“There Is No Other Hand!”

          In “Fiddler on the Roof,” Tevye faces a lot of challenges from his daughters.  Tzeitel wants to marry whom an observant Jewish boy she wants, not one the matchmaker finds.  Hodel wants to marry a lapsed Jewish boy into revolutionary ideology and follows him to Siberia.  Chavala wants to marry an Orthodox Christian and does so in the Orthodox Church, despite her father’s objections.

          In each instance, Tevye is faced with the tensions between tradition – what he has known – and what his daughters want.  In each instance, there’s a scene in which we hear what’s going on in his head.  “On the one hand….”  “On the other hand ….”  “On the other other hand …..” 

          But when Chavala presents him with a fait accompli she wants her father to “accompany,” the process ends differently.  Yes, Tevye “one hands and other hands” until, finally, faced with compromising his faith and its teachings, he raises his hands powerfully and announces: “No!  There is no ‘other hand!” 

          Moderns might want to write that off.  I see it as an Old Testament affirmation of Christ’s Teaching (Lk 12:49-53): Christ divides.  Yes, Jesus prays for unity, but not unity at any price.  A unity that papers over contradiction is not unity: it is evasion.  Jesus precisely foresees this situation when he speaks of families divided, fathers against sons and sons against fathers.  Jesus is the Messiah and Malachi the prophet calls (4: 5-6) for a Messianic era where the hearts of parents are turned to their children and children to their parents … but not at the cost of hearts in God.  Lots of contemporary ecclesiastical appeals for “unity” leave out half that story.

          I thought of that today scrolling through social media.  A hijabed Minnesota Lt. Governor Peggy Flanagan posted a video [https://x.com/i/status/2004396872434438621 ] attesting to her solidarity with Minnesota’s Somali community. 

          I can support standing with people, but I am tired of treating politicians whose fundamental views are barbaric as “normal” because they sometimes say good things.  That’s why we’re in the mess we are.  Our behavior is not consequential.  We bracket out things.

          When Tim Walz was busy making Minnesota a “sanctuary state” for confused “trans” kids fleeing “non-affirming” parents, Peggy Flanagan got up at Walz’s bill signing ceremony to lecture parents about their duties.  She announced [ https://youtu.be/zoj3r9J9WUc    ] that “when our children tell us who they are, it is our job as grown-ups to listen and to believe them.”  And, if you don’t, Tim and Peggy will make you.

          No.  Absolutely not.

          It is emphatically not “my job” as a Catholic parent to affirm my child’s sexual confusion, to medicate them into abnormal physio-sexual development, to let my daughter have a mastectomy as if it was no more than an ear piercing or my son a “bottom job” that physically mutilates him.  And if that is what the Lieutenant Governor of Minnesota believes, well, then I don’t believe anything she has to say.  She has no credibility with me – and she should not with any Catholic parent.

          This is not a question of “on the one hand” or “on the other hand.”  Ecclesiastical deacons of dialogue have led us into that confusion.  Tevye is on target: “No!  There is no ‘other hand!!’”

          A “Catholic” Senator who actively works to expand abortion is not “on the one hand” a problem but “on the other hand” a great dude worthy of an archdiocesan award because he’s “right” on immigration – and no cardinal is going to convince me otherwise.  It’s the “dialogue” mode that has given us such contradictions in public life, arguably the exact opposite of how Vatican II envisioned Catholic laity in public life should illumine the public square, even though most of the “dialogue” proponents loudly proclaim their fealty to the Council.

          Some years back, a South African philosophy professor wrote a book, published by Oxford University Press, suggesting the best thing that could happen to the planet is if human beings became extinct.  It’s why he thinks a parent who gives life to a child commits a serious moral evil.  He’d welcome the disappearance of humanity, the one thing stopping him is that he hasn’t figured out a moral way to effect that goal.

          There are those who would call this “academic discussion” and “free debate.”  I remember reading Princeton’s Robert George refused to participate in that charade.  Calling for humanity’s extinction is not an “on the one hand” option.  It is barbarian and we do nobody – especially humanity – a favor by refusing to call it what it is.

          The other side of the “dialogue” rarely intends to retreat from their position.  They may temporize to buy time, to acclimatize the social frog being boiled alive, but what pro-abortion politician have you seen say “I was wrong!  I’m for life!”  What “trans” advocate turned around and said, “you know, turning minors into sterilized people is not a good idea!”  For them, dialogue goes one way.

          Zbigniew Stawrowski is a modern Polish political philosopher.  In his little book, Clash of Civilizations, he coins an expression I have often repeated: “sleek barbarians.”  His argument is simple. Once upon a time, barbarians showed up in animal skins with clubs or on raiding ships with spears, marched through your community, killed people in front of your eyes, took what they wanted, and ruled you.  Today, barbarians show up in medical coats in clinics and Gucci power suits in courts.  They march through your community, killing and mutilating people while branding the slaughter “rights,” establish what they want and rule you.

          And we’re counseled to have a “dialogue?” 

          Perhaps our 2026 resolution should be to recognize our sleek barbarians for what and where they are – and stop the charade of taking their barbarism” as “on the one hand.”  Because there is no other hand.