Post Tagged 'Josef Pieper'

July 12, 2017

Did Spider-Man read Thomas Aquinas?

For many of us, what is heroic about Spider-Man is not his ability to do “whatever a spider can,” but rather his effortless inclination to do what is good. But what makes Spider-Man good? Continue Reading...

December 04, 2015

Letter from Rome: Paris and the Progressive Denial of Reality

In his book Living the Truth, the German Thomist Josef Pieper presents the following thesis: All obligation is based upon being. Reality is the foundation of ethics. The good is that which is in accord with reality. Continue Reading...

February 13, 2015

Sloth: When We Reject What God Wants Us To Be

“If we’re not heaven bent on doing more, we’re hell bent on trying to escape all the stuff we have to do.” In Evan Koons’ concluding vlog on the Economy of Wonder, he tackles the difference between sloth and what Josef Pieper has called “virtuous idleness.” Continue Reading...

September 08, 2010

Labor and the limits of work

There has been some good discussion over the past week and Labor Day holiday about the nature of work and its role in our lives (particularly here). The first thing I’d like to point out about Lester DeKoster’s claims regarding work is that he has in mind, at least partially, the classical Greek philosophical distinction between the active and contemplative life, particularly its disdain of manual labor. Continue Reading...