Professor Thomas Molnar: In Memoriam

We received news today that the noted Catholic intellectual Thomas Molnar has died:

Obituary

His name may not mean much to the current generation. Yet, in the early 60’s he was ranked as one of the three or four key conservative Catholic thinkers in the US: along with Eric von Kuehnelt-Leddihn and John Lukacs (what a strange grouping!). Molnar has left us major works in philosophy, political science, literature and criticism of current events. Among his innumerable articles, his contributions to the early Traditionalist magazine Triumph and as a contributor of many years to National Review stand out for the Catholic Traditionalist. Those used to the products of conservative catholic thought today will be amazed by Molnar’s profundity of thought and his clarity of expression.

“A prophet is without honor in his own country” – assuming the US was Thomas Molnar’s country, truer words were never spoken. Here, his highest academic attainment was a professorship in French in the CUNY system. France, however, was a kind of spiritual homeland to Molnar; he was highly regarded by the diverse, usually warring communities of the French right. France, the home of Action Francaise, Bernanos and Msgr. Lefebvre, has a lively tradition of the intellectual discourse and of organized resistance to the authorities of modernity. Indeed, many of Thomas Molnar’s best works were in French and dealt with issues of French intellectual life. And after 1989, towards the end of his life, Molnar was finally welcomed home to his native Hungary. He was given a professorship at the University of Budapest, his works were translated into his native tongue and he received many awards and honors.

Given the scale of his achievement, I can only touch on one aspect of Molnar’s thought. He was a preeminent chronicler and analyst of the ideological trends and deceptions of the current age. In conducting his dissections, Thomas Molnar drew primarily on Thomism, on the thought of the French right and on his immense knowledge of European literature, philosophy and history. In The Two Faces of American Foreign Policy (1962) he described the dangers of the recurrent American temptation to ideology in foreign affairs forty years before the march into Iraq squarely raised this issue. In The Decline of the Intellectual (1961; perhaps his magnum opus), he analyzed “global ideology” decades before globalization became the mantra of every corporation and government on earth. In The Counter-Revolution (1969) we find an extremely perceptive (and harshly critical) analysis of Vatican II and the papacy of Paul VI. Molnar had reached the latter conclusion only after some hesitation: in Ecumenism or New Reformation?(1968) he had still recommended rallying to the papacy as the cure for the present disorders in the Church.

Later, Molnar spelled out the dangers of the Neuhaus/Novak/First Things ideology 25 years before the bankruptcy of the “neocon” movement’s political, economic and ecclesiastical policies. Need I say that he likewise clearly foresaw the ignominious end of the National Review crowd as a claque of the establishment they had once opposed? Indeed, Molnar, generally speaking, was a critic of the “American conservative movement” and considered it a failure.

In all this Thomas Molnar was by no means a vastly learned academic pedant, let alone an ideologue. Any private conversation with Thomas Molnar was a revelation. He had a novelist’s eye for detail. By pointing out a few seemingly unimportant features or by making an unexpected juxtaposition he could shine a whole new light on a speaker, a conference or an entire organization. His candid evaluations of figures like Cardinals Lustiger, O’Connor or Joseph Ratzinger (for each after one encounter!) were prophetic. He nourished this sense for the real and concrete through extensive travel throughout the world. Moreover, he was a great listener: he always sought out and evaluated the experiences of others: college students, young and not-so-young professionals – even taxi drivers.

For many of his conservative or Catholic colleagues he was a somewhat uncomfortable figure. He would be accused of “pessimism.” But is this not another word for willingness to tell the truth: that the Second Vatican Council had disastrously failed; that the policies of John Paul II were no answer to the crisis; and that no personality or movement offering a real solution was on the horizon? Others found fault with his “anti-Americanism.” But is Molnar’s critique of American cultural hegemony that different from the earlier observations of Graham Greene (whose work I happen to be rereading at the moment)? There is an amazing agreement on this topic between these two entirely different personalities united by a common European and Catholic perspective. Similar to Greene, Molnar hated Puritanism and its progeny: ideological thought and the reduction of life to formulas. He saw this puritanical legacy – along with democracy – as the Achilles heel of the United States. His views on the American educational system and its products are negative and forceful. I will not conceal that Molnar was not a little embittered against a Church that in France had turned its back on its cultural legacy and had become the obsequious courtier of the progressive establishment. The destruction of the traditional, Catholic society of Spain that Molnar experienced first hand over the years – and in which the Church collaborated – undoubtedly added to these feelings.

I last saw Thomas Molnar early this year. Although suffering from painful and debilitating afflictions, he was, as always, polite and, despite everything, serene – ever the European gentleman. I would advise every Catholic – and in particular every Traditionalist Catholic – to seek out and read the works of Molnar. You will find there a precious legacy of European Catholicism that will help you understand the issues of today. Our condolences and prayers are with his devoted wife Ildiko, his children and grandchildren.