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Introduction

Robert P. George is regarded as one of the greatest intellects of the twenty-first century. From popular-level organizations such as the New York Times to representatives of the most prestigious academic institutions in the world, the overwhelming consensus is that Robert P. George is sui generis.[1] During his time as a student, George amassed a total of five degrees over the duration of tenure at Swarthmore College, Harvard University, and Oxford University. Up to this point in his career as an American political philosopher, George has received the Presidential Citizens Medal, the Bradley Prize for Intellectual and Civic Achievement, and the Canterbury Medal of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty. He currently serves as the McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University and chairs the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom. It is difficult to conceptualize the accomplishments that George has experienced over the duration of his academic and professional career or to adequately convey the degree of respect George demands as a preeminent scholar. Each of these conclusions is duly justified upon surveying the corpus of the updated and expanded edition of George’s groundbreaking book, Conscience and Its Enemies: Confronting the Dogmas of Liberal Secularism.

Summary 

An anthology of 32 select essays, this volume addresses a multitude of “disputed, fundamental values and moral principles” that are equally germane to conservative-minded and liberal-minded Americans (3). From the outset of the introduction chapter, George clearly articulates the thesis that undergirds and unifies each of the essays that were chosen for this literary work. There are two closely entwined dimensions to George’s thesis; the second dimension logically flowing from the first. 

1. There is a truth all too rarely adverted to in contemporary “culture war” debates—namely, that deep philosophical ideas have unavoidable and sometimes quite profound implications for public policy and public life. Anyone who takes a position on, say, the ethics of abortion and euthanasia, or the meaning and proper definition of marriage, is making philosophical (metaphysical and moral) assumptions—assumptions that are contested by people on the other side of the debate. The temptation, of course, is to suppose that “I’m not making any controversial assumptions; only the people on the other side are doing that.” But this is absurd. All of us make philosophical assumptions—about the human good, human nature, human dignity, and many other crucial matters. One objective of this book is to show that these assumptions—our own assumptions, not just the other guy’s—have important consequences, and that we should all be prepared to examine them critically (4).

2. In formal debates and informal conversations with my friends and colleagues at Princeton University, other scholars, public intellectuals, and government officials, I have found that secular liberal views are so widespread as to go largely unquestioned. As a result, many in these elite circles yield to the temptation to believe that anyone who disagrees with them is a bigot or a religious fundamentalist. Reason and science, they confidently believe, are on their side. With this book, I aim to expose the emptiness of that belief. I make no secret of the fact that I am a Christian or that on the most divisive moral issues I make common cause with devout Jews, Muslims, and other people of faith. But in these essays, I do not base my arguments on theological claims or religious authority. As we will see, human embryology, developmental biology, and other scientific fields have established certain undeniable facts that challenge the passionately held moral convictions of secular liberals. There is also a long philosophical and moral tradition—one that extends back to ancient thinkers untouched by Jewish or Christian revelation—that supports the positions of those who supposedly have no rational basis for their views (5-6).

On the basis of George’s two-pronged thesis, it can be deduced that every essay contained in this anthology is designed to promote awareness about the philosophical assumptions that are often taken for granted by those who embrace worldviews of liberal secularism and conservatism. In doing so, it is clear that George believes the case he makes from a conservative worldview provides a more philosophically and scientifically satisfying perspective of how Americans should think about the “disputed fundamental values and moral principles” within contemporary society (3). Although George devotes ample space to sharing his opinions on the subjects of American government (Part 1), the sanctity of human life (Part 3), and critical analyses of prominent twentieth/twenty-first-century thinkers (Part 4), he allocates the bulk of his attention to discussing the subjects of natural law, marriage, and human sexuality from a politically conservative, philosophically Christian worldview (Part 2). Due to the interconnectedness and polarizing nature of those topics, it is no surprise to see them comprise the majority of George’s attention in this volume. 

Critical Evaluation 

Given George’s concentration of over 100 pages to the subjects recorded in Part 2, the quality of this literary work will largely be judged on how well his thesis is expounded throughout this portion of the volume. As such, it is imperative to discern if George’s depiction of natural law, marriage, and human sexuality is more philosophically and scientifically satisfying than the alternatives espoused in liberal secularism. Despite his self-identification as a Roman Catholic, Robert P. George espouses views of natural law, marriage, and human sexuality that share continuity with the broader umbrella of historic Eastern Orthodoxy and Protestantism.

On Natural Law

Natural-law theorists do not deny that God can reveal moral truths, and most believe that God has chosen to reveal many such truths. But natural-law theorists also affirm that many moral truths, including some that are revealed, can also be grasped by ethical reflection apart from revelation. They assert, with St. Paul, that there is a law “written on the hearts” even of the Gentiles who do not know the law of Moses—a law that knowledge of which is sufficient for moral accountability. So the basic norms against murder and theft, though revealed in the Decalogue, are knowable even apart from God’s special revelation. We can know the natural law, and conform our conduct to its terms, by virtue of our natural human capacities for deliberation, judgment, and choice. The absence of a divine source of the natural law would be a puzzling thing, just as the absence of a divine source of any and every other intelligible order in human experience would be a puzzling thing (89). 

On Marriage 

Marriage is an all-encompassing sharing of life. It involves, like other bonds, a union of   hearts and minds—but also, and distinctively, a bodily union made possible by the sexual- reproductive complementarity of man and woman. Hence it is ordered to the all-encompassing goods of procreation and family life, and it calls for all-encompassing commitment, one that is pledged to permanence and sexual exclusivity and fidelity.     Marriage unites a husband and wife holistically, not merely in an emotional bond but also on the bodily plane in acts of conjugal love and in the children such love brings forth—for the whole of life. Marriage is a form of relationship—indeed, the form of relationship—in which a man and a woman unite in a bond that is naturally ordered to,     and would be fulfilled by, their conceiving and raising children together. And those who enter into this form of relationship—the human good of marriage—are truly and fully participants in it even where their bond is not blessed with the gift of children (131). 

On Human Sexuality

Precisely because of the organic unity achieved in marital acts, the bodies of persons who unite biologically are not reduced to the status of extrinsic instruments of sexual satisfaction or expression. Rather, the end, goal, and intelligible point of sexual intercourse is the intelligible good of marriage itself as a one-flesh union. On this understanding, the body is not treated as a mere instrument of the conscious and desiring aspect of the self whose interests in satisfactions are the putative ends to which sexual acts are means. Nor is sex itself instrumentalized. The one-flesh unity of marriage is not just an instrumental good, a reason for acting whose intelligibility as a reason depends on other ends to which it is a means. This unity is an intrinsic good, a reason for acting whose intelligibility as a reason depends on no ulterior motive. The central and justifying point of sex is not pleasure, however much sexual pleasure is rightly sought as an aspect of the perfection of marital union; the point of sex, rather, is marriage itself, considered as an essentially and irreducibly bodily union of persons—a union effectuated and renewed by acts of sexual congress (105-106). 

Upon inspecting George’s convictions on these matters, it is nearly impossible to find any inconsistency with how they are depicted in the Holy Bible. Passages such as Romans 2:12-16 (in reference to natural law), Matthew 19:4-6 (in reference to marriage), and 1 Corinthians 6:9-11 (in reference to human sexuality) naturally come to mind when reading George’s beliefs about each of these three categories. This correlation is to be expected given George’s posture towards Scripture. As a Roman Catholic, George makes no apologies for acknowledging that his understanding of natural law is further supplemented by his conviction that Scripture functions as God’s special revelation to humanity (126). Nevertheless, George likewise makes no apologies for his affirmation that “a set of moral norms, including norms of justice and human rights, [can] be known by rational inquiry, understanding, and judgment [apart] from any special revelation” (90). This tenet of George’s worldview leads him to the conclusion that marriage and human sexuality are objectively definable realities, both of which can be grounded in natural law. The clearest expression of this conviction is seen on page 132.

[Understanding] the nature of marriage (between one man and one woman) as a human good require no particular theology. They are, to be sure, consistent with the Judeo-Christian faith, yet ancient thinkers untouched by Jewish or Christian revelation—including Aristotle, Plato, Socrates, Musonius, Rufus, Xenophanes, and Plutarch—also distinguished conjugal unions from all others, as do many nonbiblical faiths to this day. Nor did animus against particular persons or categories of persons produce this     conclusion, which arose in various cultures long before the modern concept of “sexual orientation.”

Among others, this observation from George’s work is a masterful corroboration of his two-pronged thesis. Namely, (1) George’s philosophical assumptions are validated after being subjected to thoughtful and critical examination against the light of nature and (2) three staples of a conservative worldview in America—as expressed in George’s understanding of natural law, marriage, and human sexuality—have support by ancient thinkers who were untouched by Jewish or Christian revelation. Furthermore, the potency of George’s thesis is enhanced by demonstrating how his arguments are not simply rooted in ethereal, philosophical speculation. In the final analysis, George’s establishment of marriage and human sexuality in natural law is authenticated by indisputable scientific evidence.

It is a plain matter of biological fact that reproduction is a single function, yet it is carried out not by an individual male or female human being but by a male and female as a   mated pair. So in respect of reproduction, albeit not in respect of other activities (such as locomotion or digestion), the mated pair is a single organism; the partners form a single procreative principle: they become one flesh (105).

In a succinct synthesis of biological reproduction, George demonstrates how the advancement of the human race testifies to the philosophical cogency of tying marriage and human sexuality to natural law—all of which are ultimately grounded in how God has established the created order. As thoroughly proven by George, his convictions on natural law, marriage, and human sexuality—as broadly shared by Americans who espouse a Judeo-Christian (politically conservative) worldview—are more philosophically and scientifically satisfying than the alternatives espoused in liberal secularism. What’s more, George’s explanation of liberal secularism’s telos crystalizes the legitimacy of this anthology’s thesis.

Since proponents of liberal secularism tend to deny the validity of natural law, they are inevitably forced to embrace some variation of moral relativism (99-100). Therefore, by direct consequences, whether realized or not, a worldview undergirded by moral relativism necessitates an elimination of objective standards for defining marriage and human sexuality (160-162). The eventual outcome? A society that has no grounds for opposing heinous lifestyle practices such as bestiality, polyamory, or pedophilia (154-175). Despite the present remonstrance to the morality of such behaviors, there is no objective guard rails to prevent their future indulgence and approval within a liberal, secularized worldview. In fact, if the past decade is any indication of what the future may have in store for America, George’s insights are a dire warning of how quickly the Left will alter its moral compass in effort to appease a pagan culture (163-166). Therefore, George repeatedly calls conservative American citizens—regardless of religious affiliation—to never lose heart in their efforts to reason with their neighbor, and to stand for moral truth regardless of the cost.

Our task should be to understand the moral truth and speak it in season and out of season. We will be told by the pure pragmatists that the public is too far gone in moral relativism or even moral delinquency to be reached by moral argument. But we must have faith that truth is luminously powerful… and if we honor the truth in advancing our positions, then even many of our fellow citizens who now find themselves on the other side of these issues will come around (100). 

May God grant conservative American citizens to heed George’s exhortation in our day, with aspirations to see a brighter future dawn on this great nation.

Conclusion 

For readers who desire to observe a robust interaction between liberal secularism and conservatism in America, Conscience and Its Enemies: Confronting the Dogmas of Liberal Secularism is a terrific resource to explore. Although there are some places in which the content of the anthology assumes a broader familiarity with the subjects and/or people being discussed, George does a marvelous job of unpacking and clarifying the substance of his arguments in each of the 32 essays. Even if readers don’t agree with every conviction espoused by George, it is doubtful that one could come away from this volume and not see the value of a clearly expressed presentation of American conservatism. Proponents of conservatism in America can utilize this resource for the purpose of gaining insight into how their worldview is rooted in natural law, whereas proponents of liberal secularism can utilize this work to help ensure they are directing their critiques at the best of what their interlocutors have to offer. For those who desire to better understand how conservative intellectuals think about “disputed fundamental values and moral principles” in America (3)—regardless of religious or political affiliation—this book is a must read.

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[1] See the back cover of the updated and expanded version of the book for synonymous lauds of Robert P. George.