In the August 31 edition of America magazine, Bishop D'Arcy, the bishop of Fort Wayne-South Bend, asks some questions of the University of Notre Dame and other Catholic universities as well. Some highlights:

It is not about President Obama.... It is not about Democrats versus Republicans.... It is not about whether it is appropriate for the president of the United States to speak at Notre Dame or any great Catholic university on the pressing issues of the day.... The response, so intense and widespread, is not about what this journal called “sectarian Catholicism.” Rather, the response of the faithful derives directly from the Gospel....

Another serious question of witness and moral responsibility before the Notre Dame administration concerns its sponsorship over several years of a sad and immoral play, offensive to the dignity of women, which many call pornographic, and which an increasing number of Catholic universities have cancelled, “The Vagina Monologues,” by Eve Ensler.

Although he spoke eloquently about the importance of dialogue with the president of the United States, the president of Notre Dame chose not to dialogue with his bishop on these two matters [ND commencement and The Vagina Monologues], both pastoral and both with serious ramifications for the care of souls, which is the core responsibility of the local bishop....

I firmly believe that the board of trustees must take up its responsibility afresh, with appropriate study and prayer. They also must understand the seriousness of the present moment. This requires spiritual and intellectual formation on the part of the men and women of industry, business and technology who make up the majority of the board. Financial generosity is no longer sufficient for membership on the boards of great universities, if indeed it ever was. The responsibility of university boards is great, and decisions must not be made by a few. Like bishops, they are asked to leave politics and ambition at the door, and make serious decisions before God....

Where will the great Catholic universities search for a guiding light in the years ahead? Will it be the Land O’Lakes Statement or Ex Corde Ecclesiae? The first comes from a frantic time, with finances as the driving force. Its understanding of freedom is defensive, absolutist and narrow. It never mentions Christ and barely mentions the truth. The second text, Ex Corde Ecclesiae, speaks constantly of truth and the pursuit of truth. It speaks of freedom in the broader, Catholic philosophical and theological tradition, as linked to the common good, to the rights of others and always subject to truth. Unlike Land O’Lakes, it is communal, reflective of the developments since Vatican II, and it speaks with a language enlightened by the Holy Spirit.

The whole article from this wise shepherd is worth a read and some reflection.

Labels: bishop, church, communication, communion, dialogue, human life, moral life, politics, pope benedict xvi, USA

I received this e-mail from Katie von Schaijik of the Personalist Project today:

There was so much interest in the talks the other night that we decided to hasten the launch of our public forum for discussion.

You'll find there Dr. Healy's reflections on his experience of the event and his impression of the controversy surrounding Christopher West these days. Soon we'll be able to add audio recordings of the lectures, with, hopefully, video to follow.

We think of the forum as an online watering hole for personalists and their friends. We're calling it the Linde, after 2 establishments of that name in Liechtenstein, where we used to drink beer and philosophize between classes.

We hope you'll visit often and add your comments to our discussions!

Labels: communication, dialogue, John Paul II, moral life, theology of the body

Last evening, Catholic University of America (CUA) held a discussion entitled "The Obama Administration and the Sanctity of Human Life: Is There a Common Ground on Life Issues? What is the Right Response by 'Pro-Life' Citizens?" The discussion, featuring Professor Robert George and Professor Doug Kmiec, and moderated by the Honorable Mary Ann Glendon, was held at the National Press Club in Washington, DC. (A complete description of the event may be found here.)


I've transcribed the introduction by Professor William Wagner to give you a sense of the nature and format of the discussion:

Good afternoon.

I'm Professor William Wagner, the director of Catholic University's Center for Law, Philosophy and Culture. It's my pleasure to welcome you here today to a public exchange of views on the topic of The Obama Administration and the Sanctity of Human Life: Is There a Common Ground on Life Issues? What is the Right Response by Pro-Life Citizens? Today's event features presentations and discussions by two leading scholars and political commentators, both Roman Catholics, and both members of the pro-life community, presenting two different perspectives on the current administration's policies regarding such issues as abortion and embryonic stem cell research, and their impact on societal attitudes regarding respect for human life.

The purpose of the event is to advance understanding within the pro-life intellectual community in the United States of the issues, of what potential for common ground exists with the Obama administration on life issues, and what, in any event, is the right response of the pro-life community to the new administration.

The coverage in the press of issues relating to Obama's recent appearance at Notre Dame University indicates that discourse within the Catholic and pro-life communities on this question is of general interest to members of the American public. We are very pleased that members of our audience today represent not just the pro-life community, but other communities of discourse within the United States as well. These members of our audience are most cordially welcome.

We hope that the exchange of views we will hear today will be of value not just to members of the pro-life community, but to all members of the American public, regardless of their view on these issues.

You will note that today's event is billed as a discussion and not a debate. For it is not a debate. It is intended to present for the audience's consideration a fuller presentation of views on both sides of the question to be compared and considered within the largest possible lens. The tenor of our event is much in accord with the challenge posed by the nation's president while he was at Notre Dame. I quote him: "The question, then, is how do we work through these conflicts? Is it possible for us to join hands in common effort as citizens of a vibrant and varied democracy? How do we engage in vigorous debate? How does each of us remain firm in our principles and fight for what we consider right without demonizing those with just as strongly-held convictions on the other side?"

The Catholic University's Center for Law, Philosophy and Culture -- the sponsor of today's event -- exists to promote inquiry into the role of law in relation to culture and culture's orientation to the human good. The scope of its inquiry is both theoretical and practical. In its theoretical aspect, the Center aims to contribute to the academic fields of jurisprudence and the philosophy of law, as well as to Christian political and social ethics. In the practical dimension, it seeks to foster renewal and transformation of culture under contemporary circumstances through law and law reform.

In the President's remarks just mentioned, he concluded by calling for open hearts, open minds, fair-minded words. This is good. In the present setting, under the sponsorship of our Center, we would want, however, to clarify and make explicit what the President certainly meant to leave as implicit: What do we leave our hearts and minds open to, in particular? So as we convene this discussion today, let us leave our minds open to the truth, and our hearts open to love for one another in the light of our Creator's love for all of us.

I will now shortly turn the floor over to our able moderator, the Honorable Mary Ann Glendon, Learned Hand Professor of Law at Harvard Law School and former United States Ambassador to the Holy See. Before I do, allow me to say just a word about our format. Professor Glendon will speak for several minutes, not just to introduce our speakers, but further to introduce our topic. Then she will keep time as each speaker presents in turn. Each speaker will come to the podium to give a twenty minute presentation of his basic viewpoint. Thereafter... the moderator and the two speakers will sit before us and Professor Glendon will pose questions to the speakers. She will then also read questions from the audience for the speakers to consider in turn. Monitors are prepared to pass out note cards to the audience. You're invited to write down questions as they occur to you and pass them to the outside of your aisles, to be assembled to be given to Professor Glendon. And then each speaker will have a brief time for closing comments.

Professor Glendon...

Professor George's opening remarks are now posted on the Public Discourse website here. A snip:

The common ground I am interested in is with pro-life Americans who, like Professor Kmiec, have supported the President politically. The election is over, and the current question is not who anyone thinks will do the best job as President, or even whether one may legitimately support candidates who deny the fundamental dignity and right to life of unborn human beings and who promise to protect and extend the abortion license and expand the funding of embryo-destructive research. The question is: On which issues will we support the President’s direction, and on which will we challenge him because he is heading in the wrong direction? Those pro-life Americans who voted for him and support him should not object when we speak for the most vulnerable and defenseless of our fellow human beings, even when that means severely criticizing the President’s policies. They should stand with us on common ground, and join their voices with ours.

You can watch the streaming video of the entire event on CUA website here.

If you simply want to listen to the audio, I've created an MP3 audio podcast available on my podcast feed, or directly here.

Additional resources:
Dawn Eden was there and files this report about Kmiec's answer to a question she had submitted.

Labels: church, communication, conscience, dialogue, human life, moral life, multimedia, podcasts, politics

Father Robert Barron of Word on Fire has written a thoughtful article on dialogue, in wake of the speeches given at Notre Dame's commencement cermonies last Sunday. A snip:

It comes down to that slippery little word “dialogue.” I realize that to say that one is against dialogue is akin to saying that one is impatient with motherhood, patriotism, and sunny days. But the point is this: one should, in certain circumstances, be suspicious of dialogue. The great Canadian Jesuit philosopher Bernard Lonergan laid out the four basic moves that characterize the action of a healthy mind.....

He goes on to describe these four characteristics:

1. Attentive: Has to be able to absorb the data / facts of a situation


2. Intelligent: Needs to discern patterns of meaning


3. Reasonable: Must be capable of reasoning in order to form proper judgments vis-a-vis truth claims


4. Responsible: Must accept responsibility for the way the judgments formed will affect one's life and behavior

Father Barron then critiques the way Father Jenkins and President Obama used the concept of dialogue:

What I sensed in both Jenkins’s and Obama’s speeches was a sort of fetishism of dialogue.... The conversation, they seemed to imply, should remain always open-ended, the dialogue on-going, decision or judgment permanently delayed. But dialogue is a means to an end; it is valuable in the measure that it conduces toward judgment. G.K. Chesterton said that the mind should remain open, but only so that it might, in time, chomp down on something nourishing.

Read the whole article here.

Labels: communication, dialogue, moral life, relativism

Over at Via Media, Amy's started a discussion about dialogue.

1) Who are the parties in the dialogue?

2) Where is this dialogue situated?

Should be an interesting conversation.

To take things a step further, what are the necessary ingredients/principles in dialogue? What does dialogue look like in practice? I've made some efforts in the past to grapple with the concept of dialogue on my blog.

I know the term has been seriously sullied by the recent Notre Dame debacle, but it would be good to recover a positive sense of the term. It's one of the three keynotes of Pope Benedict XVI's message for World Communications Day 2009, which is coming up on Sunday.

I think there are probably several situations/contexts in which the abortion dialogue needs to take place -- maybe several dialogues, even. One of the most important, I think, is the actual experience of the woman in a crisis pregnancy.

I highly recommend an article entitled Abortion: A Failure to Communicate by Paul Swope. It appeared in First Things back in 2002. A snip:

Research suggests that modern American women of childbearing age do not view the abortion issue within the same moral framework as those of us who are pro-life activists. Our message is not being well-received by this audience because we have made the error of assuming that women, especially those facing the trauma of an unplanned pregnancy, will respond to principles we see as self-evident within our own moral framework, and we have presented our arguments accordingly. This is a miscalculation that has fatally handicapped the pro-life cause. While we may not agree with how women currently evaluate this issue, the importance of our mission and the imperative to be effective demand that we listen, that we understand, and that we respond to the actual concerns of women who are most likely to choose abortion.

One consideration left out of this article is the woman's relationship with the child's father. It's especially significant, I think, in a culture already facing an epidemic of fatherlessness. When a woman faces a crisis pregnancy, how is her decision conditioned by the attitudes of the man... particularly if she grew up with a father who was physically or emotionally unavailable? Does she see herself faced, oftentimes, with a decision between keeping her child and keeping a relationship? Pretty gut-wrenching for someone who already has fears and wounds around the issue of male support and availability.

Labels: communication, dialogue, human life

Anger is not necessarily always in contradiction with love. A father, for instance... sometimes has to speak crossly to his son so as to prick his conscience, just because he loves him. And he would fall short of his loving obligation and his will to love if, in order to make things easier for the other person, and also for himself, he avoided the task of putting him right sometimes by making a critical intervention in his life.

We know that spoiled children, to whom everything has been permitted, are often in the end quite unable to come to terms with life, because later on life treats them quite differently....

To put it another way: love, in the true sense, is not always a matter of giving way, being soft, and just acting nice. In that sense, a sugar-coated Jesus or a God who agrees to everything and is never anything but nice and friendly is no more than a caricature of real love. Because God loves us, because he wants us to grow into truth, he must necessarily make demands on us and must also correct us. God has to do those things we refer to in the image of "the wrath of God," that is, he has to resist us in our attempts to fall away from our own best selves and when we pose a threat to ourselves.

...It is important to recognize that true love carries with it a high seriousness. It desires the true good of the other person, and therefore it has the courage to oppose him whenever he does not see what is good, whenever he is running headlong into misfortune.

from an interview with Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, in God and the World, "Love: The Meaning of Life"

Labels: dialogue, Lent, moral life, pope benedict xvi

During the election campaign last year, the Obama Biden website posted a link to Obama's Call to Renewal Keynote Address, given in Washington, DC, on June 28, 2006. According to the site, the address was hailed as "the most important speech on religion and politics in 40 years." A pull-quote on the site reads:

“(Obama's speech on faith) may be the most important pronouncement by a Democrat on faith and politics since John F. Kennedy's Houston speech in 1960 declaring his independence from the Vatican...Obama offers the first faith testimony I have heard from any politician that speaks honestly about the uncertainties of belief.”
— E.J. Dionne, Op-Ed., Washington Post, June 30, 2006

While such praise sounds a bit ominous to any faithful Catholic, it also suggests that the speech might be worth examining in detail, as a way of attempting to understand our new President's mind as it relates to the interplay of faith and politics.

After spending some time examining the speech, I've decided to reprint it here in full, interspersed with my own commentary, which will appear in-line and [in brackets].

UPDATE (3/26/2009): The Lazy Disciple has done me the honor of providing some further comments, which will appear in-line in bold blue text. Check out his blog here.

In summary, I agree with much of his analysis, but toward the end of the speech he makes some very serious missteps, in my opinion. I'm heartened by the nature of the discussion, but the substance seems to be, in some very important respects, lacking. Still, I think that the ideas expressed here could set a positive course for a dialogue, should any such opportunity actually surface during this administration. I'm not terribly optimistic about the chances that this will come to pass, but I'll pray for it.

Call to Renewal Keynote Address
June 28, 2006

Good morning. I appreciate the opportunity to speak here at the Call to Renewal's Building a Covenant for a New America conference. I've had the opportunity to take a look at your Covenant for a New America. It is filled with outstanding policies and prescriptions for much of what ails this country. So I'd like to congratulate you all on the thoughtful presentations you've given so far about poverty and justice in America, and for putting fire under the feet of the political leadership here in Washington.

But today I'd like to talk about the connection between religion and politics and perhaps offer some thoughts about how we can sort through some of the often bitter arguments that we've been seeing over the last several years.

I do so because, as you all know, we can affirm the importance of poverty in the Bible; and we can raise up and pass out this Covenant for a New America. We can talk to the press, and we can discuss the religious call to address poverty and environmental stewardship all we want, but it won't have an impact unless we tackle head-on the mutual suspicion that sometimes exists between religious America and secular America. [Outstanding. Let's do it.]

I want to give you an example that I think illustrates this fact. As some of you know, during the 2004 U.S. Senate General Election I ran against a gentleman named Alan Keyes. Mr. Keyes is well-versed in the Jerry Falwell-Pat Robertson style of rhetoric that often labels progressives as both immoral and godless.

Indeed, Mr. Keyes announced towards the end of the campaign that, "Jesus Christ would not vote for Barack Obama. Christ would not vote for Barack Obama because Barack Obama has behaved in a way that it is inconceivable for Christ to have behaved."

Jesus Christ would not vote for Barack Obama. [Provocative.]

Now, I was urged by some of my liberal supporters not to take this statement seriously, to essentially ignore it. To them, Mr. Keyes was an extremist, and his arguments not worth entertaining. And since at the time, I was up 40 points in the polls, it probably wasn't a bad piece of strategic advice.

But what they didn't understand, however, was that I had to take Mr. Keyes seriously, for he claimed to speak for my religion, and my God. He claimed knowledge of certain truths.

Mr. Obama says he's a Christian, he was saying, and yet he supports a lifestyle that the Bible calls an abomination.

Mr. Obama says he's a Christian, but supports the destruction of innocent and sacred life. [This reveals a willingness to represent / address the views of some of his opponents. I appreciate this.]

And so what would my supporters have me say? How should I respond? Should I say that a literalist reading of the Bible was folly? Should I say that Mr. Keyes, who is a Roman Catholic, should ignore the teachings of the Pope?

Unwilling to go there, I answered with what has come to be the typically liberal response in such debates - namely, I said that we live in a pluralistic society, that I can't impose my own religious views on another, that I was running to be the U.S. Senator of Illinois and not the Minister of Illinois. [This would be a fair enough response, if opposition to abortion were a simply a matter of creed. More on that later...]

But Mr. Keyes's implicit accusation that I was not a true Christian nagged at me, and I was also aware that my answer did not adequately address the role my faith has in guiding my own values and my own beliefs. [Good. I like hearing that he has an active conscience.]

Now, my dilemma was by no means unique. In a way, it reflected the broader debate we've been having in this country for the last thirty years over the role of religion in politics. [True.]

For some time now, there has been plenty of talk among pundits and pollsters that the political divide in this country has fallen sharply along religious lines. Indeed, the single biggest "gap" in party affiliation among white Americans today is not between men and women, or those who reside in so-called Red States and those who reside in Blue, but between those who attend church regularly and those who don't.

Conservative leaders have been all too happy to exploit this gap, consistently reminding evangelical Christians that Democrats disrespect their values and dislike their Church, while suggesting to the rest of the country that religious Americans care only about issues like abortion and gay marriage; school prayer and intelligent design.

Democrats, for the most part, have taken the bait. At best, we may try to avoid the conversation about religious values altogether, fearful of offending anyone and claiming that - regardless of our personal beliefs - constitutional principles tie our hands. At worst, there are some liberals who dismiss religion in the public square as inherently irrational or intolerant, insisting on a caricature of religious Americans that paints them as fanatical, or thinking that the very word "Christian" describes one's political opponents, not people of faith. [I appreciate his willingness to acknowledge the misrepresentations.]

Now, such strategies of avoidance may work for progressives when our opponent is Alan Keyes. But over the long haul, I think we make a mistake when we fail to acknowledge the power of faith in people's lives -- in the lives of the American people -- and I think it's time that we join a serious debate about how to reconcile faith with our modern, pluralistic democracy. [Bring it on!]

And if we're going to do that then we first need to understand that Americans are a religious people. 90 percent of us believe in God, 70 percent affiliate themselves with an organized religion, 38 percent call themselves committed Christians, and substantially more people in America believe in angels than they do in evolution.

This religious tendency is not simply the result of successful marketing by skilled preachers or the draw of popular mega-churches. In fact, it speaks to a hunger that's deeper than that - a hunger that goes beyond any particular issue or cause.

Each day, it seems, thousands of Americans are going about their daily rounds - dropping off the kids at school, driving to the office, flying to a business meeting, shopping at the mall, trying to stay on their diets - and they're coming to the realization that something is missing. They are deciding that their work, their possessions, their diversions, their sheer busyness, is not enough.

They want a sense of purpose, a narrative arc to their lives. They're looking to relieve a chronic loneliness, a feeling supported by a recent study that shows Americans have fewer close friends and confidants than ever before. And so they need an assurance that somebody out there cares about them, is listening to them - that they are not just destined to travel down that long highway towards nothingness. [Is this a fair way to describe the religious impulse? Is it just a response to personal need, rather than a felt duty?]

And I speak with some experience on this matter. I was not raised in a particularly religious household, as undoubtedly many in the audience were. My father, who returned to Kenya when I was just two, was born Muslim but as an adult became an atheist. My mother, whose parents were non-practicing Baptists and Methodists, was probably one of the most spiritual and kindest people I've ever known, but grew up with a healthy skepticism of organized religion herself. As a consequence, so did I. [An interesting biographical bit.]

It wasn't until after college, when I went to Chicago to work as a community organizer for a group of Christian churches, that I confronted my own spiritual dilemma.

I was working with churches, and the Christians who I worked with recognized themselves in me. They saw that I knew their Book and that I shared their values and sang their songs. But they sensed that a part of me that remained removed, detached, that I was an observer in their midst.

And in time, I came to realize that something was missing as well -- that without a vessel for my beliefs, without a commitment to a particular community of faith, at some level I would always remain apart, and alone. [A good insight, and an ecclesial sensibility.]

And if it weren't for the particular attributes of the historically black church, I may have accepted this fate. But as the months passed in Chicago, I found myself drawn - not just to work with the church, but to be in the church.

For one thing, I believed and still believe in the power of the African-American religious tradition to spur social change, a power made real by some of the leaders here today. Because of its past, the black church understands in an intimate way the Biblical call to feed the hungry and cloth the naked and challenge powers and principalities. And in its historical struggles for freedom and the rights of man, I was able to see faith as more than just a comfort to the weary or a hedge against death, but rather as an active, palpable agent in the world. As a source of hope. [OK - so he's moved beyond that depiction of faith as mere source of comfort. But still no mention of a felt duty of the creature to a transcendent Creator. So everything remains on the horizontal plane.]

And perhaps it was out of this intimate knowledge of hardship -- the grounding of faith in struggle -- that the church offered me a second insight, one that I think is important to emphasize today.

Faith doesn't mean that you don't have doubts. [True.]

You need to come to church in the first place precisely because you are first of this world, not apart from it. You need to embrace Christ precisely because you have sins to wash away - because you are human and need an ally in this difficult journey.

It was because of these newfound understandings that I was finally able to walk down the aisle of Trinity United Church of Christ on 95th Street in the Southside of Chicago one day and affirm my Christian faith. It came about as a choice, and not an epiphany. I didn't fall out in church. The questions I had didn't magically disappear. But kneeling beneath that cross on the South Side, I felt that I heard God's spirit beckoning me. I submitted myself to His will, and dedicated myself to discovering His truth. [I appreciate the candor. At the same time, this experience, as articulated, remains largely anchored in the horizontal plane, with the creature as the primary actor in the drama of faith.]

That's a path that has been shared by millions upon millions of Americans - evangelicals, Catholics, Protestants, Jews and Muslims alike; some since birth, others at certain turning points in their lives. It is not something they set apart from the rest of their beliefs and values. In fact, it is often what drives their beliefs and their values.

And that is why that, if we truly hope to speak to people where they're at - to communicate our hopes and values in a way that's relevant to their own - then as progressives, we cannot abandon the field of religious discourse.

Because when we ignore the debate about what it means to be a good Christian or Muslim or Jew; when we discuss religion only in the negative sense of where or how it should not be practiced, rather than in the positive sense of what it tells us about our obligations towards one another; when we shy away from religious venues and religious broadcasts because we assume that we will be unwelcome - others will fill the vacuum, those with the most insular views of faith, or those who cynically use religion to justify partisan ends. [This can indeed happen, and I appreciate the posture of engagement.]

In other words, if we don't reach out to evangelical Christians and other religious Americans and tell them what we stand for, then the Jerry Falwells and Pat Robertsons and Alan Keyeses will continue to hold sway.

More fundamentally, the discomfort of some progressives with any hint of religion has often prevented us from effectively addressing issues in moral terms. Some of the problem here is rhetorical - if we scrub language of all religious content, we forfeit the imagery and terminology through which millions of Americans understand both their personal morality and social justice. [Pointing out the need for a common language in order to have a discourse.]

Imagine Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address without reference to "the judgments of the Lord." Or King's I Have a Dream speech without references to "all of God's children." Their summoning of a higher truth helped inspire what had seemed impossible, and move the nation to embrace a common destiny.

Our failure as progressives to tap into the moral underpinnings of the nation is not just rhetorical, though. [Agreed.] Our fear of getting "preachy" may also lead us to discount the role that values and culture play in some of our most urgent social problems.

After all, the problems of poverty and racism, the uninsured and the unemployed, are not simply technical problems in search of the perfect ten point plan. They are rooted in both societal indifference and individual callousness - in the imperfections of man. [Good! A recognition of the fact of original sin.]

Solving these problems will require changes in government policy, but it will also require changes in hearts and a change in minds. I believe in keeping guns out of our inner cities, and that our leaders must say so in the face of the gun manufacturers' lobby - but I also believe that when a gang-banger shoots indiscriminately into a crowd because he feels somebody disrespected him, we've got a moral problem. There's a hole in that young man's heart - a hole that the government alone cannot fix. [This is an important point. The foundational need is not a new set of laws, but a new ethos in the hearts of Americans.]

I believe in vigorous enforcement of our non-discrimination laws. But I also believe that a transformation of conscience and a genuine commitment to diversity on the part of the nation's CEOs could bring about quicker results than a battalion of lawyers. They have more lawyers than us anyway.

I think that we should put more of our tax dollars into educating poor girls and boys. [Sounds good.] I think that the work that Marian Wright Edelman has done all her life is absolutely how we should prioritize our resources in the wealthiest nation on earth. [Red flags going up on the Edelman reference: see here.] I also think that we should give them the information about contraception that can prevent unwanted pregnancies, lower abortion rates, and help assure that that every child is loved and cherished.

[Red flags well warranted. Contraception will assure that every child is loved and cherished? A strong argument can be made that the opposite, in fact, is true. I am reminded of this passage from John Paul II's Gospel of Life (#13): But despite their differences of nature and moral gravity, contraception and abortion are often closely connected, as fruits of the same tree. It is true that in many cases contraception and even abortion are practised under the pressure of real- life difficulties, which nonetheless can never exonerate from striving to observe God's law fully. Still, in very many other instances such practices are rooted in a hedonistic mentality unwilling to accept responsibility in matters of sexuality, and they imply a self-centered concept of freedom, which regards procreation as an obstacle to personal fulfilment. The life which could result from a sexual encounter thus becomes an enemy to be avoided at all costs, and abortion becomes the only possible decisive response to failed contraception.]

But, you know, my Bible [my Bible?!] tells me that if we train a child in the way he should go, when he is old he will not turn from it. So I think faith and guidance can help fortify a young woman's sense of self, a young man's sense of responsibility, and a sense of reverence that all young people should have for the act of sexual intimacy. [This seems to me a very different position from that articulated in the prior paragraph. At the very least, nothing said in this paragraph implies the assertions of the prior one.]

I am not suggesting that every progressive suddenly latch on to religious terminology - that can be dangerous. Nothing is more transparent than inauthentic expressions of faith. [This statement is a bit hard for a Catholic to swallow after watching Obama's selections of dissenting Catholics for his administration. It may be transparent, but perhaps it is also politically expedient?] As Jim has mentioned, some politicians come and clap -- off rhythm -- to the choir. We don't need that.

In fact, because I do not believe that religious people have a monopoly on morality, I would rather have someone who is grounded in morality and ethics, and who is also secular, affirm their morality and ethics and values without pretending that they're something they're not. They don't need to do that. None of us need to do that. [I would agree that common moral ground is required, and not a common creed. Of course.]

But what I am suggesting is this - secularists are wrong when they ask believers to leave their religion at the door before entering into the public square. [Amen.] Frederick Douglas, Abraham Lincoln, Williams Jennings Bryant, Dorothy Day, Martin Luther King - indeed, the majority of great reformers in American history - were not only motivated by faith, but repeatedly used religious language to argue for their cause. So to say that men and women should not inject their "personal morality" into public policy debates is a practical absurdity. Our law is by definition a codification of morality, much of it grounded in the Judeo-Christian tradition. [Agreed. But then why have you posted opinions from the dictatorship of relativism on your own blog? And why did you choose Joe Biden as a running mate?]

Moreover, if we progressives shed some of these biases, we might recognize some overlapping values that both religious and secular people share when it comes to the moral and material direction of our country. We might recognize that the call to sacrifice on behalf of the next generation, the need to think in terms of "thou" and not just "I," resonates in religious congregations all across the country. [I like the relational insight here.] And we might realize that we have the ability to reach out to the evangelical community and engage millions of religious Americans in the larger project of American renewal.

Some of this is already beginning to happen. Pastors, friends of mine like Rick Warren and T.D. Jakes are wielding their enormous influences to confront AIDS, Third World debt relief, and the genocide in Darfur. Religious thinkers and activists like our good friend Jim Wallis and Tony Campolo are lifting up the Biblical injunction to help the poor as a means of mobilizing Christians against budget cuts to social programs and growing inequality.

And by the way, we need Christians on Capitol Hill, Jews on Capitol Hill and Muslims on Capitol Hill talking about the estate tax. When you've got an estate tax debate that proposes a trillion dollars being taken out of social programs to go to a handful of folks who don't need and weren't even asking for it, you know that we need an injection of morality in our political debate. [Agreed.]

Across the country, individual churches like my own and your own are sponsoring day care programs, building senior centers, helping ex-offenders reclaim their lives, and rebuilding our gulf coast in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

So the question is, how do we build on these still-tentative partnerships between religious and secular people of good will? It's going to take more work, a lot more work than we've done so far. The tensions and the suspicions on each side of the religious divide will have to be squarely addressed. [Agreed. But this is precisely what you don't seem to be doing, Mr. President. I think, for example, of the lack of any ethical discussion / debate prior to the executive order allowing use of federal funds for embryonic stem cell research. Even the New York Times noticed this.] And each side will need to accept some ground rules for collaboration. [Agreed.]

While I've already laid out some of the work that progressive leaders need to do, I want to talk a little bit about what conservative leaders need to do -- some truths they need to acknowledge.

For one, they need to understand the critical role that the separation of church and state has played in preserving not only our democracy, but the robustness of our religious practice. [Granted.] Folks tend to forget that during our founding, it wasn't the atheists or the civil libertarians who were the most effective champions of the First Amendment. It was the persecuted minorities, it was Baptists like John Leland who didn't want the established churches to impose their views on folks who were getting happy out in the fields and teaching the scripture to slaves. It was the forbearers of the evangelicals who were the most adamant about not mingling government with religious, because they did not want state-sponsored religion hindering their ability to practice their faith as they understood it.

Moreover, given the increasing diversity of America's population, the dangers of sectarianism have never been greater. [This is a legitimate concern.] Whatever we once were, we are no longer just a Christian nation; we are also a Jewish nation, a Muslim nation, a Buddhist nation, a Hindu nation, and a nation of nonbelievers. I would take issue with the ambiguity of this statement. We are, whatever religion our fellows practice, "[A] new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal." Participation in this common conviction, in dedication to which is forged the soul of the nation, does not require a real assent to the data of faith. Nevertheless, the notion that all men are created equal is unthinkable - I mean this in a strict, technical sense - outside the cultural and institutional context that is explicitly Christian. So, the president's discussion actually begs the question. It presumes that what we might call the cultural commitments of a society desirous of securing ordered liberty to itself and its posterity are not necessarily those, which as a matter of historical fact did give rise to the first, and arguably only nation on Earth to be successful in such an experiment.

And even if we did have only Christians in our midst, if we expelled every non-Christian from the United States of America, whose Christianity would we teach in the schools? Would we go with James Dobson's, or Al Sharpton's? Which passages of Scripture should guide our public policy? Should we go with Leviticus, which suggests slavery is ok and that eating shellfish is abomination? How about Deuteronomy, which suggests stoning your child if he strays from the faith? Or should we just stick to the Sermon on the Mount - a passage that is so radical that it's doubtful that our own Defense Department would survive its application? So before we get carried away, let's read our bibles. Folks haven't been reading their bibles. [I'm all for good catechesis and well-informed faith, like this.]

This brings me to my second point. Democracy demands that the religiously motivated translate their concerns into universal, rather than religion-specific, values. It requires that their proposals be subject to argument, and amenable to reason. I may be opposed to abortion for religious reasons, but if I seek to pass a law banning the practice, I cannot simply point to the teachings of my church or evoke God's will. I have to explain why abortion violates some principle that is accessible to people of all faiths, including those with no faith at all. [This is a very good point. Many religious groups in this country could stand to look critically at their initiatives in this light. I remember going to the March for Life a few years ago and seeing "God is Pro-Life" buttons everywhere.] I agree with the President's understanding of the requirements of democracy. I agree therefore with his explicit discussion of abortion, insofar as the negative aspects of it are concerned. I am not entirely convinced that a legislator in, e.g., Mississippi, need explicitly consider the possible objections of, e.g., a Buddhist, in his formulation of his arguments in favor of a legislative ban on abortion. The point is that legislators build consensus among themselves, and enact laws that represent that consensus. In Roe, the Supreme Court said a state legislature is not competent to regulate abortion. If a legislature is not competent to impose its consensus regarding an act that may be directly destructive of a human life, then a fortiori, it is not competent to set speed limits or a legal drinking age. In sum, what appears to be the expression of a desire to see our public discourse conducted reasonably, actually ends up setting the bar too high, as it were. [More of my thoughts on this mentality, as opposed to a disposition to dialogue, here.]

Now this is going to be difficult for some who believe in the inerrancy of the Bible, as many evangelicals do. But in a pluralistic democracy, we have no choice. Politics depends on our ability to persuade each other of common aims based on a common reality. It involves the compromise, the art of what's possible. At some fundamental level, religion does not allow for compromise. It's the art of the impossible. [Impossible merely on the basis of human resources, perhaps. But not de facto impossible.] If God has spoken, then followers are expected to live up to God's edicts, regardless of the consequences. To base one's life on such uncompromising commitments may be sublime, but to base our policy making on such commitments would be a dangerous thing. [Is this really a solid principle? In particular cases, I agree, it could be convincing. But I don't think it holds up terribly well to closer scrutiny. And, ironically, it could become an uncompromising commitment in itself.] This is a false dichotomy. The art of politics is compromise, but the essence of politics is the common good, and this is knowable. Indeed, at some fundamental level, the continued existence of a given political society requires that efforts at compromise be put aside. We may disagree over where that point lies, or whether it has been reached. We cannot, however, deny that it exists. Ask Neville Chaimberlain. And if you doubt that, let me give you an example. [Just one example? Okay, I ought to hear this out....]

We all know the story of Abraham and Isaac. Abraham is ordered by God to offer up his only son, and without argument, he takes Isaac to the mountaintop, binds him to an altar, and raises his knife, prepared to act as God has commanded.

Of course, in the end God sends down an angel to intercede at the very last minute, and Abraham passes God's test of devotion.

But it's fair to say that if any of us leaving this church saw Abraham on a roof of a building raising his knife, we would, at the very least, call the police and expect the Department of Children and Family Services to take Isaac away from Abraham. We would do so because we do not hear what Abraham hears, do not see what Abraham sees, true as those experiences may be. So the best we can do is act in accordance with those things that we all see, and that we all hear, be it common laws or basic reason. [Okay, I see the point being made. But it does raise the question: Are there not many initiatives, such as the pro-life cause, that are taken up by people of faith, that are, at the same time, based on the dignity of the human person, rather than simply based on creed? And are there not many significant debates that involve this value: the dignity of the human person? And is this value not accessible to believer and non-believer alike? In which case, the larger question needs to be raised why some people recognize the value, and why others do not, and what to do about this fundamental disagreement. It has wide-ranging implications for the common good.... This is a much more delicate question, and one not to be answered neatly in the course of a political speech.]

Finally, any reconciliation between faith and democratic pluralism requires some sense of proportion. [A sense of proportion? Let's see where this is going....]

This goes for both sides.

Even those who claim the Bible's inerrancy make distinctions between Scriptural edicts, sensing that some passages - the Ten Commandments, say, or a belief in Christ's divinity - are central to Christian faith, while others are more culturally specific and may be modified to accommodate modern life. [Granted.]

The American people intuitively understand this, which is why the majority of Catholics practice birth control and some of those opposed to gay marriage nevertheless are opposed to a Constitutional amendment to ban it. Religious leadership need not accept such wisdom in counseling their flocks, but they should recognize this wisdom in their politics.

[The argument has taken several major missteps here. Several points: 1) Democratic pluralism is being confused with pluralistic understandings of human dignity. The latter can spell disaster for the common good. 2) Faith and natural law seem to be equivocated here. The assumption is that the Catholic Church's teachings on artificial contraception and marriage are designated for believers only; that is, that they are merely credal in character, rather than reflecting truths about the human person accessible to human reason. 3) The statement about birth control actually goes one step further, suggesting that widespread dissent from the Church's teaching reflects a principled theological position on the part of those who use contraception, rather than a moral compromise or poor catechesis / poor guidance from pastors. But I thought Obama just got finished making the point that folks haven't been reading their Bibles. Now they are suddenly inchoate experts on matters of Biblical hermeneutics?]

But a sense of proportion should also guide those who police the boundaries between church and state. Not every mention of God in public is a breach to the wall of separation - context matters. It is doubtful that children reciting the Pledge of Allegiance feel oppressed or brainwashed as a consequence of muttering the phrase "under God." I didn't. Having voluntary student prayer groups use school property to meet should not be a threat, any more than its use by the High School Republicans should threaten Democrats. And one can envision certain faith-based programs - targeting ex-offenders or substance abusers - that offer a uniquely powerful way of solving problems. [True enough.]

So we all have some work to do here. But I am hopeful that we can bridge the gaps that exist and overcome the prejudices each of us bring to this debate. And I have faith that millions of believing Americans want that to happen. No matter how religious they may or may not be, people are tired of seeing faith used as a tool of attack. [Okay, but... ] They don't want faith used to belittle or to divide. They're tired of hearing folks deliver more screed than sermon. Because in the end, that's not how they think about faith in their own lives. [Obama seems to be assuming bad motives on the part of many people in public leadership. I think this broad generalization is unfair.]

So let me end with just one other interaction I had during my campaign. A few days after I won the Democratic nomination in my U.S. Senate race, I received an email from a doctor at the University of Chicago Medical School that said the following:

"Congratulations on your overwhelming and inspiring primary win. I was happy to vote for you, and I will tell you that I am seriously considering voting for you in the general election. I write to express my concerns that may, in the end, prevent me from supporting you."

The doctor described himself as a Christian who understood his commitments to be "totalizing." His faith led him to a strong opposition to abortion and gay marriage, although he said that his faith also led him to question the idolatry of the free market and quick resort to militarism that seemed to characterize much of the Republican agenda.

But the reason the doctor was considering not voting for me was not simply my position on abortion. Rather, he had read an entry that my campaign had posted on my website, which suggested that I would fight "right-wing ideologues who want to take away a woman's right to choose." The doctor went on to write:

"I sense that you have a strong sense of justice...and I also sense that you are a fair minded person with a high regard for reason...Whatever your convictions, if you truly believe that those who oppose abortion are all ideologues driven by perverse desires to inflict suffering on women, then you, in my judgment, are not fair-minded....You know that we enter times that are fraught with possibilities for good and for harm, times when we are struggling to make sense of a common polity in the context of plurality, when we are unsure of what grounds we have for making any claims that involve others...I do not ask at this point that you oppose abortion, only that you speak about this issue in fair-minded words." [This, at least, would be a step in the right direction. Still not fully humane, but a start... ]

Fair-minded words.

So I looked at my website and found the offending words. In fairness to them, my staff had written them using standard Democratic boilerplate language to summarize my pro-choice position during the Democratic primary, at a time when some of my opponents were questioning my commitment to protect Roe v. Wade. [This sounds like throwing what has become a key tenet of the Democratic Party platform under the bus. Interesting.]

Re-reading the doctor's letter, though, I felt a pang of shame. It is people like him who are looking for a deeper, fuller conversation about religion in this country. They may not change their positions, but they are willing to listen and learn from those who are willing to speak in fair-minded words. Those who know of the central and awesome place that God holds in the lives of so many, and who refuse to treat faith as simply another political issue with which to score points.

[Mr. President, please show us evidence that you want a fuller conversation. Executive orders that dismiss or ignore ethical concerns as mere political gridlock are not the best evidence. Labeling principled ethical concerns as mere ideology is not good evidence. Appeals only to those who agree with you are not good evidence. The Office of the President appears to be campaigning, rather than representing the entire population of this country.]

So I wrote back to the doctor, and I thanked him for his advice. The next day, I circulated the email to my staff and changed the language on my website to state in clear but simple terms my pro-choice position. And that night, before I went to bed, I said a prayer of my own - a prayer that I might extend the same presumption of good faith to others that the doctor had extended to me. [Keep praying that. It's a good prayer. I'll do the same.]

And that night, before I went to bed I said a prayer of my own. It's a prayer I think I share with a lot of Americans. A hope that we can live with one another in a way that reconciles the beliefs of each with the good of all. It's a prayer worth praying, and a conversation worth having in this country in the months and years to come.

[Indeed it is. How long will we have to wait before the conversation will begin? And when will you begin calling the media to account for its efforts to derail this conversation?]

Thank you.

Labels: church, communication, dialogue, human life, moral life, politics

Every so often, life serves up something really surprising.

On a plane flight back in January, I found myself in a window seat in the second row of coach. Directly in front of me was a woman with the row to herself, probably in her 60's. During the flight, the airline crew would stop by periodically to chat with her. She connected with one steward about Pennsylvania and football, and at the end of that conversation, he turned to her and said, "Aren't you a dear? What's your name?" And she replied, "Sister Joan."

Synapses started to fire. Sister? I only know of one Sister Joan, but I quickly dismissed the idea. There's plenty of women religious by the name of Joan all over the US.

Meanwhile, the steward sat back down. "You're a sister? I'm Catholic too." And he proceeded to launch into a whole series of stories about growing up Catholic. Then he went up to the front cabin area to tell his associate, and she came back to meet Sister Joan. Another long conversation followed. At the end of the conversation, Sr. Joan handed the woman a business card.

At this point, curiosity got the better of me. I had to put my theory to rest. I squinted through the headrests to see if I could read the name on the card. And there it was. Sister Joan Chittister, OSB. Yep. It was her.

Sister Chittister has a blog on the National Catholic Reporter website, and has frequently spoken at the College of Saint Catherine in Saint Paul, which used to be just down the street from where I lived in the late 90's. I'd never heard Sister Joan speak myself, but there would always be an article in the local Catholic newspaper with some money quotes. I think I first learned about her sometime after college, when I saw references to her peppered throughout Donna Steichen's book Ungodly Rage. I also remember seeing her in a PBS special that aired in the weeks following the election of Pope Benedict XVI, which showed her standing in Saint Peter's Square as the new pope was announced. It made such an impression on me that I decided to include her in my short film Ratzenfreude.

The airline crew had left her now, and I felt this sudden strange urge to go up and talk to her. What a rare opportunity. And odd, you know, that she would be sitting directly in front of me.

I stopped for a brief gut check. Why did I want to talk to her? Was it just the thrill -- sort of like the impulse some people have to jump when they're standing at the edge of a steep cliff? No, wasn't that. Was it the desire to dub her anathema? No, not that either. Simple curiositas? Maybe... but more than that. The media offers us plenty of caricatures, and how often do we get a chance to actually meet someone like this, to speak with them personally, to get some sense of their ethos firsthand?

Well, I needed to get up to use the restroom anyway. I stood up and the man in the aisle seat stepped into the aisle for me. I had a few more minutes to mull things over as I waited in line to use the restroom at the back of the plane.

It seemed like the perfect opportunity. No airline staff distributing anything in the aisle. I decided to make the most of it.

I walked up to Sr. Joan's row. "Excuse, me, are you Sister Joan Chittister?" She lit up and extended her hand. "Yes, and who might you be?" I introduced myself, and mentioned that I used to live near Saint Kate's, had seen her articles in NCR, etc. etc. She started effusing about Saint Kate's. She certainly seemed open to conversation, so I sat down in the aisle seat, leaving room for her coat and other items in the middle seat.

to be continued...

Labels: communication, dialogue, dissent

This letter was initially posted over at Vox Nova. Hat tip to The Lazy Disciple.

An Open Letter to President-Elect Barack Obama
November 14, 2008

President-elect Barack Obama,

As American Catholics, we, the undersigned, would like to reiterate the congratulations given to you by Pope Benedict XVI. We will be praying for you as you undertake the office of President of the United States.

Wishing you much good will, we hope we will be able to work with you, your administration, and our fellow citizens to move beyond the gridlock which has often harmed our great nation in recent years. Too often, partisan politics has hampered our response to disaster and misfortune. As a result of this, many Americans have become resentful, blaming others for what happens instead of realizing our own responsibilities. We face serious problems as a people, and if we hope to overcome the crises we face in today’s world, we should make a serious effort to set aside the bitterness in our hearts, to listen to one another, and to work with one another

One of the praiseworthy elements of your campaign has been the call to end such partisanship. You have stated a desire to engage others in dialogue. With you, we believe that real achievement comes not through the defamation of one’s opponents, nor by amassing power and using it merely as a tool for one’s own individual will. We also believe dialogue is essential. We too wish to appeal to the better nature of the nation. We want to encourage people to work together for the common good. Such action can and will engender trust. It may change the hearts of many, and it might alter the path of our nation, shifting to a road leading to a better America. We hope this theme of your campaign is realized in the years ahead.

One of the critical issues which currently divides our nation is abortion. As you have said, no one is for abortion, and you would agree to limit late-term abortions as long as any bill which comes your way allows for exceptions to those limits, such as when the health of the mother is in jeopardy. You have also said you would like to work on those social issues which cause women to feel as if they have a need for an abortion, so as to reduce the actual number of abortions being performed in the United States.

Indeed, you said in your third presidential debate, “But there surely is some common ground when both those who believe in choice and those who are opposed to abortion can come together and say, ‘We should try to prevent unintended pregnancies by providing appropriate education to our youth, communicating that sexuality is sacred and that they should not be engaged in cavalier activity, and providing options for adoption, and helping single mothers if they want to choose to keep the baby.’”

As men and women who oppose abortion and embrace a pro-life ethic, we want to commend your willingness to engage us in dialogue, and we ask that you live up to your promise, and engage us on this issue.

There is much we can do together. There is much that we can do to help women who find themselves in difficult situations so they will not see abortion as their only option. There is much which we can do to help eliminate those unwanted pregnancies which lead to abortion.

One of your campaign promises is of grave concern to many pro-life citizens. On January 22, 2008, the 35th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, when speaking of the current right of women in America to have abortions, you said, “And I will continue to defend this right by passing the Freedom of Choice Act as president.”

The Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA) might well undermine your engagement of pro-life Americans on the question of abortion. It might hamper any effort on your part to work with us to limit late-term abortions. We believe FOCA does more than allow for choice. It may force the choice of a woman upon others, and make them morally complicit in such choice. One concern is that it would force doctors and hospitals which would otherwise choose not to perform abortions to do so, even if it went against their sacred beliefs. Such a law would undermine choice, and might begin the process by which abortion is enforced as a preferred option, instead of being one possible choice for a doctor to practice.

It is because of such concern we write. We urge you to engage us, and to dialogue with us, and to do so before you consider signing this legislation. Let us reason together and search out the implications of FOCA. Let us carefully review it and search for contradictions of those positions which we hold in common.
If FOCA can be postponed for the present, and serious dialogue begun with us, as well as with those who disagree with us, you will demonstrate that your administration will indeed be one that rises above partisanship, and will be one of change. This might well be the first step toward resolving an issue which tears at the fabric of our churches, our political process, our families, our very society, and that causes so much hardship and heartache in pregnant women.

Likewise, you have also recently stated you might over-ride some of President G.W. Bush’s executive orders. This is also a concern to us. We believe doing so without having a dialogue with the American people would undermine the political environment you would like to establish. Among those issues which concern us are those which would use taxpayer money to support actions we find to be morally questionable, such as embryonic stem cell research, or to fund international organizations that would counsel women to have an abortion (this would make abortion to be more than a mere choice, but an encouraged activity).

Consider, sir, your general promise to the American people and set aside particular promises to a part of your constituency. This would indicate that you plan to reject politics as usual. This would indeed be a change we need.

Amen.

Labels: dialogue, human life

In this post, I'll begin unpacking the first chapter of Veritatis Splendor, John Paul II's encyclical letter on the moral life. The letter begins with an extended meditation on the story of the rich young man who approaches Jesus with a question.

CHAPTER I -
"TEACHER, WHAT GOOD MUST I DO...? " (Mt 19:16) -
Christ and the answer to the question about morality

"Someone came to him..." (Mt 19:16)

6. The dialogue of Jesus with the rich young man, related in the nineteenth chapter of Saint Matthew's Gospel, can serve as a useful guide for listening once more in a lively and direct way to his moral teaching:

"Then someone came to him and said, 'Teacher, what good must I do to have eternal life?' And he said to him, 'Why do you ask me about what is good? There is only one who is good. If you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments. 'He said to him, 'Which ones?' And Jesus said, 'You shall not murder; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; You shall not bear false witness; Honour your father and mother; also, You shall love your neighbour as yourself.' The young man said to him, 'I have kept all these; what do I still lack?' Jesus said to him, 'If you wish to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me' " (Mt 19:16-21).¹³

7. "Then someone came to him...". In the young man, whom Matthew's Gospel does not name, we can recognize every person who, consciously or not, approaches Christ the Redeemer of man and questions him about morality. For the young man, the question is not so much about rules to be followed, but about the full meaning of life. This is in fact the aspiration at the heart of every human decision and action, the quiet searching and interior prompting which sets freedom in motion. This question is ultimately an appeal to the absolute Good which attracts us and beckons us; it is the echo of a call from God who is the origin and goal of man's life. Precisely in this perspective the Second Vatican Council called for a renewal of moral theology, so that its teaching would display the lofty vocation which the faithful have received in Christ,¹⁴ the only response fully capable of satisfying the desire of the human heart.

In order to make this "encounter" with Christ possible, God willed his Church. Indeed, the Church "wishes to serve this single end: that each person may be able to find Christ, in order that Christ may walk with each person the path of life."¹⁵

Notice that the Pope selects a Gospel passage about an encounter with Jesus. The question of morality -- "what must I do?" -- is not a matter of balancing precepts, but is, first and foremost, an encounter with a person: the person of Jesus Christ. The Pope invites us to this encounter as well, to "listening in a lively and direct way" to Christ Himself.

Who is it that comes to Jesus? Who is this unnamed "someone"? The Pope invites us to recognize ourselves, and every searching human being, in the person of the rich young man approaching Jesus with questions. The questions reveal a single question: the question of the meaning of life... a question that has ultimate importance... and a question, that, when answered, will direct the way we exercise our freedom. We approach Christ with our questions because we are attracted to Goodness in person and our heart desires intimate knowledge of the Good... not just to name the Good, but to identify ourselves with the Good, to participate in it, to be one with it... to make goodness our own by union with Goodness Himself. We long for union and communion.

In my next post, I'll examine the insights the Pope gains by meditating on the request of the rich young man: "Teacher, what good must I do to have eternal life?"

The table of contents for my posts on Veritiatis Splendor may be found here.

Labels: dialogue, veritatis splendor

Another experience over at PZ Myers' blog today convinced me that, generally speaking, a comments box cannot serve as a place for dialogue.

I've written about Professor Myers before. He's the teacher on the faculty at University of Minnesota - Morris who has a very popular personal blog for discussing his atheistic views.

Recently, he wrote that he obtained a consecrated host and desecrated it to show how stupid Catholics are for venerating a "cracker." (The best response I've seen is from The Curt Jester.)

Today his new target seems to be the Confraternity for Catholic Clergy.

At any rate, I made the mistake of participating in the comments box on another post today, and my conclusion is that there's no way to have a dialogue in the comments box over there. For every one comment I would post, there would be 10 comments in response, and there was simply no way to keep the conversation going. After posting comment #131, I decided to leave the conversation.

So my conclusion today: Dialogue happens in a dyad.... that is, between two people. As soon as you add a third party, fourth party, etc., the waters begin getting very murky indeed.

Labels: dialogue, technology

Can the internet be a place for authentic dialogue between believers and non-believers? I've been thinking about that this week in the wake of some internet nastiness that you may already be familiar with.

If you've been reading any Catholic blogs or news in last week or two, you've probably come across someone commenting on the story of a science professor at the U of Minnesota - Morris, PZ Myers, who runs a popular personal "science" blog called Pharyngula (when I say popular: it is currently ranked as the 12th most popular blog in the world on Facebook).

Though many bloggers have commented on the situation, Mark Shea sums up the situation best (read his blog entry for full discussion):

PZ Myers, a washed-up academic at a third tier school who takes out his bitterness on Christians, claimed that some human toothache named Webster Cook had received death threats for stealing a Eucharist and threatening to desecrate it. Reader John Farrell repeatedly tried to get Myers to verify the "death threat" bit, but was shouted down by the throngs of Myers cultists who took the claim on faith. Myers' then decided to blow away the last shreds of pretense that his Pharyngula blog was about science and give full vent to his demented hatred of Jesus Christ by urging his throng of equally demented followers to steal some Hosts so he could desecrate them and put the whole thing on his blog. The Catholic League got involved (rightly in my view) and Catholics, as is our custom, have been arguing about it ever since, pursuing a range of responses from complete pacificism to some rather over-the-top reactions.

Myers, who seems to have been surprised by the response, has waffled between "I was just kidding"--(Like a madman who throws firebrands, arrows, and death, is the man who deceives his neighbor and says, "I am only joking!" - Proverbs 26:18-19)--and promising that he shall indeed carry through on his threat. One gets the impression that both he and his followers, having nothing but contempt for Catholics, have no real grasp of the interior contours of Catholic faith and belief and therefore no grasp whatever of the hierarchy of values at work in Catholic life. A Host is a statue is a banner is a Rosary is a Bible is a scapular as far as they can tell. You get the feeling that they are genuinely surprised to find that Catholics are attaching far more importance to the descration of the Eucharist than, say, the desecration of a Rosary. They seem to have reeled a bit at the volcanic response. Now they are getting their footing and realizing this *really* ticks off Catholics and so, like eight year olds, they are enjoying being in (they think) the position of saying, "Take one step closer and I'll torture your cat!"

...What Catholics are demanding is not that Myers and his cultish followers respect the Eucharist. We are demanding that they not invade our religious services, steal what does not belong to them, and incite others to vandalize what is ours and not theirs. We are pointing out that thugs who do this are of precisely the same caliber and guilty of exactly the same crime as somebody who paints swastikas on a synagogue.

I also like what The Curt Jester had to say, with his typical wit and grace:

As an ex-atheist I can totally understand P.Z. Myers attitude and ignorance and the only outrage he invokes in me is a turn to prayer for him. So I won't be making any death threats, just life-after-death threats in that I am praying for him and hope to see him on day in the Beatific Vision.

I made the mistake of entering the fray for an hour or so over at PZ Myers' blog in a follow-up post. Here's how things started:

It's interesting to note that a belief being described as "patently ridiculous" on this blog was held in esteem / fascinated Albert Einstein. Story here. Excerpt: "Father Groeschel recounted the story of a young priest who knocked on Einstein's door without an appointment, just to pay a visit to the great professor. Einstein welcomed the priest stranger and insisted he tell him everything he knew about the Eucharist. Einstein was known to ask several priests to recommend all the books they could on the Eucharist, because of his fascination and respect for such an immense mystery."
Posted by: Clayton | July 12, 2008 5:30 PM

Your Einstein story is not at all interesting. I would not be surprised if it was a bald faced lie.
Posted by: spurge | July 12, 2008 5:39 PM

And so it began. To save you the dizzying and annoying prospect of reading through the hundreds of comments, I've extracted the bit of conversation that I participated in. You can view it in PDF form here (it's an 11 page document).

The upshot? I had an insight -- about a day later -- that I hadn't considered before: If these people won't as much as acknowledge a Creator, why would they give one of His creatures the time of day, let alone take them seriously enough to engage in a dialogue? Of course, there are atheists and there are rabid/ideological atheists. How to sort out the two, and engage in dialogue with the reasonable types, on the web? It's difficult. It would be great if there were a good forum online for dialogue. Com boxes, in my experience, are not great places for dialogue. No body language, no tone of voice, no real-time back-and-forth... no agreement among participants to act civilly... no explicit commitment on the part of the bloggers to facilitate actual dialogue, etc...

I mentioned this in another post on Mark Shea's blog, and people suggested a couple of online forums for dialogue: here and here. Now, the problem, it seems to me, is that the first site -- just from a visual point-of-view -- might be off-putting for a non-believer. The second boasts a banner ad reading "How to Become a Catholic," which might not exactly help a non-believer relax and listen. If anyone knows of others, please let me know.

Previous posts on the topic:

• blogging for the sake of communion


• like I've said before...


• blogging: gift and responsibility


• summing up my thoughts on dialogue and communion

I'll give C.S. Lewis the final word on this post:

There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendours. This does not mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people who have, from the outset, taken each other seriously—no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption. And our charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner—no mere tolerance or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment. Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbour is the holiest object presented to your senses. If he is your Christian neighbour he is holy in almost the same way, for in him also Christ vere latitat—the glorifier and the glorified, Glory Himself, is truly hidden.

from The Weight of Glory

Labels: dialogue, respect, social networking, technology

Even though I started my blog after moving out of the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis, my heart has always gravitated to that diocese in which I was raised and nurtured in the faith. And perhaps the combative part of my personality never stopped swinging my verbal fists at the forces of dissent that I left behind. (Of course, I didn't really leave them behind, seeing as I moved to the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.)

I view blogging as a gift and responsibility, and have sought to make it a catalyst for dialogue and communion. But for all my efforts, I was never able to really get a successful dialogue going with Michael Bayly.

For whatever it's worth, here's a history of my posts, in chronological order, related to dissent in the Twin Cities.

delusions of holiness (May 2005)

for everything there is a season (August 2005)

counterfeit compassion: the hallmark of Saint Joan's (August 2005)

Catholic Rainbow Parents (September 2005)

Michael Bayly's idea of dialogue (October 2005)

turning the tables (November 2005)

Screwtape's talking points (November 2005)

marriage amendment: mean spirited (January 2006)

Romephobia in the Twin Cities (February 2006)

the history of St. Joan of Arc parish (May 2006)

the history of St. Joan of Arc parish, part II (May 2006)

activism continues in the Twin Cities (January 2008)

Finally, my efforts to have a dialogue with Michael Bayly ended in this recent post on his blog... titled, ironically, greater understanding (February 2008).

Labels: dialogue, dissent

with certain individuals, there seems to be a limited interest in dialogue. One of my readers wrote me this morning with this gem:

I've made know (sic) assumptions. I know far more about this situation than you do. It's arrogant of you to suggest otherwise. As for committing yourself to this Church that's your choice.

There's no more need for dialogue; I responded to your assinine, snarky, ignorant, right-wing editorial.

I've no time for a self-righteous little fascist shit like you.

go to hell.

Sigh.

Labels: dialogue

Michael Bayly recently sent me an article he had written for the Star Tribune. I promised to write a response, so here it is, offered in parallel fashion: choose PDF or Flash format.

Although it is a bit tongue-in-cheek, part of my point is that his rhetoric is not presented in a spirit of dialogue. To illustrate that point, my response is offered in the same spirit.

Labels: dialogue

Some themes I keep returning to on my blog are dialogue and communion.

Just today, in response to reading a post on an old friend's blog, I wrote this:

Having grown up in a large and diverse family, I've given a bit of thought to how one might survive and maybe even thrive in the face of diverse and sometimes opposing points of view.

Prosyletism is a dead end if we really respect the freedom of the other person. A mushy relativism is also a false response, I think, unless we're satisfied with just being insulated from each other. (This is a pretty appealing solution in Los Angeles, though -- city of 10,000 narcissists).

On my own blog I keep approaching the question from this point of view: what does it mean to have an authentic dialogue? I've had conversations with some who were up to the challenge (see here and here for examples), and with others who were not.

Of course, I'm approaching the question from a religious point of view, but maybe it will spark some ideas for you. I do believe that dialogue is a gift and responsibility, because we are entrusted to one another.

Labels: dialogue

is not a very winning strategy in attempting to explain the Church's moral teaching.

I started to think about this during a pro-life rally on the steps of the capitol building in Saint Paul several years ago. It was the first time I'd seen this particular slogan on buttons and posters: God is pro-life.

Okay, obviously I believe that is true... but how does that help to persuade the not-convinced? There are several things that make this slogan ineffective and unhelpful:

• it is easily perceived as triumphalistic, and as a way to express a smug sense that "my way is God's way"
• it makes no appeal to human reason, thus shutting non-believers out of the conversation and giving the impression that the pro-life position is merely a credal position, rather than a human one
• it simply invites the not-persuaded to pull out their own theological trump card, God is pro-choice, and now we've established the setting for a sequel to Homer's Iliad, with warring gods duking it out

Of course, the slogan God is pro-life does have this in its favor: it could cause pro-choicers to reflect on the fact that they are not God. But, of course, pro-lifers share the same metaphysical situation...

I bring this up by way of introducing a conversation that I recently had with the "not-convinced" about another hot-button issue -- namely , the sinfulness of homosexual behavior. My hope is that we can learn from mistakes made in other debates, such as the pro-life debate, in which the theological trump card has shown itself to be ineffective.

So what are the lessons learned? Firstly, that not every assertion that is true is helpful in advancing the conversation. Secondly, that in dialogue with the non-convinced (religious or otherwise), we have to find some common ground... and so the best approach is to situate the debate within the realm of this question: What does it mean to be human? This was one of the great insights of the Second Vatican Council and, in particular, of John Paul II.

What follows are some excerpts from the dialogue I recently had in a comments box on Dreadnought's website.

* * * * * * *

A priest having a sexual relationship that is non-exploitative (= (i) with an adult, and (ii) outside any pastoral or hierarchical context) obviously literally breaks his vow of celibacy, but on the scale of sin it is at the extreme minor end, analogous to a speeding fine for driving slightly over the limit, *and* in circumstances where no harm was done.
Paul Watson

Paul,

You said: A priest having a sexual relationship that is non-exploitative (= (i) with an adult, and (ii) outside any pastoral or hierarchical context) obviously literally breaks his vow of celibacy, but on the scale of sin it is at the extreme minor end, analogous to a speeding fine for driving slightly over the limit, *and* in circumstances where no harm was done.

The Church understands Christ - and those configured to him in the ordained priesthood - as spouses of the Church. 

So breaking the commitment to celibacy is a form of adultery. Are you equating adultery with a speeding ticket?
Clayton

Clayton wrote: [A priest] breaking the commitment to celibacy is a form of adultery. Are you equating adultery with a speeding ticket?

Clayton, "adultery" is a rather medieval word that seems to gave no application to gay sex (since the is no such thing a gay marriage) apart from the metaphorical sense in which you use it (being a "spouse of the Church" can't ever be physically sexual, anyway - so it's a dumb metaphor.)

OTOH, I'm NOT saying that (i) gay sex has its own in-built license, or (ii) medieval concepts should automatically be presumed obsolete. A priest having gay sex (with a (i) non-priest (ii) adult) will be much less likely to be exploitative than his having hetero sex with a woman, because the latter will most likely have a pastoral overlap (see my above comment). 

What matters, in the end, is that the priest does his job well –and if having sex is going to in any way compromise this, then obviously, the job must come first. The medieval absolutism of celibacy has long been effective in policing the boundaries here, but in 2005, it is somewhat of a once-size-fits-all, blunt instrument.

My really big problem with an absolutist approach to celibacy is the license/succour it indirectly gives to child-abusing priests. Spare me the "spouse of the Church" guff – what really matters is that a priest raping children is very, very bad, and not remotely in the same category as a priest having non-exploitative sex. And if you don’t admit this, then it is tantamount to endorsing the *former* as a relative speeding ticket, in the scheme of things.
Paul Watson

Paul,

If adultery is a medieval word, what is it doing all over the Old Testament? Why is it, with the concept of covenant, thematically essential to the Torah? By the way, gay sex existed back then too. See the story of Sodom in the book of Genesis.

Clerical celibacy is not just a functional reality to keep expenses down for the Church, or to keep Church politics cleaner. If it were embraced solely for either of these reasons, obviously, the time would have come to dispense with it. As John Paul II took great care to explain in his Theology of the Body during a series of Wednesday audiences, celibacy exists to give a prophetic witness to the fact that sex and marriage do not exhaust our human calling, but that both are sacramental realities along the way to the final state that will be shared by all and with all. Without celibacy, the world lacks a witness to remind us that marriage is not our destiny but an essential part of the human pilgrimage toward beatitude. Without marriage, we have no point-of-entry, no sign reminding us of the total, fruitful, faithful love that awaits us in the kingdom of heaven.

To dispense with celibacy is to dispense with marriage, and vice versa. They are indispensable witnesses for each other.

Your suggestion that mandatory clerical celibacy must necessarily foster an environment in which some children are sexually abused by priests is a canard, since the rate of sexual abuse of children - undeniably a grave sin - happens with at least equal frequency with married men.

Your criteria for a sexual ethic ("non-exploitative sex") is tenuous at best. It could be argued that gay sex is essentially exploitative, regardless of one's relationships or commitments. It does not respect the human vocation to love in the image of God. I know these are fighting words, but spare me any vapid accusations of homophobia. To be a homosexual is not a sin. To engage in homosexual activity is a sin... since it does not respect the finality and vocation of those who engage in it. The human person is not destined for union with another who is metaphysically identical, but with an Other. To say otherwise is to endorse a form of atheism.
Clayton

Clayton – yes, I know that the world turned even before medieval times; I was using the word “medieval” as shorthand for a relatively brutal and inflexible ideological system. To extend my previous example, comparing clerical celibacy with car speeding fines/crimes. You maintain, as I understand it, that the former is black+white, but latter properly has shades of grey. Indeed, the current orthodoxies of the Vatican and our Western criminal justice system, respectively, confirm as much.

But what if we step outside these orthodoxies into cold applied philosophy? Specifically, if you accept that driving a speeding car, will, at its extreme end, almost certainly kill, so resulting in life-imprisonment (or worse) for the offending driver – why should a line (much less a whole series of lines) be drawn to say that driving slightly over the limit (and in circumstances where no harm was done) is any less serious? After all, it’s all just one big continuum/slippery-slope.

In other words, applying your celibacy matrix to car speeding fines/crimes would necessarily result in slightly-over-the-limit speeders getting mandatory life-imprisonment (or worse). I’m not saying that this – or hence you – would be absolutely wrong and ludicrous. In medieval times/mindsets, harsh and inflexible laws are, by definition, the way to go. What does trouble me though, Clayton, is that you seem to be having it both ways: in the bedroom, priests live in medieval times, while on the roads, they live under Enlightenment rules.
Paul Watson

Paul,

After reading your comments through several times, I think I get your drift, although I disagree with it, even on the level of philosophy. As an aside, I wasn't aware that philosophy came in a cold, hard variety -- must be a reference to the Enlightenment... when philo + sophia (love of wisdom) became something akin to love of data, thanks to nominalism and the like.

Returning to your comparison of traffic law infractions with infractions of the natural law... I would say that they differ not only in degree, but in kind. It's not a slippery slope... any more than calling apples oranges is a slippery slope... this is really a failure to make essential distinctions.

The ethics of human sexual behavior is a matter that depends on an anthropology and a determination of what is essentially human. It's not a matter of positing a particular creed, but of a shared understanding of the nature of the human person. To violate this law is to violate something universal and essential to the good of the human person.

The ethics of behavior on the roadways depends on how a society decides to order itself. To be sure, the laws established are aimed at protecting the good of individuals and a society, but particular traffic laws vary from state to state, country to country... and so there is no one way to behave on the roadways that is absolute and binding on all persons. Such laws bind within a particular, limited context.
Clayton


Clayton said: Gay sex is essentially exploitative, regardless of one's relationships or commitments. It does not respect the human vocation to love in the image of God.
There you have it. This is the kind of spiritual violence the Church commits against gay people over and over again, the ongoing effort to dehumanize us. Obviously, the Church does not want its gay sheep to breathe and live as WHOLE human beings. A healthy expression of one's sexuality is of course only a part of being whole, but it is a crucial part. However, Orthodoxy teaches that homosexuals' most intimate feelings can never, ever express Love. This is not 'human flourishing', it's a cruel, cold, cynical and inhuman attempt to control people. It's a lie, plain and simple. 
Dreadnought's descriptions of sex are indicative of how sad sexuality can become when you put it in a box and call it Lust. All that's left is an animal-like sort of fornication, void of any human connection...or so it seems. Some dark urge, one has to compulsively give in to when it becomes too strong. And then off we go again to the priest to confess our sins and be forgiven. And don't start with me about anti-Catholic bigotry, as a gay man from a Protestant background I've known this mechanism (although in a different form) personally. I know from experience how harmful, destructive and unethical this really is.
The Truth is, this type of doctrine has not in the least anything to do with morality at all. Nor is it based on Scripture, nor on the teachings of Christ. It has to do with imposing guilt, shame, and taking away responsibility.
Vincent

Vincent said: This is the kind of spiritual violence the Church commits against gay people over and over again, the ongoing effort to dehumanize us. Obviously, the Church does not want its gay sheep to breathe and live as WHOLE human beings. A healthy expression of one's sexuality is of course only a part of being whole, but it is a crucial part. However, Orthodoxy teaches that homosexuals' most intimate feelings can never, ever express Love. This is not 'human flourishing', it's a cruel, cold, cynical and inhuman attempt to control people. It's a lie, plain and simple.

I'm aware that the Church's teaching about sex and marriage is not received as "good news" by many in the homosexual community. And my personal view is that the Church has not been very effective in demonstrating how her teaching does not oppress, but actually liberates the person with same-sex attractions. To do so, I think the conversation has to shift from the sinfulness of certain acts to the question of what, intrinsically, a sin is (missing the mark) and how the activity in question misses the mark. It has to address the question: what is the good, truth and beauty of striving toward that mark. Sin has become such a loaded word, carrying a heavy emotional payload not because of what it means, but because of the way it is sometimes used, as leverage over and against other people, as a spiritual trump card of sorts in an argument. It would be helpful to move beyond this way of talking about sin, which is surely not producing much in the way of fruitful dialogue. To say, "God finds gay sex to be deplorable" is like saying "God finds abortion to be deplorable." Both statements are true, and can be supported from the scriptures and early patristic texts like the Didache, but noting all of this does not advance the dialogue.

A better method might be this: let the believer and the unbeliever in the Church's teaching about sex both agree to consider a viewpoint not their own... for the sake of the dialogue. This isn't a matter of giving up one's convictions, but of each party creating an opening by which a dialogue can take place. Perhaps the other person is saying something I have not heard yet, and may even be saying something that is true. I think one has to adopt this attitude for a dialogue to go anywhere. And I think, in too many cases, on both sides of the argument there are not enough efforts to adopt this sort of attitude, as it is hard work, requires a certain discipline of the emotions and a certain reining in of the ego... and - most importantly - requires a readiness to take the risk of positing that the other person could have my best interests at heart, and could be seriously interested in the question of what is good, true, and beautiful.... in other words, it requires a mutual trust. We're never going to lay a framework for discussion without this... as the breach of trust between persons goes to the heart of human woundedness. When the serpent convinced Eve that God was not a loving Father, but a cruel oppressor, everything began to crumble into suspicion and fear.
Clayton

Clayton said: The Church has not been very effective in demonstrating how her teaching does not oppress, but actually liberates the person with same-sex attractions.

Well, I'm all for dialogue, but so far I've never heard any Orthodox explanation (from all branches of Christianity: Catholicism, Protestantism, Evangelicals, Russian Orthodox) that makes it clear what kind of 'liberation' it is they're meaning. Even on this blog, while John is very effective in explaining the Church's teachings, it remains completely clouded how this is supposed to work in real life. So far, anyone who challenges him or tries to engage in dialogue is labeled as enemy, Nietschzean, or moral relativist. 

For me, it comes down to this: if the Church thinks I cannot express my deepest inclinations, then this denies my dignity and my conscience. It means assenting to it will always result only in misery and self-loathing. And of course, the occassional 'rumpy pumpy' because I'll always lose the fight with Lust. I hope you understand I don't want that kind of life. I chose to live as a free man.
Vincent

Vincent,

You're right to aspire for freedom. The question of the hour is: in what does freedom consist? What brings true liberty to the human person? This is a fundamentally human question... one not predicated on one's sexual orientation, or one's creed.

I also appreciate your question about "how is this supposed to work in real life?" That is an essential question. I think John Paul II has at least arrived at the proper method of coming up with the answer, with his use of personalism and phenomenology, which makes an explicit appeal to human experience as something that reveals the truth about the person. Now it is up to the members of this generation to bring about an integration of faith and practice that makes sense. 

I would suggest that there are two things that bear examination: the inclinations of the human heart, and its aspirations. I think they're different. Every human person has inclinations that, at times, conflict with their aspirations (the ideals, values, goals on which one sets his sights). So how does one work out this conflict?

I won't try to answer your whole question here. Instead, I'll simply point in what I believe might be the right direction: your dignity is most fully expressed by your aspirations and -- in a qualified way -- by your inclinations as well. What is the essential aspiration of the human heart? To love and to be loved. See C.S. Lewis essay, The Weight of Glory, for more on this.

There is no reason for you to loathe yourself, and certainly Christ does not loathe the work of his hands. Lust does not have the final word on how our lives play out... so do not grow discouraged by human weakness. In Christ, there is genuine freedom and strength to live according to one's aspirations... that is the constant refrain of John Paul II.
Clayton

Clayton,

I appreciate your response. I agree with you one's aspirations ultimately are more important than one's inclinations. But...to be able to aspire for anything, one needs to be honest about one's self. It is vital for the human soul to live in openness, honesty and authenticity, to live in Light. I also agree wholeheartedly the essential aspiration of the human heart is to love and be loved.
Vincent

* * * * * * *

Obviously this discussion hasn't solved the world's problems... but at least it had the merits of a dialogue, of a conversation that could actually go somewhere, rather than getting stuck in an endless circuit of accusations.

Labels: dialogue, homosexuality, theology of the body