There’s always a reason, a misunderstanding, a skewed perspective, a “righteous” anger, a frustration – always an argument for me to do what I will. Do I dare to confuse my will with my reasons? They are not the same thing. The best reasons do not make the best will. Goodness does not work up from reasons to will, but corruption does work it’s way down. The best reasons are corrupted by a bad will. For reasons are simply the tool of the will, seeking its own way. Reasons are helpless before the will.

So, what does it mean to be reasonable? Simply that you are better at bending the information at hand to your will. A particular conservative group puts out commercials exhorting us to “be logical” – as if that is the solution. This, rather, seems to be the perennial temptation, under the guise of either “reason” or “religion”. The latter is obvious to us modern enlightened ones. The former, though, keeps tempting us into ignorance – as if our will is made good by the application of logic and reason to the world around us. Obama declared, in allowing government support of stem cell research, that he was bringing science (that is, the most rational of human activities) back to its proper place. But this was an ethical question (whatever the answer may be) – something science can say nothing about. Reasons again.  Behind this flimsy and lauded claim (that science was depreciated below it’s proper place under Bush), Obama declared his will to be properly in line with reason. But that doesn’t even make sense.

As long as the human will is bad, no reason(s) whatsoever can make us good. That was stated by Paul a long time ago in many ways, evidenced in the work of Jesus, and persistently ignored by a bunch of self-justifying humans throughout history.

Maybe this is why the most important truths are paradoxes, graspable only by faith. We can’t use reason to grab hold of them and bend them to our will. We just have to look at them in confusion, reason struggles vainly to take control, and eventually flees in exhaustion. Then our wills, having lost their hiding place behind reasons, are laid bare for all to see.