Ash Wednesday 2013
Joel 2:12-18
2 Corinthians 5:20-6:2
Matthew 6:1-6, 16-18
What does God ask of you? This is a
question which the prophet Micah rhetorically asks and answers. His answer
follows: to act justly; to love tenderly; and, to walk humbly with God. Let us
concentrate on the latter point. But why does God ask this of me or you? Well,
He most assuredly cares about us all, collectively and individually. He gave us
free will—such a gift, but we have all abused it from time to time—sometimes in
small ways, but other times in a manner of great magnitude. Yet both God and
know that you and I will inexorably die. What then? Is that where acting justly
and loving tenderly? No, and that is why He sent His only son, Jesus Christ,
amongst us: to save us from our sins—for when we die, the inescapable question
is: did we ask our Creator and those against whom we transgressed for
forgiveness? This is a crucial way of walking humbly with God!
It may be this essence of our
salvation history and God’s plan—which we commemorate during this holy season of
Lent—that prompted the great poet and Jesuit Gerard Manley Hopkins to write his
poem “As kingfishers catch fire…” Hopkins was no stranger to proclaiming God
and all He created in his poetry—just think of his poems “The world is charged
with the grandeur of God…” and “Glory be to God for dappled things…” But I
return to the Kingfisher poem. Hopkins was not adverse to announcing God’s plan
of salvation for the human person—addressing this was an imperative for the
Jesuit poet and teacher. The stones of which he speaks that fall into the “roundy
well” might well be us. Man has fallen—the stones tumble into the well’s depth;
yet, Christ has come to save those who turn to Him. The kingfisher is no
ordinary bird, it is brilliant in appearance, it is King, and it is fisher.
Might it be Christ who has come to save us because, as we know, God so loved
the world that He sent His only son so that we might live with Him forever?
My dear sisters and brothers: we sin,
and when we do, we fall. We are those stones falling into a well that may
collapse upon us with its tumbly rock. But there is hope; there is
Christ—Christ the Kingfisher who searches not for food but for us when he
“catches fire!”
Hopkins’s the Kingfisher may also be
the one in the poem who cries out that the just person “justices”—i.e., does
justice (or, as Micah reminds us, to act justly), who keeps grace (or, again as
Micah reminds us, to love tenderly), and who is to be united with Christ. With
clarity, Hopkins announces that the person is in ten thousand places, and are
these those who are the one’s Micah says will walk humbly with God? If so, then
the plan for human salvation is in place. But something yet is still needed,
and what that is appears in the Lenten Celebration—a joyous occasion, as Saint
Matthew suggests—which we begin this day. So, three points about this
celebration now follow.
First, we are reminded of our need to
walk with God, the son incarnate during Lent. The prophet Joel announces the
time to pounder in our hearts what we have done so that we might return to God.
What an extraordinary gift this Lent is: to do just that by praying to/talking
with God. God’s mercy and forgiveness are there always: for the Kingfisher is
ever present. But do we—do you, do I—wish to turn to him? If that is the
question, the season to ponder it most effectively begins now. If all things
are possible for God, might his forgiveness extend to us?
Indeed it can and will, but one further thing is needed,
which leads me to the second point.
We must be reconciled with God as
Saint Paul reminds not only for the church in Corinth but for us as well! As Saint Paul
asserts, God desires us to serve the Son as his disciples—and this means we
must be ambassadors for Christ going out into a world as His ambassadors:
loving others tenderly, acting justly with them, knowing that along the way we
are walking humbly with God. To do this, we must acknowledge honestly who we
are: sinners loved by the one who made each of us. Therefore, to be His
ambassadors—His disciples united in God’s labors in this world—we must purify
ourselves. That is, we must turn from sinfulness and back to that grace, that
presence of God in our lives that makes us “justice” as Hopkins eloquently
argues, or to act justly as Micah asserts. Again, preparation is needed. But of
what kind? And this is where the third and final point comes into play.
Saint Matthew offers his counsel to
formulate what must be done in preparation: we do not pretend to honor God and
our neighbor; rather, we must do this knowingly and willingly with the
sincerity of our very fiber. This fundamental point necessitates turning to and
relying upon God in our prayer. While there is much to be said about good
works, these noble acts will have tarnish if the righteous deed is only for
others to see and without regard for our own need for our personal
purification. What is needed to make these works complete is that quiet place,
that inner room where we pray, where we talk with God. When we fast, even
though our outer appearance may be stunning, we follow suit—robustness on the
external, seeking God in the internal. Then God will see our authentic heart
over which we ponder with Him, as the prophet Joel counsels. We enter a sober
season, my friends, but it is not filled with gloom: it is, to the contrary,
joyous!
It is joyous because we
are serious about who we are, viz. Christ’s disciples; we know that the
Kingfisher is in our lives helping us to steer clear of sin and practice virtue
to act justly, love tenderly, and walk humbly with the one who came to save us
all.
I am certain that there are times
when what has been outlined here is our resolve for we recall those occasions
when we pondered in our hearts how best to serve God with fidelity. But there
is always temptation lurking in the dark corners of our lives—temptations that
we have allowed to sweep us up into sin and away from God. That is when an
example of those heroes God sends us to help us with our own purification
become most helpful.
One such example is our Holy Father
who made his remarkable announcement on Monday of renouncing the Chair of
Peter. What will he do, you might ask once he is no longer Peter? He has told
us: he will purify himself. He will use his remaining days to go to a private
place out of the public eye to pray to God and talk with Him.
Might we not do the same? Let us give
it our most hearty try during this holy season which we begin this day!
With this as our disposition, can the Kingfisher be far off?
Amen.
RJA sj
Monday, February 11, 2013
In light of our Holy Father’s
announcement today that he will step down from the Chair of Peter at the end of
this month, we need to take stock of several points that will help to put his
announcement and its impact in a proper context.
First of all, several other popes,
although not recent ones, have resigned their office as many news sources are
reminding us today, albeit for different reasons. But no one whom I have read
in this regard has discussed the plan of Pius XII who, with credible evidence
that Hitler had a plan to kidnap him and hold him hostage, had arranged for his
resignation if Hitler’s plan had been carried out during the Second World War.
As Pope Pius noted to his closest aids, if Hitler carried out his plan, he
would have had not Pius XII but Eugenio Pacelli; thus, the person in Hitler’s
custody would not be the pope but a priest who was also a cardinal. It was
evident that if Hitler’s plan moved forward and succeeded, the Church and the
world in relatively modern times would have had to deal with the resignation of
a pope. Even though Hitler’s plan was not implemented, what becomes clear is
that Pius XII’s plan and Benedict XVI’s actions are similar in that the
decisions both of these pontiffs made were not done lightly or out of a desire
to do other things after a long life of service. They were done for the good of
Christ and His Church.
Second, Pope Benedict exercised a
leadership that many in the secular world do not understand. Robby has pointed
out one example of this in his commentary on the remarks made by Nicholas
Kristof. Another example also comes from today’s The New York Times online article by Rachel Donadio, which has
since been changed, but which earlier made an allegation about his
ultra-conservatism. What followed has been retained, i.e., his papacy was
overshadowed by clerical abuse. Ms. Donadio called the wrong man a
conservative. The case can be objectively made that Pope Benedict was an ardent
advocate for the Church’s teachings because he understood not only the “what”
about them but the “why” as well. I do not think Ms. Donadio, her paper, or
many who consider themselves progressives will ever understand that Benedict
was far more concerned about everyone that many of the strongest advocates who
advance theories about human rights, which are lacking because they are based
on the concept of the isolated individual who has claims to whatever he or she
wants without attending responsibilities. Benedict knew the perils of this kind
of thinking and the falsehoods to which it leads; moreover, he understood,
lived, and preached the way for the progress of all peoples, not just some.
Third, the fact that Pope Benedict
will be stepping down from the papacy does not mean that his Christian
leadership will conclude, for he remains a disciple who will continue to serve
as a powerful example for others. In the future, his discipleship will likely
focus on two major activities. The first will be to continue his scholarly work
with which the papacy interfered. The second is that he will likely spend time
in his monastic habitat to pray in preparation for meeting his and our Creator.
For those of us who also share health concerns associated with either old age
or disease or both, his prayerful preparation for meeting God will, for many of
us, be and remain a vital exercise of discipleship that needs to be adopted by
anyone who claims to follow Christ.
RJA sj
Saturday, February 9, 2013
I am most grateful to Mike
Moreland, John Breen, and Greg Sisk for raising and addressing challenging
issues that pertain to the content of legal scholarship these days that
consciously addresses the neuralgic issues from a perspective that is Catholic
or aligned with views consistent with Catholic social thought. If publications
in the law reviews and journals, which are considered the most prestigious,
offer a one-sided view of the neuralgic issues, can we infer anything from the
content of legal education that law students are receiving in this age of great
and grave challenges to legal education?
Many years ago, another professor
took strong issue with what I had to say in one of my earliest articles that addressed
abortion. In that essay, I attempted to portray a sincere and serious dialogue
between conversing partners about Roe v.
Wade. In short, by use of this device, I thought I could present in an
objective manner this critical issue, i.e., abortion.
Within a short time, I noticed that
another professor, who was aggressively pro-abortion, took to task what I had
to say in one of her footnotes in a published essay in a journal many would
consider prestigious to this day. In today’s nomenclature, her essay would fall
within the category of: reproductive rights and freedom. I did not mind her
taking me on, but I did mind her using ad
hominem methods in her critique which did not address in the least the
substance of my arguments that undergirded my position which she was
critiquing. In essence, the substance of her critique was that I did not agree
with her position. The scholarly and practical reasons of for her critique that
might have been proffered and explained were conspicuous by their absence. When
I suggested to the editors of the law journal which published her essay and
which is considered one of the more prestigious in the American legal academy
as I have mentioned, they rejected my request to offer a reply. In short, it
seemed that there was nothing more to say on the matter even though there was.
I know that there are law journals
and reviews which will publish manuscripts that offer a pro-life or
pro-traditional marriage perspective, just to mention two of the principal
neuralgic issues of the day, but these periodicals, which I hasten to add
provide a great service, are not considered “prestigious” because the law
schools that sponsor them do not fall within the upper echelons of the U.S.
News and World Report law school evaluations or similar surveys. But I wonder
aloud whether these surveys do an effective job of evaluating with objectivity
the nature of legal education today and what it is supposed to be about. The
fact that a journal and its law school were once prestigious does not mean that
this status will last forever. Moreover, as most law school faculties are
pondering the future of legal education in this bleak period where the future
of many law schools is a subject of question, shouldn’t the focus of their
discussions concern the nature of legal education? It may be that the emphasis
of these discussions is not on substance of legal education itself but on how
to market a particular brand of legal education.
For those interested in Catholic
legal theory and the education that is its natural companion, I suggest that
this is a time of opportunity for those schools which are sincerely interested
in their Catholic identity to consider the possibility that to be great
institutions of legal education does not necessitate mimicry of institutions
that were the prestigious institutions of the past.
The recent postings of Greg, John,
and Mike demonstrate that if something is missing from legal scholarship and
legal advocacy on the neuralgic issues of the day, there is likely something
also missing from the education which these authors and practitioners have
received. If nature abhors a vacuum, the time may well be now for those
interested in Catholic legal theory and who teach at institutions which in some
fashion rely on the moniker Catholic to ask the pressing question: what is
missing from what we have to offer current and future students (without
worrying about whether the “prestigious” institutions are doing the same). If
some of us are willing to ask and respond to this question, we may not only be
benefiting the institutions for which we labor but we could also be aiding our
students—both existing and future, the profession, and the institution of the
rule of law.
RJA sj
Wednesday, January 23, 2013
I was pleased to see some discussion of the abortion issue
in several of yesterday’s postings on the fortieth anniversary of Roe v. Wade. After teaching for a good
portion of the day, one of my young Jesuit colleagues who is studying
philosophy here at Loyola University Chicago asked me to celebrate Mass and
conduct an adoration hour for the students who will be going to Washington
later this week and who will be participating in the March for Life and related
events. I accepted the invitation, which is an honor for me. My confrere is the
survivor of an unwanted pregnancy, and I understand why he is committed to
proclaiming the pro-life message with objective reason and intelligence. He is
talented, hard-working, and most productive. He is also a graduate of some of
the most distinguished universities in the United States. He knows how close he
came to being destroyed in his natural mother’s womb. In preparation for the
Mass and adoration, he and I talked a little bit about how pro-abortion
advocates assert the things that they do. I explained to him how their argument
had switched from the privacy argument which was first made in the advocacy
leading up to Roe to equality once
the privacy argument failed.
I further explained that the equality argument also has its
weaknesses and briefly explained an essay that I had written a few years ago [Download 45HousLRev] which examined the pro-abortion argument’s foundation on a misconception
of equality. Since this essay relied upon an earlier essay of mine regarding
the equality argument in general, I have also attached that essay here [Download 27QLR113].
Let us pray for our fifty-five million fellow Americans who
were not so lucky as my young Jesuit brother. But let us also pray for those
who think that privacy and equality arguments entitle them to destroy other
fellow Americans.
RJA sj
Wednesday, January 16, 2013
Bullies have been around for a long
time. Those famous who have a bearing on this posting include Henry VIII. I
mention Henry because the tactics he employed with the law have clear parallels
with the matter about which I shall discuss today. Sadly, tyrants—bullies—like Henry
don’t seem to disappear. The bully can be the thug who wants everything for himself;
the bully can be one’s co-worker, the executive, fellow student, or even the
professor who insists on things being done his or her way. Sometimes the bully
can be the public official who wants policies or laws to reflect a particular
constituency’s interests. The bully can also be the lobbyist-advocate who wants
more than that to which he or she is entitled by objective reason, equity, and
justice. In many contexts, what makes a person the bully is the belief that the
only thing which matters is what the bully thinks is right whether or not it is
right.
In this context, I recently read
with great interest Professor Donn Short’s SSRN manuscript entitled “Queering
Schools, GSA [gay-straight alliances] and the Law: Taking on God.” [manuscript
is available at SSRN and is here:
Download Short's Taking on God] Professor Short is an Assistant Professor of
Law at the University of Manitoba. Like many of us here at the Mirror of Justice, Professor Short is a
teacher of the law; moreover, he is against bullying—or at least a certain
kind. Nothing wrong with that initially, but as I continued to read his SSRN
manuscript, I wondered if this advocate against bullying might be the model of
a new kind of bullying which he finds not only acceptable but necessary.
The central theme of his essay to
which I refer appears to be a critique of claims for religion-based exceptions
to state-and-law mandated curricula for all schools. These curricula would
combat “unjustifiable curtailment of citizenship for queer people and would
undermine the equality gains that have been made by this group.” Throughout
this essay, Professor Short addresses equality, bullying, pressure on “queer”
students to conform to “hetero-normativity”; moreover, in his presentation he contends
that the “arguments against equality claims for queers are pretty much
exclusively and overtly religious in nature.” However, he does not cite the
evidence upon which he bases this claim. In addition, Professor Short does not
define what he means by “equality” nor does he acknowledge that many
counterpoint arguments made by religious and non-religious people alike who
disagree with his perspectives are not “overtly religious in nature.”
At this site, I have argued the importance
of equality on many important and fundamental fronts, but I have also pointed
out that people are not equal in many ways (hence the basis of human diversity
and pluralism about which we hear so much)—and one of those ways treads upon
the subject matter of Professor Short’s essay, human sexuality.
To cut to the chase, Professor
Short advances the position that the law is to be harnessed in order to control
the “transformative possibilities” of education and in order to establish the
“comprehensive queering of schools.” While he uses the existence of bullying
students who claim to be “sexual minorities” as the pretext, his real ambition
is to ensure that there is no exception to his plan for a uniform education
that embraces the model of human sexuality which he champions. The purpose of
his essay is to target the Catholic Church and the schools which she supports
and directs and to make the Church and her institutions bow to positions that
are antithetical to the faith.
Furthermore, Professor Short
asserts that there is a “mistaken belief” amongst “religionists”—especially
Catholic institutions—that Church institutions can “ ‘run their own show’ ”. He
is lucid in his condemnation of Church institutions which do not reflect and
embrace his views when he asserts that “religious dogma in some way justifies
ignoring or indeed allowing the continue the harassment of queer students
within the Roman Catholic school system.” After identifying what he considers to
be the enemy of society, he offers a solution to this offensive predicament,
and it is the law—or more specifically, its commandeering by the interests that
he holds dear but which conflict with the objectively reasoned views of many of
his fellow citizens. By retooling the law according to this author, the ability
of the Church to decide matters that transcend the state’s legitimate interest
of ensuring that all educational institutions provide a sound, fundamental education
can be reined in. He is clear about his plan for state commandeering of all
education by retooling the law when he discusses “the need for well-articulated
ministerial intervention.”
But is this not bullying by another
name all for the cause of achieving “social justice for queer youth” at the
expense of religious freedom—a freedom that is textually protected by the law?
While he insists that his plan is
to demonstrate “the need to consider the law’s potential from a pluralist
perspective,” it is clear that Professor Short is interested in neither
pluralism nor diversity in education but tyrannical uniformity.
He is also not interested in
“inclusive education” as he states in his conclusion; rather, he insists upon
“anti-oppressive education” that will assure the “cultural transformation” upon
which he insists but is prevented by the existence of Catholic education in
Canada. It is clear that his objective is to target institutions which do not
reflect his view of human nature; moreover, he contends that his proposal will
rid the world, or at least Canada, of the sort of bullying that targets “queer”
students. As he asserts, “It is clear that the culture of schools must be
transformed.” This goal will be reached by altering the curriculum of every
school “to include queer content and to recognize queer families.” However, he
knows that his proposal requires the cooperation of the state and its juridical
institutions which possess the muscularity to close any institution, especially
the Catholic ones he has targeted, which fail to be transformed in his image.
But this is bullying, pure and simple.
Here I again rely on the warning of
Christopher Dawson that I have used several times before, but it seems all the
more necessary to recall Dawson’s prophecy pertaining to things like Professor
Short’s vision of transformative education. As Dawson said about sixty years
ago,
[I]f Christians cannot assert their
right to exist in the sphere of higher education, they will eventually be
pushed not only out of modern culture but out of physical existence. That is
already the issue in Communist countries, and it will also become the issue in
England and America if we do not use our opportunities while we still have
them.
Although Dawson was speaking about
higher education, his point is applicable to primary and secondary education as
well be it in England, the United States, Canada, or elsewhere. The bully is
once again on the school yard, but this time his target is those whom he considers
as bullies but are not.
RJA sj
Tuesday, January 15, 2013
As we plunge into the new academic semester, we may confront
once again the question of what is it that Catholic law professors along with
all other Catholic teachers are supposed to be doing (in addition to developing
Catholic legal theory, of course!)?
Recently, Archbishop Charles J. Chaput, OFM Cap. of
Philadelphia offered some helpful insight to formulate a response to this
question when he addressed the national convention of the Catholic Campus
Ministry Association. [His address entitled “Young Adults and the ‘Secrets of
the Heart’” is here] Importantly for those of us who teach the law, he relied
in part on the illustration of the relationship between Saint Thomas More and
his daughter Margaret Roper.
The archbishop does not waste time by pointing out the
connections between the role of all educators, the Catholic faith and discipleship,
and the challenges presented to these first two matters by the contemporary
age. He offers his own and the thoughts of others on the challenges which are
presented in the cultural climate of the present age. I would like to offer a
further matter which students, parents, pastoral ministers, and teachers who
claim to be disciples of Jesus Christ need to consider in their roles in
educational formation. The matter involves the question of life: what’s it all
about? Of course, this question needs some nuance involving subsidiary or
related issues including but not limited to: what is the purpose or objectives
of human existence; what is at the heart of relationship; what is love; what is
the goal of education; should norms be a part of human existence and how and by
whom are they to be formed; who is God; what is the nature of the human person;
and, how does the human person know if there is a right and a wrong, and if
there is, how is it to be determined? Again, I state that these are not the
only questions which any educator ought to think about, but they are surely
some which the Catholic educator needs to consider.
I, for one, will do my best to assess how my syllabi for the
current semester take account of the issues raised by Archbishop Chaput and the
brief complementary remarks that I have offered here today.
RJA sj
Tuesday, January 1, 2013
First of all, a blessed new year to the Mirror of Justice community—participants and readers all.
I have found Patrick’s and Marc’s commentaries on Professor
Louis Michael Seidman’s December 30 essay published in The New York Times fascinating and illuminating commentaries.
Professor Seidman is well-known for his work on Constitutional Law and Criminal
Law and Procedure and enjoys a favorable reputation amongst many in the legal
academy. Moreover, I enjoyed the several conversations I had with him when I
was a visiting professor at Georgetown Law during the summer of 1993. However,
I respectfully think that he has misidentified the source of the problems which
he addresses in his essay.
It is not the Constitution per se that is the problem; rather, it is people who interpret it,
mold its meaning, and administer its provisions. I would agree that the
Constitution is not without its limitations or ambiguities, but it is still a
remarkable document, especially when the often forgotten Preamble is
considered, for within this beginning we, regardless of the time in which we
live, can see the eternal wisdom that defines the Constitution’s raison d’être. What might that be? Well,
the text spells it out with clarity for any age including that of the Framers
and that of today and tomorrow—the community of people formulating the
objectives of: forming a more perfect union; establishing justice; insuring
domestic tranquility; providing for the common defense; promoting the general
welfare; and securing the blessings of liberty for the folks of 1787 and for
future generations. This sounds like and is a sensible and durable plan for the
fundamental positive law of the nation. So, is it really the problem?
Indeed, it is, as I have said, not without its limitations.
But even the Framers foresaw its limitations and made prearrangement for its
revision when needed by amendment. Its provisions really are not the source of
what is archaic, what is idiosyncratic, or what is “downright evil.” It must
not be forgotten that the Constitution is, besides a construction of human
effort, a tool in the form of a judicial instrument that is to be used as a
principal means for attaining what is spelled out in its Preamble. And, there
is nothing archaic, idiosyncratic, or “downright evil” there. By itself, the
Constitution does nothing until it is used by the citizens and by those chosen,
directly or indirectly by the citizens, to implement its provisions. If there
are problems with the Constitution, it is not with the text per se but with those who use and apply
it.
The objectives of the Constitution specified in the Preamble
were not only noble for the time in which the text was written and adopted.
They are durable and ought to apply to any time regardless of what the demands
of any time may dictate. The difficulty is not with the text that the Framers
developed, but rather how the users appropriate the text and then construe or
misconstrue it. The real question and, therefore, the real problem is with the
person who does this work—be the person citizen, lawyer-advocate, judge,
administrator, legislator, or policy-maker. My contention is that there is a
problem, so I am in some agreement with Professor Seidman. But our disagreement
is with the problem’s source. His position is that it is with the text; mine is
that it is not with the text but with the people who have claimed the authority
to use and apply it.
Here I need to be more specific about why I make this claim.
For the Constitution to do anything, it needs human agents. By itself, it is
inert (as you might glean, I am not a big fan of the doctrine of the “living
Constitution”). For it to have activity in human existence, it requires human
agents. These agents can accomplish much that is good for the human race, but
they can also accomplish mischief along the way. The real source of the problem
is how are these agents formed and what do they see as their objectives? When
we understand the import of this assertion, we can then better understand how
the text, i.e., the Constitution of the United States, is employed and what it
accomplishes.
I do not like to identify what I consider to be a problem
without offering a solution or a means to one, which I hope is shared by people
of good will who have a strong sense of the importance of the common good. One
place to begin with the formation of the human agents who have claimed
responsibility for implementing the Constitution and its various provisions is
to test the degree to which they have been exposed to and adopted the cardinal
virtues of courage, prudence/wisdom, forbearance/temperance, and justice. These
are all important dimensions of human existence that are allied with the
objectives of the Preamble. The issue is, I think, the degree to which the “elites”,
to borrow from Professor Seidman whose term this is, have been reared in these
indispensable human attributes that are essential for the agents who will
determine what the Constitution is about and what it is not.
A great deal more needs to be said about my thesis, but
since Professor Seidman has welcomed mature and tolerant debate on the matter
of the Constitution, I, for one, look forward to this exchange, which I am sure
will demonstrate that the Constitution is not the problem.
RJA sj
