April 20, 2007
/ Volume
CXXXIV, Number
8
EDITORIAL
Bishops & Their Critics
The Editors
President George W. Bush’s decision to go to
war with Iraq was initially supported by a host of liberals, among them
New Republic editor Peter Beinart and New Yorker writer George Packer.
These commentators were convinced that Iraq posed an imminent threat to
its neighbors and that Saddam Hussein’s regime had to be removed for
both security and moral reasons.
As the administration’s case for war was
gradually exposed as a fabrication and the botched nature of the
occupation became clear, most of these liberals have admitted they were
wrong.
No such admissions of error, or even regret,
have been issued by outspoken Catholic neoconservatives who, using the
most tortured just-war arguments, publicly defended Bush’s war of
choice. Michael Novak, of the American Enterprise Institute, even flew
to Rome to persuade the Vatican not to oppose the invasion. In First
Things, George Weigel, of the Ethics and Public Policy Center,
memorably lectured religious leaders on the “charism of political
discernment” enjoyed by those in the White House (“Moral Clarity in a
Time of War,” January 2003). It was a charism, Weigel pointedly wrote,
“not shared by bishops.” He assured the war’s critics that elected
officials “are more fully informed about the relevant facts.”
Not all the relevant facts, evidently.
Writing in the April 2007 First Things (“Just War and Iraq Wars”),
Weigel revisits his argument for preventive war, and predictably finds
it sound. In doing so, however, he concedes that tactical and strategic
mistakes were made. He is silent on whether those mistakes cast doubt
on his claim that the president’s “charism” made him a better judge
than religious leaders of the morality and wisdom of war.
Weigel has long been a critic of positions
taken by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB)
regarding the church’s just-war teaching. He is especially dismissive
of the bishops’ insistence that just-war thinking begins with a
“presumption against the use of force.” Weigel’s objection rests to
some extent on an esoteric historical point. While the bishops concede
that a presumption against the use of force was not a defining
criterion of the traditional teaching, they nevertheless consider such
a presumption to be a legitimate development of that teaching. In an
age of nuclear weapons, the bishops reason, the consequences of armed
conflict are exponentially more dangerous.
It is true that the moral responsibility of
statesmen is different from that of bishops and ordinary Christians.
Still, looking back at the many nuanced statements issued by the USCCB
regarding the war in Iraq, it is hard not to conclude that the bishops’
charism, rather than the president’s, has better served the nation. As
early as November 2002, the bishops wrote of their deep concern “about
recent proposals to expand dramatically traditional limits on just
cause to include preventive uses of military force.” Repeatedly, the
conference expressed the gravest doubts about the moral justification
for the Iraq invasion. The bishops also reiterated their support for
the right of conscientious objection and selective conscientious
objection. In a prescient February 2003 statement on the likely
consequences of war, Archbishop Wilton D. Gregory, who was then
president of the conference, warned that “a postwar Iraq would require
a long-term commitment to reconstruction, humanitarian and refugee
assistance, and establishment of a stable, democratic government at a
time when the U.S. federal budget is overwhelmed by increased defense
spending and the costs of war.”
As the war dragged on, the bishops recognized
that “a new Iraq cannot be imposed by the United States or any other
occupying power” and that “our nation has to confront both our
limitations and responsibilities in the extremely complex social,
political, and religious reality of post-Hussein Iraq.” When evidence
emerged that the United States was torturing prisoners, the conference
condemned the practice in no uncertain terms. And last year, the
conference issued two papers on making a “responsible transition” in
Iraq. “Our nation cannot afford a shrill and shallow debate that
distorts reality and reduces the option to ‘cut and run’ versus ‘stay
the course,’’’ wrote Bishop Thomas G. Wenski, chairman of the Committee
on International Policy, in January 2006. Wenski argued that U.S.
forces should leave “sooner rather than later,” and noted that the key
to any transition will be greater regional and international support
and participation in forging a settlement. In a November statement, the
bishops endorsed the idea of benchmarks to measure progress,
recognizing that it is Iraqis who ultimately must make peace among
themselves. If the Iraqis fail to meet those benchmarks, the United
States must reevaluate its presence in Iraq.
For a group that is supposed to lack the
charism to make sound judgments about war and peace, the bishops have
acquitted themselves far better than their critics.
Monday, April 16, 2007
Our fearless leader, Mark Sargent, has a must-read essay in the new issue of Commonweal titled "Vengeance Time: When Abuse Victims Squander Their Moral Authority." An excerpt:
SNAP’s public campaign to expose priests who have merely been accused-or sometimes cleared-of abuse has a vigilante air about it. In their eagerness to effect justice as they know it, SNAP may in fact be disrupting the rule of law. Likewise, the Philadelphia prosecutors’ diatribe against the archdiocese (and the front-page coverage in the Philadelphia Inquirer) served as a kind of public theater in which the prosecutors cathartically worked out their rage at not being able to indict the archdiocese and Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua. The public, emotional, and absolutist character of all these actions expresses not only great anger and frustration, but also the desire to abase and punish. It’s vengeance time.
To be sure, the bishops have brought these theatrics of vengeance on themselves. For an institution famous for its rituals and emphasis on repentance, the church has offered precious few rituals of penitence as a way of acknowledging its fault, recognizing the harm it has done, and seeking forgiveness both from God and those it has wronged. Victims have often said (probably to their lawyers’ alarm) that they would have been content with an opportunity to tell their stories, an acknowledgement of responsibility, exposure of the malefactors, and a genuine apology. The Cultrera brothers’ remarkable documentary Hand of God, recently broadcast on PBS, dramatically shows how a victim first sought only some recognition of the injuries he suffered at the hands of one of the Boston Archdiocese’s worst offenders. He sued for monetary damages only after Bishop John McCormack, one of the guiltiest diocesan officials, flat out lied to him and treated him with peremptory condescension.
No wonder the extraordinary proposed settlement of the Diocese of Spokane bankruptcy requires Bishop William Skylstad not only to publish the names of all credibly accused priests (which has already been done elsewhere), but also to appear at the pulpit in every parish where an abusive priest served, and provide every victim an opportunity to speak out publicly in the parish where he was abused. What’s more, Skylstad must publicly call for eliminating statutes of limitations on sex crimes against children. In the absence of voluntary gestures of penitence, victims and their advocates are extracting public humiliation.
It is not enough to say, however, that bishops, priests, and the church are finally getting what they deserve. The vengeance game is a dangerous one. When the original offense is terrible, we feel empowered to do terrible things in response. Blinded by our righteous rage and convinced of our moral superiority, we may do things we later regret.
Sightings 4/16/07
Evangelical
Adaptations
-- Martin E. Marty
Since over one-fourth of U.S. citizens
are listed in the demographic or sociological category "Evangelicals," we should
spend at least one-fourth of our energies sighting accounts of them in the
secular media, our chief zone of operations and spying. Recent treatments
stress some significant changes within the camp, changes which fair-minded
observers should note before they generalize and stereotype.
Dr. David
Instone-Brewer, an evangelical scholar who has written at book length on the
subject, in the Wall Street Journal discusses reasons why evangelicals,
who once spoke with horror and judgment against divorce and the divorced, are
now blithely settling for possible presidential candidates who have divorced
repeatedly. Why the change? Frankly, because "the divorce rate among
evangelicals is actually as high as that of the general population." In
short, M.E.M. observes, "Everybody's doing it, so why preach against it?"
On such terms, many in this camp long ago gave up supporting "Sunday closing"
laws and other instruments that helped keep them from violating one of the
commandments. Opposition to alcohol, which once led them to total support
for tee-totaling, has softened now. Et cetera.
We used to wonder
about the selective literalism in moral judgments, noting inconsistencies on the
evangelical front -- just as we notice them on every front. Why today such
vehement denunciations of homosexuality, about which the Jesus of the gospels is
silent, and to which the Paul of the epistles devotes only a half-dozen lines --
while both Jesus and Paul were firm in opposing divorce when it then meant
remarriage to someone whose former spouse is still alive? How to wriggle
out? Saint W. C. Fields was a model: He said he'd been studying the
scriptures many years, looking for a loophole.
It turns out that Dr.
Instone-Brewer and two scholars he cites, Craig Keener at Duke University and
William Heth at Taylor University, who earlier had written books affirming the
traditional biblical anti-divorce stands, "now teach differently," as does
Instone-Brewer, himself a convert to the revised cause and code. "They
conclude that Jesus and Paul would have rejected no-fault divorce and that they
would have permitted a wronged partner to initiate a divorce based on the Old
Testament grounds of adultery or neglect. This new scholarship may allow
evangelical leaders to say what they have wanted to say for some time -- that
divorce is permitted so long as there are strong grounds for
it."
Instone-Brewer reports that some other evangelical
scholars go further: "abuse and abandonment are valid grounds," as one would
hope, while others advocate a "covenant marriage" in which spouses agree not to
divorce unless .... James Dobson of Focus on the Family promotes this
creatively wriggling approach. But where evangelicals used to gulp when
dealing with divorce and the divorced, now that they are "doing it," they are
more generous. Only "Mr. Giuliani, whose philandering apparently helped
lead to both of his divorces" at the moment is still criticized. If they
are stuck with him as the potentially willing candidate, will they keep on
opposing philandering?
The point of all this is to note: 1) evangelical
diversities; 2) evangelical adaptation to the times; and 3) celebrations of
affirmation of those who must divorce. But questions remain. For
example, are not almost all divorces undertaken by partners who both say that
"there are strong grounds for it"? Don't count on evangelicals or anyone
else to hold the line here if their candidates or they "do
it."
What's the next barrier to fall? Is this a slippery
slope?
References:
David Instone-Brewer's article "Evangelical Separation
Anxiety" appears in the Wall Street Journal (April 6, 2007), and can be
read at: http://www.opinionjournal.com/taste/?id=110009907. His book
Divorce and Remarriage in the Church (InterVarsity Press) is an informed
scholarly review of the arguments pro and con the new measures about
divorce.
I've posted a short essay of mine from the current Journal of Catholic Legal Studies titled "Subsidiarity and Suffering: the View From New Orleans." Here is the abstract:
The principle of subsidiarity often stands accused of being infinitely malleable and unhelpfully abstract, suiting whatever purposes an actor already has in mind. This essay seeks to discern the core of subsidiarity's real-world meaning by considering its implications for the rebuilding of post-Katrina New Orleans. Analyzed, as it must be, in light of the web of Catholic social teachings from which it arises, subsidiarity reminds "compassionate conservatives" that the meaningful empowerment of local communities will often be illusory, absent an active role for the federal government. At the same time, Catholic social teaching challenges the individualist premise of modern liberalism by insisting that subsidiarity's ultimate objective is not an individual's achievement of autonomy for autonomy's sake, but the facilitation of authentic human flourishing. In this regard, we must ensure that federal funding furthers local bodies' long-term viability and self-sufficiency. To the extent feasible, the lower body should take the lead in articulating plans and priorities for a given community's recovery, subject to the higher body's checking authority, and that authority should itself be grounded in subsidiarity—that is, it should be exercised with the aim of fostering the self-sufficiency of local communities.
Sunday, April 15, 2007
I'm just back from the University of Portland, and the Garaventa Center's conference on "The American Experiment in Religious Freedom." It was an excellent event, with many engaging and provocative talks (Justice Scalia on one day, Sen. Leahy on the other, etc.), and lots of conversation with old and new friends, former students, my confirmation sponsor, whom I had not seen in 20 years, and, of course, MOJ readers and bloggers!
I was struck by what great strides the University is making. There are real opportunities, I think, in that part of the country, for a school like the University of Portland (and for the Center) to make a difference for good.
