Aug. 4–11,America 2008 THE NATIONAL CATHOLIC WEEKLY $2.75 Can the Anglican Communion Be Saved? Austen Ivereigh

Also in this issue: Human Dignity and the End of Life Justin F. Rigali and William E. Lori Gordon Zahn and Milieu Catholicism William A. Au HOUGH I GREW UP within the to deny terrorists cover, and ridge lines confines of New York City, at have been obscured by settlements heart I am not a city boy. My intended to dominate the surrounding America boyhood home on the north region. At Shepherd’s Field, a Franciscan Published by Jesuits of the United States Tshore of Staten Island stood on a dead shrine near Bethlehem, a decade ago pil- end street. Just a block long, the street grims could watch as shepherds moved Editor in Chief was bordered on two sides by woodlands. their flocks down the opposite hillside Drew Christiansen, S.J. At the far end of the block was a private and then east into the Judean desert, but park with more woods, streams, a marsh today pilgrims no longer have the oppor- EDITORIAL DEPARTMENT and a pond. There we would scamper tunity to enjoy that scene, and the Managing Editor after salamanders in the spring and col- Bedouin shepherds themselves have been lect unlucky box turtles to carry home as removed. Robert C. Collins, S.J. pets. Much of the year we awoke to the First came Har Homa, the Israeli set- Editorial Director crowing of pheasants as they fed in the tlement built on a hill where a forest Karen Sue Smith neighboring yards. We lived, a Jesuit once stood, anchoring the southern end Online Editor retreat master quipped, in “the garden of the security circle around Jerusalem. Maurice Timothy Reidy spot of the cement and asphalt jungle.” It By 2000, middlemen had purchased was a life that left me with an affinity for much of the adjoining open land for set- Associate Editors the land and its problems. tlement expansion. While it could, until Joseph A. O’Hare, S.J. At certain times of year the church’s 2000, the Palestinian Authority aped the George M. Anderson, S.J. liturgy reminds me of my attachment to Israeli “edifice complex,” building homes Dennis M. Linehan, S.J. the land. In the summer, for example, right up to the edge of the land it then James Martin, S.J. readings of the parables of the kingdom controlled beneath the hill. Subsequently Matt Malone, S.J. and stories of Jesus’ ministry out in the the security barrier, or wall, built to keep James T. Keane, S.J. open, on the water and hillsides, bring to Palestinian terrorists from entering Israel, Peter Schineller, S.J. mind the land- further Literary Editor scape of the scarred the Patricia A. Kossmann Holy Land, the terrain. Like wildflowers of Of Many Things the Great Poetry Editor Galilee, the bird Wall of James S. Torrens, S.J. life on the slopes of Mount Zion. The China, it is now an unavoidable feature of Assistant Editor late Benedictine biblical archeologist and the landscape. Francis W. Turnbull, S.J. geographer Bargil Pixner called the geog- Ein Kerem is a Judean hill town asso- Editorial Interns raphy of the Holy Land “the Fifth ciated with the birth of John the Baptist. Gospel.” “Whoever has learnt to read Situated in a narrow valley between Luke J. Hansen, S.J. and peruse this ‘book’ of biblical land- forested ridges, it was famed for its natu- Jeff Johnson, S.J. scape,” he wrote, “will experience the ral beauty and moderate climate. Design and Production message of the four Gospels with a new Eventually artists and craftsmen discov- Stephanie Ratcliffe and greater clarity.” ered Ein Kerem and made it a hideaway; Pixner’s own feel for the landscape of then development began encroaching. BUSINESS DEPARTMENT the Holy Land and his scholarship grew When I was last there, a forest atop the Publisher out of his 12 years at Tabgha on the Sea mountain to the north was over-towered Jan Attridge of Galilee, where he acquired a sense of by construction cranes, and the plain that “the distances from one place to another, spreads out beneath the valley was Chief Financial Officer and for the seasons of drought and of sprouting more housing. Lisa Pope rainfall. Each season,” he wrote, “has its In the 1990s, the Holy See frequently Marketing particular wind direction, times of heat made preservation of the historic biblical Eryk Krysztofiak and cold. I have learned much about the environment one of its hopes for an Advertising lake and about fishing and navigations....” Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement. Julia Sosa Attention to the details of landscape, cli- Many pilgrims, both Jews and mate and the habits of fishermen and Christians, lament the passing of the 106 West 56th Street farmers gave him confidence in the biblical landscape. But today conserving New York, NY 10019-3803 authenticity of the Gospel accounts of the geography of salvation is a moot Ph: 212-581-4640; Fax: 212-399-3596. Jesus’ life. In two books, With Jesus point. Much of it is buried beneath con- E-mail: [email protected]; Through Galilee According to the Fifth crete and steel. Pixner’s “Fifth Gospel” [email protected]. Gospel (1992) and With Jesus in Jerusalem: has been sacrificed to the twin gods of Web site: www.americamagazine.org. His First and Last Days in Judea (1996), he fear and security. In the meantime, the Customer Service: 1-800-627-9533. spelled out his reading of the geography woods near my boyhood home were © 2008 America Press, Inc. of salvation. purchased by a conservancy that will The biblical landscape Pixner loved, protect one, small “garden spot” in “the however, is fast disappearing. Thousand- cement and asphalt jungle.” Cover photo Rowan Williams, Archbishop year-old olive groves have been bulldozed Drew Christiansen, S.J. of Canterbury. Reuters/Paul McErlane. www.americamagazine.org Vol. 199 No. 3, Whole No. 4822 August 4–11, 2008 Articles 13 Human Dignity and the End of Life 13 Justin F. Rigali and William E. Lori Caring for those in a persistent vegetative state Buyer’s Remorse Robert A. Senser 16 Spatulas, Yahoo and a consumer’s conscience For the Sake of Unity Austen Ivereigh 19 Will disagreements tear apart the Anglican Communion? Still a Prophet William A. Au 22 Gordon Zahn and the danger to the church of ‘milieu Catholicism’ Current Comment 4 25 Report 5 Decline and Progress in Africa Peter Schineller Signs of the Times 6 Morality Matters 10 The Missing Class Maryann Cusimano Love From Our Pages: 1933 25 The Diabolic Plot Dorothy Day Faith in Focus 26 Life in the Borderlands Tracy Sayuki Tiemeier Poem Who Cares Marilyn Brusca 28 Film Romance of the Robots Richard A. Blake 29 Book Reviews 31 29 Church and Society; Religion in American Politics; A Promised Land, A Perilous Journey State of the Question 35 The Future of Nuclear Energy The Word 38 ‘Little Faith’; Interreligious Dialogue? Daniel J. Harrington

This week @ A conversation with Austen Ivereigh on our podcast, and a selection of America articles by Avery Dulles, S.J. Plus, from the archives, Dorothy Day America Connects on the “dangerous goodness” of Communism. All at americamagazine.org. Current Comment

to be visited by the all-American tourists who usually trav- Finally, a Favorite Son el this time of year, and open your ears. German, French, This August, 132 years after Thomas Eakins painted it, a Spanish and Slavic tongues are everywhere, but only every masterpiece of American realist art will be on display at now and then does one hear a variant of that protean lan- the Philadelphia Museum of Art, its new home. guage called American English that we are used to hearing Newspapers reported the efforts of various museums to during tourist season. Why? Is gas too expensive? Has his- buy “The Gross Clinic,” considered by many to be one of tory reversed itself? Is the sky falling? the greatest canvasses in American art. But reports of the Hard to tell. But according to the word on the street $68 million deal fail to describe the human drama behind these days, the United States is a cheap country to travel the sale: a city’s change of heart toward one of its own. in and a cheap place to shop. And the people buying Eakins, a former medical student, had painstakingly everything—everything—in our shops this summer are created the work for the city’s Centennial Exhibition, the from a continent that 10 years ago looked as if it were first World’s Fair held in the United States. It showed an headed for economic irrelevancy. We welcome our outstanding Philadelphian making a medical break- European visitors, but remain surprised. through. Eakins depicted Dr. Gross, the most distin- guished surgeon of his day, in the operating theater demonstrating a surgical technique to his students. But Peace B w/ U showing an actual operation shocked the exhibition judges, Pope Benedict XVI has gone high-tech. On July 15, the who had never seen anything like it. The surgeon’s bloody opening of World Youth Day celebrations in Sydney, fingers and the bared thigh of the patient repelled them. Australia, Benedict sent the first of his daily text messages Most critics agreed that it was indecent. Eakins nearly to an undisclosed number of pilgrims registered for the burst into tears when he saw where the judges had hung world’s largest youth gathering. The message read: “Young his painting—not in the art galleries, but in a corner of an friend, God and his people expect much from u because u outlying building rigged up like a battlefield hospital unit. have within you the Fathers supreme gift: the Spirit of By purchasing this particular work, the Philadelphia art Jesus.” Signed, “BXVI.” Benedict’s messages focused on establishment has shown pride in an artist its predecessors the role of the Holy Spirit in the lives of young Christians. had spurned throughout his lifetime, not only for his On the fourth day, using abbreviations common among work, but for his insistence on teaching students to paint the millennial generation, Benedict wrote, “The spirit the human body from live nude models and for unproved impels us 4ward 2wards others; the fire of his love makes allegations of personal misconduct. The story, familiar in us missionaries of God’s charity. See u tomorrow nite - art history, demonstrates that the public can gradually BXVI.” The text messages serve as a creative venue to come to value an artist’s work that in the artist’s own day communicate Gospel hope, and Benedict should be com- was scorned. After the centennial embarrassment, Eakins mended for employing this tool. gave “The Gross Clinic” to the Jefferson Medical School, Amid the excitement of receiving a “text” from the where Dr. Gross taught, which kept the painting for a cen- pope, however, pilgrims should not neglect Benedict’s tury until two museums outside Pennsylvania offered to full WYD message. Benedict wisely tempered his open- buy it. Then the Philadelphia Museum sprang into action. ness to gadgetry with warnings about the “the cult of material possessions” and the perils of “acquiring as many possessions and luxuries as we can.” Undisciplined Over Here desire for the latest technological practices (texting, for Europeans! They’re everywhere. Residents of nearly any instance) can be a symptom of consumerism. What American city from Atlanta, Ga., to Zwingle, Iowa, will results in the “spiritual desert” of a materially rich soci- concur that the new tourist to be found in the United ety, according to Benedict, is “an interior emptiness, an States these days is from the Old World. Our summer unnamed fear, a quiet sense of despair.” In our techno- streets are still crowded with visitors taking in the sights logical age, the quantity of communication has increased, and awkwardly posing for contrived photos, but this year but the quality—that personal encounter with Christ in people are skinnier, they all seem to be wearing neon, and the other person—has deteriorated. Through his words they are renting bikes. What on earth is going on? and example, BXVI is teaching us that technology, which The dollar has collapsed. The euro is king. Don’t think can be used for good, should not be used uncritically and so? Walk out into the area of your town or city most likely without reflection.

4 August 4–11, 2008 America Report Decline and Progress in Africa

HE ACCLAIMED DEBUT collection of short ic. In the United States, the Senate’s recent approval of the stories by the Nigerian author Uwem so-called Pepfar reauthorization act, already passed in the Akpan, S.J., Say You’re One of Them, gives House, will also bring some relief by providing funding to readers a chance to see Africa through the fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria around the globe. eyes of its children. It is not a pretty pic- On the local level, the African Union can play a valu- Tture. Critics have praised the book, yet several have also able role in supporting developing nations; but it remains written that they do not recommend it generally, but only largely ineffective because of disunity, a lack of resources for select friends, because of the brutally honest picture it and uncritical attitudes toward many African leaders. The presents. One reviewer concluded that “Akpan reveals organization needs to function as the voice of the African Africa’s pain, pity, joy and grace, and comes closer to the people, not simply as the echo chamber of leaders often truth about modern Africa than the entire outpourings of unconcerned about the welfare of their citizens. “Free the Western mass media.” and fair elections” can become more than a hope if Recent news from Africa continues to be negative. African election-monitoring groups are put into place on Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe, now apparently dictator for the continent. Constitutional limits on the number of life, declares himself president by a ballot box coup d’etat. terms of office should be stipulated, and support given to In Sudan the incumbent President Omar Hassan al-Bashir those nations attempting to establish a legitimate system now faces charges of genocide for his role in mastermind- of checks and balances. A positive example is Nigeria, ing the horrors of Darfur, where 300,000 have been killed. where the Supreme Court in the past year has stood up In the Democratic Republic of Congo, an estimated 5.4 against the executive and demanded new elections in million have died in the past 10 years, even though the seven states. civil war is said to have ended in 2003. Somalia is ruled by warlords engaging in gang warfare. The Central African ULTIMATELY, THE SOLUTION to Africa’s problems must come Republic has been called a phantom state—worse than a from within Africa. Africa’s many natural resources, failed one. Fifteen African heads of state have been in including oil, diamonds, metals and timber, should help power for more than 15 years, and 26 for more than 10. the common good rather than enrich government officials. But positive news can be found as well. Among the 48 The future must see Africans feeding themselves, imple- states of sub-Saharan Africa, the number with a free press menting a green revolution instead of depending upon and multiparty governance has risen to 11 from 3 in 1977, food aid from abroad. Education is another obvious but according to democracy advocacy groups. The number of necessary area of concern, especially the education and nations considered to have no freedom at all has fallen to empowerment of women. Foreign nongovernmental orga- 14 from the 25 so listed a decade ago. Ghana, Liberia, nizations can be part of the solution, but their assistance Burundi, Tanzania, Mozambique and Botswana have all should not serve as an excuse for local governments to solidified democratic gains in recent years. There is also neglect their responsibilities toward their citizens. hope for the unity government of Ivory Coast, with an Two recent stories coming from Africa point the way election scheduled for November 2008. Kenya, after sever- to a better future for the continent. First, the world, and al difficult months in which more than 1,000 people were African leaders in particular, might try to see Africa killed, has returned to a fragile peace. through the eyes of its children, as presented in the stories Ultimately, reform is needed on both the international of Uwem Akpan. Second, we can all keep in mind the and national levels. The United Nations has found some standard set by Nelson Mandela, who recently celebrated success in offering assistance to developing African nations his 90th birthday. Mandela’s rule in South Africa was a and applying pressure on repressive governments. Its secu- powerful example of the good that can be accomplished by rity forces have made a difference in Liberia, Darfur and a government that serves, unites and then steps down. the Congo. But much depends on whether the G-8 group These two powerful stories from Africa might help all to of nations will live up to its promises of support for debt see the need for and possibility of responsible leadership reduction and assistance with the ongoing AIDS pandem- on that continent. Peter Schineller, S.J.

August 4–11, 2008 America 5 Signs of the Times

U.N. Agreement Helps pared with the $21.5 million it returned who was in love with his family and Curb Arms Trade to Vatican coffers at the end of 2006. friends, in love with the mountains and the sea, but especially in love with God,” Religious and peace groups heralded a said the priest. “Pier Giorgio dealt with nonbinding U.N. agreement on small Life of Blessed Pier some of our own contemporary problems arms that they said helps incremental Giorgio Frassati Extolled and struggles,” he said. “His love of God efforts to curb the trade of illicit and his tremendous sense of human soli- weapons. Disarmament advocates said darity bonded him with the poor, the the action is part of a wider effort to needy, the sick, the hungry and the curtail a serious international problem homeless.” that is being fought by faith communi- ties, such as parishes in Brazil. Referring to the slums of Rio de Janeiro, Auxiliary Mandela Letter to Bishop William Kenney of Birmingham, Catholic Bishops Released England, who attended a U.N. confer- ence on July 14-18, said: “The parish The South African human rights activist priest in the Rio favelas is part of the Nelson Mandela was inspired by the same network as those involved in nego- Catholic Church’s involvement in social tiations at the United Nations.... You justice concerns during his many years need to do this work at different levels.” of incarceration, he wrote in a letter “We’re not expecting to change things from prison to the country’s first black overnight,” he told Catholic News Catholic archbishop. Mandela, who Service. The U.N. conference ended eventually was freed and elected presi- with 134 nations agreeing to a set of dent in South Africa’s first fully demo- recommendations that includes the cratic election, in 1994, also wrote to marking of small arms at the point of the late Archbishop Stephen Naidoo of Cape Town that he was uplifted by the manufacture to assist tracing efforts. The Italian Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati was a pastoral care provided by clergy on The United States did not cast a vote struggling student who excelled in mountain and kept a low profile during the confer- climbing. He had complete faith in God and per- Robben Island, where he was impris- ence, advocates said. The conference severed through college, dedicating himself to oned for 18 years. The content of also recommended efforts to boost con- helping the poor and supporting church social Mandela’s letter, dated November 1984, teaching. He died at age 24 and was beatified trols and management of state-run was published for the first time in the by Pope John Paul II in 1990. weapons arsenals, which are often tar- July 9 issue of The Southern Cross, South Africa’s Catholic weekly, to mark gets of smugglers and thieves. Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati’s simple, Mandela’s 90th birthday on July 18. holy life gives today’s youths a needed Archbishop Naidoo, who under example, said Tom Rosica, a Basilian Holy See Reports apartheid laws was classified as priest who is the former national director “Indian,” and Mandela had become Deficit for 2007 and chief operating officer of World friends before Naidoo’s appointment to After three years in the black, the Holy Youth Day 2002. “Every crisis that the Cape Town. Then-Auxiliary Bishop See reported a $14 million deficit for church faces, every crisis that the world Naidoo regularly made pastoral visits to 2007, due mainly to the continued fall in faces is a crisis of holiness and a crisis of the arid and tightly guarded Robben the value of the U.S. dollar and the poor saints,” said Father Rosica, now the chief Island, where the former president was performance of the stock markets. While operating officer of the Salt and Light incarcerated from 1964 to 1982. Vatican City State itself did not report a Catholic Media Foundation in Toronto. deficit, this was not enough to offset loss- “If there was ever an age when young es in other areas of the Holy See’s global men and women needed authentic Benedict Prays operations, which include the Vatican heroes, it is our age,” he said on July 14 for Lambeth Conference Secretariat of State and its diplomatic at a prayer vigil that included adoration missions around the world, Vatican con- of the Blessed Sacrament and veneration Pope Benedict XVI has assured gregations and pontifical councils, the of the body of Blessed Pier Giorgio in St. Anglicans meeting for their once-a- Holy See’s investment portfolio and Mary’s Cathedral in Sydney. More than decade worldwide conference that he properties as well as the Vatican’s news- 900 youths participated in the prayer ser- and other Catholics are praying for paper, radio station, publishing house and vice and listened to the story of the them. In a message to Archbishop television production center. young Italian on the eve of the opening Rowan Williams of Canterbury, spiritual The investment portfolio ended 2007 of World Youth Day in Sydney. Blessed head of the worldwide Anglican with an income of $2.2 million, com- Pier Giorgio “was simply a young man Communion, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone,

6 America August 4–11, 2008 Signs of the Times

Will World Youth Day Be a Wake-up Call? In what is often seen as one of the most intensely secular nations in the world, Australia received a wake-up call: the faith of the church on public display over the weeklong celebrations of World Youth Day. For young Catholics used to seeing a steady annu- al decline in figures such as Mass attendance—now estimated at approxi- mately 13 percent of Catholics nation- ally—and feeling like the only young person in the local parish, the sight of hundreds of thousands of other young pilgrims may well have provided a much-needed shot in the arm. The Australian theologian Tracey Rowland, dean of studies at the John Paul II Seminarians from Fiji carry the Book of the Gospels at the final Mass for World Youth Day July Institute in Melbourne, Australia, said 20 at Royal Randwick Racecourse in Sydney, Australia. the visit of Pope Benedict XVI will not fix Australia overnight. “But Pope improve the situation, especially for their first experience of solemn litur- Benedict’s weeklong ‘Christianity 101’ Generation Y,” she said, referring to the gy, adoration before the Blessed intensive course for a couple of hun- young people. She noted that for many Sacrament and catechesis with deep dred thousand pilgrims will certainly young pilgrims, World Youth Day was intellectual and spiritual content. the Vatican’s secretary of state, said the members of Congress. The cardinal, who self-described ‘pro-choice’ advocates with pope was “mindful that a primary objec- chairs the U.S. bishops’ Committee for an opportunity to demonstrate their true tive” of the meeting was “the spiritual Pro-Life Activities, said his July 18 letter convictions.” renewal that comes from prayer and was prompted by contemplation.” The letter noted the reports that the U.S. internal divisions that trouble the Department of Health End Urged for Federal Anglican Communion and said some of and Human Services Abortion Funding those issues “pose a further and grave is preparing regula- Representative Chris Smith, Republican challenge to the hope for full and visible tions that will require of New Jersey, led other pro-life lawmak- unity that has been the long-standing hospitals, clinics, med- ers in the House in calling for the U.S. goal of our joint ecumenical endeavor.” ical schools and other Congress to end federal funding for The letter was released in Canterbury health care institutions Planned Parenthood and other family on July 21, as the conference started its to certify they will not planning organizations that provide abor- regular working sessions, which run Justin Rigali discriminate against tions. “Most Americans, I suspect, proba- through Aug. 3. The Anglican bishops people who oppose bly have no idea whatsoever that our tax face controversies involving the ordina- abortion based on their “religious beliefs dollars have enabled abortionists to estab- tion of openly gay clerics, the blessing of or moral convictions.” The proposed reg- lish and to run hundreds and hundreds of gay unions and the ordination of women ulations have not been made public offi- abortion mills throughout America,” said bishops in some Anglican provinces. cially but were apparently leaked to The Smith, a Catholic. “America’s biggest New York Times and some members of abortion chain is Planned Parenthood,” Rigali Defends Conscience Congress in mid-July. “I am not writing he said. “Each year, approximately Rights of Health Workers to comment publicly on the details of an 290,000 children are aborted in Planned unpublished draft allegedly leaked from a Parenthood clinics. Each year, Planned Protecting the conscience rights of government agency,” Cardinal Rigali Parenthood gets more than $335 million health care providers should be an issue said. “The Catholic bishops’ conference in taxpayer funds, including huge on which both supporters and opponents will be glad to provide public comment amounts from the Department of Health of abortion can agree, Cardinal Justin on a proposed rule if and when it is pub- Rigali of Philadelphia said in a letter to lished.” But he said the issue “provides From CNS and other sources. CNS photos.

August 4–11, 2008 America 7 Signs of the Times and Human Services’ Title X program.” Robert Ellsberg, editor of the recently principles of Catholic social teaching. It The amount is about one-third of its published diaries of Dorothy Day, The attempts to transcend partisan politics by $926.4 million budget. The federal grants Duty of Delight, delivered the keynote expanding the pro-life ethic to include and contracts included Title X family address. “Dorothy believed that our those who suffer from poverty, lack of planning funds for low-income people. response to the poor was a test of the health care, unjust immigration policies, Federal regulations require that abortion authenticity of our worship,” said ecological destruction, violence and war. services be kept separate from Title X- Ellsberg, explaining the synthesis made Catholics and all Americans “are hungry funded family planning services, but crit- by Day of traditional Catholic piety and for a new vision of governance that is ics of Planned Parenthood say that radical social activism. The gathering rooted in a moral commitment to human receiving funding for nonabortion ser- included panels on peacemaking and dignity and social justice,” said Alexia vices frees up its resources for providing Catholic Worker history, several work- Kelley, executive director of Catholics in abortions. shops and a closing Mass celebrated by Alliance for the Common Good, which Bishop Robert McManus of Worcester. co-sponsored the event with Network, a In a statement approved in assembly, national Catholic social justice lobby. Catholic Worker Catholic Workers called on the church Other featured speakers included Helen Celebrates 75 Years and nation to join them “in repenting Prejean, C.S.J., Senator Robert P. Casey Peter Maurin and Dorothy Day found- our affronts to God,” which include Jr., Democrat of Pennsylvania, John ed the Catholic Worker movement in “unending war” and a widening gap Sweeney, president of the A.F.L.-C.I.O., 1933 with its first newspaper and house between rich and poor. and retired Bishop Walter Sullivan of of hospitality. Seventy-five years later Richmond, Va. Former Representative the movement, centered on the works Philadelphia Meeting Charles Dougherty, Republican of of mercy, a green revolution and nonvi- Pennsylvania, challenged Catholics to olent peacemaking, continues to flour- Promotes ‘Common Good’ “change the atmosphere in Washington ish. There are over 185 Catholic More than 800 delegates met in by beginning to talk with each other” Worker communities worldwide. Philadelphia from July 11 to 13 and across partisan lines. More than 500 Catholic Workers approved a “Platform for the Common gathered July 9 to 12 in Worcester, Good” that will be sent to both presiden- Pope: Recovering Addicts Mass., to celebrate this history and to tial candidates and their political parties. look toward the future. Martha The platform blends language from the Are Choosing Life Hennessy, granddaughter of Dorothy Preamble to the U.S. Constitution— Pope Benedict XVI told a group of Day, opened the conference; and most notably, “We the People”—with young Australians recovering from drug and alcohol abuse that he considers them “ambassadors of hope.” Those who have U.S. Catholic Electorate struggled to overcome addiction and get U.S. Catholic Electorate their lives back on a positive track are the Potential Catholic voters number more than 47 million. best ones to help others who are lost and suffering, the pope said July 18 while PARTY AFFILIATION traveling in Australia for World Youth Republican 2008 21% 41% 38% Day. During a visit by the pope to a rehabilitation community and support Leaner program run by the Archdiocese of 2004 31% 30% 39% Democrat Sydney’s social service agency, a young man and a young woman publicly shared their stories with the pope, struggling PARTY AFFILIATION BY FREQUENCY OF MASS ATTENDANCE, 2008 with emotion to speak of their difficult pasts and their joy in finding the program Mass Mass Mass weekly at least a few that helps disadvantaged youths, includ- 31 or more 53 43 once a 55 43times a 66 ing the homeless and refugees as well as often month year or those trying to overcome substance but less less than abuse. The pope said the participants, weekly like the people following Moses, had been given the stark choice of choosing percent of Democrats or Democrat leaners other affi liations life or death. “They had to turn away percent of Republicans or Republican leaners from other gods and worship the true

Source: Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate, Georgetown University © 2008 CNS God,” the pope said.

8 America August 4–11, 2008 Morality Matters

twice those amounts to cover basic expens-

The Missing Class es for such families. By this more accurate ‘ measure, 30 percent of Americans live in poverty. The government’s numbers are based on 2005 numbers, and were criti- The real debate centers on our cized as too low even then. Since then the definition‘ of poverty. costs of food, fuel, housing and health care have risen dramatically while jobs have been cut, further squeezing poor families, UESDAYS ARE PEDIATRIC already enrolled in S-chip. The while the government definitions of pover- surgery days at The Johns Congressional Research Service notes that ty have not changed. The federal poverty Hopkins Hospital in 21 states will be unable to maintain present rate is thus not the real poverty rate. Baltimore, Md. Families coverage over the next year if the current The S-chip program attempts to come from around the budgeted amount, $5 billion, is not bridge the difference, covering poor chil- Tworld for everything from brain and heart increased. Expanding coverage to include dren the federal government does not surgeries to removing tonsils. The differ- prenatal care for the unborn, as the count as poor. Katherine Newman, a pro- ences of countries, class and cultures seem Catholic Health Care Association, fessor of sociology and public affairs at to disappear in a hospital waiting room, Catholic Charities and the U.S. Catholic Princeton University, calls these 50 mil- scrubbed to the essentials: sick children bishops recommend, would require more lion Americans, including 20 percent of and worried parents. As our 18-month-old investment. A strong bipartisan consensus U.S. children, “the missing class.” son underwent four hours of reconstruc- passed legislation to continue and modest- The president and some members of tive hand surgery, we were like all the ly increase health insurance coverage for Congress argue that expanding S-chip other parents. We waited, worried and uninsured children, but President Bush would extend coverage to middle-class prayed. Would the surgeries work? twice vetoed the S-chip legislation late last and rich children. The facts do not bear Would the skin grafts take? Would our year, and Congress was narrowly unable to this out. According to Georgetown toddler respond well to the anesthesia and override the president’s veto. Temporary University’s Center for Children and medicines? Unlike some of the other par- reauthorization was passed to continue the Families and the Congressional Budget ents, though, one thing we never worried program until after the election. Office, over 90 percent of children about was the cost. We have medical Much of the president’s position enrolled in S-chip are from families with insurance. The surgeries and doctors’ vis- amounts to political posturing in an elec- incomes below 200 percent of the federal its cost nearly $10,000, but we had to pay tion year. After spending nearly a trillion poverty level. More than 84 percent of only a few hundred dollars for co-pay- dollars on the wars in Iraq and the nearly four million uninsured chil- ments, X-rays and medicines. Afghanistan (most of which enriches U.S. dren targeted by Congressional legisla- This is not the case for 9.4 million defense contracting companies) while tion are from low-income families uninsured children in the United States. cutting the taxes of the wealthy and already eligible for S-chip. Since 1997, over six million poor children increasing the U.S. budget deficit to an Professor Newman notes: “It’s not have received health insurance through the all-time high (according to the Treasury clear that you can win an election focusing State Children’s Health Insurance Department) of $311 billion for the first on the dispossessed in our country...we Program. This important law offers states half of this budget year, President Bush is need to put these people back on the radar matching federal funding to cover unin- now trying to regain his credentials as a screen, and understand that if we invest in sured children whose family income, fiscal conservative by denying health them, we invest in the prosperity of the although low, is higher than allowed to insurance to poor children as “too expen- nation.” The 2008 presidential candidates qualify for Medicaid. The program came sive.” Two weeks of the war in Iraq cost differ on this issue. Senator John McCain up for renewal in fall 2007; and state gov- more than the entire S-chip program agrees with President Bush’s veto of the S- ernors, children’s health advocates, the costs per year. The president disingenu- chip legislation, saying, “The American U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, ously charges that the S-chip program people have rebelled against out-of-con- Catholic Charities, the Catholic Health amounts to federalized, socialized trol spending.” In contrast, Senator Association and others all urged that the medicine. But the program is state-run Barack Obama favors expansion of the S- program be strengthened and extended. and provides money for private health chip program, noting, “In the richest Because of the spiraling costs of health insurance. nation on Earth we must no longer stand care, more money is needed just to provide The real debate centers on the defini- by while nine million children live without the same level of coverage for the children tion of poverty. The federal government health care.” Whoever wins in November, defines poverty as an income of less than the issue will be revisited. We owe MARYANN CUSIMANO LOVE is professor of $16,000 a year for a family of three, and less America’s most vulnerable children medi- international relations at The Catholic than $20,614 for a family of four; but most cal care, not political posturing. University of America in Washington, D.C. research shows that it takes more than Maryann Cusimano Love

10 America August 4–11, 2008 August 4–11, 2008 America Vol. 199 No. 3, Whole No. 4822 PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK/KEVIN CARDEN

Caring for patients in a persistent vegetative state Human Dignity And the End of Life – BY JUSTIN F. RIGALI AND WILLIAM E. LORI –

N SEPTEMBER 2007 the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued a Response approved by Pope Benedict to answer two questions posed by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops on our moral obligations to patients who exist in what has come to be called a “persistent vegetative state.” The Congregation’s Response and its accompanying Commentary confirm and explain the state- mentsI made by Pope John Paul II on March 20, 2004, on the moral obligation to provide food and fluids to P.V.S. patients when they need such assistance to survive.

CARDINAL JUSTIN F. RIGALI is the archbishop of Philadelphia and chairman of the Committee on Pro-Life Activities of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. BISHOP WILLIAM E. LORI of Bridgeport, Conn., is chairman of the U.S.C.C.B. Committee on Doctrine.

August 4–11, 2008 America 13 Two recent articles in America, “On Church Teaching physical discomfort,” and the congregation’s response rec- and My Father’s Choice,” by John J. Hardt (1/21), and “At ognized the legitimacy of this exception. the End of Life,” by Thomas A. Shannon (2/18), appear to When patients are dying and their bodily systems are misunderstand and subsequently misrepresent the sub- shutting down at the end of life, medically assisted nourish- stance of church teaching on these difficult but important ment can be ineffective and even create additional suffering. ethical questions. This is why physicians did not initiate tube-feeding for Pope John Paul II himself when he was in his final days. The Duty to Provide Basic Care The pope’s condition in his final hours was in no way com- Thomas Shannon, in his article, cites the Declaration on parable to that of a P.V.S. patient, who can live a long time Euthanasia of 1980, which spoke of the discretion patients with assisted feeding. may have to refuse medical treatment that seems to them Thomas Shannon, in his article, confuses the three excep- burdensome, and therefore tions recognized in the congre- “extraordinary” or dispropor- gation’s Response and tionate. He argues that this judg- Commentary, and John Hardt ment by a patient is distinct from Life is the first and finds four such exceptions. The a physician’s judgment that a C.D.F. Commentary does speak treatment is “medically ordi- most basic good of the of a situation where the obliga- nary” in the sense of being cus- tion to provide nutrition and tomary or usual. What is “medi- human person, the con- hydration does not apply. This is cally ordinary” can be “morally dition for all the others. not really an exception to the extraordinary.” This is a valid norm, but rather the simple distinction, but there is an aspect recognition that we are never of patient care even more basic than the distinction between obliged to try to do the impossible. Some parts of the world ordinary and extraordinary medical treatments: the “ordi- may be so destitute or undeveloped that they lack the medi- nary care” owed to sick persons because of their human dig- cal resources and skills for the kind of assisted feeding that nity, which the Declaration said should be provided even can occasion difficult moral decisions. John Hardt goes fur- when certain medical interventions have been withdrawn as ther when he suggests that the C.D.F. Commentary intro- useless or overly burdensome. Pope John Paul II and his duces a broader and more subjective category of “burden” successor held that food and water, even when their provi- that justifies a simple dislike for survival in a helpless state. sion may require technical medical assistance, constitute the But that claim has no foundation in the text, is actually con- “basic care” that patients should receive. The value of such tradicted by the Response and raises an additional problem medical assistance is not to be judged by its efficacy in cur- that is discussed below. ing the patient or improving the patient’s condition. Supplying the basic necessities of life can often require the The Teaching on Euthanasia by Omission assistance of others, in the case, for example, of those who Both Hardt and Shannon acknowledge that a concern about are very young or very old, or simply very weak at any age. euthanasia is part of the background for the C.D.F.’s In the case of medically stable patients in a “vegetative Response. However, neither cites the longstanding church state,” who may live a long time with continued nourish- teaching that an omission of basic care may itself be ment but will certainly die of dehydration or starvation euthanasia. Euthanasia is defined in the Declaration of 1980 without it, the obligation to care for our fellow human as “an action or an omission which of itself or by intention beings presents a very direct challenge. Such a patient’s con- causes death, in order that all suffering may in this way be dition should not be characterized as “unstable” or terminal eliminated.” Such euthanasia is always morally wrong. simply because it would become so if the patient were Here the church insists on the important distinction deprived of food and water. between validly withdrawing a life-sustaining means because the means itself is burdensome, and wrongly with- Limits to This Obligation drawing it because (in someone’s view) life itself has become It is true that this obligation to provide basic care can be burdensome and should be brought to an end. exhausted when such assistance can no longer fulfill its basic To cite this distinction in no way dismisses or minimizes purpose or finality. The U.S. bishops asked the C.D.F. the real suffering of long-term illness, or the real costs and whether food and fluids should be provided “except when burdens that families may undergo in caring for a helpless they cannot be assimilated by the patient’s body or cannot family member diagnosed as being in a persistent vegetative be administered to the patient without causing significant state. In his March 2004 Address to the Participants in the

14 America August 4–11, 2008 International Congress on Life-Sustaining Treatments and the them as his sons and daughters, especially in need of help.” Vegetative State: Scientific Advances and Ethical Dilemmas, Our love and support for patients in P.V.S. should be John Paul II drew attention to this problem, insisting that modeled on God’s love, which is based not on their current such families “cannot be left alone with their heavy human, ability to act and respond but on their enduring dignity as psychological and financial burden,” but must receive assis- human beings, made in his image and likeness and facing an tance from medical professionals, society and the church. ultimate destiny with him. Earthly life is not the highest of all This is the true meaning of “compassion” in the face of ill- goods, and our hope in eternal life puts in proper perspective ness and disability, to “suffer with” the afflicted and lighten all disproportionate and burdensome efforts to sustain life. their burden through our support. The solution does not lie Life is, however, the first and most basic good of the in seeking ways to hasten the patient’s death in order to lift human person, the condition for all others: “Life is always a burdens from the patient and family. good” (Evangelium Vitae, No. 34). The way we treat this life This is why the C.D.F. Response insists that assisted feed- here and now—especially the life of those who are most ing may not be discontinued simply on the grounds that helpless and least able to care for themselves—has conse- “competent physicians judge with moral certainty that the quences for our own eternal destiny. patient will never recover consciousness.” Even if one judges Persons in the so-called “vegetative state” deserve our that such a condition, when prolonged, makes survival itself a unconditional respect. As Pope John Paul noted in his 2004 burden, such a judgment does not justify removing food and address, they should receive all reasonable assistance aimed at water so the patient will not survive. their recovery and rehabilitation. But even if such efforts at Some ethicists want to assess all the costs and burdens of recovery do not succeed, we need to provide friendship and caring for a helpless patient in a P.V.S., and then count these practical help to their families and treat these patients always among the “burdens” of assisted feeding. One problem this as fellow human beings in need of basic care. In this way our approach raises is the question of intent. By omitting food Catholic community can build a culture of life that excludes and fluids, what are we trying to achieve? Whose “burden” no one from the circle of love and mutual support. A are we trying to ease? Assisted feeding is often not difficult or costly to provide in itself, but the housing, nursing care and Read articles by Thomas A. Shannon and John J. Hardt other basic needs of a helpless patient can be significant. To on end of life care at americamagazine.org/pages. discontinue assisted feeding in order to be freed from such burdens puts the caregiver’s interests ahead of the patient’s, BY BESTSELLING AUTHOR even if we prefer not to recognize the reality of our choice. JAMES MARTIN, SJ The Unity of the Living Human Person Finally, the claim is sometimes made that the life of a P.V.S. patient, one who survives only because of medically assisted nourishment, is not a fully human life because it is not capa- “Jesuit Father James Martin ble of interaction with other persons. Such a condition has shows, in his latest book, been called a “baseline biological existence,” a merely how one may ‘read’ the “physical” life without inherent meaning or value. Assisted saints and spiritual masters nutritional support, in this view, is warranted only if it may restore the patient’s ability to engage in the activities that to deepen our knowledge of constitute the value of our earthly existence. Such an argu- both theology and the spiritu- ment has deeply disturbing implications, since it challenges al life. He does this so well the value of anyone with mental illness, retardation or cog- both because his writing is nitive disabilities who is not able to pursue what such critics lucid and his approach so deem “worthwhile” activity. Over transparently authentic.” 20,000 It was against such dehumanizing criticism that Pope copies —LAWRENCE S. CUNNINGHAM, John Paul II, in his 2004 address, insisted that “the intrinsic sold! John A. O’Brien Professor of Theology, value and personal dignity of every human being does not University of Notre Dame change, no matter what the concrete circumstances of his or her life…. Even our brothers and sisters who find them- 1-58768-036-X • 112 pages $10.00 • Paperback selves in the clinical condition of a ‘vegetative state’ retain their human dignity in all its fullness. The loving gaze of Available at bookstores or from PAULIST PRESS . www.paulistpress.com God the Father continues to fall upon them, acknowledging Call: 800-218-1903 . Fax: 800-836-3161

August 4–11, 2008 America 15 Buyer’s Remorse Spatulas, Yahoo and the conscience of a consumer

BY ROBERT A. SENSER

HEN OUR OLD WOODEN SPATULA showed Hispanic Chamber of Commerce on March 12, he warned signs of age, I looked for a replacement on that Congress’s failure to pass more free trade agreements my next trip to a nearby Giant Food super- would deprive American families of the “choices that market. I found only a plastic model and was they’ve been used to.” He went on: “We want our con- Wabout to buy it until I read the small print: “made in China.” sumers to have choices when they walk into markets. The In checking other nearby household utensils, I found that more choices available, the better it is for a consumer.” almost all came from the People’s Republic. Milton and Rose Friedman laid down the rationale for A day or two later, I mailed a complaint to Giant’s con- that view in 1980, in a 10-week PBS series, “Free to sumer affairs department. “Dear friends,” I wrote, “It Choose,” and published a book with the same theme and shocks me that a company of Giant Food’s distinction title. They compared the choices made in the supermarket would sell goods made in the People’s Republic of China.” to choices made in the voting booth, both seen as freedom The main point of my four-paragraph letter was to criticize in action. the store for depending on China as a major supplier, when The trouble with extolling free choice for the American it didn’t know how the spatula or other made-in-China shopper, however, is that something happened to it on our products were manufactured. “Can you guarantee,” I asked, way to globalization. Products made in the United States “that they were not made by Protestant ministers sentenced have almost disappeared from our shelves. They have been to forced labor camps because of their religion? Or by massively replaced by imports, above all by imports from underage children working in sweatshops? Or by college China. Consumer choice for U.S.-made products is gone, students sentenced to hard labor because they refused to or almost so. follow the dictates of the Party? Or in a People’s Liberation Army factory whose exports to the United States under- Internet Censorship and Trade write the missiles they build for firing toward Taiwan?” The services sector is falling victim to the same trend. That The response I received did not answer my questions. fact hit home to me because I am a Yahoo subscriber. Instead, the assistant director of consumer affairs wrote that Yahoo, an Internet content provider and Web portal over the years Giant had received many requests to boycott based in California, is a Fortune 500 multinational corpora- various products, but decided not to do so, being unwilling tion whose business in China is booming. In China you do to make such choices for its customers. “Those who choose as the Chinese do. So Yahoo works closely with China’s to boycott products made in the People’s Republic of China security forces in censoring the Internet. Even more seri- have the right to do so,” she explained, “but those who wish ous, it is obligated to turn over to police incriminating to purchase them ought to have that right as well.” information, which has led to jail and other punishments for At that time, in late 1995, I also wrote to other super- Chinese Yahoo users who engage in conduct the govern- market chains. The response from Fresh Fields was the ment deems unbecoming a good citizen of China. most pointed: it said that one of Fresh Fields’s founding I am especially troubled by what has happened, for philosophies is “to offer choices to consumers,” and that example, to Li Zhi, a 32-year-old civil servant, a supporter therefore it was letting customers make their own choices of the China Democracy Party, who was sentenced to eight on what to buy. years in prison in 2003 for “inciting subversion against the Both Giant Food and Fresh Fields based their positions state.” Yahoo helped put him there. The plight of Li and on a value held to be basic in the free market system—free- two other citizens of China made the news on Feb. 29, dom of choice. President George W. Bush recently when they filed a lawsuit against Yahoo in a California fed- expressed his belief in that value. In a speech to the U.S. eral court, charging that they had to endure torture and imprisonment, among other sufferings, after Yahoo handed ROBERT A. SENSER, formerly a labor attaché in the U.S. Foreign over their e-mail messages and other Internet information Service and a program officer with what is now the A.F.L.-C.I.O. to Chinese authorities. Solidarity Center, writes a blog on human rights for workers. Yahoo, which does not deny working with the govern-

16 America August 4–11, 2008 ment, may settle the case of Li and his two co-plaintiffs man at a public hearing last year—all this is not a comfort- out of court, as it did a similar lawsuit last November with able position to be in. Google wants the U.S. government’s an undisclosed sum of money. That does not end my help to get out of it. Trying to faithful to its slogan, “Don’t moral dilemma. I do not like to be connected with a com- be evil,” Google is exploring an approach not tried before. pany that helps a government torture people. Yet for 12 This initiative relies on the logic of international trade law, years I have run a Web site promoting human rights at which, in principle, outlaws barriers to trade. Since govern- home and abroad and have depended on Yahoo for its e- ment censorship of information is a serious trade barrier for mail and research services. American companies in China, it follows that China’s barri- Quitting Yahoo would not solve my problem either. As er should be outlawed as such through U.S. bilateral and a media watchdog group, Reporters Without Borders, says, multilateral trade agreements. Yahoo’s competitors, Google, Microsoft and Cisco Systems, Timothy Wu, associate professor of law at Columbia all now working in China, also follow the axiom: when in University and a scholar on telecommunications and trade China, do as the Chinese do. Under the pressure of a gov- law, came to the same conclusion on his own: that China’s ernment equipped with armies of informants and the latest Internet censorship violates international trade law. In a in surveillance technology, Internet companies have agreed paper titled The World Trade Law of Internet Filtering, he to censor their search engines to filter out material over- emphasizes the cross-border character of Internet services: critical of authorities. “This makes the regime’s job very “Much of the Internet can be reached from anywhere, mak- much easier, because these firms are the main entry-points ing nearly everyone on the Internet a potential importer or to the Internet,” Reporters Without Borders says. “If a Web exporter of services (and sometimes goods).” site is not listed by their search engines, material posted on In China’s case, Dr. Wu contends, the government them has about as much chance of being found as a message agreed to reform the protectionist practices of China’s firms in a bottle thrown into the sea.” in the services sector as a condition of entry into the World I may find I can switch from Yahoo to a comparable Trade Organization in late 2001. Instead, however, China provider that does not operate in China. That would get me has become one of the “world’s more active filterers of personally off the hook in this instance, but it would change Internet services.” He regards China as probably in conflict nothing else. Fortunately, another California-based with one of the key W.T.O. pacts—the little known General Fortune 500 multinational with a booming business in Agreement on Trade in Services, called GATS. The 21st- China, Google, is searching for a solution. Making money century expansion of the Internet, Wu insists, has “leaped on information services while at the same time collaborat- beyond what was contemplated in GATS or subsequent ing with a government to suppress information, and having telecommunications agreements [and] requires new think-

PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK/ANDRE BLAIS two of its executives called “moral pygmies” by a congress- ing about how barriers come about.”

August 4–11, 2008 America 17 Financing Repression plight of the Internet giants in China is not unique. Other A West Coast advocacy group, the California First global industries also live under trade policies that have not Amendment Coalition, is contributing some new thinking. caught up with the 21st century. Multinational corporations In an oral and written case to U.S. trade officials, the coali- still operate under rules of the world trade and investment tion specifically identifies a W.T.O. and GATS principle system that was patched together in the five decades after that China is violating: “national treatment.” Basic in all the end of World War II. trade agreements, this principle requires a country to treat Under the principles laid down by leaders who estab- imported goods and services the same as those produced lished the W.T.O., all its member nations (now 152) are locally. But China uses “a wide range of laws and regulations equal and have the same rights in the international market- that result in de jure or de facto” discriminatory treatment place. Dictatorships and autocratic governments enjoy the of U.S. companies, according to the coalition’s paper, and is same rights and privileges as democratic ones. And so thereby actively restricting the operations of U.S. Internet China, exploiting its own opportunistic blend of Vladimir companies “while at the same time promoting Chinese Lenin and Adam Smith, naturally takes full advantage of a Internet companies in the same or similar activities.” position of political and economic repression at home— At a hearing on May 20 of the Senate Judiciary subcom- especially its heavily controlled labor force—to mass pro- mittee on human rights and the law, Nicole Wong, Google’s duce for free markets abroad, especially for the largest free deputy general counsel, renewed the company position that market in the world. the U.S. government should make combating Internet cen- Result: last year the United States imported sorship a top priority. “It is vital,” she said, “for the U.S. $321,442,900,000 worth of goods from China, a record sure Departments of State and Commerce and the Office of the to be broken again in 2008. Constrained by space, the print U.S. Trade Representative—in this and in future adminis- media publish those figures only in abbreviated form, if they trations—to make censorship a central element of our bilat- publish them at all, by using a tiny “b” to replace the final eral and multilateral [trade] agendas.” nine digits, thus obscuring the 321,442,900,000 votes we U.S. government officials, however, have yet to cast by our dollars for repression in China. embrace this precedent-setting approach. After all, the In a 2001 policy paper for the U.N. Development Program, The Global Governance of Trade as if Development Really Mattered, Dani Rodrik, professor of international polit- ical economy at Harvard, proposed that a reformed trade system include the principle that “non-democratic coun- tries cannot count on the same trade privileges as democratic ones.” The idea did not catch on in 2001, and hasn’t since. This reform does not seem to stand a chance, mainly because now that China is in the W.T.O., Beijing can veto any reform that would diminish the advantages it now enjoys. Nevertheless, a broad range of ideas ought to be on the table for a serious trade policy review in light of the need to replace the president’s Trade Promotion Authority law, which expired in July 2007. To prepare for that review and the actions that should follow, Congress would be wise to commission an economist like Rodrik to prepare a report with the title “The Global Governance of Trade as if Human Rights Really Mattered.” A

18 America August 4–11, 2008 For the Sake of Unity Will disagreements tear apart the Anglican Communion?

BY AUSTEN IVEREIGH

URING A RECENT DEBATE at the Church of Global Anglican Future Conference bishops’ spurning of England’s General Synod, N. T. Wright, the that authority, nor their claim to be more faithful to the Scripture scholar and bishop of Durham, Bible, nor their demand that other Anglicans sign on to summed up the crisis facing the Anglican their 14-point declaration of Anglican orthodoxy. Bishop DCommunion rather graphically. “We are living through, on Wright is a Church of England conservative evangelical, many levels, a massive outworking of the law of unintended rather than an African or Australian one; and in the current consequences,” he said. “Or, in plain English, a slow-mov- meltdown, that is just as important a difference as those ing train wreck.” between liberal and conservative Anglicans, or Catholics Bishop Wright is a touchstone theologian for tradition- and Protestants. alists. He opposes women bishops, noncelibate gay clergy As the Lambeth Conference of Anglican Primates, and the blessing of same-sex unions—the hot-button issues which is held every 10 years, meets in Canterbury (July 16- that have plunged the Anglican Church into possibly the Aug. 3) against a backdrop of what journalists are calling the greatest crisis in its history. But that does not mean he sup- “summer of schism,” it is worth noting that the cause of the ports the decision by 280 conservative (or “Bible-believ- current Anglican crisis is not disagreement over homosexu- ing”) Anglican bishops of the developing world to form ality. Most Catholics as well as nonbelievers I know have their own communion-within-a-communion at Jerusalem a strongly diverse views about same-sex blessings, civil part- few weeks ago in defiance of the authority of the nerships and gay adoptions; homosexuality is one of the Archbishop of Canterbury. Bishop Wright likes neither the great divisive issues of our age. But disagreements do not necessarily lead to divisions or AUSTEN IVEREIGH, former adviser to Cardinal Cormac Murphy- crises. The real question is why the Anglican Church has O’Connor, is a writer and journalist based in London. not been able to contain the disagreements, and why they

Members and leaders of the Anglican Communion in Jerusalem June 23, 2008, as part of the Global Anglican Future Conference. PHOTO: REUTERS/AMMAR AWAD

August 4–11, 2008 America 19 are causing the church to tear itself apart. which led to Methodism and emigrations to Virginia, or The current crisis is not, in other words, doctrinal; it is the 19th-century Anglo-Catholic protest, which caused ecclesiological. As the center of Anglicanism has moved some to cross the Tiber—but on the whole Anglicans away from the Church of England to the global commu- stay put. They know the rules: you fight hard, but must nion, the glue that has held the Church of England togeth- be ready to bargain and compromise. er has been exposed as inadequate for binding the Anglican Churches worldwide. Fault Lines In recent decades, however, the Church of England has Mission Impossible? been shrinking as fast as the Anglican Church in former Consider the uniqueness of the historical project of the British colonies has been growing. These days the average Church of England, an attempt—intrinsically flawed, to Anglican is more likely to be a struggling African farmer some; to others, heroic—to contain under a single roof the than a lady making cakes for a sale at her English village different traditions within Christianity. There are many church. The gravitational center of Anglicanism has drifted rooms in the Anglican mansion. “Enlightened” southward, to countries where the church is not part of a Protestantism (which describes most Church of England liberal political project, and where excessive compromise bishops) co-exists with “evangelical” Protestantism (which and nuance mute its proclamation of the Gospel. Just as describes much of the clergy and laity); the first stresses rea- important, the old alliance between church and culture has son, the second biblical authority, while Protestant elements been broken in England by the rise of secular attitudes and operate alongside Catholic ones. lifestyles: cultural Anglicans believe they have found better The Anglican Catholics are in turn divided between things to do on Sundays than worship. The case for bend- “liberals” and “traditionalists,” grouped in such organiza- ing to culture in order to “baptize” it is therefore looking tions as Affirming Catholicism and Forward in Faith. much weaker, and the Church of England’s authority with- Liberals, whether Catholic or not, favor women priests and in the Anglican Communion is correspondingly reduced. bishops, and a change in church policies on homosexuality, While the Anglican Communion has come of age, what because they believe it is part of the church’s job to keep holds it together is not structures, but rather fellowship and pace with the historical movements for emancipation. a shared cultural history. There is almost nothing that can Conservatives, whether Anglo-Catholic or evangelical, are force the “enlightened” North Americans, who see gay against adapting to the age. The Bible tells the evangelicals emancipation as a matter of historical justice, to coexist with otherwise, while Anglo-Catholics believe that if developing-world evangelicals, for whom homosexuality is Anglicanism should adapt to anything it should be the an abomination deplored by Scripture. As long as former Catholic and Orthodox Churches of which they believe colonials were taking their cue from the Church of themselves to be a part. England, the absence of structures was not fatal. But at the All can give good reasons for their beliefs, and tradi- last Lambeth Conference, in 1998, concerned about the tionally all can be accommodated—messily, awkwardly, Church of England’s growing acceptance of homosexuality often with extreme bad grace and sometimes only with and what they saw as a betrayal of Scripture, a lobby of bish- imaginative 11th-hour compromises. In Britain, it is almost ops from the developing world moved to “save the church” a national sport to watch the different parties maneuvering from the forces of secularism. They pushed through around the field at synods. You can almost hear the amaze- Resolution 1:10, which declared that homosexual practice ment each time the Church of England pulls clear of schism was “incompatible with Scripture.” at the last minute—like the gasps that accompany goals This was precisely the kind of unambiguous statement before the final whistle. of doctrinal clarity that Anglicanism has been at pains to Church of England Anglicans are proud of this capac- avoid. Not only was it unacceptable to large numbers of ity for compromise, which is bound up with the project Anglicans in the North; it could not be imposed, because of political liberalism. As a national church its task, sub- Lambeth resolutions are not binding until they are accept- ject to the will of Parliament with the Queen as its head, ed by member churches. has been to bend and adapt to cultural developments. Resolution 1:10 emboldened the evangelicals to take a There has been the odd exodus—the evangelical rebel- stand against the blessing of same-sex unions, authorized by lions of the 18th century against “worldly” bishops, a Canadian diocese in 2002, and against the acceptance of a noncelibate priest, Gene Robinson, as a bishop a year later by the Episcopal Church, in the United States. As Africans Austen Ivereigh talks about the Lambeth Conference at and Americans declared themselves out of communion with americamagazine.org/podcast. each other, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams,

20 America August 4–11, 2008 struggled to establish firmer boundaries within the Anglican ditherer and a Canute-like figure pondering theological Church but without giving himself “papal powers,” as he abstractions while the waves crash on the shore. In fact his put it to a journalist in Rome a few years ago. The 2004 leadership has been extraordinary, a witness to the influence Windsor Report of the Lambeth Commission on of Catholicism on his ecclesiology. The easier path is the Communion was an impressive attempt to introduce a more one of expulsions, or at least of taking one side or another; Catholic ecclesiology through covenants and a jus commune, but he has taken the far harder option of trying to forge a but it was largely ignored. communion out of polarization. He has tried to persuade The bishops of the global South, meanwhile, demanded both the global South and the North Americans to “restorative discipline” for the North Americans and their renounce their absolute positions for the sake of unity, and expulsion at Lambeth 2008 if they did not “repent.” not to move impatiently ahead. He exemplified this when— Although Archbishop Williams has not invited Bishop although personally he is convinced that the church will Gene Robinson to Canterbury, he has made it clear that come to accept homosexual partnerships—he vetoed in expulsion is not what Anglicans do. When Archbishop 2004 the appointment of a gay friend, Jeffrey John, as Williams decided a few months ago to arrange the meeting Bishop of Reading, because he knew it would inflame dis- of the primates as a listening exercise, rather than to set up unity. The “pro-gay” lobby accused him of surrendering to a series of debates followed by resolutions, the disaffected evangelical pressure, but they misread the decision. evangelicals decided to act. Seeing that Archbishop Archbishop Williams was demonstrating that a move too Williams had no intention of disciplining the Episcopal soon—however principled—can destroy unity. He has more Church, they headed to Jerusalem for the Global Anglican than once quoted to both the Episcopal Church and the Future Conference. Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans St. Paul’s words to the Corinthians (1 Cor 11:33) to “wait for one another.” Saving Anglicanism So far they have not. A willingness to “suffer for the sake The Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans founded in of the unity of the church” is something many Anglicans Jerusalem in June by the churches of the global South is the assume only Catholics have to do. The openly gay bishop of next step in what the developing-world evangelicals see as New Hampshire, Gene Robinson, is in England, popping their way to save Anglicanism. If the Anglo-Catholic move- up on television and radio to declare that Jesus loves him ment of the 19th century sought to recover the national and that history is on his side, while the Global Anglican Catholic Church of Henry VIII, FOCA has in mind the Future Conference evangelicals are growling from abroad, Elizabethan Protestant version of Anglicanism, with its convinced the Bible is on their side. Kenosis for the sake of Book of Common Prayer and 39 Articles. FOCA rejects not unity is not on the minds of any of them. only the “false Gospel” of the North American Anglicans But that does not stop two-thirds of the world’s Anglican and their “unscriptural” endorsement of homosexuality, but bishops who are gathering in Canterbury. If at the Lambeth also what they call the “colonial” domination of the global Conference they can listen to each other—and to God—long Anglican Church by “northern, liberal mentalities.” The enough, there may be a chance for Archbishop Williams still new network includes 280 bishops of African, South to build the structures on which future global Anglican coex- American and Australian churches, which include as many istence so obviously depends. Global Anglicanism after the as half of the Anglican Church’s 80 million believers. Its Lambeth Conference may still look like a “slow-moving train rejection of the two instruments of communion— wreck,” but there is a good chance, under Archbishop Archbishop Williams’s authority (“We do not accept that Williams, that it will still be on the rails. A Anglican identity is determined neces- sarily through recognition by the Archbishop of Canterbury,” reads the Jerusalem declaration) and the Lambeth Conference (which they are boy- cotting)—means that there are now, in effect, two parallel Anglican Communions, split along both geo- graphical and ecclesiological fault lines. The sniping at Archbishop Williams from all sides has been intense. He is accused of giving in to evangelical black- mail, of being a closet liberal, of being a

August 4–11, 2008 America 21 Still a Prophet Gordon Zahn and the danger of ‘milieu Catholicism’ BY WILLIAM A. AU

OR THE FIRST TIME in its mod- Nazis. The second was a biography of the to the edge of Christian conscience? ern history, in December 1965 the Austrian peasant who was executed by the How has it become so badly blunted Roman Catholic Church gave Nazis for refusing to serve in a war he since the age of the early martyrs, many official recognition to the right of believed to be unjust. Zahn saw a kindred of whom embraced death rather than FCatholics to be pacifists and conscientious spirit in Jägerstätter, who had to stand not place one pinch of incense upon a pagan objectors to war. This historic change was only against the authority of the state, but altar?” Zahn had quoted an unnamed to a great extent a result of the life and also against the German church, which expert at the Second Vatican Council as work of Gordon Zahn. Zahn, who died in refused to recognize his conscientious saying: “We don’t encourage martyr- December 2007 in Wauwatosa, Wis., objection and endorsed the duty of dom. To prevent this, the church will would have turned 90 on Aug. 7. The Catholics to serve in the military. Vatican make almost any adjustment.” Such anniversary is an appropriate time to officials and German bishops tried to pre- adjustments, Zahn contended, had appreciate Zahn’s many contributions and vent the publication of both books. Yet robbed the church of its prophetic vital- to review the questions his life’s work still Zahn went ahead, and his work on ity since the time of Constantine and led poses for American Catholics grappling Jägerstätter paved the way for to the cultural imprisonment of milieu with issues of war and peace. Jägerstätter’s eventual beatification by Catholicism. Zahn, who was one of the few Pope Benedict XVI in October 2007. Thus, Zahn argued that the church Catholic conscientious objectors during must return to a suspicion of the state that World War II, paid a personal price for Ensnared by the State characterized its worldview before standing against popular opinion. His In his work Zahn’s chief concern was to Constantine. For Zahn, the inhumanity of application for conscientious objector sta- show how the church can become the modern state was rooted in its reliance tus was initially denied because the ensnared in nationalism, rendering it upon ever greater force to achieve securi- Catholic priest on his draft board said unable to resist the dominant currents of a ty, which resulted in ever more aggressive Catholics could not be conscientious secular culture. In such a condition, wars and the ultimate insecurity posed by objectors. Upon appeal, Zahn received his focused on preserving its corporate inter- the threat of nuclear holocaust. Zahn c.o. classification and spent the war fight- ests, the church is rendered incapable of rejected the ideological polarities of the ing forest fires in Camp Simon, a Catholic prophetic witness and tends to provide a cold war and sought to place both the cap- Worker community in New Hampshire. moral sanction for social conformity. This italist West and Communist East within a After the war, when Zahn attempted to condition Zahn termed “milieu critique of the modern state. In his view resume his student work, he found it diffi- Catholicism.” the modern state had destroyed the auton- cult to gain college acceptance because of He sought to apply his analysis of how omy of the individual, and the preserva- his conscientious objection. Finally, he milieu Catholicism had crippled the tion of the state depended on the effec- received a scholarship from St. John’s German church’s ability to resist Nazi tiveness of this moral lobotomy. University in Collegeville, Minn., but policies to the American Catholic Church. Therefore, a prerequisite for any social faced so much hostility from a student As he wrote: “This time…American reform was a revival of a personal and cul- body filled with veterans that he had to Catholics and their bishops, not their tural sense of individual moral competen- transfer to the University of St. Thomas in German counterparts, will be facing the cy and responsibility. St. Paul. crucial test. We responsible citizens of a Controversy erupted again in the nation inflexibly committed to nuclear Corrupting the Just War Theory 1960s, when Zahn published his two sem- deterrence and a ‘security’ based on main- At the heart of the church’s co-optation by inal works: German Catholics and Hitler’s taining the capacity and the readiness to the modern state, Zahn insisted, was the Wars: A Study in Social Control, and In commit acts of war already defined by just war theory, and the manner in which Solitary Witness: The Life and Death of Vatican II as ‘crimes against God and man its interpretation and application had been Franz Jägerstätter. The first book was a himself”…must decide how far we can go used to justify government policies rather sociological study of the failure of the in our compliance.” than to critique them. While his strict German Catholic Church to resist the In a review of Zahn’s study of the pacifism entailed a rejection of the just war German church, Gordon Allport theory, Zahn relished using its categories THE REV. WILLIAM A. AU is pastor of SS. insightfully noted the question underly- to argue that no modern war could be jus- Philip and James Church in Baltimore, Md. ing Zahn’s work: “[W]hat has happened tified. The reason: Modern warfare violat-

22 America August 4–11, 2008 ed the requirements for discrimination Critic of Fuzzy Thinking support individuals making a countercul- and proportionality. He also criticized the American Catholic tural stand of conscience. Throughout his In the 1960s and 1970s, such Catholic bishops for their failure to stand up to life, Zahn remained actively involved with intellectuals as James Dougherty and these developments, pointing out that the Catholic Church and strove to have it William O’Brien were among the promi- their opposition to the Vietnam War was recognize the moral validity of the pacifist nent spokespersons for political-moral belated and stopped short of an outright position. During Vatican II, Zahn, along “realism,” a school of thought associated condemnation. On the issue of nuclear with other American Catholic pacifists, with Reinhold Niebuhr in American weapons and deterrence, Zahn criticized lobbied for recognition of conscientious Protestantism and objection. His work John Courtney with the English and Murray, S.J., in Welsh bishops led American the British Jesuit Catholicism. In archbishop, Thomas their view, the cold Roberts, to give a war between the written intervention United States and at the council citing the Soviet Union the example of Franz was the defining cul- Jägerstätter. This tural and moral and the work of struggle of civiliza- Zahn and his confr- tion. In the struggle, eres led to the first the right of the formal ecclesiastical United States to recognition of con- self-defense scientious objec- required adapting tion—in the coun- the just war criteria cil’s “Pastoral to accommodate the Constitution on the type of conflict in Church in the which the United Modern World.” States was likely to Zahn co-found- find itself. For these ed Pax Christi USA, social moralists, that an American branch meant defending of the Catholic inter- both the morality of national peace nuclear deterrence movement, in 1972. and an engagement He also found great in “limited” nuclear satisfaction in the war; for O’Brien, it American hierar- even included the chy’s recognition of use of torture. This the right of thinking reflected Catholics to be paci- the majority fists in their 1983 Catholic opinion of pastoral letter, The the time. Challenge of Peace: Zahn vehe- God’s Promise and mently opposed this position, arguing that the bishops for what he called their “fuzzy Our Response. Zahn was a primary consul- it demonstrated a total corruption of the thinking,” which condemned the use of tant for the committee that drafted this just war theory and the cultural enslave- nuclear weapons while granting a condi- letter and a ghostwriter for a section of it. ment of American Catholicism. Catholic tional acceptance of their possession. He moral theology, he argued, was being asked, “How long can ‘strictly limited Examining Current Positions guided by the Defense Department, not moral acceptance’ be extended when those In the late 1990s the effects of Alzheimer’s the teachings of the church. Zahn argued limits are ignored and openly rejected by disease ended Zahn’s active participation that at a minimum, the Vietnam War vio- those responsible for making and execut- in the ongoing Catholic debates on war lated all the requirements of the just war ing the policy?” and peace, yet his analysis still poses chal- theory. And he viewed Catholic justifica- Despite his criticism of the church’s lenges that we Catholics ignore at our tions of it as a fearful parallel to the moral accommodation of the state, Zahn still saw peril. The end of the cold war and the capitulation of the German church during the church as the only institution left in events of Sept. 11, 2001, changed the

ART BY FREDERICK H. CARLSON the Second World War. the modern world with the potential to geopolitical context of the issues Zahn

August 4–11, 2008 America 23 debated in the 60s and 70s. The neocon- church with one political party. Weigel seems to have become primary, with the servative movement, which has been called the Republican Party a “more issues of war and peace taking a secondary extremely influential during the George secure platform from which Catholics can place. W. Bush administration, has sought to work on the great issues of the day, than a In the face of our current challenges, replace the American crusade against party in thrall to abortion ‘rights’ advo- Zahn would ask how we as a church can Communism with an American struggle cates [and] gay activism.” pretend to be taking a countercultural against Islamic jihadism. Zahn would decry this development as stance against the “culture of death” if we A new generation of Catholic writers further proof of the descent of American avoid treating such issues as the Iraq war, has included prominent spokesmen for Catholics into the enslavement of milieu torture and foreign policies that promote this movement, such as George Weigel, Catholicism. He would also no doubt con- conflict with the same specificity with Michael Novak and the Rev. Richard John tinue his criticism of the bishops’ inability which we address the issue of abortion. He Neuhaus, and has carried the efforts of to use the just war theory to stand against would ask whether our current position is earlier Catholic realists into current such developments. In 2002 and 2003 the to retreat into a realm of personal moral events. They continue the argument that U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops issues, where the church can assert its the justice of the American cause demands issued statements arguing that an invasion moral authority without risking a conflict adaptation of the just war theory to allow of Iraq would not satisfy the requirements with the state that could affect its corpo- for the conflicts the government deems of the just war theory. Papal denunciations rate interests. necessary. This includes pre-emptive war, were much stronger. Yet when the war Such questions are as necessary as they torture and aggressive military policies was launched, and even after the false are controversial. For they require us to toward all governments deemed hostile to premises for initiating the war became evi- discern whether we are still capable of a the United States. Weigel has argued that dent, the bishops could not make an prophetic witness that can transform our the just war tradition “lives more vigor- unequivocal break with the government’s society or whether we have become the ously...at the higher levels of the Pentagon policies. No doubt Zahn would also ques- slaves of a milieu Catholicism that desper- than…in certain offices at the United tion an apparent shift in emphasis in the ately seeks to secure a place for its corpo- States Conference of Catholic Bishops.” bishops’ social teachings from the 1980s, rate interests. To the necessity of such a Novak was sent by the State Department when the issues of war and peace, eco- communal examination of conscience, and to the Vatican to argue a just war defense nomic justice and other social issues like to the disastrous consequences of evading of pre-emptive war. Some have gone so far abortion were treated with equal force. In it, Gordon Zahn still stands as a solitary as to argue for the moral alignment of the more recent years, the issue of abortion witness. A

24 America August 4–11, 2008 From Our Pages: 1933 The Diabolic Plot BY DOROTHY DAY

T IS WHEN THE COMMUNISTS are Communist street meeting by hurling gious aspect; because of its love of the good that they are most dangerous. bricks from the roof of an adjoining house. ordinary man, and not because of its And the trouble with many Catholics He had for years been the support of hatred towards God, that so many young is that they do not recognize this dan- his invalid mother, his unemployed father, people are being attracted towards Igerous goodness but think of Communists and his schoolgirl sister.... Communism. And being attracted by as characters from E. Phillip Oppenheim’s He was not wild eyed, shaggy haired, what is good in their natures, and fervent- international mystery novels. revolutionary looking. He was not a hater ly embracing it as a cause, they come even- Not long ago a Catholic novel was of the institution of the family. He worked tually to accept whole-heartedly all the published by the MacMillan Company, party teaches. and it was all about the fiendish Bolsheviks In the Communist movement in and their international agents and how America, the question of religion only refugee women of gentle birth were kid- comes up when a strike is being carried on napped and returned to Russia to be in a Southern mill town, for instance mated to nobles, in order that they might where the mountaineers are sincerely propagate a race of supermen.... believers, or in city factories where the The story is obnoxiously class-con- foreign labor is Catholic. In these cases, scious. Nobles are nobles by nature as well here are Lenin’s directions in his writings as by birth, and the lower classes are noble on religion: in that they are the faithful servitors of those above them. If they are interested in A Marxist must place the success those of their own class, and in righting of the strike movement above all the wrongs done them, then they are bee- else, must definitely oppose the tle-browed Bolsheviks. division of the workers in this And lastly, the story is untrue. struggle into atheists and My association with the radical move- Christians, must fight resolutely ment began while I was in college and against such a division.... We must continued for a decade. I worked for the not only admit into the...party all Socialist paper, the Call, for the radical those workers who still retain monthly, the Masses, for the anti-conscrip- and served his father and mother and sis- their faith in God, we must redou- tion League, for the Communist monthly ter. He had courtesy and respect for his ble our efforts to recruit them. We the Liberator, and for the Anti-Imperialist fellow-man, and at night, after his day’s are absolutely opposed to the League, and in these various jobs I became work, he studied to better his condition. slightest affront to these workers’ acquainted with many people connected His life was actuated by a love of his fel- religious convictions.... We do not with the labor movement, so that I can lows, and in his love for his fellow-crea- declare, and must not declare in write from actual knowledge of the good- tures he forgot his Creator, if indeed he our program that we are atheists. ness of the people with whom I came in had ever known Him. Together with contact.... other boys on this street, he had been I do not know whether the boy across And then there is the case of the boy brought up without any religious training, the street knew what he was doing—that who lived across the street from me on and in growing up, he, with high ideals, he was working with the distinct end of East Fifteenth Street, between Avenue A had espoused the cause of the worker.... tearing down the Church. I do know that and First Avenue, a peaceable Communist He went to meetings, discussed the the good Irish and German neighbors youth who was killed a few months ago questions of child labor, workingmen’s didn’t know it. They said sadly: “He was a

PHOTO: COURTESY OF THE RAYNOR MEMORIAL LIBRARIES, MARQUETTE UNIVERSITY when a Trotskyite sought to break up a rights and unemployment, and donated good boy, a fine boy,” and they wept at his from his own small earnings towards strike passing. A DOROTHY DAY, co-founder of the Catholic funds to feed the hungry workers, and the Worker movement, was declared a Servant mothers and children of other workers of God in 2000. She wrote several articles like himself. for America in the 1930s, including this It is because of the Communist party’s Read the full text of this article at reflection for the issue of April 29, 1933. ideals, not because of its essential anti-reli- americamagazine.org/pages.

August 4–11, 2008 America 25 Faith in Focus Life in the Borderlands Lessons from the saints on the diversity of the body of Christ BY TRACY SAYUKI TIEMEIER

ERE IS A TYPICAL conversa- followed me wherever I went. I wanted kid who deliberately got myself kicked out tion from my childhood. It desperately to be normal—that is, to be of Taiko drum class and begged to eat at took place in the second grade American. People who treated me as a McDonald’s every chance I could. in the school cafeteria with what inevitably followed one of two paths: oneH of our room mothers: either they romanticized me (and my exot- The Saint Project “Excuse me, little girl, but.... What are ic cultural background), or they made fun It was well known in our Catholic gram- you?” of me with racial slurs and taunts, almost mar school that we would have to do a “Huh?” none of which actually applied to me. The project on the saint after whom each of us “You know.... Where are you from?” question, What are you? stayed with me, was named. It was assumed that we were “Uh.... I was born in Washington, even as I challenged people and began to named after a saint—that’s what Catholics D.C.” reclaim myself as a who. did. If it was not your first name, it was “Yes, but, what are your parents? Religious issues heightened this crisis your middle name. But I did not have a Where are they from?” of self. My mother had become a Catholic saint’s name. What was I supposed to do? “My dad is from Cincinnati, and my when she married my father, and I was What would people think? I dreaded the mom is from Los Angeles.” raised Roman Catholic. I also practiced assignment, since I often lied and told “Nooooooooo! I mean, you look Shinto and Buddhist traditions, however, people my middle name was Mary. In my so...different! What are you?” with my grandparents, extended family private games, I would pretend to be Mary “Ooooh! I’m half-German.” and cultural associations. I learned to cre- the mother of Jesus, transforming myself I, of course, knew exactly what she ate an altar for my ancestors, to talk to into what statues told me she should be, a meant all along. But as the woman in the them and feed them. This side seemed at blond-haired, blue-eyed white girl, clad in lunchroom of my St. Louis grade school the time to be in deep conflict with the flowing blue robes, clearly American and walked away exasperated, I, a particularly Catholic education I was receiving. I was obviously Christian. In these games, I willful child, walked away feeling tri- told that ancestor devotion, or ancestor could finally be beautiful. umphant. Even then, I resented that I was worship, as it was called, was idolatrous, The school project was not nearly as a what and not a who. that non-Christians were not saved and traumatic as I imagined in my grade- I am fourth-generation (yonsei) hapa, a that truly committed Christians did not school angst. My teacher was happy that Japanese-German mutt who was dressed concern themselves with anything non- my first name could be a nickname for by my mother in shirts from Little Tokyo Christian (which also seemed to mean Theresa; I could choose between Thérèse that said “Hapa, and Damn Proud of It,” nonwhite). of Lisieux and Teresa of Ávila. As a child, even though I was anything but damn I found this to be confusing and I felt more of a connection with Thérèse, proud of it. I always knew I was different. embarrassing. But while it was difficult for so I picked her. While I felt rootless at the I looked nothing like my cousins, not me psychologically as a mixed Asian- time—not quite Catholic, not quite white, not yellow. I defy easy categoriza- American girl in the very white suburbs of American, not quite Japanese—the project tion, which arouses many people’s inter- St. Louis, it was not usually cause for pub- actually freed me to construct my own est. The dreaded question, What are you? lic humiliation. I blended into my white connection to the saints and my own iden- school as much as possible. But my pri- tity. I took the project very seriously and TRACY SAYUKI TIEMEIER is assistant profes- vate, hidden struggles threatened always saw it as my chance to define who I was. I sor of theological studies at Loyola to break through the surface and were was ecstatic to take a saint’s name truly Marymount University in Los Angeles, Calif. profoundly concretized through my mid- and legitimately at my confirmation. I She teaches and does research in the dle name. I am named after my great- took a proper saint’s name: Joan of Arc. areas of comparative theology, Asian and grandmothers, Sayo and Uki. This is a She was a fighter—like me. Asian-American theology, women in religion great honor and a grave responsibility. Yet My desire to claim a Catholic, and Hinduism. I did not see it that way as a child. I was the American identity conflicted with what I

26 America August 4–11, 2008 was learning about my Japanese identity. time,” “You’re my guest,” “It’s my treat.” taining a connection to family. My grandmother’s home shrine was both You are obliged to follow the rules of hos- My grandmother offers water and rice fascinating and terrifying for this reason. pitality not only with close family and daily to her family at the shrine. Vertical Ancestors continued to be with us through friends, but with all extended family and tablets display the posthumous Buddhist this shrine, and we continued to owe friends, friends of friends, and strangers. names given to my great-grandparents at respect and honor to them. We had to The home shrine is an extension of their funerals. A bottle of Scotch is a per- feed them and keep their space clean so sacred kinship and hospitality. My grand- manent offering to her father; it was his that they would want to be with us. They mother says that her shrine is a part of the favorite drink. Pictures of deceased family were given rice and water every day, and home, the room that hosts ancestors; it is members provide images for devotional sake, mochi or oranges on special occa- essential to keep it as you would any other focus and prayer. The shrine itself is mod- sions. They may have been dead in body, part of the home. It must be clean and eled on the much more elaborate Japanese but they were very much a Buddhist shrine, called butsu- part of our lives. You hon- dan. Although my recently ored and took care of baptized Christian grand- them after death, too, just mother’s shrine serves a func- as in life. They in turn tion like that of shrines in took care of you. Japanese Buddhist homes, she When my beloved insists that her shrine is in no Uncle Victor died from a way Buddhist. Still, the blood infection, I was prayers she recites as she devastated that I could no tends the shrine are Buddhist. longer hang out at his liquor store and play silly Unclear Boundaries games. But I felt him with As a child, this multireligiosi- me at the funeral, not just ty confounded me. I was in spirit, but palpably in taught in school that the the stars and in the wind. boundaries between religions Spirits, ghosts, divine were clear and absolute, and signs and revelations were that Christians should not be seen to be a common part messing with things like of life and death. This Buddhism. But in Asian Japanese-ness I encoun- America, the boundaries are tered was wondrous, but not clear. The religions terrifying when I was told Asians bring with them to that it was superstition America have already con- and idolatry. Nevertheless, I lived in a desirable. In tending to it, you host your tended with thousands of years of religious world of cosmic visions, ancestors and ancestors and take care of them, just as pluralism. And Asian-American duties to the dead. they continue to take care of you. She says Christians, Confucians, Muslims, Hindus, that a well-kept and beautiful shrine is the Buddhists and Taoists will therefore Family and Hospitality best way to ensure that family (living and inevitably practice multiple traditions, as Family and hospitality were—and are— dead) will be happy and return. When I successive generations live and work in unquestioned values. We have sacred talk with her, she always speaks of our America. The lines between religion and duties to one another. Elders, for example, ancestors in the present tense, for the culture are not clear either. Christian are obliged to pay the check at meals; worlds beyond death are not so far away as Japanese-Americans who celebrate Bon (a there is an elaborate ritual of fighting over we might imagine. Our relationships cross festival for honoring ancestors), for exam- the check (loudly) that is required for any- time and space, are physical and real and ple, may do so in order to celebrate their one who has reached adulthood. But are just as important in death as in life. Japanese heritage. But Bon is a Buddhist junior adults must always know the appro- It was my great-grandmother who festival. Does this mean that they are no priate time to stop fighting and gratefully taught my grandmother the rites of the longer Christians? Or does it mean that thank the winner, so that you do not shrine. She emphasized that tending to we must rethink the meaning of Christian embarrass the generosity of elders. Elders the family shrine was an essential compo- traditions today in light of Japanese- negotiate within an unspoken hierarchy of nent of being a good homemaker. My American practices? family place, birth order and that bitter- great-grandmother could connect to Given my struggles to understand sweet moment when the family patriarch Japan through the shrine, hosting rela- what it meant to be both Japanese and becomes too old and his son or son-in-law tives long gone and very far away. In the American, my efforts to understand my takes the place of honor. These rituals and difficult times of World War II at the name, my culture, my religion and myself, family passages are masked by feigned Heart Mountain Relocation Center, an it is probably not surprising that I focused

ART :FROM “THE COMMUNION OF SAINTS,” BY JOHN NAVA, AT LOS ANGELES CATHEDRAL OUR LADY THE ANGELS anger and firm speech: “You paid last internment camp, it was her way of main- on saints as a child. The saints helped me

August 4–11, 2008 America 27 make sense of my Japanese-American and my Buddhist-Christian identity. I took what I learned of the saints and construct- ed my own family shrines to them, adopt- Who Cares ing them as my spiritual ancestors, talking to them and offering them toys and candy. 1. The Reading I would set up an altar outside my door and go to sleep. My offerings disappeared I see you everywhere, that bald crown bent forward almost against your during the night, confirmation that my puffy waist-length winter jacket; devotion would be rewarded. It never occurred to me that this shoulders hunched, head down between your sheltering hands against the strange act of devotion was not properly blowing wind, the lit match touching your cigarette, Christian. Instead of water, sake and rice, I offered action figures, stuffed animals and standing there in front of a string of stores at dawn, as I pass by in the lollipops. But in my attempt to hold rumbling bus, now that you’re gone. together all the worlds to which I struggled Two years and I see you everywhere as I travel to my tedious, irritating, to belong, it made perfect sense. Just as my ancestors enjoyed food and gifts, it seemed terrifying job. obvious to me that Catherine of Siena I look out and for an instant you are still here, standing on a street corner, would enjoy offerings. This may sound naïve and a little bizarre, but it is not with- or walking hunch-shouldered along. out insight. By connecting the worlds of You rode the bus to tedium over half your life, as I do now these ancestors and saints, I was able to reconcile my inner confusion about what it meant to only last few years. be both Asian and American. Ultimately it I’m sorry! allowed me to embrace a wider, more complex understanding of myself, my reli- 2. The Critique gion and the world. “What does ‘I’m sorry’ mean?” All fired up the Professor asks, and they The Catholic doctrine of the commu- nion of saints is a profound expression of strain the diverse body of Christ, our fellowship to analyze, those darling college children. here and now with each other in a mysti- cal body. We explicitly call saints those “And what do you think?” the Professor asks, looking to me, while who have gone before us, crossed the bor- for one instant I think I’ll answer: der between life and death and are con- firmed to be with Christ in heaven. But I’d like to write a poem called WHO CARES, about a young (I admit they are still with us; the communion of sullen) saints includes all of us together, living and student who is just questioned about the meaning dead, all bound together in Christ. It may sound old-fashioned, even strange to 21st- of some obscure phrase in some enigmatic poem, written by a nobody, century ears, when we sing the Litany of and I’m forced by the pure integrity of my mind the Saints or pray for their intercession. But I think we can all learn a lesson from to think WHO CARES; let them say what they mean outright! But instead, our ancestors about a renewed Catholic I mumble; “I think she was married to him imagination as we see the communion of saints as a real, vibrant (and sometimes dif- and he died, and only now she realizes all that he did, and that through ficult) family. We are dedicated and com- all his years mitted to one another, in this world and at this time; but this dedication includes he suffered.” those ancestors, those saints who have Marilyn Brusca passed on before us, yet who are still with us today. Let us not lose sight of the divine MARILYN BRUSCA is a retired nurse, who was a later-life student of English signs and wonders all around us, of the Literature at La Roche College, Pittsburgh. This poem is one of three runners- lessons of the living and the dead, and of up in the 2008 Foley Poetry Contest. Asia and America. May we embrace a wider vision of the cosmos, live in the bor- derlands and search for meaning in a wider community of relationships. A

28 America August 4–11, 2008 Film Romance of the Robots BY RICHARD A. BLAKE

WICE DURING MY MATINEE ly simulated violence, could probably deal verse comes from the eponymous hero, visit to the multiplex to see with this material handily and enjoy the Wall-E (Waste Allocation Load Lifter Wall-E, two different toddlers story with some enthusiasm. Put me with Earth-Class), a dented, rust-stained robot, started crying inconsolably and the older kids. I loved it, but perhaps for with a head made of two cameras that hadT to be taken from the theater. The very different reasons. looks and tilts much like the oversized Disney name and the G rating might have “Wall-E” opens on a blasted urban dome Steven Spielberg put on E.T. (1982). misled their mothers into thinking they landscape. What appears to be a jungle of Actually, he looks pretty good for a were taking their children to a cheery car- ruined skyscrapers gradually comes into machine that’s been working for 700 years. toon with pastel flowers, singing bunnies focus through the smog. Tall buildings His solar-powered batteries recharge every and dancing butterflies. Not so. The unre- with empty windows and buckling steel morning, like the first jolt of caffeine for lieved grimness of the ruined urban land- beams mingle with giant mounds of com- the rest of us, and he goes about his pre- scape in the opening scenes seems to have pacted scrap. The city has evolved into a programmed tasks without ever wondering gotten to the first child. It was too sad and dump, with no distinction between monu- about the point of his labors. He wanders ugly for the tot to process. The second mental buildings of some past civilization through the ruins on his tractor treads, col- could not endure the brutal pummeling and mountains of refuse. They are one. lects scrap, compacts it in his belly and that almost destroys the main character, Recall the post-apocalyptic griminess of deposits the brick-shaped bundles ever who by that point in the film had endeared “Blade Runner” (1982) or “Mad Max” higher in perfectly squared mounds until himself to his young audience. Older kids, (1979) to gain some sense of the visuals. they rival the ghostlike office buildings. In long hardened to the ways of electronical- (There goes the first of my little theater 700 years, he’s been able to compact and mates.) The script, written by the director stack a lot of stuff. RICHARD A. BLAKE, S.J., is professor of fine Andrew Stanton with Jim Reardon, takes As we soon discover, Wall-E discrim- arts and co-director of the film studies pro- its time in filling in the back story. We are inates in the trash he collects; he harbors gram at Boston College in Chestnut Hill, curious. How did all this come to pass? nostalgia for the old days. His townhouse

Mass. The only motion in this rusting uni- sports a junkyard motif, since he is contin- PHOTO: CNS/DISNEY

August 4–11, 2008 America 29 ually on the lookout for interesting fellow Its onboard computers identify a mutually looking like Teletubbies stuffed into span- gadgets. Among his most beloved posses- intelligible language, and the newcomer dex, float on recliners patterned after sions is a Zippo lighter of 1940s vintage. identifies herself as Eve (Extraterrestrial those first-class airline seats that no one I Known for its durability during wartime, Vegetation Evaluator). Even the begin- know could ever afford. They give obesity it still works despite the cataclysms it has ners in Sunday school would recognize a bad name. Their bloated faces hide faced. It is a marvel of technology, a sur- the mother of human life, but the script behind screens that provide endless enter- vivor, much like Woody Allen’s 200-year- uses its symbols so deftly that few of them tainment, and they need only stick out old Volkswagen in “Sleeper” (1973) and would have been distracted by the theolo- their hand to have a robot deliver yet like Wall-E himself. No mere automaton, gy. We now have first parents falling in another megacalorie treat. This world will he is a bit of a sentimentalist. He has dec- love in a ruined Eden. Because of their end not with a bang or a whimper, but orated his lair with Christmas tree lights, love, they offer this dead planet a second with a burp. Keeping with its corporate and for entertainment in his leisure hours, chance. philosophy, B N L dumps tons of waste he plays an old videotape of “Hello, In the tradition of the screwball come- into space. The entire universe is theirs to Dolly!” (1969). dies of the 1930s and 1940s, the lovers pollute. The plus-sized passengers can’t I doubt that many of my youthful pals come from opposite sides of the track—or bother about such things. “Get me anoth- in the theater caught any of this, but the of the universe. She’s slick and modern; er giant shake.” historian in me was delighted by the con- he’s a product of clunky 22nd-century Here on the spaceship, the threads of sistently smart and pointed allusions to technology. Her creators want her back in the narrative come together: romantic earlier movies. The technique also their own galaxy, simply to see if she has comedy, space adventure, ecological para- demonstrates a major theme of the film: been successful in detecting vegetation— ble. The fate of the universe rests with earlier inhabitants of this city created a that is, life—on the barren planet. Love Wall-E. AUTO’s sinister henchmen cap- disposable culture. As a result, they buried will not be denied, however. Wall-E will ture Eve to keep her from revealing her themselves in garbage to such a degree follow her to the ends of the galaxy, liter- secret to the humans. Wall-E’s attempted that the planet could no longer sustain life. ally. rescue pits him against an army of rogue With his junkyard bedroom, Wall-E trea- The kidnappers from outer space robots who want to tear him apart, rivet sures artifacts from the past and recycles bring their cargo back to a mother ship, by rivet, and nearly succeed. (There goes them for present use. When one of his which looks like a cruise liner designed by my second little friend.) The reclining parts wears out, he simply rummages the special-effects team from “Close humans hang in the balance. Will they around to find a replacement. Taking Encounters of the Third Kind” (1977). accept the challenge of returning to the their cue from the robot, the filmmakers The human captain is a mere figurehead. planet of their ancestors and building a have recycled movie history and made a Computers actually run the operation new society, or do they actually prefer a point on conservation of our artifacts under the command of a particularly nasty life of massive Slurpees and mind-corrod- without being preachy about it. bit of electronics called AUTO that out- ing television? Will true love triumph in One day Wall-E’s routine is forever HALs HAL from “2001: A Space the time-honored Hollywood tradition? If broken when a spaceship deposits a shiny Odyssey” (1968). Buy N Large, a multina- only Indiana Jones or Arnold the gover- white robot shaped something like a com- tional corporation that once urged its cus- nor were here to help them escape! puter mouse. While Wall-E clings to the tomers to buy more and bigger and dump After nine previous collaborations, the earth on steel tank treads, the visitor is not the leftovers wherever, launched this arti- Disney-Pixar partnership has once again subject to gravity. It zips around the debris ficial planet as a refuge for its favored cus- pushed the envelope. Of course, one has to on what appears to be an inspection tour. tomers after the earth choked on its own admire the technology that has brought Wall-E follows it, and when the two final- litter. Now these descendants of earth- animation to such an incredible level of ly meet, the visitor sputters and squeaks lings have carried their consumer culture expressiveness. Imagine giving two robots like R2-D2 in the first “Star Wars” (1977). to its obvious conclusion. Bulbous bodies, enough personality to make us really care about them. Their romantic relationship TO SUBSCRIBE OR RENEW has its light moments, like the friendship ❑ New subscription ❑ Renewal of R2-D2 and C-3PO, but it also has a serious, human dimension that the “Star Yearly rates are $48 for each subscription. Add $22 for postage, handling and GST on Canadian orders. Add $32 for foreign subscriptions. Payment in U.S. funds only. Wars” buddies lacked. Even more impres-

❑ Payment enclosed ❑ Bill me sive is the fact that this bit of clever anima-

On occasion America gives permission to other organizations to use our list for promotional purposes. If you tion, with all its entertainment value, actu- do not want to receive these promotions, contact our List Manager at our New York offices. ally poses several serious questions about For change of address and renewal: Please attach the mailing label from the front cover when writing about ser- life on this blue planet without showing a vice or change of address. Allow 3 to 4 weeks for change of address to take effect. Thank you. bit of didacticism. The issues it raises last Name: longer than the recollection of the stun- Address: ning images. I only hope those two teary- www.americamagazine.org

America City: State: ZIP: eyed viewers come back in a few years and E-mail: give this film another try. I’m sure they’ll find it as rewarding as I did. A

30 America August 4–11, 2008 semester, with an eye toward topics that Book Reviews Thinking With are theological, controversial and accessi- ble to a general audience. Church and Global Church,” while rightly affirming the Church Society collects the 38 lectures he has deliv- the growing need for a strong papacy in ered over the past two decades (minus last the paradoxical face of increasing global- Church and Society April’s valediction, which ization and nationalism, The Laurence J. McGinley Lectures, I hope will be included in does not take sufficient 1988-2007 a second edition; it can account of inculturation By Avery Cardinal Dulles, S.J. be found in America, as the necessary enflesh- Fordham Univ. Press. 546p $39.95 4/21). Substantial and ment of the one Gospel ISBN 9780823228621 rigorous, these lectures in all times and places; are best read occasional- the relationship When Cardinal Avery Dulles speaks, peo- ly, rather than sequen- between unity and ple listen. Five years ago, a group of tially. This is a book to be inculturation—or Catholic bishops and theologians gathered consulted on a given between primacy and near Denver for an initial consultation on topic for a concise survey collegiality—should not what would become Co-Workers in the of the state of the ques- be a balancing act, but a Vineyard of the Lord, the U.S. Conference tion and for measured reinforcing one. And, of Catholic Bishops’ 2005 document on but firm judgments. “The Church as lay ecclesial ministry. The meeting was Although the topics Communion” tends to warm, open, respectful. But even while of the McGinley lectures conflate the position of bishops were offering their comments, range from the death those like the late Jean- papers rustled, cell phones were checked penalty to Mary to hell, Marie Tillard, who and throats cleared. Whenever Cardinal Dulles’s method is invariably Thomistic argue for the simultaneity of the local and Dulles spoke, however, the room fell and Ignatian. Like Aquinas, he evinces universal churches, with those who silent. It wasn’t because of his voice or his clarity of thought and expression, atten- wrongly hold for the priority of the local personality—neither of which is overpow- tiveness to subtle but important distinc- church over the universal church. ering—or even primarily because of his tions, command of tradition, dispassion Cardinal Dulles’s emphasis on the eminent status. and a willingness to engage the strongest continuity of tradition, moreover, can Simply put, Cardinal Dulles was lis- objections to his arguments. He shares occasionally obscure elements of discon- tened to because he taught with authority. with St. Ignatius a desire to think with the tinuity or, at least, of discontinuity-with- His authority derives from his intellect, church, an emphasis on what the Jesuit in-continuity. “True and False Reform in certainly, and also from his lack of person- Constitutions call “more solid and safe doc- the Church,” which takes its title from al ambition (I have never met another trine” and a presupposition to put the best Cardinal Yves Congar’s book, perhaps church leader whose ego was in such possible interpretation on contrary posi- does not address adequately Congar’s inverse proportion to his talents). More tions and to honor whatever truth might argument that between a “reform of deeply, though, I believe that his authori- be found therein. abuses” (which seeks a closer adherence ty comes from his listening: to God, to the The best lectures in this volume exem- to already-existent church laws and struc- church and its multifaceted tradition, to plify the strengths of this twofold method. tures) and a “doctrinal revolution” (which contemporary developments. “I want to “Religion and the Transformation of is unacceptable), there can be a need for a learn before I speak,” he wrote recently, Politics,” for instance, delivered just weeks reform of an ecclesial “state of affairs” or and his life’s work attests to self-efface- before the presidential election in 1992, “system” that hinders the church’s life. ment before the sources of theology. He remains as pertinent as ever on the inter- The clerical sexual-abuse crisis, I think, is, as Robert Imbelli puts it in his fine fore- play of principle and prudence in the represents one such instance in which a word to Church and Society, “an original,” church’s engagement in the political order. precisely in his abjuration of scholarly and “Justification Today: An Ecumenical personal originality. Breakthrough” affirms the significance of The Reviewers For 20 years, since his statutory retire- the Catholic-Lutheran Joint Declaration on Christopher Ruddy, author of Tested in ment at the age of 70 from The Catholic the Doctrine of Justification, as it notes the Every Way: The Catholic Priesthood in University of America in 1988, Cardinal important differences that remain between Today’s Church (Herder & Herder, 2007), is Dulles has been the Laurence J. McGinley the two communities. “Pope Benedict associate professor of theology at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minn. Professor of Religion and Society at XVI: Interpreter of Vatican II”—the best Fordham University. His primary duty essay of its kind that I have read—shows Robert T. Vischer is associate professor has been to deliver a public lecture each the broad continuities and smaller, but at the University of St. Thomas School of real, discontinuities in Benedict’s ongoing Law, Minneapolis, Minn. Read a selection of Avery Dulles’s interpretation of the council. Kevin Appleby is director of migration and articles for America at americam- These lectures, like any, nonetheless refugee services for the U.S. Conference of agazine.org/dulles.cfm. have their limits. “The Papacy for a Catholic Bishops, Washington, D.C.

August 4–11, 2008 America 31 “reform of abuses” is necessary but not dency, for most of his narrative is sufficient. A Delicate painstakingly evenhanded. But by setting And yet what must not be overlooked the bar of dispassionate analysis relatively in Church and Society is that this ecclesiolo- Relationship high, he brings attention to the few gist is thoroughly Christ-centered, some- instances where he falls short. thing that cannot be taken for granted in a Religion in American One example is his portrayal of the discipline ever tempted to reduce itself to Politics faith-based initiative, which he dismisses ecclesiastical politics and structural man- A Short History as a product of President George W. agement. A surprise to some readers may Bush’s “determination to direct federal By Frank Lambert be that this least charismatic of men—dry, funds to conservative causes.” Federal Princeton Univ. Press. 304p $24.95 wry, reserved—is evangelical in the best ISBN 9780691128337 funds, we are told, had flowed previously sense of the word. “The most important to “liberal religious groups” and their thing about my career,” he noted in his Writing a history of religion in American social services agencies, including final McGinley lecture, “is the discovery of politics, much less a “short” history, is Catholic Charities and the Salvation the pearl of great price, the treasure hidden tricky business. Potential pitfalls include Army, and Bush saw an opportunity to in the field, the Lord Jesus himself.” To the seemingly infinite breadth of the sub- level the political playing field. Given that know Cardinal Dulles—in person or ject, the subtle waxing and waning of reli- funding restrictions on religious organiza- through these lectures—is to encounter gion’s influence on various issues in vari- tions were initially loosened by President the conviction and the gratitude that come ous eras and the temptation to portray Clinton, and that the Catholic Church from being in love with Christ. past disputes through the partisan lens of and Salvation Army can hardly be called The most profound today’s disputes. Frank “liberal religious groups,” this is an area lectures reveal this all- Lambert has succeed- where greater nuance would have been encompassing commit- ed, for the most part, in welcome. ment to the person of his project. Or consider this indictment couched Jesus Christ: essays on In reality, Religion as neutral observation: “Some opponents the “new evangeliza- in American Politics is of religious correctness object to the tion,” apologetics, the not as narrow as the ungenerous, sanctimonious attitude of the crucifixion, the eucharis- title suggests. It is prac- Religious Right toward people they label tic real presence and the tically impossible to sinful.” It reminded me of the classic con- Ignatian heritage in the- focus simply on reli- clusion-assuming query, “Have you ology and in contempo- gion’s role in politics; stopped beating your wife?” We are to rary Catholicism. One more accurately, take as a given that “the Religious Right” cannot avoid his concern Lambert explores the (an entity, apparently) is ungenerous and for the centrality of public dimension of sanctimonious, but for some reason only Christ in Catholic theol- religion in American some opponents have objected to that fact. ogy, the Society of Jesus history. He knows that The Religious Right’s successes, more- and in the church’s one slim volume will over, are due largely to human weakness, prayer and mission. I never be the last word as Lambert informs us that “conservatives sense that he would on such an expansive are revivalists” who “appeal to audiences’ share the judgment—if subject, and he does not emotional needs.” Liberal Christians are not the trenchancy—of the late Cardinal pretend that it is. Instead, he picks insight- less popular because of their “sedate, ratio- Jean Daniélou, S.J., who wrote nearly 40 ful episodes from our nation’s history to nal approach,” which recognizes “the years ago that the greatest problem fac- paint a picture of religion’s relevance. The complexity of modernity.” The tone is ing the church today comes from within: episodes range from the familiar (the evenhanded, but one gets a sense that a its timidity in proclaiming the Gospel of Scopes trial, the civil rights movement) to thumb is on the scale. Jesus Christ. hidden gems (early debates over Sunday Lambert devotes the bulk of his book Cardinal Dulles will celebrate, God mail service). Lambert’s succinct writing to telling the stories of religion’s role at willing, his 90th birthday this August. In gets to the heart of each episode while ably various points in American history, and it the 20 years of his “retirement” he has placing it in the broader socioreligious is worth reading because of these stories. written, in addition to the 38 lectures of context of the era. But he understandably aims to impart Church and Society, eight books and scores Often books in this genre appear to be lessons with his storytelling, and while of articles. He has done more after 70 aimed at reassuring a particular reli- those lessons for the most part do not than most theologians do in a lifetime (or gious/secularist audience of the correct- obfuscate the value of the overall project, three). There is no one who can replace ness of its existing views. They are written they left me with more questions than him, yet he would be the first to recall the in polemical tones and build caricatures of answers. words of John the Baptist: “He must opposing viewpoints that can easily be In his introduction, Lambert explains increase, but I must decrease.” torn down. Lambert, a professor of histo- that a primary argument of the book is Christopher Ruddy ry at Purdue University, avoids this ten- “that religious coalitions seek by political

32 America August 4–11, 2008 means what the Constitution prohibits, debate centers on the substance of their migrant brothers and sisters a common namely, a national religious establishment, claims, not the source of their convictions. humanity and work together for a com- or, more specifically, a Christian establish- Lambert is far from the worst offender on mon solidarity, that is, a community of ment.” He claims, in fact, that “[w]hatever this score, as a spate of recent books seems love and fellowship reflective of the reign the grievance, politically active religious to gleefully blur any distinction between of God.” groups are inspired by a particular vision politically engaged religion and theocratic Several noted scholars build on this of America as a Christian nation.” These power grabs. But the thoughtfulness of theme in the first part of this four-part sweeping introductory assertions are Lambert’s overall work makes his over- compendium, uncovering the theological belied by the history he so ably recounts. sight more glaring. Robert T. Vischer roots of migration. Jacqueline Hagan of He explains, for example, that the University of North Carolina opens Christian groups pushed both sides of an with a vivid and personal account of the intense debate over the decision to drop faith of migrants and how religious sym- atomic bombs on civilian populations in ‘Welcome the bols and rituals are central to their jour- Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Just after the neys. Peter Phan of Georgetown bombs were dropped, 85 percent of Stranger’ University looks at the history of the early Americans approved of the decision, but Christians as migrants and strangers in over the next two years that percentage A Promised Land, new lands. Jesus himself was a migrant, an dropped to a bare majority. The debate, in A Perilous Journey itinerant preacher “having no place to lay Lambert’s recounting, “triggered a broad- Theological Perspectives his head,” (Lk 9:58) and, profoundly, as er discussion of American morals and val- on Migration both divine and human, part of two ues.” The question is, how exactly does a Edited by Daniel G. Groody and worlds. Like Christ, the first Christians religious coalition formed to challenge (or Gioacchino Campese became migrants to spread the Gospel. affirm) the moral propriety of dropping Univ. of Notre Dame Press. 352p $32 (paperback) Gustavo Gutiérrez, O.P., of Notre Dame, the atomic bomb amount to the seeking of noted scholar of liberation theology, con- a “religious establishment”? And on what Missing from most of the national immi- cludes this section with an analysis of basis can we conclude that participants in gration debate has been the humanitarian migration as part of the “preferential such a coalition are motivated by their aspects of the migration phenomenon. option for the poor.” belief that America is a “Christian One can hardly find—on The book’s second part communicates nation”? talk radio, in the mass a sense of the mission Of course, there are many Christians media or in scholarly of the church toward in American history who have leapt into journals—a serious dis- migrants and how it has the public square in order to reclaim our cussion of the human developed over the cen- nation’s purportedly Christian heritage or dignity and rights of the turies, beginning with to more closely align state power with migrants who cross inter- Christ’s instruction to Christian identity. (Roy Moore, the national borders to find “welcome the Alabama judge who erected a Ten work or join family. stranger,” for “what Commandments monument in the state A Promised Land, A you do for the least of courthouse, then defied a federal court Perilous Journey, a compi- my brethren, you do order to remove it, comes immediately to lation of essays taking a unto me” (cf. Mt 25:35, mind.) But to suggest that politically theological and rights- 40-41). Stephen Bevans engaged Christians are, by definition, based approach to the of the Catholic inspired by a vision of the “Christian issue of migration, pro- Theological Union in nation” is silly. Politically engaged vides a needed frame- Chicago offers a thor- Americans of all religious and ideological work to begin that dis- ough analysis of the stripes are inspired by the worldviews that cussion. Comprised of Christian obligation in shape their moral convictions and com- pieces from a wide range this regard. Giovanni mitments. As a Christian, my criticism of of scholars, advocates Tassello writes on the the decision to drop the atomic bomb is and service providers, it engages the con- Scalabrinian tradition of assisting migrants inescapably shaped by the teachings of temporary immigration debate from a and provides historical insight into how Christ. But I do not offer my criticism in faith-based, Catholic perspective. The this mission was developed and continues order to bring the nation under the issue of migration has been with us for today. Pat Murphy, the director of authority of Christ’s teaching; I offer it centuries, and one truth maintains: Hispanic ministry for the Archdiocese of because I want to contribute to the com- Migrants are human beings and are Kansas City, points out the challenges and mon good. imbued with God-given rights that must opportunities for local dioceses in minis- This may seem like an obvious point, be honored. tering to a new generation of Hispanics. but it is an important one. If we are serious In his foreword to the book, Cardinal Then, in the part entitled “The about welcoming all citizens into the pub- Oscar Rodríguez of Honduras captures Politics of Sovereign Rights, Cultural lic square, we need to ensure that the this theme: “We are called to see in our Rights, and Human Rights,” writers con-

August 4–11, 2008 America 33 front the dichotomy of natural rights and International Institute in Rome begins legal status as a way to promote human sovereign rights. Where do the human the argument by suggesting that a rights for the undocumented and to rights of the migrant and the right of a human rights approach to migration cre- serve the common good. sovereign nation to control its borders ates room for common ground among Donald Kerwin, executive director of intersect? Does one right trump another? competing interests. By using human the Catholic Legal Immigration Network, These questions are certainly at the ful- rights as the yardstick for effective poli- compares a rights-based approach to cur- crum of the current debate, as manifested cy, economic, social and security inter- rent U.S. policy and practice. Human in the political terms “amnesty,” “rule of ests will be served. “Policies of exclu- rights and national security can go hand in law” or “border security.” But as the con- sion,” as he calls them—deportation, hand, provided the right policies are tributors to this section suggest, human detention, worker exploitation—only adopted and implemented. In the case of rights and sovereignty are not mutually lead to a failure of all competing interests the United States, post-9/11 security con- exclusive: both can be achieved and, in and exploitation of the human being. cerns have, in some cases, undermined some cases, complement each other. This argument comports with the policy basic human rights. “National security, at Graziano Battistella of the Scalabrini positions of the U.S. bishops, who favor its core, implicates the right to self-preser- vation,” Kerwin concludes. “The Catholic natural rights tradition, however, cautions against turning security into an ‘idol’ or an absolute good.” In the end, the human dignity and rights of the person should remain a central principle—even in a national security context—and the ulti- mate measure of just immigration policies. Concluding this section, Olivia Ruiz Marrujo of the El Colegio de la Frontera Norte in Tijuana, Mexico, draws attention to the sexual violence confronting migrant women, bringing needed attention to an underreported issue—one that makes clear the necessity of a rights-based approach to migration. The final section of the book returns to the theme of Christ as migrant. Daniel Groody of Notre Dame looks at migra- tion and the Eucharist, the central exam- ple of God’s real presence among us. He concludes powerfully: “The liturgy of the Eucharist is a place where we seek to develop a community that transcends all borders, that sees in the eyes of the immi- grant stranger a brother, sister, and a real presence of Christ.” A Promised Land, A Perilous Journey is a useful resource for Catholics (and others) who want to reach beyond the dehuman- izing language of the national immigra- tion debate and articulate a vision of the migrant as a human being created in God’s image. It does not pretend to engage the anti-immigrant rhetoric so often heard and seen in the media these days, and it will probably not move those who use or agree with such rhetoric. But that is not its purpose. Its purpose is to educate and inspire those who are called to “welcome the stranger” that theirs is not only a just but also a spiritual mission. It accomplishes that goal very well. Kevin Appleby

34 America August 4–11, 2008 State of the Question The Future of Nuclear Energy In “Five Myths About Nuclear Energy” (6/23), Kristin Shrader-Frechette outlined objections to an increased reliance on nuclear energy to meet the nation’s energy needs. The article drew a large response from America’s readers. A sampling follows.

Diversified Holdings after all, are not dumb. Cooperation and Development, the In her analysis of nuclear energy, Kristin To Shrader-Frechette’s question, Nuclear Energy Agency and the Shrader-Frechette is puzzled as to why therefore, of where we go from here, the International Atomic Energy Agency contemporary thinkers are moving away answer is: in several directions at once. estimated that identified conventional from the old-fashioned objections to What does any wise investor do? uranium stock would be sufficient for 85 nuclear energy that she repeats in her Frank R. Haig, S.J. years at 2004 demand levels. New fast Baltimore, Md. article. The answer is simple. reactor technology could lengthen this to Wise investors like to diversify their more than 2,500 years. alternatives. Coal, for instance, is the Accept What Exists? We must accept what exists; the energy source of choice at present in As a retired scientist with sixty years of momentum of the nuclear age is a reality. Warren I. Finch America, but is the dirtiest energy type experience in uranium geology and relat- Lakewood, Colo. that exists. Wind power is of increasing ed nuclear energy, I have major disagree- significance, but it has the difficulties of ments with Shrader-Frechette’s attempt the intermittent nature of wind, the to debunk nuclear energy. Several critical Moral Imperatives problem of power transmission and issues deserve mentioning. There are many good reasons not to opposition from neighborhoods. She states that “by the year 2050 build nuclear power plants. The eco- Hydroelectric power creates problems for atomic energy could supply, at best, 20 nomics don’t play out, the energy pay- fish and farmland availability. percent of U.S. electricity needs.” But the back is too long, and carbon dioxide Solar energy is developing fast. But 104 nuclear power plants in the United emissions are created in the mining, really, the best use of solar power is in a States have annually produced 19 percent milling and enriching of uranium. But corn or wheat field. The last thing we of our electricity for many years. New there are also moral issues to consider. want to do is to take wheat fields out of power plants will be built in the near Thou shall love thy neighbor as thy- food production. future, and they will easily surpass the 20 self. Uranium mines and radioactive Shrader-Frechette is also concerned percent mark. waste disposal sites are usually in poor about terrorist attacks on nuclear power Shrader-Frechette also argues that and minority areas. These groups don’t plants. But 9/11 showed us that terrorists nuclear power is not sustainable because have the political clout to stop these haz- like to attack soft, unprotected targets. dwindling uranium supplies will force us ards from coming to their communities. They are so much easier to hit, and they to use low-grade uranium ore by 2050. For example, Yucca Mountain in Nevada can produce massive effects that change a However, a joint report from 2005 from has been chosen to store nuclear waste PHOTO: PETRA SILHAVA whole culture for the worse. Terrorists, the Organization for Economic even though this isn’t the best place to do

August 4–11, 2008 America 35 so—the Western Shoshone Indians have great deal and were safe, the industry plants are safe. Also, offering statements lived there for generations and believe it would be able to get full insurance cover- about explosions and meltdowns to scare is sacred ground. They too are our age on the free market. But it’s not able the reader does little to share scientific neighbors, and deserve our love, not our to. The industry refuses to generate information about the safety of nuclear waste. power without the protection of a liability plants. Thou shall not kill. The processes limit that is roughly 1 percent of losses. While we can calculate and project involved in nuclear power generation are Nuclear power seems a lot like a what might occur should there be a catas- very much the same as those used in mortgage-backed bond: it’s flashy, it’s trophic event at a nuclear power plant, the building nuclear bombs. Enriched urani- complex and for a while it seems to make fact remains that the United States has um can be used for either nuclear power sense. But in the end it bites you. had no nuclear event of any significance to or nuclear bombs. Julia Yang public safety or health. The meltdown of Thou shall not steal. Mankind’s New Haven, Conn. radioactive fuel at Three Mile Island led dominion over inanimate and other living to no deaths or injuries because of built-in beings granted by the Creator is not safety mechanisms and redundant systems. absolute: it is limited by concern for qual- Imperfect but Necessary New plants proposed for the coming years ity of life and requires a religious respect Many environmentalists, including will have even more safety built into their for the integrity of creation. By creating myself, argue that nuclear power is an operations—twice that of current plants non-natural radioactive waste, we are imperfect but necessary interim source that already operate safely. stealing from all future generations the for our nation’s energy, one that should She also paints an ominous picture of land we need for storage and security of bear a significant portion of the total the dangers of transporting wastes or the waste, and possibly polluting the air, energy portfolio until truly renewable materials around the country, when in ground and water. sources can come online. fact there have been more than 20,000 John Weber Shrader-Frechette admits the nuclear shipments of spent nuclear fuel and high Boise, Id. fuel cycle emits only one-seventh of the level waste in this country since 1971 carbon-equivalent emissions of coal. Both without any radiological incident. The French Paradox the already-realized and potentially dire Projecting worst-case scenarios into Kristin Shrader-Frechette’s article decry- future consequences of global warming the future for any technology, with no ing nuclear energy did not convince me. should justify immediate substitutes for acknowledgment of current and past safe- France derives over 75 percent of its elec- coal combustion, and nuclear technology ty, will generate long lists of why any tricity from nuclear energy. This is due is already currently available. technology might not be good. The to a longstanding policy based on energy Though she presents the higher costs United States must take a broad view of security. France is also the world’s largest of nuclear energy (including all costs our energy needs with the understanding net exporter of electricity due to its very associated with both fuel and waste) as a that nuclear, wind, solar, gas and coal low cost of generation, and has been very negative, such comprehensive costs power may all be necessary to meet our active in developing nuclear technology. incurred by the consumer would spur increasing demand for electricity. Reactors and fuel products and services conservation measures and energy-saving Radiation is one of the most studied are major exports. technologies much more quickly and effi- physical hazards in our history. While it Why don’t the French have the ciently than would be spawned by volun- is necessary to assure that people are not qualms of conscience over nuclear energy tary conservation programs. exposed to radiation unnecessarily, it is that Shrader-Frechette seems to have? Schrader-Frechette correctly empha- not responsible to paint nuclear power as And why is Italy under the new prime sizes that the greatest cost benefit will a villain and needlessly cause worry for minister, Silvio Berlusconi, getting into accrue from putting dollars toward ener- your readers. nuclear energy production once again? gy efficiency programs. Government Kelly Classic Rochester, Minn. And why is Japan doing just fine with its incentives for nuclear power should be nuclear reactors? Do they know some- used judiciously until more reactors come thing we don’t know? online and economies of scale make the Hostage to Oil technology more competitive with coal. Gino Dalpiaz, C.S. Relying on 12 million barrels of imported Chicago, Ill. (Rev.) Jim F. Chamberlain Clemson, S.C. oil per day is sapping the strength of the American economy and taking us to ter- Let the Market Decide rible political decisions. I say “full speed In every country where it is used, nuclear Nuclear Fears ahead” on renewable resources, but we power exists only because of massive gov- In her analysis of the safety of nuclear won’t get there fast enough to maintain ernment subsidies. Without these subsi- power, Kristin Shrader-Frechette states an acceptable standard of living. We dies, which in the United States are many that safety claims about nuclear power must not give up on our ability to solve times greater than the amounts given to are myths, then uses arbitrary informa- the technological problems that nuclear renewable energy sources like wind and tion to support her argument; for exam- energy presents. solar power, no country would use nucle- ple, claims of government subsidies really John Dwyer ar power. If nuclear plants were such a do not support or refute whether nuclear Tolland, Conn.

36 America August 4–11, 2008–11, 2008 Classifieds OUR LADY OF PERPETUAL HELP CHURCH, thought in a variety of situations. This position Lindenhurst, N.Y., is seeking a full-time COOR- offers the challenge of developing new programs DINATOR OF YOUTH MINISTRY. Quali- and building relationships with faculty, students Artwork fications include college degree or equivalent in and staff in multiple professional schools at a youth ministry; two to three years’ experience. highly selective private university. He/she will FINE CHURCH ARTWORK stained glass, paintings, Ideal candidate will be dynamic in reaching out to seek opportunities to become part of the forma- restoration: www.redfernfineartstudio.com; (917) teens and have a solid background in Catholic tion and education of these professionals, be able 204-0417. faith. Organization and good communication to facilitate multifaceted discussions in the areas of skills are important. Music/liturgy background a ethics and Catholic thought, and maintain a pas- Education plus. Salary commensurate with experience. toral presence to the schools. The campus minis- OBLATE SCHOOL OF THEOLOGY offers an M.A. Includes medical benefits. Send résumé and cover ter will also build relationships for the purposes of degree in spirituality. Regular semester and inter- letter to: Rev. James Stachacz by e-mail to: financial development while working in conjunc- session courses. Visit www.ost.edu. [email protected]; or by postal mail to: Our Lady tion with the overall program of the Sheil of Perpetual Help, 210 S. Wellwood Ave., Catholic Center at the Evanston campus. The Lindenhurst, NY 11757. successful candidate will have experience in pas- Note Cards toral ministry and master’s level training in theol- BORDER MINISTRY. Cards honoring the work PRESIDENT, Xavier High School, New York City, ogy, ethics or related field. The candidate will be and dreams and benefitting the Kino Border N.Y. Founded in 1847, Xavier High School is an a practicing Catholic and be able to work with Initiative: www.smallsmallacts.com. independent Jesuit Catholic college preparatory independence, flexibility and a sense of being part school dedicated to providing a rigorous and chal- of a team. Priests, religious and laypeople are Parish Missions lenging education to young men of promise in the encouraged to apply. Please submit cover letter INSPIRING, DYNAMIC PREACHING: parish mis- New York metropolitan area. Serving 935 boys in and curriculum vitae: Attn: Sheil Catholic Center, sions, retreats, days of recollection. www.sab- grades 9-12, Xavier endeavors to produce gradu- Chicago Search, 2110 Sheridan Road, Evanston, bathretreats.org. ates who are persons of competence, conscience IL 60201. and compassion—“men for others.” Among the school’s signature offerings are its Junior Retreats Pilgrimage R.O.T.C. and Christian service programs. BETHANY RETREAT HOUSE, East Chicago, Ind., VISIT BIBLICAL SITES and meet local Christians Located two blocks from Union Square, offers private and individually directed silent in the Holy Land. Small groups. Private rooms Xavier offers a dynamic urban environment for a retreats, including Ignatian 30 days, year-round in with bath in Christian guesthouses. Join a pil- diverse student body. More than $1 million in a prayerful home setting. Contact Joyce Diltz, grimage in November, January or March. Ask financial aid was awarded this year. Annual Giving P.H.J.C.; (219) 398-5047; bethanyrh@sbcglob- about other dates and programs tailored for your topped $3.3 million last year, and the school’s last al.net; www.bethanyretreathouse.org. group. E-mail: [email protected]; Ph: capital campaign raised $14.9 million. The school (415) 452-9634 (Pacific Time); www.HolyLand- is debt-free and has a $25 million endowment. Institute.org. Training Program The President is the chief executive officer of SPIRITUAL DIRECTION TRAINING PROGRAM, at Xavier High School and a member of the Board of Mount Saint Joseph Conference and Retreat Positions Trustees; responsible for the direct supervision of Center, begins Oct. 13, 2008. Consists of eight CHAPLAIN. Roman Catholic priest, Our Lady of the Office of Advancement and Alumni Relations, weekly sessions held quarterly over a two-year Lourdes Medical Center. A teaching health care the Business Office and the physical plant; and, by period (2008-10). 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Must have ecclesiastical and embraces the tenets of Jesuit education to Vocations endorsement. Health care experience preferred. which Xavier is dedicated. Wickenden Associates is conducting the DESIRE PRIESTHOOD? Religious life? Lay min- Duties will include assessment of the spiritu- istries? Enriching sabbatical? Vocation discern- al needs of a diverse population and the provision search for July of 2009. Call (609) 683-1355, or visit www.wickenden.com to request the complete ment retreat? Ph: (907) 339-2486. Web: of support to patients, families and staff members. www.gonzaga.edu/ministryinstitute. This includes sacramental ministry for Catholic position description and details of the application patients. Emphasis is placed on an interdisci- process. Application deadline: Sept. 5, 2008. plinary team approach and enhancing the spiritu- Wills ality of the organization. In-house and on-call SHEIL CATHOLIC CENTER at Northwestern Please remember America in your will. 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August 4–11, 2008 America 37 The Word ‘Little Faith’ Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time (A), Aug. 10, 2008 Readings: 1 Kgs 19:9, 11-13; Ps 85:9-14; Rom 9:1-5; Mt 14:22-33 “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?” (Mt 14:31)

ATTHEW’S FAVORITE to make Peter the “rock” on which the apostle is Peter, and church will be built. Nevertheless, Matthew’s favorite descrip- Matthew does not flinch from showing M tion of the apostles’ faith the weaker side of Peter, as he fails to before Jesus’ resurrection is “little faith.” understand much of Jesus’ teaching, refus- In Matthew’s account of Jesus walking on es to accept the predictions of the passion the water, Peter serves as the exemplar of and deserts Jesus in the passion narrative. “little faith.” Whereas Mark at times por- For Peter to get out of the boat and trays the apostles as having no faith at all, start walking took faith, courage and hope. appropriate description of most of us. Matthew upgrades their image somewhat. But eventually Peter let his fears and self- While we may be sincere in our faith and A little faith is not perfect faith, but it is centeredness get the better of him. try always to trust in God’s care for us, too better than none at all. Because Peter lacked perfect faith (some- often we let our problems and fears get the

Jesus walking on the water should not better of us. We need to learn, as Peter ART BY TAD DUNNE be regarded as simply a stunt or a magic Praying With Scripture did, that the Lord is still there for us, ready trick. Rather, it has a deep ancient Near • Can you recall some instances of to hear our prayer and stretch out a saving Eastern background. One of the ways in “little faith” in your own life? hand. which people in the biblical world imag- Today’s selection from Romans 9 • Why do you think Peter began to ined the creation was through the image doubt and so began to sink? begins Paul’s long meditation on the place of the highest or most powerful god of Jewish Christians like himself in God’s imposing order on the chaos represented • Why was Paul’s Jewish identity so plan, how non-Jews could become part of important to him and so significant for by the wild activity of the sea. A recurrent God’s people and why not all Israel his work as an apostle? image for the creation in the Old accepted the Gospel. At the outset Paul Testament and other ancient Near thing he comes to exemplify after Easter), lists Israel’s privileges and prerogatives in Eastern writings was God walking on the his faith grew weak and so he floundered. salvation history and affirms his continu- sea, thus manifesting his power and con- The term “little faith” is probably an ing allegiance to Israel as God’s people. trol. When Jesus walks on the water, he is doing what God does. Only Matthew interrupts the narrative of Jesus walking on the water with an Interreligious Dialogue? account of Peter’s attempt to do so as well. Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time (A), Aug. 17, 2008 As a kind of test to determine whether it Readings: Is 56:1, 6-7; Ps 67:2-3, 5-6, 8; Rom 11:13-15, 29-32; Mt 15:21-28 really is Jesus, Peter challenges Jesus to command him to walk on the water. At “O woman, great is your faith!” (Mt 15:28) first Peter succeeds. But then he becomes HE IMPORTANCE of interreli- Christians committed to interreligious frightened and flounders. He calls out in gious dialogue today should be dialogue. prayer, “Lord, save me!” and needs to be evident to everyone. Yet when This encounter has many surprising rescued. Jesus reprimands him: “O you of Christian theologians try to features. It takes place in “the region of little faith, why did you doubt?” Tfind New Testament foundations for such Tyre and Sidon,” outside the traditional Matthew presents Peter as one of the dialogue, they come up against such texts territory of the chosen people. The first disciples, names him first on his list of as Jn 14:6 (“I am the way and the truth and woman who approaches Jesus is described the Twelve, makes him spokesman for the life”) and Acts 4:12 (“nor is there any as a “Canaanite” (not as “a Greek, a Jesus’ followers and relates Jesus’ promise other name…by which we are to be Syrophoenician by birth,” as in Mark). In saved”). Christians must take these texts this way Matthew shows her relation to DANIEL J. HARRINGTON, S.J., is professor of seriously because they represent the basic the ancient pagan inhabitants of the area New Testament at Boston College School of thrust of the New Testament. Matthew’s and very much an outsider to Jesus’ people Theology and Ministry (formerly Weston surprising narrative about Jesus’ and movement. Moreover, as a Gentile Jesuit School of Theology) in Chestnut Hill, encounter with a Canaanite woman, how- woman in a very patriarchal society, she Mass. ever, may offer a point of entry for shows courage and boldness in approach-

38 America August 4–11, 2008 ing a Jewish teacher like Jesus, calling him “Son of David” and requesting him to heal her daughter. Jesus’ role in the initial stages of the Our future dialogue is also surprising. He responds to her request initially in an uncharacteristic and unattractive way by announcing that depends on his mission is “only to the lost sheep of the you. Praying With Scripture • Have you ever participated in an Please remember interreligious dialogue? What hap- pened? America • How would you describe and assess Jesus’ behavior in his interaction with in your will. the Canaanite woman? • Why is interreligious dialogue so important today? house of Israel.” Matters grow worse when he refuses her plea by lumping her together with “the dogs,” a pejorative term applied by some Jews to non-Jews. Our legal title is: As the story proceeds, these two state- America Press Inc. ments serve as the occasion for highlight- 106 West 56th Street ing the Canaanite woman’s faith in Jesus. The greatest surprise is that through New York, NY 10019 dialogue Jesus seems to change his mind and comes to display great openness to the faith of this non-Jewish woman. This is the only debate in the Gospels in which Jesus seems to lose an argument. One can interpret Jesus’ behavior as “only a test” of the woman’s faith. But one can also find in it an instance where through dialogue Jesus learns something and changes his attitude and behavior. He appears to come to understand better that his mission includes not only his own people, Israel, but also outsiders like the Canaanite woman and her daughter. While the pri- mary goal of interreligious dialogue is bet- ter mutual understanding, it often hap- pens that through such dialogue we come to understand ourselves better and make changes for the good of all. A key New Testament text in dia- logues between Christians and Jews since the Second Vatican Council has been Romans 9–11, which is Paul’s long and dense meditation on the place of the Jewish people in God’s mysterious plan of salvation. In today’s excerpt Paul insists that Israel has played an essential role in that plan and continues to do so, and that God’s gift and call to his people remain irrevocable. Daniel J. Harrington

August 4–11, 2008 America 39