accomplished, the lower classes choose to reflect that in their own lives and things decay further.

We have aristocrats without the nobility. This is all very important with Pope Francis's pontificate. Yes, the poor are a huge concern, but we so many of the virtues that were formerly associated with poverty have been destroyed by a barren culture that has been spawned and is sustained by our elite class. It is all one huge materialistic morass, with no room for beauty, charity, or even good manners. Perhaps a recollection of the preferential option for the nobility is an unexplored remedy for our current desolation.

On a side note, I'd recommend this book even if I could just get people to read the American history parts, as Professor Correa does a good job of showing what is so often forgotten in the democratic myths ingrained in our worldview. The Founders were elites and expected the nation to be governed by such a class. I know. Shocking, right? Yet, it's amazing how many people completely ignore this in their consideration of our nation's past.