The Cathars of the pandemic
Translation:
Mariana Rimoldi-Sevellec
It wasn’t until Enrique V. del Carril
invited me to the presentation of his book “El país de los cátaros, ensayo
sobre el maniqueísmo en la historia”[1]
(Buenos Aires, Dunken, 2004 and Amazon Kindle), that I vaguely recalled, back in
my Law School days, having read something about that Christian cult that
expanded in the Languedoc area, in south of France, almost a thousand years ago.
When I read the book I understood (or so I thought) that it wasn’t that the
author had a somewhat eccentric interest in just that one episode in history,
but was rather looking into an issue that is still alive and kicking.
From what my limited brainpan could grasp,
those Christians had come up with the idea that the work of God consisted only
in the spiritual world, and that matter is nothing but industrial waste from
the devil’s outrages. Apparently “cathar” means “pure”, and so those guys
thought of themselves. Yet, they weren’t phony but authentic folks who, among
other things, practiced extreme poverty. They became very popular in their zone
of influence, mainly because they were in stark contrast with the lifestyle led
by the bureaucratic head office of Christianity.
Hierarchs disliked the fact that these
individuals were questioning the dogmas they had taken the time and trouble to
define, precisely so that they would never be challenged again. Consequently,
the Papacy, when it ran out of patience, asked Simon de Monfort to do it a
favor and go kill, in a single night, all the Cathars he could find. And that
was the pragmatic end of such an interesting doctrinal debate: the decision of
making one of the parties to the dispute disappear.
I find this issue relevant in these days
of pandemic, when many of my friends, with the best of intentions, are showering
me with messages, videos, sermons, poems and the like, in which spiritual
leaders of all hues encourage me to a sort of conversion to spiritualism. They ask
me to prioritize my values, which they presume I have subverted, and forgo the
slavery to which matter is subjecting me. In reality, those who do that do not
know me quite well, maybe they are confused by my penchant for provocative
statements on poverty (they probably heard me quote the hilarious reverend Ike
when he says “The best remedy for poverty is wealth” or “The best thing you can
do for the poor is not be one of them”, or the mean Ayn Rand when she urges
“The rotter who simpers that he sees no difference between the power of the
dollar and the power of the whip, ought to learn the difference on his own hide
-as, I think, he will”. My dear ones are not too worried about my soul falling
prey to materialism. On the contrary, they know how I dress, what car I drive,
and that I am as amazed as Diogenes was upon seeing how many things were available in the market that he didn’t need.
If, after the current plague I am still on
the most convenient side of the grass, my new spiritual managers, with as much
heartiness as the Cathars, cherish the hope that I come out of this experience
as a better person. That is a rather unpretentious goal: anything would be
better than what I am right now. Furthermore, they believe that out of all the
benefits of my conversion, the most important one will be contempt for matter.
It is hard for me to think that way. In all honesty, I don’t think I will ever
be ready to claim that our local La Morenita coffee is tastier than the
coffee served in any Italian restaurant and therefore it is better to stay home,
here in Argentina, forever. Fear of contagion, or, in the best of cases, the
resignation of someone who realizes that is poorer now might work to force me
stay at home, more than wisdom.
Mind you, I do enjoy listening to people
who think differently. For instance, I would listen carefully to a Mennonite from
the La Pampa province. I have always thought they were quite consistent. They
don’t use electric power and they travel in carriages. Their world as they know
it ends when they reach the nearest town. They sew their own clothes, use an
abacus to count and believe that children should only be taught the rudiments
of arithmetic, German language and the Bible, because everything else is sinful
or useless. They are not at all interested in learning about the usefulness of a
particle accelerator or even a boiler, and they couldn’t care less about a
Velazquez painting or the tango song Adios Nonino. They don’t get upset over
the 30% tax on the Spotify subscription.
Conversely, our spiritualists make me a
little anxious when they seem to ignore the things they have freely decided to
depend on. Their children were able to have breakfast this morning because
someone (not them) milked a cow, a truck driver loaded the milk pails, the milk
was processed, refrigerated and transported by some industry, the supermarket
employees put the milk bottles on the shelves, someone kept the IT systems
running, all of that while the spiritualists ranted and raved about the need to
get rid of the tyranny of matter (a condition also shared by milk protein).
They think the guy who milks the cows is
kind and friendly because they think of him as poor, if not also as a “Cathar”;
but they despise the multinational company that manufactured the reagent he
uses to make sure his cows are not maggoty. They also disdain the other
multinational company that sells the antibiotics when necessary. They pull the
paranoid thesis by which ALL the seeming needs have been perversely created by
corporations, as if nature and the human condition didn’t have the terrific
ability to constantly produce new problems, all by themselves. The 21st
century Neo-Catharism has identified its new demons.
It wouldn’t be efficient to have to milk
our own cow each morning for breakfast. In order to reap the benefits of
someone else’s efforts, I can think of three possible ways: violence (I’m not
really into it), solidarity (a wonderful virtue, but it’s silly to pretend that
it is inherent to everyone), or voluntary trading. It looks like there’s no
choice but to allow for some people to grow oranges and others to do massages
so that we don’t go back to dying toothless and illiterate at the age of
thirty-seven on average, not knowing what’s beyond the neighboring village. At
this point, I try to tell my well-meaning friends that, unfortunately, the milk
and the cart’s wheel (and for those who appreciate it, also anesthesia for
surgery) will be available again only if lots of people go back to spending as
soon as possible on things as “superfluous” as oil paint, Fernet Branca,
cruises in the Caribbean, breast implants, Barcelona soccer games, Oreo cookies,
hair dye, McDonald’s menus, Mini Cooper cars, biscuits, wedding dresses, teddy
bears, refrigerator magnets, flowers, jelly, soap-bubble blowing toys,
videogames, accountants’ fees and even stupefying and loathsome (for my liking)
Marcelo Tinelli[2]
TV shows. If we all devoted ourselves to meditating in a cave, we would end up
slaughtering one another, as many cavemen used to before they started trading.
As usual, we will
have to beware of the morons who think they must turn themselves or their loved
ones in, or betray their moral code for anything enticing in the marketplace.
Maybe the greatest stupidity is to pretend we live in a world without idiots.
We cannot eliminate them overnight, like they did with the poor Cathars, who
weren’t bad people after all.
[2] TN:
Marcelo Tinelli is an Argentine TV host, media producer and businessman, best
known as the host of the TV show ShowMatch. He is one of the most iconic
figures in Argentina's television. Source: Wikipedia.
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