Corey J. Mahler — Comments

I had a full-tuition scholarship to law school.

At the time, my one-bedroom apartment ran ~$1500/month (~$54,000 over the course of three years); today, that same apartment would be ~$2800/month (~$100,800 over the course of three year).

Using some (admittedly very) rough math, living expenses (utilities, vehicle payment, auto insurance, health insurance, fuel, groceries, Internet connectivity, cell phone service, et cetera) in 2010 would have run something like $2000/month (~$72,000 over the course of three years); today, those same living expenses would be something more like ~$3700 (~$133,200 over the course of three years).

Someone with no scholarship would need to take out $234,000 in loans to cover just the cost of living to attend law school in Southern California. Notably, I have not calculated in the cost of books, et cetera, which easily runs into thousands of dollars.

You will note that I have not included any budgeted amount for entertainment or anything else of that sort — no dining out, no drinks with friends, and certainly no vacations. These numbers are for living a relatively frugal life and more or less simply attending classes and then going home to study. And God help you if you get injured or suffer some other misfortune.

Now, admittedly, these are numbers for graduate school, but the picture is hardly better for undergraduate. Sure, the undergraduate can save a bit of money by living in the dorms instead of an apartment, but most of the rest of those costs remain. The current system is simply unworkable for all but the independently wealthy.

As a society and a civilization, we lose far more by failing to provide, e.g., the education necessary for our fellow countrymen to take advantage of their talents than it would cost us to provide, e.g., that very education. The current economic system in the US has driven many into the foolish belief that we are engaged in some sort of zero-sum rat race in which all are against all and any gain by another man is a loss to everyone else — this is wicked nonsense. We all benefit when talent and ability are nurtured and realized instead of foolishly suppressed.

Now, I am, of course, not saying that loans are the answer to this problem — in fact, I am providing no solution at all in this post; rather, what I am saying is that the current system does not work, and that the oppressive and predatory student loans that have been made in the past should be erased and such loans prohibited going forward. For the Christian reader, I am going further and stating unequivocally that this is the Christian position on the matter (the forgiving of a debt should sound familiar to you).

It is a deeply perverse and evil worldview that looks upon aid rendered to another man and opposes that aid because a similar sum was not paid to everyone. Would you begrudge the cripple his wheelchair? Would you demand that those providing hot meals to the homeless provide you one as well?

We need — desperately — to stop looking upon our fellow countrymen as competitors or opponents and, instead, look upon them as brothers and friends who are engaged in the same sorts of struggles as we are. We should look upon them as fellow workers, and that is regardless of whether they work with the mind in some ‘white-collar’ profession or with the hands in some ‘blue-collar’ job. Sure, I spend my days in my office working with books and pen and paper and computer, but that does not make me better or other than the man who works outside all day. I need him and he needs me — we are very much in this together.

Similarly, we should not look down on the man who has suffered some misfortune in life — there but for the grace of God go I —, but we should come to his aid. The members of a family should aid one another, should stick together through good and through bad; the same must be true of society, for a nation is simply an extended family.

Five minutes of dealing with the EO makes five centuries of arguing with the Reformed seem like a Sunday brunch.

If any Christian tradition were handed definitive proof that one of their beloved writers was a sodomite who consorted with impenitent pedophiles and lured young men out into the woods, every man in that tradition would condemn that writer.

The EO defend Seraphim Rose more staunchly than they defend Christ.

The EO ridicule Luther for marrying a nun (after having been released from his monastic vows), yet constantly praise a sodomite (‘Seraphim Rose’) who opened a monastery with a known pedophile.

It does not take a genius to figure out what is going on there.

The deportation of aliens from American soil will include those who have adopted alien religions — e.g., Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Eastern ‘Orthodoxy’.