0918
15 September 2018 Monthly Year 2
‘I am just a boy’: Meditating on the young with Kings David and Solomon
People as a Mythical Concept for .9 o Pope Francis, Reader of Dostoyevsky
Refugees in Crisis: Spiritual Resources and Ethical Principles
OLUME 2, N 2, OLUME
V Jerusalem: Holy City, Open City
2018 The Paradoxes of Vulnerability
Korea: the State of Play
Don Tonino Bello: A bishop who became the Gospel
Benjamin Britten’s Billy Budd
CONTENTS 0918
BEATUS POPULUS, CUIUS DOMINUS DEUS EIUS
Copyright, 2017, Union of Catholic Asian Editor-in-chief News ANTONIO SPADARO, SJ
All rights reserved. Except for any fair Editorial Board dealing permitted under the Hong Kong Antonio Spadaro, SJ – Director Copyright Ordinance, no part of this Giancarlo Pani, SJ – Vice-Director publication may be reproduced by any Domenico Ronchitelli, SJ – Senior Editor means without prior permission. Inquiries Giovanni Cucci, SJ, Diego Fares, SJ should be made to the publisher. Francesco Occhetta, SJ, Giovanni Sale, SJ
Title: La Civiltà Cattolica, English Edition Emeritus editor Virgilio Fantuzzi, SJ ISSN: 2207-2446 Giandomenico Mucci, SJ GianPaolo Salvini, SJ ISBN: 978-988-79271-0-5 (paperback) Contributing Editor 978-988-79271-1- 2 (ebook) Luke Hansen, SJ 978-988-79271-2-9 (kindle) Contributors Published in Hong Kong by Federico Lombardi, SJ (Italy) UCAN Services Ltd. George Ruyssen, SJ (Belgium) Fernando De la Iglesia, SJ (Spain) P.O. Box 80488, Cheung Sha Wan, Drew Christiansen, SJ (USA) Kowloon, Hong Kong Andrea Vicini, SJ (USA) Phone: +852 2727 2018 David Neuhaus, SJ (Israel) Fax: +852 2772 7656 Camilo Ripamonti, SJ (Italy) www.ucanews.com Vladimir Pachkow, SJ (Russia) Publishers: Michael Kelly, SJ and Arturo Peraza, SJ (Venezuela) Robert Barber Bert Daelemans, SJ (Belgium) Production Manager: Thomas Reese, SJ (USA) Rangsan Panpairee Paul Soukup, SJ (USA) Grithanai Napasrapiwong Friedhelm Mennekes, SJ (Germany) Marcel Uwineza, SJ (Rwanda) Marc Rastoin, SJ (France) CONTENTS 0918
15 September 2018 Monthly Year 2
1 ‘I am just a boy’: Meditating on the young with Kings David and Solomon Vincenzo Anselmo, SJ
13 People as a Mythical Concept for Pope Francis, Reader of Dostoyevsky José Luis Narvaja, SJ
27 Refugees in Crisis: Spiritual Resources and Ethical Principles David Hollenbach, SJ
38 Jerusalem: Holy City, Open City Giovanni Sale, SJ
55 The Paradoxes of Vulnerability Diego Fares, SJ
68 Korea: the State of Play Kim Youn-su, SJ and Antonio Spadaro, SJ
86 Don Tonino Bello: A bishop who became the Gospel Giancarlo Pani, SJ
97 Benjamin Britten’s Billy Budd Virgilio Fantuzzi, SJ ABSTRACTS
ARTICLE 1 ‘I AM JUST A BOY’ MEDITATING ON THE YOUNG WITH KINGS DAVID AND SOLOMON Vincenzo Anselmo, SJ
Scripture offers significant portraits of young people chosen by the Lord to implement his plan of salvation. The point of view is that of a God who is not put off by the age of his interlocutors; in fact, God even relies on young people. While adults do not pay attention to little David, the Lord is able to recognize in him a true shepherd for his flock. Solomon believes he is just a boy, even though he has become king. When he is questioned in a dream by God, he expresses his concern that he will be crushed under the weight of responsibilities too heavy for his slender shoulders, yet he knows what to ask from the Lord: a heart that listens. The author is a professor of Bible and Biblical Hebrew at the Interregional Pontifical Seminary of Campania in Naples, Italy.
ARTICLE 13 PEOPLE AS A MYTHICAL CONCEPT FOR POPE FRANCIS, READER OF DOSTOYEVSKY
José Luis Narvaja, SJ
The thought of Pope Francis has been formed gradually through his personal reading and reflection together with his academic studies and an intellectual engagement in the various areas where he has lived and worked. Among the many authors who have enriched his thought, in this study we focus on Fyodor Dostoyevsky, taking into particular consideration Romano Guardini’s monograph Religiöse Gestalten in Dostojewskijs Werk. Here we see how the “mythical” category of a people occupies center stage in Guardini’s text, and how Dostoevsky’s novels bring concrete content to this category.
ABSTRACTS
ARTICLE 27 REFUGEES IN CRISIS: SPIRITUAL RESOURCES AND ETHICAL PRINCIPLES
David Hollenbach, SJ
The first part of this article highlights some resources found in the great religious and spiritual traditions of the world that can offer an answer to humanitarian crises and to today’s migrations. The second part proposes some ethical perspectives that are more politically oriented and inspired by the social doctrine of the Church. Recently, some scholars have shown that advocacy on ethical standards can have a significant positive impact in some domains of contemporary international politics. The author is a professor at the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University in Washington.
ARTICLE 38 JERUSALEM: HOLY CITY, OPEN CITY
Giovanni Sale, SJ
History demonstrates that the problem of Jerusalem and the solution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are closely linked and interdependent. This article explores this theme in recent decades. U.S. President Donald Trump’s declaration on December 6, 2017, by which he recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, revived interest in the problem of the Holy City and its special character. Jerusalem should be subject to an internationally guaranteed special status; moreover, it should be an open city and represent a place of communion and peace, not of discord and division. ABSTRACTS
ARTICLE 55 THE PARADOXES OF VULNERABILITY
Diego Fares, SJ
In his Message for the First World Day of the Poor, Pope Francis underlined “how hard it is for our contemporary world to see poverty clearly for what it is.” One of the fashionable words used to identify poverty is “vulnerability.” The author – partially in light of his long experience in welcoming the vulnerable at the Hogar de San José in Buenos Aires – here tries to clarify the meanings of this word, looking at its etymology and its use in various disciplines. He considers our responsibilities and the best approaches to the wounded to avoid the measurement of the degree of vulnerability that ends up distracting from the actual vulnus and the injured person.
FOCUS 68 KOREA: THE STATE OF PLAY
Kim Youn-su, SJ and Antonio Spadaro, SJ
On April 27, 2018, a historic meeting took place between Moon Jae-in, president of the Republic of Korea, and Kim Jong-un, leader of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. This was followed by a meeting on June 12 between Kim and Donald Trump, the president of the United States. The three months between these two meetings witnessed an alternation of opposing events, a mind-boggling exchange of announcements and mutual accusations, with subsequent immediate reconciliations and clarifications. This article – written jointly by the director of La Civiltà Cattolica and the coordinator of the National Reconciliation Apostolate Committee of the Korean Jesuits – gives a detailed account of these events. Then it gives an interpretative and critical framework of events pointing out that mistrust has not disappeared but that hope of a future of reconciliation on the Korean Peninsula has increased. ABSTRACTS
PROFILE 86 DON TONINO BELLO: A BISHOP WHO BECAME THE GOSPEL
Giancarlo Pani, SJ
“A bishop who became the Gospel”: this is the expression that Monsignor Agostino Superbo, the postulator of the cause of beatification, uses to define Don Tonino Bello, bishop of Molfetta, Italy. It has been 25 years since his death, caused by cancer. A short but intense life (58 years), simple but provocative, sober but rich with love for the poor and the dispossessed, his life as a pastor was a living exegesis of the Gospel. “The Church of the apron” (the only “vestment” worn by Jesus at the Last Supper) is the expression coined by Don Tonino to indicate service to the brothers and sisters, the love for the least, the courage to denounce social injustice, the choice of nonviolence and peace. The Church must abandon the signs of power to embrace the power of signs, to be a credible face of the Gospel in the world.
ART, MUSIC AND ENTERTAINMENT 97 BENJAMIN BRITTEN’S BILLY BUDD
Virgilio Fantuzzi, SJ
For the first time since its London debut in 1951, ‘Billy Budd’ has been staged in Rome’s Teatro dell’Opera. This two-act opera by Benjamin Britten focuses on three characters: Billy Budd, a symbol of innocence and goodness; Claggart, a symbol of perfidy and evil; and Captain Vere, who cannot decide between the reasons of the mind and those of the heart. This opera, performed by an all-male cast, takes place entirely on a warship and depicts a microcosm that is clearly divided into two parts: those who command (the officers) and those who serve (the crew). Power exercised in absolute terms leads to its abuse, leading to the death of an innocent, executed under the appearance of the normal course of events. LCC 0918:
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For educational and bulk rates, please email [email protected] ‘I am just a boy’ Meditating on the young with Kings David and Solomon
Vincenzo Anselmo, SJ
Is it possible to depend on young people? Is it not risky to give responsibilities to those who have not gained experience? Would trust in a young person be misplaced? Ecclesiastes seems to respond to these questions by stating: “Alas for you, O land, when your king is a child (na’ar)” (Eccles 10:16). Even 1 the prophet Jeremiah, facing the mission that God entrusted to him, is self-deprecating and resists, citing his young age as the reason: “Then I said, ‘Ah, Lord God! Truly I do not know how to speak, for I am only a boy’ (na’ar)” (Jer 1:6). Because of his young age Jeremiah feels unsuitable and too immature to speak and to carry out the prophetic mission. In both cases the Hebrew word na’ar is used, which generally refers to a non- adult, a young person, an adolescent, but can also refer to a child or an infant.1 But can young age alone be an indication of incompetence and inadequacy? God answers Jeremiah’s concerns with: “Do not say: ‘I am only a boy’; for you shall go to all to whom I send you, and you shall speak whatever I command you’” (Jer 1:7). Here, as in other passages of the Bible, the Lord shows that his own criteria for selection go beyond mere chronological age. God does not behave like a recruiter looking for curricula vitae that offer a wide range of experiences. As Pope Francis
1.Cf. L. Alonso Schökel – M. Zappella, Dizionario di ebraico biblico, Cinisello Balsamo (Mi), San Paolo, 2013, 554. There is uncertainty in the Bible about when adulthood begins. In some texts, the end of youth is set at age 20 (Exod 30:14; Num 1:3.18; 14:29); in other cases it can last until age 25 (Num 8:24) or up to 30 (Num 4:3.23; 1 Chron 23:3): cf. H. F. Fuhs, “na’ar” in G. J. Botterweck – H. Ringgren (eds), Grande lessico dell’Antico Testamento, V, Brescia, Paideia, 2005, 926-940. VINCENZO ANSELMO, SJ
recalled in the pre-synodal meeting with young people: “In many moments in the history of the Church, as in numerous Biblical episodes, God wished to speak through the youngest… In difficult moments, the Lord moves history forward through young people.”2 We will see, in fact, how the Lord is not afraid to entrust to young people the fate of his people.
The youngest of Jesse’s sons: David The monarchy in Israel had a troubled and complex history. Following the long period of judges, the elders asked Samuel for a king who would govern them like other nations (cf. 1 Sam 8:5). The choice fell on Saul who, after a promising start, 2 revealed himself to be a disobedient and rebellious ruler: during the wars against the Philistines and against the Amalekites, he rejected the word of the Lord (cf. 1 Sam 13-15). Following the king’s transgressions, God is portrayed as regretting having placed him on the throne of Israel. Samuel addressed Saul, announcing that “the Lord has sought out a man after his own heart; and the Lord has appointed him to be ruler over his people” (1 Sam 13:14). Later, the prophet challenges the king with words just as harsh and clear: “The Lord has torn the kingdom of Israel from you this very day, and has given it to a neighbor of yours, who is better than you” (1 Sam 15:28). Samuel announces a new choice from God. The narrative tension grows, while the reader wonders who will be this person according to the heart of God, who will prove to be better than King Saul. Will he be a courageous warrior, of noble lineage and as tall and handsome as Saul (cf. 1 Sam 9:1-2)? While crying because Saul had been rejected by the Lord, the prophet receives the divine order to anoint another king: “Fill your horn with oil and set out; I will send you to Jesse the Bethlehemite, for I have seen for myself a king among his 3 sons” (1 Sam 16:1). God sees a king for himself. This personal
2.Francis, Pre-Synodal Meeting with Young People, March 19, 2018, in w2.vatican.va. 3.This is a literal translation of the text. MEDITATING ON THE YOUNG WITH KINGS DAVID AND SOLOMON note from the Lord differentiates the new choice of David from that of Saul, whose duty was to rule for the people (cf. 4 1 Sam 8:22). This time the divine choice implies a personal relationship and special elective affinity between God and the new sovereign. Samuel then went to Bethlehem to offer a sacrifice and to see the king that God had chosen. Throughout the chapter, the Hebrew root r’h, “to see,” occurs six times as a verb and twice as a noun and plays a central role in the narration.5 There is a subtle game that alternates between God’s point of view and that of the human agents: What does Samuel see? What does the Lord see? What do the others see? Among the sons of Jesse, the prophet sees Eliab, but his certainties crumble before the words of God: “Do not look on 3 his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him; for the Lord does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart” (1 Sam 16:7). In Hebrew, the sentence is complex and difficult to translate. The last part could literally be translated like this: people see “the eyes,” “in the eyes,” “according to the eyes,” but the Lord sees “the heart,” “in the heart,” “according to the heart.”6 In Hebrew, the word “heart” means the seat of thought and will,7 the place where the ability to choose resides.8 God not only sees the heart, but sees according to the heart, that is, through vision that is profound, not superficial and stopping at appearances. In the same way, even the prophet is invited not to stop at what the eyes see. Saul had been chosen based upon his strength and his lineage, his
4.Cf. J.-P. Sonnet, L’alleanza della lettura. Questioni di poetica narrativa nella bibbia ebraica, Rome, Gregorian & Biblical Press, 2011, 146. 5.Cf. R. Alter, The David Story. A Translation with Commentary of 1 and 2 Samuel, New York, W. W. Norton & Company, 1999, 85. 6.On the possible translations of the particle le, cf. L. Alonso Schökel – M. Zappella, Dizionario di ebraico biblico, op. cit., 408-411. 7.Cf. R. D. Nelson, I e II Re, Turin, Claudiana, 2010, 40. 8.In Jewish mentality emotions reside in the viscera or in the mother’s womb: cf. A. Sisti, “Misericordia,” in P. Rossano – G. Ravasi – A. Girlanda, Nuovo dizionario di teologia biblica, Cinisello Balsamo (Milan), Paoline, 1988, 978-984. VINCENZO ANSELMO, SJ
beauty and his stature (cf. 1 Sam 9:1-2). Perhaps he was the most beautiful of Israel’s sons, but he was certainly not the best king possible.9 So, Samuel examines the sons of Jesse, one after another, but the Lord does not let his gaze rest on any of them. Seven young people are introduced to the prophet. This number gives the idea that all of Jesse’s sons were brought before the prophet, but that none of them has been chosen. “Samuel said to Jesse, ‘Are all your sons here?’ And he said, ‘There remains yet the youngest, but he is keeping the sheep’” (1 Sam 16:11). The prophet – and with him the reader – discovers that there is still another son, who must have seemed so insignificant in his father’s eyes that he had not even been 4 invited to the sacrifice with the other brothers. It is as though, for Jesse, this child does not exist. Instead, it will be God who sees him, choosing for himself the youngest.10 David is the “son who remains.” The verb that is used here is linked to a theme that is very dear to the Old Testament, that of the “rest of Israel.” The person of David is a reminder of the few who remain faithful to the Lord and who will be saved to return to the Promised Land and worship the Lord their God. Therefore, the word “remain,” attributed to David, makes one think of all the people of Israel, the least of the people, but loved 11 by God (cf. Deut 7:7-8). “(Jesse) sent and brought him in. Now he was ruddy, and had beautiful eyes, and was handsome. The Lord said, ‘Rise and anoint him; for this is the one’” (1 Sam 16:12). The eyes of the prophet continued to see the outward appearance, while the
9.In Hebrew the word ṭôb has a double meaning of “handsome” and “good.” Meir Sternberg dedicates interesting pages to the theme of the ambivalence of “good-looking” in the books of Samuel: cf. M. Sternberg, The Poetics of Biblical Narrative. Ideological Literature and the Drama of Reading, Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 1985, 354-364. 10.In the account of Genesis 4 God “looks” at Abel’s offering and not Cain’s, the same as with Jacob and Esau, the Lord chooses the younger. Later, Joseph will be a prince among his brothers and Gideon will be established as a savior over Israel, despite being the youngest in his father’s house (cf. Judg 6). 11.Cf. M. Gargiulo, Samuele. Introduzione, traduzione e commento, Milan, San Paolo, 2016, 175. MEDITATING ON THE YOUNG WITH KINGS DAVID AND SOLOMON secret heart of David is known and seen only by God, who chose the young shepherd as king according to his heart (cf. 1 Sam 13:14). “Then Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the presence of his brothers; and the spirit of the Lord came mightily upon David from that day forward” (1 Sam 16:13). The least of the house of Jesse becomes the sovereign in the midst of his brothers. The one who shepherded the flock is now called to shepherd the people of God, Israel. After the anointing, the spirit of God bursts upon him and gives him public recognition amid his family. The spirit that descends upon David corresponds to the spirit that is withdrawn from Saul (cf. 1 Sam 16:14), who finds himself tormented and frightened by an evil spirit. One of his servants suggests to him that David could be the one who, with 5 the sound of his harp, can make him feel better: “I have seen a son of Jesse the Bethlehemite who is skillful in playing, a man of valor, a warrior, prudent in speech, and a man of good presence; and the Lord is with him” (1 Sam 16:18). The verb “to see” occurs again here. The point of view is that of Saul’s young servant,12 who sees in the son of Jesse the solution to the king’s problems. The portrait that is presented, even without directly naming David, anticipates some aspects of the young son of Jesse which will return later in the story. In fact, Saul recognizes David in the servant’s description and summons him to himself. Over the course of the narration, David will be called to show strength and courage, skill with weapons and wisdom, knowing that the Lord is with him. Only the gaze of God and that of a servant are able to see in a boy an indication of what he will become.
The giant and the boy In chapter 17 of the First Book of Samuel, David is once again introduced into the story.13 The context is the war
12.The word na’ar can be taken to mean a young person, a servant or an errand boy: cf. L. Alonso Schökel – M. Zappella, Dizionario di ebraico biblico, op. cit., 554. 13.There are two stories that introduce David into the history of Israel. Probably behind these narratives are two different traditions that have been VINCENZO ANSELMO, SJ
between Israel and the Philistines. From within the Philistine ranks a champion emerges called Goliath, a giant almost three meters tall who wears armor that weighs about 50 kilograms. Goliath challenges a champion from among the sons of Israel to battle, but King Saul, as well as all of Israel, is intimidated and terrified by him (cf. 1 Sam 17:11, 24). What is going to happen? Who will be able to take action and fight against Goliath to save the people? While the reader is faced with these questions, the young shepherd boy David, sent by his father to bring a few supplies to the brothers who went to war, shows up in the Israelite camp. When he arrives, he does not limit himself to obeying his father’s command but gathers information about the promised 6 reward for whoever brings down the Philistine giant. The presence of this boy on the battlefield provokes colorful reactions from the other characters, arousing irritation, disbelief and indignation. The older brother is annoyed: “Why have you come down? With whom have you left those few sheep in the wilderness? I know your presumption and the evil of your heart; for you have come down just to see the battle” (1 Sam 17:28). Eliab interprets David’s presence on the battlefield in a spiteful way, like an annoying intrusion. In fact, in his eyes, David’s heart appears arrogant and malicious. In reality the reader knows well that David came to the camp obeying his father’s order, not out of ambition or vanity. Even Saul, when facing David when he wants to fight Goliath, reacts with mistrust and skepticism: “You are not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him for you are just a boy (na’ar), and he has been a warrior from his youth” (1 Sam 17:33). Saul only sees a boy in David and views him as faced with the paradox of an impossible challenge that looms between a young person with no experience and an adult
preserved in the Bible. Both texts are important for understanding the relevance of David. According to Robert Alter, 1 Sam 16 focuses on the call of the young David by God, to whom the whole initiative belongs, while 1 Sam 17 has a horizontal perspective: the son of Jesse interacts, speaks and fights, and there does not appear to be any direct action from the Lord (cf. R. Alter, The David Story…, op. cit., 110f). MEDITATING ON THE YOUNG WITH KINGS DAVID AND SOLOMON man, trained and experienced, who has been fighting since his youth. However, David is not discouraged, he rejects Saul’s heavy armor and faces the challenge with his own weapons: the slingshot and pebbles from the stream. He does not want to wear the armor of the king but, having freed himself of it, finds himself free and light, able to rely on his own abilities and, above all, the help of the Lord. Confronted with the young David, Goliath’s reaction is one of mockery and contempt: “When the Philistine looked and saw David, he disdained him, for he was only a youth, ruddy and handsome in appearance” (1 Sam 17:42). In the eyes of the giant, David’s youth and glowing complexion are sufficient reasons for looking at him with disdain and a sense of superiority. Goliath’s criteria are purely external and superficial.14 7 The son of Jesse, however, is neither discouraged nor annoyed, but replies to the Philistine, revealing his secret: “You come to me with sword and spear and javelin; but I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied… All the earth may know that there is a God in Israel, and that all this assembly may know that the Lord does not save by sword and spear; for the battle is the Lord’s and he will give you into our hand” (1 Sam 17:45-47). The young boy brings into play his true strength: his weapon is the one who has chosen him and who has anointed him king. The Lord did not judge David according to appearances – as did the adults Eliab, Saul and Goliath – but he gambled on a boy to be the liberator of his people. If the strength of David was in the Lord, what specifically was the instrument with which he obtained victory? Certainly the slingshot, with which he defeated Goliath, but above all his acumen and his intelligence, with which he would forever change his own fate and that of the people. If David had not been ingenious and intelligent, he would have died at the hand of Goliath. The youth knew that he had been chosen by the Lord, but this knowledge needed to be combined with
14.Cf. M. Gargiulo, Samuele..., op. cit., 189. VINCENZO ANSELMO, SJ
his ability; otherwise he would have been reckless and a fool. The divine choice joined with the talents of David, which were also gifts from God. David acts with great skill and cunning, and this is the reason for his victory over Goliath. But here, in addition to the causality exercised by men, the causality of God is also manifested as the intervention of the Lord of history and the God of Israel, in 15 whose name David acts (cf. 1 Sam 17:37, 45-47).
A king too young? Solomon The story about the choice of David (cf. 1 Sam 16-17) is not the only one in the Bible that has at its center a young person called by God and invested with a responsibility over the people 8 of Israel. Solomon, son of David, also feels like he is only a “little boy” (na’ar qāṭōn) when the weight of the father’s kingdom is placed on his young shoulders. David is now near to death and the moment has come for him to set his house in order.16 He tells Solomon: “I am about to go the way of all the earth. Be strong, be courageous, and keep the charge of the Lord your God, walking in his ways and keeping his statutes, his commandments, his ordinances, and his testimonies, as it is written in the law of Moses, so that you may prosper in all that you do and wherever you turn. Then the Lord will establish his word that he spoke concerning me: ‘If your heirs take heed to their way, to walk before me in faithfulness with all their heart and with all their soul, there shall not fail you a successor on the throne of Israel’” (1 Kings 2:2-4). Some see in this first part of David’s speech (verses 2-4) a subsequent intervention by an editor,17 to mitigate the second part (verses 5-9), which is very cruel and in which David asks his son to carry out violent actions to settle the accounts with those who have opposed him during his reign. In fact, from a
15.On the links between human causality and divine causality in the biblical story, cf. Y. Amit, “The Dual Causality Principle and Its Effects on Biblical Literature,” in Vetus Testamentum 37 (1987) 385-400. 16.Cf. Gen 28:1-4 and 49:29; 2 Kings 20:1. 17.Cf. R. Alter, The David Story…, op. cit., 374. MEDITATING ON THE YOUNG WITH KINGS DAVID AND SOLOMON narrative point of view, this first part is fundamental since the old king finally performs his role as father, handing over to the next generation the law of Moses and the promise of the Lord, which is recalled here (cf. 2 Sam 7). On the macro-level of the story, David fulfills his paternal responsibility18: he passes on what the people received through Moses and the promise that he himself had been given. Similar to the father described in the book of Deuteronomy (cf. Deut 6:1-9), he transmits the law to his son; as a king according to the heart of God, he has before his eyes the law of the Lord (cf. Deut 17:18-20). Later, the narrator will tell us that Solomon loves the Lord and follows what the father has prescribed for him, but his faith in God is still uncertain: in fact, his dedication to the 9 Lord was accompanied by sacrifices carried out in the high places, locations where idolatrous practices are performed (cf. 19 1 Kings 3:3). It is precisely during one of these sacrifices, at Gibeon, that the Lord reveals himself to Solomon. The generational transmission of the faith from father to son is not enough: it is also necessary that Solomon should personally experience the God of his father. “At Gibeon the Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream by night; and God said, ‘Ask what I should give you’” (1 Kings 3:5). The words of the Lord are surprising: they are neither rebuking nor condemning of the fact that Solomon makes idolatrous sacrifices; but God presents himself to him as one who gives. Even Solomon’s attitude is surprising: paradoxically, his wisdom begins here when he demonstrates a humble and sensible spirit, disposing himself to welcoming Wisdom.20
18.Cf. F. Ficco, “‘Sii forte e mostrati uomo.’ La paternità di Davide in 1 Re 1-2,” in Rivista Biblica 57 (2009) 257-272. 19.Cf. J. T. Walsh, 1 Kings, Collegeville, The Liturgical Press, 1996, 72. 20.The prayer of Solomon in the First Book of Kings echoes the words of the son of David in the Book of Wisdom: “Therefore I prayed, and understanding was given me; I called on God, and the spirit of wisdom came to me. I preferred her to scepters and thrones, and I accounted wealth as nothing in comparison with her. Neither did I liken to her any priceless gem, because all gold is but a VINCENZO ANSELMO, SJ
He knows the right thing to ask: “And now, O Lord my God, you have made your servant king in place of my father David, although I am only a little child (na’ar qāṭōn); I do not know how to go out or come in... Give your servant therefore a heart that listens to govern your people, able to discern between good and evil; for who can govern this your 21 great people?” (1 Kings 3:7-9). Solomon presents himself as a servant of the Lord and recognizes that he is only a small boy, inexperienced because of his young age. His reaction echoes that of Jeremiah when faced with the mission that God entrusted to him: “Ah, Lord God! Truly I do not know how to speak, for I am only a boy (na’ar)” (Jer 1:6). Being a boy would make Solomon unable to assume 10 public and military obligations.22 This is the meaning behind the statement: “I do not know how to go out or come in.” Yet the young king shows himself already wise in what he asks: a heart that listens. For the Israelite believer, in fact, the ear is the principal organ of perception. In the Bible, the verb “to listen” appears more than a thousand times. Israel is called to hear the word of God. The daily prayer of the Israelite believer begins with the imperative Šema‘ Yisra’̄ ēl: “Listen, Israel!” (Deut 6:4). The people who listen to the words of God are obedient to the Torah and undertake the path toward life. Solomon is inexperienced and still knows little about life. A heart that listens in this way becomes the prerequisite for the young king to exercise justice and discernment in governing the people of Israel. Will Solomon be a king according to the heart of God, as was David, his father? The model of monarchy that shines through his words gives cause for hope. Solomon appears to be a king who wants to serve God and
little sand in her sight, and silver will be accounted as clay before her. I loved her more than health and beauty, and I chose to have her rather than light, because her radiance never ceases” (Wis 7:7-10). 21.In the last verse, “a heart that listens” is the literal translation. A more liberal translation would be “a docile heart.” 22.Cf. M. Cogan, I Kings: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary, New York, Doubleday, 2001, 186. MEDITATING ON THE YOUNG WITH KINGS DAVID AND SOLOMON
Israel, and not as a selfish, inward-looking sovereign who takes advantage of the people to pursue his own interests (cf. Samuel’s speech in 1 Sam 8:11-18). Therefore, the Lord acquiesces in Solomon’s request: “Because you have asked this, and have not asked for yourself long life or riches, or for the life of your enemies, but have asked for yourself understanding to discern what is right, I now do according to your word. Indeed, I give you a wise and discerning mind; no one like you has been before you and no one like you shall arise after you” (1 Kings 3:11-12). Since Solomon expressed to God the most important request, the Lord will grant to him everything, wealth and glory, as to no other. Awakened from sleep, Solomon returned to Jerusalem with a new awareness; the external sign of this inner change is that he 11 will not make sacrifices on the heights, but will stand before the ark of the Lord.23
Conclusion In the book of Proverbs, being young is linked to inexperience and to a lack of judgment: “and I saw among the simple ones, I observed among the youths, a young man without sense” (literally: heartless) (Prov 7:7). The choice of David and that of Solomon decisively overturns this perspective. Recalling the history of Israel, St. Paul states: “(God) made David their king. In his testimony about him he said, ‘I have found David, son of Jesse, to be a man after my heart, who will carry out all my wishes’” (Acts 13:22). The gaze of God sees far and makes a long-term commitment to a young person from whose descendants will come the Messiah for Israel and for all the people of the earth. And Solomon too, son of David, when he became a king, only felt like a boy. When asked in a dream by God, he expresses his concern about being crushed by responsibilities too heavy for his slender shoulders, but knows what to ask for: a heart that listens.
23.Cf. M. Cogan, I Kings…, op. cit., 188. VINCENZO ANSELMO, SJ
In the history of salvation, the Lord trusts the young and entrusts to some of them the fate of his people. It is the revelation from a Lord who has faith in the future and in life, and does not fear the new things that tomorrow brings: “I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?” (Isaiah 43:19).
12 People as a Mythical Concept for Pope Francis, Reader of Dostoyevsky
José Luis Narvaja, SJ
There is a work by Romano Guardini that was well known to Fr. Jorge Mario Bergoglio when he was rector of the faculties of philosophy and theology at San Miguel in Buenos Aires. It is Religiöse Gestalten in Dostojewskijs Werk (Religious Figures in Dostoyevsky’s Work), in which the 13 master from the Rhine analyzes the world of the characters of the Russian writer.1 Bergoglio in that period recommended the reading of this monograph, which already circulated among the students.2 His personal reading of the Russian novelist was enriched by the study of Guardini and his synthetic and systematic reflection on the “religious world” present in the works of the Russian author. It is interesting to understand how the reflection of Guardini on Dostoyevsky had an influence on Francis, leading him to affirm that “people is a mythical concept.” The pope has repeated this affirmation on various occasions and in numerous interviews. In a conversation with our director, he said: “There is a word that is much misused: one speaks a lot about populism, populist politics, a populist program. But this is an error. ‘People’ is not a logical or mystical category, if we mean it in the sense that everything that a people does is good, or in the sense that the people is an angelic category. No! It is a mythical concept, if anything. I
1.R. Guardini, El universo religioso de Dostoyevski, Buenos Aires, 1954 Italian translation: Dostoevskij: il mondo religioso, Brescia, Morcelliana, 2000. 2.Cf. D. Fares, “L’arte di guardare il mondo,” preface by R. Guardini, L’opposizione polare, Milan, Corriere della Sera, 2014, V-XI; cf. M. Borghesi, Jorge Mario Bergoglio. Una biografia intellettuale. Dialettica e Mistica, Milan, Jaca Book, 2017, 13 and 126. JOSÉ LUIS NARVAJA, SJ
repeat: ‘mythical.’ People is a historical and mythical category. A people comes to be in a process, with an endeavor in view of an objective or common project. History is constructed by this procession of generations succeeding one another within a people. One needs a myth to understand a people. When you explain what a people is, you use logical categories because you have to explain it: it is necessary, of course. But you do not explain in this way the sense of belonging to the people. The word ‘people’ has something more that cannot be explained logically. To be part of a people is to be part of a common identity made of social and cultural bonds. And this is not something automatic. On the contrary, it is a slow, difficult process … toward a common project.”3 14 And recently in another interview, the pope said: “To comprehend a people it is necessary to enter into the spirit, the heart, the work, the history and into the myth of the tradition. Only in this way will we understand what the values of that people are. This point is indeed the basis of the ‘theology of the people.’ The idea is to go with the people, to see how it expresses itself.”4 Therefore, even to “preach to the people it is necessary to look, to know how to look, and to know how to listen, to enter into the process which it lives, immerse yourself.”5 In these words of the pope we find some elements to make us think: the distinction between “logical category” and “mythical category,” a distinction that induces us to reflect on method; expressions that permit us to enter into the heart of a people and determine the object of the reflection; and the necessity of “going with the people,” which indicates the theological place of the reflection. At the beginning of his study of Dostoyevsky, Guardini affirms the same thing we hear being said by Bergoglio: “People
3.A. Spadaro, “Le orme di un pastore. Una conversazione con Papa Francesco,” in Pope Francis, Nei tuoi occhi è la mia parola. Omelie e discorsi di Buenos Aires (1999-2013), Milan, Rizzoli, 2016, XV-XVI. 4.D. Wolton, Pape François. Rencontres avec Dominique Wolton. Politique et société. Un dialogue inédit, Paris 2017, 47f. 5.A. Spadaro, “Le orme di un pastore…,” op. cit., XVI. POPE FRANCIS, READER OF DOSTOYEVSKY is a mythical being”. But what does it mean that people is a “mythical category,” “a mythical being”?
The myths of Plato A first explanation can be sought in the teaching of Plato, one of the masters of Western thought. His philosophical reflections start precisely from mythical expressions. Briefly, we can say that for Plato myth is the expression of a level of existence that is intermediate between the world of ideas and the material world.6 It is the maternal womb, the matrix where concrete realities are generated from an eternal idea. Plato turns to myths to express complex realities, since myth is in relation to the idea but it is not the idea; and it is in relation with the concrete but is not reduced to the concrete. It is an 15 expression of the tension existing between the historical and the trans-historical, between the immanent and the transcendent. Differing from logical categorical affirmations, the myth alludes to the complexity of reality and provides some elements in order for us to know it in its complexity, without the presumption of exhausting it. Myth is an expression of the search for the eternal, be that of the concrete person, individual or collective. Thus it represents the struggle to find the underlying meaning of the historical event: in this rests its transcendence, its theological validity. But at the same time we have to emphasize that myth is not opposed to the concrete life of the concrete person and the irreversible facts of history. It is a human account showing the meaning – the ideal meaning, according to Platonic understanding – that underlies the concrete reality of historical facts that are themselves unique and unrepeatable. Myth expresses a way of confronting existence “with meaning,” and bearing history and life in a responsible way. Carrying us on to the mythical plain, Pope Francis, reader of Guardini, brings us to a level of perception, comprehension and reflection with its own characteristics.
6.Cf. J. L. Narvaja, “Città visibili e città invisibili. Una riflessione a partire da Italo Calvino,” in Civ. Catt. 2018 I 128-141. JOSÉ LUIS NARVAJA, SJ
The spirit of the Russian people according to the analysis of Guardini In considering a people as a mythical category, what is highlighted is not the cold abstraction of a concept, but a living reality. A people is not the simple sum of the individuals, but a reality in tension by origin and vocation, by the place it occupies in the material world, to which it must give a spirit. Guardini understands it as “another sphere, an original and essential environment, and real humans are ‘people’ in the measure that they reveal the presence of this other sphere. This people is near to God”. It means individuals with a personal life who under this common myth are united in the perception of a collective root, a shared vocation and a meaning that transcends it: 16 a beginning, end and sense of their existence, which are expressed in the myth and assume diverse personal forms in the life of each person. However, belonging to a people conceived in this way is not automatic. Guardini indicates a condition for a person to belong to this category of people: one supposes that someone “remains faithful to the existence that is given to them and does not assume an artificial orientation of reflection and critique”.7 The fundamental characteristic that Guardini finds in people, just as it appears in Dostoyevsky, is their relation with the “fundamental realities of existence”: nature and destiny. This relationship with nature does not signify naturalism, however. Here nature does not appear as pure nature, but through it God manifests himself to the people “as the One who creates, governs and moves all, and who is encountered in humble daily existence”.
7.Dostoyevsky criticizes intellectuals. Troyat explains that Dostoyevsky was deluded by the intellectuals of his epoch, who were trying to imitate Western European culture and for this reason were disparaging Russian culture and people. He found himself “divided from the intellectual world. He does not receive any more letters, does not read books. The Gospel is his only moral sustenance, and the Gospel is precisely the triumph of the heart over the mind” (H. Troyat, Dostoievski, Buenos Aires, Emecé Editores, 1996, 143; Italian translation, Ibid., Dostoievski. Vita tragica e avventurosa, Milan, Poligono, 1948). POPE FRANCIS, READER OF DOSTOYEVSKY
Nor does the relationship with nature, in which the people discover the presence of God, signify pantheism. There exists a clear distinction between God and the creature. However, both the world and human life are in God; they are “made in the hands of God.” There is not therefore an identity with nature or with God: there exists an intimate relationship with both, but without being identified with them and without accentuating their distance. Guardini specifies: “Here we sense the mystery of the love of God for the world. We sense the mystery of the heart of God and the world near to this heart, the mystery of a unity that does not confuse but clearly conserves the distinctions, above all the one par excellence between the creature and God, and yet, what it distinguishes it collects into a supreme 17 ineffable unity”. This is the expression of the tension in which a people lives between nature and God; between the present reality and the vocation to a future destiny; between the liberty of its election and a destiny imposed without taking into account its liberty.
The holiness of a people of sinners If sometimes we have the feeling that Dostoyevsky idealizes the people, as soon as we analyze the characters of his novels we recognize how false such an impression is. His perspective is not veined with a romanticism that loses sight of the reality of the existence of a people. In an objective way, he indicates the corrupt and destructive traits of his characters: greed, depravity and degradation are described with crude realism. Nonetheless, it is always the “people of God”. All the characters experience the tensions of existence: evil, pain and sin. At some point, all find themselves confronted by this dilemma, and each has to find a way to overcome the tensions, oppositions and contradictions. The pious women and the two Sonias – one in The Adolescent and the other in Crime and Punishment – achieve this by forgetting themselves with unwitting heroism; Makar the pilgrim in The Adolescent and Zosima in The Brothers Karamazov appear rooted in a “living indestructible union with the great forces JOSÉ LUIS NARVAJA, SJ
of existence” and overcome such contradictions “through the unifying and radiant force of a redeemed heart; Alexei [Karamazov] will later reach there through the angelic force which is in him”. In the characters of Dostoyevsky, Guardini points out two characteristics that belong to every member of the people as a consequence of their relationship with nature: obedience and patience. These virtues appear clearly in the two Sonias who endure pain as destiny in the cross imposed upon them by existence, and therefore “with a pious orientation” of obedience and acceptance, aware of the fact that “the redemptive transformation of existence” is accomplished through that pain. 18 But one can better appreciate the significance of a life strictly united to nature in an attitude of obedience to God and of patience in the face of destiny, if we take into consideration the characters in whom these virtues are absent. The luminosity of the members of the people stands out better when compared to the dark life of those who have decided to separate themselves from the people and not live in the light of such a myth. The clearest example of someone who rejects the people is Ivan Karamazov. In him is realized the opposite of the affirmation: “For those who know how to penetrate into the humble and pious secret existence of the people, in which the mystery of the creative and redeeming action of God is continually renewed, their eyes will be opened before the mystery itself of God,” because “those who do not believe in God, much less do they believe in a people of God”. Ivan finds himself before the very dilemma of existence, but does not renounce “the pride of the superman … placing himself above good and evil”. He rejects what Guardini indicates as the fundamental characteristic of the people, “reality as a mystery of God, refusing also to accept it as it is, that is, in obedience and patience”. In the tension and the distinction between good and evil, Ivan does not admit to “being saved by the love of God”; he prefers to affirm that “the world bears the mark of imperfection”, with a “titanic POPE FRANCIS, READER OF DOSTOYEVSKY rebellion against God”, in the style of Faust, where the finite assumes the proper character of the infinite (211f). This is not atheism but rebellion. Ivan “believes in God, but does not accept his creation”. The consequence of this attitude of rebellion is clear since “what is proclaimed is the nude and uncovered finite, without symbolic value, without a place in the space, no longer turned toward the vigilant solicitude of God; around it extends instead the nothing that ‘annihilates’”.
The transformation of the world In nature, the redeeming work of God is made manifest by means of Jesus Christ who invites us to unite ourselves to him in view of a new creation. For this reason, the earth, 19 nature and the people are not just natural realities, but also redeemed realities. In this regard, all that happens – destiny – is seen as the will of God to which we should conform. God is present in the world. He is the creator. The creature must follow God and let himself be transformed. This personal interior transformation is the first step – a necessary one – that permits the transformation of the world into a new creation. It is a participation in the action of God which, according to Guardini, is present in the forces of nature. Ivan Karamazov has transformed the world, but without allowing himself to be transformed. He isolates himself “with his individual reason” and “his subjective will,” and only for this reason is he transformed “into the demoniacal ‘force of the earth’”. This fracture demands a decision from him: either he remains in rebellion or he creates a new relationship with the world and with God in a bond that gives sense to his life. Suffering, sin and crime can be overcome when the individual is able to enter anew into contact with terrestrial forces. In Crime and Punishment, Raskolnikov kills in order to acquire an illusory liberty. He fights against himself and against God. However, in the end he is pardoned: Christ finds him again because, without knowing it, Raskolnikov had sought him (cf. 311). Guardini considers this possibility, at JOSÉ LUIS NARVAJA, SJ
the level of a personal project, a “work” or mission capable of creating “a new [relationship with God] on a different plain of existence” (177). And here we arrive at the most profound affirmations in Dostoyevsky. Belonging to a people, the relationship with nature and with God do not signify that the process of salvation is automatic. We find ourselves at the center of these tensions that push us to make a decision which, if we do not wish to take the wrong path, must come from the heart, because “it is the heart that allows us to truly ‘live,’ not the spirit, not the physis. Only thanks to the heart does human life have spirit, does human life have matter. Only thanks to the heart does the spirit become ‘soul’ and the matter ‘body.’ Only then is a 20 human life born, with its joys and pains, its tasks and struggles, miserable and great at the same time.”8 In the heart of the people, there is Christ. However, a character like Stavrogin – in Demons – has a dead heart; his heart is a desert: “His life seems frozen. He is not able to feel any sentiment of joy or pain, only their sad degenerate forms: the physical pleasure and torment of his own state seen with a desperate lucidity. There is no true life in him”. Those who allow their hearts to be transformed “reacquire their liberty in God and enter into ‘paradise,’ and paradise also begins to exist around them”. According to Guardini, the fundamental characteristic of a people is its strict relationship with nature, through which it perceives the redeeming action of God. It represents only the beginning of a process. The relationship with the world flows out into a new creation, where, thanks to redeemed humanity, the world participates in this redemption. This liberation from sin, which “has spread darkness and error in the world,” transforms all our relationships: the world becomes more transparent, and its inner meaning does not remain hidden in the opacity of a dark mind.
8.Dostoyevsky writes, “One pretends that the Russian people do not know the Gospel, that they even ignore the commandments that are the basis of our faith. Yes, in effect it is so, but the people know Christ and carry him in their hearts for eternity” (H. Troyat, Dostoievski..., op. cit., 318). POPE FRANCIS, READER OF DOSTOYEVSKY
Alexei, “the cherub” of the Brothers Karamazov, the brother of Ivan the rebel, is the image of such an eschatological transformation: “How can I be worthy to be served by another person who is made like me in the image and likeness of God?” (87).9 Even if “there cannot not be masters and servants, … I also would like to be the servant of my servants, just as they are mine”. Alexei cannot accept that someone who is made in the image and likeness of God can be subject to him. And if for him it is not possible to change destiny, if a change of the structures is above his abilities – “in this world you cannot do without servants” – it is nevertheless possible for him to change his heart and the world which is around him; for this reason, he recommends: “You act in such a way that your 21 servant feels in your house freer of spirit than if he was not your servant”. This transformation does not come about through force;10 the true force of transformation is the living and humble love that comes from God: “Humble love is a formidable force, the greatest of all, like no other”.11 Thus Guardini describes the religious world of Dostoyevsky, constituted by the relationship with God, with nature and with other people. The destiny of each character is played out in belonging to the people or in estrangement from it. The fundamental trait giving identity to the people is the Gospel, and the figure that is uncovered – but only in a veiled manner – is Christ. Dostoyevsky says so in a letter: “My profession of faith is very simple. Here it is: to believe that there is nothing more beautiful, more profound, more pleasant, more reasonable, more extraordinary, more perfect
9.Cf. also ibid, 226. 10.“Russia advances. The true Russia. Not that of the bitter intellectual, of the revolutionaries, of the ‘possessed,’ but the Russia of the earth, of work, of the faith. This one will save the other one” (ibid., 285). 11.In a similar manner, Troyat affirms: “For Dostoyevsky … nothing is vile on the earth except the person deprived of desire, the arid spirit, the proud intellectual. No crime kills the right to forgiveness. Love saves everything. Love is humility. Because human love ought to be humble” (ibid., 231). JOSÉ LUIS NARVAJA, SJ
than Christ. Not only is there not anything more than him, but I say it with a jealous love: there cannot be anything more than him. Still better: if someone should show me that Christ is not true, if it should really be ascertained that the truth is other than Christ, I would prefer to be with Christ than with the truth.”12
Go with the people to know the people To discover the heart and the spirit of the people in its expressions, Pope Francis reminded us of the necessity of “going with the people.” Dostoyevsky offers us the possibility of clarifying this affirmation of the pope. Henri Troyat, a biographer of Dostoyevsky, highlights an important point. 22 In the early works of the novelist a character is absent: God. This is not what we have seen in the world of his characters. And yet Dostoyevsky needed the “trial of the firing squad and Siberia so that God would arise in the background of the Dostoyevskian universe.”13 The Russian writer had an experience of salvation when, at the foot of the gallows, the czar commuted the death sentence to prison in Siberia. “Life sentence. Exile. Joy fell upon Dostoyevsky like a landslide. Safe! What else matters? Twenty years later he will say to his wife: I do not remember a happier day.”14 And when they asked him about his experience in jail, he responded: “Who knows if, maybe, from up there the Omnipotent wanted to send me to jail so that I would learn what is most important and without which one cannot live?”15 Thanks to an extreme existential experience Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky was able to place himself within the myth of his people. Obedient to his destiny, he patiently puts up with four years of prison and forced labor. Following the “happiest day,” when he felt himself saved, there came the years of purification and apprenticeship.
12.Ibid., 144. 13.Ibid., 60. 14.Ibid., 115. 15.Ibid., 106. POPE FRANCIS, READER OF DOSTOYEVSKY
This painful experience permitted him to understand that “once again the light will come from below,”16 and for this reason he considers himself a “disciple of the inmates.” In Siberia, “He was their disciple, their student, and the teaching of the life sentence marked him throughout his entire existence. Those four years are like the hidden gas tank from which he will fuel his genius from then on. They constitute the center of his life. They divide it into two equal parts. There is Dostoyevsky before the House of the Dead and Dostoyevsky 17 after the House of the Dead.” With other words and experiences, Pope Francis invites us to come close to the people, whose “religious reserve,”18 without pretenses, purifies us from all our attempts to flee from the reality of our existence. For Bergoglio, “people, 23 more than a word, is a call, an invitation to escape our individualistic isolation, from one’s own limited interests, from our little personal lagoon, to be poured out into the ample bed of a river that advances and advances, reuniting in itself the life and the history of the vast territory that it traverses and to which it gives life.”19 But “one can speak of the people [only] if one begins with engagement, participation.” For this reason, the pope points out to theologians that “there is a sense of the reality of the faith which belongs to all the people of God, even those who do not have the particular intellectual tools to express it,”20 inviting them to come close to them, to listen to them in order to be able to make reflections based upon the treasure of this experience of God.
16.Ibid., 318. 17.Ibid., 139. 18.J. M. Bergoglio, Meditaciones para religiosos, Buenos Aires, 1982, 46f. 19.Ibid., El verdadero poder es el servicio, Buenos Aires, Editorial Claretianum, 2007, 88. 20.Francis, “Address to the Italian Theological Association,” December 29, 2017. JOSÉ LUIS NARVAJA, SJ
Knowledge and method We arrive at the most abstract point of the issue. The first thing that Francis underlines in the quotation from which our analysis began is the distinction between two levels of knowledge. On one hand, there is “logical” knowledge. If we take this route, we will have as a result a “description” of the people. But this does not allow us to enter into its heart. It is a description from the outside. The thinker places himself outside of the people as if he did not belong to it, distances himself and thinks of the people in terms of an “idea” or a “paradigm” of his own. The people, in this case, become the object of understanding, analysis and description. 24 On the other hand, the pope speaks of another form of drawing close to the people that does not have its origin in distancing one’s self, but which is born from “walking with the people.” Beginning from this nearness and from the encounter with the people, another knowledge is possible, where the people are not the object but rather the subject. One recognizes that a people creates the manifestations of its life, or culture.21 And in culture a people expresses – based on what the pope says – “its spirit, its heart, its work, its history and the myth of its tradition.” Guardini shows us the problem that arises when one tries to conceptualize, that is to say, when one has the intention of expressing with fixed (“irreversible”) words the character of
21.In his “Inaugural Address” to the Congreso Internacional de Teología, “Evangelización de la cultura e inculturación del Evangelio,” Bergoglio affirmed that “cultures are the place where creation is made conscious of itself in the highest degree. For this reason, we call ‘culture’ the best of peoples, the height of their art, the zenith of their technology, what permits their political organizations to pursue the common good, their philosophy to give a reason for their existence, and their religions to bind themselves to the transcendent through ‘worship.’ But this human wisdom which brings him to judge and order his life on the basis of contemplation, is not given in the abstract, individually or instantaneously: it is above all contemplation of what is worked by hand; contemplation that has its origin in the heart and memory of peoples; contemplation is made through history and on the basis of time” (J. M. Bergoglio, “Discurso inaugural,” in Stromata 41 [1985] 162). POPE FRANCIS, READER OF DOSTOYEVSKY uniqueness and the coming-to-be living of life. One runs the risk that the concept is not able to express fully the dynamism of life and the tensions of living. For this reason, Guardini calls attention to the necessity of a “more subtle” method.
It is necessary to consider the tension of the contrasts both in reality and in the act itself of the perception of reality. Reason (ratio) can perceive a situation, a determinate moment, and a timely problem – like a photograph does – but does not exhaust the reality of living. In fact, the life of the one living is characterized by its unfolding in processes – and therefore not like a photograph, but like a film – and so it requires that the “conceptualization” expresses the perception of such a process, which does not always signify movement, 25 because the tensions may be external or internal, existential or accidental.22 This condition of living comes to create a situation where on the level of knowledge a “non-logical element” is inserted. But one need not in fact believe that this non-logical element – which is “accessible only to intuition” – is of an inferior character to the one of logic alone. This constitutes rather its polar opposite, and it must be included in the conceptualization insofar as it is constitutive of life, which does not mean that one ought to consider ratio a danger to life and the comprehension of life. According to Guardini, one must take account of the tension between these two elements that live together in the living person and in the person’s relation to the world, with other people and with God. Therefore, they have to be present in the comprehension and in the codification of that reality which is the human person.23 From this it comes about that a conceptualization that respects this tension can never have
22.Cf. H.-B. Gerl, “Vita che regge alla tensione. La dottrina di Romano Guardini sull’opposizione polare,” epilogue by R. Guardini, L’opposizione polare, Milan, Corriere della Sera, 2014, 235-262. 23.Guardini affirms that “modern Western thought has not yet rediscovered the necessary position of balance and, passing from one extreme to another, has evaded the fundamental problems of thought and action” (330). JOSÉ LUIS NARVAJA, SJ
the traits of a finite thought: it appears rather as a dynamic indication, which necessarily leaves open the door to the proper movement of human life. Guardini thinks that Dostoyevsky describes the existence of his characters in the light of these two poles in tension: “the moment of the fullness of existence, indefinite, the fluid element fleeing from every form, the unforeseen and unforeseeable” (350). This richness in the works of Dostoyevsky constitutes the most important aspect of the study of Guardini on the religious world of the writer. He in fact maintains that this way of describing the world of relationships may give a “contribution to the building of a human and spiritual Europe,” and, consequently, to the “knowledge of the spirit and of the 26 human heart”. Refugees in Crisis: Spiritual Resources and Ethical Principles
David Hollenbach, SJ
The humanitarian system is severely challenged today. There are more displaced people today than at any time since World War II. Former UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon called the situation a “monumental crisis” that will require a response based on “monumental solidarity.”1 We need to develop much 27 better ways of protecting the humanity of those threatened by tragedies today. The first part of this article highlights some resources found in the religious and spiritual traditions of our world for responding to this crisis situation. It gives particular attention to Christian inspiration to serve the needs of the displaced, and then it proposes some ethical perspectives that are more policy-oriented.
Religious and spiritual perspectives Recently some secular political philosophers, like Joseph Carens, and some refugee scholars, like Philip Marfleet, have been arguing that the time has come to make borders fully open to all who are fleeing from persecution, conflict or disaster.2 In a similar spirit, the modern human rights movement affirms the universal dignity of all human beings and seeks to tear down walls dividing people into those who count and those who do not count when the most basic requirements of humanity are at stake.
1.Ban Ki-moon, “Remarks on Forced Displacement: A Global Challenge,” Speech at UN News Centre, Washington, D.C., April 15, 2016: http://www. un.org/apps/news/infocus/sgspeeches/statments_full.asp?statID=2997#. V0DRKCMrIb1. 2.Cf. J. Carens, “Aliens and Citizens: The Case for Open Borders,” Review of Politics 49/2 (1987) 251-273; P. Marfleet, Refugees in a Global Era. New York, Palgrave Macmillan, 2006, 288-290. DAVID HOLLENBACH, SJ
This orientation also has strong support in the world’s great religious traditions. Both Judaism and Christianity hold that all persons are created in the image and likeness of God and share a dignity that reaches across the borders between nation states. Pope Francis drew on this biblical vision during his visit to the Greek island of Lesbos, where he assured Syrian refugees that “God created humanity to be one family” and called Europe to “build bridges” rather than “put up walls.”3 Further, albeit with slight differences, each of the great monotheistic traditions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam – trace their origins back to the Patriarch Abraham, who was himself a migrant from the home of his kinsfolk to the land of Canaan. The identity of Jews is shaped by the story of 28 the Exodus: a migration from slavery in Egypt to freedom in the land of God’s promise. And the New Testament tells us that just after his birth, Jesus was driven from his home by persecution as a refugee to Egypt along with Mary and Joseph. Muslims measure time from Muhammad’s hijra, or migration, from Mecca to Medina. Thus each of these faith communities sees its religious and ethical commitment as reaching across borders. Thus in 1963 Pope John XXIII affirmed that “the fact that someone is a citizen of a particular State does not detract in any way from their membership in the human family as a whole.”4 Consequently “Refugees cannot lose [their] inherent rights simply because they are deprived of citizenship of their own States.”5 Pope Francis has repeatedly stressed that the Christian vocation includes a responsibility to reach out to refugees in a spirit of compassion or mercy.
3.Cf. Francis. Address to Refugees, Mòria Refugee Camp, Lesbos, Greece, April 16, 2016, in w2.vatican.va; Ibid., Meeting with the People of Lesvos and with the Catholic Community. A Remembering of the Victims of Migration, Lesbos, Greece, April 16, 2016, in ibid. Cf. A. Spadaro, “Roma e Costantinopoli si incontrano a Lesbo. L’ecumenismo delle frontier,” in Civ. Catt. 2016 II 237-248. 4.John XXIII, Encyclical Pacem in Terris, No. 12, in w2.vatican.va. 5.Ibid, No. 57. REFUGEES IN CRISIS: SPIRITUAL RESOURCES AND ETHICAL PRINCIPLES
Ethical priorities for policy Some years ago the philosopher Martha Nussbaum called nationality a “morally irrelevant” characteristic of personhood, an ethical position that implies open borders.6 It is clear, of course, that states and borders continue to play very important roles in relation to displaced people. There is a duty to love all humans as our neighbors, but there are also duties to those with whom we have special relationships, such as the members of our family or own country. Thus a key task is to determine the ethical priorities that should exist among these duties. Such priorities can help shape a policy-oriented approach to humanitarian crisis. In some circumstances, responsibilities to those who are nearer should take priority over concern for those at greater distances. On the other hand, when those farther away have 29 greater needs, they can have priority. Catholic social thought formulates this in terms of what is called “the principle of subsidiarity.” This principle affirms that there are special duties within smaller, proximate communities. But it also insists that when there is serious need at a greater distance or when local communities do not respond adequately to this need, larger regional communities or the international community as a whole can have a duty to provide help 7 (subsidium). Though the subsidiarity principle was developed within Catholic social thought, the Union Nations has adopted it.8 It means that the primary responsibility toward displaced persons falls on the country of which they are citizens. But if their own country fails to protect them, the duty moves to neighboring countries and to international actors. Thus there are duties both to one’s fellow citizens and to forced migrants. Neither is absolute. Duties to fellow citizens do not always trump duties to refugees, nor do duties to refugees always override duties to co-citizens.
6.Cf. M. Nussbaum, “Patriotism and Cosmopolitanism,” in Ibid., For Love of Country, Boston, Beacon Press, 2002, 5. She later changed her opinion on the importance of the nation states. 7.Pius XI, Encyclical Quadragesimo Anno, Nos. 79-80, in w2.vatican.va. 8.Cf. United Nations High Commissioner of Refugees, South Sudan emergency, in www.unhcr.org/en-us/south-sudan-emergency.html. DAVID HOLLENBACH, SJ
Let me suggest several priorities among these types of obligation, focusing first on negative duties not to act in ways that cause humanitarian crises, and then on positive duties to those facing crisis. Most of the refugee movement in the world today is caused by wars, such as the conflicts in Syria, Afghanistan, Somalia, South Sudan and Yemen. Key negative duties relevant to such displacement can be highlighted by drawing on the moral tradition known as the just war ethic. This tradition requires that force be strictly limited to defending the rights of innocent persons to life, freedom and security, and the rights of nation states to self-determination and territorial integrity. Conversely, there is a negative duty not to use force to deny people their 30 political freedom, to exploit them economically, or because they are culturally different. Violation of these negative duties is both immoral and criminal. Such a violation is just what happened in the abomination of the Rwanda genocide of 1994, where force was used to slaughter most of the Tutsi people. It was also violated in the atrocity at Srebrenica, where thousands of Bosnian Muslims were killed because of their identity in an “ethnic cleansing.” Thus a central priority in efforts to prevent humanitarian crises should be much stronger efforts to prevent the unjust use of force. Just war norms also forbid intentional attacks on civilians, as well as disproportionate collateral harm to civilians. International law sets forth such prohibitions especially in the Fourth Geneva Convention and the First Protocol. Several recent cases of forced migration have been due to such violations. For example, as Human Rights Watch affirms, in the civil war that began in South Sudan in December 2013, both the government of the country and the opposition forces have “committed extraordinary acts of cruelty that amount to war crimes and in some cases potential crimes against humanity.”9 Because of this
9.Human Rights Watch, South Sudan’s New War: Abuses by Government and Opposition Forces (Human Rights Watch, 2014), 1, 82 and 83. Cf. Interim Report of the Panel of Experts on South Sudan established pursuant to Security Council resolution 2206 (2015), in www.southsudanhumanitarianproject.com/reports/ docr-532. REFUGEES IN CRISIS: SPIRITUAL RESOURCES AND ETHICAL PRINCIPLES mayhem, by January 2018, some 2.5 million South Sudanese had become refugees and the number of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) was approaching 2 million.10 In Syria, violation of the basic rights of civilians has led to the single largest forced migration in recent history. This raises the question of our positive obligations to assist the displaced given our responsibilities to people in our own country. To address this issue we can draw on a mode of moral analysis originally developed in the 1970s in the context of debate about response to the apartheid regime that separated South African people by race and ethnicity. In that debate, some maintained that only those who had created the apartheid system had a duty to work to overcome it, namely white South Africans. But a very 31 different ethical approach was proposed by several scholars at Yale University who argued that under certain circumstances there can be positive duties to help remedy harms we did not ourselves cause.11 They called their approach the Kew Gardens Principle, for it arose from reflection on a tragic case that occurred in the Kew Gardens section of New York City in 1964 where a young woman named Kitty Genovese was viciously assaulted and stabbed to death while 38 people stood nearby and just watched, not even calling the police.12 The public outrage that occurred points to the fact that most people have a conviction that in some situations omission can be as bad as commission. Drawing on this conviction, the Kew Gardens Principle argues that an agent has a positive duty to help when four conditions are present: 1) there is a critical need; 2) the agent has proximity to the need; 3) the agent has the capability to
10.Cf. www.unhcr.org/en-us/south-sudan-emergency.html/; A. Rusatsi, “Il Sud Sudan. A sei anni dalla travagliata indipendenza,” in Civ. Catt. 2017 IV 466-474. 11.This is a long established idea in Catholic moral theology. 12.J. Simon – C. Powers – J. Gunnemann, The Ethical Investor: Universities and Corporate Responsibility, New Haven, Yale University Press, 1972, 22-25. For further insight into what was learned about the murder cf. N. Lemann, “A Call for Help: What the Kitty Genovese Story Really Means,” New Yorker, March 10, 2014, 73f. DAVID HOLLENBACH, SJ
assist; 4) the agent is likely the last resort from whom help can be expected. Subsequent reflection has added a fifth condition: action can be taken without disproportionate harm to the one providing assistance. While bearing in mind the differences in application of the principle between individual persons and sovereign States, these criteria can help us think about the scope of positive duties toward displaced people today. First, need. There is no doubt that very many people are in grave need of protection in Syria and South Sudan today. Those inside the borders of these crisis-torn countries face harms that could kill them, and they are in flight because of this vulnerability. The duty to respond falls first upon those whose proximity gives them knowledge of the need and 32 better understanding of how to respond. This means that the government of the nation where the crisis occurs and local communities within that nation bear the prime responsibility. In South Sudan and Syria both the governments and the opposition forces in each country have the negative duty to stop their atrocities and the positive duty to help lift the burdens of suffering. Duty to take positive action, however, does not end at the national borders of the countries where crisis is present. When people in a neighboring country or even in a country at a great distance become aware of crisis, this awareness leads to what might be called intellectual or psychological proximity. It puts them in moral proximity to those who are suffering. In the case of South Sudan, the regional organization of Sudan’s neighboring countries, called the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), has played a diplomatic role by seeking to mediate the present conflict in South Sudan. Regrettably, economic and political self-interest has sometimes distorted the mediation efforts of several IGAD countries, particularly Uganda and Ethiopia. This has led several countries from outside the region to become involved in an effort known as IGAD Plus, which includes the African Union, the UN, China, the U.S., the UK, Norway and the EU. A sense of moral responsibility arose in these more distant countries because of their proximity through awareness. These REFUGEES IN CRISIS: SPIRITUAL RESOURCES AND ETHICAL PRINCIPLES combined regional and global efforts have certainly not been perfect. But they have helped and suggest ways that action can be taken from a distance. The criterion of capability also sheds light on positive duties to respond to humanitarian crises. It has become common to point out that someone who cannot swim does not have a duty to aid a child who is drowning, while a good swimmer can have such a duty. Lebanon, Turkey and Jordan are today already massively overburdened with Syrian refugees. They are not capable of providing asylum for many additional refugees. On the other hand, the wealthy nations of northern Europe, North America and the oil-producing Gulf states are capable of receiving many more asylum seekers and of sharing the weight being carried by Syria’s already overburdened nearest 33 neighbors. Countries with greater economic and political capacities to help have proportionally greater responsibilities to do so. These duties may be carried out by granting asylum to more refugees, by providing larger opportunities for resettlement, and especially by providing economic assistance to Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan, who are already carrying a disproportionate burden.13 The existence of such positive duties was at the root of the emergence of the moral and policy framework known as the Responsibility to Protect (R2P). When we speak of “responsibility to protect” in today’s international discourse, reference is made to concepts that are more precise than those of the primary responsibility of the State to ensure human rights are respected, to protect public order, social harmony and security for people, their families and their properties. The Responsibility to Protect is defined on the basis of three fundamental principles: 1) The State has the responsibility to protect its own population from any serious crime, or from any violation of rights considered part of the ius cogens, that is, values that are fundamental and binding in all situations, such as genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.
13.Cf. United Nations High Commissioner of Refugees, Greater support in countries of first asylum needed to stem refugee outflows, August 26, 2015, in www. unhcr.org/55ddd2c86.html. DAVID HOLLENBACH, SJ
2) In carrying out this task the State must be sustained by the international community, which has the responsibility to sustain it as it protects. 3) The international community assumes the responsibility to use all diplomatic, humanitarian and peaceful means to protect populations whenever a State fails in its duty and allows determined crimes to take place. Finally, every action of the international community must follow the principles of international law and the Charter of the United Nations.14 The Responsibility to Protect has been the focus of heated controversy since it was endorsed by heads of state at the UN General Assembly in 2005. It should be observed that there are difficulties of a technical, juridical nature with R2P compared 34 with the Charter of the United Nations. The second and third principles raise important international questions, both about the difficulty to harmonize the international community’s obligation to protect with the right to non-interference, foreseen by Article 2.7 of the Statute of the United Nations, and also because there is not yet an international legal test that authorizes the use of collective force beyond the types in Chapter VII of the same Statute. A juridical formulation of the principle would demand at least a reform of Article 39, including – among the types that authorize the Security Council to intervene – the crimes referred to in the concept of R2P. A reform would also be needed, or at least an authoritative interpretation of Article 2.7, to define the competencies of the United Nations in the case of crimes referenced by the Responsibility to Protect. Instead, when a State appropriates to itself the right to intervene with force in another State applying the principle of Responsibility to Protect, it actually leads to a negation of the entire construction of the international law of the 20th century. Despite the critiques of R2P, it is important to note that it has led to effective protection of people in a number of crises. For example, when conflict flared in Kenya following the disputed
14.Concerning the approval of the R2P by the UN General Assembly, cf. World Summit Outcome Document, Nos. 138-139, in www.globalr2p.org/media/ files/wsod_2005.pdf. REFUGEES IN CRISIS: SPIRITUAL RESOURCES AND ETHICAL PRINCIPLES
2007 elections, the UN, the African Union and a number of other governments, including the U.S., took initiatives to stop the conflict. These led to a power-sharing agreement and halted descent into civil war.15 R2P can be carried out successfully through nonviolent political and diplomatic means. R2P has also been invoked to justify the use of military force to protect people from atrocities. For example, in 2012, France and the Economic Community of West African States took military action with UN approval to restore peace in Mali. And in 2013, French and African Union troops acted to stop the atrocities and the displacement of nearly one million people occurring in the Central African Republic.16 Though these cases are not fully resolved, they indicate that the doctrine of the Responsibility to Protect can help reduce crises. 35 Libya and Syria, however, raise questions about the relevance of R2P today. In Libya, the UN authorized the use of “all necessary measures” to protect civilians when fears arose that Libya’s leader, Muammar al-Qaddafi, was about to commit atrocities.17 NATO intervened with airpower, Qaddafi was killed, and his regime was overthrown. Sadly, Libya has since fallen into chaos. This had led some to conclude that pursuing humanitarian goals not required by national self-interest is likely to do more harm than good.18 It can be argued, however, that the intervention in Libya failed not because it was excessive but because it was incomplete. NATO and the U.S. should have followed up their intervention with action to rebuild and to prevent the chaos that developed. Syria has also been invoked to suggest that R2P is dead. The political complexities and moral ambiguities of the Syrian
15.The International Coalition for the Responsibility to Protect. The Crisis in Kenya, II. International Response to Halt the Spread of Violence, in www. responsibilitytoprotect.org/index.php/crises/crisis-in-kenya. 16.About UN action concerning the Central African Republic, cf. UN Security Council Resolution 2127 (2013), in www.un.org/en/ga/search/view_doc. asp?symbol=S/RES/2127(2013). 17.Cf. UN Security Council, Resolution 1973 (2011), Nos. 4 & 6, in www. un.org/en/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=S/RES/1973%282011%29. 18.Cf. A. J. Kuperman, “Obama’s Libya Debacle: How a Well-Meaning Intervention Ended in Failure,” in Foreign Affairs 94 (2015) 66-77. DAVID HOLLENBACH, SJ
situation go very deep. But these complexities do not discredit the existence of a duty to protect people facing atrocities when protection is possible. The duty to protect the Syrian people does call for continuing political and diplomatic initiatives to find a path toward their protection. Not only Assad and the rebels, but also other international actors are keeping the crisis in Syria alive.19 The global community, therefore, has a duty to engage these powers diplomatically and to seek other possibly effective ways to protect those in the dire Syrian crisis. There is also continuing responsibility toward the large number of Syrians presently seeking asylum in Europe and the developed world. At a minimum, we need to live up to the 1951 36 call of the Refugee Convention that refugees fleeing persecution be granted asylum. Countries in Europe and North America have the capability and resources to grant asylum to significantly more refugees from Syria than they are. Indeed, the number of Syrians seeking asylum in Europe is not even close to the number already within the borders of Syria’s neighbors. When in fall 2015 the then Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, David Cameron, announced that his country would grant asylum to 20,000 Syrians over the next five years, he was appropriately reminded that Lebanon had admitted that many Syrians over the past two weekends. Developing countries today host 84 percent of the world’s refugees, and the very poorest countries provide asylum to 25 percent of the global total. 20 A substantial increase in the funds being provided to Syria’s neighbors by the Global North should be a priority today. To achieve this, the rich nations of the Global North need to overcome racially or religiously driven xenophobia and the mistaken fear that refugees are likely to be terrorists under false guises.
19.Cf. G. Sale, “Il ‘martirio’ di Aleppo,” in Civ. Catt. 2017 I 34-45; Ibid., “La Turchia e le ‘enclave’ curde in Siria,” ibid. 2018 I 476-490; Ibid., “The War in Syria,” in Civ. Catt. English Edition, August 2018. 20.United Nations High Commissioner of Refugees, Global Trends: Forced Displacement in 2016, 2, in www.unhcr.org/en-us/statistics/unhcrstats/5943e8a34/ global-trends-forced-displacement-2016.html?query=Global%20Trends. REFUGEES IN CRISIS: SPIRITUAL RESOURCES AND ETHICAL PRINCIPLES
The recent work of some scholars has shown that advocacy for ethical standards can have significant positive impact in some domains of contemporary international politics.21 For example, the standards of the international law of refugee protection and on the regulation of armed conflict were the result of normative advocacy by groups such as the International Committee of the Red Cross over the past century. More recently, “normative entrepreneurs” have advanced the effort to hold political leaders accountable for violating normative standards in several international tribunals. This suggests that ethical standards can come to have real impact on the conduct of nations. The Christian community has a role to play is advancing this effort. Pope Francis has repeatedly called both the Catholic community and all persons of good will to join in the effort. 37 There is hope that with normative pressure from a wide range of nongovernmental bodies, including religious communities, we can make progress in living up to the responsibilities that – as we have stated here – we have only partially taken up. The task is urgent; so should be the response.
21.Cf. M. Finnemore – K. Sikkink, “International Norm Dynamics and Political Change,” in International Organization 52 (1998) 887-917. Jerusalem: Holy City, Open City
Giovanni Sale, SJ
The year 2018 marks the 70th anniversary of the founding of the State of Israel on May 14, 1948. The United Nations resolution of November 29, 1947, had established that two independent and sovereign states would be created from the 38 Palestinian territory, ex British Mandate: one Jewish and one Palestinian. This resolution created the so-called “partition plan” that met with opposition from Arab countries. It was never actually implemented. On this anniversary, U.S. President Donald Trump wanted the U.S. Embassy – as he had unilaterally declared on December 6, 20171 – to move from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Besides having strong symbolic significance, this decision is also politically relevant as it goes against the established practice followed by the majority of the international community in this delicate matter. Its members prefer to comply with the various resolutions of the U.N. that aim to maintain the status quo for East Jerusalem while waiting for an agreed decision. It should also be acknowledged that the following day, May 15, the Arab world recalled the 70th anniversary of the so-called Nakba (The Catastrophe). This commemorates the memory of the expulsion – after the 1948-49 Arab-Israeli war – of around 500,000 (according to others, more than 700,000) Palestinians from their houses and their land, forcing them to seek asylum in neighboring countries.2
1.Cf. G. Sale, “Concerning Jerusalem as Capital,” in Civ. Catt. English Edition, April 2018; G. Pani, “La Giordania e Gerusalemme,” in Civ. Catt. 2018 II 257-264. 2.Our journal published several articles on this topic: Cf. G. Sale, “La fondazione dello Stato di Israele e il problema dei profughi palestinesi,” in Civ. Catt. 2011 I 107-120. JERUSALEM: HOLY CITY, OPEN CITY
This event was commemorated, as happens every year, in the Gaza Strip with several protests beginning March 30 at the Israeli border.3 This provoked clashes between the two sides: on several occasions the Israeli military opened fire on demonstrators who were trying to cross the border fence, claiming the lives of 49 people, including two journalists, and wounding at least another 1,500. These events come at a delicate moment for the Israeli government, committed as it is to keeping Syria from becoming “conquered territory” of the Iranian Pasdaran and Shiite Hezbollah, from where the security of Israel could be threatened. According to analysts, this explains the frequent shelling and bombing of Iranian military targets in Syria – usually unclaimed – conducted in recent months by Israeli 39 artillery and air force. In any case, the move of the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem certainly has historic relevance. Events of the last decade show how the problem of the Holy City and the solution to the Israeli- Palestinian conflict are inexorably linked and interdependent, and this fact can be neither ignored nor underestimated. Furthermore, Trump’s decision to move the embassy has had the unintended consequence of returning the focus of the international community and of public opinion on to the question of Jerusalem, following a number of years in which it had mostly fallen off the radar while concerns focused on ISIS and Islamist terrorism.4 In fact, in their political propaganda the “new jihadists” – unlike al-Qaeda – had downgraded the Palestinian question (which for decades had agitated the Arab world), thinking that it was no longer fundamental for the unity of the Muslim world.
3.The so-called “Great Return March” started May 30, 2018. It is a protest to claim the right of Palestinians to return to the land from which they had been removed in 1948 by the Israeli military, and also to denounce the blockade imposed by Israel on the Gaza Strip in 2007. Cf. A. Ayman, “Tent City nights: Gaza’s dance of resistance unites Palestinians,” in Middle East Eye, April 17, 2018. 4.Cf. T. Marshall, Prisoners of Geography: Ten Maps that Tell you Everything you Need to Know about Global Politics, Elliott and Thompson Ltd, 2016. GIOVANNI SALE, SJ
Jerusalem: holy city to the three monotheistic religions Jerusalem (in Arabic, al-Quds) is a holy city for the three great Abrahamic religions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam – with about three billion adherents worldwide. For the Jews, it is the place where their temple, the dwelling of God’s presence on earth, was located. The Romans completely razed it in the first century A.D. and the entire Jewish people were forced into diaspora. Every time the Jews were exiled from their homeland, they dreamt of a return to Jerusalem; and this is the origin of the expression that the diaspora Jews have exchanged for centuries at the end of Passover: “Next year, in Jerusalem!” reaffirming the centrality of this city in their lives. Jerusalem is also a holy city for Christians of all confessions. 40 It was the place where many decisive events of Jesus’ life happened. This city has some of the most important places of Christian worship and pilgrimage, such as, for example, the Constantinian basilica of the Resurrection (the Holy Sepulcher), which is today divided among the Orthodox, Catholics, Armenian, Coptic and other Christian communions. After the painful and controversial experience of the Crusades, the “Custody of the Holy Land” was established in the 14th century with the recognition of the Sultan as having the task of safeguarding all the Holy Places, not only those in Jerusalem. The Franciscan Friars are still responsible for this internationally renowned ministry. For Muslims worldwide, both Sunni and Shiite, Jerusalem is the third holy city, after Mecca and Medina. It is the city from where the prophet Mohammed – according to medieval tradition – ascended to the heavens to talk to God (the precise location being where today is found the Mosque of Omar or the Dome of the Rock). In this place is one of the oldest and most venerated mosques of Islam, known as “the furthest,” or al-Aqsa. All these places, full of great religious significance for the three Abrahamic faiths – something unique in the world – occupy an area of no more than one square kilometer. Two of these sites, those revered by the Jews and Muslims, are in the same physical space, the great Temple Mount. Observant JERUSALEM: HOLY CITY, OPEN CITY
Jews are forbidden to enter the most central part of the Temple, the Holy of Holies; as its exact position is unknown, this prohibition covers the entire plateau. For their part, in past centuries Muslims have extended to the whole Temple Mount the official area of the sanctuary al-Haram al-sharif (“the noble sanctuary”). The only part remaining for Jewish veneration is the so-called “Western wall” or “Wailing Wall” (which was a retaining wall dating to the Second Temple period), in front of which on the occasion of the Six Day War of 1976 (when the Israelis occupied the majority of East Jerusalem), a large piazza was built to allow worship, eliminating a dilapidated Arab neighborhood. Not far from this place is the “Via Dolorosa” (Way of the Cross), which leads to the Church of the Resurrection. 41 Due to the importance of Jerusalem for the three religions, what happens in this city has international repercussions. The smallest error in managing the sacred places can lead to severe conflicts, as has happened in the recent past between Arabs and Israelis. Jerusalem is like a powder keg that could explode at any moment, destroying a status quo that has been both accepted and challenged by the communities living there. The Israeli- Palestinian conflict will not be solved until a shared solution on Jerusalem can be reached. Yet in its political and ideological propaganda, Zionism – which since the end of the 19th century has inspired the migration of Jews from the diaspora to Palestine with the goal of building there an “authentically Jewish” state – has marginalized Jerusalem and its status as a “holy city.” Zionism was a Euro- centric and secular movement that espoused the idealism of the Left and considered Jerusalem a relic of the past, a “bigoted, superstitious, and inefficient city” far from the commercial centers of the Middle East, and surrounded by an arid and resource-poor territory. It should also be remembered that the European immigrants, with their own ideas of progress and civilization – sometimes calling themselves socialists, sometimes liberals – brought to the new country their religious and sectarian fanaticism (which usually considers the ghetto as a fortress), and militaristic GIOVANNI SALE, SJ
nationalism with all its pseudo-imperialistic trappings. Israeli writer Amos Oz also adds: “Meanwhile, it was the immigrants from the East (Sephardic Jews and others) who brought with them an ancient tradition of moderation, of relative religious tolerance, and the habit of living as good neighbors even with those who do not look like you.”5
Jerusalem and the foundation of the State of Israel When, on November 29, 1947, with Resolution 181 the U.N. approved the plan to partition Palestine (that up until then had been under the British Mandate) into two autonomous and independent states – one Arab and one Jewish – the Zionist leaders of that time hurried to accept the plan of the United 42 Nations. On May 14, 1948, in a room of the museum in Tel Aviv – which became the capital of the new nation-state – David Ben Gurion declared the independence of the “Jewish State.” In this solemn declaration, Jerusalem – the city that was always invoked by the pious Jews of the diaspora – was not mentioned even once. The State of Israel therefore was born without reference to Jerusalem. As opposed to the Jews, the Arab states did not accept the “partition plan,” thinking that it was a violation of the inalienable and non-negotiable rights of Palestinians who had been living in that land for centuries. With regard to Jerusalem, given the difficulties presented by its eventual division, the partition plan of 1947 affirmed that it should be instituted as corpusa separatum under a special international regime to be administered by the United Nations.6 Furthermore, its territory was to include small, neighboring villages such as Bethlehem. Israeli Prime Minister David Ben Gurion, in order not to antagonize observant Jews, claimed that the loss of Jerusalem (a city he had no love for) was the price to pay for the foundation of a Jewish state. However, it would soon be partially occupied, manu militari, by the Israeli army. This happened in May 1948 when the Arab states bordering Israel (Egypt, Lebanon,
5.Amos Oz, How to Cure a Fanatic, Princeton, 2010. 6.Cf. D. Neuhaus, “The Catholic Church and the Holy City,” in Civ. Catt. English Edition, March 2018. JERUSALEM: HOLY CITY, OPEN CITY
Syria, Jordan and even Iraq) declared war. The war was won decisively by the nascent state, which seized the opportunity to “expand” the borders indicated by the partition plan to its own advantage, incorporating a part of Jerusalem, and involving the “liberation” of some areas of the country from the presence of Palestinian residents. (This is the origin of the unsolvable refugee problem.) The armistice agreements of 1949 between Israel and the Arab states divide the city of Jerusalem into two parts through the so-called “Green Line”: the western part (West Jerusalem) assigned to Israel, while the eastern part (East Jerusalem), including the Old City, the Temple Mount, and the Holy Sites, was entrusted to Jordan. The U.N. did not recognize these agreements and maintained 43 the borders established in the partition plan. However, in the following years, both Jordan and Israel preferred to leave Jerusalem divided. As with cities divided in two by conflict – for example, Berlin and Belfast – so too in Jerusalem the division was perceived by all as a rending apart. A city that had previously been experienced as a unique reality, complex but complementary, was suddenly torn apart, both in a material sense as well as culturally and spiritually: “Jerusalem,” writes a religious man living there, to his brother “leaves a sadness in my memory. The city is surreal as the division is a kind of evil mechanism placed in the heart of the night by a demon, as if it were an obscene prank. But it is no joke, and the cruelty is highlighted by walls, fences, barriers, rifles and soldiers.”7 Pope Pius XII, in two encyclicals – In multiplicibus, in 1948, and Redemptoris nostri, in 1949 – called for the restoration of an “international regime” in the Holy City, with the aim to “guarantee the protection of the sanctuaries,” ensure freedom to access the holy sites, and respect the customs and religious traditions of that place. This plea was not accepted by the
7.P. Caridi, Gerusalemme senza Dio. Ritratto di una città crudele, Milan, Feltrinelli, 2017, 189. (Available in English as P. Caridi, Jerusalem without God: Portrait of a Cruel City, University of Cairo Press, 2017.) For the situation in Jerusalem after the 1948 war cf. V. Lemire (ed.), Gerusalemme. Storia di una città- mondo, Turin, Einaudi, 2017, 90f. GIOVANNI SALE, SJ
parties involved. On the contrary, it was opposed even by other Christian confessions present in the Holy Land as they were afraid that the Holy See wanted somehow to guarantee its own privileged status over them.8 From that moment, Jerusalem fully entered the history of the State of Israel, becoming a constitutive element for both political and religious reasons. Prime Minister Ben Gurion, in response to the proposal of the U.N. to internationalize the city, was determined to move the Knesset (the Israeli parliament) to Jerusalem in 1950 so that the annexation would be definitive. Only in 1980 after the unification of the city following the Six Day War did the Israeli parliament vote in a “Fundamental Law” on the constitutional level that declared Jerusalem the 44 “complete and undivided” capital of the Jewish state. Through Resolution 478, the U.N. declared this law “null and void” since it violated international law and thwarted the establishment of peace between Israelis and Palestinians. This is why the international community continued to keep their embassies in Tel Aviv and refused to officially recognize Jerusalem as capital of Israel.9
Jerusalem and the Six Day War With regard to the more recent history of the State of Israel and the city of Jerusalem, the Six Day War is extremely important.10 It was in fact this war – fought over less than a week (June 5-10, 1967) between the powerful and motivated Israeli military and those of the bordering Arab states, which had more troops but were less equipped – that redefined the borders established by the United Nations, successively extended in favor of Israel since the war in 1948. Following these events, Israel occupied the West Bank (where the Palestinian state was
8.Cf. P. Pieraccini - E. Dusi, “Gerusalemme: un accordo impossibile?” in Limes, 1/2001, 98. For relations between the Holy See and Jerusalem, cf. D. Neuhaus, “The Catholic Church and the Holy City,” op. cit. 9.Cf. E. Dusi - P. Pieraccini, “La battaglia per Gerusalemme,” in Limes (www.limesonline.com/cartaceo/la-battaglia-per-Gerusalemme), July 13, 2010. 10.Cf. G. Sale, “Fifty Years after the Six-Day War,” in Civ. Catt. English Edition, July 2017. JERUSALEM: HOLY CITY, OPEN CITY to have been born) and East Jerusalem, taking them from Jordan. It went on to take the Sinai Peninsula and the Gaza strip from Egypt, and deprived Syria of the Golan Heights. This “cursed victory,” a term taken from the recent title of a book by Ahron Bregman,11 was the beginning of unending questions, disputes, failed agreements, bloody intifadas and inexpressible suffering for the two peoples – both Palestinian and Israeli – that were living next to each other and against each other. Israeli troops occupied the Old City and the Temple Mount on June 7, 1967. On that occasion, chief military rabbi General Shlomo Goren was one of the first to run to the place to bring the Sefer Torah and to sound the shofar. He also suggested that General Uzi Narkiss – according to the General’s testimony – blow up the Mosque of Omar. 45 Moshe Dayan, the Minister of Defense, restored order at the holy place and prevented further violence first of all by ordering the removal of the Israeli flags that had been placed on top of the Dome of the Rock and the Al Aqsa Mosque, and commanding the paratroopers to clear the Temple Mount.12 He restored to the Muslim militias the custody of the place: in fact, eight of the nine gates that access the Temple Mount were returned to the waqf (custodian of the Muslim holy sites); the Israelis kept possession of the ninth entrance, the so-called “Mughrabi Gate” (Gate of the Moors), where a police station was erected.13
11.Cf. A. Bregman, La vittoria maledetta. Storia di Israele e dei Territori occu- pati, Turin, Einaudi, 2017. 12.Cf. B. Morris, Vittime. Storia del conflitto arabo-sionista 1881-2001, Milan, Rizzoli, 2001, 405f. 13.After the Six Day War, Jordan had to evacuate Jerusalem. However, it retained the right to appoint the Grand Mufti, the religious leader of Jerusalemite Muslims and custodian of the Temple Mount. In 1994 this authority was transferred from Jordan to the Palestinian National Authority following a conflict between these two authorities. The peace treaty signed that year between Israel and Jordan affirmed that “Israel respects the present special role of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan in Muslim Holy shrines in Jerusalem. When negotiations on the permanent status take place, Israel will give high priority to the Jordanian historic role in these shrines.” This decision deeply irritated Arafat who, as soon as the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem died, immediately decided to appoint a Palestinian, putting him in charge and giving him the keys to the Temple Mount. The Kingdom of Jordan did the same, but their Grand Mufti was GIOVANNI SALE, SJ
Traditionalist and ultra-orthodox Jews opposed this decision as they wanted to take possession of the Temple Mount in view of a possible construction of a Third Temple. In order to discourage attempts of this kind, a few days later the rabbinate of Israel prohibited entrance to the Temple Mount – in virtue of Jewish Law that forbade all Jews from setting foot in the Holy of Holies whose exact location was unknown. From that moment onward, entrance to the Temple Mount was effectively restricted to Muslims, tourists, and non-religious Jews. In November of the same year, the U.N. Security Council approved Resolution 242, which established that Israel was supposed to restore all occupied territories in exchange for a 46 lasting peace. This should have bound Israel to keep the status quo in the Territories, but Israel did not implement it. On the contrary, it expressed the determination to extend its sovereignty in the West Bank and above all to East Jerusalem, expelling the Arab population as much as possible.14 The events of 1967 also caused an important change in the politics of the Holy See toward the Holy Land. Paul VI abandoned the goal of the internationalization of Jerusalem, which was considered unrealistic, and in some speeches promoted an “an internationally guaranteed statute,” which had the goal of safeguarding the freedom of worship and conservation of the Holy Sites, “with particular attention to the historical and religious physiognomy of Jerusalem.”15
in charge only for a short time and without any power. Concerning the role of the Kingdom of Jordan in Jerusalem cf. G. Pani, “La Giordania e Gerusalemme,” op. cit. 14.Israel annexed the eastern part of Jerusalem after its military occupation, that is, at the end of June 1967. Afterwards, the U.N. approved two important resolutions (no. 2253 and no. 2254) which condemned the annexation, and asked the State of Israel to abstain from any action which would change the status quo of the city. While the vote of the U.K. was in favor of both resolutions, the U.S., as it had already done in similar situations, abstained, but declared that they were against the territorial expansion of Israel. Neither of the two countries transferred their own embassies from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Cf. N. Erakat, “Thank you President Trump, you have finally ended US double-speak on Middle East ‘peace’, in Middle East Eye, December 8, 2017. 15.Cf. D. Neuhaus, “The Catholic Church and the Holy Land,” op. cit. JERUSALEM: HOLY CITY, OPEN CITY
Starting from June 1967, Israel occupied most of East Jerusalem: in this way, the so-called “Green Line” lost much of its significance. The new administrative boundaries of the city were thereby extended to the eastern part, enlarging its surface area from 38 square kilometers to 108 square kilometers.16 This area excluded the quarters that were more densely populated by Palestinians since they were considered difficult to administer and manage, to say nothing of their welfare needs. Instead, several areas were included that were then uninhabited, surrounding the Old City, and destined to be transformed into urban green areas. In recent decades, several Israeli settlements have been established on these lands, and they are real “settlement cities,” sometimes with more than 50,000 inhabitants. Many Jerusalemites now live there. 47 As early as 1968 the municipal authorities gave the first permits for the construction of new modern Jewish neighborhoods in Jerusalem. One of the strongest supporters of the strategy to make Jerusalem a Jewish city – in defiance of U.N. resolutions – through residential construction, was the mayor at the time, Teddy Kollek. In this way, the city would remain eternally in the hands of Israel and would not have been included in an eventual Palestinian state. Both right- and left- wing governments followed this approach in successive decades – and not only in Jerusalem. This politics of annexation followed by Israel for East Jerusalem was strongly condemned by the U.N. and by the European Union, which considered it an obstacle to the peace process. One of its declarations denounced these changes: “By the new settlements, the building of the border fence, building demolition, restriction of permits and repeated closing of Palestinian institutions, the Jewish presence in East Jerusalem is reinforced; meanwhile the Arab community weakens and urban development by Palestinians is prevented, and East Jerusalem is separated from the rest of the West Bank.”17
16.The population of Jerusalem grew to 263,000, including 197,000 Jews, 55,000 Muslims, and 11,000 Christians. Cf. P. Pieraccini - E. Dusi, “Gerusalemme: un accord impossible?” op. cit. 17.E. Dusi - P. Pieraccini, “La battaglia per Gerusalemme,” op. cit. GIOVANNI SALE, SJ
Today it is not at all easy for the Jewish people to buy land, build houses or do anything else in East Jerusalem. However, this can be done through forcing (in various ways) the Arab residents to abandon their property, or through the municipal authorities issuing ordinances of demolition with regard to dilapidated, dangerous or illegal buildings. It is forbidden to sell houses or lands to Israelis according to a fatwa (religious ruling) of 1925, reiterated in 1997. Whoever is found guilty of this “delict” is expelled from the community and is forbidden a religious funeral, nor can they be buried with other believers. Arafat himself ordered his collaborators to use heavy-handed methods in discouraging the sale of property to the Jews, and the Palestinian Minister of Justice proposed the death penalty 48 for this “crime.” Today in Jerusalem there are around 880,000 residents, of which 63 percent are Israeli and 37 percent are Palestinian. In the eastern part of the city, which was annexed after the war of 1967, there are about 300 Palestinians. Having refused Israeli citizenship in 1967 in order to delegitimize the policy of the “fait accompli” of unification, these people are considered “permanent residents.” They pay taxes and enjoy rights reserved to Israelis, but do not have the right to vote in legislative elections. According to many observers, the principal problem that Jerusalem will have to face in the future is a demographic one (that is, keeping Israel a Jewish state). In this regard, in some environments people speak of a “demographic bomb” through which, in the end, the Palestinians will be able to defeat their enemies.18 In fact, the rate of growth of Palestinians in recent years has been significantly higher than that of the Jewish people. In the 1980s and 1990s, the Jewish people benefited from the arrival of many Ashkenazi Jews, mostly observant, with many children, who came from Russia and other former Soviet countries. This immigration has now ceased.
18.Cf. S. Della Pergola, Israele e Palestina: la forza dei numeri. Il conflitto mediorientale fra demografia e politica, Bologna, il Mulino, 2007, 206. In English, cf. S. della Pergola, “Israel and Palestine: Population Trends 2017” in Ripplezoo, November 14, 2017. JERUSALEM: HOLY CITY, OPEN CITY
Jerusalem from the Oslo Accords to the Camp David Summit The “Question of Jerusalem” – its partition and ensuing contradictions – contributed in recent decades to the increasing conflict between Palestinians and Israelis. Recent history teaches that it is not possible to reach a peace agreement between the two peoples without first defining the status of the Holy City. Several attempts by the international community under the leadership of the United States to solve the Arab-Palestinian problem have tried to set aside, at least provisionally, the problem of Jerusalem, despite knowing that success of the peace process would then depend on the equitable resolution of this question, which religious groups of both sides were monitoring closely, sometimes blackmailing governments and other times baiting the population. 49 The most serious attempt to solve the very complicated Israeli-Palestinian question, upon which peace in the Middle East depends, was without any doubt that of the so-called “Oslo Accords” in the summer of 1993. Mediated by U.S. President Bill Clinton, its protagonists were Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat. It should be kept in mind that these accords, even if they were criticized by both sides, established fundamental starting points for a peace process and made possible the coexistence of the two peoples. For example, in the protocols it was established that Israel withdraw from some areas densely populated by Palestinians, such as the Gaza strip, and from other zones of the West Bank (indicated in the protocol as Zone A, while for others, indicated as Zone B and C, there were different rules). Furthermore, the right to Palestinian self-government was established in these areas through the creation of the Palestinian National Authority. There was a provision that five years after the Israeli withdrawal there could be negotiation of a definitive agreement that would have looked at more delicate problems, such as the question of Jerusalem, that of the Jewish settlements in the West Bank, and the return of Palestinian refugees. These problems have no easy solutions.19 Furthermore, the two parties signed
19.Cf. V. de Giovannangeli, “Il negoziato impossibile,” in Limes, July 13, 2010. GIOVANNI SALE, SJ
letters of mutual acknowledgment. This is without any doubt one of the most positive aspects of the Accords. The Israeli government committed to recognize the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) as the legitimate representative of the Palestinian people, while the latter recognized the right of the State of Israel to exist and renounced violence and terrorism as instruments of political strategy. According to the Palestinian activist Noura Erakat, the Accords were not based on international law – even if they promised to respect the U.N. resolutions on the issues (such as No. 242) – but simply on negotiated agreements which were given the force of law. In her opinion the consequences of these agreements for Palestinians were disastrous. “The Oslo 50 Accords,” she writes, “became a permanent structure that led to the current situation: a barrier through which Israel confiscated 13 percent of the West Bank lands. An aggressive policy of ethnic cleansing in Jerusalem, with the objective of reducing the Palestinian populations and to keep a Jewish majority.”20 It should also be remembered that, on the basis of the Oslo Accords, Israel has the military and administrative control of the entire Zone C, which covers 59 percent of the West Bank territories. As a matter of fact, the Oslo process was more favorable to the Israelis than to the Palestinians. Its gradual approach was without doubt unfavorable to the Palestinians and allowed Israel to benefit from the situation. Afterward, the only peace talks to treat directly the situation of Jerusalem was the summit held at Camp David from July 11- 24, 2000. However, these talks failed. Again these negotiations were strongly supported and mediated by President Clinton. For the first time, Israelis accepted the idea of discussing – even with pressure coming from religious parties to the contrary – the partition of Jerusalem with the Arabs who were living together with them, abandoning the position that had been firmly held up to that point, and conceding to Palestinians a sort of administrative autonomy over part of East Jerusalem.
20.N. Erakat, “La pace si ferma a Gerusalemme,” op. cit., 19. (Cf. N. Erakat, “Thank you President Trump, you have finally ended US double-speak on Middle East ‘peace’,” in Middle East Eye, December 8, 2017) JERUSALEM: HOLY CITY, OPEN CITY
Negotiations started to get more complicated when they discussed the Old City, and in particular the Temple Mount. One of the suggested proposals was to divide the Old City in two, entrusting to the Israelis the Jewish and Armenian quarters, and to the Palestinians the Muslim and Christian quarters. Besides not satisfying either of the two parties, this solution alarmed the Churches and Christians present in the Holy Land. They signed and sent to Camp David a letter in which they protested against the division of the Old City and asked instead for an “internationally guaranteed special status.” While Israeli and American negotiators wanted to treat one problem at a time with the aim of finding concrete solutions for each question debated, the Palestinians asked that the negotiations start with the definition of general principles. In 51 particular, Arafat asserted that the negotiation would have gone further if the Israeli party (represented by Prime Minister Ehud Barak) recognized Palestinian sovereignty over East Jerusalem. The outcomes of the Camp David summit were based precisely on the relations between the principles of “sovereignty” and “functional authority.” In fact, the Israelis proposed to entrust autonomous management of the Arab-majority neighborhoods of East Jerusalem to the Palestinians and to bring their capital to the populous neighborhood of Abu Dis. In return, the municipal borders of the city would have been extended to the Greater Jerusalem Model.21 Concerning the Temple Mount and the mosque, it was recommended that they be entrusted (with the right to raise a flag) to the PNA. Arafat said that he was ready to discuss the delicate matter (under the scrutiny of the entire Arab world) only on the condition that the Palestinians gained sovereignty of the entire Temple Mount except for the Western Wall. On his side, Barak suggested that one part of the Temple Mount be dedicated to the Jews for their worship. Arafat rejected the proposal. The Americans proposed a “vertical partition of sovereignty” so that Palestinians could have had the surface
21.Cf. P. Pieraccini - E. Dusi, “Gerusalemme: un accordo impossibile?” op. cit., 109. GIOVANNI SALE, SJ
of the Temple Mount where the mosques were located and the Israelis the underground. However, the Arabs refused this solution as well. The Israelis, in any case, did not fear the unshakeable stance of the Arabs and even in the following years continued their archeological excavations under and on the side of the Temple Mount. Upon returning from Camp David, Arafat was welcomed in Ramallah as a victor, for having resisted the joint pressures of Israel and the United States, and for having saved Palestinian honor. Before leaving the presidential palace, he had told Clinton: “The Arab leader has not been born who will give up Jerusalem.” Again the peace process stalled, this time definitively with regard to Jerusalem. 52 The consequences of the failure of the Camp David Summit were disastrous. In September of the same year the second intifada, called the “Al-Aqsa” intifada, began. (The first had arisen out of a refugee camp in 1987 and led to the Oslo Accords). When the leader of the right-wing Likud party, Ariel Sharon, boldly decided to go for a “simple walk” together with some of his supporters on the Temple Mount and to visit the Israeli excavations of the so-called “Solomon’s Stables” that were under the mosque, Palestinians took this act as a provocation and a profanation of their holy place. The intifada, as is known, lasted five years and claimed more than 5,000 Palestinian and 1,000 Israeli victims. Another important result of the failure of the Camp David Summit, which still has consequences today, was that subsequently Israeli leaders have decided to apply to Jerusalem a principle that had been experienced for a long time in the West Bank, and partially also in Gaza, which was to “occupy the maximum amount of territory with the minimum amount of Palestinian presence.” After Camp David, it was decided to remodel the city in a way that included the greater part of the Israeli settlements, while keeping out the Arab neighborhoods. This security measure was then reinforced starting from 2002 – in the dark years of the intifada – with the construction of a “dividing barrier” between Israel and the occupied territories, which followed a tortuous tract around Jerusalem of about 150 JERUSALEM: HOLY CITY, OPEN CITY kilometers and sometimes cut Arab villages in half, modifying the juridical status of thousands of people. Tens of thousands of Palestinians therefore found themselves in the West Bank, even though they had an Israeli identity card.
Conclusions In recent years, both in Jerusalem and in the Territories, coexistence between Israelis and Palestinians has become difficult and sometimes impossible. More than 400,000 Israelis (the so-called “settlers”), often with religious-political motivations, have moved to the West Bank, where the Palestinian state was to have been established. Today, many political and intellectual observers, even progressives and leftists, now consider the two-state solution to be obsolete 53 and impractical. They suggest a one-state solution for two populations, where all citizens, Jews and Palestinians, enjoy the same civil and political rights. They believe that the old project of a two-state solution nowadays only aims at keeping alive a corrupt political establishment, namely the Palestinian National Authority, which has failed in its objectives and would not have the support of a majority of Palestinians anymore. The international community, above all the U.N., which never recognized the annexation of East Jerusalem and the Territories, reiterates the importance of the two-state solution, where the peoples would live one next to the other in peace and security and within acknowledged boundaries. Pope Francis has spoken in these terms in his annual address to the diplomatic corps. Now, regardless of the questions linked to a one-state or two-state solution that do not pertain to this study,22 some sectors of the political and intellectual world, both Israeli and Palestinian, look to Jerusalem (beyond the “cage” of Oslo) as
22.For the ongoing debate, cf. C. De Martino, Il nuovo ordine israeliano. Oltre il paradigma dei due Stati, Rome, Castelvecchi, 2017, 19f; N. Chomsky - I. Pappé, Palestina e Israele che fare?, Rome, Fazi, 2015. In favor of a two-state solution, A. Oz, Cari fanatici, op. cit., 87f. “Yes, a compromise between Israel and Palestine. Yes, two states. Partition of this land should become the home of two families,” Ibid., 96. GIOVANNI SALE, SJ
an open, united city, without internal borders, capital of two peoples who live there. That is, a “single and shared” city, where the “entire mosaic of neighborhoods, settlements, colonies, historical suburbs, the Old City and the holy places should represent a unique urban body, in which there is total freedom of movement.”23 Such a city should have, however, a special status, with a mayor elected by all inhabitants and a municipal council that represents the two communities equally. “Jerusalem,” writes Paola Caridi, “must remain open beyond the several walls that enclose and wound it.”24 For all people, it should be an “open city”25 and represent a place of communion and peace, and not of discord and division.
54
23.P. Caridi, Jerusalem without God, op. cit. 191. 24.Ibid., 189. 25.This is what Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin says: “Jerusalem should have a special status that would make it an open city” (G. G. Vecchi, “Gerusalemme città di pace, ma solo con il dialogo diretto,” in Corriere della Sera, December 21, 2017). Paradoxes of Vulnerability
Diego Fares, SJ
In his message for the First World Day of the Poor, celebrated November 19, 2017, Pope Francis stressed “how hard it is for our contemporary world to see poverty clearly for what it is.” And yet, “in myriad ways poverty challenges us daily, in faces marked by suffering.”1 Completing the 55 otherwise abstract evaluation based on indices of vulnerability, poverty and human development – necessary but insufficient, as recognized by the United Nations Development Programme2 – the pope invites us to consider the faces of the poor. In order to see faces, and not just numbers, it is necessary to become personally involved in the life of the poor and to learn from them, walking together with them: “Promoting integral human development demands dialogue and engagement with people’s needs and aspirations, listening to the poor … initiating processes in which the poor are the principal actors and beneficiaries.”3 One of the trendy words for identifying poverty is “vulnerability.” The fact that this term is used in different academic disciplines is both an advantage and a risk. The positive side is that it allows for dialogue on common ground. The common
1.Francis, Message for the First World Day of the Poor, November 19, 2017. https://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/messages/poveri/documents/papa- francesco_20170613_messaggio-i-giornatamondiale-poveri-2017.html 2.Cf. United Nations Development Programme, Human Development Report 2015, in http://hdr.undp.org/en/content/human-development-report- 2015-work-human-development. 3.Francis, Address to participants in the congress organized by the Centesimus Annus-Pro Pontefice Foundation, May 20, 2017. https://w2.vatican.va/content/ francesco/en/speeches/2017/may/documents/papa-francesco_20170520_ centesimus-annus-pro-pontifice.html DIEGO FARES, SJ
usage makes it possible to bring together the riches of different points of view, a necessity given the complexity of the topic. The risk lies in transposing indiscriminately the characteristics of a technical or physical vulnerability into the sphere of human vulnerability. This could lead to “vulnerability” becoming an abstract concept, obscuring the problem rather than making manifest the “invisible thread that links together all exclusions” that are suffered by the vulnerable.4 First of all, we will try to give structure and precision to the various meanings of the word “vulnerability” by examining its etymology and its various uses in different disciplines. Next, we will consider the paradoxes to which the term gives rise. Finally, we will propose a few thoughts that help us to become aware of 56 how – by working to prevent various types of vulnerability – to heal those already afflicted and to care for the most vulnerable. This will show what is really at stake: the very fabric of society and its dignity.
Vulnerability as wound and blow From an etymological point of view, vulnerability comes from the Latin vulnus, which means wound, sore, cut, blow, harm. It was used with both a passive and an active meaning: 5 Una manus vobis vulnus opemque ferret, “the same hand that wounds you, heals you.” In the High Court of the Balaeric Islands, Ovid’s expression is transformed into Vulnus opem ferret, “the wound points to the one who inflicted it” (to the action and to the author). In forensic medicine, it is said in an autopsy that “the body talks.” When the wound is not visible in the flesh, when it is not possible to quantify it, when it is inflicted by an impersonal subject, it is harder to determine “what caused it” and the impact this has on other aspects of life.
4.The invisible thread of those “destructive realities that belong to a system that has become global” (Francis, Address to the Second World Meeting of Popular Movements, Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia, July 9, 2015). http:// w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/speeches/2015/july/documents/papa- francesco_20150709_bolivia-movimenti-popolari.html 5.Ovid, Remedia amoris, 4, 44. THE PARADOXES OF VULNERABILITY
Measuring the meager defenses that allow a virus to damage the health of a person or the low wages that render families vulnerable is relatively easy. It is much harder to understand the extreme degree of vulnerability caused by war, or by a lack of assurances in civil society or by scant hope for the future that leads the father of a family to leave his homeland behind and emigrate to another country. The radical nature of such an undertaking should be enough to conclude with certainty that society has suffered a real and profound wound. This is what we need to keep in mind. Otherwise, we could unwittingly focus on only the visible and quantifiable wounds or, worse still, the possibility of such a wound, and lose sight of the social dimension of vulnerability and its real cause. Reporting real damage to rights or to the dignity of someone, 57 and analyzing and measuring the degree of vulnerability of that person or social group, are not the same thing.6 This second way of looking at the term ends up creating a new identity: that of the vulnerable. This can be a way of taking responsibility away from the one who wounds.7
Vulnerability as viewed in different disciplines The term “vulnerability” has gained an ever greater presence in different academic disciplines.8 It was first used in the 1970s and by the year 2000 had supplanted the concept of “exclusion” that was popular in the 1990s when speaking about “social fragility.”9 Today, the term is used as a sort of code when describing personal, social, even religious or financial problems in different contexts.10
6.Cf. A. Madrid Pérez, Palabras que piensan: “soy ‘vulnerable’ o me ‘vulneran’? in www.mientrastanto.org/boletin-129/notas/palabras-que-piensan-soy-vulnera- ble-o-me-vulneran. 7.Today’s manipulation, compared to all the shows of strength, simply ignores the person as ‘free will.’ (H. U. von Balthasar, Teodram-matica, vol. IV, Milan, Jaca Book, 1986, 147). 8.The uses of this term grew notably between the years 2000 and 2014 (cf. A. Brodiez-Dolino, Le concept de vulnérabilité, in www.laviedesidees.fr/Le- concept-de-vulnerabilite.html). 9.Cf. A. Brodiez-Dolino (ed.), Vulnérabilités sanitaires et sociales: De l’histoire à la sociologie, Rennes, Pur, 2014. 10.Cf. R. Maiolini, Tra ferita e cura: Per una riflessione sulla vulnerabilità dell’esistenza umana alla luce del pensiero occidentale, in Credere oggi 37 (2017) 27. DIEGO FARES, SJ
The versatility of the term can be seen in the fact that vulnerability is both universal and personal; every creature is vulnerable but each in a distinctive way. The term is also relational and contextual; it cannot be taken out of its historic context. It is also reversible, given that it is possible to intervene in its causes and its context.11 Let’s look at two examples of usage: one on the natural level and another on the technical level. In civil engineering, “seismic vulnerability” means the propensity of a structure to suffer a specific amount of damage caused by a specific intensity in a movement of the earth. Here, the proportionality between cause and effect is clear and is, in some ways, inevitable and predictable at a material level. 58 In the technological field, “vulnerability” is a weakness in a system that can be taken advantage of to damage it. In this field it is important to underline the fact that vulnerability is seen in reference to hackers, individuals who make a decision to strike. Another thing to keep in mind is that vulnerability in one area, however small it might be, can compromise the entire system in a more radical way than in nature.
Paradoxes of vulnerability In real life, vulnerability shows its complex and paradoxical nature in the way that material resilience12 can grow exponentially, so that what constitutes a vulnerability at one level transforms into a positive force at another and vice versa. The foundation of the paradoxical nature of vulnerability finds its origins in its contrast with autonomy.13 Autonomy, which underlies many of our convictions and our claims of rights and responsibilities, is a task: we must grow into being autonomous,
11.Cf. M.-H. Soulet, “Vulnérabilité et enfance en danger: Quel rapport? Quels apports?” in Dossier Oned, May 2014, Vulnérabilité, identification des risques et protection de l’enfance, edited by L. Lardeux, 128-139. 12.Regarding resilience – initially interpreted as an innate quality – currently the prevailing tendency is to consider it a process strictly connected to communitarian and cultural dimensions. 13.For what follows, cf. P. Ricoeur, Autonomía y vulnerabilidad, Paris, Esprit, 1995, 85-105, in https://documents.tips/documents/paul-ricoeur-autonomia-y- vulnerabilidad.html. THE PARADOXES OF VULNERABILITY precisely because we are vulnerable. Our vulnerability and intrinsic limitedness, rather than being an affirmation of our impotence or weakness, actually serve as notice that life is a task, something to be constructed. In the paradox between vulnerability and autonomy, it is interesting to notice the relationship between the two – they are opposites and yet they complement one another – within the same universe of thought.14 Humans are both one and the other, from different points of view: their autonomy is that of a fragile, vulnerable being; our vulnerability drives us to seek autonomy. This paradoxical character of vulnerability reveals its richness and makes of it the gateway to the mystery of our being personal, social and open to the transcendent. 59 An autonomous being that needs the aid of others On the personal-familial level, we see, on the one hand, that no one is more vulnerable than a newborn. Yet paradoxically, no other creature in the universe is stronger and more capable of development, if aided by the arms of his or her mother and by the loving, protective and stimulating context of a family. Therefore, when we speak of a newborn, “vulnerable” is not the right word, unless we are imagining a child in a situation where something or someone poses a direct and imminent threat. Our need to be sustained by others is more an “embraceability” and a “vulnerability.”15 Therefore, fragility has a positive meaning. The love of a mother (and of every person) that inspires us to protect and caress a newborn, spontaneously brings together a sense of duty and freedom and makes us enter into the mystery of our being-in-relation. We are beings that come into the world and grow thanks to others and with others. We are not closed in on ourselves, but rather exposed and this is what makes us vulnerable.
14.“In the old contrast between freedom and determinism, the thesis springs from the moral universe (freedom) and the antithesis from the physical universe (determinism). Philosophy need do nothing more than distinguish them and confine each to its proper order” (ibid.). 15.From the root vel of the word vulnus, it is possible to make reference to uncovered skin, exposed and unprotected, like the skin of a newborn that “invites a caress, not harm”: cf. S. Vázquez, Inclinaciones políticas: vulnerables e inermes, in laU, July 5, 2017, http://la-u.org/inclinaciones-politicas-vulnerables-e-inermes. DIEGO FARES, SJ
Artificial vulnerability is greater than natural vulnerability At the biological level, we can say that, on one hand, humans are the most vulnerable species16 and, on the other hand, that humanity is not “too vulnerable.” As opposed to animals, the fundamental relationship of the individual with the species and the world is open. We do not have biological characteristics of adaptation to a single environment nor do we have a determining instinct that limits our actions,17 and this makes us more vulnerable as individuals and, at the same time, more capable of human development (rational, free, political, transcendent). As a species, we have not only survived, but we have grown and contrived many ways of defending ourselves from the wrath of nature. The paradox is that we are more vulnerable still in the 60 artificial structures that we have created.18
What wounds has a qualitative value, not a quantitative one If we reflect on social vulnerability, the great paradox to consider is that many aspects that are less able to be measured quantitatively – such as freedom, the value of one’s personal opinion, social-political recognition, freedom of religious expression – from a qualitative point of view, are those of greater weight regarding feeling vulnerable as persons or groups, when they are not respected. The Human Development Index (HDI) and the Social Vulnerability Index (SVI)19 have become more complex over time. To the traditional categories of longevity, like educational levels and quality of life, others have been added like gender. There is a need now to revisit the question of human development
16.“Humanity is the most important species threatened by climate change,” cf. M. Chan, president of OMS, in https://www.globalhealthnow.org/2017-05/ most-important-endangered-species-humans). 17.Cf. R. Fayos Febrer, “Vulnerabilidad e indigencia de la condición humana,” in A. Cayuela (ed.), Vulnerables: Pensar la fragilidad humana, Madrid, Encuentro, 2005, 15f. 18.“Economic disasters are just as devastating as natural disasters” (J. Stiglitz, “Molti vinti pochi vincitori,” in L’Espresso, October 29, 2017, 38-41). 19.The SVI is calculated according to the following formula: a * Illiteracy + b * chronic malnutrition + c * poverty rates + d * infant morality rates + e * ethnicity + Fc. THE PARADOXES OF VULNERABILITY in light of the different phases of the life cycle20 and the relation of vulnerability to development, security and human rights.21 It must be remembered that statistics are compiled with the available data, while other data are ignored, when they are not trustworthy or when they cannot be obtained in all countries.22 To demonstrate the weight of qualitative realities, it is necessary, on the one hand, to expand the reflection, by using a systematic approach and, on the other, to integrate it with the subjective opinions of the most vulnerable. In research on vulnerable groups, one can note how individuals identify “vulnerability” with “insecurity,” making reference to political and economic crises, war and natural disasters.23 It is also of vital importance to keep in mind one aspect that might seem unmeasurable: hope. The poorest of the poor 61 dedicate their mental efforts to confront the “here and now” and the question of survival. Consequently, “they see their capacity to think in a strategic way and to make long term plans shrink.”24 This vulnerability of “hope” inflicts a mortal wound on everything else.
The essentials of life are lived in fragility What is essential in human life is lived in fragility. Values such as love, beauty, democracy, peace and life are, at the same time, both fragile and powerful. The key to understanding a society consists in evaluating how it respects and cares for the most vulnerable more than in its technological capabilities or
20.Cf. United Nations Development Programme, Report on Human Development 2016, in http://hdr.undp.org/en/2016-report. 21.Cf. Ibid., Report on Human Development 2015, op. cit. 22.A report of the United Nations Development Programme states: “Given that reliable data are not available … the privation of a level of comfortable life has been measured by two indicators instead of three: the percentage of the population without sustainable access to an adequate source of water and the percentage of underweight children” (United Nations Development Programme, Report on Human Development 2006, http://hdr.undp.org/en/content/human- development-report-2006. 23.Cf. J. Stigliz, “Expand our reflection on Vulnerability” in http://hdr. undp.org/sites/default/files/hdr14-report-en-1.pdf 24.Ibid. DIEGO FARES, SJ
wealth or military might. To understand a nation, it is essential to know which “politics of fragility” it puts into action.25 In a society in which politics, as the search for and realization of the common good, dominates all other forces, the most vulnerable are – and must be – the most protected, in an analogous way to the family because in them is found what is most important and what is specifically human.
Wounds that heal On a technological level, we find the paradoxical affirmation that the Apostle Peter takes up from Isaiah: “By his wounds, you were healed.”26 What does it mean to say “wounds provide healing”? We say it all the time, but it is not so obvious that 62 one wound can heal others. This statement, focusing our attention on the wounds of the risen Christ, summarizes the whole of Christian doctrine. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) says, the question about the existence of evil does not have a simple answer: “There is not a single aspect of the Christian message that is not in part an answer to the question of evil.”27 If we want to place the topic of vulnerability in the proper theological context, we must consider at least three important principles of Christian doctrine in an articulated way. The first is that all of creation is good and that sin is drama with an open end, not a tragedy. As the Bible says, when God considers his creation, he sees that the creatures are “good.”28 Sacred Scripture considers the mystery of evil as the consequence of the abuse of freedom caused by temptation,29 not as the result of an original defect. Paradoxically, what was vulnerable was not the fragile flesh but rather the spirit and its desire to be like God. Freedom was tempted by the devil, whom Jesus called a
25.Cf. F. Poché, Une politique de la fragilité, Paris, Cerf, 2004. 26.1 Pet 2:23-25; Is 53:4-5. 27.CCC 309. 28.Cf. Gen 1:12. 29.Cf. CCC 397. THE PARADOXES OF VULNERABILITY
30 “murderer (vulnerator) from the beginning.” In this way, sin has left us wounded and vulnerable, subject to sickness and death, but has not totally corrupted our nature that, even if wounded, remains essentially good.31 The second principle refers to the Incarnation and states that the Lord redeems what he has assumed. By becoming incarnate of the sinless flesh of Mary, the Lord reaffirms “the goodness of creation,” confirming that the fragility of our flesh, when held and cared for by familial love (which in his case was that of Mary and Joseph), is something positive. For this reason, acknowledging “Jesus Christ come in the flesh”32 means professing the essential goodness of all flesh in its fragility that must “be supported.” But it must be supported from within, assumed, taken on. For, as Irenaeus says, “that which has not 63 been assumed has not been redeemed.” Taking on our flesh, the Lord begins redemption. Allowing himself to be wounded in the passion, up to the final blow of the lance, he conquers the fear of death and any kind of exclusion.33 Freely embracing his passion, he gives witness to the fact that no one takes his life, but only wounds it in part; it is he, himself, who gives it wholly. The essential positivity of human fragility is reinforced with the positivity of being capable of taking on “vulnerabilities” as they were (the persecutions, the cross), thanks to the redemptive meaning given to them by the Lord, in his taking them on. The third principle deals with the gift of the Spirit and the Kingdom. It holds that we save ourselves by caring for and healing the vulnerability of others. From the open wound in the heart of Jesus spring forth the sacraments; the Church is born. Showing his wounds, the Risen
30.John 8:44. Peter uses the image of a “roaring lion looking for someone to devour” (1 Pet 5:8). In the Spiritual Exercises (ES), Saint Ignatius uses the image of a captain who, “observing the forces or defenses of a castle, attacks it at the weakest point” (ES 327). 31.CCC 405-406. The wound of original sin manifests itself in the four vul- nerabilities of the soul, the opposites of the four cardinal virtues: ignorance, malice, fragility and concupiscence (cf. Thomas Aquinas, Sum. Theol., I-II, q. 85, a. 3). 32.1 John 4:2. 33.It was the fact of feeling “excluded” from the favor of God that lead Cain to kill his brother (cf. 1 John 3:12-14). DIEGO FARES, SJ
Lord sends forth the Holy Spirit who, “healing the wounds of sin… renews us interiorly through a spiritual transformation 34 (cf. Eph 4:23).” In this way, the Lord establishes his Kingdom, maintaining the seal of vulnerability – when it is identified with the “wounds,” as we see in the parable of the Good Samaritan – and making care for the vulnerable the criterion for final judgment (cf. Matt 25). In the dynamic of the parable of the Good Samaritan, the involvement of the protagonist with the wounded man carries the stamp of the Incarnation and the saving passion of the Lord. The Samaritan takes responsibility for the wounded man, even promising to return in order to “pay” whatever further expenses are incurred in caring for him. This need not be interpreted as 64 an extraordinary work of mercy. Binding wounds rather than inflicting them, including and incorporating into society rather than excluding and abandoning, and paying the further expenses show the way of “repaying” the gracious gift of our existence.
In wounding others, we harm ourselves We cannot respond to the gift of life with another, equivalent gift, one that would “repay” as much as we have received. For us, the only appropriate way to respond to the gift of our existence with something equivalent is to “honor the other.”35 Honoring the other, especially the wounded one, is the way in which humankind can make itself worthy of what it has received. Dignity (from the Latin dignus, in Greek, axios) is a value regarding the weight, respect and esteem that a person merits by the fact of being a person. Recognizing this in others means recognizing oneself as equal to the other in this fundamental aspect of being “created” that is more essential than all of our differences: being was given to us. Wounding the dignity of the other implies wounding the equality that we have in common. Whoever treats the other in an undignified way also becomes undignified (without weight or value).
34.CCC 1695. 35.Cf. P. Gilbert, La pazienza d’essere. Metafisica. L’analogia e i trascendentali, Rome, Pontificio Istituto Biblico, 2015, ch. 13. THE PARADOXES OF VULNERABILITY
This ontological meaning of dignity provides the foundation for its ethical meaning. Becoming undignified is the equivalent of becoming weak, losing the weight and value constitutive of our personhood. Plato, in the dialogue Gorgias, demonstrates what happens when someone is wounded. Socrates says to Callicles: “I deny, Callicles, that to be wrongfully boxed on the ear is the deepest disgrace, or to have either my person cut or my purse stolen; I hold that to strike or cut wrongfully is yet more of a disgrace and an evil, and likewise stealing and kidnapping and housebreaking, and in short any wrong whatsoever done to me or mine, are both worse and more shameful to the wrongdoer than to me the wronged.”36 Justice, which is the virtue that orders people in relationship 65 to give to each his or her own, is the foundation of our political and social being. Wounding justice, even if no one notices, wounds the social being of the person who commits an injustice. Not wounding the other is an issue not only of a social pact or peaceful coexistence, much less of mercy toward the poor, but of outward justice: a question rooted in our very being as persons. Wounding another person means wounding myself, where what is most “mine” is an “us.” If in striking another I wound myself – and wound the “us” that is our social being – when I embrace the other and care for that person, I repair our social fabric in its most intimate part, which springs forth from the recognition of an equal human poverty.37
The obligation of caring for the wounded We have come to the final paradoxes that transform into an advantage. The first consists in the fact that healing wounds, although it is in the end a duty (one for which we will be judged), is proposed to us as a beatitude, as a preferential option, capable of going beyond what is just and required, capable of “paying more.”
36.Plato, Gorgias, 508 d-e. 37.Cf. P. Gilbert, “Paul Ricoeur: reflexión, ontología y acción,” in Algunos pensadores contemporáneos de lengua francesa, Mexico, Universidad Iberoameri- cana, 1996, 123-176. DIEGO FARES, SJ
If we start with measures of the degree of vulnerability of the wounded and not from the actual vulnus, we will not arrive at the unconditional and total embrace that is necessary to cure the wounds. Pope Francis, in preparing for the First World Day of the Poor, described the unconditional embrace needed to respond to vulnerability in this way: “All the poor – as Blessed Paul VI loved to say – belong to the Church by ‘evangelical 38 right’ and require of us a fundamental option on their behalf. Blessed, therefore, are the open hands that embrace the poor and help them: they are hands that bring hope. Blessed are the hands that reach beyond every barrier of culture, religion and nationality, and pour the balm of consolation over the wounds of humanity. Blessed are the open hands that ask nothing in 66 exchange, with no ‘ifs’ or ‘buts’ or ‘maybes’: they are hands that call down God’s blessing upon their brothers and sisters.”39 Considering vulnerability as something “that belongs to the Church” as mother, by evangelical right, radically goes beyond the approach to vulnerability considered from the outside, identifying “vulnerable groups” or measuring “degrees of vulnerability.” The instinctive move is to embrace the wounded as persons, caring for and tending to them until they can recover. This is what makes a social group its best self. Not doing so means losing dignity – not just for each person but for each nation and for an entire civilization – losing social “weight,” becoming weak, even if our economic, military and technological strength makes us believe we are invincible.
The wounded healer The second paradox is that of the wounded healer. Pope Francis affirms: “After all, it is a perilous deception to think we are invulnerable. A girl I met on my recent journey to Colombia said: ‘vulnerability is intrinsic to the essential nature of humankind.’”40
38.Paul VI, Address at the Opening of the Second Session of the Second Vati- can Ecumenical Council, Sept. 29, 1963 https://w2.vatican.va/content/paul-vi/la/ speeches/1963/documents/hf_p-vi_spe_19630929_concilio-vaticano-ii.html 39.Francis, Message for the First World Day of the Poor, op. cit. 40.Francis, Address to participants in the conference organized by the Pontifical Council for Promoting New Evangelization, Oct. 21, 2017 - http:// THE PARADOXES OF VULNERABILITY
That encounter took place at the end of an intense day. When the pope came back to the Nunciature, a large crowd was waiting for him, singing and dancing. Francis stopped to thank them and, listening to the message read by three children with mental disabilities, he was struck by what one of them said. He asked her what her name was. “Lina María,” the child replied. The pope, calling her by name, asked her to reread what she had just said about vulnerability. The child, filled with emotion, reread it, raising her eyes at each pause: “We want a world in which vulnerability is recognized as essential in what is human. Far from making us weak, it strengthens us and gives us dignity. A common ground that makes us human.” The difficulty the child had in reading, overcome by her efforts (she had practiced over and over again in the preceding days), made her speak of vulnerability, in her own 67 personal vulnerability, with evangelical force. Francis then expressed his wish for “a world in which vulnerability is considered the essence of humanity.” He described it as “the need of being supported by God.” “We all are vulnerable, all of us. This vulnerability must be respected, embraced, cared for as much as possible, so that it bears fruit for others. It is the essence of the human being, this need to be sustained by God, all of us. This is why no one can be thrown away; is this clear? Because everyone of us is a treasure, offered to God, so that God makes us grow in his way.” At the end, the pope asked for prayers, as he always does, adding: “Because I, too, am very vulnerable.”41
w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/it/speeches/2017/october/documents/papa- francesco_20171021_convegno-pcpne.html 41.Francis, Words in front of the Nunciature in Bogota, September 7, 2017. Three days later, the wound the Holy Father received on his right cheek and above his right eye, caused when he bent down to greet a child from the popemobile, seemed to confirm the “vulnerability” confessed by Francis - http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/es/speeches/2017/september/documents/ papa-francesco_20170907_viaggioapostolico-colombia-nunziatura.html Korea: the State of Play Amid historic summits and seesaw diplomacy
Kim Youn-su, SJ and Antonio Spadaro, SJ
On April 27, 2018, a historic meeting took place between Moon Jae-in, the president of the Republic of Korea, and Kim Jong-un, the leader of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. The meeting concluded with a declaration affirming their 68 mutual commitment to bringing war between the countries to an end and building a denuclearized Korean Peninsula. The success of this inter-Korean summit paved the way to a historic meeting between the North Korean leader and the president of the United States in Singapore on June 12, 2018. Enthusiasm was expressed by many Koreans and international observers, but there were also skeptics. Hoping for continued progress for the peace process both on the Korean Peninsula and beyond, we would like to retrace these recent events step-by-step, offering our own assessment and perspective on the future.
Building trust between Moon and Kim The April 27 summit between Moon and Kim was the third between the Korean heads of state. The previous two summits took place in Pyongyang, the capital of North Korea, and this one took place in South Korea at the “Peace House” in the southern part of Panmunjom. This was the first time that the North Korean leader had set foot in South Korean territory, entering the country by means of a structure built on the border where the armistice had been ratified by the two nations in 1953. After having crossed the border at the demilitarized zone (DMZ), Kim was warmly welcomed by President Moon, who immediately asked, “Now that you have come to the South, when KOREA: THE STATE OF PLAY can I visit the North?” Kim responded, “Would you like to enter North Korea now?” Kim and Moon then stepped over together into North Korean territory hand-in-hand before reentering the South and beginning the official welcome ceremony, during which they continually exchanged cordial signs of friendship and goodwill. The most important moment occurred when the two met privately for a half-hour dialogue on a nearby jetty. After the summit, 77.5 percent of South Koreans described Kim Jong-un as trustworthy, 86.3 percent approved the way Moon conducted himself, and 88.7 percent called the summit a success.1 These figures suggest a strong desire for reconciliation on the part of the people. Pope Francis had earnestly followed these events and, two days before the summit at his General Audience on April 25, 69 he expressed support for the efforts of the two leaders: “To the Korean peoples who fervently desire peace, I assure my personal prayers and the closeness of the entire Church. The Holy See accompanies, supports and encourages any useful and sincere initiative to build a better future in the spirit of encounter and friendship among peoples. I ask those who have direct political responsibilities to have the courage of hope by becoming ‘artisans’ of peace and I call them to continue with trust along the path they have begun for the good of all.”2
The Panmunjom Declaration The summit was capped by a joint agreement titled, the Panmunjom Declaration for Peace, Prosperity and Unification
1.Cf. http://imnews.imbc.com/replay/2018/nwdesk/article/4593810_22663. html 2.Recent developments on the Korean Peninsula seem to correspond to the “culture of encounter” that Pope Francis has invited nations to pursue in international relations and which he applied directly to the Korean Peninsula during his Apostolic Visit to South Korea in 2014. Cf. Spadaro, Il nuovo mondo di Francesco: Come il Vaticano sta cambiando la politica globale, Venice, Marsilio, 2018; Il viaggio di papa Francesco nella Repubblica di Corea: Custodia, empatia, consolazione, in Civ. Catt. 2014 III 403-418; Korea’s Present and Future: An interview with Archbishop Hyginus Kim Hee-joong, Civ. Catt. English Edition, Dec. 2017 pp. 78-89. KIM YOUN-SU, SJ AND ANTONIO SPADARO, SJ
3 of the Korean Peninsula. The first point of the Declaration expresses a shared commitment to facilitate a “comprehensive and groundbreaking advancement in inter-Korean relations” in order to bring forth a “future of co-prosperity and reunification led by Koreans.” The second point affirms a joint effort to alleviate military tensions and eliminate the threat of war by means of complete cessation of “all hostile acts against each other in every domain, including land, air and sea.” The third point expresses an agreement to establish “a permanent and solid peace regime on the Korean Peninsula,” carried out through “disarmament in a phased manner” and reaffirming common efforts to transform the armistice into “a robust peace regime” and to build “a Korean Peninsula free 70 of nuclear arms.” Even though the majority of Koreans and international journalists praised the summit, others were perplexed and doubtful about the results. The New York Times, for example, published an article on April 27 titled “North and South Korea Summit Is Short on Details, but Long on Theater,”4 pointing out that the two leaders did not specify the details about how to create a regime of peace and implement a process of denuclearization. We must understand, however, why the two Korean leaders were not in a position to specify details. Since the United States and China also took part in the armistice of July 27, 1953, the two Korean leaders were unable to declare a formal and proper end to the Korean War. They must rather collaborate with the leaders of the United States and China to bring the conflict to an official conclusion. For this reason, the leaders affirmed a commitment “to actively pursue trilateral meetings involving the two Koreas and the United States, or quadrilateral meetings involving the two Koreas, the United States and China with a view to declaring an end to the Korean War
3.The text is published on www.korea.net. 4.Russell Goldman and Choe Sang-Hun, “North and South Korea Summit Is Short on Details, but Long on Theatre,” in New York Times, April 27, 2018, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/27/world/asia/north-korea- south-border.html. KOREA: THE STATE OF PLAY
… and establishing a permanent and solid peaceful regime” (Panmunjom Declaration, 3.3). It is important to note that Moon and Kim “agreed to actively seek the support and cooperation of the international community for the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula” (Panmunjom Declaration, 3.4). President Moon also clearly affirmed that this inter-Korean meeting would have a guiding role to play in the summit between North Korea and the United States. On May 9, Moon met with Chinese and Japanese ministers. On May 8, for the second time in two months, Kim met with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Dalian, a northern port city near North Korea, signaling Beijing’s key role in political and diplomatic developments on the Korean Peninsula. Moon subsequently left for the 71 United States for his second meeting with President Trump in Washington on May 22.
‘Our desire for unification’ Even though the two leaders were unable to hammer out the details, they were able to make some specific decisions, such as the joint participation of Korean athletes in the 2018 Asian Games and a program of reuniting separated families, the next stage of which is scheduled for August 15, 2018. Thus they solidified plans regarding all the points on which they were able to reach an accord. There were other encouraging signs in the wake of the meeting. On May 1, for example, both Koreas, as promised, dismantled loudspeakers along the border that had been used to broadcast propaganda. Then, on May 5, North Korea changed its official time, which had been a half-hour behind that of South Korea, to bring it into conformity with the latter. During the summit, Kim had said he would rewind the hands of the clock to the former unified time – since it had indeed been the North that had originally taken the initiative to change its time. Kim followed up on his promise. On the eve of the inter-Korean summit, musicians from North and South Korea performed a joint concert on April 3 in Pyongyang, including a piece, titled “Our Desire for KIM YOUN-SU, SJ AND ANTONIO SPADARO, SJ
Unification,” that North and South Koreans continue to learn from infancy. Despite the history of antagonistic and tragic incidents between the two countries, the Koreans have never lost their desire for unification. According to a poll conducted immediately after the summit, 75.5 percent of South Koreans favor the need for unification,5 while 73.7 percent believe that reunification will be achieved within the next 30 years.6 Many Koreans believe that the most urgent task for the two leaders is to reunite separated families. After the 1950-1953 conflict, around ten million Koreans suffered separation of their families between the North and the South. Given the political climate, many of them are unable to visit one another, and in many cases they have not even been able to confirm whether 72 their loved ones are still alive. There have been 21 opportunities for separated families to reunite since 1985, but only a small fraction of them have done so successfully, and only for a day or two. In South Korea, around 130,000 people have requested to enroll in the government family-reunification program since it was introduced in 2015.
A change in atmosphere after a decade of icy relations Koreans, however, are also reflecting on 10 lost years in the process of pacifying the Korean Peninsula. The first inter- Korean summit took place in 2000, and the second in 2007. What happened between the second and third summits of 2007 and 2018? Was it a period of total setback for the efforts at peace and reunification? During the presidency of Lee Myung-bak (2008-2013) and Park Geun-hye (2013-2017), relations between North and South Korea continued to deteriorate to the point of nearly nullifying the accords reached in the preceding summits. The North had developed nuclear arms and performed missile tests. In the South, President Lee announced unilateral sanctions in 2010 including the suspension of all inter-Korean trade except for the industrial complex of Kaesong (KIC) near the
5.Cf. http://www.kinu.or.kr/pyxis-api/1/digital-files/c59a3264-4fe1-4f08- 9595-f195e0db1bed 6.Cf. http://news.kbs.co.kr/news/view.do?ncd=3642525 KOREA: THE STATE OF PLAY demilitarized zone. Park, after assuming the presidency, tried to restore a certain level of trust. Despite her efforts, tensions between the South and the North continued to escalate following nuclear tests by North Korean and joint military exercises on the part of South Korea and the United States. Finally, in 2016, Park decided to close KIC, considered the last trace of improvement in inter-Korean relations reached by President Kim Dae-jung after 2002. As soon as this last piece of the legacy was dismantled, relations between the North and South completely froze over. At the beginning of the presidency of Moon Jae-in, following the 2017 “Candlelight Revolution,”7 a hope for change in North-South relations was reignited in the hearts of many South Koreans because they saw in Moon a return of 73 the spirit of Presidents Kim Dae-jung (1998-2003) and Roh Moo-hyun (2003-2008), who had visited North Korea for summit meetings with Kim Jong-il, father of current leader Kim Jong-un. In his first year as president, Moon attempted to rekindle a dialogue with the North. The latter never responded in kind. To the contrary, North Korea announced it had developed a small hydrogen bomb after a sixth nuclear test on September 3, 2017. Then, on November 25, 2017, North Korea launched a class Hwaseong-15 intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM). Despite these gestures of mistrust, Moon did not back down in his conciliatory efforts and finally made decisive steps to foster a dialogue for peace. In a speech given on the occasion of the New Year, there were signs that Kim had changed his attitude. After announcing that the country’s nuclear plan had reached completion, he announced the possibility that North Korean athletes might compete in the Winter Olympic Games in Pyeongchang, South Korea, in February 2018, accepting President Moon’s invitation for the two nations to compete together under one flag. This, in fact, is what happened.
7.Cf. Seil Oh, “After the Candlelight Revolution in South Korea,” in Civ. Catt. English Edition June 2018. KIM YOUN-SU, SJ AND ANTONIO SPADARO, SJ
A month later, toward the end of March, Kim made his first official foreign visit, going to Beijing in an armored train. The trip was organized by the direct invitation of Chinese President Xi Jingping. Kim’s wife, Ri Sol-ju, and several personal advisers joined him on the trip. Kim told Xi that he was open to the idea of initiating official diplomatic ties with the United States and of undertaking a process of denuclearization in his country and moving forward in cooperation with South Korea.
The May pirouettes On the heels of the April summit between Kim and Moon came a meeting between Kim and Trump in Singapore on 74 June 12. South Korea had been engaged in closed-door conversations with the United States ever since the initial phases of the inter-Korean summit in April. Furthermore, the current U.S. Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo – his appointment had not yet been announced; at the time he was head of the Central Intelligence Agency – made a secret visit to North Korea on April 26 to meet Kim and begin preparing a summit between Kim and Trump. This was revealed in an article published by The Washington Post and confirmed subsequently by United States government, as well as by Trump himself. According to some analysts, Pompeo’s background in American intelligence with the CIA shows that what has happened on the Korean Peninsula should not be framed merely in diplomatic terms.8 Pompeo made a second visit to North Korea on May 8.9 On the following day, three United
8.Cf. M. Landler, “Spies, not diplomats, take lead role in planning Trump’s North Korea Meeting,” in The New York Times, March 16, 2018. 9.This was the third meeting between an American government representative and a North Korea official. In 2000, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright visited Pyongyang, at which time she had the opportunity to discuss strategic questions with Kim Jong-il, the father of the current North Korean leader. More recently, in 2014, James Clapper, Director of National Intelligence, made a trip to Pyongyang to finalize the release of two American prisoners and to meet with the North Korean intelligence official. KOREA: THE STATE OF PLAY
States citizens were freed from North Korean prisons. Trump expressed gratitude to Kim Jong-un for releasing these detained American citizens, calling it a gesture of good will. A series of contradictory events ensued in the following days: a swinging back and forth of announcements, accusations and counter-accusations, followed by conciliations and clarifications. These were accompanied by a seesaw of media reports fed by official declarations and tweets. All this needs to be accounted for if we are to understand the events and general climate surrounding the historic meeting in Singapore on June 12. On May 12, North Korea announced to the United Nations that it did not intend to conduct any more unannounced missile tests or launch any intercontinental missiles. The 75 decision was communicated from Pyongyang in the course of meetings between North Korean officials and representatives of the International Organization of Civil Aviation (ICAO). The announcement was made through a bulletin issued by ICAO, which specified that Ri Yong Son, deputy director general of North Korea’s aviation administration, had declared that further tests would not be carried out because the national program for nuclear arms was completed: hardly a peripheral detail. Another step followed. The official news agency of North Korea – the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) – announced that a complete dismantling of the nuclear site at Punggye- ri would take place between May 23 and May 25, including the destruction of tunnels using high-power explosives and the closure of access to the tunnel system. This decision was included in the commitments Kim made at his April 29 meeting with South Korean President Moon Jae-in in Panmunjom. Punggye-ri was the site of six nuclear tests between 2006 and 2017. The demolition was witnessed by a group of journalists from South Korea, China, the United States, Great Britain and Russia. Some analysts greeted the news with skepticism since it was announced that part of the site had already collapsed as the result of a recent nuclear experiment, rendering it unstable. Nevertheless, it was a positive and encouraging sign. KIM YOUN-SU, SJ AND ANTONIO SPADARO, SJ
May 16, however, witnessed a sudden and unexpected escalation in tension between North Korea and the United States: Pyongyang threatened to cancel the June 12 summit meeting between Kim and Trump, and it canceled previously scheduled high-level talks with Seoul that were supposed to take place in the demilitarized zone on the border. The reason, claimed Pyongyang, was the joint military exercises conducted by Seoul and Washington, which had recently been initiated a short distance away from where the talks were to take place. However, an urgent telephone call between North Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha and U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, reconfirmed the joint desire to continue on course toward the summit in Singapore. 76 The next day, Trump himself, in an announcement made to journalists at the White House, declared that the talks to organize the summit would go on as scheduled. Moreover, the president excluded the Libyan model10 for an accord with Pyongyang: a model recalled the previous week by national security advisor John Bolton. An announcement that eased tensions was made on May 19: Han Tae-song, the North Korean ambassador to Switzerland, stated during a conference that North Korea’s cessation of nuclear tests was “an important step toward global disarmament,” and that Pyongyang “would join the international desire and effort for a total blockade of nuclear tests.” A series of highs and lows quickly followed, leading to a mix of anxiety and hope. On May 22, when Trump hosted South Korean President Moon Jae-in at the White House, Trump suggested that the summit between him and North Korean President Kim Jong-un scheduled for June 12 might not take place after all: “We are continuing to work with North Korea,” he affirmed, “to see each other in Singapore, but it is not a given that it will happen. I think it will happen, but perhaps not on that date. I have noticed a different attitude from Kim after the second meeting he had with Chinese President Xi.”
10.Once he decided not to develop a nuclear program, Gadhafi could not escape his ultimate fate. KOREA: THE STATE OF PLAY
The accusation, albeit veiled, was that the president of China, during meetings with Kim in Dalian on May 8, had led the North Korean leader to adopt a firmer tone leading up to the latter’s meeting with Trump. Pyongyang added further fuel to the fire by suggesting that it could give the United States a “foretaste” of the terrible tragedy it could inflict upon them. In the meantime, however, North Korea had effectively taken a first step toward denuclearization by dismantling the atomic site at Punggye-ri.
Halting and restarting On May 24, the White House released a letter directly addressed to Kim from Trump in which the former told the latter that the face-to-face meeting scheduled in Singapore 77 would not take place. The letter exuded both threats and regret: “The world, and North Korea in particular, has lost a great opportunity for lasting peace and great prosperity and wealth,” Trump wrote, noting that this was “truly a sad moment in history.” The president added that he appreciated “your time, patience, and effort with respect to our recent negotiations and discussions relative to a summit.” Sadly, “based on the tremendous anger and open hostility displayed in your most recent statement, I feel it is inappropriate, at this time, to have this long-planned meeting. Therefore, please let this letter serve to represent that the Singapore summit, for the good of both parties, but to the detriment of the world, will not take place. You talk about your nuclear capabilities, but ours are so massive and powerful that I pray to God they will never have to be used.” Nevertheless, there was a glimmer of hope. Trump wrote: “I felt a wonderful dialogue was building up between you and me, and ultimately, it is only that dialogue that matters. Some day, I look very much forward to meeting you. In the meantime, I want to thank you for the release of the hostages who are now home with their families. That was a beautiful gesture and was very much appreciated.” The conclusion of the letter was open- ended: “If you change your mind having to do with this most important summit, please do not hesitate to call me or write.” KIM YOUN-SU, SJ AND ANTONIO SPADARO, SJ
Having received Trump’s letter, the official North Korean news agency, KCNA, affirmed that “North Korea is still open to talks with the United States.” Another development emerged on May 26. Kim and Moon met once more in the demilitarized zone on the border to discuss the latest developments in the crisis. The meeting was once more marked with smiles and embraces. “The two leaders shared an open exchange of opinions regarding the application of the Panmunjom Declaration and the possibility of a successful USA-North Korean summit,” declared the president’s press secretary in South Korea. President Moon has always shown himself to be an able mediator and a courageous statesman, capable of making the right steps at the right time 78 to push dialogue ahead. Immediately, on May 28, negotiations were resumed between the United States and North Korea toward a summit in Singapore. The State Department of the United States confirmed that their officials were engaged in a series of talks with North Korean officials. To solidify the good intentions of the United States, Trump expressed praise for the economic potential of North Korea, writing on Twitter: “I truly believe North Korea has brilliant potential and will be a great economic and financial Nation one day. Kim Jong Un agrees with me on this. It will happen!” On May 30, one of the highest-ranking Pyongyang officials, Kim Yong-chol, vice-chairman of the Workers’ Party central committee and former head of military and intelligence, traveled to Washington to meet U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. The news was released by the South Korean news agency Yonhap, which reported that Kim Yong-chol’s trip was the first foreign mission of any North Korean official tothe United States since 2000. A new round of high-level talks was initiated at the Peace House in Panmunjom on June 1. In the meantime, Kim received the Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, in Pyongyang, who extended an invitation to Kim on the part of Vladimir Putin to visit Russia. We need to recall that in 1950, Stalin gave his assent to North Korea to invade South Korea in order to KOREA: THE STATE OF PLAY challenge the United States and involve China in the conflict. Now a deflation of tension could be economically fruitful to Moscow and lead to the opening of a new commercial corridor: the pan-Korean railroad. The official announcement was made on June 2: the awaited summit would take place in Singapore on June 12. Trump himself confirmed this after receiving General Kim Yong-chol in the Oval Office at the White House. He personally delivered a letter from Kim to the American president. This was the last step toward a definitive meeting in Singapore. On June 5, Singaporean Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan went to Pyongyang to meet his North Korean counterpart, Ri Yong- ho. From Moscow, the Russian president expressed good wishes for a successful summit before flying to Beijing for talks with 79 Chinese President Xi Jinping. On June 8, Trump was in Canada for the G7 summit, the annual gathering of the world’s greatest economic powers, but he left the meeting early to travel to Singapore where he landed on Sunday, June 10. Kim arrived the same day aboard a private jet supplied by Air China, a Boeing 747 usually used by the Chinese government for the transport of its officials, including the president. On June 12, at 9 a.m. local time, the summit began. Two days earlier, during the Angelus, Pope Francis said: “I wish once again to address to the beloved Korean people a particular thought in friendship and in prayer. May the talks that will take place in the coming days in Singapore contribute to the development of a positive path forward, that may ensure a future of peace for the Korean peninsula and for the whole world.”
Why did Korea develop nuclear arms? Many wonder why Kim Jong-un, at the beginning of 2018, suddenly put an end to his risky diplomatic stance and announced the complete denuclearization of North Korea in accord with the wishes of South Korea and the United States.11
11.Until last year, Kim was a suspicious and friendless leader of a nation in the sights of the American military. Let us also recall the threats that Trump made to the North Korean leader, using especially colorful terms. Cf. M. Stevens, KIM YOUN-SU, SJ AND ANTONIO SPADARO, SJ
To better understand his behavior, we must recall why North Korea decided to develop its nuclear program in the first place, even though, by doing so, it made itself vulnerable to sanctions and increased its risk of military conflict.12 Rodong Sinmun, the official newspaper of the central committee of the Workers’ Party in North Korea, wrote that no other people in the world had ever been threatened with nuclear attacks so directly and for so long a time as North Korea.13 The history of the North Korean nuclear program can be traced back to when the United States evaluated the nuclear aspirations of North Korea and China during the Korean War (1950-1953). From that time, North Korea wanted to equip itself with nuclear arms to protect its power and national security. 80 The nation assuredly learned a lesson from events in Iraq and Libya. In both cases, the United States played an important role in destroying local regimes that did not possess nuclear arms.14 North Korea’s attempt to develop nuclear arms technically became official when, in 2003, they withdrew from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT).15 They were developing their nuclear program, then, for “diplomatic” purposes. But by doing so – it is crucial to
“Trump and Kim Jong-un, and the names they’ve called each other,” in The New York Times, March 9, 2018. 12.For a detailed analysis, cf. G. Sale, “North Korea and the Nuclear Crisis,” in Civ. Catt. English Edition January 2018. 13.Cf. Rodong Sinmun, March 22, 2012, in http://www.rodong.rep.kp/ko/. 14.In Iraq, Saddam Hussein had destroyed his arsenal of weapons of mass de- struction, including chemical and biological weapons, even though he was act- ing as if he still possessed them. Although the United Nations had confirmed the destruction of the Iraqi arsenal, the United States invaded Iraq in 2003 and finally captured Saddam, handing him over to the people for final justice. The Ukraine is still an open case, in that it has renounced the nuclear arms left in its territory after the collapse of the Soviet Union. In exchange, on the basis of a memorandum approved in Budapest in 1993, the United States, Great Brittan and Russia prom- ised to protect the Ukraine from aggressors. But in 2014, when Russia occupied Crimea and involved itself in conflicts in Donbass and Luhansk, the other two countries made no effort to get involved. The lesson was clear: nuclear powers are immune from external pressure. Among other things, we can recall the with- drawal of the United States from the Iranian nuclear agreement (JCPOA) in May. 15.Cf. A. Macchi, “Il ritiro della Corea del Nord dal Trattato di non prolife- razione nucleare,” in Civ. Catt. 2003 I 337-344. KOREA: THE STATE OF PLAY remember – North Korea had brought its people to their knees; they were reduced to starvation and suffered from diseases that the authorities did not have the resources to cure, especially in the countryside. Although all the implications of Kim’s recent turnaround remain to be seen, it seems that the objective he now proposes – given his bargaining power – is the survival of his regime and the possibilities of economic exchange that will make this possible, putting an end to the country’s isolation and sanctions. In this sense, Trump is right to claim a victory with his strategy of threating Kim and ratcheting up sanctions. But Kim can equally claim a victory in that he has presumably reached the capacity to strike the United States, and in this way he can negotiate from a stronger position, turning his military capacity 81 into diplomatic leverage. What then is the highest priority? In the past, South Korea and the United States held the idea that peace negotiations could begin only after nuclear disarmament, while North Korea was inclined toward a simultaneous process of peace negotiations and nuclear disarmament. These two different positions were carried forward in a parallel way for many years. In any event, in August 2003, the United States, China, Japan, Russia and the two Koreas launched the Six-Party Talks, aimed at finding a peaceful solution for security and stability in northeast Asia by means of the denuclearization of North Korea and a conciliatory settlement on the Korean Peninsula. Consequently, the joint declaration of September 19, 2005, and the agreement of February 13, 2007, signed by the six parties in question, affirmed the principle for simultaneous action in denuclearization and the instauration of a climate of peace, as was initially suggested by China. This principle remains a reasonable option for peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula. Nevertheless, as has been noted, the accords stemming from the Six-Party Talks have not yet been applied by North Korea and the United States.16
16.The failure of the Six-Party Talks lies not in problems with the principle of simultaneous action, but rather in the lack of trust between the two countries. On the one hand, North Korea did not seem transparent KIM YOUN-SU, SJ AND ANTONIO SPADARO, SJ
The Singapore Declaration Although there are those who believe that the current situation is not much different from what emerged out of the Six-Party Talks, there is reason for optimism in the wake of the summit. The dialogue between North Korea and the United States, which occurred long after the armistice of 1953, was not just a meeting between respective officials, but a meeting at the highest level: the leaders of the two nations themselves. Kim demonstrated his diplomatic potential by winning trust through talks with Moon and Chinese President Xi. For Trump, the summit was a special occasion to demonstrate his own capacity for negotiating peace. After rejecting similar negotiations with Iran based on his negative assessment of Obama’s bargaining 82 strategy, Trump wished to be successful in his own negotiations with Kim. Another important element is the fact that South Korea closely collaborated with the United States, proving itself a trustworthy intermediary between the United States and North Korea. South Korea was not brushed aside as several analysts had thought, believing that Kim’s objective was to isolate and humiliate the South. To the contrary, the level of cooperation between South Korea and the United States remains very high. Now, with the Singapore Declaration, President Trump has committed himself “to provide security guarantees to the DPRK” (the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, the formal name of North Korea), and President Kim Jong-un has reaffirmed his clear and constant commitment to “work toward the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.” Furthermore, the declaration states that the summit “was an epochal event of great significance in overcoming decades of tensions and hostilities between the two countries and for the opening up of a new future,” noting that “mutual confidence building can promote the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.”
enough in allowing inspection of its nuclear sites. On the other hand, the Bush administration put aside the accord, and similar situations in Libya and Iraq raised doubts in North Korea that they were dealing with a credible negotiating partner in the United States. KOREA: THE STATE OF PLAY
Here are the four points of the agreement: 1. The United States and the DPRK commit to establish new U.S.-DPRK relations in accordance with the desire of the peoples of the two countries for peace and prosperity. 2. The United States and the DPRK will join their efforts to build a lasting and stable peace regime on the Korean Peninsula. 3. Reaffirming the April 27, 2018, Panmunjom Declaration, the DPRK commits to work toward complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. 4. The United States and the DPRK commit to recovering POW/MIA remains, including the immediate repatriation of those already identified. This agreement may open a new chapter in relations between the United States and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. 83 More significantly, this may be the inauguration of a new season for the Korean Peninsula. This Declaration – which affirms and reiterates what was expressed in the Panmunjom Declaration – implies a resolution to bring the war on the Korean Peninsula to an official end and stipulates a non-aggression pact and peace negotiations between North Korea and the United States. Only time will tell if denuclearization will effectively be realized and whether these accords are able to ensure a peaceful and harmonious future for the Korean Peninsula. For now, we can say that there is no roadmap or definitive commitment. The sanctions against North Korea remain in place. They may end when Pyongyang decides to enter the international economic scene, but we have not reached that point, even if Trump has made predictions that it is inevitable. In any event, along with the end of missile tests in North Korea, the United States put an end to periodic joint military exercises with South Korea, which Trump had surprisingly described as “provocative and expensive war games.” This was the freeze-for- freeze that Beijing greatly desired. We must remember that Kim’s arrival in Singapore aboard an Air China jet was a clear sign of the invisible presence of China at the meeting.17
17.It is said that the presence of over 30,000 American troops on the Korean Peninsula is being put into doubt. Their departure would obviously entail a great victory for China, which has always considered North Korea a cushion to KIM YOUN-SU, SJ AND ANTONIO SPADARO, SJ
A possible lightening of the reigns with regard to security in the area on the part of the United States troubled Tokyo, in that the latter would be seriously limited in its capacity for deterrence without the help of the former. Conversely, we must keep in mind that the threats Pyongyang made to Seoul were not based merely on nuclear missiles, but on guns of various sizes – about 13,600 of them – pointed toward the South. South Korea asked North Korea to move them back 40 kilometers from the border. Some commentators have been critical of the American president, considering the summit a clear victory for Kim alone, with nothing but concessions from the United States. Kim indeed succeeded in bringing about a face-to-face summit: something 84 neither his father nor grandfather had accomplished.18 Kim himself, while shaking hands with Trump, did not hesitate to say, “Many will think that our meeting is a scene from a science fiction movie.” This was in fact the effect of seeing not only the two leaders together, but also the rows of American and North Korean flags behind them. Celebrating a Mass of Reconciliation, Cardinal Andrea Yeom Soo-jung, Archbishop of Seoul and Apostolic Administrator of Pyongyang, made this comment during his homily: “As we all know well, it is nearly impossible that this summit will solve all of the problems once and for all as we would like. We thank God, however, that it is an initial step toward paving the right path to peace on the Korean Peninsula. There is no doubt that may obstacles still have to be overcome
keep American presence at a safe distance. Ending the geopolitics of territorial ‘encirclement’ is a priority for China. Although, US fleets dominate the Pacific rim and the Strait of Malacca, in the South, which permits the flow of raw materials to China from Africa and the Middle East, containment is unravelling. Oil and gas is now transshipped via pipelines from the Chinese-built port of Kyaukphyu, Myanmar on the Bay of Bengal terminating in Kunming, China; and, the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor is another example of the Middle Kingdom’s soft power at work. 18.In the press conference following the summit, President Trump explained that he wanted to do something to make the world a safer place: www.vox.com/world/2018/6/12/17452624/trump-kim-summit-transcript- press-conference-full-text. KOREA: THE STATE OF PLAY if we are to keep the dialogue going. But we must overcome whatever obstacles we encounter with firm resolution.” In these past months, the Korean people have expressed a desire for reconciliation that includes the healing of wounds still left gaping. Their hesitation has not completely disappeared, yet hope has assuredly grown.19
85
19.There have been positive developments since the meeting in Singapore. Seoul and Pyongyang have agreed to reinstate direct lines of communication between the two militaries, and they have also discussed the complete demilitarization of the border village of Panmunjom and to put into full effect the bilateral accord of 2004 on preventing accidental skirmishes at sea along the western frontier. They also decided to transform the Northern Limit Line, that is, the de facto maritime border, into a sea of peace, and to consider other ways of easing military tensions. North Korea has returned the remains of around 200 of the 5,300 United States service members who died north of the 38th parallel during the Korean War. The program of recovering and returning the bodies commenced in 1996, but was interrupted when relations between the two countries deteriorated. In the meantime, there has been a third meeting between Kim and Xi, at which the latter promised to involve himself personally in the process of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula, guaranteeing Kim China’s assistance in reconstructing the North Korean economy. A few hours before Kim’s arrival in Beijing, the United States and South Korea, in a significant gesture of support in the prospects for peace on the 38th parallel, suspended joint military exercises scheduled to take place in the region in August. Don Tonino Bello A bishop who became the Gospel
Giancarlo Pani, SJ
“A bishop who became the Gospel”: this is the expression that Monsignor Agostino Superbo, the postulator of the cause of beatification, uses to define Don Antonio Bello, paraphrasing the latter’s own definition of a bishop. In fact, at the beginning 86 of his episcopal ministry, Don Tonino said: “I would like to be a bishop who becomes his people, a bishop elevated to the dignity of the people.”1 To those who asked him about the elements of his human, religious and pastoral formation, he answered in a simple and direct way: “The Gospel and the last ones.”2 Twenty-five years have passed since his death, caused by cancer. He had a short but intense life (58 years), simple but provocative, sober but rich in love for the poor and the dispossessed, humble and open to all: today we can truly say that his existence and commitment as a pastor were a living exegesis of the Gospel. The bishop of Molfetta never wanted to be called “Monsignor” or “Your Excellency,” but simply “Don Tonino,” and this is how he signed his pastoral letters and documents. He always considered himself a priest of the Pugliese Church. His name was, and is still, “Don Tonino” for all. A month after his death, Luigi Santucci, in his foreword to a book by Don Tonino, Maria, donna dei nostri giorni, offered an accurate list of his virtues: “Gentleness, tenderness, wonders of a vibrant poet; but also strength, passion and unconventional courage. These last virtues are those that have made me esteem and love him for the generous boldness with which he has been
1.D. Amato, Tonino Bello. Una biografia dell’anima, Rome, Città Nuova, 2013, 5. 2.Ibid., 185f. DON TONINO BELLO: A BISHOP WHO BECAME THE GOSPEL facing and denouncing the abominable deeds of our society; the weaknesses and hesitations of our Church; ... his radical option for the last and the poor, the commitment to peace and nonviolence.”3 The most significant aspects of Don Tonino’s biography have already been highlighted: “The priest, the bishop, the Franciscan tertiary, the pacifist, the native of Salento and Molfetta, the Marian scholar, the mystic, the writer, the poet, the utopian, the committed and the eccentric person.”4 What is his spiritual legacy today?
The Church of the apron In one of his first writings, Don Tonino defines the Church that announces the Gospel as “the Church of the apron.” He 87 then explains: “Perhaps someone may consider it as an irreverent expression, and the connection of the stole to the apron may appear almost sacrilegious. “Yes, because, usually, the stole recalls the sacristy cabinet, where, with all the other sacred vestments, perfumed with incense, it proudly hangs with its silk and colors, symbols and embroideries... Instead, at best, if not exactly an accessory used in the wash house, the apron brings to mind a kitchen cupboard, where, imbued with sauces and stained with spots, it is always within reach of the good housewife... Yet it is the only priestly vestment mentioned in the Gospel. In fact, for the solemn Mass celebrated by Jesus on Holy Thursday night, the Gospel does not mention either chasubles or amices, stoles or copes. It only speaks of this rough cloth that the Master wrapped around his hips, an exquisitely priestly gesture... “The most important thing, however, is not to place the apron in the sacristy cabinet, but to understand that the stole and apron are almost the two faces of one priestly symbol. Indeed, even better, they are like the height and width of a single service
3.L. Santucci, “La confidenza di un vescovo,” in A. Bello, Maria, donna dei nostri giorni, Cinisello Balsamo (Mi), San Paolo, 1993, 6. 4.G. Minervini, “Relazione al Convegno nazionale: ‘Don Tonino Bello, vescovo secondo il Concilio’ (April 24-26, 2003),” in T. Dell’Olio, “Stola e grembiule. Don Tonino Bello, vescovo,” in Aggiornamenti Sociali 55 (2004) 107. GIANCARLO PANI, SJ
cloth; the service rendered to God and the service offered to others. The stole without the apron would simply be symbolic. The apron without the stole would be fatally sterile.”5 For Don Tonino, the “Church of the apron” is simply the “Church”: he himself agrees that it can somehow be “a shabby, playful image; however, it is the truest image of the Church. The Church that bows down before the world, on its knees, and becomes poor, poor in terms of power. Pauper (poor) in Latin is not opposed to dives (rich), but rather to potens (powerful). This is the reason why we must not have the signs of power, rather the power of signs... Welcoming evicted persons into one’s home does not mean solving this scourge, but establishing signs as examples for everyone, for all as a Christian community.”6 88 A Church living in poverty is the only way to be close to everyone, to be taken seriously and become credible, as the Lord Jesus taught us, who “for your sake became poor although he was rich, so that by his poverty you might become rich” (2 Cor 8:9). Salvation does not come from someone who has everything and offers us something, but from one who took our flesh, gave us all of himself, until he lowered himself to our level, and starting from our lowest level, he raises, renews and redeems us. The “Church of the apron” is also the image of the pastor who personifies the Gospel as a historical reality and prophetic presence, who embodies the mystery of Christ within society, in dialogue with his brothers and sisters and the world, according to the words of the Gospel: “But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many” (Mark 10:43-45). Today, the expression “Church of the apron” has become the icon of the magisterial work of Don Tonino, from which two fundamental aspects of the pastor emerge: Don Tonino as a man of God and as a servant of the people.
5.V. Salvoldi, “Introduzione: ‘E chi mi ascolta?’” in La Chiesa del grembiule. Sulle orme di don Tonino Bello, Padua, Messaggero, 1999, 7f. 6.A. Bello, Scritti di pace, Molfetta (Ba), Mezzina, 1997, 146f. DON TONINO BELLO: A BISHOP WHO BECAME THE GOSPEL
The man of God The first teaching that the bishop of Molfetta has left us consists in his being a man of prayer, a contemplative person. In his many pastoral letters, much awaited by his people because they were unpredictable and incisive, prayer frequently resounds: “Every day, I experience that, when I have long spoken with the Lord and confided in him all the pastoral and personal problems that trouble me, difficulties are resolved like an ice cube melting in the sun.”7 This prayer was not an easy one, because sometimes it also meant “fighting with God – at night – in a shocking ‘face to face’ – almost in order to steal the secret of happiness from him. This was the same happiness that we pursue for all of our lives.”8 “Prayer was his guide and it gave meaning to his pastoral 89 mission: it allowed him to get hold of the ‘steering wheel of history.’ ... Within the local Church, the bishop is, actually, the supreme head of that great spiritual ‘issue’ that is called prayer... He has the very important task of fostering relationships between the people and the Lord and, therefore, of arousing and animating an intense spirit of prayer in his territory. This entails that the Lord will consider me accountable for how people pray in my diocese, if little or badly.”9 The man of God, attentive to the prayer of his own people, finds it in the most hidden and least likely places. His sensitivity can also detect what does not appear: “I realize that, in terms of prayer, there is an incredible hidden world, whose proportions are difficult to calculate. I have found so many people who meditate every day on the Word of God. There were many very lively young people who have invited me, out of the blue, to pray with them the liturgy of the hours. There were so many sick people whom I found in my pastoral visits, who turned into living candles perennially lit before the Lord and then ... who knows how many people there are, who are apparently far from God, but who pray without even knowing it!”10
7.D. Amato, Tonino Bello…, op. cit., 93. 8.Ibid., 95. 9.Ibid., 93. 10.Ibid., 93f. GIANCARLO PANI, SJ
Don Tonino, the contemplative person deeply united with God, teaches us to commit ourselves more to “reading” the earth rather than the heavens. It is necessary to take into consideration the most humble of human hardships, the world oppressed by struggles and pain, ordinary people who have lost all hope, the atheists who have made efforts for their brothers and sisters, unaware that in this way they have lived the Gospel. Through this “earthly” light, Don Tonino carefully scrutinizes the pages of the New Testament, presenting the Mother of Jesus. In his book Maria, donna dei nostri giorni, he addresses the Virgin, calling her “working woman”: “[You live] in Nazareth, where amid pots and looms, tears and prayers, balls of yarn and scrolls of Scripture, you have 90 experienced, in all the richness of your natural femininity, joys without malice, bitterness without desperation, departures without return.”11
The service of the Church Don Tonino teaches us another feature of the “Church of the apron”: a Church that is a “servant.” This is what the Lord meant with the washing of the feet. He carried out an act that not even a Jewish slave would do, because it was not seemly. The task of washing the feet was for foreign slaves. “A priest can hardly be a bearer of credible acts if he ... is not willing to wash the feet of everyone else… For people accept the message of Christ not so much from those who have experienced the asceticism of purity but rather from those who have experienced the tribulations of service. The logic of the washing of the feet is subversive.”12 On another occasion, Don Tonino said: “A true Christian always swims against the tide, not out of affectation, but because he knows that the Gospel is not compatible with 13 the current mentality.” “The Christian task is to be the critical 14 conscience of the world.”
11.A. Bello, Maria, donna dei nostri giorni, op. cit., 13. 12.A. Bello, Omelie e scritti quaresimali, Molfetta (Ba), Mezzina, 1994, 358. 13. 13.D. Bona, “Il Vangelo della pace,” in La Chiesa del grembiule…, op. cit., 119. 14. 14.Ibid. DON TONINO BELLO: A BISHOP WHO BECAME THE GOSPEL
Don Tonino’s perspective is in line with that of Pope John XXIII and Vatican II: reading the signs of the times and having the courage to be open to what is required of us. The vocation of the Church is the service of people, above all of the poor, the weakest, the little ones, the last, the dispossessed, to whom the Lord himself wished to be particularly united.15 This is the mission of the disciples. Don Tonino spoke many times of the need for an “outgoing” Church, that is to say, a Church that is not self-referential, “going forth” (as Pope Francis would say today), dedicated to serving the world through a sign that must qualify Christian action: “Think globally and act locally.”16 And he was the first one to set an example: he opened his bishop’s palace to evicted people; he welcomed those who knocked at his door; he was close to 91 workers who fought for a more human justice, but above all to AIDS patients and prostitutes; he defended the cause of the disabled, the unemployed, the first immigrants from Albania. Here one can also notice the deep human dimension that constantly animated Don Tonino’s service, which made him credible and close to ordinary people: the pastor was a visible sign of the human face of the Church, willing to be next to the most humiliated human lives.17 We should mention a letter that he wrote to the “Moroccan brother,” on the occasion of the Day for Migrants and Refugees. It opened by begging pardon for calling him this, because maybe he had nothing to do with Morocco at all: he said that we call “Moroccans” all the unhappy people who, covered with carpets, go around selling them. He then went on: “Please forgive us, if we were not able to bravely raise our voices to put pressure on our legislators. We still lack the courage to shout that the rules applied in Italy to illegal immigrants like you, recall a police approach; they do not protect the most elementary human rights, and are unworthy of a free people like us. Please forgive us, Moroccan brother, if we Christians do not even
15.Cf. Council Decree Presbiterorum Ordinis, 6. 16.D. Amato, Tonino Bello…, cit., 151. 17.Cf. A. Picicco, Nel riverbero di cento ideali. Spessori di umanità nel magistero del vescovo Tonino Bello, Terlizzi (Ba), Ed. Insieme, 2012, 15-21. GIANCARLO PANI, SJ
grant you hospitality on the threshold… One day, when we meet our God, this wayfarer on the roads of the earth, we will surprisingly realize that he has ... skin of your color.” And finally, he concluded: “If you pass by my house, please stop and visit.”18 Don Tonino considered the least not as privileged recipients of his ministry, but as protagonists of the history of salvation: the poor, the dispossessed, the outcast, the migrants incarnate the presence of Christ among us, precisely because the Lord Jesus identified himself with them (“I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me,” Matt 25:40). Our salvation comes from them.
The service of communion 92 The service of the pastor is marked by communion and solidarity: “We are called to be servants of communion. This must be our brilliant career.”19 As in the early Church, Christians were “of one heart and mind” (Acts 4:32), this must be the style of the community. It is a matter of “harmoniously orienting the action of the various ecclesial components (parishes, associations, priests, lay people) toward the creation of that ‘Eucharistic Church’ of which bishops speak in the document Eucaristia, comunione e 20 comunità, and establishing credible signs and gestures.” Don Tonino lived through the crucial moment of the merging of four dioceses – Molfetta, Giovinazzo, Terlizzi and Ruvo di Puglia – with its inevitable aftermath. The exhortation to communion determined the atmosphere to come together in the life of the new diocese. This involved an ecclesiology of communion, in line with the Council, bearing in mind that in the Church there are not two categories of Christians – the clergy and the laity – but, as Lumen gentium states, they share “a common dignity as members from their regeneration in Christ, having the same filial grace and the same vocation to perfection” (32). It follows that the hierarchy is not placed above, but within the people of God. In this way the ecclesiology of communion bans all forms of “clericalism.”
18.A. Bello, Articoli, Corrispondenze, Lettere, Notificazioni, Molfetta (Ba), Mezzina, 2003, 286-288. 19.A. Bello, Scritti vari, interviste, aggiunte, Molfetta (Ba), Mezzina, 2007, 75. 20.A. Bello, Omelie e scritti quaresimali, op. cit., 102. DON TONINO BELLO: A BISHOP WHO BECAME THE GOSPEL
For Don Tonino, the Trinitarian theological foundation of the service of communion is very interesting. Father, Son and Holy Spirit do not live side by side, but for each other. Hence he proposes the clever “mathematical” formula, to help us grasp the mystery of one God in three persons: “I do not speak of one plus one plus one, because this adds up to three. I instead speak of one times one times one: which always adds up to “one.” In God every person lives for the other. It is a kind of family brand..., so that even when the Son came down to earth, he manifested 21 himself as a person for others.” In short, the Trinity challenges us to communion, making us “a face turned toward the other,”22 in the sense that whoever lives for the other creates unity and is a witness of the Gospel. This communion stands out as a special sign: joy and 93 hope. He states: “We must serve the world, but as risen ones. In the Church, much service is carried out, very much indeed – sometimes up to exhaustion. We stand with the poor; we make a thousand sacrifices; we help people..., but not with souls of risen ones, but with souls of employees. And we do not always proclaim that Christ is the hope of the world through our service. Rather, we proclaim how skilled we are and not him! We often appear as an organization inspiring respect, often fear as well as awe. We are not, however, the enthusiastic travelers who, together with others, direct our steps toward the Risen Christ.”23 He notes finally: “The Church must never consider herself as an absolute. The absolute is her Lord Jesus Christ. The Church is a humble servant. I would dare to say, that the more she moves out of the way, the better it is, in order to make him stand out, Jesus Christ, the bridegroom who arrives. One day, the Church herself will be introduced to the wedding with the Lamb, and only then will there be glory for her too. Not before. Any anticipation of glory would be misappropriation.”24
21.Ibid., 337. 22.Ibid. 23.A. Bello, Scritti vari…, cit., 77. 24.Ibid. GIANCARLO PANI, SJ
The witness of nonviolence and peace Another great teaching of the bishop of Molfetta was his bearing witness to nonviolence and peace, not only in Salento, but also in the Italian Church, especially when he was appointed president of the Pax Christi movement. It was at that time that his commitment came to the fore. In 1991, the Gulf War was particularly felt in Molfetta, since four fellow citizens who were working in Iraq had been taken hostage by the Iraqi regime. In that delicate and painful circumstance, Don Tonino had the courage to restate the rejection of war, of all wars, in the line of John Paul II. When the U.S. threatened to declare war, he sought the solidarity of the Italian Bishops to launch an appeal to reason. It seemed that 94 no one answered. Italy then sided with the coalition against Saddam Hussein. At the outbreak of the conflict, Don Tonino also affirmed that the war had been declared for devious reasons, because the oil interests in the region were at stake. The following year, when cancer already severely affected him, Don Tonino committed himself to the Marcia dei Cinquecento (March of the 500) in Sarajevo, with the creator of the enterprise, Don Albino Bizzotto, the group Beati i Costruttori di Pace of Padua and several parliamentarians. He personally participated, together with his friend Monsignor Luigi Bettazzi. Despite many difficulties, negotiations, postponements and refusals, the blockades of the army and the paramilitaries, under the fire of the snipers, the 500 participants succeeded in the impossible mission: reaching Sarajevo under siege, at night, on the occasion of the International Day of Human Rights. It was a sign of hope for the devastated population, who lived under the threat of hunger and death. On that occasion, during an assembly, Don Tonino proclaimed the value of nonviolence and peace among the different ethnic groups: “We are here, agreeing on the great idea of active nonviolence... Tomorrow’s armies will be these: unarmed men. We have experienced that there are alternatives to the logic of violence.”25 On his return to Molfetta, he wrote: “We did not
25.A. Bello, Scritti di pace, op. cit., 340. DON TONINO BELLO: A BISHOP WHO BECAME THE GOSPEL go into Sarajevo to solve the problem of war but to give witness of our solidarity to those people, to state that Europe has not forgotten them, to say that in the world there are people who love peace and that today there are new alternatives to the armed aggression of war.”26 It was a symbolic journey, but it paved the way for initiatives of cooperation and help to the Balkan populations, reinventing human solidarity through the search for peace. As Christmas was close, Don Tonino imagined that the 500 participants were the Three Kings who encountered Herod searching for the Child Jesus. Where was Jesus to be found? “As a matter of fact, we found him in the people we hugged along the way. In the children who came to meet us, to shake our hands offering a smile of hope. In the elderly who were moved by our courage. 95 In the young soldier who cried when we left. In the religious leaders of the city and in the civil authorities who implored us to shake the world that was indifferent, like the city of Bethlehem, to the sufferings of the poor.”27 Four months later, on April 20, 1993, Don Tonino concluded his painful passion.
‘If one day you will be proclaimed a saint...’ What follows is an episode that happened in Milan, sometime earlier. Don Tonino had been invited by Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini to speak in the Duomo. On his return, he asked for an opinion on the archbishop from a Milanese priest who accompanied him, as Martini’s biblical commitment for the diocese was beginning to be praised. Here is a summary of the conversation through the words and reactions of Don Tonino: “The priest replied: ‘If you take the Bible out of the hands of Cardinal Martini, he cannot do anything else.’ … How I wished that the same would be said of me! … If you take away the word of the Gospel from my lips, I am left with nothing else.”28
26.S. Paronetto, Tonino Bello Maestro di nonviolenza. Pedagogia, politica, cittadinanza attiva e vita cristiana, Milan, Paoline, 2012, 183 (the quote is taken from A. Bello, Scritti di pace, cit., 532). 27.A. Bello, Scritti di pace, op. cit., 344. 28.D. Amato, Tonino Bello…, op. cit., 171f. GIANCARLO PANI, SJ
Here is today’s legacy of Don Tonino: the priest of the Gospel, the prophet whose strength was in his weakness, the poor at the service of the poor – who are Christ’s presence in history – the man who saw in politics the highest exercise of charity for peace. On his death, the historical leader of the PCI (Italian Communist Party) in Molfetta, Sandrino Fiore, wrote: “Apart from the great human openness, it was his intellectual rigor that led him to scrutinize history with a deep prophetic insight, even in its most terrible turning points. Now Don Tonino is no longer here anymore. Let me therefore address him directly: Dear Don Tonino, ... thank you for allowing me to come to know ‘your’ God. And if one day you will be proclaimed saint, 96 I will be with you, because I can touch saints like you, squeeze them in my arms and feel them close to me.”29 In 2018, Pope Francis made a journey to Molfetta as the Church’s recognition of a life spent for the last and the least by “a bishop who became the Gospel.”
29.Ibid., 221f. Benjamin Britten’s Billy Budd
Virgilio Fantuzzi, SJ
Billy Budd is an opera in two acts by Benjamin Britten. It finally came to Rome’s Teatro dell’Opera nearly 70 years after its London premiere in a coproduction with Madrid’s Royal Theater and the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden in London. This version has been awarded the prestigious International 97 Opera Award for best production.
The Short Story by Herman Melville This masterpiece is inspired by a novella of the same name by Herman Melville, who dedicated the last, hard years of his life to it. The protagonist is a young and handsome sailor, Billy Budd, spontaneous and natural, who, forced to serve on the English warship Indomitable, inspires the affection and admiration of his fellows. He exercises upon them a benign influence, bringing joy and peace even in the terrible conditions endured by sailors of that time, particularly the British ones. The short opera is set in 1797 when England is at war with France. Budd is an orphan, a pre-Christian primitive, demonstrating an elementary and pre-cultural development, living day by day, with the absolute innocence of a child. He could be identified as a kind of primordial Adam before the Fall. He has a stutter, but he is able to sing joyfully together with others. Opposite the protagonist, Billy Budd, is set the antagonist, Claggart, the master-at-arms, charged with the crew’s discipline. As Billy is a symbol of innocence and goodness, Claggart is the symbol of perfidy and evil. Expert in the ways of the world, totally ignored by Billy, but governed by cold reason, Claggart is like Cassius in Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, VIRGILIO FANTUZZI, SJ
or the Bard’s Iago in Othello. He represents the essence of the biblical tempter. He is the devil incarnate, acting like Milton’s Satan in Paradise Lost. Due to his hostility toward the Good, Claggart can neither accept nor endure the primordial goodness of Billy, whose inability to suspect others and complete innocence are taunting provocation for Claggart. He understands that Billy has in him the ability to counter evil, and Claggart cannot even admit this is possible. Therefore, he is determined to eliminate him, resorting to the subtle, underhand methods of which he is capable. The naïve Billy falls into the trap set by Claggart. Here we have the determining presence of the third protagonist: Vere, the ship’s commanding officer. 98 When Claggart brings Billy in front of Vere, falsely accusing him of inciting a rebellion among the sailors, the captain understands the groundless nature of this accusation. For his part, Billy cannot speak in his own defense because of his stutter and instead punches and kills Claggart. Vere is forced to decide his fate. He knows that Billy is innocent of the charges brought against him; now the young sailor is guilty not only of assaulting a petty officer, but of having killed one in time of war. The law is the law. Even if innocence and guilt, respectively personified by Billy and Claggart, change places, between prudence and severity, compassion and discipline, mercy and rigor, Vere feels compelled to choose the second. Moral doubt cannot prevail over military duty. The individual conscience must give way to the rigor of the code. The heart has to give way to the mind. That is how the innocent Billy is sacrificed. He is hanged from the main mast with echoes of both transfiguration and ascension.
From words to sounds For Britten it was not easy to compose in the mid-20th century a masterpiece in the structure of Grand Opera, the large-scale French operatic theater typical of the previous century: grandiose scenes, a plot based on the conflict of ideas, and everything set in a precise historical situation. BENJAMIN BRITTEN’S ‘BILLY BUDD’
The whole opera develops on a warship in the Mediterranean. The settings provided by the libretto use all possible elements – decks, cabins, sleeping quarters with sailors in their hammocks – while music reproduces the physical sensation of sailing. For example, the lament of the mariners underlies the daily sufferings, singing in unison, a repetitive, sad melody of weariness: “O heave, O heave away, heave!” Billy Budd has an all-male cast. Among its best features, it has a great protagonist, Captain Vere. Always restless, a deep thinker and a prisoner of regret, even before taking a decision… Maybe he could save Billy instead of condemning him, but he is not free to do what he thinks is right. In his mind there is a conflict of ideas, with English conservative principles on one side, and revolutionary Jacobin values on 99 the other. In order to develop this project, Britten collaborated with a great writer, Edward Morgan Forster, who, not being an expert in theater, asked the help of playwright Eric Crozier. The short story by Melville seems the least theatrical text one could imagine. It was necessary to construct the action of the first scenes according to very brief indications given by the author. Several episodes of the first act have been invented completely. Among these, the monologue by Claggart, who peremptorily explicates much that remains mysterious and impossible to understand in Melville’s description of the character. “O beauty, O handsomeness, goodness! Would that I had never seen you! Having seen you, what choice remains to me? None, none! I’m doomed to annihilate you. I’m vowed to your destruction.” The aria is constituted of two musical cells that come from the chorus of the sailors: “Blow, wind, blow!” But if the chorus corresponds to what Melville writes about the sincerity and simplicity inherent in the “juvenile race” of the singers, Claggart’s exclamation, above, corrodes its profile, undermines the harmonic certainties, and makes harmonious music into something dissonant. In the opera, the Novice assumes an importance that he does not have in the short story. Punished for something VIRGILIO FANTUZZI, SJ
unimportant, physically and psychologically prostrate, he is unable to stand and is supported by another character, called only “Friend of the Novice.” Flogging (the punishment inflicted on the novice) had been used in Britain until the end of World War II. In addition to the physical suffering it inflicts on the one punished, it includes humiliation without remedy. The Novice is a man violated, relegated to the ranks of the degraded; and this is why he says he experiences unending shame. Weakened by this inhumane treatment, the Novice becomes easy prey for Claggart, who uses him to deceive Billy. “Would you betray a fellow shipmate?” The Novice yields. Britten translates into song Billy’s internal beauty. The 100 most traditional music is reserved to him. The vocality of other characters, caged in convention, makes one think of tiptoeing through a minefield. Billy’s voice traverses the musical scale on the notes of a perfect chord in the energetic cabaletta that he intones as soon as he is recruited: “Billy Budd, king of birds! Billy Budd, king of the universe! Up there among the albatross! Up there challenging the storms!” Throughout, there is a fog, which is recalled many times in the libretto. The fog, which only at some points lifts, is the ideal background to a score permeated with consonance and dissonance, clarity and confusion. On a thematic level, fog is the element that, by hampering the ability to see, obscures the hidden moves of Claggart. At the same time, it is a symbol of the mental confusion suffered by Vere. Billy, who “descends from the heavens” when he plummets to the bridge from the crow’s nest, “ascends into heaven” when he is hanged at the end, witnessed by his fellows. It is a musical ascension. The naïve boy of Melville’s short story becomes, thanks to Britten’s music, a saving angel. Which music? A music brought to a minimum level of sustained public attention. Neither melody nor rhythm, there is only a series of consonant chords, dynamic variations and instrumental timbre, a path that begins bumpy and develops into something more and more serene, toward the final, major cadencepianissimo : the conquest of the serenity that is able to dissipate fog and confusion. BENJAMIN BRITTEN’S ‘BILLY BUDD’
From score to scene The musical texture, which privileges dark tones, finds a perfect correspondence in the framing composed on the set. The ship on which all the scenes take place is not represented in a realistic way. The audience’s attention is focused on the elements that evoke the atmosphere: a great wooden platform to indicate the bridge, a network of ropes and lines intertwined against the background of the sky. The presence of the sea is suggested through the masterful use of lights. Director Deborah Warner and her collaborators (production designer Michael Levine, the costume designer Chloe Obolensky, lighting director Jean Kalman, and the choreography of Kim Brandstrup and Joanna O’Keeffe) create an evocative production. The characters move on the scene with precision, 101 both in the choral scenes and monologues. From the whole of the performance a clear idea emerges: the crew of the warship is divided into two parts. On one side, those who command: the officers, impeccable in their uniforms, standing straight and serious. On the other hand, those who serve: the crew, men reduced to a minimal level of survival, stripped of dignity and rights, forced to work in extreme conditions, threatened and humiliated, punished mercilessly. The absolute power exercised gives rise to abuses that multiply endlessly, even to the point of the death of an innocent, executed under the appearance of the normal course of events. The ship, with its crew, is cut off from the wider world, and becomes a human microcosm where good and evil, strength and weakness, power and impotence confront each other. The sea and the sky suggest an incomprehensible expanse, which is the kingdom of spirituality and eternity. In the opera, there is space for themes that Britten, a committed musician in social and political spheres, has studied and deepened in other compositions: These include the betrayal of innocence, injustice and cruelty, tragedy and the insensibility of war, the abdication of moral responsibility on the part of those who govern human life. With his art, Britten has repeatedly stigmatized the unconscionable behavior of the strong and defended the cause of the weak. VIRGILIO FANTUZZI, SJ
The happy outcome of the evening is ensured by the expertise of Maestro James Conlon, particularly expert in this kind of repertoire. The orchestra and choir were both good, led by Maestro Roberto Gabbiani. The performance of the three protagonists was excellent: the baritone Phillip Addis, in the title role; the tenor Toby Spence, as Captain Vere; and the bass John Relyea as Claggart. The whole cast was first class.
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