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Platform for Grace

As staff theologian for Cardinal Joseph Bernardin from 1985 until his death, I commend the editorial A Culture of Life (9/25) for reminding us once again of Cardinal Bernardin’s efforts with regard to a consistent ethic of life. In particular I applaud the observation that no one image or idea can bear the weight of the whole conversation. No one was more aware of this than the cardinal.

As regards images, for example, the cardinal spoke of his dying as his most important homily. The photos of the frail, dying cardinal anointing the sick, after having been anointed himself, and the stories of his ministry to fellow cancer patients evoked a sense of peace that only God could give and no homily could explain.

As regards ideas, the vocabulary of consistent ethic was complemented by other proposals such as the Common Ground Initiative. A church torn by acrimony could not be a credible witness or effective partner in public discourse about protecting and enhancing human dignity.

What held so much of this together was a hopefulness that was captured, in a small measure, in his pastoral on Catholic health care, A Sign of Hope, a hope sustained by the conviction that because of God’s love for us we can live with confidence in the midst of alienation and chaos. I would suggest that without hopefulness our attempts to explore symbols and stories, as you helpfully propose, will be less than effective. Bernardin’s hopefulness was quite personal: as inviting as his blue eyes and as robust as the operas he loved. But it also reflected his appropriation of the teaching of the Second Vatican Council, in particular the image of the church as leaven. Redemption was possible in a sinful world.

As this conciliar perspective is replaced by a profound pessimism about what some consider to be the moral bankruptcy of the United States and western Europe, Bernardin’s hopefulness is viewed as being outdated, if not dangerous. Without hopefulness, it is understandable that the complexity of a consistent ethic or the labors of Common Ground-type dialogue can seem to be a waste of time.

In a few weeks we will celebrate the ninth anniversary of Cardinal Bernardin’s death. Perhaps it is time for us to ask what does the Christian virtue of hope mean today. Is it nave to trust in that which is unseen, or is this the confidence that is an appropriate platform for God’s grace?

(Rev.) Michael D. Place

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Insights and Answers

Bishop Donald W. Trautman’s challenging article, Our Daily Bread (10/3), raised many concerns about the function of the World Synod of Bishops in pursuit of its mission. I urge him, once the current meeting of the synod is over, to give us the benefit of his insights and his answers, if there are any, to his questions.

John E. Dean

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Church and War

The article by Robert F. Drinan, S.J., Holy See Backs Nuclear Disarmament (9/12), is excellent. We need more articles on this issue and on the church’s positions on war in general. A substantial number of Catholics in the United States think that the church supports the war in Iraq.

Walter C. Hooke

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Thinking People

You can only blame yourselves! As a Jesuit-trained scientist (Holy Cross, 1959; Ph.D. in physics from U.C.L.A., 1965), I was trained to use my Little Gray Cells (5/30) in a continual challenge of hypotheses, no matter how enticing, no matter how vigorously promulgated by respected authorities. It worked for me in a satisfying career in teaching and research at U.C.L.A., diverse foreign universities, and the University of California Davis. I taught entry-level physics for hard science majors for many years. Among the most pathetic cases I encountered were students from a conservative or evangelical background who had somehow to mesh a literal interpretation of the Bible with the overwhelming evidence of science. In many cases they resorted to God the Great Deceiver, who made the world in six days circa 5,000 years ago but imbedded in the world misleading clues about a universe 13.5 billion years old. They were not allowed to use their little gray cells in whole areas of their existence. Off limits. Do not tread there!

So are we, Catholic students and faculty together, supposed to turn off our little gray cells as we walk through the door of the church? That seems to be the desire of some in authority, but it blocks us from a more profound and holistic knowledge of our existence. One area that I would like to see examined is a discussion of the effect of science on religion. The early church adopted a literal interpretation of the Bible now rejected by science, the Catholic Church, and most mainline Christians. Thus, the human interpretations of Jesus’ message in the early church were in some respects biased by the incorrect science of the times. What would the early Fathers have concluded based on more accurate scientific knowledge? In many cases, the question is not relevant. But in a few, the impact could be significant. How would knowledge of the lack of a physical, as opposed to metaphorical, Adam and Eve have modified the thinking of St. Augustine on original sin? Could he have conceived of an all-determining original sin that cast humankind into the abyss without an original sinner?

Sticking with Genesis a bit further, the key message involves the role of free will and the ability to make choices in full knowledge of the consequences thereof, good and bad. The church has wisely said that an immortal soul, a gift of God, cannot arise from material evolution. Would our more accurate knowledge about the development of human consciousness modify how the church analyzed when that transcendental gift occurs? Could such a gift occur when a being has no ability rationally to choose good and evil with knowledge of the consequences thereof and an ability to modify behavior? How does that touch upon the role of infant baptism for a human being who has yet to be able to eat of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge?

The church has waltzed around these questions for centuries, trying to merge our knowledge of a just and loving God with a series of mostly philosophical constructs (limbo?) designed to paper over the fundamental problems. It would be far better to address these problems head on with a bit of Catholic little gray cell thinking so that we can present a unified truth that blends science and religion in a way to attract thinking people everywhere. On most days, that includes at least some of my students.

Thomas A. Cahill

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Name-Calling

After reading Of Many Things (8/29) by James Martin, S.J., about his trip to Spain, I laughed out loud at his ending. What a gift that the trip to Loyola was a confirmation of your Jesuit vocation. However, being called an idiot was truly a confirmation of your vocation to become a disciple of Christ! Jesus told us very clearly there would be name-calling for those who speak his truth. Thanks for the reminder.

Denise Anderson

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Legacy

James Ross should be commended for placing a spotlight on prison abuse in Afghanistan, Iraq and Guantnamo Bay in Bush, Torture, and Lincoln’s Legacy (8/15). But he loses credibility when he extols our 16th president as a model of restraint and humanistic principles. Has he never heard of Sherman? Of Lincoln’s abolishing of habeas corpus? His issuing of an arrest warrant for Chief Justice Roger B. Taney (after the 84-year-old judge decided that Congress, but not the president, can suspend habeas corpus)? His instituting of the draft (followed by draft riots)? His jailing of tens of thousands of dissenters without due process for reasons of criticizing the Lincoln administration (including the mayor of Baltimore, a Maryland congressman, an Ohio congressman and scores of newspaper editors)? His belief in the inherent inequality between the black and white races?

Leading Catholic thinkers of the time were very troubled by the precedents set by Lincoln. Since then, whatever constitutional safeguards remain reflecting restraint and humanistic principles in government have been trampled to such an extent that presidents can no longer be bothered with requests for declarations of war. Today, the military serves as the sitting president’s private army, while actions taken in places like Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib are justified with the same logic that Lincoln used to circumvent constitutional (and moral) constraints of his day. The military doctrine of Shock and Awe has 19th-century roots.

A frank discussion of the restraint and humanistic principles of U.S. presidents would be fascinating. Unfortunately, I am still waiting to see one.

Christopher Westley

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A Shared Belief

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The Islamic Society of North America, the Managing the Atom Project of the Kennedy School of Government of Harvard University, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and the Churches’ Center for Theology and Public Policy convened a group of 24 religious leaders and scholars, with equal representation

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Potential Abuse

Your bias is showing again in your editorial The Patriot Act and Civil Liberties (8/1). The various points you raise allow for easy correcting responses. I’ll use one as an example, namely, the potential abuse you apparently see of the right/prohibition against unreasonable search. The act requires that a search warrant be obtained from a federal court by convincing a judge of the reasonableness of a search in the particular circumstances.

I presume you must have known that related relevant fact. I also presume you would agree there could be a number of good reasons for the need to search the living quarters of a suspected terrorist.

You reference your contributing authority citing the need for changes in the act to provide a notion of checks and balances. What changes? I think it would be generally agreed that a search warrant approved by a federal court provides such a notion of a check and balance.

This is the type of slanted editorial opinion which detracts from your image of objectivity and seems inconsistent with the test of intellectual honesty.

John J. Van Beckum

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Diverse Ecclesiologies

I read Christopher Ruddy’s review of volume two of my Christian Community in History with some surprise (8/1). The whole two-volume work is a history, not of the church, but of ecclesiology, the understanding of the church. Thus I was pleased when he wrote of the author’s largely evenhanded expositions of diverse ecclesiologies and recommended it as a text and reference work for graduate and advanced undergraduate students. This was the goal of the work. The surprise came with the harsh criticism which followed, and I sought an explanation.

I have formulated a theory. I wonder whether Mr. Ruddy thinks that Volume Two of C.C.H. is the systematic theology that I promised when I indicated that the two-volume work C.C.H. was itself the first part of a two-part ecclesiology from below which I hope will be followed by a more systematic and constructive essay. As a theory it accounts for several things about his review: first, he seems to want a history from above, something that is at least paradoxical. In this historical ecclesiology, the transcendent dimensions of the church, especially the roles of Christ and the Spirit, appear in all the examples that are analyzed, thereby suggesting historically a normative, ecclesiological constant. Second, he asks many questions that can be answered only in a systematics. And third, his review reads as though he thinks my lack of a long conclusion means that Volume Two of C.C.H. is the end of my ecclesiology. Actually, the promised concluding systematic volume which, will address many of his questions, is under construction. It will draw out in an explicit way the transcendent dimensions that appear in the comparison of ecclesiologies among themselves and with the sources of Christian theology.

I do not know whether this theory is true, but it accounts for much if not all of the data. I think that my long sentences may be due to the early influence of Karl Rahner! In any case, if it is true, it would mean that Ruddy did not recognize the difference between the history of ecclesiology and a systematic ecclesiology, something that would subtract from the value of his judgments.

Roger Haight, S.J.

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Ignatian Perspective

The article A Veteran Remembers, by James R. Conroy, S.J., (8/1) offers an excellent perspective on the war in Iraq. By calling attention to the disproportionately large number of African-Americans and Hispanics who are serving and dying there, he asks us all to consider whether or not this really is our nation’s war. In addition, his reflections on his experience in Vietnam (first as a soldier and recently as a pilgrim) are the clearest examples I have seen of an Ignatian perspective on one’s own experience. If we are immersed in the work of living in the present, it will always be messy. I appreciate Father Conroy’s reminder of this.

Thomas J. Brennan, S.J.

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