Or rather Orwell vs. God: a fascinating piece in The Spectator about Orwell's mixture of fascination and hostility towards Christianity. Thanks to Marianne, who linked to it in the comments on the previous post.
Orwell and God
6 responses to “Orwell and God”
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Orwell said:
‘If you talk to a thoughtful Christian, Catholic or Anglican,’ he wrote in 1944, ‘you often find yourself laughed at for being so ignorant as to suppose that anyone ever took the doctrines of the Catholic Church literally… [Those] who cling to the letter of the Creeds while reading into them meanings they were never meant to have, and who snigger at anyone simple enough to believe that the Fathers of the Church meant what they said, are simply raising smokescreens to conceal their own disbelief from themselves.’
Gosh! Is he speaking of “Spirit of Vatican 2” types (prior to V2, of course). -
Not that Orwell seemed any more favourably inclined towards Catholics such as Hilaire Belloc and G.K. Chesterton, who most certainly did believe and uphold the doctrines of the Church. These were men, he maintained, who had prostituted their intellectual integrity in order to turn out propaganda for their faith. In particular, the solid Englishman in Orwell recoiled from Belloc’s and Chesterton’s idealisation of Latin countries, especially France, which they presented as ‘a land of Catholic peasants incessantly singing the Marseillaise over glasses of red wine’.
If I said that this passage makes me chuckle, would that make me a Bad Person?
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With his penchant for seeing every question through a political eye, Orwell fastened upon what he discerned as a marked pro-fascist streak within the Church. In his mind religious dogmatics and right-wing dictatorships were indissolubly linked.
Is this not somewhat back to front? Why look at everything through a political eye when one could look at it through a philosophical or theological eye?
Suppose we made the defensible statement that the state is always confessional, that Caesar is always a believer in some kind of creed, wouldn’t that account for the “fascism” and “propaganda” of the Church? -
These were men, he maintained, who had prostituted their intellectual integrity in order to turn out propaganda for their faith.
Really? Did Orwell really think this? Does anyone else here agree? I can’t quite see it myself. -
Orwell took an equally jaundiced view of the Church’s role in domestic politics. The Catholic quest for salvation implies liberty of choice, which is extended to include the right to hold property. Certainly the rich are called to repentance; in sober reality, however, they do not repent: ‘in this matter,’ Orwell drily observed, ‘Catholic capitalists do not seem to be perceptibly different from the others.’ Indeed he suggested that, where a surfeit of worldly goods is concerned, ‘religious belief is frequently a psychological device to avoid repentance’.
But, George! Did you not read the Gospel about camels and needles? Did you not consider the practical outcome of the Doctrine of Original Sin, even for Catholics, and even though we are indeed capable of being perfected through the Sacraments? Is there any great distinction in having a jaundiced view about the actions of particular Catholics? -
I’m not at liberty to comment at any length right now, but
1) the “spirit of VII” was definitely around well before it flowered.
2) looking at things through a political eye was sort of a basic limitation of Orwell’s, I think. However, at least in the case of Spain he was right about the Church’s alliance with a right-wing dictatorship or would-be dictatorship, not precisely a fascist one in the pure ideological sense, but in alliance with German and Italian fascists. In general it seems the Church tended to be anti-socialist and really anti-communist, so right-wing at least in that sense.
3) I think the stuff about C-B prostituting their intellects is complete balderdash.
4) Surely it’s just as likely true, probably more so, to say lack of “religious belief is frequently a psychological device to avoid repentance.”
Light On Dark Water 
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