[ricpic]

At the risk of extreme oversimplification, could it be said that "The Second Reality" boils down to a systematic rebellion against "The First Reality?"
On the political plane communism, on the social/political plane feminism, environmentalism, the homosexual agenda, racial seperatism; they are all radical rejections of the existing hierarchy: they are all anti-nominal and they are all manifestations of "The Second Reality."
In laymans' terms isn't Voegelin saying that it is impossible to enter into dialogue with people hell bent on overthrowing "The Father?"

[betty boop]

At the risk of extreme oversimplification, could it be said that "The Second Reality" boils down to a systematic rebellion against "The First Reality?"

ricpic, this is hardly an "oversimplification." What you say above and the rest that followed in your last is precisely what Voegelin is saying. Truly, you get the picture. IMHO. Thanks for writing!

[gore3000]

In laymans' terms isn't Voegelin saying that it is impossible to enter into dialogue with people hell bent on overthrowing "The Father?"

Not quite. What Voegelin is saying is that Aquinas could debate the Mohammedans because they at least shared a common ground - a belief in reason and also like himself a regard for Aristotle. The advocates of the '2nd reality' however reject not just Aristotle, but reason itself and even truth. The article is really an attack on materialism:

[I]f we remove…everything that smacks of cosmological symbolism, there remains as a piece de resistance the argument that a universe which contains intelligent beings cannot originate with a prima causa [first cause, prime mover] that is less than intelligent]….