Dennis Prager Show - The Religious/Secular Divide in Viewing Quarantine⎜The Dennis Prager Radio Show
Aired: 2020-05-06
Duration: 09:16


=== Ultimate Issues Unveiled (08:36) ===

[00:00:00]  Ultimate Issues Hour.
[00:00:02]  It's every Tuesday, the third hour of the show.
[00:00:07]  And it's more important than ever.
[00:00:10]  Because isn't it clear to you that based on how one views life, everything else follows that?
[00:00:21]  Think about it.
[00:00:23]  Even if you haven't thought it through, you will have imbibed.
[00:00:27]  Nobody...
[00:00:27]  It's devoid of a view of life.
[00:00:33]  You may not even be aware of it because you haven't thought about it.
[00:00:36]  Most people don't think about ultimate issues.
[00:00:39]  Very rarely.
[00:00:40]  Unless some great crisis happens and then they think, well, gee, what is life about?
[00:00:44]  What is the meaning?
[00:00:46]  But it's the way of life that if you will still imbibe a view of life, Even if you don't think it through.
[00:00:58]  For example, people will think life is supposed to be safe.
[00:01:04]  That's a worldview.
[00:01:05]  That's an ultimate issue.
[00:01:06]  People think safe is the most important thing.
[00:01:11]  That's an ultimate issue.
[00:01:15]  I don't think safe is the most important thing.
[00:01:18]  And so I have a different reaction to things that happen.
[00:01:22]  Obviously, I'm thinking about what's happening right now than others.
[00:01:27]  So, it's a very interesting question about the way in which people have reacted to the virus and to the quarantine.
[00:01:40]  And it seems to be divided.
[00:01:44]  Obviously, there are exceptions, but it's irrelevant that there are exceptions.
[00:01:48]  If exceptions nullify generalities, then you don't understand anything about life.
[00:01:57]  The inability to generalize is a big problem.
[00:02:01]  So there seems to be a divide.
[00:02:07]  A left-right divide and a religious-secular divide.
[00:02:14]  So I have a guest on for the Ultimate Issues Hour, which is pretty rare.
[00:02:20]  It's usually just you and I. And R.R. Reno is the editor of a terrific journal.
[00:02:29]  I remember when it started.
[00:02:31]  I used to be published in it regularly.
[00:02:35]  It's a Christian magazine, actually run by Catholics.
[00:02:40]  But it's a Christian magazine, and I was a Jew who was writing for it.
[00:02:46]  They have people of all faiths right for it.
[00:02:49]  The editor of First Things is R.R. Reno.
[00:02:54]  And listen to what he wrote in the April 27th issue of First Things.
[00:03:02]  The coronavirus pandemic is not and never was a threat to society.
[00:03:06]  COVID-19 poses a danger to the elderly and the medically compromised.
[00:03:10]  Otherwise, for most who present symptoms, it can be nasty and persistent, but not life-threatening.
[00:03:17]  A majority of those infected do not notice that they have the disease.
[00:03:21]  Coronavirus presents us with a medical challenge, not a crisis.
[00:03:25]  The crisis has been of our own making.
[00:03:28]  My own column today, my Tuesday column, is exactly on that, why I think it's probably the biggest mistake humanity has ever made, the lockdown.
[00:03:38]  down.
[00:03:40]  By the end of March, most of the United States had been locked down.
[00:03:47]  And tens of millions of Americans have lost their jobs, more than six trillion.
[00:03:52]  Anyway, you know the rest.
[00:03:55]  Now, why does he hold this view as a religious man?
[00:03:58]  Why do I hold it as a religious man?
[00:04:02]  That's part of the question on the Ultimate Issues Hour.
[00:04:06]  Our Reno, welcome back to my show.
[00:04:10]  It's great to be with you, and it's a great question about this divide.
[00:04:15]  It's quite extreme, isn't it?
[00:04:17]  I have friends who share our view, and they say it's just impossible to talk to people about what's going on.
[00:04:29]  I didn't know you lived in New York City.
[00:04:33]  I am talking to you from my office.
[00:04:37]  I'm media, so I'm essential services, so I can actually go to my office at 40th and 5th Avenue.
[00:04:43]  You're at 40th and 5th.
[00:04:45]  I'm curious.
[00:04:47]  I know New York well.
[00:04:48]  I grew up there.
[00:04:49]  Are the streets deserted?
[00:04:53]  The Midtown is very deserted, but the residential neighborhoods, not so much, because that's where the people are.
[00:04:59]  Right, so where you are is Midtown.
[00:05:02]  I just can't imagine the area deserted.
[00:05:07]  This is unique in history.
[00:05:09]  It's never happened.
[00:05:10]  The last time it was deserted, Peter Stuyvesant was the mayor.
[00:05:16]  Yes, indeed.
[00:05:18]  I also, I bike around the city a lot, and I've been out to the outer boroughs and really explored a lot of the city.
[00:05:25]  This is a, it is a once-in-a-lifetime, hopefully once-in-a-lifetime experience.
[00:05:32]  You feel your heart goes out to all of these working people, small business owners, being shattered by the shutdown.
[00:05:43]  Yes.
[00:05:44]  So, okay.
[00:05:45]  So I want to discuss with you, it is the Ultimate Issues Hour.
[00:05:48]  By the way, I assume you're Catholic, correct?
[00:05:51]  I am, yes.
[00:05:53]  Right.
[00:05:53]  And I want to tell people, I want you to know, I'm telling this to my audience.
[00:06:01]  I have a paid subscription.
[00:06:02]  I didn't even ask Rusty Reno for a free subscription.
[00:06:07]  I have a paid subscription.
[00:06:09]  I love you all the more for your paid subscription.
[00:06:13]  May your number multiply.
[00:06:17]  Well, if people don't support good endeavors, it's over.
[00:06:23]  Indeed, yes.
[00:06:29]  What does it cost to have a year subscription to First Things?
[00:06:33]  $45 a year.
[00:06:35]  $45 a year.
[00:06:36]  Okay.
[00:06:37]  Ten issues.
[00:06:38]  Yes, it's a well-spent $45 for me.
[00:06:43]  I love your name.
[00:06:44]  Your listeners are ideal candidates because it's people who want to continue their education.
[00:06:50]  Yeah.
[00:06:51]  They're the ideal First Things reader.
[00:06:53]  And of course, that's part of your mission is to...
[00:06:57]  Help people develop intellectually as well as spiritually.
[00:07:02]  So what is your theory?
[00:07:04]  I'm a religious Jew.
[00:07:06]  You're a religious Catholic.
[00:07:08]  Why do we see eye to eye on something having nothing to do theoretically with religion, the lockdown?
[00:07:15]  That's the issue.
[00:07:16]  Right.
[00:07:17]  Everybody sees eye to eye about the coronavirus, but we don't see eye to eye about the lockdown.
[00:07:23]  Why do we agree?
[00:07:25]  Well, I think there's a superficial answer and there's a deeper answer.
[00:07:30]  I mean, the superficial one is that we've trained ourselves to ignore the propaganda machine.
[00:07:38]  And I think that this is something that conservatives have an advantage over their liberal friends, which is that they have a learned distrust of whatever the elite consensus is.
[00:07:53]  And that gives us some critical freedom to actually weigh the evidence and think about this more dispassionately.
[00:08:01]  I think that's one answer.
[00:08:03]  Wait, wait, wait.
[00:08:04]  I love it.
[00:08:05]  I love it.
[00:08:05]  I don't want to go to the second yet.
[00:08:07]  Just don't forget the second.
[00:08:10]  This, you see, I agree with you.
[00:08:14]  It's so interesting, your answer, and I agree with you.
[00:08:18]  Let me tell you my language of putting it is we are trained not to worship false gods.

=== Religious Reflection on Happiness (00:54) ===

[00:08:27]  Is that what you're saying in your language?
[00:08:30]  Yes.
[00:08:34]  You know that there is...
[00:08:36]  One of the things about religious belief is that it forces you to distinguish between what is ultimate and what is not ultimate.
[00:08:46]  And this allowed this so that a religious person has to be more reflective about the messaging he's getting from society.
[00:08:56]  If I get this car, I'll be happy.
[00:08:57]  If I get this job, I'll be happy.
[00:09:00]  If I make this salary, I'll be happy.
[00:09:02]  Well, a religious person has to reckon with the fact that those are false promises.
[00:09:08]  And so here we come.
[00:09:10]  We've got this, you know, it's a nasty virus.
[00:09:13]  You know, we should definitely be taking...