Q.   Chris, tell me about yourself and your family – any children or hobbies?

A.   When not teaching philosophy, I keep busy chasing my six kids around the house.  I have 2 boys and 4 girls ranging from 13 years to 4 months old.    Despite it always seeming to be monsoon season in my house, they are the delight of my life.  In my other spare moments, I enjoy chatting with my wife on the porch while sipping a glass of wine, reading, and for physical activity, I study Brazilian jiu-jitsu.

Q.   How did you get involved in the Westchester Institute for Ethics and the Human Person?

A.   I was involved with the Westchester Institute from its very inception.  I partook in most of the original conversations about what the institute should be.  Much to my delight, it has grown and evolved considerably since those first days when Fr. Thomas and I affectionately referred to the institute as "Two guys and a fax machine."

Q.   What is the first thing you do when you get to work?
 
A.   The first thing I do when I get to work is wonder why I didn't make myself a larger cup of coffee.  I then start looking over my notes and the philosophy texts that I will be lecturing on in class that day.

Q.   You have an incredible education and experience base, not to mention you regularly publish research on disputed questions in the Church, how does this affect your life in your local parish, as it is quite likely that you are better educated than your pastor?

A.   Vade retro Satana!  I have a difficult enough time as it is growing in holiness without you tempting me to think that I'm wiser than my pastor.  But seriously, I am actually quite blessed to have a very sharp and holy pastor.  In the past I have given bio-ethics talks at the parish, and am willing do so again, but right now I am mostly involved as a member of a committee helping to formulate a design for the new Church that our parish is building.  

Q.   How does anyone become a philosopher? When did such an occupation become interesting to you? What did you aspire to be as a child?

A.   I fell in love with philosophy as I began to mature in my Christian faith and started to realize how important, deep, and amazing reality was.   So I attribute my love for philosophy to divine providence and my ability to make a living teaching philosophy to a divine miracle.  

As a child, I vacillated in my career ambitions between wanting to be Indiana Jones, Carey Grant in "To Catch a Thief," and a deep sea salvage diver/Navy SEAL.  I suppose if the philosophy thing doesn't end up working out, I can always resurrect my idea of being a jewel thief on the French Riviera.

Q.   If you had lunch with the President, what would you discuss?

A.   Recalling his comments during the campaign to Rick Warren at the Saddleback Forum, I would discuss with him ways of increasing his "pay grade" so that he might come to know at what point a human baby possesses human rights.

 
Q.   What is the most pressing issue facing the Church today?

A.   I think the most pressing issue facing the Church today is the loss of authentic Catholic identity among believers, and the difficulty many Church leaders seem to have communicating the full meaning and content of the gospel to the laity and the world at large.  

     There is a truth to what it means to love (Caritas in Veritate), but this often gets lost in a fog of shallow "niceness," for we live in a culture that no longer regards theological doctrines as either true or false, but as mere accoutrements of one's life-style option.  Thus, religious beliefs in our culture largely function today as non-rational preferences, as aesthetic therapy serving to make us "feel" okay with ourselves.  Thus, it pretty much doesn't matter what one believes, so long as one is "nice" and regards the beliefs of others as equally valid preferences.  

     Unfortunately, this dictatorship of relativism has creeped into the mindset of many Catholics who hold their faith as a mere aesthetic preference no truer than any other, and thus no more able to bring about human happiness than any other spiritual perspective.  It is rampant among many Catholic politicians who compartmentalize moral truth and refuse to acknowledge the natural law as having any claim on their public duty, and even among many Catholic priests and bishops who do not want to "offend" or "rock the boat" and so refrain from protecting the integrity and identity of Catholic communities and institutions.

     This state of affairs is slowly but surely choking the life of the Church out of existence in this country, and it will continue to do so until either our collective response to this situation of therapeutic relativism changes or there is no more genuinely Catholic life in the Church to choke out.

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