The Theological Project of James Alison Grant Kaplan of Many Things Published by Jesuits of the United States

THE NATIONAL CATHOLIC WEEKLY May 19, 2014 $3.50

The Theological Project of James Alison Grant Kaplan Of Many Things Published by Jesuits of the United States

106 West 56th Street hen we hear “The harvest behaviors such as selfishness, collective New York, NY 10019-3803 is abundant but the greed and the hoarding of goods on Ph: 212-581-4640; Fax: 212-399-3596 laborers are few,” our a mammoth scale.” In the preface, Subscriptions: 1-800-627-9533 W www.americamagazine.org minds turn at once to priestly or Cardinal Peter Turkson said everyone facebook.com/americamag missionary vocations. But there’s more is called “to examine in depth the twitter.com/americamag to it than that: The Gospel of Luke principles and the cultural and moral isn’t just describing a labor shortage. It values that underlie social coexistence.” President and Editor in Chief is important to keep in mind that the As this week’s editorial points out, we Matt Malone, S.J. only reason there is a labor shortage is would do well at this moment to recall Executive Editors that there is an abundance in the first this truth. Robert C. Collins, S.J., Maurice Timothy Reidy place. Before we get to any practical In other words, we need to Managing Editor Kerry Weber questions, then, we might profit from remember who we are: gifts of God Literary Editor Raymond A. Schroth, S.J. some reflection on what a marvelous who are called to give in return. No Senior Editor and Chief Correspondent thing it is that the vineyard exists at all, one is saying that being a banker or a Kevin Clarke for this reminds us of the primordial business executive is necessarily a bad Editor at Large James Martin, S.J. fact of human existence, an essential thing. Only that being a selfish banker Poetry Editor Joseph Hoover, S.J. truth embedded in each of our hearts: or business executive is a bad thing, Associate Editor Luke Hansen, S.J.

All is a gift. All that is and was and will just as being a selfish schoolteacher Assistant Editors Francis W. Turnbull, S.J., Olga ever be began with God and will return is a bad thing. We should remember Segura, Joseph McAuley, Ashley McKinless to God in the fullness of time. The that, in case any one of us is tempted Art Director Stephanie Ratcliffe harvest, in other words, is a gift. It is, in to scapegoat others for our troubles, Columnists John J. Conley, S.J., Daniel P. Horan, fact, the gift itself. whether they’re conservative bankers or O.F.M., James T. Keane, John W. Martens, Bill McGarvey, Angela Alaimo O’Donnell, Margot To be a Christian disciple is to liberal protesters. Let us recall that in Patterson, Michael Rossmann, S.J. live one’s life in this truth, the truth all likelihood, every one of us has been Correspondents of gratitude, the truth that God-in- a part of the problem at some point John Carr –Washington, D.C.

Christ is the origin and destination of in our lives. I know I have. And I have Moderator, Catholic Book Club everything. The very opposite of this learned the hard way that throwing Kevin Spinale, S.J. truth is grandiosity, the lie that I am, stones is inadvisable for those who live Editorial e-mail or we are, the origin and destination in heavily mortgaged glass houses. [email protected] of everything. In gratitude, we see our All that God asks of us may sound lives as gifts, freely given; in grandiosity, terribly lofty, even naïve. It does to Publisher and Chief Financial Officer Edward Spallone we see them as earned possessions. my ear at times. What is more naïve, Deputy Publisher This sense of entitlement more often though, is any notion that we can Rosa Del Saz than not leads to greed and calculating be rescued from the world’s colossal Vice President/Advancement self-interest. troubles by something other than the Daniel Pawlus

So much of our world is built on truth, however difficult it may be to Development Coordinator principles of mutual self-interest and hear, however seemingly impossible it Kerry Goleski rational choice, the laws of supply may be to live out. Operations Staff and demand. These things are not God knows it isn’t easy. So God Chris Keller, Glenda Castro, Judith Felix necessarily bad in themselves, but it is gives us the gifts we need to give to Advertising contact [email protected]; 212-515-0102 sometimes not easy to see, watching one another in return—the grace of Subscription contact/Additional copies events on Capitol Hill or on Wall creation, the transformative power of [email protected]; Street or in The City or in Hong Kong, love, the redemptive power of mercy. 1-800-627-9533 that the world and its resources are, in And as if all that weren’t enough, God © 2014 America Press, Inc. fact, gifts from God, gifts of which we sent us something else: his only son, are merely stewards for one another whose grace not only makes possible and for future generations. our generosity, but whose earthly Cover: The processing of the first detainees at In October 2011, the Pontifical vocation provides us with the real Camp X-Ray, Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, on Jan. 11, 2002. Camp X-Ray closed in April, 2002. Reu- Council for Justice and Peace said the world example of how to do it. ters/U.S. Department of Defense/Petty Officer global financial crisis “has exposed Matt Malone, S.J. 1st class Shane T. McCoy/Handout/Files Contents www.americamagazine.org Vol. 210 No. 17, Whole No. 5051 MAY 19, 2014

articles 14 Morality and Morale The experience of U.S. soldiers inside Guantánamo Bay Luke Hansen

22 defending ‘the Worst’ An interview with the lawyer of an accused terrorist Luke Hansen

25 renewing the Tradition The theological project of James Alison Grant Kaplan

14 COLUMNS & DEPARTMENTS

4 Current Comment

5 editorial Facing Inequality

6 reply All

8 Signs of the Times

11 Column The West Knows Best? Margot Patterson

28 Generation Faith Johnny Unites Marie Kalas

38 the Word The Witness of Hope John W. Martens 25 BOOKS & CULTURE

30 Television “Orange Is the New Black’” of other things The World According to Wes BOOKingS Objects of Contemplation

ON THE WEB Reporting and video dispatches from Guantánamo Bay from Luke Hansen, S.J. Plus, the debut of “The Living Word” web page, a collection of resources from America’s multiyear collaboration with the American Bible Society. All at americamagazine.org 30 CURRENT COMMENT

Bishop Keenan explained that he wanted to live Nigeria Takes the Lead simply, but also echoed Pope Francis’ desire to be part of A long overdue “rebasement” of Nigeria’s gross domestic a community, saying he hoped to find “people who could product in early April nearly doubled the nominal size form a family with me and support me.” His example serves of the country’s economy overnight. Incorporating new as a reminder that we should not live simply solely for the sectors like telecommunications and the booming film sake of sanctifying ourselves, but we must do so on behalf industry, the recalculation more accurately reflects the of others as members of the body of Christ. And the call real economic gains made by the most populous nation in to live simple, communal lives is not for clerics alone. All Africa over the past two decades and pushes it ahead of Catholics strive to live out “the common priesthood of the South Africa as the continent’s largest economy. faithful,” and we must challenge each other to examine Under different circumstances, this new ranking might our own actions and motives: Do we condemn others’ have inspired a measure of national pride. As it is, the extravagance while isolating ourselves in enormous houses news throws into sharp relief the disturbing reality that fenced off from our neighbors? Do we call for greater impressive growth rates have done little to improve the community and then walk by our neighbors without lives of most Nigerians. Extreme poverty—61 percent greeting them? Do we remember Paul’s words in the First of the population lives on less than a dollar a day—and Letter to the Corinthians? “If I give away everything I a severe lack of government services and infrastructure own…but do not have love, I gain nothing” (13:3). are at the root of the insecurity that plagues the country’s majority Muslim north. A week after the new G.D.P. was announced, Boko Haram, the Islamist rebel group, carried out a rare bombing attack in the capital city of Abuja, Talking About Race killing more than 70, and abducted an estimated 200 The National Basketball Association moved surprisingly girls from a boarding school in Borno State. According quickly to punish Donald Sterling, owner of the Los to Amnesty International, in 2014 alone at least 1,500 Angeles Clippers, for his racist remarks. Just days after people, more than half of them civilians, have been killed his comments were made public, Mr. Sterling was fined in a relentless cycle of attacks, reprisals and executions. $2.5 million and banned for life from the N.B.A. by There can be no justification for the atrocities the league’s new commissioner. Players and fans were committed by Boko Haram. But the grievances that fuel gratified by the league’s actions, but a bad taste still the insurgency—corruption, deteriorating or nonexistent lingers. Mr. Sterling was far from a model citizen prior to infrastructure, the impunity of security forces—are his repugnant remarks. In 2009, the real estate developer shared by many of the country’s impoverished regions. settled the largest-ever housing discrimination suit The next 20 years of economic growth must foster brought by the Justice Department. The league should inclusive development and good governance if Nigeria is have acted against Mr. Sterling long ago. to be a leader in more than just name and number. It is tempting to view the 80-year-old as a relic from another time. Mr. Sterling’s views are so appalling that they must be just the mutterings of an angry, out-of- ’Tis a Gift to Be Simple touch man. But is that all they are? Racism may be widely Pope Francis’ decision to forgo the apostolic palace for condemned today, but it still reveals itself in insidious simpler surroundings is by now old news. Yet the example ways. In 2008, President Obama said, “The legacy of he set in the first weeks of his papacy has had a lasting discrimination—and current incidents of discrimination, effect. In Germany, Bishop Franz-Peter Tebartz-van Elst while less overt than in the past—are real and must be of Limburg resigned after spending about $43 million addressed.” renovating his private residence. Archbishop Wilton It is easy to speak out against overt acts of racism. D. Gregory of Atlanta responded to the voices of the Healing a history of discrimination is a more complex faithful in his archdiocese by taking steps to downsize task and will require continuing education and vigilance. the archbishop’s residence. And recently in Scotland, A quick verdict for Mr. Sterling may have provided newly appointed Bishop John Keenan of Paisley chose to a measure of satisfaction for N.B.A. fans, but it is live in a parish house with a local priest rather than in a important to remain alert to more subtle forms of bigotry sandstone villa used by previous bishops. that still happen every day.

4 America May 19, 2014 EDITORIAL Facing Inequality

ew subjects stir up and polarize national discussion legislation to lower the top tax rate quite like capitalism in general and inequality in on dividends from 39.6 percent to Fparticular. Recent evidence is the English-language 15 percent and to completely phase publication of Capital in the Twenty-First Century, which has out the estate tax. Congressman ignited a firestorm of opinion and debate. The new book, by Paul Ryan has proposed a more the French economist Thomas Piketty, is hailed by some as radical plan to eliminate all taxes on “a masterpiece” and criticized by others as “seriously flawed.” interest, capital gains, dividends and estates. In Capital, Mr. Paul Krugman, the Nobel Prize-winning economist, wrote Piketty expresses concern about the increasing percentage of in The New York Review of Books (5/8) that the book “will wealth that is inherited, not earned. He calls it a system of change both the way we think about society and the way we “patrimonial capitalism,” and argues that it undermines the do economics.” At the very least, the book has made everyone role of merit in democratic societies. with a stake in capitalism sit up and take notice. Why all the This analysis should challenge Americans to rethink hype over this 700-page tome? our notions of wealth and poverty and whether any Mr. Piketty offers a far-reaching analysis of modern semblance of “equal opportunity” actually exists. Who is the economic trends, especially as related to inequality. His “taker”—someone who gets $133 each month to buy food, central observation: In modern capitalism, over the course or someone who inherits a multimillion-dollar fortune from of three centuries, people who own “capital”—assets like his or her parents? Is the opportunity for the American businesses, housing and land—are able to reinvest profits dream equal for a child who grows up in one of the poorest at a higher rate than overall economic growth. The rich get areas and one from a wealthy suburb? Of course not. richer, while many others struggle in minimum wage jobs, if The true test of any economic system is whether it they are employed at all. The rise of a strong middle class and protects human dignity and provides for the basic needs the convergence of incomes and living standards in the mid- of every member of society, especially the most vulnerable. 20th century were historical exceptions, not the rule, he says. In “The Joy of the Gospel,” Pope Francis denounced an In modern capitalism, according to Mr. Piketty, the “forces of economy of “exclusion and inequality” and asked why it divergence” tend to concentrate wealth in the hands of a very is news when the stock market drops two points but not few, and he fears we are moving toward a future with “levels when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure. The of inequality never before seen.” promotion of justice in society, he wrote, requires “decisions, Not everyone is buying it. Critics of the thesis say that programs, mechanisms and processes specifically geared to the overall gains of the capitalist system eventually reach a better distribution of income, the creation of sources of every person, even if some benefit more than others. They employment and an integral promotion of the poor which point, for example, to the significant drop in extreme poverty goes beyond a simple welfare mentality.” around the globe in the past 40 years. Vast income inequality What policies will reduce inequality rather than is not the problem, they say. exacerbate it? Though little can be expected of Congress In an interview with The New York Times (4/20), these days, they would be right to increase the federal Mr. Piketty agreed there is nothing inherently wrong with minimum wage, expand the Earned Income Tax Credit and inequality, which can spur initiative and help create wealth. reinstate the tax rates of the 1990s, which would decrease But the benefits of wealth, he explained, need to extend to a dependence on public assistance and strengthen the safety larger group. To that end he proposes a global tax on wealth net for those who still need it. and steeply progressive tax rates on large incomes. The questions, problems and solutions regarding the Such measures are fiercely opposed by those who use and abuse of capitalism are as varied as the think-tanks, demonstrate an intense concern for the rights of individuals position papers and experts who study them. Mr. Piketty to make money and pass it to their heirs with little or no has made an important contribution. His book prompts the government interference instead of defending the rights of discerning person to evaluate anew the human and social the poorest Americans to basic necessities like food, shelter, costs of capitalism. The creative thinking of citizens is now health care and education. President George W. Bush signed required to combat the ills he has diagnosed.

May 19, 2014 America 5 REPLY ALL gional, religious and divergent voices. a freelance writer. Second, my tenure at the N.E.A. Complaints aside, I sympathize Writer Responds was openly characterized by its com- with Ms. Oakes. It is hard for a young I read “Writers Blocked?” by Kaya mitment to decentralization. For the writer to make his or her way in the Oakes (4/28), about Catholic writ- first time in its history, N.E.A. fund- world today. In fact, it isn’t always easy ing today, with some bewilderment. ing reached every community in the for older writers. While I agree with much of what she United States. Likewise our N.E.A. Dana Gioia says, Ms. Oakes makes a number of panels carefully represented regional, Sonoma County, Calif. odd or erroneous statements about cultural, ethnic and aesthetic diversity. He Is Unqualified my literary and cultural views. The Third, in my essay “The Catholic In “Unfriendly Fire” (Current oddest of all: “Gioia calls for a more Writer Today,” can Ms. Oakes find a Comment, 4/7), the editors express centralized Catholic literary culture single paragraph or single sentence disapproval of the N.R.A.’s “vicious at- from the position of being the former that calls for “a more centralized” liter- tacks” on Dr. Vivek H. Murthy’s nom- chairman of the National Endowment ary culture? The very idea of cultural ination to be surgeon general, and crit- for the Arts and a tenured professor at centralization is anathema to me. icize “the timidity of the senators who the University of Southern California.” Finally, I am not a tenured faculty genuflect to the N.R.A.” What can this tangled assertion possi- member at U.S.C. I’m not even a full- Under his qualifications for why he bly mean? time professor. I teach only half of might be appropriate for this position, First, as a poet, critic and antholo- each year on a contract basis. I didn’t the editors underemphasize the five gist, I have consistently championed a start teaching till I turned 60, and I most important words: “he is regretta- decentralized view of American liter- valued my independence too much to bly pro-choice” (vicious attacks on the ary culture. Much of my critical writ- go full-time. I felt it would be good defenseless unborn). I am no support- ing has analyzed the bias against re- discipline to spend half of the year as er of the N.R.A., but I am a support- er of life. It is alarming that someone BLOG TALK where, is declaring that Alvaré has charged to be guardian of our health is gone over to the dark side by aligning in the position to choose whose health The following is an excerpt from herself with Jesuits; I’m equally cer- the office will guard. The fact that he is “Jesuits and Women: Helen Alvaré tain that in another corner someone pro-choice makes him unqualified for to America!” by Elizabeth Scalia, the is muttering that America is selling the office. Anchoress, at patheos.com (4/10). out by bringing in a voice guaranteed In the very next comment, “Saving to mention abortion and contracep- Graces,” the editors say that the trend This is, by any estimation, “a good tion more than is “seemly.” of youth suicide deserves more at- get” for America; it demonstrates Both must be disabused of their tention. Yet is this not a form of pro- the commitment of Editor-in-Chief illusions. This is just people of faith choice? This inconsistency does not Matt Malone to move away from the coming together, probably not in help young people or anyone see the bubbles, labels and the intellectual/ precise lockstep (they are, after value of their God-given life. We need ideological ghettos that we Catholics all, Catholic, so there will be noise to be consistent. All life is important. too often build amidst all the beau- and messes) yet nevertheless talking, Janet Caraballo ty. The move emphasizes a desire to teaching, exploring and sharing their Valrico, Fla. more forcefully and inclusively en- faith from disparate perspectives, Jesuit Martyr gage with the world, and to pursue because the nature of the church I appreciated “Witness in Rwanda,” the truth in love. is catholic. I’m sure that someone, some- Elizabeth Scalia (Vantage Point, 4/7), with its thumb- nail sketches of the Jesuits who died in the genocide in 1994. I was a What You’re Reading at americamagazine.org classmate of the oldest, Chrysologus 1 Vicar of Christ, by James Martin, S.J. (Online, 4/23) Mahame, the first Rwandan Jesuit. We 2 Shared Sacrifice, by Msgr. Michael Heintz (4/28) studied theology in Belgium from 1958 3 The Greatness of Pope John, by Msgr. Raymond Etteldorf to 1962 and were ordained together. (Vantage Point, 4/28) I remember him as amiable but 4 Friends of Merton, by Daniel P. Horan, O.F.M. (4/28) shy, and very intelligent. How did he 5 Writers Blocked? by Kaya Oakes (4/28) become the courageous leader de-

6 America May 19, 2014 scribed in the article? He himself gave have to remain in prison for the rest of Ignatius Loyola and Francis Xavier, his the explanation, an African Jesuit told his life? At the very least, it is a waste roommates at the University of Paris? me. Father Mahame said, “The people of taxpayers’ money to keep him incar- For the answer, we turn to John C. taught me how to be a priest.” I vener- cerated. If free, he would be a model H. Wu, China’s minister to the Holy ate him as a martyr. citizen. See under Chiang Kai-shek. In 1954, James Torrens, S.J. Some 40 years ago I met a young Dr. Wu spoke to the Jesuits in forma- Fresno, Calif. man who later committed murder at tion in Weston, Mass., and noted the age 19. He was initially on death row growth of an amazing interest in Jesus Continuity and Development in North Carolina, but because of a Christ throughout Asia immediate- For me, ordained in the wake of Supreme Court decision, his sentence ly after World War II. In response to Vatican II, who valued the role of Yves was changed to life with the possibility the obvious question of why it took so Congar, O.P., and the other periti, the of parole. During his 34 years in pris- long, he said, “Perhaps Jesus wanted to article “When Not in Rome,” by Paul on, I saw a transformation not unlike save the best for the last.” Philibert, O.P. (3/24), was heartening. Mr. Rosenthal’s. Fortunately, he was As our church renews itself, Peter Viewing church life through the lens paroled in 2009. Some things have Faber, S.J., is the saint for our times. of center-periphery interaction allows been difficult for him, but his parole Paul Kelly for a dynamic and energized church. Saco, Me. officers have made it clear that he has Vatican II promised an open, lis- truly turned his life around. tening church sensitive to the diversi- Body and Soul It is my sincere hope that Stan ties of our world, unafraid to risk and In his review of (1/6), Rosenthal and many others like him Icons of Hope capable of responding to the needs and Thomas P. Rausch, S.J., points out that will be able to savor the same freedom opportunities of our time. That church both Pope Benedict and John E. Thiel, as my friend. has yet to be fully realized, but Pope Peter C. Winkler the book’s author, “reject the idea of Francis seems poised to bring us along Schroon Lake, N.Y. resurrection at the time of death.” that road. How do Professor Thiel and Pope The treatment of Father Congar’s Attitude Change Benedict account for the traditional, principle that the church has organs In “Open to All” (3/17), Katarina metaphysical claim that body and soul of development and organs of conti- Schuth, O.S.F., writes that many of together constitute one acting and re- nuity is a fundamental one for ongoing Pope Francis’ early actions convey sponsible agent, one person? Catholic reform and renewal. It applies to the more than simply “tone and manner.” teaching holds that at death the soul relationship between Rome and the She writes about his “benevolent and leaves the body, immediately undergoes local churches. I suggest that it applies respectful attitude” and his “attitude of the particular judgment and is con- even more broadly, especially to the humility.” This directly opposes those signed to purgatory, heaven or hell. It relationship between a bishop and the members of the hierarchy who would is the soul, then, not the person, that is pastoral units of the diocese. have us believe that Francis is only judged and exists in one of these states. Father Congar’s wisdom and the talking about tone and manner. When the soul’s temporal punishment vision of Vatican II provide us with Attitude, not tone or manner, is is completed, it “goes” to heaven. The promising direction for the church, what Francis is asking us to change. body, then, has escaped the punish- both global and local. He is showing us by his actions how ment of purgatory even though it par- John Jennings we can change the church by our ac- ticipated in the acts that merited it. Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada tions, if we only will. Father Rausch writes that Professor Jim McLaughlin Thiel holds that the blessed dead are Prison Transformations Sparkill, N.Y. “involved in the ongoing work of for- Many things make me proud to be an giveness, healing rifts that exist in the American. Our criminal justice sys- Saint for Our Times communion of saints.” Couldn’t body tem, however, is an embarrassment John W. Padberg, S.J., deserves com- and soul together engage in that work to me. “On the Run,” by B. G. Kelley mendation for two fascinating articles until it is completed in the general (3/24), serves as an excellent example in America about the newly canon- judgment? The general judgment is of its extreme rigidity and obsessive- ized Peter Faber, S.J.: “A Genius for not just about bodily resurrection; it ness. After reading about the trans- Friendship” (3/10) and “A Saint Too also confirms each person’s life either formation of Stan Rosenthal during Little Known” (7/17/2006). in heaven or hell. his 26 years of imprisonment, I could Why did it take almost 500 years Gerald J. Williams not help but ask: Why does this man for Faber to be recognized as were Denville, N.J.

May 19, 2014 America 7 SIGNS OF THE TIMES

Catholic Charities A father hugs his daughter while taking a break Deadly Storms Sweep from helping friends sift though rubble from Southern U.S. homes destroyed in an Arkansas tornado. atholic Charities agencies were on the ground assessing damage after a series of storms with deadly tornadoes Cand massive floods swept through the southern United States on April 27-29. The storms killed 35 people, left thousands without power and razed homes and businesses. Arkansas and Mississippi were the hardest hit, but deaths were also reported in Oklahoma, Iowa, Alabama and Tennessee. Georgia residents lost power, and the Carolinas and Florida experienced flash floods. In areas hit by tornadoes, thousands of people forced out of their homes sought temporary shelter while the National Guard, local police and residents sifted through the rubble searching for victims. Patricia Cole, communications director for Catholic Charities USA, said its disaster response operations team has been coor- dinating with local Catholic Charities agencies in Oklahoma, Arkansas, Mississippi, Florida and Alabama, “where conditions on the ground are changing by the hour.” Cole said Catholic Charities USA had received requests for grants for financial assistance and is Gallaher said the local Catholic Middle East staying in close contact with Catholic Charities agency continues to coor- dioceses and agencies in the damaged dinate with other agencies to provide Iraqi Refugees areas as they assess the needs in their support during the cleanup phase and communities. is gathering case managers for the re- Head to the Patrick Gallaher, executive direc- building effort that will come in the Polls in Jordan tor of Catholic Charities of Arkansas, months ahead. posted updates on the agency’s web- “The long-term relief effort will steady stream of Iraqi refu- site, noting that the search and rescue take months as we assist people in gees, smiling and displaying phase of the relief effort finished on obtaining replacement housing, furni- Apurple index fingers, emerged April 30. He also said the overflow of ture, clothing and counseling,” he said. from a polling station in the Hashemi donations made it impossible to store “As needs crystallize, we shall seek help Shamali district in the Jordanian capital any other contributions until new col- from among our parishes.” of Amman, where most of these urban lection points were established. “The Greg Patin, executive director of refugees live. immediate need of survivors is being Catholic Charities in Jackson, Miss., “Change is badly needed in Iraq. met,” he said. told Catholic News Service on April Hopefully the elections will yield a suit- St. Joseph Church in Conway, Ark., 30 that staff members would begin to able leader. God is gracious,” said Um initially was used as an American assess local needs on May 1, after first Martin, a Chaldean Catholic woman Red Cross shelter, but the shelter was responders finished their work. from the biblical city of Nineveh in closed April 29 because not enough Once needs are assessed, he said, northern Iraq. “My family and I fled people were using it. Parishes in the “we will begin to provide what assis- here one month ago because of the Little Rock Diocese have been con- tance we can,” but he also noted that threats and attacks on Christians. We ducting their own drives to mobilize the agency has limited staffing resourc- are hoping that, after the elections, there and collect donated materials. es and will need volunteer assistance. will be greater stability,” she added.

8 America May 19, 2014 were threatened,” her husband said, peace,” he said solemnly. without providing details. “There is vio- A Catholic from Baghdad, Abu lence specifically targeting Christians in Laith, said he and his family fled to the northern city of Mosul and its envi- Jordan a year ago because many family rons. There are about 40 to 60 families members were killed. who fled here recently,” he added, saying Despite having a good job as a nurse they are unsure exactly who is carrying in a hospital for 12 years and having his out the measures against Christians. young children enrolled in school, he “If there is change following the elec- and his family decided to leave Baghdad tions, we will return home. But if not, because of the violence committed then we will remain in Jordan. Honestly, against his family and their Christian al-Maliki did not accomplish anything. community. Things are bad,” he said. “The terrorism must end. The people Al-Maliki, battling for a third term of Iraq are not O.K.,” he said as he came as prime minister, faces a fractious op- out of the polling station holding his position and no obvious challenger. The 10-month-old son. resurgence of sectarian violence, which Whether Christian, Sunni Muslim nearly tore Iraq apart in 2006 and 2007, or Iraqis from a tiny sect called the underscores the precarious politics of a Sabean-Mandean, who are followers of democratic but splintered nation. John the Baptist, those interviewed at Iraq’s Christian population has once the polling station said they want to see again come under threat, with senior al-Maliki out of office and someone else clergy, priests and parishioners becom- at the helm. ing victims of kidnappings, bombings But some analysts believe voters go- Iraqi Catholic refugees, along with and murder, often by extremist mili- ing to the polls on April 30 inside Iraq their exiled countrymen, voted in the tants. probably cast ballots along sectarian first parliamentary polls since the with- “Many Iraqi Christians are turning and ethnic lines, and no single party is drawal of U.S. troops from their vio- out to vote because people want to find expected to win a majority. With more lence-plagued nation in 2011. Iraqi ex- the way for peace. Others really want to than 9,000 candidates competing for patriates in more than 20 countries were return home,” said the Rev. Raymond 328 parliamentary seats, others said they permitted to cast ballots before the vote Moussalli, patriarchal vicar of the expect an alliance again led by al-Maliki, in Iraq on April 30. Chaldean Catholic Church in Jordan. a Shiite, to win and that he will seek a About 300,000 Iraqi refugees still live He has spent many years in Jordan min- third term as prime minister. in Jordan, more than a decade after the istering to Christian refu- U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam gees who have fled Iraq. Hussein. Other Iraqis continue to flee Father Moussalli’s con- for safety, although the country’s ambas- gregation in Amman cur- sador said only 50,000 of the Iraqis in rently has about 2,000 peo- Jordan are old enough to vote. ple who have come from Newcomers like Um Martin all over Iraq, including told Catholic News Service that the the capital, Baghdad, the security situation for Christians in northern areas of Mosul, Iraq is becoming ever more precarious. Nineveh and Kurdistan as They hope the vote will remove Prime well as the predominantly Minister Nouri al-Maliki and put in Shiite city of Basra in the someone more capable of addressing the South. surging violence and instability. “We hope that the new An Iraqi woman living in Jordan casts a ballot at a “We left because of problems; we government will make polling station in Amman.

May 19, 2014 America 9 SIGNS OF THE TIMES Vatican Lifts Sanctions On Irish Theologian NEWS BRIEFS An Irish priest who was forbidden to In April the sultanate of Brunei became the first write by the Vatican because of his views East Asian country to introduce the criminal on human sexuality has had the sanc- component of Shariah law at the national level, tion lifted. The moral theologian Sean raising concerns among Buddhist and Christian Fagan, 86, a Marist priest, had been minorities. • Palestinian Christians welcomed Religion under threat. subject to sanction by the Congregation the agreement between rival political factions for the Doctrine of the Faith for the last Fatah and Hamas to form a national unity government. “The divi- six years. The superior general of the sion among Palestinians was a factor that weakened the peace pro- Marist congregation in Rome, Father cess,” according to the Rev. Raed Abusahlia, general director of Caritas John Hannan, confirmed that Father Jerusalem. • The European Union border agency reports that over Fagan is now “a priest in good standing” half of the immigrants who entered Europe illegally in 2013 made the where the church is concerned. final perilousborder crossing by way of the sea. • Eight countries, Mary McAleese, the former pres- including Syria, Pakistan and Egypt, should be added to the State ident of Ireland, reportedly wrote to Department’s list of the worst religious freedom offenders, according Pope Francis appealing for his interven- to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. • In re- tion in the case of Father Fagan and had sponse to Pope Francis’ call “to go to the outskirts of existence,” Sister her letter acknowledged by the pope’s Maria Nazareth of Argentina is preparing to go to the war-torn city secretary. Father Fagan, who has suf- of Aleppo. • Christians fear that the demolition of a massive church fered from ill health for many years, was in Wenzhou, a Chinese coastal city known as the “Jerusalem of the first disciplined by the doctrinal congre- East,” may signal an intensified campaign against religious organiza- gation in 2008 following the publication tions by local Communist authorities. of his book, Whatever Happened to Sin? In 2010 Father Fagan was informed by Cardinal William J. Levada, then minorities and counsels family members “Colleges and universities can no lon- prefect of the C.D.F., that he would be who find their loved ones’ sexual orienta- ger turn a blind eye or pretend rape and dismissed from the priesthood should tion disturbing. sexual assault doesn’t occur on their cam- he write for publication any material His passion is to see an end to what puses,” said Vice President Biden at the considered contrary to church teaching. he calls “religious homophobia”; this re- report’s release. A study of undergradu- quires reaching out to other religious ate women in 2009 found that one in five leaders. To that end, he runs educational are sexually assaulted during college. Ministering to Nairobi’s awareness seminars on human sexuality The task force recommends that and gender identity. schools issue campus climate surveys Gays and Lesbians “Gays and lesbians are children of to learn the extent of the problem and Alarmed by the number of members of God and created in his image,” Makokha to implement prevention programs the clergy resorting to hate, oppression said. “They should be accepted and af- that “engage men as allies in this cause.” and discrimination against gays and les- firmed as such. They deserve a place to When a sexual assault occurs, schools bians, one pastor has opened the doors of worship and serve God.” should provide trained advocates, as well his church to Nairobi’s outcasts. The Rev. as mental health and pastoral counsel- John Makokha is risking his position and Combatting Sexual ors, to support victims through the pro- reputation by welcoming gays and lesbi- cess of reporting and recovery. ans into the Riruta Hope Community Assault on Campus The White House has also created Church, but feels he has no choice. On April 29 the White House Task NotAlone.gov, a website that provides The Kenyan penal code regards ho- Force to Protect Students from Sexual information about students’ rights, mosexuality as a crime, and Christian Assault issued its first report, which out- school-by-school enforcement data and and Muslim clergy speak clearly and lines ways to more effectively identify, resources on how to file a complaint. forcefully against it. In this environ- prevent and respond to sexual violence ment, Makokha ministers to sexual on campuses. From CNS, RNS and other sources.

10 America May 19, 2014 Margot Patterson The West Knows Best?

ne of the best books of his- ness to seize portions of Russia and the crisis in Ukraine, I’ve been struck by tory I’ve read is a slender western half of Ukraine and to annex the nationalism it has aroused in this Ovolume by Arnold J. Toynbee these to Western Christendom. It was country as well as in Ukraine and called The World and the West. In it, not until 1945 that Russia was able to Russia. The United States won the the late British historian takes as his regain this territory lost in the 13th Cold War, but some seem eager to re- topic the encounter between the world and 14th centuries. In the interval, start it. Russia is being painted not just and the West, an encounter that he Russia saw invasions by the Swedes, in somber hues but as absolute pitch notes has been going on for at least 400 the French, the Poles and the Germans. black. This though the United States or 500 years and in which the world, It was Peter the Great who launched has also, and rather often, schemed to not the West, is the party that has suf- Russia on a race to catch up with the keep countries in its sphere of influ- fered from the encounter. Different West, one Russia has been on ever ence. though the non-Western peoples of since. Toynbee sees Peter Should we see the the world are from each other in race, as “the archetype of the The United crisis in Ukraine as religion, language, civilization and his- autocratic Westernizing the Western powers of tory, Toynbee observes that Hindus, reformer” who imposes States won light arrayed against Muslims, Russians, the Japanese, the Western ways and technol- the Russian powers of Chinese and others will all agree that ogy on his society in order the Cold darkness? Warnings “the West has been the arch-aggressor to resist its domination War, but of the provocation to of modern times.” In this perception, by the West. In the 20th Russia engendered by he writes, they are largely correct. century, Communism be- some seem NATO’s continued ex- I first readThe World and the West came another weapon in eager to pansion eastward have a few years ago and found it as timely the struggle. Toynbee calls gone unheeded for 15 and unexpected as when it was pub- Communism a Christian restart it. years. Robert Jervis, a lished in 1953. The conflict between heresy, a Western creed professor of internation- Islam and the West, so often discussed Russia adopted to wage spiritual war al affairs at Columbia University who since 2001, is limned there, though against the post-Christian West. favors creating a neutral Ukraine as a with a great deal more sympathy, nu- It is interesting to think how long the solution to the face-off, calls Europe’s ance and historical intelligence than is contest over Ukraine between Russia actions leading up to it “totally irre- common in contemporary accounts. and the West dates back. It is also in- sponsible.” In the case of Russia, the subject of teresting that the indigenous people of Scholars take the long view, which the first chapter in the book, Toynbee Crimea are the Tatars. Deported from is what Toynbee does so lucidly in his notes that though the Russians have the peninsula by Stalin, it is only since book. His reflections on the encounter been Christians, they have never been 1991 that they have been allowed to between the world and the West do Western Christians and owe their faith return to their homeland. Seeking to not provide nostrums for the current not to Rome but to Constantinople. build a navy, Peter the Great made war conflict in Ukraine but may jolt read- In the early Middle Ages, relations on the Crimean Tatars, but it wasn’t ers’ underlying assumptions regard- between Russia and the West were until close to 60 years after his death in ing it. Describing the existential crisis not unfriendly, but they subsequently 1725 that Russia finally gained a port other cultures face in contending with deteriorated. The Tatars’ conquest of on the Black Sea. It remains important the West’s superior technology— and Russia in the 13th century led to losses to Russia, a major factor in her recent noting that technology is bound up of Russian territory as Russia’s western intervention in Crimea. with values—Toynbee offers a histo- neighbors took advantage of her weak- The collapse of Communism has rian’s perspective on the struggle of quieted but obviously not ended ten- non-Western cultures to survive the Margot Patterson is a writer who lives in sions between Russia and the West. assault of an aggressive and dynamic Kansas City, Mo. Listening to the commentary on the civilization.

May 19, 2014 America 11

Morality and Morale The experience of U.S. soldiers inside Guantánamo Bay By Luke Hansen

he hunger strike that involved more than camps, instead closed the state department office responsi- 100 detainees and captured international ble for finding countries to take detainees. A hunger strike attention was still on when I landed on the ensued, and more than 100 of 166 detainees joined the ef- U.S. naval base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. It fort. As some became increasingly malnourished, military was July 16, 2013, and my arrival coincided officials decided to force-feed as many as 46 detainees on a Twith that of John F. Kelly, a four-star Marine general who given day. Though the practice is considered unethical by the is commander of U.S. military operations in Central and American Medical Association, the Pentagon defended it as South America and the Caribbean. Although our visits were a humane attempt to save lives. similarly timed, our missions were decidedly different. I was In an article on the op-ed page of The New York on assignment for America to tour the detention camps, Times (4/15/13), Samir Naji al Hasan Moqbel, held at interview staff and bring to light what was happening in Guantánamo since a place typically veiled in secrecy. General Kelly was at the 2002 and never Restraint chair and tube used for force-feeding base to install a new commander for detention operations. charged in a military Public affairs officers escorted me to the Windjammer or civilian court, de- Ballroom for the change-of-command ceremony. The “high scribed the first time liturgy” included processions, music and an invocation. Flag a feeding tube was bearers on the stage represented each branch of the military. shoved up his nose, At the podium, General Kelly said he would do something down his throat and “a little unusual” for this type of event: speak directly to the into his stomach. troops about this “incredibly important mission.” The de- “There was agony tainees’ hunger strike, then in its sixth month, had attract- in my chest, throat ed a lot of unwanted attention and criticism, not only from and stomach. I had human rights groups but also from the commander in chief. never experienced General Kelly seemed resolved to boost the morale of the such pain before,” he 2,000 U.S. troops responsible for detention operations. wrote. “I just hope that because of the Competing Narratives pain we are suffering, the eyes of the world will once again A morale boost was needed because of a crisis that arose look at Guantánamo before it is too late.” Many took no- quickly in early 2013, following three relatively quiet years tice. Several elected officials, public commentators and at the detention camps. Despite the fact that the U.S. gov- newspaper editorial writers denounced the status quo at ernment had several years earlier approved the release or Guantánamo and called on the president to renew his com- transfer of more than half of the remaining detainees, the mitment to closing the facility. process of emptying the camps had essentially halted be- At a press conference on April 30, 2013, President Obama cause of congressional restrictions. Between October 2010 finally addressed the hunger strike and force-feeding. He and early 2013, only five men left Guantánamo: two made said he did not want any detainees to die, but as a country plea bargains and served out their time; two found freedom we should ask, “Why exactly are we doing this?” He also said in El Salvador; and one left in a coffin. the indefinite detention of individuals in Guantánamo Bay Frustration and desperation among the detainees inten- is “contrary to who we are” and “contrary to our interests.” sified, especially when they received news that President Then, in a major security speech at the National Defense Barack Obama, who had promised to close the detention University on May 23, he said, “History will cast a harsh judgment on this aspect of our fight against terrorism and those of us who fail to stop it.” Luke Hansen, S.J., an associate editor of America, made his first trip to Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, to report on military commission hearings in At the change-of-command ceremony, General Kelly de-

October 2012. livered an aggressive and unapologetic 13-minute rebuttal of the author photos courtesy

14 America May 19, 2014 SOLITARY LIFE. In April 2013, nearly every detainee was held in a single-cell lockdown unit like this one in Camp Five. Today the majority of detainees live in communal settings.

to the critics of Guantánamo. At the outset, he em- alism of the guard force. Soldiers do not create policy, but phasized the distinction between U.S. policy and the they do implement detention practices widely criticized as troops on the ground. “We in uniform are responsi- illegal and immoral. This raises several important questions. ble for one thing here: detention operations. We don’t Beyond the rhetoric, how do the troops experience and un- make policy,” he said. derstand their work? How does the political debate, espe- General Kelly praised the troops as “world-class cially the words of the commander in chief, affect them? And professionals” who endure “endless hours” of verbal do they wrestle with the moral questions of Guantánamo? and physical abuse but do not retaliate. He said this professional conduct reflects “the truth of this effort.” Tough Reporting Defending the troops from what he called “unwarrant- Last summer the Pentagon approved tours of the detention ed and most often fabricated criticism,” General Kelly operations for only a few reporters. America was grant- took dead aim at what he called the “champions” of ed rare access to Camps Five and Six (where most of the the detainees, the “agenda-driven chattering class” and the detainees are held), the detainee library, food preparation “self-serving, misguided pundits.” He expressed particular center, hospital and behavioral health unit. My request for frustration with anyone who implies that the troops partic- a tour of Camp Seven, the top-secret facility for the “high- ipate in a “shameful and illegal undertaking.” Meanwhile, he value” detainees, was ignored. During my five-day visit, I said the detainees “are among the most violent and hateful interviewed two chaplains, a defense attorney, a watch com- men on the planet: terrorists, extremists, Al Qaeda leader- mander, a member of the guard force, the Muslim cultural ship, who are, in most cases, still at war with our country.” adviser, the senior medical officer, the head psychiatrist, the It is not uncommon for public officials and military lead- director of public affairs and General Kelly. ers to characterize the detainees broadly as “the worst of the Before arriving on the naval base, reporters must agree worst” terrorists in the world; and yet the Bush administra- to 10 pages of ground rules, including a strict prohibition tion released more than 500 of these men from Guantánamo. on communicating with any detainees. The military’s motto In 12 years only eight detainees have been convicted of any at Guantánamo Bay is “Safe, Humane, Legal, Transparent,” crimes, and half (77) of the remaining detainees have been but the whole operation is so lacking in “transparency” that cleared for release or transfer, most in January 2010 by a task it is difficult to assess whether it is “safe, humane and legal.” force of top U.S. security and intelligence officials. The tours were carefully choreographed. In the course of The troops in Guantánamo Bay have a demanding job five days, we observed just a few detainees for a total of 10 and do it exceptionally well, but the moral evaluation of the minutes. In each interview, staff repeated the same talking detention operations cannot be reduced to the profession- points: Detainee noncooperation is their way of “staying in

May 19, 2014 America 15 the fight”; detainees are held in “single-cell lockdown,” not ly reflected what he actually experiences each day. Once in solitary confinement; detainees routinely splash guards with Guantánamo Bay, he shadowed his predecessor for a week, cocktails of feces and urine; the hunger strike is exaggerated. was observed for a week and then took over. He works 12- The media restrictions, however, made it impossible to ver- hour shifts, but has gotten used to it. “It’s not really that ify these claims, and requests for documentation were nev- stressful,” he said. In two months of duty, he had not seen er fulfilled. For example, General Kelly claimed that many a single incident of detainees splashing troops with urine or detainees only “pretend” to be on hunger strike. I asked to feces. “The way you treat detainees is how they are going to observe the detainees at a meal time. That, I was told, would treat you back,” he said. “The respect factor goes a long way.” not be possible. He told a story about a detainee who moved into his camp After several requests, the public affairs office did allow but did not have sneakers, so he found him a pair. The next me to visit Camp Iguana, a special housing facility originally built for juvenile detain- Camp X-Ray, now abandoned, where the ees as young as 13. In recent years the camp first detainees were held in 2002 housed Turkish Uighurs classified as “exon- erated residents” because they had release papers from a U.S. federal court. Once we arrived at the camp, set on the edge of a rocky stretch of Caribbean coastline, the officer allowed me to photograph only the opaque fence surrounding the camp. When I walked toward the gate to peer inside, she yelled, “Stop!” Camp Iguana is the least restrictive housing facility in Guantánamo. What is there to hide? And how do these restrictions reflect on the stated commitment to transparency? Spencer Ackerman, national security editor for the web publication Guardian U.S., told an audience at New York University in November that day the detainee said thank you. “If you help these guys out,” it is harder to report in Guantánamo than in Afghanistan Sergeant Branson said, “it goes a long way.” or Iraq. “It is very controlled,” he explained. “Never once Army Spc. Andrew Stark, 22, after seven months on the in a war zone did I present anything to a censor.” At guard force, said the job can be stressful at times. Everyone, Guantánamo, however, every photograph and video clip is he said, experiences intimidation and hate from the detain- carefully reviewed before it leaves the base. Sometimes late ees. “I have seen biological assault, verbal assault, people into the night, public affairs officers scroll through hundreds struck with items,” he said. On a couple of occasions, he had of images, cropping and deleting any prohibited items, like feces and urine thrown at him. He sees it as just part of the naval assets, entry procedures, pathways or even coastlines. mission. “You get tested [for communicable diseases], and go Never mind that satellite images of the facilities are available back to work,” he explained. A person needs to be resilient, to anyone with access to Google Maps. he said, but also to know one’s limits. “Everyone has different ways to cope,” he explained. “I go outside, smoke a cigarette, Soldiers’ Stories and then I come back in, and it’s like nothing ever happened. Though access to many places and people was restricted, I’m a new man.” there were many opportunities to listen to the experiences Army Cpt. Brady Frederick, chaplain of the 525th of military personnel through formal interviews with mem- Battalion, has listened to many guards talk about person- bers of the guard force, testimony from chaplains and daily al and professional struggles. Since they are separated from interaction with the public affairs officers responsible for their normal support system of family and friends, Captain escorting members of the media from place to place on the Frederick said, guards have to find another a way to work naval base. through moments of frustration and anger. “Life is paused Army Sgt. Vernon Branson, 33, had no experience work- while they are here,” he explained. Soldiers miss weddings, ing in a detention facility before he arrived in Guantánamo. birthdays and even funerals. Many are worried about the Now he is a watch commander. He received two weeks survival of their marriage, and how to be a good father of training before taking on this assignment, but it hard- or mother when separated from their children. National

16 America May 19, 2014 Guard Cpt. Loneshia Reid, who worked in the joint operations center, said that her biggest worry is the well-being of her family. “I pray for the safety of my family, and that they’re O.K. in my absence,” she said. Part of the challenge for troops, Captain Frederick explained, is that only 1 percent of Americans serve in the military. Friends and family typically have no reference point for what the soldiers experience on deployment, especially in a place like Guantánamo Bay. Soldiers have to come to grips with the fact that most people will never know what they did, or the sacrifices they made. “There will be no parade” when they return home, he said.

Moral Questions The troops experience a strong sense of duty to faithful- ly execute the mission. They value the chain of command and follow orders. Yet it can be hard to maintain morale. The commander in chief referred to the prison as unnec- essary, contrary to our country’s interests and not who we are. When soldiers hear this, they might naturally wonder: Who is giving the orders? What is the mission? Why are we here? Such questions do not change their daily reality of waking up, going to work and doing their job. But at the same time, they inevitably live in the shadow of the political and moral realities of Guantánamo, a heavy weight to car- ry—so heavy that most people try not to think about it. Whenever I asked soldiers about the president’s charac- terization of the detention facilities, they would often smile, lean back, take a deep breath and say it does not really help to think about it. Specialist Stark tries to separate himself from politics as much as possible. “I don’t want anything getting in my brain that is going to give me any sort of prejudice against this job,” he said. Captain Reid said she has a personal opinion, but when she wears her uniform, President Obama “is commander in chief and is entitled to say what he wants to say.” The military personnel simply try to get through each day, and they have other things to worry about. There does not seem to be much room for critical analysis or moral dis- cernment. “Once you accept the duties of this uniform, you kind of have to make your own way, spiritually,” said Captain Reid, who completed a master of divinity degree immediately before her deployment. “I feel God understands that this is my job, and if I were called to do something else, I would be somewhere else.” Therefore, she said, she will do this job to the best of her ability. I asked General Kelly whether President Obama’s comments have affected the morale of the troops on the ground. “One of the great things about being in the U.S. military is you don’t have to worry about that kind of stuff. You just do what you are told,” he explained. “My troops know they are doing a noble thing here, because our country sent us here

May 19, 2014 America 17 to do this. Our country wouldn’t send us anywhere to do of indefinite detention. President Obama has offered a lita- something that wasn’t noble, honorable and legal.” ny of reasons for why the detention camps at Guantánamo Many others, however, do not have the same level of cer- should be closed. Here is another: It is unjust to subject tainty as General Kelly. The U.S. Catholic bishops, for ex- military personnel to these circumstances. It unnecessarily ample, have criticized the indefinite detention of detainees places them in a compromising moral and political situation at Guantánamo Bay. that none of them asked for. In a letter to Secretary of Defense Chuck Hegel on June One year since Mr. Obama’s recommitment to closing 25, 2013, Bishop Richard E. Pates of the detention facility, 12 detainees have Des Moines, Iowa, chairman of the U.S. On the Web been transferred, admittedly a small bishops’ Committee on International America’s reporting number of the overall population but on Guantánamo Bay. Justice and Peace, wrote that detainees in americamagazine.org/guantanamo the largest step toward closing the facil- Guantánamo Bay “have the right to a just ity since his first year in office. Tensions and fair trial held in a timely manner.” The have cooled, but not disappeared. As of United States has charged fewer than 20 of the 779 detain- March, about two dozen detainees continued to refuse ees in the history of Guantánamo. Bishop Pates explained, meals and were being force-fed. “The indefinite detention of detainees is not only injurious to President Obama does not bear responsibility for cre- those individuals, it also wounds the moral reputation or our ating the problem of Guantánamo Bay, but now he owns nation.” Stephen Colecchi, the director of that bishops’ office, it. As commander in chief, he must fix a situation that, in explained to America last June that experts can debate the his words, is “not sustainable” and “contrary to who we are.” legality of indefinite detention, but legal is not the same as When he issues an order, the military will execute it. General moral. “Is it moral? Absolutely not,” he said. Kelly told me, “We in uniform have no dog in the fight.” A day earlier, he had met with Cliff Sloan, the U.S. official ap- The Next Step pointed last June to find countries to take detainees, and told The policies in Guantánamo Bay affect not only the detain- him, “You give me a name, and you give me a country, and it’s ees but also the soldiers stationed there. Soldiers do not de- a machine after that.” The military is just taking orders. They cide policy, but they operate within and help sustain a system need to be the right ones. A

18 America May 19, 2014

Defending ‘the Worst’ An interview with the lawyer of an accused terrorist By Luke Hansen

Cmdr. Walter Ruiz of the U.S. Navy serves as legal counsel to Navy Cmdr. Walter Ruiz Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi, 45, a defendant in the military commissions at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, for his alleged role in the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. The charges against Mr. al-Hawsawi, a citizen of Saudi Arabia, include conspiracy to commit terrorism and murder in violation of the law of war. He was reportedly taken into custody by the United States in 2003 and transferred to Guantánamo Bay in 2006. The interview, edited for length and clarity, took place on Nov. 14, 2013, in New York City.

here was your client detained between 2003 and 2006? I know, but I can’t tell you because it’s prohibited Wby classification restrictions.

Is his detention prior to 2006 relevant to the current case? It’s critically important. This is a death penalty prosecution. In these cases, we are charged with providing the fact-finder Left: Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi ruiz of walter P hoto courtesy or jury with all of the facts necessary to make a determi- nation between life and death. The conditions of con- What do you know about Mr. al-Hawsawi’s family? finement of any prisoner are very relevant and necessary. I know very little about his family. It is a very It’s also critically important because if any informa- sensitive subject. One of his biggest concerns, of tion obtained during that period of time was obtained course, with someone like me, a representative of through the use of torture or coercive measures, we have the Department of Defense in uniform, is that any to litigate the reliability of a statement and whether it can harm would come to his family. ultimately be admissible in court. At the beginning, there was a great deal of mistrust in our relationship, which was understandable because of the Where is your client currently held in Guantánamo Bay? differences in our backgrounds, upbringings and religious Mr. al-Hawsawi is housed at a high-security detention facility traditions. Over a period of time, however, the relationship that I have never seen. Our legal team actually filed a motion has evolved. I respect him as a human being, and I think he to gain access to that facility and to stay overnight because we feels the same way. thought it was important to see where he sleeps, where he eats and what conditions he lives in. The military judge granted What have you learned about Mr. al-Hawsawi as a person? our motion, in part. I’m waiting to make that visit until I re- He is shockingly normal. Many people have an impression ceive records and help from an expert from the International of him as “the worst of the worst,” the personification of Committee of the Red Cross. evil. When I have sat across from him, time after time, for Technically, I am never supposed to discuss Mr. al-Haw- over three and a half years, I have not seen it. He has never sawi and the prison facility by name together because that is been disrespectful, vicious or vindictive. He is soft-spoken supposed to be classified—although I often see it in media re- and mild-mannered. He is a person who loves, fears and has ports. [Editor’s Note: That facility is known as Camp Seven, or pain. At the end of the day, he is a human being. Camp Platinum.] What is his religious background? Luke Hansen, S.J., an associate editor of America, has made two trips to Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, to report on the military commissions and the He is a very pious man. In a normal day of legal meetings, he detention camps. typically prays at least three times. Islam is a central tenet in P hoto: wikimedia commons/ B. H ussein S oetoro

22 America May 19, 2014 his life that guides every decision that he makes. with family members here in New York, and we have forged We have had pointed conversations about Islam—some relationships based on friendship and trust. genuine questions of interest and some about differences, Overall, I find the family members to be remarkable hu- where I pointedly asked, “Why is this?” man beings. Despite a great deal of grief and pain, many of The sincerity with which Mr. al-Hawsawi approaches his them push for a legal process that is fair, truly just and con- faith is striking to me because it’s not what you necessarily sistent with our values as Americans. They are concerned about torture. At times they have been encouraging of my work, to do it zealously and professionally, which is an amazing and remarkable testament to the human capacity to overcome grief and pain and have the vision to see the Mr. al-Hawsawi is much larger picture. I spoke with some family members who were very upset with shockingly normal. He what they saw as the “delay tactics” of the defense team. Yes, family members have expressed that at various times. That interaction is difficult, heart-wrenching, sad, because is a person who loves, you still see—after all this time—their pain and lack of closure or resolution. But I absolutely understand that po- fears and has pain. At sition. If I changed places with them, I might feel exactly the same way. In those interactions, I just spend time listening because the end of the day, he I think that’s mostly what they want. There isn’t anything I can say that would ultimately be meaningful because I don’t know what it’s like and, frankly, I wouldn’t want to. is a human being. In terms of the tactics, the really sad reality that we are still at this stage of legal proceedings, 11 years after Sept. 11, has absolutely nothing to do with me or the other law- see portrayed in the public eye, which is unfortunate. Islam yers. We have come into the picture relatively late. The delay can be portrayed as a religion of hatred or a cause for killing comes from our elected officials’ inability and lack of will to anyone who is an infidel. In fact that is not his approach. The do what was right from the beginning. It comes from their sincerity with which he pursues his connection with Allah is posturing, politicking and utilizing this case as a political the sincerity with which I would like to approach my own football to advance politically motivated goals. When our spirituality. elected officials failed to do this correctly, in accordance with established principles of law and justice, they set in motion a You are an officer in the U.S. military. Your client is accused process that would ultimately take a very long time. of fighting against the United States. How is it even possible At the present time, some of the issues that we have to establish a relationship with him? had to litigate are not creatures of our creation, but the My approach is to treat him like every other person I repre- government’s. In one of the most illustrative examples, sent. When I first met him I asked him to judge me based an intelligence agency literally reached into an American on the things I said and the actions I took, as opposed to the courtroom and turned it off because they didn’t like what clothing or the uniform I wore. And I promised him that I they heard. would not treat him based on my own preconceived notions of somebody from his background or religious tradition or “Turned off” the courtroom? alleged association with a group like Al Qaeda. I would treat There is a 45-second delay in the video and audio feed [to him with respect, listen to him and respond honestly, even if viewing rooms on the naval base and a few U.S. cities], so I believed it wasn’t what he wanted to hear. a control can “shut off ” the courtroom if any classified information is disclosed. When one of the lawyers apparent- Some family members of victims of the Sept. 11 attacks are in- ly said something offensive or classified, a red light started vited to attend the legal hearings in Guantánamo Bay. Have flashing and the courtroom was turned off. you met with any of them? The really shocking thing about the incident is that the I’ve met just about every group of family members down in judge didn’t hit the button, the court security officer didn’t Guantánamo Bay willing to meet with us. I have also met do it, and neither knew who did. The incident created weeks

May 19, 2014 America 23 of litigation and delay, even thought the judge made it abun- best we can. When it is all said and done, we hope there will dantly clear that nothing said was actually classified. be an honest and open assessment of Mr. al-Hawsawi’s role and culpability, if any, that results from a detached observa- What is the strategy of the defense team? What does victory tion of facts and evidence, and not through a prism of anger, look like? fear or vengeance. We are building a pretty strong appellate record of issues; we hope a federal court will overturn any conviction. Federal If your client is convicted but that is overturned on appeal, courts have repeatedly turned back the tide against en- I think Americans will be pretty outraged, even though he croachments on constitutional protections. would probably not be released. I don’t know that there can be any “victory” in such a place They should be outraged. They should be outraged that we’re or such a case. Every day we show up in court to simply do the here 11 years after the fact because we didn’t have the will to do it right the first time around. But I would hope that they would direct their outrage where I think it should be directed: at the people who ultimately created this inferior system and allowed the opportunity for such challenges to exist.

You have said that you do not view the military commissions system as legitimate. At what point does your decision to par- ticipate potentially violate your own deeply held values and professional duties? I wrestle with that very much. If there were a way that we could all just stop, I think we probably would. But now I have a relationship with a person who trusts me. I also have principles and ethical duties. I don’t think that removing myself is the answer; the process would still continue anyway. I think that it is better to be involved and continue to do what I think is just and truthful, and hope that in the end we can find some measure of justice.

Our government officials are trying perhaps the most important terrorism case in U.S. history in a widely criticized system. How do you hope Americans respond? I’ve seen exactly what I’ve hoped: the re- sponses of family members who, despite their grief, are striving for just process; human rights organizations who have sought to preserve human dignity and human rights; civil liberties organizations who have sought greater transparency and access to information; many, many Americans who understand the balancing of civil liberties with the reality that 11 years ago there was a very griev- ous injury inflicted upon this country. I hope these efforts continue. A

24 America May 19, 2014 Renewing the Tradition The theological project of James Alison By Grant Kaplan

ames Alison belongs on any short list of the most im- Father Alison’s understanding of the human person has portant living Catholic theologians. He has met and been deeply influenced by René Girard, the French anthro- Jperhaps exceeded the high expectations that arose pologist and literary theorist. Girard developed what he from his first book,Knowing Jesus (1993), and his most called “mimetic theory,” the belief that human desires are substantial work of constructive theology, The Joy of Being learned from others rather than forged within a person, and Wrong: Original Sin Through Easter Eyes(1998). For a theo- this results in discontent, rivalries and conflicts. In response logian under no tenure constraints and without a university position, Father Alison has managed to pro- duce steadily and predictably. He has written seven books, and his style has changed from academic to almost breezy, as if he simply transcribed his lectures. His writings suggest a man in no great hurry; he often lingers for pages with an image or analogy to help unpack a biblical text. Accompanying this shift in style has been a turn toward the theology of sexual orientation, beginning with Faith Beyond Resentment: Fragments Catholic and Gay (2001). His three subsequent books—On Being Liked (2004), Undergoing God (2006) and Broken Hearts & New Creations (2010)—have given considerable Father James Alison at a talk at the University of Malta. space to the underlying assumptions of official Catholic teachings about same-sex attraction and actions, and have a created a new to this social tension, according to Girard, the community and devoted readership. The commitment of Father Alison identifies and rejects a scapegoat, and the pattern contin- to a kind of popular theology has made his more recent work ues. Girard has applied this theory to Christian theology, accessible without sacrificing depth or theological creativity. and many others have followed in his footsteps. Even be- Father Alison’s lack of university affiliation has led fore Father Alison took on this project, there was Raymund many readers to wonder about both his biography and Schwager, Gil Bailie and Robert Hamerton-Kelly. Yet the his current location. He grew up in an evangelical family capacity of Father Alison to highlight the urgent relevance in England, where his father worked for the Conservative of mimetic theory for self-understanding has no parallel, Party. After converting to Catholicism in 1977, he joined and his ability to gain converts deserves generous reporting. the Dominicans in 1981 at age 22. He subsequently wrote (Indeed, a recent writer on Girard noted making three “false his dissertation under the supervision of the Jesuit faculty in starts” with mimetic theory before everything came togeth- Belo Horizonte, Brazil. He left the Dominicans in 1995 and er upon a chance encounter with Father Alison’s On Being since then has remained mostly in Brazil. He is still a priest. Liked.) Mimetic theory remains the central axis around which Grant Kaplan is an associate professor of systematic theology at Saint Father Alison’s theology turns, although his time with the

Louis University, St. Louis, Mo. Dominicans, especially Herbert McCabe, O.P., has left a cer- of james alison P hoto courtesy

May 19, 2014 America 25 tain “Thomist” residue in his thought. (Christopher Ruddy development of the Western doctrine of original sin and the made this observation in Commonweal in 2009.) Perhaps message of the Gospel. the best way to position his work as the mainstream, moder- The church calls Augustine “the doctor of grace.” No con- ately conservative theology that he claims it to be is to high- temporary Catholic theologian remains more tethered to light its parallels with another astute observer of the human an understanding of grace as gratuitous than does Father heart, St. Augustine. The deep and continual introspection Alison. The very language he uses to describe an authentic that made Augustine the great forerunner of the modern encounter with Jesus contrasts “undergoing” with “grasping” self also marks Father Alison as a great beneficiary (and crit- (see especially Undergoing God). If God’s gift is always a ic) of this legacy. self-gift, then Father Alison correctly deduces that any real encounter entails a kind of passivity. Like the jolt of falling The Place of Sin in love, it happens to us. This necessary quality of religious Mimetic theory, especially as Father Alison has elaborated it, experience follows from an anthropology that describes the offers perhaps the most interesting support for Augustine’s disinclination of humans to relate peacefully to others. We theology of original experience the divine sin, which the Catholic in a radically different Church more or less manner because Jesus, adopted wholesale at The gratuity of the resurrection the forgiving victim, the Council of Trent. comes to us in a way At first this link allows for a community shaped so unlike our expecta- seems unlikely, given by forgiven-forgivers. tions of divine justice. Augustine’s insistence Grace, freely given, re- that original sin is orders the universe and transfused propaga- remakes the communi- tione, non imitatione (“by propagation, not imitation”), im- ty we call church. Unlike previous communities in which the plying an almost genetic transmission. For Augustine this bond among members forges itself through those it excludes meant that we share in Adam’s sin as a physical inheritance and scapegoats, the gratuity of the resurrection allows for a rather than as a shared experience. community shaped by forgiven-forgivers. If mimetic theory teaches us anything, it is that we do not begin with a blank slate. Further, our larger communi- New Interpretations ties, built on victims hidden from sight, maintain traces of Father Alison asks his readers to linger with images, or an original violence. Thus our desire, ordained by God as passages from Scripture, in a way that makes the shape of pacifically mimetic and fundamentally good, becomes the reading such passages conform to the shape of a graced “un- conduit for actual sins on account of the sinful communities dergoing.” Even biblical formulas require deconstruction of that donate to us our sense of being. We are far too commu- the different ways that we perceive faith as a kind of work nal and too inclined to be locked into others to avoid being and thus miss the massive shift God calls us to undergo. infected, ontologically, by sin. Throughout his work, Father Perhaps Eph 2:8 is the hidden verse informing the work of Alison offers examples both trivial and serious to demon- Father Alison: “For by grace you have been saved through strate the fundamental, Augustinian truth about our inher- faith, and this is not from you; it is the gift of God.” If a per- ited identity and communal sinfulness. son regards faith—either the coming into Father Alison also argues that the res- On the Web it or the maintaining of it—as some kind Follow America urrection of Jesus as the forgiving victim on Twitter. of achievement, then the person remains makes the doctrine of original sin pos- twitter.com/americamag beholden to an economy without grace. sible. It is no surprise that the expulsion The anti-Pelagian writings of Augustine, from Eden (Genesis 3), though largely ig- which even his enthusiastic readers often nored in the Old Testament, receives serious attention in the eschew, show the same urgency to understand grace in the writings of St. Paul. Augustine, the great inheritor of Paul, right way. struggled intensely to understand the relationship between Like Augustine, Father Alison understands the pressing the old Adam and the new Adam. It is only after the salvific need to free Scripture from being a source of scandal for be- revelation of the risen Lord that humans have the capacity lievers. Both argue for a particular hermeneutic to aid or- to understand how deeply enmeshed they were in the pro- dinary believers and preachers of Scripture. Augustine lays clivities and systems of violence that led to the death of the out a set of principles in On Christian Teaching. Perhaps the sinless second Adam. There is thus no chasm between the most important of these comes at the end of the first book,

26 America May 19, 2014 where he commands readers to locate the twofold love com- realization of being truly liked by a God who loved us first, mand within any particular passage in order to understand we can become less reflexively reactive to every statement it properly. Father Alison talks less reverently of Scripture, and pronouncement from the “mediators” of faith (bishops speaking of it as “the big bad book” and of certain passages and theologians, for example), which can at times seem as “texts of terror.” Significantly, he does not run away from like a stumbling block. We can instead learn to relax into difficult passages like Judges 3 and Romans 1, in which God a space given to an heir, not a laborer, and learn to form a punishes disobedience by handing people over to violence real community of reconciliation and generosity. If it took and sexual impurity, respectively. Instead, he uses the herme- an Augustine to rid the church of an inclination to rigid per- neutical principle given by Jesus on the road to Emmaus, in fectionism and asceticism, then perhaps it will take a little addition to context provided by historical and earlier biblical more Father Alison to wean the church from a violent sacred writings, in order to illustrate the deeper meaning of scan- to which it has been tethered, in large and small ways, for far dalous texts that many of us would rather pretend do not too long. A exist. As a constructive theologian, he models a creative and imaginative reading of Scripture that offers great fecun- dity for present and future Alisonians, should they take up this mantle. Father Alison is also an underrat- ed ecclesiologist. Perhaps his greatest legacy as a theologian will not be his Girardian rereading of the doctrine of original sin or of the Resurrection, but as one who helps us imagine a new way of being church, particularly through his category of “aristocratic belonging.” According to Father Alison, the people of God should understand themselves as “aristocratic” in the sense that God loves them unconditionally and showers gifts upon them. Maybe it requires a Brit via Eton and Oxford to tell Americans how to be aristocratic Catholics. Central for any healthy ecclesial being is finding a way to exist in the church without being dominated by the forms of belonging that divide between “good” and “bad.” Some people in the church have justified a deeply rooted notion of who is good and bad in the church by focusing on the disproportionate power wielded by the bad people, defining themselves or their group over against another. This kind of psychology finds no room in Father Alison’s musings on the church. He exposes the patterns of belonging that undo ecclesial bonds instead of fostering them. Father Alison suggests the image of aristocrats at a dinner party who refuse to think that the wait staff matters in any real way. He does not mean that we adopt an attitude of su- periority, but rather that as we grow in

May 19, 2014 America 27 Generation Faith Johnny Unites To a schoolmate dying young By Marie Kalas t is 8 a.m. Monday, time for morn- her speech, I look up only once. A out the cliques and the school legends ing prayer. The principal comes sophomore catches my eye, her body combined. He was more of a symbol Ion the loud speaker, her voice es- shaking and sobbing. She looks at me. of our Catholic high school than the pecially shaky. Everyone knows. Still, Even though I am 100 feet away from mascot itself. In that moment people I tense up when she says, “Students, her, I can see the anguish in her eyes. knew our school as the school that come meet me in the gym.” My class They seem to call out to me to hold her Johnny attended, the school that, for gets up and we go. No one in the halls and comfort her. once, cared about more than football. dares to speak one word. I am supposed to be a leader at the We learned of his sickness with- When we get to the gym, the seniors school, but for one day, there is no such in his first couple of weeks starting sit apart from the sophomore class— thing as leaders. There is no such thing high school. I was a junior, starting the upperclassmen on the bigger side as the freshman class, sophomore the hardest academic year of my life. Johnny was starting the hardest year of

A jersey in memory of Johnny his life, physically. His family was just Weiger, who lost his battle with starting the hardest years of their lives, cancer in Nov. 2012. spiritually. We learned quickly that grades were not the be-all and end-all of life. Johnny passed on Nov. 4, 2012, after a long battle with chronic myeloid leukemia. Countless prayer services, trips to the hospital and fund-raisers were held before he died. Monday, Nov. 5, held a whole different kind of hope and faith. We no longer had prayer services to pray for his health; no one went to the hospital to visit him; fund-raisers were not organized to help with the constant stream of bills. Instead, prayer services became a time to pray for those who had died and a time to thank God for the bless- of the gym and the underclassmen class, junior class or senior class. There ings in our lives. Trips to the hospital across from us. It is how every pep rally is no anxiety about quizzes. There are were to visit other children suffering. has been in the past. But this gather- no long, boring lectures. There are only Longstanding fund-raisers for other ing feels nothing like past events. The thoughts, thoughts I keep to myself— causes were taken more seriously, with principal comes to the single podium long, silencing thoughts. more and more money flowing to those in the bare gym. I put my head down When the words “Johnny Weiger less fortunate. Suddenly, it felt as if, no preparing myself for the worst. During passed away last night” fill the gym, matter your relationship with Johnny, our innocence is taken away in a sin- you knew him. Everyone knew Johnny. Marie Kalas, a graduate of Montini Catholic gle breath. He was 16. He was a bigger Everyone loved Johnny. Everyone aul J ames Bergstrom High School in Lombard, Ill., is going into her sophomore year at Indiana University in part of the school than the four-peat prayed for Johnny. All because Johnny Bloomington. in football, the petty drama through- had moved so many people. P hoto:

28 America May 19, 2014 There was no distinction among classes that Monday. Actually, there was no distinction that whole week. We were ready to help one another at a snap of the fingers. Johnny’s life and death brought our school together. He brought opposing teams together. He even brought opposing schools together. Before a football game with our rival school, the two teams came together in the middle of Duffy Stadium to hold hands and pray as one Catholic body for one boy. Football is a big deal at our school, so having two teams come together to benefit one family and one boy didn’t go unnoticed. Our rivals even came to support us in the Illinois State title game just because of how this one, single boy transformed them. For the first time, we saw truth in a statement all too often dismissed as a cliché: We were one body in Christ. I believe that something good can always come out of something terrible. It was so hard to see it then, but now, looking back, I’ve never felt a bigger sense of community. School was cancelled, and kids were bused down to the funeral. During the Kairos retreat going on that week an hour away from the school, retreatants were transported to the funeral after special time had been carved out of the retreat. Students wore specially made fund-raising T-shirts. Teams played games with Johnny in mind. Our emotions were so raw. No one was alone, and everyone knew it. Johnny touched not only my life, but countless lives all around us. He taught us that the most important relationship to have in life is the relationship with God. Even through his pain and suffering, Johnny was there praying, believing and filled with hope. Johnny was and still is a special kid who will always have a place in innumerable lives. All these emotions arrived, despite the fact that Johnny and I didn’t really know each other. In fact, I never even spoke with him—yet his life and death continue to speak volumes to me. A

May 19, 2014 America 29 Books & Culture

DOWNTIME. Taylor Schilling in “Orange Is the New Black” P hoto: J o W hilden for N etflix television | Jim Mc Dermott cade earlier, in point of fact “Orange” is also very much invested in the lives A Broken, Humbled Heart of the dozens of women with whom Chapman resides. Women like Janae Netflix’s ‘Orange Is the New Black’ Watson (Vicky Jeudy), the high school track star who throws away her ast summer, Netflix released side Netflix’s higher profile shows— future in a life of crime; Sophia Burset Orange Is the New Black, the “House of Cards,” starring Kevin (Laverne Cox), a transgendered fire- Lbased-on-real-events story of an Spacey; “Hemlock Grove,” created by fighter whose wife has continued to upper-crust white woman sentenced gore-master Eli Roth; and the return stand by her through it all; or Suzanne to 15 months in a women’s correction- of “Arrested Development”—the buzz “Crazy Eyes” Warren (Uzo Aduba), a al facility for her involvement years surrounding Kohan’s new show was gay black inmate obsessed with turn- before in a drug-running operation. muted at best. Viewers anticipated an- ing herself and Piper into a “chocolate The show was created by Jenji Kohan, other small-scale dramedy—“‘Weeds’ and vanilla swirl.” Within the walls of whose previous half hour drame- Goes to Jail.” this fictional federal dy “Weeds,” about a suburban mom Instead, Kohan On the Web prison in Litchfield, who sells pot, began a cottage indus- has provided in Raymond A. Schroth, S.J., revisits N.Y., we meet ad- try of shows about anti-heroines for “Orange” a rich ex- the film “Queen Margot.” dicts, militant and Showtime, including “Nurse Jackie,” ploration into the americamagazine.org/film not so militant gay “United States of Tara” and “The Big lives of a diverse cast women, meth-head C.” The second season of “Orange” be- of women. While semi-psychotic re- gins next month. the show is pitched as being about ligious nutbags, a yoga instructor, By most critics’ estimates “Weeds” Piper Chapman (Taylor Schilling), a mother and daughter, and even a went on a few seasons too long; and the sheltered Manhattanite put in jail Catholic nun. when “Orange” was slated along- for a crime she committed over a de- And over the course of the sea-

30 America May 19, 2014 son, each of them has a powerful sto- Yael Stone, left, and Uzo Aduba ry that slowly unfolds. Taking a page from “Lost,” “Orange” offers flashbacks in each episode that complicate and enrich our sense of who these women are and where they come from. Sam Healy (Michael Harney), the either-kind-or-conspiring social worker, has at home a mail order bride who hates him; Alex (Laura Prepon), the book-smart and street-smart drug lord who got Piper into trouble in the first place, came from poverty. Kohan is constantly on the watch for ways to undermine our expectations. She’s also a master at the Easter Egg, little things going on in the background that offer hints of other stories: the older woman always on the phone next to Chapman, crying; the woman P hoto: K . C Bailey for N etflix who spends hours in the one toilet stall buki fan dance, Netflix refuses to re- that is supposedly “Girls.” And though with a functioning door, screaming in lease ratings. But it has claimed that the threat of violence is often present, another language; the throwaway line “Orange” received more viewers and and the sense of danger palpable at cer- that Sister Ingalls (Beth Fowler) is in hours viewed in its first week than tain moments, it is also not the female prison for nonviolent antinuclear ac- “Development” or “Cards.” And if so- version of HBO’s searing prison drama tivism. Time and again, “Orange” teas- cial media are any indication—admit- “Oz.” No, if “Orange” has a main sto- es us to take another look at characters tedly, an assumption larger than the ryline, it is about a white woman brought we may have already summed up or National Security Administration’s face to face with the sinful truths of her overlooked entirely. apparent field of inquiry—the show own selfish existence and both the pain- Alongside this highly diverse and has clearly resonated. Tweets, reviews ful realities and the hidden beauty of rich cast of characters, the story of and blog posts have persisted since the world in which she so blithely has Chapman and her needy fiancé, Larry the show’s release, and with a passion lived. The lives of the women she meets Bloom (Jason Biggs), feels a bit hollow. similar to that directed toward HBO’s threaten to break her heart open once Thet metaphor of hollowness is apt; “Girls,” but without the “Why do I and for all, and for the better. And—if Kohan in fact has called Chapman the watch this show when it makes me so Kohan has her way—ours, too. show’s Trojan horse. She is the gate- angry?” frustration. way character, the person most like “Orange” makes no claim to the many of the Netflix viewers; it is her Jim McDermott, S.J., is a television screen- twee cinéma vérité of women’s lives writer in Los Angeles. story that entices them to enter into this larger, more complicated world. And she is also the vehicle for the show’s most potent attack. As characters, Chapman and fiancé Bloom em- body white, affluent liberalism—edu- cated, socially concerned, comfortable; but they are also narcissistic, absurdly sheltered, and they hold on to a deeply set victim mentality. They are nice people, but they are not good people, and their status and attitudes may hit too close to home for some viewers. Embracing its own version of a ka-

May 19, 2014 America 31 of other things | Maurice Timothy Reidy The World According to WEs

t is not quite accurate to say I After two critical successes, more darker themes. grew up with the films of Wes marquee actors signed up to be in A balance of wonder and fear IAnderson, but my evolution Anderson’s films. Gene Hackman, characterizes all great children’s as a film fan has coincided rough- Gwyneth Paltrow and Ben Stiller stories, and Anderson seemed to ly with his career as a director. His starred in “The Royal Tenenbaums” find that groove again in “Moonrise first movie, “Bottle Rocket” (1996), (2001). Meanwhile, the director’s Kingdom” (2012), his widely praised was one of the first films I purchased style became more stylized, with fine seventh film. But it is “The Grand on DVD, and 18 years later, a new attention to costumes and interior Budapest Hotel” that impressed me Wes Anderson film remains an event landscapes. His was an exquisitely as his most ambitious film to date. for me. I am happy to say that after embroidered world that started to In many ways it is a classic Anderson drifting away from his films for a few feel farther from the world we live in. film. The usual suspects (Bill Murray, years, I find myself re-engaged by his At least it did for Owen Wilson, Adrien work, which strikes me as more ma- me. Anderson’s next It is good Brody) make an ap- ture, less precious than it once was. two films followed pearance. The set- Anderson has made eight full- the same approach, to see ting—a mountain re- length films, including this year’s “The though the plots and this gifted sort in a fictional east- Grand Budapest Hotel.” Like many locales grew more ern European country of his fans, I was first drawn in by fanciful. “The Life artist in the early half of the “Rushmore” (1998), his ode to grow- Aquatic With Steve confront 20th century—allows ing up that struck just the right bal- Zissou” (2004) told Anderson to indulge ance between cynical and sweet. The the story of a famous a few his passion for the superb soundtrack helped sell it for oceanographer and his demons. accouterments of a me, but so did Anderson’s obvious af- family. “The Darjeeling pre-digital age. He fection for the minutiae of childhood. Limited” (2007) fol- lavishes his directorial Max Fischer, the film’s protagonist, lowed three brothers gaze on train cars and was a Peter Pan character of sorts, on a train journey the dandified outfits not quite ready to grow up but none- across India. The lat- worn by the hotel’s theless enchanted by a pretty young ter struck me as more maitre d’, played by teacher and the worldly charms of a childish than child- Ralph Fiennes. local magnate played by Bill Murray. like, and I worried that Yet you can’t make As a recent college graduate with sib- Anderson was stuck in a film about east- lings still in elementary school, I was a state of suspended adolescence. At ern Europe in the 1930s without a little attached to childhood too, and a time when I was dealing with more reckoning with the monsters on the I quickly embraced the sensibility of serious issues in my own life, his style horizon. So while “Grand Budapest” this precocious young director. and storytelling seemed insubstantial. maintains Anderson’s idiosyncratic I liked “Bottle Rocket” almost as Ironically, it was a cartoon that style, it takes surprising turns toward much. Owen Wilson plays Dignan, brought me back into the fold. violence and ends on a tragic note. It a would-be crime boss whose elabo- “Fantastic Mr. Fox” (2009) is a hints at the horrors of the Holocaust rate robbery plans never turn out as charming tale (told in stop motion while maintaining a sense of the ab- he hopes. Like Max in “Rushmore,” animation) based on the book by surd. You get the sense that Anderson he has grand ambitions, but he can Roald Dahl. By revisiting a classic is using all the arrows in his quiver never quite execute his vision. Yet he children’s tale and imbuing it with his to struggle with larger questions of retains a child-like enthusiasm in the own brand of wry humor, Anderson history and the randomness of evil. face of failure. seemed to be venturing into new ter- He is not entirely successful, but it is ritory. The story had an element of good to see this gifted artist confront menace, too, which suggested that a few demons. Maurice Timothy Reidy is an executive Anderson was interested in exploring Welcome to our world, Peter Pan. editor of America.

32 America May 19, 2014 Then try, try to come closer— bookings | Joseph Hoover my wonderful and less than.

Objects of contemplation As the official overseer of your A spring poetry anti-review tour through this collection of poetry, I don’t even want to try and explain Incarnadine style. It is all about taste. It is about what this poem. Explaining a poem can de- By Mary Szybist connects with your personal history and feat its purpose. Syzbist quotes from Graywolf Press. 72p $15 geography, your way of seeing the world. Simone Weil at the outset of her book. This poetry review is an anti-review. “The mysteries of faith are degraded if What I’ve Stolen, What That being said, Mary Szbist’s collec- they are made into an object of affir- I’ve Earned tion of poems, Incarnadine, is the best! mation and negation, when in reality By Sherman Alexie It’s better than other books! they should be an object Hanging Loose Press. 160p $19 I love this book! It’s num- of contemplation.” One ber one! might say the same, at A Wilderness of Monkeys (In fact, it was declared times, for art. By David Kirby Hanging Loose Press. 104p $18 by the astute committee of And so Szybist the National Book Award contemplates the Book of Hours to be number one. In giving Annunciation from the Poems it this prize, the committee point of view of the By Kevin Young described the book in this grass beneath Mary and Knopf. 208p $26.95 lovely way: “This is a reli- Gabriel. She contem- gious book for non-believ- plates the Annunciation Women’s Poetry ers, or a book of necessary using direct quotes from Poems and Advice doubts for the faithful.”) the Starr Report and Nabokov’s Lolita, By Daisy Fried In these poems, many of which cen- or past statements given by Senator University of Pittsburgh Press. 88p ter on the Annunciation of the birth of Robert G. Byrd and President George $15.95 Jesus to the Virgin Mary, Szybist is not W. Bush. dipping the Virgin—or anything holy She contemplates, in “Entrances Darktown Follies for that matter—into a deep fryer of and Exits,” a friend’s daughter coming By Amaud Jamaul Johnson sanctity that would conceal one’s core re- into her office and eating rice cakes and Tupelo Press. 70p $16.95 ality. She gets right at both the tactile and rice milk, a 76-year-old woman miss- symbolic aspects of the Annunciation ing at the bottom of a canyon, the same Testimony and everything else that mirrors annun- woman found alive by men who noticed A Tribute to Charlie Parker (With ciation in our own lives. She talks about ravens circling, “The Annunciation” by New and Selected Jazz Poems) Mary, and a lot of Marys. She talks about Duccio, Jesus talking about the ravens By Yusef Komunyakaa everything. It’s just a nice book is what of the air and how their father takes Wesleyan University Press. 156p $30 I’m trying to say. care of them, Russia holding a “na- The poems do not always speak of tional day of conception,” the death of Stay, Illusion By Lucie Brock-Broido religious things directly, but nearly all of Pavarotti, honeybees disappearing and Knopf. 112p $26 them bear the whiff of something spiri- God’s entrance into time. tual. “The Troubadors Etc.” closes in this It is all elegantly held together. It all This spring poetry review is a spring way: works. It ends like this: poetry anti-review. It is all so subjective isn’t it? After a collection of poems has At what point is something gone The blue container of rice milk fits already made it through the jangly rites completely? loosely into Olivia’s hand the same way of agents and editors and elegant pub- The last of the sunlight is disappearing the book fits into the hand of Duccio’s lishing houses and beautiful jacket covers even as it swells— Mary. She punches a hole in the top and, and delectable author photos and a brief Just for this evening, won’t you put me until it is empty, Olivia drinks. passage at the end about the book’s type- before you face, who are we to judge which are bet- until I’m far enough away you can Something else is great about these ter than others? At this level it is all about believe in me? poems. They have a lot of white space.

May 19, 2014 America 33 Poems with lots of white space are, numb at the ends of my fingers, all is words and associations you have heard frankly, helpful. Let’s just say it out all. I say it is. of, and b) they are in a Poem! He has loud. It’s nice to read poems with lots brought Poem to you, or you to Poem! of white space. I could go on reprinting these po- And not in a cheap sense, it feels. Not In the midst of this white space, ems all day and feel as if I’m doing an in a pandering way. Just in a way where Szybist writes, in “To Gabriela at the act of service to the world. I think this he’s like: hey, this is what I wanna talk Donkey Sanctuary”: is what is called a “gushing” review. I about...in my Poem. leave by reprinting “Holy”: In this manner his writing is free. I think I see annunciations every- In fact, he feels like a guy free enough where: blackbirds fall out of the sky, trees Spirit who knows me, I do not feel you to write bad poetry. There isn’t a lot of lift their feathery branches, a girl in an fall so far in me, bad poetry in this collection. But even out-sized yellow halo speeds toward— do not feel you turn in my dark center. if there were, you wouldn’t really know My mother is sick, and you it, because you would be like: it’s just She goes on to describe, elliptically, cannot help her. so convincing! It sounds so good! the death of a girl who apparently was So, with a writer like this it is best, crushed while being pulled by a truck The poem closes in devastating for the remainder of this review, to just in the snow in a yellow inner tube. fashion, let him do the talking. Later she tapes to the refrigerator a Quickly, one more thing: Sherman postcard depicting the Annunciation, Ghost, what am I Alexie is Indian (Spokane/Coeur if I lose the onewho’s always known D’Alene) and knows you know he’s because I liked its promise: a world me? Indian and knows you know he knows where a girl has only to say yes and heav- Spirit, know me. he’s Indian and knows you know he en opens. Fragile mother, impossible spirit, will knows...and however far that goes, the you fall so far point is that in his highly self-aware In “How (Not) to Speak of God,” from me, will you leave meto me? irreverent ironic yet mostly uncynical the sentences are written on the page To think it is the last hard kiss, that writing he is always one step ahead of as if in a pinwheel, or flowing out of a seasick you. sun. The construction feels experimen- silence, your bits of breath For instance, rage at genocide is tal and cute and it works. She writes in diffusing in my mouth— there (shocking, eh?), the shameful this circling poem about a God American history never forgotten. Like Catholics after a Holy And yet it sometimes comes out in a who is enough, who is more than Thursday stripping of the altar, I think kind of humor. And his humor, his po- enough all you can do is walk away in silence. etry, like all good writing, unites. And who should be extolled with our it divides. It divides while it unites and sugared tongues I do not know Mr. unites while it divides. You who knows us in our burnished Sherman Alexie, I have are not he and he is not windshields as we pass never met the man. I gain you but he can share his who will care when the iridescent flies no currency from his fame truth with you and you can swarm toward us nor do I garner any cut of receive that truth and— who can feel without eroticizing his personal wealth. I just But stop! Enough of everything think probably we would this talk! To the work! who could be a piece of flame, a piece all do well to go out and In “Crazy Horse of mind shimmering. buy everything he has ever Boulevard,” Alexie writes: written and then get on It keeps going round and round with our lives. I think that In Indian theology, there with no beginning and no end. may be true. are four directions: East, “To You Again” tells the story of a Alexie, whose latest col- West, North, and South. long relationship, someone wanting a lection is What I’ve Stolen, What I’ve Sounds expansive, I guess, but it’s really closeness she can’t quite get: Earned, writes poems that refer to pop limited.... And, really, there are maybe songs, sports stars and chain restau- three Indians in the whole country who It’s not the best in you rants. You feel smarter reading his can say “The Four Directions” without I long for. It’s when you’re noteless works, because a) they are filled with secretly giggling.

34 America May 19, 2014 Later in the same poem: the editorial and print this poem. Sherman Alexie’s poetry is so poi- And then there is “Monosonnet for gnant and affecting because…and now I’m guessing there are four kids in Colonialism, Interrupted,” one of my the reviewer sums up what you have each of my sons’ classes who haven’t been favorites: just read and explains it to you. immunized against mumps, measles, and Or the reviewer just leaves more rubella. If my sons, Indian as they are, Yes, Colonialism white space, the anti-review com- contract some preventable disease from George plete. those organic, free-range white children Custer and die, will it be legal for me to scalp And I have an issue with David Kirby’s and slaughter their white parents? Andrew A Wilderness of Monkeys. I have a Jackson problem with this poetry! From “The Native American (who were genocidal maniacs, but But first, consider this: Kirby’s po- Dictionary, Page 1”: without American colonialism we ems are fun, crazy, free-fall, a tumbling would not have action-adventure mov- of words, a stream of whatever. Is he Powwow: n. An event where mid- ies like Die Hard or the consolations going somewhere? Is this random? Is dle-class white people come to watch and and desolations of Emily Dickinson. it okay to be random? What does it take photos of dancing Indians. I am a man who loves cinematic gun- all mean? Who really was the fattest fire and American poetry, if not equal- president? Is Kirby simply being fun- In “Happy Holidays!” he writes, ly, then with parallel passion. In fact, ny? Can a book of poetry be a series at one point, I considered writing an of jokes? I want to combine Catholic Lent and action-adventure movie about Emily In “Legion, For We are Many,” he the Jewish Day of Atonement, and begin Dickinson....) writes: each year with six weeks of apologies. Dear Ants that I slaughtered with I told you I wasn’t going to inter- I’m doing a couple of yoga stretches in M-80 fireworks, I am sorry for my rage. rupt Mr. Alexie. I’m not. I’m going on. a quiet corner Dear Chickens-to-Be that I dropped In “Loud Ghazal”: of the Atlanta airport because my into frying pans, I am sorry for my hun- flight’s delayed, ger. Who among you thinks that I am though having said “Atlanta airport,” Dear Family Outhouse, I am sorry afraid of silence I realize that I failed to recognize your primitive Because I can’t find your version of that I don’t have to say “my flight’s beauty. God with silence? delayed.” I hear God in a pinball machine’s “Sonnet, with Slot Machines” dis- sound and fury. I love that! Poetry can be so self cusses, well, slot machines: You say you can’t? Are your ears serious! As with Alexie, it’s nice to see clogged with silence?... some humor! 1. Gambling is traditional. 2. So is the God is the raucous laughter during “Massages by Blind Masseurs” sacrificial murder of mammals, but who and after sex. starts off: is going to start that up again? Makes noise! Joyful noise! Don’t fallow sod with silence. My tree guy and I are watching as the Alexie goes on to lay out a dia- logue that winds up describing the soul-murdering quality of playing slots day after day. It ends, 14. If you punch a kid once, then he’ll cry. If you punch a kid once an hour, for a year, then he’ll learn how to make the fist feel like flowers. If a responsible big-city paper wanted to write a somber editorial declaim- ing against the sad state of affairs of gambling and its effects on reserva- tions, it could do a lot worse than ditch

May 19, 2014 America 35 man with the chipper with Olive Garden? We want to give than that? (I’m not really asking.) arrives, and I say, “Mr. Pumphrey, you a fair shake. We’d like to give In “Bereavement Fare”: every once in a while you credit. Author photos and bi- Nothing fair about it. I read that somebody gets tired of his ographies can be deceiving. People wife and knocks her are different ways. But we just don’t (Why does this work? It just does. on the head and passes her through know. This anti-review may just have It could be so tacky! It’s not! He just one of these chippers,” to leave off with a brocade of doubt goes for the kill with this line and he and he says, “I know, Mr. Kirby— stitched into its David Kirby section. gets it!) terrible isn’t it?” and then (Then again, that may be the point It continues: he says, “And it doesn’t do the chipper of an anti-review.) any good either.” Heaven on the layaway plan. I like the poems in Kevin Young’s Huge interest Hilarious. A number of the poems Book of Hours. I like them very much. Now the world’s only noun— in this collection are just as strange A weather no map dare measure. and funny. But still, I have an issue. It lies in (A weather no map dare measure. the poem “Good Old Boys,” where How does Young get away with that David Kirby mentions people who line too? How does he do it?) got take-out from the Olive Garden Or what do you even do with a and left their puppy nearly to die in work like “Mercy”? In this poem, Mr. an overheated truck cab. He derides Young sits on a plane with a woman them, saying, who carries in an ice chest a heart that will be implanted in her body. Besides who gets He relates this to his dead father. take-out from the Olive Garden? You miss out on the endless I thought breadsticks and salad that way. There is something about these po- I could be her holding you, hoping ems centered around birth, marriage, there was enough life left in you Here, here is the rub. Mr. Kirby miscarriage and the death of the po- to help me writes about Olive Garden as if he et’s father. Just a little turn, the way again breathe. And then this little actually goes to that restaurant. But words are placed, and you are in them. touch at the end: a farmer father in the author’s photo on the back of You are saved by them. You recognize & mother send off the book, Mr. David Kirby sits on a yourself in their dim mirror. I feel at their plaid son the first time he’d flown porch next to a black wrought iron home in these poems. As with the everyone wiping their eyes fence, wearing a smart haircut and a others above, these too are poems I do & waving. splendid poet’s uniform of black sport not want to explain, but just lay out. coats and (I believe) dark jeans, with In “Rue,” Young writes of traveling In “Charity,” Young is going through a Robert O. Lawton Professor of to his father’s funeral: his father’s clothes: English at Florida State University annual salary of $127,080. All of my future Body bags which leads me to believe he has not wife and I of old suits, shirts set one foot inside an Olive Garden stayed at the Worst Western still pressed...too manycoats to keep, for the past 15 years. .... though I will save If this is true, clearly it undermines The pale bathroom so many. How can I his credibility as a poet who can write whose light burnt on, red give away the last authentically about Olive Garden! as a darkroom, of your scent? Even if he has gone there recently, we ticking down—your eulogy dashed out may guess that he went with irony, among the tiny If this is not heartbreak, it doesn’t with a “slumming” self-awareness that broken soap, each day exist. Each of Young’s poems bear grief, he was going someplace faux-classy shrinking, slivered in our hands. joy and everything in between with a like Olive Garden. master’s touch that is both self-assured So tell us Kirby: what is the deal How do you write more poignantly and humble.

36 America May 19, 2014 The poems inStay, Illusion, by Lucie Brock-Broido, are poems that, as they say, deserve a second read. Or is this just an elegant way of saying I don’t get them? She does provide marvelous turns of phrase. In “Infinite Riches in the Smallest In Brief a sexuality, a spirituality. In “Rhythm Room,” she provides us with an image In “Torment,” the opening poem of Method,” both lovely and horrifying: Women’s Poetry: Poems and Advice, by Daisy Fried, a Princeton professor The Mantra Each child still has one lantern inside lit. rides a train with undergrads return- of spring rain opens the rose May the Mother not Blow her children out. ing from job interviews in New York. & spider lily into shadow, The students are by turns sweet, naive, & someone plays the bones The poem ends, as do many of the driven, ironic, over-sexed, dreaming, ’til they rise & live again. poems in this collection with mystery confused: We know the whole weight and even faint hope: depends on small silences If I don’t get a job, we fit ourselves into. High heels at On the roads, blue thistles, barely it’s Wharton MBA. Or teach English daybreak Visible by night, and, by these, you in Japan. is the saddest refrain. may yet find your way home. But this girl on my floor told me Asian girls Nearly every poem in the collection Joseph Hoover, S.J., is poetry editor of depilate their whole bodies, even their stirs up images as delicate and as fierce. America. arms. I can’t be the hairiest person in my life. CLASSIFIED Summer Institute Oblate School of Theology 2014 The rest of the book is marked with Books this kind of incision and humor. Summer Institute, “Coping with Grandiosity in Religion & Civility (faith & reason) Together; www. Our Lives,” June 16–18, 2014. Keynote speakers: The first part ofDarktown Follies, a wordunlimited.com. Robert Moore, Ph.D., Rev. Ron Rolheiser, O.M.I. collection of poems by Amaud Jamaul San Antonio, TX 78216. Information: Brenda at Johnson, focuses on the challenges of Rosaries (210) 341-1366 ext. 212 or www.ost.edu. Rosaries. Beautiful hand-crafted and Italian black performers, particularly in min- rosaries are available at The Rosary Beads Post a classified ad in print or online at americamaga- strelsy, a genre of entertainment in- Company. Visit http://rosary-beads.co. zine.org or call 212-515-0102 for more information. volving the performance of black stereotypes through dancing, music and various other skits. Johnson forces us to think about how “performing” minstrel- sy has led to a type of “performing” of various stereotypes by black Americans in everyday life today. (If this review sounds a bit smarter than the others, it is because it was written by Olga Segura, assistant editor of America.) Testimony: A Tribute to Charlie Parker, With New and Selected Jazz Poems, by Yusef Komunyakaa, describes jazz as a country, a way of life,

May 19, 2014 America 37 THE WORD

those who challenge and contest our The Witness of Hope message. It is hope that should shape the Sixth Sunday of Easter (A), May 25, 2014 Gospel message, for this is the core of Readings: Acts 8:5–17; Ps 66:1–20; 1 Pt 3:15–18; Jn 14:15–21 evangelization in both the first and the “Always be ready to give an explanation for your hope” (1 Pt 3:15) 21st century. Hope is inherent in Jesus’ message of triumph over sin and death o be a Christian witness in the or have just been bored into indiffer- and also in the out-working of the Holy ancient church was to make ence by it. Commentators sometimes Spirit in our midst as Christians. The Tknown the euangelion, literal- define this world as “post-Christian” or Gospel must be preached, but evangeli- ly “good news” or “gospel,” from which “neo-Pagan,” but I see a world of people zation must be shaped anew in every age we derive our word evangelization. The struggling with nihilism, adrift in hope- and in every place by the Holy Spirit. Acts of the Apostles reports a great lessness. Because the questions and concerns, the number of overt “signs and wonders,” Christians throughout the centuries history and the education differ from including exorcisms and healings, as a have offered compelling rea- age to age, the Gospel must be incultur- part of the witness of the earliest evan- sons to believe in the Gospel, ated and must respond to the situ- gelists, more than we might find today, but powerful reasons have ations and realities in which though both then and now the Holy also been offered, often by people live. In the history Spirit guides evangelization. Still, the the behavior of Christians of the church, there was no content of Christian evangelism remains themselves, against belief. golden age when everyone the same—the life, teachings, death and While evil has its own de- responded to the Gospel resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ— signs on the destruction of the with openness and warmth, while the processes of evangelization good and the truth of the church, change to meet shifting conditions. the responsibility for passing on and PRAYING WITH SCRIPTURE The earliest church had to evangelize for safeguarding the tradition rests a world with no history of Christianity. with the faithful. The Greek word for Think of your friends, family and community. What is the best way for you Initially they did this with no written tradition is paradosis, which means to witness to hope? Gospels to explain the life of Jesus the to “hand on” or “give over.” We in the Messiah. The first disciples evangelized church are accountable for how suc- a world populated with numerous gods, cessfully we have passed on the tradition. when all Catholics were able to give an explaining why it was necessary to turn In 1 Peter, Christians are encouraged explanation of their hope, when sin was away from all of them to the one, true to hand on their tradition by always be- absent from our midst, and everyone God, made manifest recently in the ing “ready to give an explanation to any- was always obedient and deferential. incarnation of the Word. This world one who asks you for a reason for your Passing on the Gospel takes hard posed its own challenges to Christian hope.” Other versions render “explana- work by flawed human beings. The witness, but the ancient world took seri- tion” as “defense,” a translation of the church does, however, have an advan- ously the reality of a divine world. Greek apologia, which suggests a verbal tage in its mission: Jesus promised us the Today we preach the Gospel in a defense of oneself or of ideas. This sort paraclêtos, the Advocate or Holy Spirit, world, at least in the West, that was of defense, though, can get caught up in to comfort us and guide us into all truth. shaped to a large and deep extent by the minutiae if we are not careful, divorcing Jesus warned that not everyone will be- traditions of Christianity. But the citi- us from those who desire the truth, and lieve the truth when we make our apo- zens of this world, with 2,000 years of defensiveness, separating us from the logia, but he did promise that he will Christian history and theology to con- hope of the Gospel message. This is why always guide us into the truth. It is this template, have only cursorily considered 1 Peter stresses that hope demands “gen- truth we must offer with gentleness, Christianity and either rejected it out- tleness” and “reverence,” not just for the reverence and love. right, found it wanting or unconvincing, Gospel, but toward our interlocutors, John W. Martens America (ISSN 0002-7049) is published weekly (except for 13 combined issues: Jan. 6-13, 20-27, April 28-May 5, May 26-June John W. Martens is an associate professor 2, June 9-16, 23-30, July 7-14, 21-28, Aug. 4-11, 18-25, Sept. 1-8, Dec. 8-15, 22-29) by America Press Inc., 106 West 56th Street, New York, NY 10019. Periodical postage is paid at New York, N.Y., and additional mailing offices.C irculation: (800) 627- of theology at the University of St. Thomas, St. 9533. Subscription: United States, $56 per year; add U.S. $30 postage and GST (#131870719) for Canada; or add U.S. $56 per Paul, Minn. year for international priority airmail. 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38 America May 19, 2014