The Tragedy of Skepticism: How Distrusting the Real Undermines Human Fulfillment
How skepticism severs our connection to reality, meaning, and moral responsibility.
Pursuing the Truth is far more than an intellectual pursuit—it is a profound journey of intimate engagement with reality. As we’ve seen, truly understanding reality requires more than detached thought; it demands a sincere and active participation in the world, shaped by obedience to the moral law inscribed on our hearts. Our journey toward the Truth is not found in mere philosophical musings or the pages of a book, but through living fully as human beings. This path to the Truth, to what is real, is deeply woven into our very nature. It is a noble and worthwhile calling because, at our core, we are made for communion with the Truth and the real. We are born with a love for the real, instinctively drawn to it, and called to embrace it. This communion with reality, with the Truth, is not only our highest good, but the source of genuine happiness—the ultimate fulfillment of our human nature.
Yet, skepticism stands as a devastating barrier to this fulfillment. Why? Because skepticism poisons our ability to trust the real. We are made to love the Truth, but the skeptic, by definition, can never fully embrace what is real—there is always doubt, always a withholding of assent. This is tragic because it cuts us off from the very thing we are designed to embrace. The human heart longs for the real, for something firm, lasting, and true, yet skepticism locks us into a space where nothing can be trusted, nothing is certain. It deprives us of the peace that comes from knowing the world as it is, rather than constantly questioning its authenticity.
This skepticism is precisely what prevents people from embracing human action. In action, a human being exercises their will, makes choices, and engages with the world. Action is not a detached mental exercise; it involves a subject—a person—making decisions that carry weight in the real world. Choices have meaning, they entail sacrifice, cooperation, consequences, and real costs in a tangible environment. Virtues and vices, responsibility and freedom, all come into play in this dynamic. But skepticism clouds this reality, obscuring the sense of responsibility that comes with it. When we fail to trust what is real, we lose the ability to see that our choices can be right or wrong, good or bad, better or worse. Skepticism denies the reality of our agency, making it impossible to recognize the moral dimensions of our actions, and thus preventing us from fully living the human life we are meant to live.
Skepticism, at its core, is a way of avoiding responsibility and participation in the world. By refusing to commit to what is real, the skeptic remains detached, evading the consequences of choices and actions. Without trust in the real, there’s no need to own up to the moral dimensions of life—no accountability for right or wrong, good or bad. In skepticism, there is always an escape route, a refusal to confront the weight of decision and the demands of virtue. This avoidance undermines human agency and responsibility, making it impossible to fully embrace the Truth.
One reason for the rise of skepticism, and the dread and confusion that follow in its wake, is modernity’s deep distrust of the Truth. Modernity, in many ways, has laced our culture with a refusal to consent to what is real. It’s as though modernity is built on a foundation of suspicion—a belief that Truth, if it exists at all, is always just out of reach, always subject to doubt or reinterpretation. This refusal to consent, this constant "no" to reality, this constant “no” to the Truth, is at the heart of our modern existential crisis.
To commune with the Truth, to truly understand what is real, requires consent. It demands a "yes" to the world as it is, an openness to being shaped by reality rather than trying to bend reality to fit our subjective whims. But modernity, with its anti-realist tendencies, rejects this. It turns away from the real, favoring instead the creation of subjective or contingent "truths" that only deepen our sense of isolation and disorientation.
There is something profoundly tragic about the way a person can move from childhood, where they love the real with a pure and untainted heart, to adolescence, where skepticism and cynicism creep in. Children naturally trust the world around them—they are instinctively attuned to the real. But somewhere along the line, often during the teenage years, something snaps. The world becomes less certain, less trustworthy. This shift, in part, can be attributed to the modernist epistemologies that have tainted our educational systems—systems that prioritize doubt over trust, critique over assent, and skepticism over belief.
This isn’t to say that critical thinking is wrong or that questions shouldn’t be asked. But when skepticism becomes the default mode of thought, when it becomes a habit of mind that we carry into every area of life, it robs us of the ability to experience the fullness of reality. It closes us off from the Truth, the very thing we are made for.
To live in communion with the real, to love the Truth, is what brings genuine joy and fulfillment. It is, ultimately, what we are designed for. And in a world that increasingly says "no" to the real, our task is to say "yes" again, to open ourselves up to the Truth, to consent to the reality that we are called to embrace. Only then can we find the peace and happiness we are meant to experience.
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