University of Notre Dame's Little Manicheans

America has been led by the nostrils by Manicheans to the point where people test the atmosphere before offering an opinion on anything - life, marriage, identity, fried chicken breast cuts, hot, or cold  coffee products poured by baristas, doctors dragged off of United Airlines flights, Black Lives, White Guilt, historical cycles, or bathrooms.

People really have their shorts in a knot in Old Columbia - 24/7.

Musicians refuse to buy products at a store that they had for over thirty years because the owners voted for Donald Trump and Fox News junkies continue to watch Bill O'Reilly, but revile Bill Cosby.

This underlying cultural mind-set was formed by a pre-Islamic, 3rd Century Persian prophet by the name of Mani.

Mani had an ecstatic vision at ages 12 and 24 of a "heavenly twin" telling him to leave his father's cult, a sort of Jewish/Christian gnostic sect, and preach a new gospel Christ with Mani serving as a composite prophet (Christ, Zoroaster and the Buddha).  Everything is either good, or bad.

Manicheanism divided followers accordingly - electi ( the elites) and auditores ( everyone else).

Manicheanism was suppressed by Christianity:

The key to Mani's system is his cosmogony. Once this is known there is little else to learn. In this sense Mani was a true Gnostic, as he brought salvation by knowledge. Manichæism professed to be a religion of pure reason as opposed to Christian credulity; it professed to explain the origin, the composition, and the future of the universe; it had an answer for everything and despised Christianity, which was full of mysteries. It was utterly unconscious that its every answer was a mystification or a whimsical invention; in fact, it gained mastery over men's minds by the astonishing completeness, minuteness, and consistency of its assertions. Catholic Encyclopedia

Manicheanism returned with the Puritanism of John Calvin and especially the Methodism of John Wesley.  The notion of the elect.  It really took off in the 19th Century with the 'Great Awakening' in England and America. Unitarianism and radical abolitionism evolved into the transcendentalism of Emerson and Thoreau and radical intolerance of William Lloyd Garrison, Lyman Beacher, Jane Addams, Roger Baldwin and W.E.B. Du Bois.

WEB Dubois espoused the openly Manichean concept of "talented 10 percent" that has suppressed African American advancement as much as Jim Crow  -electi the talented 10%; auditores the unfortunate 90%.

Manicheans hated Marriage as well, " St. Augustine (especially "De Moribus Manich.") strongly inveighs against the Manichæan's repudiation of marriage. They regarded it as an evil in itself because the propagation of the human race meant the continual imprisonment of the light-substance in matter and a retarding of the blissful consummation of all things; maternity was a calamity and a sin and Manichæans delighted to tell of the seduction of Adam by Eve and her final punishment in eternal damnation. In consequence there was a danger that the act of generation, rather than the act of unchastity was abhorred, and that his was a real danger Augustine's writings testify."

Planned Parenthood could not ask for more.

Differ in opinion and see what happens.

Today, Notre Dame students, like so many students in America's ridiculous universities, are frightened by the possibility of  Vice-President Mike Pence doing an ND commencement address.

Mike Pence is a Christian and formerly a Roman Catholic.  Notre Dame University is a public relations driven university that formerly taught Catholic doctrine and defended the faith.  Federal funding and American Manicheanism changed all of that.

Students Immane Mondane and Jourdyhn Williams are agitating to cancel that invitation with a #NotMyCommencementSpeaker hashtag that will feature students holding white boards with “direct quotes from Pence that are racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, offensive, or ostracizing to members of our community.”
Campus Reform reports that the students add, “You may also write about why you feel unsafe with the presence of Mike Pence on our campus.”. . .“I feel  that is offensive to such a large population here at Notre Dame, and I also believe it goes against certain Catholic Social Teaching, which is something the University likes to broadcast that it stands behind, but it picks and chooses when it wants to stand behind them,” Williams stated.

The anti-Pence campaign is just another insult to the Trump administration. The legendary Catholic university has historically invited the president of the United States in his first term of office. This year, apparently fearing student protest, the university invited Pence instead.

But the university’s efforts to pre-empt protest have proved unsuccessful. Besides the social media demonstration, other student groups are opposing the Pence invitation, including the Diversity Council and the College Democrats. Daily Caller

Time was that heresy was unacceptable at a Catholic University.  That was long before, a Manichean American President ordered crucifixes and Catholic icons covered, whenever he gave a speech at American Catholic Universities.

Manichean Americans kept the volume at scream levels.

St. Monica - August 27th is Her Feast Day!

St. Augustine - 'Jesus, Ma! That Hurt! You hit me in the Throat!

St. Monica - 'Watch your language, Austin! Now, say you're sorry.'

St. Augustine - 'Sorry.'

St. Monica - 'You want a fresh one, boy? Like you mean it! Now!'

Tomorrow is the Feast of St. Monica!

St. Monica was a girl from Roman Tagaste, North Africa. She was a Christian, but her parents married her off to a Pagan by the name of Patricius ( Paddy Boy) and from all accounts was a gold plated jerk in many ways - he teased his wife about her charity works and her piety. Paddy Boy had a lousy temper to go with his dissolute life style - " I'll be home in an hour -What? Two Beers for Crissakes -What . . .I can't hear you. It's about work. Kiss the kids."

Monica bore this mope three children and one of them was Honors student and Dad wannabe Augustine (Austey).

The old man took a dirt nap for keeps when Austey was 17 and Monica did all she knew how to drag the kids up right and in the Faith. The Old Man had not been a great help and now Austey was off to school in Milan and found himself - he became a Manichean -kind of like the Scientologists of 6th Century Rome in Decline.
Austey was like many of our contemporary soul-patched Arabica youths who believe -nay know - that they are absolutely correct on all matters -not unlike President 'It's Distraction' Obama:

I still thought that it is not we who sin but some other nature that sins within us. It flattered my pride to think that I incurred no guilt and, when I did wrong, not to confess it... I preferred to excuse myself and blame this unknown thing which was in me but was not part of me. The truth, of course, was that it was all my own self, and my own impiety had divided me against myself. My sin was all the more incurable because I did not think myself a sinner. (Confessions, Book V, Section 10)

Monica was no harpy, but prayed for the wee lad to snap out of it.

He did. Along with his teacher of rhetoric and mentor Ambrose, Monica brought the smart-ass around to where he began - in faith. His sins are his own and life is obligated to others. When Austey woke up, he went to work with a will.

St. Monica endured a crumb of a husband and know-it-all- jerk of a son. She did so out of love for both men and in communion with her Faith in God. We have several Monicas in the ever expansive Hickey Family and they all tend to be gems.

We have more than a few Pats/Paddys/Patricks/Padgrigs and some of us (including yours truly) seem not unlike the guy St. Monica got saddled with - no Augustines - yet.

Perhaps, St. Monica might interceded and send us an Austin/Augustine/Gus; but if not, more Monicas will do very nicely.