But What Is Happiness?
A new study ranks the United States at number 16 among the nations of the world as regards “happiness”. A bit more about the research:
The World Values Survey (WVS) is the work of a global network of social scientists who perform periodic surveys addressing a number of issues. The latest surveys, taken in the United States and in several developing countries, showed increased happiness from 1981 to 2007 in 45 of 52 countries for which substantial time series data was available.
Researchers responsible for the analysis, from the University of Michigan’s Institute for Social Research (ISR) in Ann Arbor, say the overall rise in reported happiness is due to greater economic growth, democratization and social tolerance.
Looking at this, I can’t help but wonder how, according to the scientific method, happiness is determined? Or to quote Gene Wilder as Willy Wonka quoting Shakespeare, “Where is fancy bred - in the heart, or in the head?”
If the conditions really are “greater economic growth, democratization and social tolerance” then what consideration is given to spirituality, family life, committed love, healthy relationships, satisfaction from meaningful work, the joy of true culture, etc.?
There’s a lot more to life than prosperity, the ability to vote, and not having anyone tell you what you’re doing is wrong. Heck, I’d push all of those down to near the bottom of my “must have” list, with the possible exception of the freedom from stress that prosperity, rightly handled, can bring. (It would mean that all the contributing factors to the financial Sword of Damocles that always seems to be hanging over my head might take a vacation for a while, anyway.)
I’m not sure what to make of this. The details of the study as reported here are too vague. And if people are self-identifying as happy despite being more disconnected than ever from what we know to be the source of true happiness, what’s the disconnect? Are they really that deluded? I see far more unhappy Catholics than I do non-Catholics. Maybe thinking that whatever you want to do is OK really is the key to happiness in this life.
As for the next one, well, that’s another story.
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Funny. I just posted on this today. I don’t think secular people are all that happy. Superficially, sometimes. But it’s only when they’re amused, which is why they’re perpetually seeking amusement in various forms of entertainment, material possessions, and/or utilitarian relationships. We wouldn’t have the divorce rate (and even more tragically the suicide rate) we currently have if people in our society possessed real joy in their lives.
As for Catholics, I completely agree. There are entirely too many who express little or no joy. In my opinion, there are 2 kinds of unhappy Catholics. Those who are basically secular but go to church to establish a loophole. They want to live in this world and enjoy it in its fullness, but they keep a window open to the next. They’re never really happy because they’re in a state of constant internal conflict.
Then there are the devout Catholics who truly see the beauty and meaning in Catholicism and want to live according to the Truth, but when it comes to this world and the little things in it they take everything too seriously. They see the forest but miss the trees, the flowers, the birds, and every vibrant color He uses to paint our life on earth. They’re always worried about and discussing every problem in the world and the Church (it’s no wonder they’re depressed) and they live in constant fear of damnation because of scrupulosity. So they never really sit back and relax with a beer around a campfire, singing folk songs while the kids chase after fireflies in their barefeet. Instead, they’re inside reading the latest (or oldest) encyclical and fretting over what it means for the futures of their 8 equally miserable children.
I like to think of the Catholic intellectuals of the early 20th century - Belloc, Chesterton, Tolkien and the like. They certainly concerned themselves with questions of importance but they had a jolly good time doing it. And they lived their lives appreciating the beautiful things of this world - i.e. Belloc traveling by foot across Europe and the US. IF you find a Catholic like that, he’ll most certainly be happy in this life and the next.