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Books
Smart Rebel
John B. Breslin
With his latest novel Roddy Doyle the laureate of Dublin rsquo s present quot lower middle classes quot moves down the social ladder a notch or two and a century back in time His sympathy remains however clearly with the proles and in Henry Smart he has found his ideal protagoniststreet-sma
The Word
A Wedding Invitation: Please Respond!
John R. Donahue
Late February with Lent around the corner is not a time when we ordinarily think of weddings yet nuptial imagery sets the tone for the liturgy In the first reading the eighth-century prophet Hosea enacts in his life God rsquo s enduring love for a people that has turned away to worship Canaanit
Editorials
Survey From a Mountaintop
The Editors
President Clinton’s State of the Union address on Jan. 27 left Republicans and Democrats in agreement on at least two points: The speech was very long, and its delivery was a great performance. It was bound to be a long speech, because in pursuit of his two main purposes Mr. Clinton had a lot
Globalization: Myth, Reality, Problems
Victor Ferkiss
The demonstrationunprecedented since the Vietnam war erathat convulsed normally laid-back Seattle late last fall had two results. It brought the work of the World Trade Organization to a halt, and it reintroduced the issue of globalization to the American political scene. Labor had unsuccessfully fo
Letters
Letters
Our readers
Gospel FirstThe theological education issue (1/29) contributed many good points for reflection. But there is a troubling undercurrent here that occurs also in other literature, as well as in comments from pulpit and chancery. It is a shift from the Ascension commission to proclaim the Good News to p
Television
A Wasteland Less Vast
James Martin, S.J.
Not long ago I came across an article about one Mr. Newton Minow, the former chairman of the Federal Communications Commission who famously described television in the 1960’s as "a vast wasteland." Doubtless it would have surprised Mr. Minow that his phrase still sums up the current
Columns
Not Born to Do Evil
Robert Coles
'Even the monsters Hitler or Stalin are fallen sinners, and we cry and pray for them.' In recent months, while a war-time pontiff’s attitudes toward mid-century European totalitarianism became a subject of written discussion (as in Hitler’s Pope and the response to it by reviewer
Letters
Letters
Our readers

Journey of Conversion

Apologies for a tardy response to Tourist or Pilgrim? Rescuing the Jubilee, by Paul Robichaud, C.S.P (12/18/99); a prolonged absence and the Christmas festivities have me going through issues of America in random order.

Father Robichaud asks questions about this Jubilee Year’s visitors to Rome, observing that the notion of pilgrimage is lost under the weight of tourism. Along more than 400 miles of the Camino de Santiago in Spain in 1998, my companions and I often tried to answer similar questions: Who are the real pilgrims? and Is the pilgrimage in the journey or in the destination?

On the road, we walkers knew that we were real pilgrims, allowed that those on bicycles or horses probably were pilgrims, and questioned whether or not those in autos or buses could be included in the select group. We also distinguished between those who walked the road for spiritual reasons, and those hikers whose goals were only sportif. However, by the time we got to Santiago de Compostela, most of us felt that it was silly to categorize the crowd into pilgrims and non-pilgrims, or to try to judge the worth of the intentions that moved men and women to undertake the journey. All had come to Santiagothat was important. Why we had come to Santiago was also important, but only each person could experience how life-changing that might be. Santiago’s and Christ’s holy door is open to all: pilgrims, tourists, spiritual vagabonds; one never knows when the Spirit will illuminate those who pass through it.

Father Robichaud writes, The heart of the pilgrimage is conversion, not travel, for the journey is only the means to the end. My one-pilgrimage experience leads me to a different conclusion, echoed by my companions on the road. The day-by-day life of the journey blends with arrival at the destination into an experience that lives long after the pilgrim returns home. The pilgrimage is a journey of conversion that continues in the mind of the pilgrim and changes the way he or she lives his or her life.

So I say: Relax, Father Robichaud. Today’s visitors to Rome will get as much spiritual benefit as pilgrims ever did. Don’t look for signs. Many of those in the crowds will exemplify the saying, I departed as a tourist; I arrived as a pilgrim.

J. Richard Durnan, D.D.S.

Newport, R.I.

A Worthy Guide

Paul J. Caruso of Boston (Letters 1/15) lamented the fact that the excellent article by Paul Robichaud, C.S.P., (12/18/99) did not supply the titles of good texts on Rome and the topic of pilgrimage.

May I humbly recommend my recent publication, A Pilgrim’s Guide to Rome and the Holy Land for the Third Millennium (Thomas More Press)? It treats the topic of pilgrimage throughout church history and is meant as a spiritual guide for pilgrims. It’s not a guide for shopping, museums, eating and lodging, but rather a guide for those who want a retreat, and not just a tourist tour.

This book seeks to provide basic information and spiritual reflection that will help the pilgrim both to appreciate the places, art works and history, and to encounter God in the midst of them. In short, it is a guide to enable pilgrims to marvel and pray, to understand and worship, to perceive and praise.

Aurelie A. Hagstrom

University of St. Francis

Joliet, Ill.

A Post-Superbowl Reflection

Thomas McCarthy on American Sport is right (1/29). Professional sports are a huge waste of time. Sports fans will all say they watch sports for the enjoyment of it, but I wonder. A class polled at my local university reveals that most students are tense during football games, not relaxed, and many feel bummed out over the next several days and some up to a week if the game is close and the home team loses. If the fans enjoy watching so much, why do so many curse when something goes the wrong way?

I suggest another explanation. We might watch a live war on television, not because it is so enjoyable but because we believe it matters a great deal who wins and who loses. Similarly, by all appearances, sports fans also believe that it truly matters who wins the games and who loses. So we watch sports not because it is always so pleasant, but because we believe the outcome is of some importance. If sports fanatics

Of Many Things
Of Many Things
James Martin, S.J.
Heretical as it is for someone living in New York, I must confess: I almost never go to the theater. But before you peg me a hopeless philistine, I might explain that there are a number of, well, reasonable reasons for this. First of all, have you checked the price of a Broadway ticket lately? Not a
Columns
The Educated Dork
Terry Golway
William Bennett’s latest book, The Educated Child, earned a prominent place on my shelves the day I caught a glimpse of just how difficult it must be for people who wish to raise educated childrenindeed, how difficult it must be to wish to be an educated child. While making my occasional and u
Editorials
Seeking Peace in the Holy Land
The Editors
The last days of January have been turbulent ones in the Middle East. Even as Palestinian and Israeli diplomats have been engaged in secret talks near Jerusalem and while behind the scenes negotiations are continuing in advance of the resumption of bilateral talks between Israel and Syria, three Isr
Film
Dubious Talents: The Talented Mr. Ripley
Richard A. Blake
Good news for Matt Damon fans: They will hate Matt Damon in The Talented Mr. Ripley. My theory rests on the junior high school girls sitting behind me, who squirmed and chatted from prelude to coda. I harbored dark hopes that the popcorn they replenished every half hour would lodge under their retai
News
Signs of the Times
From AP, CNS, RNS, Staff and other sources
Pope Plans to Canonize Blessed Katharine DrexelPope John Paul II plans to canonize Blessed Katharine Drexel (1859-1955), the U.S. heiress who dedicated her life to defending and educating African Americans and Native Americans. During a meeting with the Congregation for Sainthood Causes on Jan. 27,
Books
Normative and Not
Lisa Sowle Cahill
Martha Nussbaum a philosopher and professor of law and ethics at the University of Chicago is a prolific and forceful writer with wide-ranging interests in the classics literature jurisprudence politics feminist theory economics and international development But her primary orientation is et
Books
Winners Behind the Wall
George M. Anderson
Doing Time 25 Years of Prison Writing is an anthology of short stories essays and poems written by incarcerated women and men over a 25-year period They were all prize winners in the yearly competition sponsored by the prison writing program of PEN Poets Playwrights Essayists Editors and Nove
Why I Shall Not Seek a Mandate
Richard P. McBrien
Soon after the U.S. Catholic bishops passed the revised version of the Application of Ex Corde Ecclesiae on Nov. 17, 1999, several newspapers, including The New York Times, phoned me for a reaction. In each instance, the reporter asked if I intended to request a mandate from the local bishop. I indi
Nazareth Journal
Drew Christiansen
The front-page photos were an editor's delight. In one, a man kissed the locked doors of the Holy Sepulchre. In another, a pilgrim knelt in prayer before them. In a third, an Austrian nun, excluded from the Basilica of the Nativity, wept in Bethlehem's Manger Square as Palestinian police loo
Politics & SocietyEditorials
Homeless and Hungry
The Editors
How can it be that in this time of unprecedented prosperity for many in the United States, between 600,000 and 700,000 Americans are homeless on any given night? And that requests for both emergency shelter and food are on the increase around the country? But in fact, the 1999 Status Report on Hunge
Theology for Teens
James J. DiGiacomo
Europeans tell the story of a young man who was disturbed by the antireligious skepticism prevalent at his university and decided to strike a blow for faith. One evening after classes, he went into the deserted lecture hall and in large letters wrote on the chalkboard: "JESUS CHRIST IS THE ANSW
The Word
Compassionate in Word and Deed
John R. Donahue
Very few topics occupy the American consciousness as much as health care and the onset of debilitating illness a concern of the readings for these Sundays The tone is set by Job rsquo s lament of endless suffering and sleepless nights The Gospels portray a Jesus who enters the world of the sick a