Are Traditional Catholics Optimists?

JMJ

Today's question is are Traditional Catholics Optimists?

For reference, here's some definitions from the Merriam-Webster Dictionary:

Optimistic: of, relating to, or characterized by optimism : feeling or showing hope for the future.

Pessimistic: : a person who is inclined to expect poor outcomes : someone who is given to pessimism

Optimism: a doctrine that this world is the best possible world, an inclination to put the most favorable construction upon actions and events or to anticipate the best possible outcome

Pessimism: an inclination to emphasize adverse aspects, conditions, and possibilities or to expect the worst possible outcome;

So a Traditional Catholic who is inclined to expect poor outcomes could be a realist in the near-term, but what about the long-term?

The Extreme Sedevacantists that follow their principles to successively de-throning multiple Pontiffs to the absurdity are not optimists. I think that they may be fatalists or dogmatic pessimists.

But that decries free-will and the Cardinal Virtue of Hope.

So I would say that, in a way, Sedevacantists are not Traditional Catholics, and if they have lost the virtue of hope, well - that doesn't look too good for their extreme long-term outlook.

Traditional Catholics hold on to more than just their opinions of who is or is-not the Pope. They, IMHO, hold on to what the Church has definitely taught as right and wrong, virtue and vice, Dogma and Heresy.

Holding on and not giving up is not an act of fatalism, but of Hope.

Hope is, in essence optimism, so true Traditional Catholics are optimists waiting and hoping for a better future to become the present.

Things may be tough, but there joy and happiness are still mingled with tears in this valley.

So yes, Traditional Catholics are optimists and should be happy, but not delusional.

The Stockdale Paradox (link) describes how we will survive:

James C. Collins related a conversation he had with James Stockdale regarding his coping strategy during his period in the Vietnamese POW camp.When Collins asked which prisoners didn't make it out of Vietnam, Stockdale replied:

Oh, that's easy, the optimists. Oh, they were the ones who said, 'We're going to be out by Christmas.' And Christmas would come, and Christmas would go. Then they'd say, 'We're going to be out by Easter.' And Easter would come, and Easter would go. And then Thanksgiving, and then it would be Christmas again. And they died of a broken heart. This is a very important lesson. You must never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end—which you can never afford to lose—with the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.

Collins called this the Stockdale Paradox.^[21]

So deal with the reality of your situation by:

Applying and adhering to the Catholic principles, not the theories of what to do with an errant (link) Pope.
Practice and hold onto the Cardinal Virtue of Hope.

P^3

Comments

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