The Theocons
In First Things (Aug./Sept. 2006), Richard John Neuhaus tipped us off about a new book called The Theocons: Secular America Under Siege (Doubleday) by Damon Linker, who was Associate Editor and then Editor of First Things from May 2001 through January 2005 (Neuhaus is Editor in Chief). Neuhaus called Linker’s an “attack book” on First Things and himself. Jeepers-creepers, a mole high up inside First Things. Intrigue. Espionage.
Gotta get this book.
We’ve been quite critical of Neuhaus. We read the book, but it’s largely a dud. Linker’s book was obviously a rush job.
From our point of view, the book is not an “attack book”; in fact, Neuhaus looks good to us in the book, with certain exceptions.
“Theocons” is short for theoconservatives, but in all of our dictionaries, “theoconservative” does not appear. So, what does theocon mean? Is it intended to imply a theocrat or theocracy? But Neuhaus is not a theocrat. He fully supports John Courtney Murray, an advocate of the separation of Church and State, and Neuhaus supports Vatican II’s Dignitatis Humanae, which essentially abandoned the Confessional State and allowed for the separation of Church and State.
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Neuhaus’s plea for the restoration of religious values in the public sphere and for the believing community to act there on the basis of its beliefs is proper and necessary.
Why does neocon George Weigel defend Condi Rice, a pro-war and pro-abortion member of the Bush administration?
He dissents from a basic moral principle of Judeo-Christian, Catholic social teaching: that superfluous wealth must be shared with the poor.