Re: Teilhard de Chardin - new documentary

erik simpson <eastside.erik@gmail.com> wrote:

On 5/18/24 11:24 AM, *Hemidactylus* wrote:

Martin Harran <martinharran@gmail.com> wrote:

(RNS) - In the history of the Catholic Church, too many innovative
thinkers were persecuted before they were accepted and then embraced
by the church.
 
The list includes St. Thomas Aquinas (whose books were burned by the
bishop of Paris), St. Ignatius Loyola (who was investigated by the
Spanish Inquisition) and St. Mary MacKillop (an Australian nun who was
excommunicated by her bishop for uncovering and reporting clergy child
sex abuse).
 
It's not surprising, then, that a French Jesuit scientist, Pierre
Teilhard de Chardin, who tried to bridge the gap between faith and
science, got himself in trouble with church officials and his Jesuit
superiors in the 20th century. Only after his death was he recognized
as the inspired genius that he was.
 
His story is magnificently told in a new PBS documentary, "Teilhard:
Visionary Scientist," which was produced by Frank Frost Productions in
a 13-year labor of love. It took Frank and Mary Frost to four
countries on three continents, a total of 25 locations, and included
more than 35 interviews.
 
[…]
 
"Teilhard: Visionary Scientist" will premiere on Maryland Public
Television on May 19 and be available for national and international
streaming for two years, beginning on May 20, on the free PBS app.
 
https://www.americamagazine.org/arts-culture/2024/05/13/pierre-teilhard-de-chardin-pbs-documentary-247920
 

Will this awkwardness be included in the magnificent retelling?:
“Teilhard has been criticized as incorporating common notions of Social
Darwinism [sic] and scientific racism into his work, along with support for
eugenics,[41] Teilhard sharply criticized the idea of racial equality,
saying in 1929: "Do the yellows—[the Chinese]—have the same human value as
the whites? [Fr.] Licent and many missionaries say that their present
inferiority is due to their long history of Paganism. I'm afraid that this
is only a 'declaration of pastors.' Instead, the cause seems to be the
natural racial foundation…"[41] Too, he said in 1936, "As not all ethnic
groups have the same value, they must be dominated, which does not mean
they must be despised—quite the reverse…In other words, at one and the same
time there should be official recognition of: (1) the primacy/priority of
the earth over nations; (2) the inequality of peoples and races."[41] And
around 1937, he said, "What fundamental attitude…should the advancing wing
of humanity take to fixed or definitely unprogressive ethnical groups? The
earth is a closed and limited surface. To what extent should it tolerate,
racially or nationally, areas of lesser activity? More generally still, how
should we judge the efforts we lavish in all kinds of hospitals on saving
what is so often no more than one of life’s rejects?…To what extent should
not the development of the strong…take precedence over the preservation of
the weak?"[41]
In 1951, Teilhard continued to argue for racial and individual eugenics,
and wrote a strongly worded criticism of the United Nations declaration of
the Equality of Races. He continued to argue for eugenics as late as 1953,
two years before his death.[41] Nevertheless, he has also been defended by
theologian John F. Haught.[42][43]”
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Teilhard_de_Chardin
 
https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/teilhard-eugenics
 
https://ejournals.bc.edu/index.php/ctsa/article/view/11473/9623
 
 
 

These views were (or should have been) anachronistic circa 1950,
although many still subscribe to the notion.  That said, I'm impatient
with "cancellation" of figures from the past for holding views that were
"common knowledge" at the time.  Very few people in the 19th century
would escape being called racist by modern standards.  There is such a
thing as progress, even if it's not always obvious.
 

Well I find this bit of elaboration by John Slattery rather disturbing from
my 2024 perch. Wonder how it went over when it happened (1947):

“Besides their obvious objectionable nature, Teilhard’s views withstand two
troubling tests: first, he defends them boldly in the face of his respected
Christian colleagues who disagree; second, he persists in such views
despite the shocking revelations of what took place in the concentration
camps and death camps of Nazi Germany. One of Teilhard’s early biographers
recounts a 1947 public debate with Gabriel Marcel, the famous French
Catholic existentialist, where Teilhard persists in arguing for forced
eugenical practices:

“Once in a debate with Gabriel Marcel on the subject of ‘Science and
Rationality,’ [Teilhard] shocked his opponent by refusing to permit even
the appalling evidence of the experiments of the doctors of Dachau to
modify his faith in the inevitability of human progress. ‘Man,” [Teilhard]
asserted, ‘to become full man, must have tried everything’ …He added that
since the human species was still so young…the persistence of such evil was
to be expected. ‘Prometheus!’ Marcel had cried…’No,’ replied Teilhard,
‘only man as God has made him.’”

Slattery gives this source: Mary Lukas and Ellen Lukas, Teilhard (Garden
City, New York: Doubleday, 1977): 237-8.

https://religiondispatches.org/pierre-teilhard-de-chardins-legacy-of-eugenics-and-racism-cant-be-ignored/

I wonder if the PBS labor of love will touch any of that.

Of course aside from that I think Gould’s views on the drunkard’s walk,
Modal Bacter, and contingency counter Teilhard’s overarching orthogenetic
teleos bending upward toward Christ as point Omega. YMMV. When I brought
that stuff up recently I was instead presented with a clueless tangent into
Gould’s much less appealing NOMA idea.