Catholicism and Political Philosophy

An important new volume on political philosophy, which appeared last year, by the astute Catholic critic, James V. Schall, is Roman Catholic Political Philosophy (Lexington Books, 2004). In this volume Schall reflects on the relationship of revelation, as understood within Catholicism, to the implications of political life. Writing in The Claremont Review of Books (Spring 2005), Robert R. Reilly observes:

According to [Schall], there is no derogation of reason in Christian revelation. Rather, Christianity contains an invitation to reason because God is revealed as logos. He claims that "what is revealed does not demand the denial of intellect, but fosters it." If God is logs, reason and revelation are not at an impoasse. A division of labor defines them. The common objective is the search for the highest things, and reason is given primacy in this search, including in its examination of the truths claimed by revelation. As Schall says, in Christianity "revelation itself has turned to philosophy precisely to explain more fully what is revealed." Christian revelation confirms reason in its authority. At the same time, revelation has a claim on reason. A philosophy that a priori excludes the possibility of revelation is a philosophy that is not true to itself. This book is about "how the highest things of philosophy, politics, and revelation related to each other.

In an interview with Claremont Institute's Ken Masugi (available at www.claremont.org), Schall said:

[W]e will not know, intellectually, if revelation has happened, unless we have first taken the trouble to examine the questions that arise in the experience of political and human things together with the varieties of answers that have been given to these questions by the philosophers.... I like to say that the study of political philosophy ought to bring such questions forward in our souls so that there is a kind of longing or searching that arises from the suspicion that none of tne answers so given have been complete or adequate.

Reilly continues, playing on Tertullian's metaphorical use of cities to symbolize rival commitments--to reason, to faith, and so on:

Political philosophy has the obligation to look at all cities--Athens, Jesusalem, and Rome. Today, Rome seems the least familiar of these three, and there is not better guide to it than Fr. Schall. For those confronting modernity, it is an essential visit because, as he has pointed out in Reason, Revelation and the Foundations of Political Philosophy (1987), modernity is not a distortion of classical political thought, but of Christianity. Millenarian ideology attempts, in its clumsy and destructive way, to ape the redemptive action of Christianity--of "God in Christ reconciling the world to Himself." Therefore, the recovery from modern ideology requires far more than the resuscitation of classical political philosophy, though that in itself is a good thing.

One need not be a Catholic, much less a Christian, to grasp the importance of Roman Catholic Political Philosophy.

Food for thought

"A Calvinist Presbyterian beclieves that all Catholics will be damned because they are predestined to be damned, whereas an ordinary Presbyterian believes that all Catholics will be damned on their merits." --Jon Bartley

Cartoonist Kevin Giovanetto takes on the finer points of Calvin's doctrine of predestination (right).

More food for thought

"Jim, you think he's with Jesus now? We only have 30 seconds."

Larry King, CNN talk-show host, interviewing actor James Caviezel, who played Jesus Christ in the film The Passion of the Christ, about the Pope's death.

New controversial book

Washington Post reporter, John F. Harris, has just come out with a blockbuster about the Clinton White House years, The Survivor: Bill Clinton in the White House. If you've got the stomach for more Bill raunchiness and Hilary exposes, this book, which ranked 9,527 on Amazon's sales parade Monday afternoon, promises to be a keeper. Some highlights are listed by the Druge Report.

Alice von Hildebrand on Kierkegaard's view of women, love, and feminism

Alice von Hildebrand's magnificent article on Kierkegaard's view of women, "Beautiful Words About Women," has been published online at Philosophia Perennis (May 28, 2005). Based on a careful reading of Either/Or, The Woman Who Was a Sinner, and Training in Christianity, it is a remarkably profound piece of Christian philosophical reflection. Here is a brief excerpt from the introductory part of the essay:

... It is not my purpose here to discuss some of the contradictory interpretations of his thought that scholars have offered; such would call for a whole book. In the framework of this article, my modest concern is to shed some light on Kierkegaard's views on women. His position is ambiguous; he has written about them both beautifully and spitefully. Deal Hudson, in his book An American Conversion, tells us that he did not like Kierkegaard because the latter "did not like women -- a remark likely to attract the sympathies of the fair sex.

I am going to take to Kierkegaard's defense and show that the few regrettable things he wrote about women are largely compensated by the beautiful things he wrote about them, and that his insights into the female personality and role in human and religious life could only come from the pen of someone who has loved.

That Kierkegaard loved Regina Olsen is something no one can deny, for he says so explicitly and unambiguously. It is true that a German "scholar" by the name of Schrempf contested this fact. But Kierkegaard was in a privileged position to know his feelings for his fiancee; I find it wiser to trust him.

The Soren Kierkegaard-Regina Olsen love story is certainly one of the most tragic in the history of great love affairs. He fell in love with her; he conquered her; he got engaged to her and was hoping to marry her. Then, to his horror and despair, he realized that he could not achieve the universal, tread the common path, and marry the girl he loved. Kierkegaard was a penitent; he had received a special calling which was not compatible with marriage. He often refers to the tragedy of Abraham, who was called upon to sacrifice the son he loved. To read about how he broke off his engagement, about her despair, about the humiliation to which her proud father submitted himself by begging him not to abandon his daughter, and the qualms of conscience that Kierkegaard suffered make at times painful reading. To the end of his life, he makes reference to this drama. At times, he hoped he could, after all, make her his wife. All these hopes were dashed when he found out that she was engaged to a previous beau that his ardent courtship had eliminated from the picture. That this was a serious blow, that he probably had to fight against a certain bitterness and disappointment, is not unlikely. He left her his literary bequest -- this was rejected by Regina's husband, and it fell into the hands of Kierkegaard's older brother, Peter....

Read more here ...

[Alice von Hildebrand is Professor Emerita of Philosophy at Hunter College of the City University of New York. She is the author, most recently, of The Soul of a Lion (Ignatius), about her late husband, the Catholic philosopher Dietrich von Hildebrand ; The Privilege of Being a Woman (Sapientia Press); and By Love Refined [Letters to a Young Bride] (Sophia Institute Press). She has written extensively for many Catholic periodicals and appears frequently on Mother Agelica's EWTN. This article (published in full at Philosophia Perennis) is reprinted with permission from New Oxford Review, 1069 Kains Ave., Berkeley CA 94706, U.S.A.]

Home schooling? Some resources for math ... and summer fun

Attention home schoolers! Bargain book of the week - 59% off Math Curse by bestselling Children's author Jon Scieszka - Only $6.99. While supplies last. From my own experience with parents and kids involved in home schooling, I understand only too well how math can be a challenge for some children. Here's a book that actually makes math fun.

"If you can believe that!" someone will say. But did you realize that when the famous French mathematician and theologian, Blaise Pascal, was being home schooled by his father, Etienne, attitudes toward math were very different. Math was one subject so exciting, so intoxicating, that duels were sometimes fought over competing mathematical theories. The great mathematician, Tycho Brae (1546-1601) even had his nose cut off in a duel over math and had a prosthetic nose made of silver, which required him to always take a bottle of glue along with him for repairs in case he sneezed.

Etienne thought the subject of mathematics so enticing that if his kids caught even a whiff of it, they would be unable to concentrate on anything else. Careful father that he was, Etienne therefore secretly locked up into a closet all the the math books. It was only after Etienne discovered that his son, Blaise, had discovered a considerable amount of Euclidian geometry on his own that he unlocked the math books, realizing that he had a genius on his hands.

Another boon to the effective math education, as many home schoolers will know, is the Saxon Math series of texts, whose exercises not only progressively cover material introduced in the chapter, but continue to reinforce material covered in earlier chapters. Christopher, one of our sons, practically taught himself algebra by working through one of these books. These books are available for different levels. But for a sample, see Saxon Math 87: An Incremental Development, about which one Amazon reviewer raves: "My son used this and S.A.T. tested high 90th percentile!" The reviewer continues:

"My 12 year old son has used Saxon materials at home for 4 years. His younger sister is currently using 8/7. It can be challenging, but they've been very successful! It's nice as a mother of 5 to have confidence in the Saxon program as it frees me up to deal with other things. If they have a question, it is easy just to review the short lesson and find the answer! If I could give it 6 stars, I would. Now my third child is also in Saxon. Thank the Lord for this effective curriculum. The results have been great!"

Oh, and just in case you like to take your family on camping excursions, I saw this incredible deal: 55% OFF on a Columbia CB-5400 Black Mountain Dual Composite 6-Person Cabin Tent for only $99! This is the easy-to-assmble type of tent with a mix of flexible fiberglass and steel poles, not the kind with easily breakable aluminum poles that have to be inserted into one another. Several years we tented with our family all the way to Banff and Jasper, in the Canadian rockies, and back to North Carolina--which was a trip we shall never forget!

Insights on Catholicism from The New Yorker

As many of you already know, Peter J. Boyer has written a terrific article in the May 16, 2005 issue of The New Yorker Magazine entitled "A Hard Faith: How the New Pope and His Predecessor Redefined Vatican II." I wasn't sure what to expect from the article while Boyer was still writing it and called me to ask a number of questions about the significance of John Paul II's pontificate on the eve of his death. (When a writer for one of New York's most liberal secular magazines calls to ask your opinion of the pontificate of a Pope whom, you realize, you will end up making look slightly left-of-center, naturally you're suspicious.) Boyer conceded the point by acknowledging that I probably had my doubts about his interview, but he assuring me several times that he thought I would be pleasantly surprised. For one thing, he gave me a list of those on the side of the angels that he had interviewed and spent time with, including Archbishop Chaput of Denver, Fr. Benedict Groeschel of New York, and many, many others.

Peter Boyer has clearly done his homework--and I mean a thorough job of it. Catholic readers pleased with the election of Pope Benedict XVI will be happy to find a treatment of Catholicism that takes its Faith seriously as something challenging, substantial and irreducibly real. By contrast, Boyer's reporting on his interviews with the dissident gallery--Richard McBrien, Charlie Curran, etc.--reveals them for the bitter, lackluster, sputtering media poodles that they are. They realize that history has passed them by, they have no new ideas left to pull out of their tattered hats, and Boyer clearly smells their gloom. The composite picture that emerges is really worth examining, if you have the time.

On a personal note, I gathered from my interview with him that Boyer is a Christian, and I asked him about his religious background. He didn't divulge his denominatinal background directly, but he did allow that he and his family currently find their home in a good Episcopalian parish.

This article is now available on the internet (thanks a tip from Sam Schmitt, who notes that it appears on the "Call to Action - Western Washington" website, and wonders whether they are finally seeing the light): "A Hard Faith: How the New Pope and His Predecessor Redefined Vatican II." It's well worth reading in full. Here is the closing paragraph from my copy:

If the introduction of Holy Communion into the political arena in 2004 was, for many American Catholics, a divisive and regrettable turn, it was no less regrettable for Chaput according to Chaput who criticized the press for a shallow understanding of the Eucharist and its centrality to the Catholic faith. But Chaput, like Razinger, also believed that such controversy might ultimately prove salutary. "Whenever the Church is criticized, she understands herself better and is purified." And when she's purified, then she better serves the Lord. We're at a time for the Church in our country when some Catholics too many are discovering that they've gradually become non Catholics who happen to go to Mass. That's sad and difficult, and a judgment on a generation of Catholic leadership. But it may be exactly the moment of truth the Church needs."

Read this article. Ultimately you'll find it a bracing dose of reality.

"Kneeling before outcasts"

The Prison Angel, by Mary Jordan and Kevin Sullivan

A review by Karen Long

Three decades ago, no religious order would consider a twice-divorced 51-year-old novitiate. So Mary Brenner committed the audacious act of making private vows and moving into a Tijuana prison where she lived among its sick and reviled inmates.

Now 78, Mother Antonia still lives in an unheated cell in La Mesa, the notorious Tijuana prison.

Like Mother Teresa, Mother Antonia gravitates toward outcasts, prostitutes and criminals, corrupt guards and mentally deranged prisoners. Readers will leave this nun's company reluctantly and thank Jordan and Sullivan for making her remarkable life visible in a jaded world. (Penguin, 237 pages, $24.95)

-- KAREN LONG, RELIGION NEWS SERVICE [The Charlotte Observer, May 15, 2005]

Evangelical perspective on Pope Benedict XVI

Timothy George, in an article entitled "The Promise of Benedict XVI," published online in Christianity Today online (May 26, 2006), finds five points in which he believes Pope Benedict's pontificate holds great promise--five points in which Evangelicals can make common cause with his Catholic Church:

1. He takes truth seriously.
2. His theology is Bible-focused.
3. His message is Christocentric.
4. He is Augustinian in perspective.
5. He champions the culture of life.

Read more.

Why liberal Catholics think authority is "repressive"

The short answer is that they think "authority" means power. It does not. In the current postmodern milieu, these stepchildren of the masters of suspicion (Marx, Freud, Nietzsche)--particularly Nietzsche--think of authority as something reducible to power. Thus, when the academic tradition speaks of canonical writers and essential core requirements for cultural literacy within the liberal arts tradition, these liberals know (they think) in their heart-of-hearts that beneath it all, that all this talk about knowledge is reducible to power. Likewise, when the Church speaks of canonical scriptures, Sacred Tradition, and magisterial authority of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, these liberals know (they think) in their heart-of-hearts that religion, along with everything else, is ultimately reducible to power. Or so they think.

In a May. 15, 2005 article entitled "Faith isn't threatened by questions" in The Charlotte Observer, MARY C. CURTIS says she consideres her Jesuit university education a blessing. She writes:

That's why I was saddened to hear that the Rev. Thomas Reese, an American Jesuit, has resigned as editor of the Catholic magazine America. According to the National Catholic Reporter and Catholic officials, Reese was forced out--for encouraging thinking.

In the seven years under the leadership of this respected political scientist, America has published articles representing different points of view on issues such as stem-cell research and the church's relationship with Islam.

The Rev. Richard McBrien, a theology professor at the University of Notre Dame, told Newsday that Reese "has been very careful to be even-handed, fair-minded and restrained in any comments he's ever made."

Thus the Vatican comes out looking villainous and repressive, an enemy of "thinking," as well as "even-handedness," "fair-mindedness," and "restraint" in discussions about current scientific research. But Ms. Curtis isn't through: "As Reese wrote in an editorial," she writes: "'A church that cannot openly discuss issues is a church retreating into an intellectual ghetto.'" The election of Pope Benedict was clearly a blow to "open discussion" and free thinking, according to Ms. Curtis. But she remains hopeful, despite these threatening clouds, she says, "that the Church is strong enough, resilient enough to withstand anything--even thinking."

Such sentiments as these are quite common, sad to say; but they are really worth examining? Why does Ms. Curtis see the Church as opposed to open discussion and free thinking? Because she makes distinctions between ideas and practices that accord with the Christian Faith and those that don't. In other words, she claims to have the authority to do that. But "authority," we remember, means power to liberals like Ms. Curtis. So the only thing the exercize of such authority can mean for them is the arbitrary weilding of power.

In a related article, entitled "Stifling Catholic debate? Critics say Tom Reese's departure an ominous sign," in the May 14, 2005 issue of The Charlotte Observer, KEVIN ECKSTROM writes that Reese, by most accounts, "was ousted as editor of America magazine because some U.S. bishops and Vatican officials had grown impatient with his policy of allowing open debate on controversial topics." There again we have it: the Church stifling "open debate." What can this mean? Like Ms. Curtis, Eckstrom turns for support to that champion of self-congratulatory Catholic liberalism, the National (Anti-)Catholic Reporter:

"Is Rome's definition of faith simply a matter of absolute assent to every utterance that comes out of Rome and we're all supposed to obey and not question?" asked Tom Roberts, editor of National Catholic Reporter, an independent newspaper with liberal leanings.

Um ... yeah, though that's putting it mildly. During the final days of Pope John Paul II and the election of Benedict XVI, says Eckstrom, Reese was a sought-after commentator on the unfolding events in Rome: "He was respected for providing a candid assessment of both men while never betraying his loyalties to the church."

I wonder, what does "never betraying one's loyalties to the church" mean to a liberal in this context? It clearly cannot mean supporting orthodoxy and orthopraxy in matters of faith and doctrine, since that was the reason for Reese's dismissal. It cannot mean "obedience" or "submission"--words apt to induce apoplexy in a liberal. NCR editor Roberts could speak only of a "Chilling effect." According to Eckstrom, Reese's "grievous sin" was only that he "devoted too much time and ink to the three D's--debate, dialogue and discussion--that some interpret as a threat to church teaching." He continues, "Reese opened the magazine to all sides of an issue, giving equal space to each." Overall, he adds, "the magazine enjoyed a solid reputation for balance." So the Church is allegedly opposed to giving "equal space" to "all sides of an issue," opposed to America magazine's "solid reputation for balance."

Why must the Church seem opposed to "thinking," "open debate," "balance," and "giving equal space to all sides of an issue"? Eckstrom provides some clues. He writes:

The editorials sometimes leaned left of center, and Reese sometimes expressed dismay at the Vatican's move toward centralized authority.... But according to the National Catholic Reporter and other media outlets citing unnamed sources, church leaders (including the pope himself) were angered by articles on gay priests, contraception and politicians who supported abortion rights.

Once again, why must the Church seem opposed to "open debate," "balance," and "free thinking"? Simple: because Church teaching condemns what is opposed to its teaching--including homosexuality, contraception, abortion, as well as the dissent and confusion promoted by the liberal editorial bias of Reese in a publication ostensibly representing a religious order of the Church. Since the Church stands for something (orthodoxy and orthopraxy), it can't help opposing something (whatever is opposed to orthodoxy and orthopraxy).

Would it make sense for Orthodox Judaism to promote Buddhism? Would it make sense for the Unitarian Universalist Association to promite belief in the divinity of Christ? Would it make sense for the Japanese Shinto religion to promote the Muslim belief in the Prophet Mohammed? Of course not. Neither does it make sense to expect the Catholic Church to promote views inimical to her own traditional doctrines. Granted, what self-styled liberal Catholics want is to promote a revisionist re-interpretation of what "Catholicism" means. But of course they should hardly be surprised, then, when the Church resists their efforts to denature her teaching.

What is "authority," according to liberal dissenters? Nothing but the raw exercise of arbitrary power. In other words, they don't really believe the Church has anything like divine authority at all. This is why this idea (heavenly authority) is translated into that (power), which is something earthly, human, and mundane. But what is the Church's authority, really? To quote Peter Kreeft, it is nothing more than "author's rights." The author of a book has rights to it. The Author of the Church has rights to it, just as the Author of the Church's Gospel has rights to what it means. Likewise, those to whom He has delegated authority in the Church have the His rights as Author to declare what is and what is not in accord with the Author's intended teachings and purposes. That is what lies behind Apostolic Succession. That is the meaning of the Church's authority. It is that authority (author's rights), which provides the sticking point that sticks in the liberal craw; because what it means is that The Faith can't simply be twisted, like a wax nose, in any arbitrary direction that prevailing whim would desire.

Is this authority repressive? Hardly. Instead, it provides a standard by which to measure, an ideal to which to aspire, a foundation for undersanding. "I believe in order that I may understand" (credo ut intelligam), said St. Augustine. This provides a ground for humility--a humility, as G.K. Chesterton said, which is a "spur that prevented a man from stopping; not a nail in his boot that prevented him from going on." Catholicism founded all the earliest universities in the West. Catholicism promoted much of the research that launched the Renaissance and Scientific Revolution (see my post of July 30, 2004: The Church and the birth of modern science). In this country Catholicism is responsible for hundreds of colleges and universities, including major research universities like Notre Dame and the Catholic University of America. It's a red herring to suggest that Catholicism stifles debate and free inquiry. It merely insists (by Author's rights) on Catholicism being Catholic.

If Ratzinger is a "fundamentalist," what is Frank Schaeffer?

Frank Schaeffer--film maker, novelist, Eastern Orthodox convert from evangelical Reformed Protestantism, and son of the late Francis A. Schaeffer, the well-known Christian apologist of L'Abri, Switzerland--has recently come out with a piece in the San Francisco Chronicle calling Pope Benedict XVI a "fundamentalist" (this according to Carl E. Olson of Ignatius Insight). Sigh ... so what's new? Haven't we all known for some time that any non-revisionist Catholic, like any protestant evangelical, is regarded as a "fundamentalist." The word "fundamentalist" began in 1909 among evangelical Protestants who rallied around several basic principles--such as the deity of Christ, the virgin birth, the authority of the Bible, etc.--called "The Fundamentals," in order to combat the rising tide of protestant liberalism (link). But the term has lost any association with those historical antecedents. "Fundamentalist" now connotes any person with beliefs and practices that are generally regarded as "fanatical." Politically, it therefore refers to "Islamic terrorists," as well as "repressive patriarchal papists," and just about anybody who seriously believes that God actually makes any demands of us. Thus Pope Benedict is a "fundamentalist."

The really interesting question to me personally, though, is where this puts Frank Schaeffer. Franky, as we used to know him, is a bright, creative author and film-maker who authored the hilariously amusing autobiographical novels, Portofino (Calvin Becker Trilogy). In 1995 he published Dancing Alone: The Quest for Orthodox Faith in the Age of False Religions, an earnest account of his conversion to Eastern Orthodoxy somewhat tarnished by his often bitter attacks on the evangelical Protestantism of his childhood, as well as on Catholicism (see my critique in the New Oxford Review here). The question now, as far as I am concerned, is this: if Franky Schaeffer believes protestant evangalicalism and traditional Catholicism are to be disparagingly dismissed as "fundamentalist," then what does that make him? An newly minted species of Eastern Orthodox liberal? An irrational mystic? For some time I have argued that Eastern Orthodoxy lacks a fully catholic identity due to its increasingly reactionary bent, and that it might more aptly be called "Anti-Western Orthodoxy." That bend, coupled with Schaeffer's own animus and personal vendetta against his erstwhile evangelical co-religionists and Catholic pro-life colleagues, would seem to make for a toxic potion. Let us pray for him.

This makes me wonder why converts do not more often share the generous attitudes toward their former friends found in the likes of Peter Kreeft, Thomas Howard, or Louis Bouyer--none of which have Schaeffer's reactionary and dismissive disposition. On the contrary, to a fault, each of these emphasizes his appreciation and gratitude for all that was good and nurturing in his former religion. (See Peter Kreeft's Fundamentals of the Faith, Thomas Howard's Lead, Kindly Light: My Journey To Rome, and Louis Bouyer's The Spirit and Forms of Protestantism.)

All Christians come in two different sizes, to paraphrase Peter Kreeft (Fundamentals of the Faith, p. 272): orthodox Christians, who follow the traditional teachings of their churches; and liberal Christians, who dismiss the traditional teachings of their churches in favor of revisionist re-interpretations. The clearest litmust test to distinguish the two is their attitudes toward the Bible. Liberals reduce the Bible to a human book. Their low view of Scripture they (naturally) call "higher criticism." They are the "demythologizers." This means that orthodox Catholics, Protestants, and Eastern Orthodox Christians ought to have a great deal in common. Far more in common, certainly, than any of them would have with liberal Catholics, Protestants, or Eastern Orthodox Christians. If only Christians could get this much straight. If only Franky Schaeffer could get this much straight.

[See my earlier post of March 8, 2005, "Marvin Olasky on Francis Schaeffer's 'Political Legacy'" ]

42 new Opus Dei priests ordained

The Prelature of Opus Dei, which promotes founder St. Josemaria Escriva's refreshingly this-worldly vocation of "finding God in work and daily life," has just ordained 42 new priests. This, of course, is not to belie the fact that the most earthly good is often done by the most heavenly-minded. Opus Dei promotes the vocation of sanctification of life and work among both men and women in ordinary walks of life. It does this through the hard work of regular training in the bread-and-butter virtues and habits that foster spiritual growth. Faith, after all, is hard work: discipleship comes with a cost. Opus Dei has its own priests, who are drawn from men already involved in the work. A news release about the recent ordinations reads:

Bishop Javier Echevarria ordained 42 new priests for the Prelature of Opus Dei in the Basilica of St. Eugene in Rome on May 21. The new priests come from Nigeria, the United States, the Philippines, and various European and Latin American countries.

Perhaps only those involved as numeraries, supernumeraries or cooperators in "the work," as it is called, will fully understand when I say that these priests are exceptional men. As to the the deluded public, which prefers to garner its "facts" from the likes of Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code [critique here], this will probably only inspire thoughts of dark conspiracy and near-pathological paranoia. Any faithful Catholic with a hunger for a deeper life of faith, growth in sanctity, and clarity of vocation in daily life, has a wealth of resources in the writings of St. Josemaria Escriva, renown for their bracing martial temper, as well as other publications of Scepter Publishers and, most of all, from the regular meetings of the work itself.

Recommended reading:

• James Socias, ed., Handbook of Prayers [highly recommended Scepter prayer book including nearly 600 pages of just about everything you'd ever need--including the Mass, examinations of conscience, prayers before and after confession, etc.]
• St. Josemaria Escriva, The Way, Furrow, The Forge (Single Volume Edition) [short, often profound paragraphs for daily reading consisting of St. Josemaria Escriva's spiritual direction, rebukes, encouragement, and advice]
• St. Josemaria Escriva, The Way [first of the three-part readings in Escriva's spiritual direction as a separate volume]
• St. Josemaria Escriva, The Furrow [second of the three-part readings in Escriva's spiritual direction as a separate volume]
• St. Josemaria Escriva, The Forge [third of the three-part readings in Escriva's spiritual direction as a separate volume]
• St. Josemaria Escriva, Christ is Passing By [Biblical commentary drawn from Church documents, the Fathers, and Escriva]
• St. Josemaria Escriva, Holy Rosary [Rosary with commentary and illustrations]
• St. Josemaria Escriva and Alvaro Del Portillo, The Way of the Cross [The Stations of the Cross with commentary and illustrations]
• Peter Berglar, Opus Dei: Life and Work of Its Founder, Josemaria Escriva
• Josemaria Escriva, Conversations With Monsignor Josemaria Escriva

The Faith Connection promotes God as "Mother"

To the attention of His Excellency, Most Reverend Peter J. Jugis, Bishop of Charlotte, North Carolina:

On Trinity Sunday, May 22, 2005, The Faith Connection, a bulletin insert produced by RCLweb.com and regularly used by our church in the Diocese of Charlotte, NC, carried the title: "Why Is it Okay to Call God 'Mother'?" The article states that "a number of Catholic feminist theologians have written in recent years about the negative consequences for the Catholic faith of a narrow reliance on exclusively male imagery to name the Divinity." The article then goes on to give the impression that the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) and Church teaching support revisioning God as "Mother." This impression, however, is simply mistaken. The idea that Scripture or Church teaching could be made to support such a view is simply not true.

While it is true--as everyone from the early Church Fathers to the contemporary Catechism of the Catholic Church (for online edition, click here) attests--that God's inner nature is humanly incomprehensible, that He transcends human gender, and that His tenderness and compassion may be expressed in feminine imagery (CCC 239), it is not true that the Church Fathers or the Catechism ever suggest that we may call Him "Mother." No Church Father says this. No catechism of the Church, past or present, says this.

There's a radical difference between saying (1) God is like a mother (which the Bible and Catechism say in a couple of places) and (2) God is a mother (which the Bible and Catechism, for good reason, never say). While it's true that God in Himself transcends gender as well as every human conception, both Scripture and Catholic tradition have always insisted that He is masculine in relation to us (the Church). While God may be like a mother in His mercy and compassion, He is not merely like a father: He is a Father. While the Holy Spirit may be like a feminine spirit in His mysterious movements, that is not what He is: How else could He have served as the Spouse of the Virgin Mary, who begot the Son of God by impregnating her? And while many feminists would like to revision the Incarnation in feminine terms--oh, rue the day!--He became incarnate as a man, the Son of God.

It is true that God is Spirit and transcends gender, but if He were not masculine in relation to us, Jesus would have "two mommies," as in a "same-sex marriage." Furthermore, one could hardly make sense of the nuptial imagery of Christ as the Church's Bridegroom, a truth at the heart of the Church's Eucharistic theology (see, e.g., The Theology of the Body according to John Paul II). But it is not true that Jesus has "two mommies." His only mother is the Blessed Mother Mary. His paternity is divine, not human. As the Creed says, "He was conceived of the Holy Spirit, [and] born of the Virgin, Mary ...." And we, the Church, are the Mystical Bride of Christ, our Divine Lover and Lord.

The gender revisionism of Catholic feminism (which is part of a wider movement of secular post-modern feminism and relativism) plays right into the hands of a dissident agenda that promotes not only the ordination of women, but also a revisioning of "God" as Gaia (the pagan mother-earth goddess), a divine womb from which creatures are born. Canaan and the whole ancient world were rife with polytheistic religions, priestesses, and feminine deities, implying that the gods were immanent, not transcendent--part of the world, not a creator outside of the world. Israel alone had a God who was understood in masculine terms, underscoring His transcendence, the fact that He is a Creator-God who creates outside of Himself (not from within a feminine womb), is active (not receptive), initiates a covenantal relationship with His people and gives them His law. (A good resource on these issues, for starters, is Peter Kreeft's essay, "Gender and the Will of God," as well as Matthew Berke's First Things essay, "God and Gender in Judaism.")

This revisionist agenda is what has animated the tampering with the Lectionary in some parishes over the last decades, where masculine pronouns have been regularly feminized or neutered with the nonsensical result that a verse like John 3:16 might read like this: "For God so loved God's world that God gave God's only child ...." This, of course, is pure Gnosticism (the view that we get at a true understanding of God only by getting "behind" the language of Scripture, which ought to be dismissed as culturally relative). These tendencies have been the cause of widespread confusion in Catholic parishes, further eroding the already thin respect for the authority of God's Revelation among modern Catholics.

But I have some larger concerns here as well. As the Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, declared at the outset of his pontificate, we are in the middle of a war against a "dictatorship of relativism" today, in which the very heart of the Gospel is being threatened with eviscerating revisionism. More than ever, those in Christ's little flocks need the clear voice of faithful shepherds. There is confusion in the world, and when this confusion finds its way into parishes, the bewildered sheep tend to stray from the pasture and drop off the cliffs.

While there is still a great deal of confusion over such matters, it must be admitted that the source of most of these confusing influences in our parishes today lies in the legacy of an older generation of priests who were products of the cultural revolution of the 1960s. The sixties and seventies spawned a time of radical destabilization and confusion among many Catholics, who were exposed to the influences of the secular counter culture as well as the influence of liberal mainline Protestantism, and their acids of skeptical relativism. Many of these earlier priests, like a considerable number still, have granted quarter to dissenters by indulging regular tinkering with the Lectionary, substituting gender-neutral language in the Creed, encouraging proponents of female ordination to bide their time until a more "open-minded" pope comes along, thereby promoting false expectations and fundamental misunderstandings of the Church (see my post on Why liberal "Catholic" media can't understand the Church). So also with their legacy of parish subscriptions to periodicals such as National Catholic Reporter, Commonweal, America, and US Catholic (see my critique: What I Learned from U.S. Catholic Magazine: Discerning Editorial Bias). So also with other parish materials and even bulletin inserts like The Faith Connection. Priests often like to be viewed as reasonable, "moderate" men. Unfortunately, this sometimes leads them to talk misleadingly about striking a "balance" between "conservatism" (their label for official Church teaching) and "liberalism" (their label for dissent and heresy). It is a tempting posture for priests and bishops who want to avoid alienating the liberal "faction" within their parishes (see my essay on Extremism and Toleration: Striking the Right Balance), though honest reflection shows it to be as disingenuous as it is seductive.

It is noteworthy that none of the Apostles entertained such compromising notions of "reasonableness" or "moderation." The Apostle John in his First Epistle, when confronting the earliest dissenters in the Church, who were Gnostics who denied the Incarnation and believed God was "above" taking corporeal human form, granted them no quarter but condemned them as "deceivers" and "antichrists" (I Jn 2:18-28). When Paul confronted the revisionism of the Judaizers, he declared them anathema and partisans of "an alien gospel," saying, "If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to that which you received, let him be accursed" (Gal. 1:9, passim).

It is significant that Christ called us sheep. Sheep are stupid. A flock of sheep couldn't survive for a day without a good shepherd. When a parishioner reads a bulletin insert that says it's okay to call God "Mother," he's likely to think this is what the Church is teaching today. He's likely to think that the benighted commentators of TIME, NEWSWEEK and CNN are right when they portray the Church as a reactionary, outmoded patriarchal religion.

How to respond? First, I think last Sunday's bulletin insert clearly calls for an immediate statement from the pulpit stating that the bulletin insert egregiously misrepresented Church teaching and that the insert will be pulled from all future bulletins. (This is hardly an isolated case. An earlier insert from The Faith Connection, "Who Can Be Saved?" [Jan. 2, 2005] clearly promoted the relativism of a universalistic view according to which all religions offer different but equally acceptable ways of salvation, suggesting that Catholics should no longer think of trying to win converts to the Catholic Faith.)

Second, I would encourage priests and bishops, including my own, to consider pulling dissident periodicals like US Catholic from the parish magazine racks and forming doctrinal committees to review the content of periodicals and other parish faith-formation materials to see if they support or oppose Church teaching, and submit their recommendations to their pastors and bishops. (To humor those progressive Catholics who are so fond of Extraordinary Eucharistic Ministers, these committees might even be called "Extraordinary Congregations of the Holy Inquisition.")

Third, I would encourage both bishops and priests to begin seriously thinking of more effective ways of teaching their parishioners the Catholic Faith. "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge," warned the Prophet Hosea. Most homilies are woefully insubstantial and often little more than reiterations of benign platitudes and pop psychology. But parishioners don't need donuts and pop tarts from the pulpit. They get too much of that from television as it is. They need what St. Paul calls "solid food" or, more simply, "meat."

St. Augustine, quoting Scripture, opposed the perfectionism of the Donatists by stating that we will always have tares (weeds) and wheat growing together within the Church until the great harvest on Judgment Day. It's one thing to recognize that the Church will always have hypocrites and sinners within the fold until the end of time. It's not for any of us to judge the heart of another individual. But it's another thing altogether to suppose that the Church should passively permit error and confusion to co-exist side-by-side with Church teaching in her parishes. I don't think that's what Augustine or the Good Shepherd meant. May the Holy Spirit fortify our shepherds with wisdom, courage and resolve.

Doctrinal "pluralism" in the early Church?

There is a common assumption among moderately-well educated people with at least a smattering of exposure to modern biblical scholarship that no "single Gospel" is to be found in the early Church, but rather a "pluralism" of rival Gospels. They point to the fact that early Christianity emerged from a predominantly Jewish environment where the first Christians continued to observe precepts of the Torah and only later evolved into a Gospel for the Gentiles that did not require them to submit also to the Jewish requirements such as circumcision. They extrapolate from this, sometimes under the distant influence of Hegel, to suggest that Christianity is ultimately a product of a synthesis between the early Hebraic outlook of Jesus and the Jesuralem party of Apostles and the later Hellenic outlook of Paul, the missionary to the Greek or Gentile world. Further, they take this as a justification for an ever evolving, changing conception of the Gospel that could allow for endless revisionism, even accommodating women priests, practicing homosexual bishops, and a univeralist gospel according to which everbody in the world is saved (even though the meaning of "salvation" has to be radically re-thought since, of course, there is really no Hell according to these folks).

Without going into the complexities of this misguided thesis that is the legacy of classic liberal Protestantism, a few simple observations may be in order. If the NT Church was so "pluralistic," why did St. John anathematize the Gnostics revisionists (who denied the Incarnation) as "antichrists"? Why did St. Paul submit his teaching for review by the Jerusalem authorities under the headship of St. Peter (Gal. 2:1-2; cf. 1:18-24) even though Paul was the extremely well-educated protege of the Rabbi Gamaliel while Peter was a mere fisherman? Why did Paul himself anathematize the Judaizers as partisans of "another Gospel" in such harsh language (cf. the opening chapter of Galatians)? ... Etc., etc., etc. The Church has never been "pluralistic" in the sense of formally allowing (let alone teaching) rival, conflicting doctrines. It is one thing to accept the Venerable Cardinal Newman's thesis that Christian doctrine has developed, as an Oak tree is the product of the organic development from a tiny Acorn. It is altogether another thing to suggest that the Church can evolve doctrines that contradict the Apostolic Deposit of Faith. There is nothing in Paul's religion that contradicts the teaching of Jesus and the Apostles, since Jesus never intended for His Gospel to be limited to Jews, even though it took time for His Jewish disciples to comprehend this fact. But the notion that Christianity could be "revised" to accommodate contemporary versions of Gnosticism, universalism, New Age ideas, "same sex marriages," and so forth, is so far fetched as to make one laugh, were it not such a egregiously serious matter that involved the de-naturing or evisceration of the Gospel. The Apostle John would surely call partisans of such nonsense "antichrists." St. Paul would surely denounce them as partisans of "another Gospel." Let us try to be charitable about this, without being naive and gullible.

A good antedote to the liberal protestant thesis about Paul's religion being something other than the religion of Jesus, Peter and the other apostles is the classic refutation of this nonsense by the venerable old Princeton Professor, J. Gresham Machen, The Origin of Paul's Religion (James Sprunt Lectures). Another related classic by the same author, probably one of the ten most important books I have ever read, is his memorable volume, Christianity and Liberalism.

Al Kimel ("Pontificator") swims the Tiber

Al Kimel, a priest of the Episcopal Church who has been involved for some years as a thoughtful and substantial contributor to theological dialogue within the blogging community under the heading of Pontificator, has resolved to enter into full communion with the Catholic Church. In a recent post to his blog, Pontifications, he declares: "A Decision is Reached." An excerpt:

Last night I tendered my resignation to the Vestry of St. Mark's Church, effective July 1st. It is my intention to renounce my orders as an Episcopal priest and to enter, for the sake of my salvation, into full communion with the Catholic Church. I freely affirm the Catholic Church to be the one true fold of Jesus Christ. It is also my intention to avail myself of the Pastoral Provision and to apply for ordination to the Catholic priesthood.

Al, we rejoice in your decision, which we know comes after much soul searching, study, and prayer. Prepare to be tested, remembering the doubts with which the Evil One must have attempted to afflict the Blessed Mother after her decisive fiat, when, on the long and exhausting flight into Egypt, the memory of the angelic chorus singing "Glory to God in the highest!" must have seemed like a distant dream, if not a hallucination. Your presence aboard the Barque of Peter is a welcome one, and your gifts are needed and the Lord will see that they are eventually put to good use. But don't be surprised if you are confronted by obstacles, indifference, or even hostility. Remember the warnings of Thomas Merton to converts: don't let the all-too-human side of the Church get you down. The amazing thing is that the Church has a divine side at all. But the truth about that, of course, is the little ineluctable thing that prevented us converts from putting off the hour of decision indefinitely. (As you put it: "For the sake of my salvation ...") May God bless you, and may the Blessed Virgin sustain you, and your patron saint and guardian angel intercede for you always. You will be in our prayers.

Irish Catholics in Mexican army in war of 1846-1848

A fascinating chapter in American history is the story about the St. Patrick's Battalion of Irishmen fighting on the side of Catholic Mexico in the Mexican-American War (1846-1848). Irish families fleeing the Potato Famine in their native land and seeking refuge in the United States were guaranteed U.S. citizenship if they volunteered one son for service in the US Army. By the early 1840s a significant proportion of the enlisted men in the United States Army were Catholic immigrants from Ireland. These Irish Catholic recruits were severely maltreated in the Army because of the notorious prejudice against immigrants, especially Catholic immigrants, at that time in America. The Mexican government, aware of this prejudice, started a campaign during the Mexican-American War to win the foreigners and Catholics to its cause. The Mexicans urged the Irish to throw off the burden of fighting for their "Protestant tyrants" and join the Mexicans in driving the Yankees out of Mexico. Many Irish enlisted men, suffering discrimination and persecution in the US Army, drew the conclusion that they were fighting on the wrong side against their Catholic brothers in Mexico. Many deserted.

In November 1846 Gen. Santa Anna organized American deserters in Mexico to form the San Patricio Battalion, or St. Patrick's Company, a name it probably received from its Irish-American leader, John Riley, formerly a member of Company K of the Fifth United States Infantry. The company saw action at Monterrey, again near Saltillo, and at Buena Vista, each time receiving praise for its thorough job. The most important conflict came at the battle of Churubusco in August 1847, where the San Patricos took their last stand, in a battle reminiscent of the Alamo. The rest is history.

Were they heroes? Were they traitors? It all depends on your vantage point. But even from the viewpoint of the U.S. military, the less said about such subjects--the maltreatment of Irish Catholic enlisted men in the 1840s, the desertion of many, the defections of still others--the better. Mistreatment of servicement, as well as desertiongs, reflect poorly on political leadership and military command; defections even more so. The fate of the San Patricios was sad and cruel, as the U.S. meted out severe punishment to the Irish survivers when the Americans finally overran Mexican territory. I am told that to this day, the Mexico's Fighting Irish are commemorated as historical comrades in arms in Mexico.

The little-known story of the San Patricios was first rendered in film by Mark Day of California in 1996, under the title of "The San Patricios," and shown on RTE (Irish Public Service Television) in 1997. However, the story also attracted the attention of producer, Bill McDonald, who had a new version of the story shot (under the direction of Lance Hool) in Durango, Mexico, with Tom Berenger in the lead role as Sergeant Riley from Clifden. More extraordinary, Prince Albert of Monaco, son of Princess Grace, appears as a member of the San Patricios' famed artillery crew, "James Kelly." Actor Mark Thomas, close friend of Prince Albert's, had a role and involved the prince in the production since he was interested in the San Patricio story and in trying his hand at acting.

An excerpt from Robert J. McNamara's editorial review of the latter film:

"This historical drama set during the Mexican War is ambitious and tries to grapple with some serious themes, but it also tends to meander before finally finding a dramatic conclusion. Tom Berenger, who puts in a credible performance as an Irishman serving as an officer in the U.S. Army of the late 1840s, impulsively rides off with band of deserters, fellow Irish immigrants who have been persecuted for practicing their Catholic religion in the ranks. Berenger's character and the rebellious Irish lads flee into the hills of Mexico, where they are quickly taken captive by banditos who happen to be encamped with beautiful senoritas wearing dresses that can just never stay up on both shoulders at once. A romantic plot begins, but is put aside while Berenger and his men form their own Irish brigade to fight with the Mexicans against the U.S. troops invading from the north. After a series of hard-fought battles, their endeavors end disastrously."

McDonald's film, which appeared in 1998 under the title of "One Man's Hero" is a very decent production. The DVD version of "One Man's Hero" came out in 2001 and is available online (used or new) "HERE".


(Sources: "San Patricio Battalion," in The Handbook of Texas Online; and ""The San Patricios: An Historical Perspective," by Brian McGinn, in The San Patricos: Mexico's Fighting Irish; "The San Patricios on Screen," by Catherine Jennings, in The San Patricos: Mexico's Fighting Irish)

Why liberal "Catholic" media can't understand the Church

A representative sampling from the letters-to-the-editor department of the liberal, anti-Vatican National Catholic Reporter after the election of Pope Benedict XVI, collated by Karl Keating for his newsletter, includes the following:

1. Mike Coverdale of Nevada, Iowa:

I turned the TV on just before noon, at the very moment Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was announced as Pope Benedict XVI. "No!" I screamed from the depths of my soul. I hit the speed dial to my wife's cell phone. "They not only shut the doors with this guy, they locked them!" I shouted. "I don't know what to do now," I cried, feeling physically ill.

2. Mark Summit of Portland, Oregon:

I am deeply saddened and distressed by the election of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger to the papacy, so much so that I sat outside the Portland cathedral the afternoon of the "Mass of the Holy Spirit," holding a sign that said "The Spirit Was Asleep."

3. Michaeleen Swanson of Lakeville, Minnesota:

The morning headlines may as well have read instead: "Cardinals to Catholic Women: Go to Hell." We Catholic women have been told for so many years, just hang in there, we are only one death away from change. Well, some of us have hung in there, but every day the handhold is slipping.

4. Pierre LaPlante of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia:

Since Cardinal Ratzinger has been elected pope, I guess I won't be returning to the Catholic Church too soon. This man is the most undesirable of all the candidates and a reinforcement of all I would have hoped could have been modified.

And what's the moral of this sampling? Simple: You can't expect to learn the truth about the Catholic Church from liberal, anti-Vatican sources like NCR. They will ultimately let you down. Every time. And the reason why? They assume that the Church is nothing more than a human organization that can be understood adequately on the level of power politics and rival interest groups jockeying for position, and they assume that Church policy is ultimately vulnerable to revisionism in terms of whoever happens to be in charge in any pontificate.

You have to feel sorry for these people who are given a vision of the Church that does not match the reality. For example, why are liberal Catholic women led to expect that the Church will reverse its policy on an all-male priesthood and open the door to the ordination of women priests? Why were they told, as Michaeleen Swanson (above #3) was told, to "just hang in there, we are only one death away from change"? On whose authority? Why did Ms. Swanson believe she could trust whomever said this? Why should anyone have believed this self-appointed authority? Only because these women, as well as their self-appointed authorities, have been taken in by the myth that the Church is ultimately no more than a human organization, which, like any other human organization, will ultimately yield to the pressures of history and the lobbying of political interest groups, and will relent in her traditions and accommodate herself to the ideology of the current prevailing consensus of opinion. Pity the poor souls who believe that!

Reading recommendations:

• Peter Kreeft, "Gender and the Will of God: The Issue of Priestesses is Ultimately an Issue of God."
• Peter Kreeft and Alice von Hildebrand, Women and the Priesthood
• Donna Steichen, Ungodly Rage: The Hidden Face of Catholic Feminism

Jane Fonda's Christianity ...

So Jane Fonda's found the light. Or so she says. After having been an agnostic most of her life, she says she's become a Christian. When asked recently about her faith, she replied that she's a "feminist Christian" and still hasn't found a church yet, but that she's looking for one. When asked whether she sees Christianity more broadly than fundamentalists, she replied:

"I don't want to offend anyone. But I believe people have different ways of approaching The Word. For me, it's metaphor, written by people a long time after Christ died. And interpreted by specific groups. I read the gospels that aren't included in the Bible. These make me feel good about calling myself a Christian."

While it's always heartening to see people "come out" as a Christian, it's always a bit dicey as to what extent their new-found faith can break free of the corrupting influences of the secular milieu that has found its way even into Christian circles. This has sorely compromised what the Anglican writer, Harry Blamires, years ago called "The Christian Mind," in a book by that title (The Christian Mind: How Should A Christian Think? [1988]; see also his more recent The Post-Christian Mind: Exposing Its Destructive Agenda [1999]).

Ms. Fonda says she believes there are "different ways of approaching The Word." This already falls into the relativism of historical protestantism, which denies there is no authoritative or correct interpretation of Scripture, and may well be reinforced by the popular relativism that prevails today, which falls victim to what G.K Chesterton called "humility in the wrong place":

[W]hat we suffer from today is humility in the wrong place. Modesty has moved from the organ of ambition. Modesty has settled upon the organ of conviction; where it was never meant to be. A man was meant to be doubtful about himself, but undoubting about the truth; this has been exactly reversed. Nowadays the part of a man that a man does assert is exactly the part he ought not to assert--himself. The part he doubts is exactly the part he ought not to doubt--the Divine Reason.... But the new sceptic is so humble that he doubts if he can even learn. (Orthodoxy, from ch. 3, "The Suicide of Thought")

How does Ms. Fonda approach The Word? "For me," she says, "it's metaphor." What does she mean? If something is metaphorical, it means that it isn't to be taken literally. When the movie Barbarella came out in 1968, starring Jane Fonda, guys used to say that she was "hot." They didn't mean that her body temperature was alarmingly elevated. "Hot" was simply a metaphor for the elevated temperatures of their own libidos, which is to say: she looked sexy. What does Ms. Fonda mean by calling The Word "metaphor"? Does she mean that the Incarnation, Resurrection, Ascension, Redemption, and promise of Eternal Life are not to be taken literally?

Ms. Fonda adds that she believes that the Bible was "written by people a long time after Christ died." This is a view commonly held by liberals Christians along with their secular counterparts who don't believe in the supernatural. It's a view that "demythologizes" the Biblical narratives, a view we owe to the influence of the Enlightenment skeptics, who rejected belief in the supernatural, and to their stepchildren, the classic Protestant liberals who re-interpreted Christianity in light of this anti-supernaturalist bias (for a great survey of this tradition, take a look at John O'Neill's excellent book, The Bible's Authority: A Portrait Gallery of Thinkers from Lessing to Bultmann).

Ms. Fonda also says: " I read the gospels that aren't included in the Bible. These make me feel good about calling myself a Christian." Which "gospels" does she mean? She means the Gnostic pseudo-Gospels, like the so-called (pseudo-) Gospel of Thomas, which the notoriously irresponsible Jesus Seminar, whose chief contribution to Biblical studies is its notoriously irresponsible conclusion that virtually none of the words of Jesus recorded in the Gospels were actually spoken by Jesus, has packaged together with the four canonical Gospels (those that are actually part of the New Testament) by the Seminar's notoriously irresponsible founder, Robert W. Funk, in a book presumptuously entitled The Five Gospels: What Did Jesus Really Say? The Search for the AUTHENTIC Words of Jesus.

Now as to why reading the Gnostic pseudo-Gospels makes Ms. Fonda "feel good" about calling herself a Christian, we'll leave for you to guess-- although my own guess would be that she needs prayer.

Totalitarian liberalism

"The truth is, universities [today] are the most hostile, narrow-minded and intolerant environment in society." --Philip Mitchell, Historian
"Totalitarian liberalism"?! Is that an oxymoron? Seemingly so, at least linguistically, since "liberality" would seem to connote nothing totalitarian. The problem, however, is the track record of a certain kind of liberalism that has been in ascendency over the last several decades. Its antecedents may be found in the outlook of Jean-Jacques Rousseau (pictured right) who declared in his Social Contract, that those who opposed the "general will" of "the people" must be coerced to comply: "They must be compelled to be free," he said. But it's also evident today in attitudes of people as they sometimes slip out in conversation. These are often some of the nicest, most well-meaning people who oppose violence, support tolerance, and wouldn't want to hurt a flea. But in unguarded moments of emotion, one may hear utterances that betray a latent problematic. In a group of nice, moderately well-educated liberals talking about school massacres at Columbine and Red Lake, about the need for gun control, and such, one may hear the most unexpected surges of outrage surface in utterances like: "Those promoters of the NRA [National Rifle Association] ought to be shot!" During a Great Books discussion one time, I heard a young mother from an urbane and politically very liberal Quaker family say, "When my baby grows up, I want to support her no matter what she wants to do. She can do anything she wants, I don't mind--I don't care if she wants an interracial marriage, or if she's a lesbian, or anything ... as long as she's not a Republican."

Liberals don't notice it, but they are about the most illiberal people in the world when it comes to certain values. They just can't seem to see it. This is evident in a lot of the talk thse days about "tolerance" and "inclusiveness," celebrating "multicultural diversity" and "difference." What these expressions usually appear to intend is an open, welcoming attitude toward those that have been "marginalized," "victimized" and "oppressed" in various ways--such as blacks, non-Christians, gays and lesbians, women excluded from the all-male Catholic priesthood, etc. Which means that the person with probably the best chance of self-promotion and advancement today would be an anti-Catholic African-American lesbian. Or some combination of one or more of these traits. That's a virtually sure ticket to the talk show circuit and a top-dollar publishing contract. I know white male professors who promote themselves by embracing feminism, queer studies, trans-genderism, liberal religious revisionism, and the like. On the other hand, if you suppose for a moment that this "inclusiveness" and "celebration of diversity" means anything like the acceptance of traditional family values, Republicanism, or traditional Judeo-Christian values, you'd better think again.

Better yet, ask Phil Mitchell, who was fired from his position as professor of history at the University of Colorado last spring when one of his students objected to having to read Charles Sheldon's In His Steps, a book about liberal Protestant Christianity at the turn of the 20th century--a book used for many years at the university and read with enjoyment by numerous secular and Jewish students.

Ironically, the University of Colorado is also the academic home of Ward Churchill, the controversial, America-hating, leftist professor who wrote that those who died in the 9/11 attacks were not innocent victims but "little Eichmanns," a reference to Adolph Eichmann, the Nazi bureaucrat who implemented Hitler's Final Solution. While this cause two northeastern schools to cancel his speaking engagements, Churchill received strong backing from members of his department, who appealed to principles of free speech and academic freedom, and he remains a tenure track professor at at the university with an annual salary of $90,000. (For more on the case, read this interview with Phil Mitchell.)

One of the most notorious contemporary critics of contemporary totalitarian liberalism, whom liberals love to hate, because she is cultured and pretty but brazenly "politically incorrect," is Ann Coulter--recently featured on the cover of TIME magazine (April 25, 2005). A regularly featured political news analyst on various network programs, she has authored numerous best-sellers, including

• How to Talk to a Liberal (If You Must) (2004)
• Treason: Liberal Treachery from the Cold War to the War on Terrorism (2003)
• Slander: Liberal Lies About the American Right (2003)
• High Crimes and Misdemeanors: The Case Against Bill Clinton (2002).

The TIME cover featuring Coulter sported the caption by John Cloud: "Fair and balanced she isn't. This conservative flamethrower enrages the left and delights the right. Is she serious or just having fun?" Why can't liberals figure it out? The answer, of course, is both. Why do critics of totalitarian liberalism have all the fun? Follow the humor. The trail will rarely, if ever, lead you to the door of a totalitarian liberal.

One of the most astute scholars of totalitarian liberalism has been the Jewish Zionist and Professor of History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, J.L. Talmon. His most recent publication is Totalitarian Democracy and After (Cass Series--Totalitarian Movements and Political Religions) (2002). But forty-five years ago he already offered a provocative analysis of the convoluted logic of Jean-Jacques Rousseau's Social Contract in his profound study of The Origins of Totalitarian Democracy (Praeger university series) (1960). This is particularly significant in that Rousseau's work is seen by many as a charter for egalitarian democracy. It was certainly viewed as such by the primier Enlightenment philosopher, Immanuel Kant, who was greatly enamored of his work. In many ways Rousseau may be considered the theorist behind the French Revolution of 1789, which, as we may recall, was the revolution that "devoured her children."

The significance of the French Revolution (1789-1794) and the profound difference of its underlying ideology from the values of the English Revolution (1621-1688) are succinctly analyzed in Walter Lippman's visionary little book, The Public Philosophy (which is available only in used copies, though important enought that it ought to be brought back into print). The French Revolution was ideologically the antecedent of the Bolshevik Revolution (1917) that brought Marxist-Leninism into power in Russia--which eventually saw the slaughter of many more millions than were lost in the Nazi Holocaust. On the other hand, the English Revolution was in many ways the antecedent of the American Revolution (1776). John Locke, whose political writings championed minimal government (its function was restricted to the protection of life, liberty and property) and whose writings may in many ways be considered the theory behind the English Revolution, drafted the constitution of the original Carolina colonies.

Another overlooked scholar whose work offers brilliant insight into the logic of the French Revolution from a Dutch Reformed perspective is Guillaume Groen van Prinsterer, who was also Prime Minster of The Netherlands from 1901-1905 and founder of the Anti-Revolutionary Party in Holland. His lectures on the subject, entitled Ongeloof en Revolutie (Unbelief and Revolution), have been partially translated into English, Lectures VIII & IX, entitled Unbelief in Religion and Politics (His Unbelief and Revolution; Lectures 8 and 9) (1975), and Lecture XI, entitled The History of the Revolution in Its First Phase: The Preparation (Till 1789) (His Unbelief and Revolution; a series of lectures in history, Lecture 11) (1973).

The point is that the totalitarian liberalism animating the thinking of Rousseau, the French Revolution, and the Bolshevik revolution has far more in common with the liberalism of the contemporary western world than the liberalism of John Locke, which represented the "liberality" of a government whose powers were restricted, on the assumption that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely, an assumption based on the Christian premise of a fallen human nature. Here's a test by which to measure the degree to which the meaning of political "liberalism" has shifted in history: "liberalism" today is associated is associated with big government politicians like Ted Kennedy, Bill & Hillary Clinton, and John Kerry; whereas the values of "liberalism" in its original sense are associated today with conservative ("that-goverment-is-best-which-governs-least") politicians like Ronald Raegan, Newt Gingerich, Pat Buchanan, and Jesse Helms. There's an irony in that. "Liberalism" used to mean what the tradition of John Locke stood for. Today it means, at least politically, the politics of big government, if not Orwellian "Big Brother" state totalitarianism.

The "politically correct" liberalism of contemporay liberal ideologues, however, is much more than mere political liberalism. It is an ideological allegiance, a worldview, an attitude and habit of mind that is ultimately tyrannical and even self-destructive. The scientist and philosopher, Michael Polanyi addressed the problem of such liberalism in an essay entitled "The Eclipse of Thought" in his book, Meaning (University of Chicago Press, 1977), in which he writes:

Here the inconsistency of liberalism based on philosophic doubt becomes apparent: freedom of thought is destroyed by the extension of doubt the the field of traditional ideals, which includes the basis for freedom of thought. (p. 10)

I don't know how it could be put more succinctly than that. Yet another worthy work in the tradition of conservative (original) liberalism is James Burnham's Suicide of the West: An Essay on the Meaning and Destiny of Liberalism (1975), which points out the many self-referential inconsistencies and self-undermining policy decisions and self-parodying illogicalities of modern liberalism. How could anything so well-intentioned become so idiotic and tyrannical?

"The best way to convert liberals is to have them move out of their parents' home, get a job, and start paying taxes." --Ann Coulter

"Zorro" based on Irish-Catholic freedom fighter in Mexico

According to the pages of The Honourable Society of the Irish Brigade, which was formed in 1994, on the 300th anniversary of the death of its founder, Justin MacCarthy, to commemorate the lives and achievements of the Irish Soldier in Foreign Service, the historical figure behind the tales of the masked swordfighter, Zorro, was "an Irish gentleman of noble birth named William Lamport, born in 1615 in County Wexford [Ireland]." The masked hero and freedom fighter "Zorro" was the creation of Johnson McCulley, and first appeared in August 1919 as a serial in a pulp fiction journal entitled All-Story Weekly. But the historical antecedent, as the claim goes, was the 17th century William Lamport, who "hailed from a Catholic family," left Ireland during the confederate conflict as a result of oppressive English rule," in 1643 "enlisted in one of the three Irish regiments in Spanish service (O'Neill, O'Donnell and Fitzgerald) to fight against the French forces in Spanish Flanders," was "commended for bravery and entered Spanish Royal service," "went to the then-Spanish colony of Mexico," assumed the name "Guillen Lombardo," and became a notorious freedom fighter in the Mexican independence movement. Read more.

"Here's to the Irish
The Men that God made mad
For all their wars are merry
And all their songs are sad."
- G.K.Chesterton.

When will Boston College become Catholic again?

We all know that Boston College has a prestigous history as one of the primier Jesuit institutions of the northeast. But when will Boston College have the integrity to institutionally align itself with the Catholic Church again? This, from cyberCatholics.com, is hardly encouraging:

Despite the fact that Massachusetts allows religious institutions to discriminate against active homosexuals based on a moral objection, Boston College has decided to re-write its policy of non-discrimination.

The new policy states that Boston College "commits itself to maintaining a welcoming environment for all people and extends its welcome in particular to those who may be vulnerable to discrimination on the basis of their race . . . religion, color, age . . . or sexual orientation."

No wonder Massachussetts Catholics had trouble with homosexual pedophile & pederast priests!

What, you have trouble with that??? It's one thing to call sinners to repentance and welcome them home to the Father. It's another to welcome the unrepentant sin into the bosom of an institution that officially identifies itself with a church that has historically and traditionally regarded such sexual behavior as a crime against nature and an abomination before God. Give it up, BC, and become what you are: an erstwhile Jesuit and Catholic institution that shows every sign of institutional apostasy.

On why liberal arts programs are being eroded

At our academic institution, like many across the country, liberal arts programs are under the gun. They are seen as unproductive, often under-enrolled by students, in contrast to the "professional" programs like business, occupational therapy, nursing, and such, which are popular money-makers.

One of my colleagues recently suggested that the problem is over-specialization among the various liberal arts disciplines. Among other things, he also suggested that many liberal arts disciplines are seen as having little value. He said, "nothing so irritates Science and the Market as history, philosophy and religion. (I would add literature)." E.F. Schumacher in his Guide for the Perplexed, when talking about the "maps of life" furnished to students by most universities these days, writes:

The maps produced by modern materialistic Scientism (I would add Business Programs) leave all the questions that really matter unanswered; more than that, they deny the validity of the questions .... Questions like "What should I do?" or "What must I do to be saved?" are strange questions because they relate to ends, not simply to means. No technical answer will do, such as "Tell me precisely what you want and I shall tell you how to get it." The whole point is that I do not know what I want. Maybe all I want is to be happy. But the answer "Tell me what you need for happiness, and I shall then be able to advise you what to do"--this answer, again, will not do, because I do not know what I need for happiness.

Specialization may be part of the problem, but I'm not sure that's really the worst culprit. It seems to me that we're witnessing a significant shift towards the technical (the "how" questions) that represents an abdication of the reflective (the "why" questions). To put it in more Chestertonian terms, there is a thought that stops thought, and that is the only thought that ought to be stopped. As Chesterton puts it in his essay, "The Suicide of Thought" (Chapter 3 of Orthodoxy):

... what we suffer from today is humility in the wrong place. Modesty has moved from the organ of ambigion. Modesty has settled upon the organ of conviction; where it was never meant to be. A man was meant to be doubtful about himself, but undoubting about the truth; this has been exactly reversed. Nowadays the part of a man that a man does assert is exactly the part he ought not to assert--himself.... For the old humility made a man doubtful about his efforts, which might make him work harder. But the new humility makes a man doubtful about his aims, which will make him stop working altogether.

In other words, the assumption has settled into the philistine mind that questions of the sort raised in liberal arts classes can't be answered and are therefore not worth asking. As the philistine student, Peter Pragma (in Peter Kreeft's book The Best Things in Life), responded when faced with Aristotle's distinction between three kinds of knowledge (productive, practical, and theoretical) and asked what each of them improves: "Productive knowledge improves things in the world, practical knowledge improves our practice, and theoretical knowledge (knowledge for the sake of knowledge, such as we find in the liberal arts) improves nothing."

Whether it's a matter of specialization, excessive focus on technical know-how, or loss of confidence that anything really meaningful can be actually known, I do agree that it's a problem reflected in academe. I see it not only in the drift towards "professional" programs and majors, but even in the growing gap between administration and faculty. It used to be that college and university presidents were members of the faculty and taught one or two courses as part of their annual contract. That's all been lost as they've increasingly adopted CEO models of administration (reinforced by their corporate board members), along with "perfect professional distance" from members of their faculty, whom they seem inclined to treat increasingly as "employees." None of this helps, of course.

A good place to discover the heart and mind of Benedict XVI

In 1996, Cardinal Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, granted an extended interview to Peter Seewald, a journalist who had left the Church and was wrestling with questions about the Faith. Significantly, Seewald himself returned to the Church sometime after the interview. In a recent newsletter Steve Wood, President of Family Life Center International, comments on this interview:

Sweewald's interview became the book, Salt of the Earth: The Church at the End of the Millenium: An Interview with Peter Seewald [Ignatius Press]. This book is one of the best places to start discovering what is inside the heart and mind of our new Holy Father. I highly recommend it. There are so many good things Cardinal Ratzinger says in this book it would be impossible in a newsletter to begin mentioning them all. My copy of the book is highlighted, underlined, and filled with asterisks. Here are just a few of the many things I found encouraging in Salt of the Earth:

Seewald: (P.114)

"In one of the documents bearing your signature you recalled the admonitions of the Apostle Paul: 'Preach the word, be urgent in season and out of season, convince, rebuke, and exhort, be unfailing in patience and in teaching. For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own likings, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander into myths. As for you, always be steady, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfil your ministry'" [2 Tim 4:2-5].

Cardinal Ratzinger:

"I don't want to overreach myself, but I would say that this expresses the essence of what I consider to be my standard at this time."

Seewald (p. 82) -- Inquiring about his concerns as a bishop about the dissolution of tradition and authenticity and how he denounced the forces spinning everything into confusion.

Cardinal Ratzinger:

"The words of the Bible and of the Church Fathers rang in my ears, those sharp condemnations of shepherds who are like mute dogs; in order to avoid conflicts, they let the poison spread. Peace is not the first civic duty, and a bishop whose only concern is not to have any problems and to gloss over as many conflicts as possible is an image I find repulsive. Even today I am glad that in Munich I didn't dodge conflicts, because letting things drift is - as I have already said - the worst kind of administration.

Seewald (p.113)

"One often has the impression that you have been trying to preserve something, like a father who wants to preserve the inheritance created with so much hard work, if not for his own children, who apparently can't do credit to it or use it, then at least so that his grandchildren can still have access to it."

Cardinal Ratzinger:

"I like that idea of preserving something even for one's grandchildren. For what I really have at heart is keeping this precious treasure, the faith, with its power to enlighten, from being lost."

Seewald (p.166 & 168) -- Asking if the Church should be relaxing its standards to become more attractive to those with "modern" lifestyles:

Cardinal Ratzinger:

"More and more frequently we observe that young people are underchallenged. In fact, the increasing membership in sects with radical internal demands can be partly explained by the fact that, first, young people are looking for certainty, they want a secure shelter, but then also they want to be challenged. Somewhere deep down man knows: I have to be challenged, and I have to learn to form myself according to a higher standard and to give myself and to loose myself."

(Ignatius Press is in the midst of reprinting Salt of the Earth).

Apparently Ignatius Press has been inundated with orders for books by Ratzinger since he became Pope. [Gratia tibi, Steve Wood]

The Lasting Legacy of Pope John Paul II

In an article entitled "The Lasting Legacy of Pope John Paul II" in the on-line journal, The New Pantaguel, Eduardo J. Echeverria offers an insighful reflection on the abiding points of significance in the previous pontificate. These include, in summery form, the following:

First, John Paul II revitalized the papacy by recovering its evangelical roots. This is the thesis of papal biographer George Weigel. It means that he recovered the biblical teaching that the Church, and by implication the papacy, has a missionary nature, the great commission to preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and this has revitalized the evangelical dynamism of the Church....

Second, John Paul II has provided an authoritative and authentic interpretation of the teachings of the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965). In the wake of the Council, there seemed to be a mentality afoot that everything was up for grabs .... As Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger wrote in his own memoirs about this time, "The impression grew steadily that nothing was now stable in the Church, that everything was open to revision. More and more the Council appeared to be like a great Church parliament that could change everything and reshape everything according to its own desires."

In response to this mentality of liberalizing Christianity, John Paul has left the Church with a prolific and substantial body of writings--for example, books presenting the rich texture of his Catholic worldview including Crossing the Threshold of Hope and, most recently, Memory and Identity: Conversations at the Dawn of a Millennium; great encyclicals including the "Splendor of Truth," the "The Gospel of Life" (Evangelium Vita), "Faith and Reason" (Fides et Ratio) and the "Mission of the Redeemer" ....

Third, John Paul II also provided a profound interpretation of the spiritual, moral, and intellectual dynamics of Western modern, secularist culture.... The Holy Father has left us the basic theological and philosophical framework in which to discern between the authentic and inauthentic, truth and falsity, good and evil in our culture, and thus to accomplish the task that the Apostle Paul gave us: "Test everything--hold on to what is good and avoid every form of evil" (1 Thessalonians 5:21-22)....

Fourth, John Paul II's commitment to authentic ecumenism is also a fundamental element of his legacy to the Church. Christ calls all His disciples to unity (John 17:20-23). Of course, as John Paul II correctly writes, "Love for the truth is the deepest dimension of any authentic quest for full communion between Christians" (Encyclical Letter, Ut Unum Sint--"That All May Be One," May 25, 1995, no. 36)....

Fifth, John Paul II's commitment to the youth of the world is certainly one of the most visible and, indeed, powerful signs of his papacy. In overwhelming numbers they responded positively to his message: "Christ alone is the cornerstone on which it is possible solidly to build one's existence. Only Christ--known, contemplated and loved--is the faithful friend who never lets us down, who becomes our traveling companion, and whose words warm our hearts (cf. Luke 24:13-35)." These words, spoken by John Paul II to an estimated six hundred thousand young people in Toronto on July 27, 2003 at the seventeenth, and, sadly, his last World Youth Day reflect the Holy Father's consistent message to young people since 1985....

Sixth, John Paul II's commitment to a society of peace, justice and freedom is also essential to his legacy. How does he define peace? ... "The order which prevails in society is by nature moral. Grounded as it is in truth, it must function according to the norms of justice, it should be inspired and perfected by mutual love, and finally it should be brought to an ever more refined and human balance in freedom." ....

In conclusion, the most important element of John Paul II's lasting legacy is his conviction that, as he often put it, Jesus Christ is the answer to the question that is every human life. This is the heart of the Gospel, and he tirelessly and boldly proclaimed it throughout his life: "Our age needs to hear the revealed truth about God, about man, and about the human condition. The moment is right for kerygma. The pastoral challenge ... is to proclaim with renewed vigor 'Jesus Christ, the one Savior of the world, yesterday, today and forever' (cf. Hebrews 13:8) ... The challenge is enormous, but the time is right. For other culture-forming forces are exhausted, implausible, or lacking in intellectual resources adequate to satisfy the human yearning for genuine liberation--even if those forces still manage to exercise a powerful attraction, especially through the media. The great achievement of the [Second Vatican] Council is to have positioned the Church to engage modernity with the truth about the human condition, given to us in Jesus Christ who is the answer to the question that is every human life."

[A tip of the hat to Ed Echeverria: gratia tibi!]

Advice for your bishop

In an article entitled "Helpful Hints for the Household of Faith," John W. Blewett recently observed:

Of the 65 million Catholics in the United States, seeminly the only ones who do not realize that the Catholic hierarchy in our country is in major trouble are the American bishops themselves. In the midst of ever-expanding sexual scandals, the relentless proliferation of the taking of innocent human lives through abortion and abortifacient contraception, and a crisis of ignorance and misunderstanding of Catholic teachings among the Faithful, the shepherds of the Catholic Church in America are conducting their affairs as though all is well, excepting a few problems which can be corrected with appropriate committee study and recommendations.

Consider the Novermber 2004 meeting of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), the pemirf "good ol' boys club" and model of oppressive bureaucratic government. The bishops' first aganda item was to elect a liberal bishop as president of the Conference to succeed another liberal bishop, who is presumably being rewarded for his service to the USCCB with his appointment as Archbishop of one of America's larger archdioceses....

The next order of business for the bishops following the election was to approve their massive 2005 budget. Perhaps the only thing more mystifying than the misplaced priorities of the bishops is the willingness of Catholics in America to financially support the agenda of the USCCB....

In the November 2004 meeting no resolution was reached on how bishops should deal with Catholic public officials whose policies contradict Catholic teachings on fundamental issues such as abortion. There was a discussion about joining a new ecumenical association, Christian Churches Together in the USA .... Nor was there any reported discussion of the diabolical sex education programs promoted by many bishops, the closing of churches and schools against the wills of the parishioners and the glaring problem of homosexuality among hierarcy, priests and seminarians. To summarize, the bishops do not seem to realize that they have lost their moral authority and credibility.... Their agenda is superficial and does not address the real problems that confront them and their charges. They thrive in the anonymity of the faceless bureaucracy and they build their own structures to prevent interference or communication with the laity and the clergy. Their mishandling of the sexual abuse scandals is a scandal in itself.

Without making light of the scandals occurring in the American Catholic Church, it is important to remember that the bishops are, like ourselves, all-too-human. More than anything else, perhaps, what they may really need, suggested Blewett, is to simplify their lives, to return to the basics that are fundamental to their appointment as successors to the apostles--namely, to teach, to govern, and to sanctify. On this note, Blewett offered a number of suggestions in the form of advice for his readers to pass on to their bishops. Some of them were:

1. Drop your membership in the USCCB [United States Converence of Catholic Bishops] and in your Country Club. You will imeediately find more time for prayer, spiritual reading and correspondence with orthodox, grass-roots Catholics who support you and respect your office.... Your diocesan bureaucracy will also shrink, when interfacing with USCCB bureaucrats and their committees is no longer necessary....

5. Throw out every sex education program in your diocese and disband the offices of Peace and Justice and Liturgy. If you're not connected with the USCCB, you won't need them anyway. Review your Religious Education programs and eliminate any heresy, dissidence or ambiguity contained therein, and fire the Director if he or she disagrees with you.

6. Go to confession once a week for a few months to different parish priests in your diocese. It will reinforce your role as servant of the humblest and you will soon know if this Sacrament is allive and well in your diocese. Spend some time with your priests and hear their concerns; they welcome sound counsel.

7. Ask your priests, religious and laity in your diocese to pray for you. You deserve their prayers and they deserve yours. Christ placed you in your position and the grace of office is yours for the asking.

[John W. Blewett is Managing Editor of The Latin Mass magazine. His article, "Helpful Hints for the Household of Faith." appeared in Spring, 2005 issue of The Latin Mass magazine, pp. 62-63.]

Jim Caviezel: "Shamelessly proclaim Christ!"

Jim Caviezel, who played Jesus in Mel Gibson's film, The Passion of the Christ, recently addressed the academic community at Thomas Aquinas College on his experiences in making The Passion. He was introduced to the audience by President Thomas Dillon with these words:

It is not often that we have reason to welcome a Hollywood celebrity to our campus. But today we are honored to have with us a man who in his acting career is known for his uncompromising witness to the Faith."

Caviezel began his talk by talking in a surprisingly hushed voice about how, during the filming of the movie, he stuggled to pick up the cross day after day, of how it "felt like it was a penance," of how it ripped his flesh. He spoke of the five weeks spent filming the crucifixion scene. The hours upon hours of hanging on the cross--in cold, rain, wind, and even lightening--gave him a special vantage point from which to ponder the prophet's description of the crucified Christ as "rejected and alone." It humbled him, he said.

Acknowledging the profound effect the film has had on audiences, Caviezel also revealed the seriousness with which he undertook his own role as Jesus [pictured in The Passion, right]. "Anything good you saw in the movie was the fasting, the prayer and the daily Masses," he said. "That was me simply as an instrument."

Caviezel also recounted his own journey of faith, one in which Our Lady and her Rosary played a central role. It was here that his pace quickened, and his voice began to take on a commanding tone. "A woman is calling us back to her Son," he said. We are being asked "to pray, to fast and to recite the Holy Rosary."

With mounting passion, he decried the pervasive corruption of our time, insisting that "only the faith and wisdom of the Church can save us." He exhorted his listeners to "pray for our bishops and our priests that they will preach an unpopular Gospel in season and out of season."

In a conclusion that mounted to a crescendo, Caviezel ralleyed the Thomas Aquinas College community with these words:

I see before me an army .... With Mary as your shield and Christ as your sword, have the courage to step into this pagan world and shamelessly proclaim Christ!"

Reflecting on Caviezel's visit, Dean Michael McLean stated: "Clearly, Mr. Caviezel's frequent reception of the sacraments and his devotion to Our Lady graced his work in The Passion of the Christ. It was an honor to have him visit the College and an inspiration for our students."

[Source: Thomas Aquinas College Newsletter (Winter 2005), p. 9.]

Protecting the Lavender Mafia?

by Ken Skuba
One of the requirements of teaching CCD in the Diocese of Scranton is attendance at a diocesan-sponsored training course on sexual abuse. So in November I attended one and watched the video Protecting God's Children at the local Catholic school.

Protecting God's Children, produced by The National Catholic Risk Retention Group, Inc., achieves its main objective: raising the awareness of diocesan volunteers and employees about the widespread problem of sexual abuse of minors in our society. What troubles me, though, about Protecting God's Children is that it misses the mark by diverting attention away from the root cause of the clergy sex abuse scandal, which was the catalyst for this course in the first place.

Arguably, the intention of the training course is not to find the exact coordinates of the scandal's epicenter, but rather to give Church workers a set of tools to identify and prevent sexual predators from causing harm to children. I think the course does this. However effective the course might be, I would argue that Protecting God's Children will fail to stop clergy sexual abuse. In order to solve a problem, one must understand its root cause. Knowing the root cause, one can then take corrective action that goes to the root of the problem. The best approach to problem-resolution is usually the most direct approach, the one that aims at the target and hits it. Using a hunting analogy, if I am hunting for a spring gobbler, I would not take aim at a hen. As I sat through the two-hour training course that night, I could not help thinking that the Church had shot the hen.

What is the root cause of the clergy sexual abuse scandal? Reading Michael Rose's Goodbye Good Men reinforced my growing realization about the nature of clergy sexual abuse: It was the work of homosexual predators in the priesthood. Were there cases of priests molesting girls? Yes. Were there cases of lay employees molesting young people? Yes. But the reason some 50 Church workers in my Diocese were attending a training course that night was because of homosexual priests.

As I watched the video recounting the stories of four abuse victims (two girls and two boys), I recalled one glaring statistic from the John Jay study, provided for the Church: 81 percent. Eighty-one percent of the victims in the Church's sexual abuse scandal were boys molested or raped by clergy. The following is a quote from the National Review Board's report onh the crisis: "That 81 percent of the reported victims of child sexual abuse by Catholic clergy were boys shows that the crisis wa characterized by homosexual behavior."

Of the four victims interviewed in the video, only one was abused by a priest, and the victim was a girl. It was not at all representative of the overwhelming majority of cases of clergy sexual abuse, which involved priests preying on boys. The two male victims interviewed were molested by men who were not priests. The other female victim was abused by a female teacher.

The problem with Protecting God's Children is that zero percent of the abuse cases it portrays were representative of the scandal in the Church. Each one missed the target. Given that 81 percent of the victims were male, the video presentation we saw that night gave an entirely different impression of the crisis. I thought I should be looking over my shoulder at the dad sitting next to me or the old woman in the back for the tell-tale signs of a sexual offender, instead of focusing on what went overwhelmingly wrong in our Church and how to prevent its recurrence. The more I reflected on the video, the more I believed it was part of a great big charade by the bishops to divert attention away from the real crisis. That is a conclusion I still don't want to believe.

I have read recently that as many as 30 to 50 percent of priests in service today are homosexuals. I have also read estimates as low as two percent and as high as 70 percent. A close friend of mine, an ex-seminarian, says that based on his recent seminary experience, he believes the actual figure is closer to 50 percent. My friend says the solution to the problem of sexual abuse by homosexual priests is not to admit or ordain homosexuals. He says the homosexual subculture at the seminaries he attends is cause for continued concern about the future of the Church in America.

To stop clerical sexual abuse of the kind documented in the John Jay study, we need to stop ordaining homosexuals to the priesthood. There needs to be a massive overhaul of the seminaries in our country. We should train admissions staff to weed out candidates to the priesthood who are attracted to other men. It's crazy to put men with same-sex attractions into an all-male environment. It doesn't get any simpler than that.

A short time ago, another friend of mine called me, alarmed at something he had read. He read that inside the U.S. Catholic hierarchy there are a number of bishops, and chancery and seminary oficials, who were referred to as the "Lavender Mafia" because of their homosexual lifestyles, their tight control over vocations, and the power they wield in the American Church. The term "Lavender Mafia" was not new to me, but I was shocked that this well-read, orthodox friend of mine had only recently stumbled over the term. It just does to show that Catholics are not as well informed as they ought to be about the problems in the Church. Films such as Protecting God's Children, which is being implemented by a number of bishops, presents a grossly skewed picture of the crisis and serves to indulge our ignorance.

The problem is largely with the episcopacy. Some of our bishops seems to have purposely or naively concealed the homosexual crisis in the Church. Others are in denial.

Since returning to the Church eight years ago, I ahve struggled to learn the Faith. I've had no formal training in theology. Yet I am able to clearly see the root cause of the Church sexual abuse scandal--and many of our bishops cannot. There seems to be an ingrained institutional blindness in the hierarchy, perhaps a willful blindness. Where is the love of God and the Church? Are these bishops so immobilized by fear that they just sin on their hands in the chancery offices waiting for a cultural shift? Don't they know they are the ones who must create the shift? I give credit to our local ordinary, the Most Reverend Joseph F. Martino. His recent pastoral letter on chastity is a great piece of work and is evidence of the small but growing number of bishops who exhibit the courage to take on the sexual revolution.

As for the rest of them, the Church needs to find a way to send them into early retirement.

[Ken Skuba and his wife, Susan, and their five children reside in Sugarloaf, Pennsylvania. This article was originally published as a Guest Column in NEW OXFORD REVIEW (April 2005), pp. 45-47. Reprinted with permission from NEW OXFORD REVIEW, 1069 Kains Ave., Berkeley CA 94706, U.S.A.]

No salvation outside the Church?

John Hick claims that "very few Catholics would dream of affirming this today (the doctrine of extra ecclesiam nulla salus, or no salvation outside the Church), and most who are asked about it only find it embarassing." I say it depends on which Catholics you ask, those informed by liberal telenewsmagspeak, or those informed by an understanding of Catholic teaching. Read more.

Vatican fires warning shot across Jesuits' bow

The scuttlebut says that the Vatican has just fired a warning shot across the Jesuits' bow. Under pressure from the CDF (Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith), Thomas J. Reese, S.J., Editor in Chief of the Jesuit English language publication, America magazine, has apparently just been asked to step down. The magazine has long been under pressure from the Vatican for it's regular publication of articles attacking Vatican policy and Church teaching on controversial issues. You may expect to see the usual hue and cry in the pages of the National (Anti-)Catholic Reporter about "repression" and "Inquisition." Others will welcome voices that call a spade a spade, insisting that those who call themselves Catholic should be Catholic, and that those who call themselves Jesuits should write and behave like Jesuits. Partisans of the contemporary dictatorship of relativism won't understand why words and names ought to have any sort of stability as to essential meaning. In far away China, Confucius clearly understood this, as witnessed by his great principle of the Rectification of Names, according to which language must be used "in accordance with the truth of things," and names ought to be "spoken appropriately." In other words, if a journal or a religious order claims to be Jesuit, it ought to adhere to the values and mission of order's founder. And everyone knows that St. Ignatius Loyola [pictured right], the founder of the Society of Jesus, was anything but a insubordinate dissident, rankled by the authority of Rome. Freedom of thought and expression is not compromised by the demand for intellectual and moral integrity, which insists that those who represent themselves as Catholic should submit to the obedience expected of all Catholics, which is nothing less that a submission to truth. "The truth shall set you free," said Jesus. Intellectual slaves subject to the dictatorship of relativism, of course, cannot be expected to understand such freedom, which they will invariably construe as mindless servitude. How little they see or understand.

Luther: "Every man is born with a Pope in his belly"

In an article entitled "Do you have a Pope in your belly?" Al Kimel (Pontifications, May 6, 2005) offers a thoughtful and incisive review of liberal Catholic dissent against Church teaching and Papal authority. He analyzes responses to Pope John Paul II's Apostolic Letter, Ordinatio Sacerdotalis ("On Reserving Priestly Ordination to Men Alone"), noting that the wording would seem to remove all doubt that this is a closed case, Roma locuta est, causa finita est:

Wherefore, in order that all doubt may be removed regarding a matter of great importance, a matter which pertains to the Church's divine constitution itself, in virtue of my ministry of confirming the brethren (cf. Lk 22:32) I declare that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church's faithful.

He reviews the manner in which dissidents, despite the Responsum Ad Dubium issued by the CDF stating that Ordinatio Sacerdotalis was indeed infallible, have still pushed for women's ordination, responding to Rome by parcing the "level of infallibility" involved in such a declaration, qualifying to death the Pope's authority. The attitude is aptly summarized by Kimel thus: "How little can I get away with believing and still be considered a card-carrying Christian?"--an attitude he aptly says might well be described as "the liberal Protestant disease." Never mind that it has infected a huge party of Catholics who want to be, as they put it, "more Catholic and less Roman"--which translates: "Ecclesia? Mater, si; Magistra, no!" or "We are the world, Rome; so get off our backs!" Kimel takes issue with "Progressive Catholic," a blogger whose recent offerings include "Is the Ordinary and Universal Magisterium Infallible?" and "Truth, Certainty, Infallibility, and Dissent." He revisits the 1870 declaration of Papal Infallibility and the frequent and misleading dissident cavil that the only doctrines that have been defined infallibly are the doctrines of Papal Infallibility and the Assumption of Mary. He cites Newman's views on the question. He takes on Charlie Curran's self-styled heroic dissent against the Roman Inquisition in his essay "A Place for Dissent."

By the way, on the question of the ordination of women, the best rebuttal and overall popular treatment of this issue, in my opinion, is still Peter Kreeft's essay, "Gender and the Will of God: The Issue of Priestesses is Ultimately an Issue of God." It will rankle, it will provoke, it will offend, but it will also draw a line in the sand that will difinitively clarify the sides on which the opponents stand on this issue. I highly recommend it.

In all of this, I'm reminded of what Fr. Augustin DiNoia once said in response to a question concerning infallibility following one of his presentations at the Aquinas-Luther Conference at Lenoir-Rhyne College. After some give and take on the question, which took that all-too-inevitable turn towards qualifying to death the "infallible" status of the doctrine, DiNoia responded: "Who cares if it's infallible; the question is whether it's true!" The question of infallibility, after all, is ultimately a question of authority, calling for faith that God's providence will prevent the Church from falling into error. A prior question, one that cannot be answered definitively without faith but which is open also to the dialectic of empirical testing, is whether what the Church has taught throughout her history is true and, concomitantly, whether her teaching record bears witness, at least circumstantially, to her claim of infallible divine guidance.

"The Reform of the Reform" has already begun ...

As Sandro Magister observes, "The 'Reform of the Reform' Has Already Begun" (Roma, May 5, 2005, www.chiesa). His first acts as pontiff--from his words to the cardinals in the Sistine Chapel to the carefully chosen symbolism of his inauguration Mass--make clear the intended direction of Pope Benedict XVI's pontificate.

He describes the Eucharist as "the permanent center and source of the Petrine ministry that has been entrusted to me." This from a pope who, as Cardinal, addressed the problems of the context of the Eucharist as it is celebrated all-too-often in contemporary Masses: "How often do we celebrate only ourselves, without even realizing that He is there!" "He," of course, refers to Jesus Christ crucified and risen, the overlooked Person in so many new liturgies, which have become "meaningless dances around the golden calf that is ourselves." His Holiness will take the reform of the liturgical reform seriously, if his writings are any indication. His remarks addressing the issue in Alcuin Reid's recent anthology, Looking Again at the Question of the Liturgy With Cardinal Ratzinger: Proceedings of the July 2001 Fontgombault Liturgical Conference (St. Augustine Press, 2004), are but the most remarkable of his recent statements. His long friendship with his fellow Regensberger, the late Klaus Gamber, author of Reform of the Roman Liturgy: Its Problems and Background (reprinted by Roman Catholic Books, 2003), is well-known, as is his sympathy for traditionalists who would like to see a far broader and more generous implementation of Pope John Paul II's indult "Ecclesia Dei," granting permission for the continued celebration of the pre-Vatican II "Tridentine Mass," known for its dignity, reverence, and rich transcendent symbolism. [pictured right: Pope Benedict XVI celebrating a Tridentine Mass while still a cardinal--link]

Not only are the implications of Pope Benedict XVI's pontificate clear for the reform of the reform where liturgy is concerned. There is no doubt as to his intentions regarding the truth of the Gospel. Before being elected pope, he was probably best known to the wider world for his August 6, 2000 declaration, "Dominus Iesus: on the unicity and salvific universality of Jesus Christ and the Church." This declaration, which insisted on Jesus Christ and His Church as the sine qua non of salvation for all peoples, met with vociferous hostility from liberal Catholics and from the world at large. Sandro Magister observes:

Benedict XVI did not cite this explicitly during his first week as pope. But in the opening mass of his pontificate, on Sunday, April 24, he did in fact repeat with great emphasis the central doctrine of "Dominus Jesus." This doctrine is the nucleus of the faith of the New Testament.

In his homily, he said that his agenda is not "to pursue my own ideas, but to listen to the word and the will of the Lord, to be guided by Him."

No sooner said than done. The first reading of the mass was from the Acts of the Apostles, chapter 4, in which Peter says of Jesus:

"There is no salvation in anyone else, for there is no other name in the whole world given to men by which we are to be saved."

That same day, Sunday, April 24, in all the churches of the world the Gospel reading was from the fourteenth chapter of John, in which Jesus says of himself:

"I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me."

When Benedict XVI says that his agenda is not "to pursue my own ideas, but to listen to the word and the will of the Lord, to be guided by Him," I have no doubt he is being utterly truthful and sincere. But nobody should expect this to mean he has any intention of compromising his commitment to the Lord Jesus and His Church. This commitment is the passion that has animated his entire life.

(Gratia tibi, Benjamin, Ad Limina Apostolorum, May 2, 2005)

The Vicar of Heterodoxy

Andrew Sullivan's dogma is a circular system that's immune to reasoned query

Note: In the May 2, 2005 issue of Time magazine, Andrew Sullivan published an article entitled "The Vicar of Orthodoxy: The Pope's dogma is a circular system that's immune to reasoned query" (also published in the Time online edition in the foregoing link). The following is a parody and a critique.]

He is an intellectual opposed to questioning the intellectual assumptions of that parish magazine of affluent and self-congratulatory liberal enlightenment, the New York Times. He is a critic with scant experience in critically reflecting on his own presuppositions. He is a product of post-Vatican II Catholicism, deeply opposed to the Catholicism of Vatican II. In these seeming contradictions, you can begin to see the contours of one of the most predictable and ordinary, moderately well-educated, liberal, self-styled gay Catholic men to become a journalist and a critic.

For the young Andrew Sullivan, struggling out of the spiritual abyss of England in the 1970s, acting provided a guiding light. At Harvard, he was best known for his acting, he once wrote, "appearing as Hamlet, Alan in Peter Shaffer's 'Equus,' and Mozart in Shaffer's 'Amadeus.'" In the summer of 1985, he travelled through thirty of the United States. While he also devoted himself to political science, finishing his doctorate at Harvard in 1987, and to writing for various journals, in the early 1990s Sullivan tested positive for HIV and became known for being openly homosexual and for pioneering such issues as same-sex marriage. His 1993 essay, "The Politics of Homosexuality," was credited by the Nation magazine as the most influential article of the last decade in gay rights. His 1995 book, Virtually Normal: An Argument About Homosexuality, was greeted with positive reviews and became one of the best-selling books on gay rights. Sullivan grieves that the Church has not kept pace with the times, especially on sexual morality. "Does this mean that the Church should take a poll on its doctrines, or change its rules on celibacy or sex overnight? Of course not," he writes. "Obedience matters. But real obedience requires respect; and until the hierarchy listens ... obedience will be difficult, if not indefensible." Obedience, thus, dies the death of a thousand qualifications.

For Sullivan, faith is an acquisition, not a gift. In Christianity, humankind comes to itself not through what it accepts, but through what it does. The Christian identity is not simply received and passed down through tradition, but appopriated, throught through, and re-made by each generation. It is constituted and revisioned through "dialogue." Because it is not simply received, it can be altered. Failing to bring its sexual teachings in line with contemporary society, Sullivan suggests, may well imperil the Church's future. "This crisis is all the more appalling because it rests on differences about doctrines that are not central to the faith," he writes. None of these sorts of things--contraception, masturbation, homosexuality--he suggests, are part of a fixed revelation that has been consigned to us, which we have no right to reconstruct as we choose.

Alas, the Gospels do not tell us everything, he says. Jesus never mentions, say, abortion, homosexuality, or celibacy. Well, but of course St. Paul and early Church tradition do. But what if they didn't? Neither do they mention cannibalism, pedophilia, or torture. How do we know what is "revealed" about them? According to Sullivan, only "dialogue" with contemporary culture can decide that, a dialogue in which those like Sullivan have the last say as to what does or does not constitute the "essentials" of Christian doctrine. "Those who say the church can never change are simply wrong," writes Sullivan. "It has always been pragmatic about the nonessentials, accommodating itself to new cultures ... and to social change." Because truths concerning cannibalism, pedophilia or torture--like those concerning abortion, homosexuality, or celibacy--are not simply received from God and therefore nonnegotiable, we are free to follow our consciences with respect to them. Imagine ... Cannibalism in the privacy of your own home ... Who could possibly object as long as it was consensual? Faith, according to Sullivan, comes not from simply regurgitating what has been heard, but from reflecting upon it (as in philosophy) and dialoguing about it (as in politics). No wonder Sullivan, in his role as journalist and critic, has been so willing to criticize the guardians of the Church's Faith who have been so benightedly ignorant as to defend her unrevised traditions.

Sullivan has thus been emboldened to make several claims. Take the question of women's role in the Church. Their inclusion in the ranks of the ordained priesthood, he suggests, is within our power to change, under properly enlightened leadership. Never mind that in making this claim, Sullivan is claiming more authority than the Catholic Church has ever claimed for herself: the authority to change doctrine. The Catholic Church did not invent the priesthood. God did. The Catholic Church claims less authority than any other Christian church in the world; which is why she is so conservative. Protestant churches feel free to change the "deposit of faith" (e.g., by denying Mary's assumption, though this was passed down from the beginning) or morals (e.g., by allowing divorce and remarriage, though Christ forbade it). Sullivan claims authority that Pope John Paul II explicitly denied having himself in his Apostolic Letter On Reserving Priestly Ordination to Men Alone (Ordinatio Sacerdotalis) when he declared "that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women." Further, if Sullivan claims these things are not matters of faith and morals, but merely "inessentials," he is still claiming more authority than the Church by assuming the competence to judge what is matter of sacred tradition.

Women in society? The Church approved vocations of motherhood and virginity, says Sullivan, imply that a woman is less of a woman if she is a scientist of Prime Minister. Says who? What is there to prevent a mother or virgin from becoming a scientist or journalist or Prime Minister? Nothing. "What happens when nature suggests that some women are not cut out for motherhood or virginity?" asks Sullivan. But this is a red herring. When has the Church ever forced a woman into motherhood or virginity any more than it has forced any man into celibacy? A man is free to forgo celibacy by forgoing the priesthood, as a woman is free to forgo motherhood by not marrying. What Sullivan wants is a pretext for bending the Church's laws on the hot pelvic issues. An analogy: What happens when nature suggests that some men are not "cut out" for abstinence from violence or alcohol? Does this give license to assult and battery, rape and drunkenness? Whatever happened to self-control and self-mastery?

The chief obsession animating Sullivan's protest and dissent clearly surface when he asks: "What if biology gives us, say, a child with indeterminate gender or a transgendered person or a homosexual?" From the Church's viewpoint, nature has somehow gone awry in such cases, he suggests. People may be born with homosexual inclinations, the Church admits. But such inclinations are "objectively disordered" and directed towards "intrinsic moral evil." Sullivan finds this judgment intolerable: "A whole class of human beings naturally more disposed to evil than others? Don't ask the obvious questions. Just accept the answers. And if the result is enourmous human suffering, as women and gays labor under discrimination, condescension and prejudice? Suffering brings them closer to Christ." But what are the "obvious questions" here? Let's be realistic. If I am naturally disposed to migraine headaches, am I not more disposed to evil than those who aren't? Or if I am naturally disposed toward violent outbursts of rage, am I not more disposed to evil than those who aren't? Does this cause suffering? You can bet your sweet petooties. Who in their right minds would not admit that such dispositions would be an unwelcome cross to bear, even like St. Paul's "thorn in the flesh," which God did not remove from him despite his petitions. Whoever said life would be fair? Some get all the brains, good looks, good connections, and good luck, it seems; and others seem perpetually flat out of luck, not to mention the rest. So what to do: bend the Church's laws to allow for everyone's natural dispositions? So we can give those disposed to alchoholism, predatory homosexual activity, rape, pedophilia, and wife-battery reason to feel greater self-esteem? So the Church can offer forgiveness in God's name without repentance?

Reading Sullivan for a struggling straight, nonrevisionist Catholic like me is like reading a completely circular, self-enclosed system that is as intellectual at times as it is maddeningly immune to reasoned query. The dogmatism is flat-out astonishing. If you find yourself ill-disposed to accept a Church teaching, label your behavior a matter of "conscience," then it's no longer a sin. And if all this circular dogmatism permits you to remain "Catholic" without being Catholic, then so much the better for you. Syllivan once wrote: "Perhaps what American lay Catholics need to say more clearly is that the aim of our desire to change the church is not to undermine but to save it. We love our faith .... [Whatever happened to "He who loves me will keep my commandments"?] But what we have witnessed means we would be delinquent if we didn't fight for real change. We are actually being more faithful than those who want to perpetuate the conditions for further decline." That is his vision. If the Church withers to a mere shadow of its former self, it will not be because she has strayed from the apostolic deposit of faith, be because she lost touch with the 21st century and failed to accommodate herself to people where they find themselves--with their desires for recreational sex, homosexual liaisons, pedophilia, and other addictive disorders. Sullivan quotes Pope John Paul II, intending to transpose his sentiments into a context where he might make use of them:

"Be not afraid," the current Pope said in his book Crossing the Threshold of Hope. "Of what should we not be afraid? We should not fear the truth about ourselves."

And what is this truth about ourselves? Not that we are acceptable just as we are--as unrepentant promiscuous, lustful sinners, as Sullivan seems to think. But precisely this: that we are sinners who do not want to change. Rather, we're inclined to want a Church magnanimous enough to accept us on our own terms without demanding the repentance of changed lives. Regardless of how long Pope Benedict XVI's pontificate is, Sullivan might just manage to get what he wants, but only at the cost of a schismatic AmChurch separated from Rome.

[Note: The foregoing is based on Andrew Sullivan's article, "The Vicar of Orthodoxy: The Pope's dogma is a circular system that's immune to reasoned query" Time online edition (also published in Time Magazine, May 2, 2005, p. 49). All quotations from Sullivan, as well as representations of his views, are taken from this article, as well as from various essays posted on his weblog at www.andrewsullivan.com.]

Recommended reading:

• Al Kimel, "The Apoplectic Andrew Sullivan" (Pontifications)
• Paul Likoudis, Amchurch Comes Out: The U.S. Bishops, Pedophile Scandals and the Homosexual Agenda (2002).

Laura Bush's bawdy humor creates hysteria

Should Laura Bush appear on Saturday Night Live? Check this out.

Pope Benedict's favorite beer

It would warm a German's heart: the Pope's favorite beer, apparently, is Franziskaner Weissbeer, a wheat beer brewed under the Franciscan label. He also likes an occasional glass of excellent wine from the Piedmont, says Manuela Macher co-owner of the Cantina Tirolese, a Bavarian restaurant near the Vatican where Pope Benedict XVI, before he was elected Pope, was a regular. Source: Franziskaner website; (gratia tibi, Christopher)

On the red herring that the Pope obstructed investigation into the sex scandal

"Jimmy Akin takes apart the liberal media's smear of Pope Benedict XVI and his alleged attempt to obstruct justice by reminding the bishops that internal church investigations of sex abuse allegations must be carried out in secret." Find Akin's analysis on his weblog, JimmyAkin.org, "Observe This," April 29, 2005. (Gratia tibi, St. Polycarp)

Why Pope Benedict XVI is not wrong about relativism

In an article entitled "WHY POPE BENEDICT XVI IS WRONG ABOUT RELATIVISM," published Friday (April 29, 2005) in NigeriaWorld.Com, Okezie Chukwumerije takes issue with a scathing attack on relativism made by Josef Cardinal Ratzinger in his homily during a Mass on April 18, before being elected Pope Benedict XVI. Chukwumeriji notes that Cardinal Ratzinger, in his homily before the conclave, was stating his views on the most important issues facing the Church "and trying to concentrate the minds of the cardinals on the kind of person that would address these issues as leader of the Catholic Church."

Chukwumerije then goes on to argue that Cardinal Ratzinger grossly misjudged the greatest threats faced by the Church:

People without food on their table, those inflicted with AIDS but who do not have the medicine with which to fight the disease, those who are unable to provide a decent quality of life for their children, do not sit and worry about the "dictatorship of relativism." ... If these indigent people in developing countries (a part of the world where there has been the largest increase of membership in the Catholic Church) were able to listen to the Pope's homily and understand it, they would probably have wondered why relativism trumped hunger, poverty and AIDS. Or, to put it differently, they would have wondered why the philosophical concerns of Westerners trump the practical problems of Catholics in the developing world.

Now I do not wish to dispute that the problems Chukwumeriji mentions are important. In fact, when all is said and done, the greatest social service organization in the world--clothing the naked and feeding the poor--is probably the Catholic Church. Certainly much larger than the United Nations. So there is no question these issues are important, and Chukwumeriji's article is a thoughtful and sensitive one, particularly in this respect.

What I do want to take issue with, however, is the way he procedes to politicize the debate over relativism. Ratzinger had noted that having a clear faith based on the Creed of the Church is often labeled "fundamentalism" today, whereas "relativism" is celebrated as a progressive outlook toward the modern or postmodern world. Chukwumeriji picks up on the reference to "fundamentalism" to play to its associations with repressive regimes of "Islamic fundamentalism" in the popular mind and public media. Fundamentalism is also associated, of course, with moral absolutism. He writes:

The danger with moral absolutism, however, is that if one truly believes in the absolute truth of moral propositions contained in religious texts, there is less incentive to negotiate with others about whether these propositions should be enforced by law. If I believe that abortion is evil because I believe the Bible says so, and I believe the bible is the absolute truth, and I believe that those who hold different positions on the issue are demonstrably wrong, there is limited space for me to engage in a public dialogue and negotiation about how society should deal with the issue of abortion. I have the truth. You don't. So shut up, listen to me, and do as I say.

By contrast, in Chukwumeriji's view, moral relativism looks positively enlightened:

Whatever one may think of the philosophical validity of moral relativism, there is no denying the fact that it promotes a healthy skepticism of the way society makes decisions about its values, especially of those decisions that involve choosing which values to enforce through the use of the police powers of the state. For example, a relativist may be reluctant to enact a particular religious tenet into law without first evaluating the tenet in the light of the broader goals of the particular society. Since the relativist does not accept religious tenets as absolute moral propositions, he would have to dig deeper, not rely merely on faith, as justification for the enactment of the tenet into law.

There are at least several serious problems with this reasoning, however well-intended as it may be. First, it confuses a debate about the existence of universal absolutes (truth, right and wrong, etc.) with a debate about how repressive political regimes are. It turns a discussion about the former into a discussion about the latter, which is something else. "Absolutism" is lifted out of its philosophical context and placed in a politically charged context where it means something utterly different, having historical associations with the Divine Right of Kings, Absolute Monarchy, "Islamic fundamentalism," Nazis and other repressive dictatorships, etc. By the same token, "relativism" is transposed into a political context where it is associated with multicultural tolerance, progressivism, liberalism, etc.

Second, when Chukwumerije suggests, in effect, that the relativist would be politically less repressive, more tolerant, and more just than the absolutist, he is making two indefensible assumptions. First, by assuming that less repression, more tolerance, and more justice are objective, real goods, he is assuming something that relativism has no right to assume: the existence of universal absolutes--like justice. This shows, in effect, that if one wants a basis for condemning injustice, repression, and for supporting compassionate outreach to AIDS victiums, the poor and the starving, only moral absolutism can provide that basis. Relativism cannot. Second, he is also assuming the indefensible premise that political repression always presupposes moral and religious absolutism, and that political liberality presupposes moral relativism. While it takes no genious to find historical examples of absolutists who have been repressive, the question is whether such repression is a function of their absolutist principles or a hypocritical lapse that can be credited to human greed and sin. There is no question that religious and moral absolutes also provide the basis for condemning such hyocritical repression, greed and sin. On the other hand, can Chukwumerije or anyone provide even one example of a saintly individual or a just society whose saintliness and justice is founded on moral relativism? Clearly not. Some absolutists have been sinners; but no saints have ever been relativists. Yet if one can find examples of sinful absolutists, one can much more easily find examples of notorious sinners who excuse their sin on the basis of moral relativism, or repressive political regimes that have do so. Witness Benito Mussolini [see photo, left, in which Mussolini is pictured to the left of Adolf Hitler]. Significantly, Mussolini wrote:

Everything I have said and none in these last years is relativism by intuition.... If relativism signifies contempt for fixed categories and men who claim to be the bearers of an objective, immortal truth ... then there is nothing more relativistic than fascistic attitudes and activity.... From the fact that all ideologies are of equal value, that all ideologies are mere fictions, the modern relativist infers that everybody has the right to create for himself his own ideology and to attempt to enforce it with all the energy of which he is capable. (Diuturna, pp. 374-377; quoted by Peter Kreeft in A Refutation of Moral Relativism)

Third, Chukwumerije assumes that the most important thing in life is material welfare. In assuming this, he joins ranks with the bourgeois capitalist consumers in the United States and the First World who care about nothing more than their own personal peace, affluence, and wellbeing. Ironically, Capitalism and Marxism share this assumption. The Capitalist wants to grow his own piece of the material pie bigger. The Marxist wants to grow the whole pie of the state bigger. But in both cases, the name of the game is getting more of the material pie. But the Catholic Church, while solicitous of the material welfare of the poor and repressed, also warns of the dangers of material wealth. Wealth can turn people away from God and from one another, so that their hearts turn in upon themselves (in curvatus in se) and they begin to look more like Gollum in Tolkien's Lord of the Rings than like healthy human beings. It is instructive that the third of the Joyful Mysteries of the Rosary, according to the prayers of St. Louis de Montfort, petition the Lord for a "detachment from the things of the world, a love of poverty, and a love for the poor." This is not because poverty is something good in itself, but because wealth can corrupt the heart. The love of money, said Jesus, is the root of all evil.

Chukwumerije notes that very few people are moral relativists in the strict sense of denying the existence of any absolutes. This is certanly true. It's simply impossible to live as a strict relativist. Hence, even the most vociferous opponent of moral absolutism ends up only practicing a kind of selective relativism. The moment self-styled "relativists" feel victimized by some injustice or another, they will be appealing to the (objective, absolute, universal) value of things like justice, fairness, toleration, etc. (See in this connection J. Budziszewski's lucid, common sensical defense of natural law, i.e., what people can't help knowning about right and wrong just by virtue of being human beings, in his What We Can't Not Know

Chukwumerijie also notes that moral pluralism, the view that different moral theories capture parts of the truth about moral life, has more adherents than does moral relativism. This is also likely true. But moral pluralism effectively reduces to a species of moral relativism and to its native skepticism, which proclaims that nobody can really know what's right or wrong. The irony here, of course, is that the single greatest obstacle to the kind of relief for AIDS victims, the poor, and oppressed that Chukwumerije desires is very likely the relativistic and skeptical outlook which saps conviction and undermines charity and feeds self-indulgent hedonism. Ratzinger was right about relativism. (Gratia tibi, Stephen Starr)