Because it is based on the subjectivism, the moral relativism, of mere personal judgment, the fruit of a thousand years of schism from the Holy Orthodox Church, the ripening of Roman Catholic Papism and Protestant Lutheranism.
Father George Florovsky writes of Martin Luther,
Luther even added the word "alone" — allein — in Romans 3:28 before "through faith" — durch den Glauben — precisely to counter the words in James 2:24:"You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith only” — οράτε ότι εξ έργων δικαιούται άνθρωπος και ουκ εκ πίστεως μόνον. What is more is that Luther became very aggressive and arrogant in his response to the criticism that he had added "alone" to the Biblical text. "If your papist makes much useless fuss about the word sola, allein, tell him at once: Doctor Martin Luther will have it so and says: Papist and donkey are one thing; sic volo, sic jubeo, sit pro ratione voluntas. For we do not want to be pupils and followers of the Papists, but their masters and judges." Luther continues in a bantering manner in an attempt to imitate St. Paul in the latter's response to his opponents. "Are they doctors? So am I. Are they learned? So am I. Are they preachers? So am I. Are they theologians? So am I. Are they philosophers? So am I. Are they writers of books? So am I. And I shall further boast: I can expound Psalms and Prophets; which they cannot. I can translate; which they cannot... Therefore the word allein shall remain in my New Testament, and though all pope-donkeys should get furious and foolish, they shall not get the word out."
--http://www.holytrinitymission.org/books/english/fathers_florovsky_4.htm#_Toc27729548
This is exactly the spirit of Americanism: ‘Are they governors? So am I. Are they lawmakers? So am I. Are they judges? So am I. Are they constitutional philosophers? So am I.’ And so forth.
This demonic pride destroys the guardian of truth and goodness: tradition. Fr George writes about this,
The true tradition is only the tradition of truth, traditio veritatis. This tradition, according of St. Irenaeus, is grounded in, and secured by, that charisma veritatis certum [secure charisma of truth], which has been "deposited" in the Church from the very beginning and has been preserved by the uninterrupted succession of episcopal ministry. "Tradition" in the Church is not a continuity of human memory, or a permanence of rites and habits. It is a living tradition — depositum juvenescens, in the phrase of St. Irenaeus. Accordingly, it cannot be counted inter mortuas regulas [among dead rules]. Ultimately, tradition is a continuity of the abiding presence of the Holy Spirit in the Church, a continuity of Divine guidance and illumination. The Church is not bound by the "letter." Rather, she is constantly moved forth by the "Spirit." The same Spirit, the Spirit of Truth, which "spake through the Prophets," which guided the Apostles, is still continuously guiding the Church into the fuller comprehension and understanding of the Divine truth, from glory to glory.
"Following the Holy Fathers"… This is not a reference to some abstract tradition, in formulas and propositions. It is primarily an appeal to holy witnesses. Indeed, we appeal to the Apostles, and not just to an abstract "Apostolicity." In the similar manner do we refer to the Fathers. The witness of the Fathers belongs, intrinsically and integrally, to the very structure of Orthodox belief. The Church is equally committed to the kerygma of the Apostles and to the dogma of the Fathers. We may quote at this point an admirable ancient hymn (probably, from the pen of St. Romanus the Melode). "Preserving the kerygma of the Apostles and the dogmas of the Fathers, the Church has sealed the one faith and wearing the tunic of truth she shapes rightly the brocade of heavenly theology and praises the great mystery of piety."
--https://www.fatheralexander.org/booklets/english/following_fathers_florovsky_e.htm#_Toc98545750
The West has been rebelling against the life-giving Orthodox Tradition for more than 1,000 years: First the Bishop of Rome in claiming a special primacy for himself as ‘Vicar of Christ’ on earth, then the Protestants in claiming the papal powers for themselves (as we saw with Martin Luther above), and now the secular, political expression of this same thing in Yankee Americanism. The results of this are clear for all to see: The West continues to slide further and further into spiritual death and therefore into moral and physical degradation as well.
The States are not immune to these spiritual laws, however much her peoples want to claim a special ‘exceptionalism’ to exempt themselves from their effects. The South has understood the importance of tradition more than the other cultural/regional ethnoi of the union, though that loyalty to tradition has been shaky in certain seasons and on certain subjects. Howsobeit, if she and anyone else in the other States want to escape the fall into the looming abyss of utter spiritual chaos and demonic pandemonium, the Orthodox Church is waiting to embrace them with her motherly love.
***
A couple of articles about the federal courts show how relevant this remains. Both Mr Bryan Fischer and Monomakhos have just written essays tracing the origin of the lawless federal judiciary to Marbury v Madison:
https://www.afa.net/the-stand/culture/2020/10/february-24-1803-the-day-it-all-went-wrong/
https://www.monomakhos.com/scotus-just-saved-the-electoral-college/
There is some truth to that claim, but the deeper truth is that federal judicial rebellion against ‘the constitution’ is simply another manifestation of the norm in the West since the Great Schism: rebellion against God-ordained authority.
Thus, it makes no sense for Monomakhos to write (bolding added),
Since that fateful date in 1803, it’s been downhill. The list of egregious Court rulings has been mercifully short, but nevertheless destructive. It was most damaging in destroying the necessary comity that must exist in a Federal Republic between historic Christian institutions and the state. Prime examples of this include West Virginia State Board of Education v Barnette (1943), Engel v Vitale (1962), and all the demonic stupidity unleashed on us in the 1960s by that odious harridan, Madalyn Murray O’Hair (Murray v Curlett 1963).
Incongruous and out-of-character with America’s foundational Protestantism, West Virginia, Engel and Murray literally blindsided America. America, after all, was a land whose national legislature built one of the world’s largest Christian cathedrals just a few blocks from the Supreme Court. A country in which the Congress, and all state legislatures, employed full-time chaplains, and whose military cemeteries are marked with a myriad of Christian crosses.
It bears repeating, that so novel and so out-of-left field were these decisions, nobody could have seen them coming.
--https://www.monomakhos.com/scotus-just-saved-the-electoral-college/
Of course we could have seen this coming. Protestantism is inherently rebellious, and New England by this time (mid-20th century), whose Pilgrim/Puritan foundation is extolled by so many misguided folks, had already been transformed into Unitarianism, Mormonism, the Social Gospel, etc., with worse yet to come. In other words, an insurrection by the judiciary or some other part of the government or society, together with atheism and apostasy, was the logical outcome in the States, with or without Marbury v Madison. Some changes to the constitutional structure could have helped slow the process, but the underlying forces would not have been stopped.
We need another paradigm in order to overcome the destructive moral relativism of individualism that is part of the post-Schism West, which is battering nearly every part of it so badly today, and that paradigm is found in the Orthodox Church. There, every man is equal (i.e., all are free to pursue and attain theosis/deification), yet God has ordained that hierarchy is necessary to achieve that end (the hierarchical principle is present even in the angelic world, lest anyone think this is some kind of ‘oppressive’ ideology dreamt up by sinful, fallen men; see, e.g., The Celestial Hierarchy and The Ecclesiastical Hierarchy written by St Dionysius the Areopagite (+96), the disciple of the Holy Apostle Paul).
The modern West accepts the first principle but has rejected the second, and this has led to the rebelliousness at work in the [u.] S. federal Supreme Court and elsewhere. Without the humility to doubt our own reasoning, without the ability to seek guidance from others and to cut off our own will at the suggestion of another, the cursed legacy of the apostate bishops of Rome and of Luther and the Protestants will go on ravaging New England, the South, Germany, France, and nearly every corner of the West.
The political system arising from the Orthodox view of man will be very different from that derived from the cult of ‘We the People’ and its Gnostic, Neo-Platonic constitution ‘of, by, and for the people’. The anointed king; the three estates (clergy, nobility, and common folk; or those who work, those who fight, and those who pray); guilds; etc.; these are much more normal in truly Christian lands than the individual in revolt against any and all authority that restrains his self-defined understanding of ‘freedom’.
***
Lastly, more evidence that a conservative ascendancy is not likely within the federal Supreme Court even with Amy Coney Barrett on that bench:
https://www.theblaze.com/op-ed/thomas-alito-gay-marriage-decision
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Holy Ælfred the Great, King of England, South Patron, pray for us sinners at the Souð, unworthy though we are!
Anathema to the Union!
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