St. Thomas More's Utopia

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Ok I was wondering, what was St. Thomas More’s main point with Utopia. Was it meant to be a humorous look at society if allowed to run amok or did he truely believe in priests both male and female, clerical rights to marriage, and divorce? What was the philosophical/theological point (if any) that St. Thomas More is trying to make? It doesn’t really seem like the devout Catholic we know to be St. Thomas More. What are your thoughts?:confused:
 
gatewood1988 said:
Ok I was wondering, what was St. Thomas More’s main point with Utopia. Was it meant to be a humorous look at society if allowed to run amok or did he truely believe in priests both male and female, clerical rights to marriage, and divorce? What was the philosophical/theological point (if any) that St. Thomas More is trying to make? It doesn’t really seem like the devout Catholic we know to be St. Thomas More. What are your thoughts?:confused:
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Satire is largely lost on the modern reader it seems (alack! alack!). Think a moment: would the Church really canonize a man who She thought was a heretic?

Satire is an art form that has sadly been lost in recent years as people become less critical readers.

Here is what I get from Utopia: the name Utopia means no-place. Thus, a society of male and female priests, easy divorce, easy euthanasia, etc. is a society that cannot exist. It is a no-place. It is, in More’s mind (from my interpretation) a society that is not possible. If a society does so, it is no longer a society but an anarchy. Hope this helped.
 
I never thought of it that way, well maybe I did but not to that extent. That does help.
 
Thanks for the link Mijo, it will come in handy when I get around to reading “Utopia” It’s on my reading list.
 
Your welcome AuroraB, also I would like to point out that Dr John Boyle also pointed out the meaning of the places in More’s novel:
“Some of the names [of places] used in Utopia are famously indicative of this [humor]…Utopia is a Greek neologism for ‘nowhere’, the principal city of the island is Amaurot, which means “foggy or phantom”, the principal river…is the Anider, which is Greek for ‘waterless,’ and the man who tells the story of Utopia, Raphael Hythloday, [his surname] is probably best translated as ‘peddler of nonsense’."
GK Chesterton, famous Catholic writer, also discussed Thomas More’s sense of humor:

“the great humorist delighted in daily life; perhaps the biggest joke of all being the book called Utopia. The nineteenth century Utopians imitated the book without seeing the joke.”
 
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