Live not by Lies

I remember a time when you could publish words like this by Alexander Solzhenitsyn and people would just nod because, you know, duh. However, now that Catholics have (with their customary anti-charism of discernment) foolishly hitched their prolife wagon to Lying for Jesus and even more foolish decided that those who question this stupid move are Enemies of the Church who want babies to die, there is always a significant percentage of nervous lip lickers who wonder what my “agenda” is for saying “lying is bad” and if I’m “on the right side” in saying we shouldn’t lie. Why, I even have a deacon who is (I am not making this up) threatening to write my bishop and try to get him to adjudicate a combox dispute and condemn me for saying I think this is true:

2485 By its very nature, lying is to be condemned. It is a profanation of speech, whereas the purpose of speech is to communicate known truth to others. The deliberate intention of leading a neighbor into error by saying things contrary to the truth constitutes a failure in justice and charity. The culpability is greater when the intention of deceiving entails the risk of deadly consequences for those who are led astray.

For my part, I would love to be a fly on the wall should that call for an Episcopal Internet Inquisition against me really wind up in my bishop’s hands. After all, what better things does he have to do than leap into a defense of lying against some layman in his diocese he probably couldn’t remember if his life depended on it?

For those in the reality-based community of the faith, let me recommend we all stop speculating on my role in the Great Conspiracy and focus on Solzhenitsyn’s words, recalling a dim time in the past when “faithful conservative Catholics” didn’t feel the need to concoct elaborate sophistries in favor of lying, just to prop up another folk hero’s Alinsky tactics.