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Signs of the Times
Vatican: Collapse of Regime Offers Opportunity for IraqAs Baghdad and other Iraqi cities fell to U.S.-led forces, the Vatican said the collapse of President Saddam Hussein’s regime was an opportunity for the Iraqi people and offered to help in the massive humanitarian task that lies ahead. At
The War on Terrorism
The war now being fought by U.S. military forces in Iraq means that Saddam Hussein’s murderous reign is finished. And the recent capture of several senior Al Qaeda operatives gives hope that the terrorist network’s lifespan has been considerably shortened. But these developments do not m
Faith in Focus
On Being Gentle and Firm
About once a month here in Rome, I go to St. Peter’s and enter when the doors open at 7 a.m. It is awesome to gaze at the huge, empty basilica as the morning light filters through the windows. Lately I have found myself immediately drawn to the altar of Pope John XXIII, where an older Italian
Letters
Letters

Just Unwise

George Weigel challenges me to rethink my position on the war (3/31). I find myself caught between the logic of his position and that of the pope’s. The war in Iraq in my estimation is an unwise war, but I find it difficult to discern whether it is or is not a just war. And, as Mr. Weigel writes, is that not a judgment call for competent authorities to make? And is that not why the Vatican’s spokesman has said that one who makes the choice for war assumes a grave responsibility before God, his conscience and history?

Robert Fontana

Letters
Letters

More Inclusive

Since Cardinal Avery Dulles mentioned me in his article Vatican II: Substantive Teaching (3/31), I would like to make it clear that I also understand the Second Vatican Council to mean that it is only in the Catholic Church that the church of Christ continues to exist with all the institutional elements that Christ bestowed on his church. However, I have never understood subsists in to mean that it is only in the Catholic Church that the church of Christ continues to exist. If that were the case, one would have to say that in 1054 the church of Christ ceased to exist in half the Christian world. Then one could not describe the Orthodox churches as true particular churches, nor could one say that by the celebration of the Eucharist in those churches the church of God is being built up. The question at issue is whether the church of Christ is wider and more inclusive than the Catholic Church. It is not clear to me where Cardinals Ratzinger and Dulles stand on that question.

Francis A. Sullivan, S.J.

Editorials
Renewed and Transformed
Let him easter in us, be a dayspring to the dimness of us, be a crimson-cresseted east,
Forgiveness: A Radical New Factor
A few years ago, a gutsy doctor named Susan Black strode into the merciless mess of Kosovo. She went there as a volunteer expert to help expand medical services in refugee camps, assisted by her trusty translator, Faza, an ethnic Albanian. After traveling with Faza for six weeks, 12 hours a day, she
The Imaculate Heart of Mary: Contemporary Catholics on Traditional Devotions
In the cold December half-light where I sat with my first cup of coffee, it caught my eye. I was intent on praying myself into a good attitude for a weekend of meetings, and saw outside my window one of many astounding ironies in midtown Manhattan. There, in the middle of a postage-stamp size conven
Books
Apr 21, 2003 issue
What of St. Peter's Facade?
Franco Mormando
In case you have ever wondered why the facade of St Peter rsquo s Basilica in Rome seems so disproportionately and disagreeably wide in relation to its height the explanation is that the final bays on both of its sides are in fact not part of the facade itself They instead represent the lower por
News
Signs of the Times
Charity Groups Protest Military Oversight of Iraqi AidThe Catholic Church’s top charity officials are protesting coalition military plans to oversee humanitarian aid distribution in Iraq, seeing it as part of a worrying trend in recent years toward militarizing aid. Two weeks into the U.S.-led