Tui Motu Interislands May 1999 Price $4
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Tui Motu InterIslands May 1999 Price $4 The Year of the Father TuiTui MotuMotu InterIslandsInterIslands 1 editorial Fathers and Warriors s I write it is Anzac Day. It reminds concern regarding the role of fathers, Contents Ame of my own father mutilated especially when they are absent from 2-3 ...editorials by one World War – and of memories the home. The issue is complex; a whole Tony Russell of the horrors of the Blitz in a second set of causes, related and unrelated, 4 ...letters one. Meantime we are constantly being have combined to make fatherhood a focus on fatherhood bombarded by images of yet another somewhat threatened vocation. The 5-7 ...The Year of the Father Janet Soskice bloody conflict in the Balkans – and advance of women’s rights against the 8-9 ...Being a father in 1999 the fears of a further conflagration in effects and legacy of patriarchy has been our own backyard, in East Timor. I am a wonderful and admirable feature of 10-11 ...The sacrament of everyday also reminded of another anniversary this age. But it has often left the male living Dennis Horton which falls about this time: the bombing half of society in a state of guilt and 12-13 ...War and rumours of war of Dresden. It received little publicity uncertainty. The avalanche of sexual Pax Christi at the time. Only years later did it be- abuse cases where the guilty party is 14-15 ...Searching the soul of the land come publicly known that Dresden in nearly always the male, has added to Kevin Francis O’Connor 1945 was probably the most successful this sense of collective guilt, so that it is 16-17 ...A song of Christ ascending – example of ethnic cleansing ever: the almost impossible now to recruit males Paul Sorrell slaughter of 120,000 mostly innocent into professions which involve caring 18-19 ...Time to rehabilitate Mary civilians in a few minutes. for young children. Magdalen Susan Smith RNDM 20-21 ...Marching to a differnt tune It is human decisions that start wars and The traditional role of being a faithful Selwyn Dawson prosecute wars. People designed and Christian dad has never been so seri- 22-23 ...Sport – healthy recreation or new used the Atomic Bomb. A human strat- ously undermined. The good news is religion Mike Marshall egy devised the firestorm of Dresden. It that in spite of appalling publicity there 24-25 ...Acculturation in East Asia – interview with Kevin Toomey OP is Slobodon Milosevic who has decreed are still lots of males who continue to 26 ...Charles Davis: living the truth that hundreds of thousands of Kosovans happily share the joys and burden of Mary Eastham be driven from their homes and who raising a family with their spouses, and 27-29 ...reviews: Nicola McCloy, launched his military on a spree of rape to give their time unsparingly to sharing Jocelyn Harris, Gerald Pillay, Paul and pillage. Yet the Serbs are Orthodox the chores, coaching, supervising, or just Hitchfield, Winston Halapua Christians. And Clinton and Blair are playing – doing all those things which 30-31 ...Crosscurrents. Rome comment both church-going Christians. So what help make the childhood of another 32 ...Postscript Michael Noonan is happening to the gospel imperative generation a secure and joyous experi- of love? Dr Tony Russell (opposite) asks ence. The churches cannot do enough cover photo: Mary Ann Bishop this fundamental question as he seeks to to support fathers. look behind the traditional Christian ethic regarding the morality of war. he spectre of war and the vocation to fatherhood may seem to be Independent Catholic Magazine Ltd T his issue of the magazine, however, topics which are utterly unrelated. Yet P O Box 6404, Dunedin North Phone: 03 477 1449 Tis not primarily concerned with fundamentally they are? Virtually every Editor: Michael Hill, IC war. In view of the season and the Year man guilty of abuse has himself been Assistant Editor: Frances Skelton of the Father which Pope John Paul sometime the victim of abuse. Con- Illustrator: Don Moorhead decreed for 1999 in preparation for versely, strong and caring male figures Directors: the millennium, we have particularly help to shape our families, our parishes, Tom Cloher concentrated on human fatherhood neighbourhoods, indeed society itself as Annie Gray and what Christian faith does to put it it evolves. I wonder what sort of a child- Elizabeth Mackie, OP in religious context. It also is a topical hood Slobodon Milosevic had? Margaret May issue because there is growing social M.H. Judith McGinley, OP Ann Neven, RSJ Tui Motu welcomes discussion of spiritual, theological and social issues, in the light Paul Rankin, OP of gospel values and in the interest of a more peaceful and just society. Divergence Patricia Stevenson, RSJ of opinion is expected and will normally be published, although that does not neces- Printed by John McIndoe Ltd sarily imply editorial commitment to the viewpoint expressed. 2 Tui Motu InterIslands Make Love, not War! Tony Russell ake love, not war was one of slo- the criteria which can justify taking lives destroyed? What if my neighbour – Mgans of the 1960s. For a genera- to save lives?” Most if not all these ques- the tyrant, the unjust aggressor, the tion which was witness and heir to war tions revolve around issues of justice. military or political dictator – violates in Europe, Korea and Vietnam, it was a the foundational command of agapaic cry which summed up an option to drop Justice per se is a human construct, in so love? What can I rightly do – in fact, out rather than become embroiled in a far as it is often relative to a variety of what must I rightly do – to restore world of international conflagrations. dimensions and contexts. Justice is also agapaic order? What am I commanded Beneath that option there was also a a ‘second tier’ virtue. It is one of cardinal to do to defend my life, and, above all, profound protest against the violence virtues (prudence, justice, temperance the life of my neighbour and so restore of war. and fortitude), rather than the theo- love – and justice? logical or God-given virtues (faith, hope Make love, not war also encapsulated and love – or agape). Arguing out the Moving the discourse about war away much of the history of Christian moral pros and cons of war purely in terms of from arguments founded on justice reasoning about war. Since Augustine justice is, in a way, short-circuiting the to arguments founded on agape does in the 5th Century, the Christian com- Christian ethical argument. Christian clarify the Christian moral posture. In munity has been debating the rationale reasoning must be ultimately founded the face of rape and pillage, of ethnic for legitimate defence of self and neigh- on the discourse about love (agape). If cleansing, murder and atrocity, the bour, and the criteria which can justify we approach war – is it justified or un- Christian cannot just stand by. When military violence. The heirs of Augustine justified? – purely from the perspective the violent and the unjust violate the – Aquinas, Suarez, Francesco di Vitoria, of justice, our arguments will ultimately foundational agapaic order, no matter and in recent times, Bernard Haring, be confused and insufficient. Our ar- what their motives, political beliefs or Bruce Kent, Gordon Zahn, Jacques El- guments must be founded on agapaic religious persuasions, I must act to re- lul and Richard McCormick, to name reasoning. store the agapaic order of things. but a few – have all added to the endless debate about justifiable warfare. he foundational order of agape is The means of restoration are going to be Tgenerated by the command of grim, confused, costly, violent and often The war in Kosovo and the NATO Christ to love our neighbour. The cos- plain distasteful. The consequences are bombing of Yugoslavia has brought mic firestorm of the Resurrection, as certainly going to be complex, even bit- the whole issue of justifiable war back Chardin says, renders the whole cosmos terly contestable. But, neither you nor to the front pages of our newspapers Christic. All things, all times and events, I can stand by and let the foundational and the top of the TV news. Tragically all activity is now in Christ, and must command of Christ be violated. We we are back there once again: missiles, be subjected to his foundational law of are commanded to restore the agapaic “collateral damage”, ethnic cleansing, agapaic love. order. Are we, then, called to make love atrocities, the endless stream of bewil- – and war? ■ dered refugee faces, the international What if violent people invade my posturing and feinting, Ministers meet- home, and the lives of those I love are (Dr Tony Russell is Director of ing, press conferences, interviews with not merely threatened but even being Challenge 2000, Wellington) the ‘enemy’ on the streets of Belgrade. Nightly the TV counts down the Days. The Fifth Horseman Ethnic cleansing. It is my observation that in the face The Holocaust, Hutu slaughtering Tutsi of conflicts such as that in Yugoslavia, in Rwanda, the Armenian massacres Christians have a tendency to roll into in Turkey, the plight of the Kurds, the some sort of moral foetal position. In killing fields of Cambodia – and many other words, they are inclined to flinch more. And as we write Serbs are driving and even retreat before a barrage of trou- our Kosovans from their homeland, and bling questions. Some of these inter- Indonesian troops continue to ravage In the Book of Revelation Chapter 6 East Timor.