![]() According to Judith Baxter, a linguistic professor at Aston University, it is statistically found that women were four times more likely than men to engage in double-voiced discourses. Such speakers try to understand what their audiences feel and think, and then tailor their speech accordingly to achieve their desired outcome. As opposed to single-voiced discourse (where a topic is expressed in a straightforward way), speakers who practice double-voicing speak with a dual agenda: to express a particular opinion and at the same time adjust the way they speak to take into account their counterpart’s views and concerns. While we may not often speak of this term, some of our everyday actions would fall under its very definition. Then we need to live our lives accordingly.The ability to anticipate cultural expectations, absorb the reactions and readjust our language accordingly can be a highly effective tool for leadership.ĭouble-voiced discourse is a phrase coined by the Russian philosopher and linguistic theorist named Mikhail Bakhtin. Instead, human emotions need to be integrated into a coherent account of Christian faith, human reason, human action, and human flourishing-something undertaken with great skill by past figures like Aquinas and contemporary thinkers such as the late Servais Pinckaers. Feelings are central aspects of our nature. “The solution isn’t to downgrade the importance of emotions like love and joy or anger and fear for people. How should the Christian church face this epidemic of sentimentalism? Gregg shares the antidote at the end of his piece: Gregg identifies three primary causes of how the Church ended up “sinking into a morass of sentimentalism.” He points to contemporary culture, the prevalence of a “feeling faith” (one in which the focus is on how I feel, rather than what is truth) and “efforts to downgrade and distort natural law” as main catalysts for Affectus per solam ideology. Rather, “The sentimentalism infecting much of the Church is all about diminishing the gravity and clarity of Christian faith,” Gregg notes. However, modern Christian sentimentalism does not seem to root itself in the seriousness of eternal spiritual implications. With regards to hell, “Sentimentalism simply avoids the subject.” How scary it is to think that many modern Christians are not considering such an essential spiritual reality, “the possibility that any of us could end up eternally separated from God.” For example, Western Christians today will often describe sins as “regrets” or “sad mistakes,” which removes the gravity of what sin is and the damaging effects sin has on humanity. ![]() Gregg notes that Affectus per solam sentimentalism “rears its head” in numerous areas in modern Western Christianity. Gregg begins by introducing a term for sentimentalism: Affectus per solam, which means: “By Feelings Alone.” Affectus per solam, the opposite of hyper-rationalism, “is an exaltation of strongly-felt feelings, a deprecation of reason, and the subsequent infantilization of Christian faith.” Christianity in Western countries is widely infected by this dangerous, selfish way of viewing and practicing religion. In his article “A Church drowning in sentimentalism”, Samuel Gregg, Acton’s Director of Research, writes about the dangerous trend toward sentimentalism in present-day Christianity. However, a recent shift towards religious sentimentalism raises questions about the desire for truth in the modern-day. Christianity, by definition, is a religion that emphasizes sacrifice and selflessness. Involvement in the Christian Church should never be characterized by self-centeredness.
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