I think many feasts are done wrong. 

I recently wrote a blog post about the trouble with house parties, and then when I was reading Aesthetics, Hildebrand hit me with a thunderbolt. I realized that perhaps that trouble is merely symptomatic of a wider trouble.   

In Hildebrand’s treatment of the aesthetic value of spiritual beauty, he contrasts it with the aesthetic disvalue of the prosaic. The prosaic is the unattractive quality of being dull, un-poetic, attracting no more than a practical interest. The prosaic is perhaps best embodied in the visual of a series of office cubicles, or a factory assembly line. It is not only the absence of beauty, but an actual stifling of it, an almost deliberate negation. 

He then follows this up with the point that the antithesis between the prosaic and beauty is not to be confused with the antithesis between the everyday and the festive. (2) And this I found surprising, because surely the ‘everyday’ or the ‘habitual’ seems like almost the same thing as the prosaic? However, simply because a thing happens every day does not guarantee that it is prosaic. For instance, sunrises and sunsets both occur daily; every day I encounter people who fill my life with joy, and every morning the married man wakes up next to the woman he loves. These cannot be prosaic realities. In spite of the fact that human nature possesses a terrible flaw that the more habitual and everyday a thing becomes, the more we tend to associate it with the prosaic, this does not in any way indicate that everyday occurrences are in fact prosaic. This is, in itself, a significant thing to meditate on, though it is not the main point that I am looking to arrive at. 

In reality nothing need be prosaic, it is entirely possible that the every day be filled with beauty. So what then is this ‘festive’ that is the antithesis to the ‘everyday’? The festive is the unique quality of a thing capturing its beauty in as far as it grants a relief from the labor of life, a vacare, a foreshadowing of the eternal rest which awaits man beyond this life. It also contains a certain brightness, a vivaciousness, an aesthetic warmth. It is high-spirited. Lastly, but most importantly, the festive is exceptional, it has as its object a special occasion, a particular source of joy: a wedding, a birthday, an ecclesiastical feast, the Sabbath. This is especially why the festive is the antithesis to the everyday; it revolves around objects that are qualitatively special and unique, demanding of us a festive and joyful spirit. The third quality is the reason for the first two: the vacare and the high spirits. 



But then, Hildebrand mentions offhand something that I found to be of incredible relevance.  There is a different kind of festive, a festive in which the first two qualities are present but not the third. This kind of festive is a relief from labor and a lifting of the spirits, but without a reason to do so. It is feasting merely for the sake of feasting. (4)This is typified in the ‘bread and circus’ which the Roman emperors used to pacify the mob. They handed out easy sources of entertainment to keep them occupied. This second type of the festive is entertainment solely to be entertained. In other words, it is nothing but distraction. 

This second type of the festive is inherently illicit, it denies feasting its very reason for existence. It puts the cart before the horse in the sense that feasting is celebration, and celebration is about something. Feasting without celebration is… nothing but self-indulgence. 

This second kind of the festive differs from the prosaic in that it is not dull and can even be vivacious, but, unlike the first kind of festive, it does not lift us out of the prosaic, it does not actually provide us with something that is qualitatively opposed to the prosaic, it does not center around an object with goodness and beauty. 

These two senses of the festive result in two attitudes toward feasts and feast days. In one attitude, when a feast day or a celebration rolls around, I ought to feast; I ought to be joyful and high-spirited, I ought to eat, drink, and be merry, not because tomorrow I may die, but because today is good. Life is beautiful and it is especially beautiful today. There is moral merit in this kind of feasting. 

In the second attitude I am constantly looking to escape from life. And feasts and celebration are simply an opportunity to do this, or rather, an excuse. Here I feast because I find life is not good, and with a little bit of pleasure I am able to ignore this fact. I just want to “Forget about life for a little while.”


Unfortunately, I find that this second sense of feasting often dominates the modern man. An example of this is the Catholic who thinks that it is ‘weak’ to excuse himself from his Lenten fast on Sundays. This is not something that is permitted simply because otherwise one couldn’t make it all 40 days; this is something that is demanded by the nature of the Sabbath. Another example is that because we constantly look for excuses to “have a good time”, the actual days on which we ought to do this do not seem so special and important. Ever notice that birthdays, Christmases, Easters, or 4th of Julys can sometimes feel more like awkward social gatherings that are societally demanded than legitimate celebrations?

Perhaps one might object that there aren’t that many actual feast days and if we reserved celebration for those times then life would be exceptionally boring. I beg to differ, there is at least one Sabbath every week. And there are the great feasts: Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving, New Year’s. There are also more personal things, birthdays, weddings, graduations, anniversaries. And there are accomplishments, completing of great tasks. There are friends who are able to visit; there are going-away-parties. There is the changing of seasons; sometimes there are just exceptionally beautiful days. There are more than enough reasons to celebrate! What the two different types of the festive distinguish more than anything else is one’s attitude towards celebration. It is the difference between looking for an excuse to self-indulge, and the openness to acknowledging and participating in the inherent beauty in the world by one’s own joyful attitude, which can be further manifested in and through material ‘props’ if you will: a fine meal, a spirited beverage, a fire, and above all, companions.  

Ask yourself this question, do I celebrate for me, or do I do it for the sake of that which is celebrated? True celebration is the latter and it is by far the more joyful, for as in all things, when I put myself first, I tend to lose myself. When I place my own enjoyment as the end, somehow my concentration on myself prevents me from actually enjoying. This is but a revelation of that great and mysterious statement in the Gospels, “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; for he that shall lose his life for my sake, shall save it.” (Luke 9:24) 

Do not feast for yourselves, but learn to feast for a reason. 



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(2) Dietrich von Hildebrand, Aesthetics, pg. 222
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(4) Dietrich von Hildebrand, Aesthetics, pg. 223
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We’ve been talking a lot about beauty on Truth From the Heart recently, so I figured I would mix it up and talk about something else which is often overlooked but ought to be addressed: triviality. 

For those that are unaware, Dietrich Von Hildebrand is very emphatic on the role that beauty plays in man’s life. He believes that man is a spiritual creature, and is destined for more than a merely material existence, and that beauty is the pathway by which man transcends the material conditions of his existence and lives in a robust, spiritual way. 



As you can see, it is with good cause that we won’t shut up about beauty. BUT, someone needs to talk about the antitheses to beauty as well, of which there are three according to Hildebrand, ugliness, triviality, and boringness (1). Just as beauty can elevate man, these antitheses can pull him down and envelop him in an ever expanding matrix devoid of all meaning. Just as man must be a lover of beauty in order to fulfill himself, he must also abhor its opposites. 

All of these antitheses are present in our lives, but it occurred to me that one in particular possesses an all-pervading influence throughout society at large. 

If there is one thing our culture has right, it is that we despise the boring, mainly because we are spoon-fed on instant gratification. But therein lies the problem, we hate the boring so much, we are captivated by anything which offers even a modicum of interest. We would even prefer the ugly to the boring. And thus: we worship triviality. 

Triviality is precisely that which offers a modicum of interest, but no more. Whereas true beauty exposes us to the depths of reality, in which we can lose ourselves in a holy awe; triviality captivates us in a painfully limited and finite way. 

Have you ever felt like something was interesting, but you also knew that it was only a little bit interesting, such that almost as soon as you apprehend it the entertainment value expends itself, leaving you hanging, wanting more, so you go to the next interesting thing that is only a little bit interesting which the last thing conveniently presented as well, and so on and so on because every time you get interested you get let down and so you keep on trying but always get more let down, and by the time you finally get out of this vicious cycle you have blown an hour and a half and you hate your life? 

Funny, that kind of sounds like every time I have ever gone on the internet.* 

Imagine that... 



Well, I think we are all pretty well acquainted with the trivial. The problem with it? It pretends to be truly beautiful. 

“The pseudo-beauty proper to a trivial work and the claim that the quality of triviality always contains, namely, the claim to be at least a positive aesthetic value as opposed to ugliness.” (2)
In other words the claim to fame of triviality is, “at least I am not ugly or boring.” Insofar as it is not these things it has the capacity to interest us, but it is not beauty proper. And so we get our “beauty fix” without being exposed to genuine beauty. This is DISASTROUS, because not only are we not exposing ourselves to beauty but we are removing our desire to do so. 

Furthermore, not only do we lose the desire to behold beauty, but we make it much more difficult for ourselves to do so even if we should somehow get that desire back. Because to see beauty requires effort and commitment, in a very real sense, beholding beauty involves vulnerability and a willingness to be affected. Whereas, the trivial asks nothing of us; it willingly comes to us and grants us a few seconds of satisfaction; then it dissipates. 

The more we settle for this kind of shallowness, the more we will fear the deliberate attitude that beauty asks. The man who is consumed by the trivial, “Dreads the effort involved in penetrating the depths of being; he wants to remain on the periphery… he passes with a light touch from one thing to the other.” (3)

If you feel like you now sufficiently understand the danger of spending time on trivial things, brace yourselves, because insofar as I can tell, most people not only enjoy triviality, not only do they embrace it and crave it, not only are they saturated by it, but they are verily DROWNING in it. 

Everything in our society, and I mean EVERYTHING, is presented in and through the trivial. Advertisements, news stories, magazines, social freaking media, modern art. If something needs to be communicated, but it can’t be trivialized, then it pretty much can’t be communicated. We thrive on 30 second sound bites, two sentence long tweets, and those thrice-blasted infernal links at the bottom of the page that have come to be known as 'clickbait': “THE TEN COOLEST PICTURES EVER” “WHAT HAPPENED NEXT WILL BLOW YOUR MIND” 
  

All of this is partially why our blog posts aren’t supposed to exceed 800 words, (present word count: 854, WHAT UP) 

I don’t think I need to convince most people that we are suckers for trivial just-barely interesting things that don’t matter at all. But I do want to convince you of this: you shouldn’t be, you honestly need to be careful how much time and attention you spend on really irrelevant and erroneous things, because it affects your ability to be a lover of beauty, to be a great personality, and to lead a fulfilled life. And it isn’t just because trivial things take up so much time, but also because they make us more stupid and more lifeless. 

“But I only look at my phone when I have to wait for something else and literally have nothing else to do… it doesn't waste any of my time”

Is that why all your trips to the bathroom get extended by ten minutes to check out that one article? 

We are surrounded and inundated by triviality, and we need to be really, really careful not to let it ruin us. 



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*the aforementioned experience applies to every time you go on the internet with the exception of when you go on Truth From the Heart and read our stuff :) 

(1) Dietrich Von Hildebrand, Aesthetics, p. 261
(2) Ibid 272
(3) Ibid 240 


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I am very nostalgic for fall, and it makes me think of how much I enjoy Pumpkin Spice Lattes. Perhaps the reader is aware fall air conditions the taste buds to be sensitive to certain admixtures nutty, spicy, and sweet, perfectly encapsulated in that sublime seasonal libation? 

Problem though: I’m a guy. And the Pumpkin Spice Latte has become the sovereign possession of that ever-expanding phenomenon, the “basic white girl.” And there are those who think that when this indomitable creature makes such a claim, it becomes uncouth for any man to partake of it.

I once encountered just such a viewpoint. A small group of gentlemen had formed in the social center on Franciscan University’s campus and we had but recently polished off our Saturday noon meal (which means breakfast in the college student’s tongue). Being that we were in no rush, were feeling both lazy and satisfied, it was a fall day, and a lull had entered the conversation, I thought I knew the next logical step. So I inquired of the group, “So are we doing this or what?” A couple of them knew what I meant and slowly grinned, but others looked at me quizzically so I spelled it out for them, “Are we grabbing some PSL’s?” That was when the philosophical debate broke out.



“You can’t do that, you’re a guy, and Pumpkin Spice Lattes are a white girl thing.” 

If this was a pearl of wisdom then it was truly being thrown in front of swine. About half of us hastily disregarded it and indulged ourselves in the aforementioned beverage. Thereupon we disputed the principle which my friend had referenced. That principle is this: if some activity or thing has been taken up by the popular culture, or a certain group, then to partake of that activity or thing is somehow to lose one’s identity in the face of the mob, to be swept along by a current instead of resolutely standing one’s ground. In other words, he equated my purchase of a Pumpkin Spice Latte with, “giving in.” 

I can’t deny that what he described does in fact occur, sometimes people do things just to go with the flow. I’m sure this has a lot to do with the popularity of Pumpkin Spice Lattes and a great many other things. I don’t think it takes a lot of thinking to realize, that if a majority of a person's actions are done to fit in, then they don’t really have a genuine personality. However, using a similar line of thinking we can also say that if one avoids a certain activity or thing for no other reason than that it is popular, this also displays a lack of genuine personality, because it is equally reactionary. In both instances one determines one’s activity as a reaction (either for or against) what other people are doing. The motivation of “being different” is often just as disingenuous as “fitting in”. This is a test of personality that hipsters and “basic” individuals alike may fail. 

In order to appreciate what makes a true personality, one has to factor an entirely new element into the discussion, the strengths of one’s inner convictions. As Dietrich Von Hildebrand says, 

“A person is a being who ‘possesses himself,’ who does not simply exist but who actively achieves his being.” (1)  

Von Hildebrand would additionally argue that the convictions which make up a true personality cannot be self-centered. A person who is in love with himself would have a pretty wretched personality. Whereas a person whose convictions are for things greater than himself and outside of himself, and who possesses those convictions not because of societal pressures, but because of the goodness of the things he or she loves, has a genuine personality. 

“A man is rich in values, is a personality, in the highest sense of the word, to the degree that he perceives values, that he possesses a spiritual vision clear and open to the fullness of the world of values” (2)

To be a personality, then, is to be a lover,  and to be a lover of what is genuinely good: art, music, beauty, nature, adventure, vitality, and above all, other persons.

This is precisely the reality that my debate with my friend reminded me of, and why I now associate Pumpkin Spice Lattes with being a lover of values. Because if one is truly a lover, say, of nature, especially in the fall, and a Pumpkin Spice with extra nutmeg serves to facilitate their response to that value (there is nothing at all about having a center of warmth and comfort lodged in your hand, a rich and girthy flavor lingering in your mouth, and a robust vibration of caffeine in your veins that doesn't enhance the experience of the fall season) then this truly flows from a genuine personality, and participates in a genuine love.



To be a personality is to be a lover of genuine values. And while it is quite clear that to be determined by popular culture is not at all indicative of a personality. I think that it is actually possible that in the case of pumpkin spice lattes, all the “basic white girls” actually might be onto something. 


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(1) Liturgy and Personality, Dietrich Von Hildebrand, pg. 15
(2) Liturgy and Personality, Dietrich Von Hildebrand, pg. 36


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If you can relate to the above testimony, than it might come as a surprise how many people, have lost sight of the mysterious depth of the human person and consequently have lost sight of the mysterious depth of the world around them. In many cases this blindness leads to an over intellectualization.  Feelings and the imagination are discounted as superfluous when it comes to a rigorous intellectual study of the human person. We must place all these silly musings about our mysterious hearts and souls into the hands of the detached psychologist, who can explain away all of our emotions and feelings as mere products of chemical synthesises. We can rest easy and die easy knowing that there is no God to judge us in the end. When our hearts are broken we can remind ourselves that true love never existed in the first place.























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