Welcome Pope Benedict XVI to the world
stage with your message that we need to recognize and appreciate the
existence of “Truth.”
We need a global discussion of this issue. This issue is at the core of a functional and functioning society.
We need more open debate. We must get rid of the idea of Truth once and for all.
No American believes in Truth in the sense that Benedict XVI means it. I couldn't talk to any American for more than a moment without hearing “I know that my truth may not be the same as your.” That is not Truth. That American position is the core of relativism.
Civil society is based on common values, in our case about equal opportunity, self reliance and justice. We also believe that there is no Moral Truth, that each issue of law, etiquette and criminality must be examined in a context from which a reasonable moral outcome can be derived.
The pervasive American notion of
relative truths is widespread in the world and makes most of the
functioning civil societies possible. It is societies based on
Truths that have Sharia, communist dictators and tribal warfare.
We are battling Truths in the war on terrorism and the new Pope will help us understand that perspective, inadvertently.
(Of course there are syllogistic truths; I didn't mean to ignore my philosopher friends.)