(See also, “Clerisy on the run” from May 28, 2025.)

High on my wish list of things that I would like to see the Trump administration accomplish is the removal of the current clerisy from positions of institutional authority. The dictionary definition of clerisy is a “distinct class of learned or literary people”. To our determinant, we have cultivated and nurtured a clerisy that are only learned in superficial ways.  They mimic the forms and manners of learned people but lack the intellect. They cloak themselves with the mantle of science but in reality, are dogmatic and unscientific. They are pretentious in the extreme and assert moral superiority whenever challenged. They hold the opinion that the trappings of representative government can remain, as long as it does not challenge their influence within government institutions.

Our modern-day clerisy is a shabby secular version of the First Estate clergy in the Ancien Régime. The clergy of old were a privileged and influential class that oversaw the spiritual life, education, and moral guidance of the populace. They advised the king. They ran schools, universities, and had the power to censor books and ideas deemed heretical. Everyone paid a tenth of their income to support them.

However, I would prefer the clerisy of the First Estate to our present-day posers. At least in their defense, they had a working knowledge of Latin and the scriptures. What can be said about the clerisy of today? Their belief system is a muddled collection of forms and fashions without substance. They profess an eschatology that man-made global warming will lead to our extinction. They believe that sex is a malleable concept. They don surgical masks in public to assert their moral rectitude. I want nothing to do with their shallow religion. The business at hand for the rest of us is to expel them from the institutions and never again allow them near the levers of power. So, when I see the recently fired CDC Director, Susan Monarez, making her way through the CDC lobby for hopefully the last time, I rejoice.

Image: Public domain.