F IT’S OCTOBER, - America · The Shack: Where Tragedy Confronts Eternity, by William P. Young? The book appeared late last year, but I learned about it only this past spring, by

F IT’S OCTOBER, with the feast of St.Francis near, can America’s literaryeditor be far behind?

Yes, readers, another fall publish-ing season is upon us; and we take thisoccasion—the first of two—to introduceyou to some of its highlights. The booksreviewed herein cover theology, memoir,history, biography and poetry. KathleenNorris, Richard McBrien and MaryOliver join others in the fall lineup.

To answer the many questions I amasked, the process of selecting books tobe reviewed in our pages remains thesame. I pore over catalogs from a multi-tude of publishers, some large, somesmall, some distinguished, some obscure.Blocks of time, and quality time at that,have to be carved out regularly to readabout books that might in the end carryonly a minimal chance of making the cut.Even being selected for consideration,and received here as early as the publish-er can oblige, does not guarantee assign-ment for review.

Easiest todecide, ofcourse, are newworks by bignames and/orbooks on timely social, religious, politi-cal and other issues of interest to ourreaders. But it is impossible to reviewevery worthy book because of the largevolume of solicited and unsolicited gal-leys and books that cross the thresholdinto our offices. To address this situa-tion somewhat we have begun—and willrun regularly—a new section calledBooks in Brief, which will alert ourreaders to some other titles they mightwant to look at. We hope this addition-al coverage will compensate to someextent for the recent cutbacks of booksections in newspapers.

Still, the books roll off the press inrecord numbers. I find it amazing that inthese dire financial times, the level ofprint output from publishers seems not tofalter. Leave out the economy, say, andconsider the expenditure of naturalresources involved in producing andbinding the printed word. Some day Ishould give you a list of the actual titlesof some books; reading them aloud at theoffice always provides some moments ofhilarity. Besides titles, there are subjectsthat, in my view, could appeal only to anextremely limited readership (a history ofsalt, anyone?).

I try from time to time to mention

books published by small presses, booksthat rarely come with an advertising orpromotion budget. New City Press hasjust released two: Sister Earth: Creation,Ecology & the Spirit, by Dom HélderCâmara, and Pathways to Community, byBishop Robert F. Morneau. Each is athin paperback containing 28 reflec-tions, in keeping with the series ofwhich they are a part, A Meditation aDay for a Span of Four Weeks. Câmarareflects on our role as co-creators;Morneau writes on prudence, justice,fortitude and temperance.

Sundays With Jesus: Reflections for theYear of Mark, by America House’s ownJames DiGiacomo, S.J. (Paulist Press), isa superb resource for homilists. Lastweek’s issue of America on the comingSynod of Bishops focused on Scriptureand mission—being “doers of the Wordand not hearers only.” DiGiacomo is agifted preacher and has written widelyand well on the subject. This paperbackcompresses a wealth of practical insight,

interpreta-tion andreflectioninto a rela-tively small

package. Be ready to take it up whenAdvent approaches.

Have you heard about a novel calledThe Shack: Where Tragedy ConfrontsEternity, by William P. Young? The bookappeared late last year, but I learnedabout it only this past spring, by whichtime it had soared to the top of bestsellerlists. Published by Windblown Media inpaperback, it is the story of a young girlabducted from a campsite where she wasspending a weekend with her father, sib-lings and other families. The father’sworst fear is ultimately confirmed, whichshatters his already tenuous faith in God.So God has no choice but to intervene inthe flesh, inviting the father to spend aweekend at the shack where the girl’sbody had been discovered. Here theTrinitarian God comes as three of themost unlikely persons we could expect.The storyline requires attentiveness onthe reader’s part. Also helpful is an openmind and heart. The writing is brisk andwell paced. This, in a word, is a book ofwonder; it rekindles faith and makes usthink about God’s relationship withhumanity, and about suffering and death.

This season, no matter your literarypreferences, “get caught reading.”

Patricia A. Kossmann

AmericaPublished by Jesuits of the United States

Of Many Things

Cover photo Tatyana Borodina

Correction: The photo credit for Of ManyThings of Sept. 29 should have read: SnugHarbor Cultural Center.

IEditor in Chief

Drew Christiansen, S.J.

EDITORIAL DEPARTMENT

Managing EditorRobert C. Collins, S.J.

Editorial DirectorKaren Sue Smith

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Associate EditorsJoseph A. O’Hare, S.J.

George M. Anderson, S.J.Dennis M. Linehan, S.J.

James Martin, S.J.Matt Malone, S.J.

James T. Keane, S.J.Peter Schineller, S.J.

Literary EditorPatricia A. Kossmann

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Articles

Conscience and the Catholic Voter 13Mary Ann WalshConscience is more than a mere “feeling” aboutwhat we should do or not do. It’s God’s own voicerevealing what we must do.

Current Comment 4

Editorial Bailout and Equity 5

Signs of the Times 8

Life in the 00s 10Déjà Vu on Wall Street Terry Golway

Faith in FocusDays of Awe Arthur Schneier 19

Letters 44

The Word 47God’s Banquet Daniel J. Harrington

19

26

www.americamagazine.org Vol. 199 No. 10, Whole No. 4829 October 6, 2008

An audio interview with Kathleen Norris and, from the archives, Rev. Richard P.McBrien on “What Theology Is and Is Not.” Plus, Mark Judge on love, theologyand rock ’n’ roll. All at americamagazine.org.

This week @ America Connects

13

Fall Books

ty. Two years ago in California, nearly half of all publicschool students were Latino, and many such childrenattend school in Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada,Colorado, Illinois, Florida and New York. Although morethan half of all Latino students in the nation are attendingschools in Texas or California this fall, Latinos, especiallythe foreign-born, are moving rapidly to other parts of thecountry, where local schools may be less prepared forthem.

To be effective, educators must take into account threekey dimensions of the Latino student profile: first, mostlive in two-parent households. The rate is 71 percentamong U.S.-born students of immigrant parents, which isa little higher than that of non-Latino white students andmuch higher than non-Latino black students (30 percent).Second, more than a quarter of Latino children live inpoverty. Third, 7 in 10 speak a language other thanEnglish at home. Taking these factors into account couldhelp schools and local communities reach out to the nextmajority.

Relics Secular and SacredNonbelievers are not the only ones who smile at or evenridicule Catholics for their veneration of relics. Even non-Catholic Christians criticize Catholics for this strand ofour tradition. Yet when one reads about the dollars paidfor a piece of Yankee Stadium, one begins to wonder.Memorabilia have become big business, with stores thatsell sport, pop star and Civil War memorabilia. Might onecall them relics?

Devoted fans pay $869 to carry away two seats fromShea Stadium. Bases go for $1,500. Dirt from the razedTiger Stadium sells for $20. A urinal from Busch stadiumwent for $2,220. Total sales of memorabilia from that latestadium added up to $5.4 million. But New York is unusu-al: the sale of Yankee Stadium memorabilia is expected toamount to $50 million.

Baseball stars themselves want a piece of the action.On the last night at the House That Ruth Built, DonLarsen, Mariano Rivera and many others reached down toscoop handfuls of dirt from the pitching mound into plas-tic cups.

Something in the human psyche does not want to letgo but to remember, to keep continuity with the best ofour past. We need ways to remember the good, the trueand the enjoyable—not all that different from the Catholictradition, which for centuries has venerated the bones andclothing of its heroes in holiness. Perhaps veneration ofsaints’ relics was simply a bit ahead of the times.

Mary’s SmileMuch of the media coverage of Pope Benedict XVI’srecent visit to France focused on his more overtly politicaltalks, including his desire for a “positive laïcité” in thecountry. But during his visit to Lourdes to mark the 150thanniversary of the apparitions to St. Bernadette Soubirous,the pope spoke in a more devotional mode. Standingbefore the Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary, Benedictreminded the faithful that one of the first “acts” of Marytoward Bernadette was a simple, personal gesture. “Maryfirst taught Bernadette to know her smile, this being themost appropriate point of entry into the revelation of hermystery. In the smile of the most eminent of all creatures,looking down on us, is reflected our dignity as children ofGod, that dignity which never abandons the sick person.”

Benedict’s combination of a scholarly approach toworldly questions and his embrace of something as “other-worldly” as apparitions underlines the fine balance that aCatholic must maintain. Involvement in real-world issuesdoes not mean that one does not believe in the possibilityof things that intellectuals sometimes reject—like appari-tions and miracles. At the same time, the church is notcredulous. Shortly before the pope’s visit to Lourdes, theVatican announced that it was initiating steps to avoid“excesses and abuses” in the church’s acceptance of appari-tions, and it disciplined one of the main spiritual directorsfor the original visionaries at Medjugorje, a popular shrinethat has been viewed with some suspicion in Rome. Bene-dict’s words at Lourdes show once again that reason andfaith are complementary.

The Coming New Majority This fall, more Latino students will take a seat in ournation’s public schools than ever before: 10 million chil-dren, one of every five enrolled in kindergarten throughhigh school. That total has nearly doubled since 1990,according to a recent report by the Pew Hispanic Center,and it is expected to double again by 2050—to 28 million.If it does, Latinos would then make up the majority of theU.S. school-age population. Are public schools adequatelyprepared to teach them? Do teachers and parents under-stand Latino cultures, the bilingual family and the particu-lar needs such students may have? Are those who are notLatino preparing themselves to acknowledge Latinos asthe new majority, and to see themselves as members of aminority group?

Already, regions with large Latino populations areadapting to the bi- or multilingual and multicultural reali-

Current Comment

4 October 6, 2008 America

Editorial

Bailout and EquityHE AUGUST INVESTMENT FIRM ofLehman Brothers, founded in 1850,weathered the American Civil War, twoWorld Wars and the Great Depression.Yet over a few days in September, the firm

collapsed in the wake of the credit crisis that has roiledfinancial markets around the world. It was one of severalstunning developments that included the sale of the venera-ble Merrill Lynch and the transformation of MorganStanley and Goldman Sachs into bank holding companies,as well as the government’s near-takeover of the mortgagebehemoths Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and the insurancegiant American International Group. On Sept. 19 TreasurySecretary Henry Paulson Jr. asked Congress to allow thegovernment to purchase $700 billion worth of problemmortgages to put an end to the crisis. Overall, the govern-ment bailouts could deliver a bill of $1 trillion.

Certainly there is enough blame to go around. Exper-ienced C.E.O.’s of giant financial institutions should haveknown better than to risk investors’ assets in complexfinancial instruments that few people understood. RobertRubin, the Treasury secretary under President Bill Clinton,told “The NewsHour With Jim Lehrer” that most peoplewho deal with these instruments “probably do not fullyunderstand all the risks that are embedded in those instru-ments that can materialize under unusual circumstances.”These ill-understood instruments were then bundled andsold multiple times, like hot potatoes, to other investors.

C.E.O.’s were not the only ones who profited from the“credit culture.” Ordinary people grew complacent in thegrowing value of their single major asset, their homes, andrefinancing became commonplace across the middle class.Loan officers offered mortgages to customers who were notcredit-worthy. This practice preyed on the poor, but for oth-ers it fostered a credit culture in which speculating in realestate was as easy as visiting the nearest bank. Popular televi-sion shows, like A&E’s “Flip This House,” promoted get-rich-quick schemes for the middle and upper classes.

Since the days of the Carter administration, deregula-tion has been a bipartisan policy. Regulation during theClinton and Bush administrations, however, was particu-larly lax. As long as the Dow kept rising, both were reluc-tant to place any restrictions on new financial instruments.The present administration could, for example, haveempowered the Treasury Department to study more close-

T ly the reasonableness of mortgage-backed securities.Indeed, William H. Donaldson, a Republican who servedas chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission,resigned his post after the Bush White House resisted hispleas for greater regulatory oversight.

The debacle offers a warning to those who place theirfaith in a market system free of regulation. The “efficientmarket hypothesis”—the notion that the market optimallyallocates resources—assumes that full information willenable investors to weigh risk carefully when makinginvestment decisions. On this assumption, poorly perform-ing C.E.O.’s and fund managers would be penalized byfalling stock prices and poor financial reports. Yet whenthe information is so complicated that few—even those onboards of directors—can understand what is being traded,we see what economists all too coolly call “market failure.”In such circumstances governments must regulate.

GIVEN THE GLOBALIZATION OF DEBT in today’s financial net-works, Secretary Paulson’s proposal for a bailout is necessaryto avert a worldwide economic meltdown. The failure ofmortgage brokers, investment houses and A.I.G. makes thefuture prospects for ordinary people ever more precarious.The cost of the bailout will also make the government lesscapable of assisting the needy both at home and abroad for avery long time. Even before the present crisis, the rise in theprice of foodstuffs and gasoline had precipitated food riotsaround the world. Saving the financial institutions will pro-vide only a limited cushion for those always most vulnera-ble—the poor and the lower-middle class. Here in theUnited States, they will find it harder to obtain home mort-gages. Globally, the millennial hope of cutting world povertyin half by 2015 will almost certainly become a faded dream.

Still, as the bailout endeavors to prevent an even moredire collapse, steps must be taken to prevent worseningimpoverishment at home and abroad. Without equity,there will be no financial stability. The test of leadershipwill be to articulate a new design for the economy predi-cated on human solidarity, in which the costs will be fairlyallocated and the benefits shared by all. For the burdensmust be borne for generations to come. It will take rarehonesty, an exceptional degree of persuasion and anunswerving sense of justice to lead the nation on a newpath. It is time to pull together for the common good.Self-interest has had its day and has failed us all.

October 6, 2008 America 5

love, coexistence and peace for genera-tions,” Rabbi Cohen told Catholic NewsService in an interview in his Jerusalemoffice in late September. “We see in [the]invitation a kind of declaration that [thechurch] intends to continue with the poli-cy and doctrine established by Pope JohnXXIII and Pope John Paul II, and weappreciate very deeply this declaration.”

New Tensions for Vietnam CatholicsGovernment authorities in Vietnam havestarted a construction project for a parkand library at the former apostolic nun-

different parts of thecountry on a daily basis,”Babu Joseph, of theSociety of the DivineWord, who isspokesman for theCatholic Bishops’Conference of India,told Catholic NewsService.

Though some of theattacks look sporadic,with incidents reportedfrom different areas,Father Joseph pointedout that “there is a clearconspiracy to terrorizethe Christian communi-ty.” Dozens of attackshave been reported sinceSwami LaxmananandaSaraswati, leader ofHindu nationalistgroups in Orissa, wasshot dead by Maoistrebels Aug. 23.

“I publicly say we aredeeply hurt. The church

in Karnataka is wounded,” ArchbishopBernard Moras of Bangalore, chair-man of the Karnataka CatholicBishops’ Council, told the state’s chiefminister, B. S. Yeddyurappa, Sept. 22.“There is surely a conspiracy to ter-rorize the Christians.”

Church Officials Charge: Conspiracy Behind Violence

Church officials and others say thereis a “clear conspiracy behind the sud-den upsurge in the atrocities commit-ted against Christian targets in differ-ent parts of India.” “We are reallydistressed to see that atrocities onChristians are being reported from

ciature, a building Catholics have beentrying to have returned to them. Localchurch sources told the Asian churchnews agency UCA News that beginningearly on the morning of Sept. 19 hun-dreds of local police, mobile units andplainclothes security officials erected ironbarriers blocking off the street from theformer nunciature. Two trucks and acrane were taken into the compound,they said, and workers toppled the ironfence in front of the building in themorning and moved some furniture outof it. State-run media reported that dis-trict government authorities announcedtheir construction plan at the nunciatureon Sept. 18, saying they would develop aflower garden on the 1,370-square-yardcompound. The nunciature building willbe repaired and renovated for use as alibrary, the report said. Authorities con-fiscated the building in 1959, after whichthe Vatican’s delegate to Vietnam shiftedto Saigon, now Ho Chi Minh City, inwhat was then South Vietnam.

Cardinal Urges Congressto Reject Abortion BillDeclaring that “we can’t reduce abortionsby promoting abortion,” the chairman ofthe U.S. bishops’ Committee on Pro-LifeActivities has urged members ofCongress to reject the proposed Freedomof Choice Act. In a Sept. 19 letter,Cardinal Justin Rigali of Philadelphia saidthe legislation “would counteract any andall sincere efforts by government toreduce abortions in our country,” forceall Americans to subsidize abortion withtheir tax dollars and overturn “modestrestraints and regulations on the abortionindustry” in all 50 states. The Freedomof Choice Act was introduced in both theHouse and Senate April 19, 2007, the dayafter the Supreme Court upheld the con-stitutionality of the Partial-BirthAbortion Ban Act in Gonzales v. Carhart.Although no action has been taken ineither house of Congress since then, “theCatholic bishops of the United States aregravely concerned about any possibleconsideration” of the legislation in thefinal weeks of the 110th Congress,Cardinal Rigali said.

8 America October 6, 2008

Signs of the Times

Consecrated hosts lie scattered on the floor next to a van-dalized tabernacle at St. James Catholic Church in a suburbof Bangalore, India, Sept. 21.

Israeli Rabbi to AddressBishops’ Synod on WordThe Vatican invitation to participate inthe upcoming World Synod of Bishopson the Bible is a “signal of hope,” saidIsraeli Rabbi Shear-Yashuv Cohen, whowill lead a one-day discussion on theJewish interpretation of the Scriptures.Rabbi Cohen, co-chairman of the Israeli-Vatican dialogue commission and chiefrabbi of Haifa, is the first non-Christianever invited to address the Synod ofBishops. He will speak the second day ofthe Oct. 5-26 synod at the Vatican. Theinvitation “brings with it a message of

Donations Fall for Storm ReliefDestruction from the hurricanes andtropical storms that have devastated U.S.communities and Caribbean nations inthe past few months has exceeded thedamage Hurricane Katrina inflicted onNew Orleans in 2005, but donations forrelief efforts this time are drastically less.“I believe a combination of the recenteconomic crisis and the media attention,or lack thereof, have presented challengesto us,” said Patricia Hvidston, seniordirector of development for CatholicCharities USA. “We have gotten dona-tions, and we’re grateful to everyone whohas made donations, but it’s significantlylower than the response to Katrina.”Donations to Catholic Charities inresponse to Katrina averaged $890 eachfrom more than 180,000 contributors,but donations in response to the series ofstorms that have crippled communitiesalong the Gulf of Mexico, Florida and


Signs of the Times

From CNS and other sources. CNS photos.

the Nov. 4 election would continue alongtime tradition of presidential candi-dates addressing the annual fundraisingdinner, a tradition that has been followedoff and on in recent years. CardinalEdward M. Egan of New York, who willpreside at the dinner, called it “a splendidopportunity to recall the spirit of ‘thehappy warrior,’ Gov. Al Smith.” Theannual dinner, now in its 63rd year, andthe Smith Foundation have raised mil-lions to provide support for the sick, poorand underprivileged in the New Yorkarea. In statements released by the NewYork Archdiocese, both Mr. McCain andMr. Obama said they looked forward tothe event.

Feuerherd NamedPublisher of N.C.R.

Joe Feuerherd,who during thepast 24 years hasfilled a variety ofroles at TheNational CatholicReporter, rangingfrom intern toWashington cor-respondent, has

been appointed publisher and editor inchief of the paper. The appointment wasannounced Sept. 15 by Patrick Waide Jr.,chairman of the N.C.R. board of direc-tors. N.C.R. is an independent Catholicnewspaper based in Kansas City, Mo.Feuerherd succeeds Rita Larivee, S.S.A.,who was elected in August as generalsuperior of her religious order, the Sistersof St. Ann. Sister Rita had been publisherfor four years. Prior to that, she was asso-ciate publisher for seven years. “Theboard is pleased to have attracted to thepublisher position an experienced jour-nalist who is well versed in the publishingoptions available today via the Internet,”said Mr. Waide in announcing Mr.Feuerherd’s appointment. “We are alsoimpressed with Joe’s strong commitmentthroughout his adult life to peace and jus-tice issues, as well as to the documentsand spirit of Vatican II.”

elsewhere have averaged only $159 eachfrom fewer than 1,000 supporters,Hvidston reported. Meanwhile, CatholicRelief Services has raised around $1 mil-lion for emergency aid for Cubans andHaitians affected during this hurricaneseason, but have fallen $1.5 million shortof the agency’s fundraising goal for thoseCaribbean nations, said Mark Melia,deputy vice president for charitable giv-ing for the international relief agency.

Candidates to Address Al Smith DinnerThe Democratic and Republican presi-dential nominees both have agreed to beguest speakers at the Al Smith dinnerOct. 16 in New York, the Archdiocese ofNew York announced Sept. 17. Thearchdiocese said Senator Barack Obamaand Senator John McCain would “sharenonpartisan good humor before an audi-ence of civic, business and social leaders.”The joint appearance three weeks before

Bishops Issue Ritual Book for Quinceañeras

“Quinceañera,” the coming-of-age cel-ebration for girls turning 15 years old,has long been a tradition in Latinofamilies in the United States and anumber of Spanish-speaking countriesas a rite of passage from childhood toadolescence. The custom expressesthanksgiving to God for the gift of lifeand asks for a blessing for the yearsahead. On Sept. 19 the U.S. bishops

published thebilingual“Order of theBlessing on theFifteenthBirthday,”designed tohelp U.S. com-munities cele-brate this ritualwithin and out-side Mass,according to apress release.

In a state-ment, AllanFigueroa

Deck, S.J., executive director of theU.S.C.C.B.’s Secretariat of CulturalDiversity in the Church, emphasizedthe importance of developing a ritualthat “helps Latino Catholics celebratetheir cultural heritage and build newbridges to other Catholics in theircommunities.” The “quinceañera” ritu-al book may be ordered online atwww.usccbpublishing.org.

Yaritza Alcazar, 15, is escorted down the aisle during her “quinceañera”at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church in San Diego.

would assume that somewhere in theboard rooms of corporate America and inthe polished offices of leading politicians,somebody somewhere remembers hearingabout how banks collapsed following theirderegulated binge, and how it took lawslike Glass-Steagall to restore the nation’sconfidence in its economic system.

Well, perhaps the 1930s are just, like,so yesterday. Perhaps the 21st century’shard-charging business leaders and politi-cians simply do not see the connectionbetween the two eras of bank failures. Fairenough. How about the late 1980s, whenafter another round of deregulation thenation’s savings and loan associations wentbelly up thanks to bad investments, impru-dent choices and greedy leadership? TheS&L scandal cost the taxpayers billions toclean up. But, it was said at the time, astern lesson was learned: Dogmatic dereg-ulation is bad for business!

The collapse of the dot-com craze ofthe late 1990s did not result in a catastro-phe like today’s. But it surely was a conse-quence of the belief by business leadersthat they were smarter than their prede-cessors, that they had found a way to makethe business cycle an anachronism. Theywere rather surprised to learn that theywere not the first to delude themselves insuch a way.

So we are left with the grim headlines oflate summer 2008. Great financial institu-tions, shorn of the burdens of governmentoversight and set free to work their for-prof-it magic in the dynamic global marketplace,have collapsed under the weight of theirgreed, their incompetence and their impru-dence. An institution they loathe, the feder-al government, has come to the rescue—yetagain. This scenario may not sound familiarto the beneficiaries of the bailout, but forsome of us it is, as the historian Yogi Berraput it, déjà vu all over again.

Meanwhile, the legacy of the sub-prime mortgage crisis will continue toclaim innocent victims. To cite just oneexample, more than 70 companies, includ-ing Bank of America, have stopped under-writing loans for college students.

What a terrible irony: Thanks to oneindustry’s ignorance, thousands of youngpeople may never get the chance to go tocollege—where they might have learned alittle bit about history. Terry Golway

Déjà Vu on Wall StreetThe meltdown of venerable

investment houses might have beenanticipated.

Life in the 00s


S A WRITER and teacher ofhistory, I constantly have tograpple with the skepticismof friends, editors and, yes,students who invariably ask a

dreaded two-word question: Who cares?This is a variation on the cheerful senti-ments that Henry Ford expressed in theearly 20th century, as his Model T’swere transforming American culture.“History is bunk,” Ford famously said.His view is not without adherents allthese years later.

When I am asked why anybodyought to care about the past when thepresent has more than enough excite-ment, anxiety and pleasure, my answer isa variation of George Santayana’s maximthat those who do not understand histo-ry are doomed to repeat it. That cannedresponse rarely leaves me satisfied, or myinquisitors convinced.

And yet, didn’t Santayana have itexactly right? The Wall Street meltdownsurely proves that there is wisdom in eventhe most overused cliché.

If history were taken seriously in thebusiness world, in the halls of Congressand the White House or in the editorialoffices of some of the world’s most impor-tant newsgathering organizations, thensurely the headlines of mid-Septemberwould not have come as such a surprise.The meltdown of venerable investmenthouses might have been anticipated. Thepanicked response of government couldhave been foretold.

Why? Because it all happened before,in one way or another. The unfolding sagaof greed gone wild is not new in U.S. his-tory. Indeed, it is a theme in any honestsurvey of American history.

A‘ ‘

TERRY GOLWAY is the curator of the JohnKean Center for American History at KeanUniversity in Union, N.J.

The problem is that every generationseems surprised to learn that it can happenagain, that history has not been suspended,that the modern world has not solved theproblems that have plagued capitalism andcommerce over the centuries.

The world, Senator Daniel PatrickMoynihan once observed, is a dangerousplace, but many people seem surprised tolearn that this is so. He was referring moreto the international scene than to domes-tic events, but a variation of his formulawould seem appropriate now. The worldis a dangerous and greedy place. Andregrettably, many powerful people havechosen to believe that there is no connec-tion between danger and greed.

Who are these naïve people? Forstarters, they are the members ofCongress who “reformed” the financialindustry eight years ago when they abol-ished the Glass-Steagall Act, an early NewDeal initiative that established a wall sepa-rating the activities of insurance compa-nies, investment firms and banks. The“reform” measure was sponsored by,among others, a senator from Texasnamed Phil Gramm. He, of course, wasuntil recently a top economic adviser toSenator John McCain and was among themost dogmatic deregulators of the 1980sand 90s. He was hustled to the sidelines ofCampaign 2008 a few weeks ago when heopined that the United States was a“nation of whiners.” This expression wasnot considered appropriately sensitive at atime of economic distress, so Gramm waspersuaded to sever his formal ties to theMcCain campaign.

The Glass-Steagall Act was just one ofmany new laws put into place duringsomething called the Great Depression.One would assume that most Americanshave some familiarity with the troubles ofthe 1930s, which were caused by the irra-tional exuberance of the 1920s. One

HE 2008 U.S. PRESIDENTIAL and Congressional elections present a chal-lenge for Catholics. Catholic voters may experience frustration becausethey agree with some of what the candidates seeking office say, but notwith all that they espouse. The “life issues” are absolutely crucial as wemake decisions. But what should voters do if an otherwise acceptable

candidate falls short in concern for alleviating poverty or promoting just working con-ditions, access to health care and affordable housing?


MARY ANN WALSH, R.S.M., is the director of media relations for the

U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in Washington, D.C.

Ten things to remember this fall

Conscience and theCatholic Voter

– BY MARY ANN WALSH –

October 6, 2008 America Vol. 199 No. 10, Whole No. 4829

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A voter casts his ballot March 3 at a polling station at St. Dominic Catholic Church in Cleveland, Ohio.

Catholic voters are wary when truth becomes a casualtyof political warfare. Instead of seeking to bring together apolarized nation, campaigns too often exacerbate divisions.For the sake of a political victory, politicians often createenemies, and so the positions of opponents are twisted andmissteps become a reason to pounce on them mercilessly.Faced with what some call “the choice between the evil oftwo lessers,” thinking people may wonder, why vote at all.

With this in mind, here are 10 things to consider duringthe November election.

1. Not all issues are equal. Life issues are paramountamong all issues because the right to life is fundamental. Allother rights are based on it. Simply put: You can never takean innocent human life. Embryonic stem cell debates arenot about scientific advancement; they are about sacrificinga life, however small, for possible scientific gain. Thechurch bans embryonic stem cell research because tinyhuman beings are sacrificed for their stem cells. Instead, thechurch encourages adult stem cell research.

2. You have to work to become informed. A Catholic must beinformed both intellectually and morally. Getting one’shead around an issue means gathering information. A keysource of information is the U.S. bishops’ Web site(www.faithfulcitizenship.org), which includes the text ofForming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship: A Call to PoliticalResponsibility, by the Catholic bishops of the United States.The statement explains the teachings of the church that canhelp Catholics form their consciences in order to makemoral choices in public life.

Other good sources of information include theCatechism of the Catholic Church and its companion, theCompendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church. The UnitedStates Catholic Catechism for Adults also provides updatedteaching on issues such as justice and poverty. ManyCatholic colleges offer programs and lectures on Catholicsocial thought, and church periodicals explore contempo-rary issues.

Principles of social justice ought to guide decision-mak-ing. Among them is the principle that people have a right tojobs that pay a living wage and a right to join a union.People have a right to affordable and accessible health care.In 1935, when the elderly were facing an economic crisis inthe wake of the Depression, the government underPresident Franklin D. Roosevelt recognized a basic right toa decent life, which led to the creation of the Social Securitysystem. There is a comparable need today for access tohealth care.

Opposition to unjust discrimination is another principleof social justice. Racial, ethnic and religious discrimination,both overt and subtle, have no place in society. Catholics arecalled to defend against discrimination, whatever its roots.All are children of God, and all fellow citizens are our

brothers and sisters. A society that discriminates unjustlydiminishes not only the victims of discrimination but thesociety itself. Such discrimination seems to rise up whenev-er people feel economic or other pressures in society.

Our current immigration system violates those princi-ples related to opposing discrimination, respecting the dig-nity of every person, defending the family and protectingthe dignity and rights of workers. We need to replace a dys-functional system with a system of immigration laws thatwork and can be enforced.

Being informed requires keeping up-to-date with devel-opments in church teachings, such as what constitutes a justwar or whether there is such a thing as a “legitimate pre-ventive strike.” Catholics must work to avoid war. Peopleand nations have a right to defend themselves, but anyresponse to aggression must be proportionate. If someoneshoots you, you cannot annihilate his or her whole family orcountry to send a message. The Catechism of the CatholicChurch also points out that the use of arms must not pro-duce evils and disorders graver than the evil to be eliminat-ed. Given the power of nuclear weapons at a nation’s dis-posal today, it is hard to conceive a justification for their use.

Church teaching on the death penalty also has devel-oped in recent decades. The catechism states that the deathpenalty is not acceptable if there are alternative means tokeep a criminal from harming others. Penal sentences, suchas life sentences without parole, protect society and makethe death penalty seem to be based more on a desire forvengeance than for justice.

3. God speaks through our hearts and minds. Wise decision-making speaks through the stirrings of the heart, whichreflect lived experience. Hearts are moved, for example,when people see immigrants huddled together waiting foremployment so they can support their families. They aremoved when shoppers overhear people without healthinsurance ask a pharmacist if a non-prescription medicinewill cure strep throat (it won’t). Hearts are moved whenpeople read that a 12-year-old without dental care died of abrain infection that started as an abscessed tooth. Scripturesin defense of widows and orphans call us to be compassion-ate, to have a preferential option for the poor. Stirrings ofthe heart must influence our vote.

Compassionate responses move our consciences tomake moral decisions. As the bishops say in FormingConsciences for Faithful Citizenship, conscience is more than amere “feeling” about what we should or should not do (andit certainly does not justify doing whatever we want).Conscience is God’s own voice revealing to us what we mustdo. As prideful and imperfect individuals, we can sometimesmistake the voice of our own wants and desires for God’svoice. So we must test our consciences by asking whetherthey are in harmony with the truths of our faith. A proper-


ly developed Christian conscience will always be in accordwith the teaching of the church. The bishops identify (No.18) three key steps to forming one’s conscience:

…this begins with a willingness and openness to seekthe truth and what is right by studying SacredScripture and the teaching of the Church as con-tained in the Catechism of the Catholic Church. It isalso important to examine the facts and backgroundinformation about various choices. Finally, prayerfulreflection is essential to discern the will of God.

4. Fidelity to conscience is more important than party loyalty.Thinking Catholics cannot blindly accept party platformsor the positions of candidates. We have to examine all theissues before voting. Saying, “I always vote Democratic” (orRepublican) is an easy but unintelligent approach.

5. Simplistic reasoning is simpleminded. It can be difficultto see clearly in an election year. Voter guides abound, butmany are written from a particular political persuasion andsome manipulate church teachings to support a partisancause. The publications of some religious groups read likethe Democratic or Republican Party at prayer. Simplisticvoter guides that view life as a series of black-and-whitechoices are unrealistic. Life is not that easy.

6. Gut feelings may be your conscience speaking. Often we

cannot articulate a concern, but we still feel it inside. Onesign of a gut reaction is becoming uncomfortable with aninitial decision. We cannot rest with it, or, as we sometimessay, just can’t stomach it. It does not feel right. This is a callto reconsider a decision or a usual way of acting, to consid-er whether we have formed our conscience. Having doneso, we need to reflect on what God is calling us to do. Inpolitics it means questioning traditional party loyaltybecause we sense something is just not right.

7. Politics is the art of the possible. Voters need to evaluatethe likely effectiveness of proposed policies and whether acandidate is fully committed to them and can act on them.“These decisions should take into account a candidate’scommitments, character, integrity, and ability to influence agiven issue. In the end, this is a decision to be made by eachCatholic guided by a conscience formed by Catholic moralteaching” (Faithful Citizenship, No. 37).

8. Your neighbor can be an ocean away. As the world growssmaller, the neighborhood does not stop at the corner oreven the shore. Global solidarity is a fact of modern life.Such awareness should prompt actions to prevent interna-tional violence. The motto of the Catholic Campaign forHuman Development, “If you want peace, work for justice,”rings truer every day. Poverty and discrimination breedsocial unrest. Until ordinary Americans face their obligationto help not only those in need here but also those abroad,


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“Anyone who thinks they know the story of the Americanwomen’s movement or of modern American Catholicismshould read Mary Henold’s book.”—Ann Braude, author of Sisters and Saints: Women andAmerican Religion

“Henold proves decisivelythat there has indeed been avibrant movement of Catholicfeminism since the 1960s. It… still impacts Catholics whocontinue to pursue a visionof an inclusive church on theinside and outside edges ofinstitutional Catholicism.”—Rosemary Radford Ruether, Claremont GraduateUniversity and Schoolof Theology

“FEMINISTS ARE THE HOPE of the Catholic Church.I applaud Mary Henold for her scholarship, her insight,and her vision. Catholic and Feminist shows the way thatwomen can take the best of our traditions to shape our church and make it the moral anchor thatwe need.”—Kathleen Kennedy Townsend

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the United States will leave itself vulnerable to smolderingrage all over the globe.

9. The political process begins long before you pull the lever inthe voting booth. In the Internet age, political involvementcan be a matter of a few keystrokes. It is not overly time-consuming to answer polls, send messages and ask the hardquestions. It is also easy to contact campaigns and partyheadquarters. It takes more time, but it is even more help-ful to attend rallies and discuss thoughtful questions, tobring up important issues and elevate the overall discussion.Politics is too important to leave to politicians.

10. We hear God in prayer. In our noisy world it is oftenhard to hear the voice of God. We can, however, create aclimate where we can hear God speak through our ownselves. Sometimes this happens in church, when we arepulled away from life’s worries and concerns for an hour. Ithappens too whenever we can remove ourselves from themedia bombardment and other noise around us. We need tomake time to contemplate our world and move toward aninner peace. We need to bring our political decisions toGod.

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conflicts in southeastern Europe, my ecu-menical colleagues from the Appeal ofConscience Foundation and I have soughtto establish contact with religious commu-nities between East and West who werecut off during the cold war and to makeuse of our common belief in God to help

reconnect hostile nations. The Days ofAwe, which call for penitence, prayer andcharity, boost our capacity to reconcileourselves with God and our fellow man.

Making Redemption PossibleThe last two decades have witnessednumerous historic acts of forgivenessranging from governments apologizingfor the mistreatment of their citizens toreligious leaders of one faith apologizingto those of other faiths for past misdeeds.

Apologies alone, however, do not suf-fice. The High Holy Days require us to bepenitent and seek forgiveness if a wrong iscommitted against God and man. Evenafter one apologizes, if the apology is notaccepted, then one must reach out to theinjured party on two other occasions and

attempt reconciliation. This law of recon-ciliation is complemented by a certainposture on the part of the injured parties,namely, being accepting of and mercifultoward those who have wronged them.

Forgiveness without acceptance failsto change the facts on the ground.

Acceptance without forgivenessallows the perpetuation ofsenseless martyrdom. Mercyand forgiveness together createconditions that make relationalredemption possible. Just asGod is the Av Harachaman,Merciful Father, so we must bemerciful children in acceptingsincere apologies.

The peak of the HighHolidays is Yom Kippur, theDay of Atonement (Oct. 9 thisyear). Atonement is the endresult of a long process ofrepentance that moves fromintrospection to forgiveness andculminates in reconciliation: tobe “at one” with God and man.When the process is completed,

not only has the human being changed,but his relationship to those around himhas been transformed. Yom Kippur isreferred to as a “Sabbath of Sabbaths.” Asthe Sabbath is a time when man reconcileshimself with nature, Yom Kippur is a daywhen man reconciles himself with Godand man.

Historic Acts of ForgivenessIt is the spirit of reconciliation—not justforgiveness—that stands behind the recentglobal gestures of rapprochement. Theevolving bonds of friendship and coopera-tion between the Catholic Church and theJewish people are historic in their abilityto create new social and political tiesbetween Jews and Catholics worldwide.The Second Vatican Council’s

HE JEWISH TRADITION hasfour new year observances, ofwhich the two most notable arePassover, which celebrates the

birth of the Jewish people, and RoshHashanah, which celebrates the birth ofthe world. “On this day the world was cre-ated,” we read in our RoshHashanah liturgy. RoshHashanah is a universal momentthat demands actions to bringabout universal reconciliation.In the Jewish tradition, reconcil-iation entails a dual process: apersonal act of forgiveness bythe penitent and an attempt toestablish a new relational orderbetween God and man andbetween man and man.

Following Rosh Hashanah(Sept. 30 this year), Jews observe10 days of repentance.Maimonides (1135-1204), thegreat Jewish sage, warns that it isinsufficient merely to ask forforgiveness; what is desired is anact of reconciliation.

Surviving the Holocaust forced me toask myself many difficult questions. Afterexperiencing the beast and best of man, Iwas in a quandary: Do I rebel against Godor try to reconcile myself with God and afailed humanity? Do I give up or sustainmy faith in man’s ability to change? Iopted to pay a price for survival with adetermination to build bridges with peo-ple who face oppression and tyranny andto make conciliation and reconciliationmy life’s work. From helping to heal thetensions and rifts in Northern Ireland tobringing together warring sides of ethnic


Faith in Focus

Days of AweForgiveness, atonement and the High Holy DaysBY ARTHUR SCHNEIER

RABBI ARTHUR SCHNEIER is president of theAppeal of Conscience Foundation andsenior rabbi at the Park East Synagogue inNew York City.

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Pope Benedict with former New York Mayor Ed Koch, left, and RabbiArthur Schneier, right, at the Park East Synagogue in New York.


“Declaration on the Relation of theChurch to Non-Christian Religions”(1965) not only apologized for past mis-treatment but tried to reconcileChristians with their “older brothers.”Without its declaration that “we cannottruly call on God, the Father of all, if werefuse to treat in a brotherly way anyman, created as he is in the image ofGod,” we would never have witnessedPope John Paul II’s visit to the RomeSynagogue and Pope Benedict XVI’s visitto Park East Synagogue, my congrega-tion, on the eve of this past Passover. Thespirit of reconciliation made our meetingpossible and allows Jews and Christiansto see each other as having a shared mis-sion in the world.

The admissions of guilt issued byGermany after the Holocaust wereaccepted by the State of Israel and theJewish people because they came withconcrete measures and attitudinal changesin an outreach to the Jewish people andthe fledgling state.

Likewise, the apology issued by theapartheid state of South Africa wasremarkable only because it was acceptedby a leader who, having spent 20 years

behind bars, could respond to his captors’apologies by saying: “The moment tobridge the chasms that divide us hascome.... We enter into a covenant that weshall build the society in which all SouthAfricans, both black and white, will be ableto walk tall, without any fear in theirhearts, assured of their inalienable right tohuman dignity—a rainbow nation at peacewith itself and the world.” WithoutNelson Mandela’s acceptance and thegovernment’s willingness to change thefacts on the ground, all the apologies inthe world would not have sufficed.

Conversely, we still await a true rec-onciliation among Christians, Muslimsand Jews, in which peace will triumph overthe misunderstanding and demonizing ofthe other. Only then will Isaiah’s wordsbecome a reality: “And the wolf shall dwellwith the lamb, and the leopard shall liedown with the kid” (Is 11:6).

May Rosh Hashanah, the anniversaryof the creation of the world, inspire us tohelp perfect an imperfect world. May Godspread the canopy of peace over us all.May we help God establish that peacethrough reconciliation, tolerance andreciprocal respect. A

tual trust to build. Recent interfaith outreach has not

been limited to Christian initiatives. A let-ter issued last October by 138 Muslimleaders addressed to the heads of all majorChristian denominations captured wideattention. Entitled “A Common WordBetween Us and You,” this documentdraws upon scriptural texts from both tra-ditions, seeking to foster a conversationabout the commonality of love of God andlove of neighbor in Christianity and Islam.A number of those addressed, includingLambeth Palace and the Vatican, havetaken steps to respond to the October let-ter. Organizations without a religiousaffiliation have also become quite active inthis sphere. Institutions as diverse as theU.S. State Department’s Office of PublicDiplomacy, the World Economic Forumand the United Nations have launchedprograms to enhance interreligious andintercultural understanding. The socialand political concerns sparked by recentworld events and by accelerating demo-graphic shifts have put interfaith relationson the agendas of many groups for whomthis subject had not previously been afocus of attention.

Such institutional efforts, whetherinternational or national, form the back-drop for the more personal, local andregional investigation that this volumeundertakes. Crisscrossing the UnitedStates and interviewing adherents of manyfaiths, Gustav Niebuhr, former religionreporter for The New York Times and

What Holds UsTogetherBeyond ToleranceSearching for InterfaithUnderstanding in AmericaBy Gustav NiebuhrViking. 256p $25.95ISBN 9780670019564

If the second half of the 20th centurycould be called the ecumenical era, the ini-tial decades of this century signal the startof the interfaith era. In the years followingthe promulgation of Nostra Aetate, theCatholic Church took early leadership inoutreach efforts to other religious tradi-tions, but it was a rather lonely leadership.Now many other Christian denomina-tions have begun their own programs ofinterreligious dialogue. Since 2002, forexample, an Anglican initiative convenedby Archbishop Rowan Williams in collab-oration with Georgetown University hassponsored an annual gathering in placeslike London, Doha, Washington, Sarajevoand Singapore. In both plenary assembliesand intensive working sessions, an invitedgroup of Christian and Muslim scholarsengage in the close study of Biblical andKoranic passages pertinent to a particulartheological topic. Such sustained exegeti-cal analysis can open rich veins of theolog-ical reflection, while the continuity of acore group of participants allows intellec-

now a professor at Syracuse University,explores the proliferation of interfaith ini-tiatives emerging on the American land-scape. His visits to churches, synagogues,mosques, temples and gurudwaras (Sikhplaces of worship) and his conversationswith clerics and congregants are chroni-cled in the recently released BeyondTolerance: Searching for InterfaithUnderstanding in America.

The seeds for this instructive andinsightful study can be found in the articleNiebuhr and his colleagues wrote for TheNew York Times about random attacks

The ReviewersJane Dammen McAuliffe is president ofBryn Mawr College in Bryn Mawr, Pa.

Rev. Robert P. Imbelli, a priest of theArchdiocese of New York, teaches systemat-ic theology at Boston College.

William A. Barry, S.J., is co-director of thetertianship program for the New EnglandProvince of the Society of Jesus, a retreatdirector and editor of the periodical HumanDevelopment.

Vincent Ryan is a doctoral candidate inmedieval history at Saint Louis University.

Angela O’Donnell teaches English, creativewriting and Catholic studies at FordhamUniversity in New York City.

Paul J. Fitzgerald, S.J., associate profes-sor of religious studies at Santa ClaraUniversity, Calif., contributed “Married in theEyes of God: a Spirituality for InterfaithMarriage” in the forthcoming Companion toMarital Spirituality (Peeters).


Fall Books

against Muslims, or those thought to beMuslims, in the immediate aftermath ofSept. 11, 2001. He found plenty of mate-rial for that article; but he also found thebeginnings of a counter story, a storyabout gestures of support extended toMuslims and to mosques, gestures moti-vated by a desire to defend and to protect,to reaffirm the welcome and hospitalitythat continue to characterize so manyAmerican communities. In six brief chap-ters Niebuhr describes the deeds ofMuslims, Sikhs, Jews, Hindus, Christians,Buddhists and others whose efforts, greatand small, are forging an interfaith cultureof outreach, connection and dialogue. Thesignificance of Niebuhr’s title is capturedin a key statement: “What holds societytogether is not just people who will toler-ate others, but people who will actually gobeyond that, to provide the glue thatnourishes social relationships.” This bookis about that glue.

Although his focus is the present,Niebuhr’s narrative is enriched withnumerous references to the long history ofAmerican religious diversity. In one chap-ter we hear about the Cape Cod syna-gogue that began life in 1797 as aCongregationalist church. When becauseof diminished size, the Christian congre-gation could no longer sustain the build-ing, the remaining few deeded it to theflourishing Jewish community ofFalmouth. In a later chapter, Niebuhrtakes us from Falmouth to Flushing andthe 17th-century house of John Bowne, alocal farmer who in concert with othersrejected the restrictions that GovernorPeter Stuyvesant placed upon Quakerimmigrants to New Amsterdam. Thegroup’s 1657 protest statement, theFlushing Remonstrance, stands as a mile-stone in the evolving history of Americanreligious liberty.

The people Niebuhr profiles, theexamples of interfaith engagement that hedescribes and the various forms of mutualcollaboration he catalogues make for adecidedly optimistic picture. Yet theauthor acknowledges that shadows existand that powerful, negative currents exerttheir force. He quotes a young Muslimsocial entrepreneur who compares his rel-atively modest resources to those ofHezbollah; he recognizes that this nation’spolitical rhetoric is bellicose and blink-ered; and he acknowledges that many

American Christians share the sentimentsof those who cannot condone any dia-logue that is not aimed at proselytizationand conversion.

Nor does Niebuhr shy away from thehard questions: What is the ultimateadvantage of all this interreligious activity?Other than the creation of personalfriendships and the warm glow of mutual-ity, is there any lasting value or larger ben-efit? In his final chapter Niebuhr venturesa “measured yes” to these queries andquotes Albert Camus on the radicalcourage of clear-eyed hope.Camus’s prescient words in a1946 publication, Neither Victimsnor Executioners, complementremarks made two years earlierby the renowned theologianReinhold Niebuhr, the author’sgreat-uncle. Well before the demographicchanges wrought on the American reli-gious landscape by mid-60s revisions inU.S. immigration legislation, the olderNiebuhr had reflected upon religiousdiversity and its challenges: “The solutionrequires a very high form of religiouscommitment. It demands that each reli-gion, or each version of a single faith, seekto proclaim its highest insights while yetpreserving a humble and contrite recogni-tion of the fact that all actual expressionsof religious faith are subject to historicalcontingency and relativity.” The olderNiebuhr’s great-nephew has amplydemonstrated that this theological attitudenow animates countless efforts of inter-faith exchange and interaction. The verbaldocumentary that this volume offersallows us to hope in Camus’ formidablegamble: “that words are stronger than bul-lets.” Jane Dammen McAuliffe

All He EverWantedNo Ordinary FoolA Testimony to GraceBy John Jay HughesTate Publishing. 344p $19.99 (paperback)

ISBN 9781606041826

In his most affective and affecting epistle,St. Paul wrote to the Philippians: “I give

thanks to my God for all my memories ofyou” (Phil 1:3). Paul’s eucharistic remem-bering came repeatedly to mind whilereading the Rev. John Jay Hughes’s lovelyand moving autobiography, No OrdinaryFool. Calling to mind and narrating theevents of his life—the sorrow of his moth-er’s death when he was but six years old,the emotional and spiritual closeness to hisAnglican priest father, his own ordinationto the priesthood as an Episcopalian andsubsequent reception into the full com-munion of the Catholic Church, his

painful alienation from his belovedfather, his fruitful scholarly and pas-toral ministry—all this and moreHughes celebrates as a testimony tograce.

As a precocious and sensitivechild, the loss of his mother at so early

an age had and continues to have anindelible impact. He says simply: “Fromthis blow I have never recovered. I belongtoday to the walking wounded.”

Yet, from this unfathomable sorrowthere came a conviction of grace. Let meallow Hughes to recount the decisiveoccurrence in his own voice:

I can no longer recall the exact daywhen I discovered God in thedarkness. I can fix it, however,before the age of nine. One day Irealized the parting was not forev-er. With blinding certainty itcame home to me that I would seemy mother again, when Godcalled me home. From that day tothis the unseen spiritual world—the world of God, of the angels, ofthe saints, and of our beloveddead—has been real to me....Decades later I realized that thisinsight was the beginning of mypriestly vocation.

Hughes spent six happy years as apriest in the Anglican Communion, most-ly in parish ministry. Four aspects of thatpriestly service continue to characterizehis approach to priestly ministry to thisday. They have relevance not only forpriests, but for all those seeking to respondgenerously to the Lord’s call.

First, early in his ministry he made acommitment to tithe whatever income hereceived. To his surprise he found thepractice of tithing not a burden, but a


source of blessing. He writes: “Since it isbased on faith (trusting that our needs willbe taken care of if we give away the firstportion of our income), it deepens faith. Itenables us to use money sacramentally, bymaking something material a vehicle ofthe spiritual—gratitude.”

Second, Hughes soon became con-vinced of the need for a sustained prayerlife as the soil of fruitful ministry and,indeed, of all growth in Christ.Moreover, this discipline must be prac-ticed in season and out of season, what-ever feelings of consolation or desolationaccompany one’s prayer. As he writeswisely: “Neglect of this fundamentaltruth is the root cause of much of theChurch’s present difficulties.”

Third, from teenage years the prac-tice of confession has been crucial to hisspiritual life. Indeed, one of the sorrowshe experienced in becoming RomanCatholic before the Second VaticanCouncil was that he did not hear pro-nounced the consoling words of absolu-tion, which he had heard and rejoiced inas an Episcopalian. Instead, Catholicsbefore the council were instructed topray the Act of Contrition while thepriest mumbled absolution in Latin. Theirony, of course, is that the linguisticintelligibility of the sacrament has alsowitnessed a decline in its celebration—though there are welcome signs of arediscovery of this great grace.

Finally, a practice that Hugheslearned from his Anglican mentors andwhich he has followed faithfully is never topreach on Sunday without a written textbefore him. The obvious advantage is thatone thereby disciplines oneself to a clearbeginning, middle and ending to structur-ing the interconnections among them.Those who have read Father Hughes’spublished homilies know the care and theimagination they exhibit. He tells us thatin homilies he shuns “moralism.” Heexplains that even when preaching themoral law, he presents it “not as the stan-dard we must meet before God would loveand bless us, but rather as the descriptionof our grateful response to the blessingsand love bestowed upon us by our lovingheavenly Father as a free gift.”

Father Hughes writes with passionand conviction, spicing his recollectionswith telling incidents and wry humor,often enough directing his wit at his own


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false steps and follies. But it is the author’sJacob-like wrestling with the call toCatholicism that provides the distinctivedrama of the narrative.

In his early 20s he began to wonderwhether the Anglican tradition had notin fact splintered itself from the CatholicChurch, a questioning that his high-church father dismissed as “Romanfever.” Resolved for a time, the questionsre-emerged forcefully after his ordina-tion as an Episcopal priest. The stum-bling block was his suspicion of exagger-ated papal claims. But as he studied andconsulted about them, he foundthem less an obstacle than hehad feared.

The decision, in 1960,to enter into full commu-nion with the CatholicChurch was motivated by noemotional appeal or aestheticattraction to the preconciliar church, butsolely by his persuasion of the truth of itsclaim. In his view this entailed no repudi-ation of his past nor of the abundantgraces he had received. As he wrote hisfather at the time, “It was not so much thatI had come to find Anglicanism wrong, asincomplete.” But all efforts at explanationwere spurned; the elder Hughes barred hisson from the family home; and, thoughcorrespondence continued between them,they never saw each other again.

Hughes’s subsequent studies inInnsbruck (where he attended the lec-tures of Karl Rahner, S.J.) and inMünster (where he heard and greatlyappreciated Joseph Ratzinger) were fol-lowed by his conditional ordination as aCatholic priest. His account of his manyyears of priestly ministry in the postcon-ciliar church as teacher, theologian andpastor will elicit respect, gratitude andfrequent moments of recognition asreaders recall their own experiences andenter (as I did) into silent, yet spiritedconversation with the author.

One will find much to relish and tolearn from in this marvelous testimonyto grace. Eucharistic remembering pro-vides the cantus firmus that inspires andsustains Hughes’s honest and joyful wit-ness. His book evokes, in an almostsacramental way, what St. Paul saw to bethe fruit of grace: “an overflow ofthanksgiving to the glory of God.”

Robert P. Imbelli

The NoondayDemonAcedia and MeA Marriage, Monks, and a Writer’s LifeBy Kathleen NorrisRiverhead Books. 352p $25.95ISBN 9781594489969

Leave it to Kathleen Norris to make anancient and almost unknown word rele-vant to modern readers, believers or not.The poet and author of a number of bestselling memoirs, such as The Cloister Walkand Dakota, which brought the wisdomof the desert monks and nuns and of theRule of St. Benedict to bear on modern

life, here brings close attention to her ownexperience and her immense reading tobear on exploring the nature of acedia, the“noonday demon,” as the basic temptationbesetting the modern world. True to hercalling as a poet she notes that the wordacedia at root means a lack of care. In thenoonday sun the monks of the desert weretempted to give up caring for their way oflife and eventually for God. Norris is care-ful to distinguish acedia from depression,with which it has many similarities. Shecomes at the distinction from a number of

different directions, among them the fol-lowing: “A crucial distinction betweendepression and acedia is that the formerimplies a certain level of anguish overone’s condition, while in the latter itremains a matter of indifference.”

In an account of the “noondaydemon” by the desert monk EvagriusPonticus (A.D. 345-99) she found anexplanation of her experience as a teenag-er overwhelmed by an ennui that left herwith a sense that nothing really mattered.Over the years she collected references toit and during the writing found herselfreflecting not only on its effects on monksand nuns, but also on writers like herselfand her husband, on commitments such asher own marriage and on modern life.Readers walk with her through life in asmall town in South Dakota, a difficult butdeeply loving marriage; her husband’sbouts with alcoholism and severe illnessand finally his death; her widowhood; andher dialogue with ancient and modernwriters who have grappled seriously withlife’s ultimate issues. It is a bracing andenlightening journey.

Along the way the reader learns agood bit of healthy spirituality and theolo-gy as an antidote to much of the shallowtidbits of both that pervade modern life.Many have banished the word “sin,” forexample, but often its real meaning is ter-


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Listen to an interview with Kathleen Norris, at americamagazine.org/podcast.

ribly distorted, not least because of a sadlytruncated theological and catecheticalteaching. A biblically sound notion of sinhas to start with the knowledge of God’sabiding love. Sin can be understood onlyby those who realize that they are theapple of God’s eye, made in God’s ownimage. In other words, a Christian under-standing of sin begins with a healthy self-regard. Only from that viewpoint can wesee our sinfulness as a falling short of ourbest selves. Norris also notes that acediawas one of the eight bad thoughts that arenot sins themselves but can, if they are notdiscerned and fought, lead us to fall shortof our calling to be images of God. In timethese bad thoughts became the sevendeadly sins.

Norris writes that the shift from“thoughts” to “sins” led to an emphasis onacts rather than underlying dispositions.The monks expected to be besieged bybad thoughts; hence they encouraged pay-ing attention to them to note their prove-nance and their outcome so as to discernthem as leading human beings to becom-ing less human, less whole, less caring.

Jesus himself had noted that the prob-lem was not so much our acts, but our dis-positions: “For out of the heart come evilintentions, murder, adultery, fornication,theft, false witness, slander. These arewhat defile a person, but to eat withunwashed hands does not defile” (Mt15:19-20). Also, in the move to sevendeadly sins acedia was dropped. Norrisbelieves that acedia’s loss of prominenceallowed it to continue its deadly work withless restraint. I was reminded of C. S.Lewis’s Screwtape Letters, in whichScrewtape reminds his young devilnephew that their policy is to keep theirexistence secret.

Commitment to a profession, to amarriage, to an athletic or artistic career orto any way of life requires the hard work ofpractice, often boring practice. It is such acommitment that acedia attacks so insidi-ously. When she was a teenager, Norrisplayed the flute but hated to practice. Herteacher told her that she was an amateur.That’s the difference between someonewho can bear the discipline of daily prac-tice and routine and someone who cannot;the latter remains an amateur in the gameof life. “The early Christian monks stakedtheir survival on their willingness to be asGod had made them, creatures of the day


to day.” They saw clearly that the antidoteto acedia’s blandishments was commit-ment to the discipline of developing goodhabits, another name for which is virtues.Our age flees from such commitment andfinds, like ancient Rome in its decline, thatit needs “bread and circuses” in order tostave off boredom.

Acedia and Me is not a book for theamateurs of life, but for those who takeseriously their creation as images of God—God who cares enough to create our worldand us and to pitch his tent within it andwith us. For the sake of God’s world Norrishas written this book. I hope that many willtake it to heart.

William A. Barry

‘Armed Pilgrimage’Fighting for the CrossCrusading to the Holy Land By Norman HousleyYale Univ. Press. 356p $38ISBN 9780300118889

The Crusades are typically thought of asthe wars between Christians and Muslimsin the Middle East that occurred duringthe 12th and 13th centuries. While thiswas their most famous manifestation, itwas not the only one. They also involvedconflicts against the Moors in Iberia,heretics in southern France, pagans innorthern Europe and the political oppo-nents of the papacy on the Italian peninsu-la. Yet, though medieval Christiansviewed all these various campaigns as cru-sades, fighting in the Holy Land wasunderstood as being the ultimate form ofcrusading. In his latest book on the sub-ject, the prolific Norman Housley, a pro-fessor of history at the University ofLeicester, provides a full immersion intothe origins, experience and impact of cru-sading to the Middle East.

Since the events of Sept. 11, 2001,there has been a noticeable surge of bookson the Crusades. The “politically incor-rect,” “idiots” and even those with shortattention spans have all had titles aimed atsatisfying their apparent thirst for crusad-ing knowledge. In contrast to most ofthese recent tomes, however, Housley’sbook is not a narrative history of the


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es had perished) is amusing, but also quitetelling.

Though it is published by an academ-ic press, Fighting for the Cross: Crusading tothe Holy Land is accessible to a generalaudience. Housley regularly incorporatesquotations from contemporary sources,which, along with an assortment of maps,photographs and illustrations, furtherenhance the average reader’s understand-ing of different aspects of crusading. Thebook loses some momentum in the lastchapter and ends somewhat abruptly. Amore focused conclusion or summationwould have been useful. Also, the subtitleof the book is slightly misleading, sincethree of the key expeditions that Housleyconsiders had ultimately little to do withthe Holy Land. The Fourth Crusade waspermanently sidetracked to Constantino-ple, and the Fifth and Seventh Crusadeswere focused on Egypt. But as a title,“Crusading to the eastern Mediterranean”doesn’t have quite the same ring. Clearly,these minor shortcomings detract littlefrom a study that succeeds in providing uswith a better understanding of what theexperience of crusading entailed.

Vincent Ryan

Crusades. While he does provide a shortoverview of the various crusading cam-paigns in the East so that the average read-er has the foundation to proceed, his pri-mary aim is to determine what crusadingmeant for the men and women involved.

For many, the decision to go on cru-sade was rooted in personal piety. Wetend to think of crusading as a holy war,but medieval people perceived it primari-ly as a new type of pilgrimage.Pilgrimages were an increasinglypopular spiritual activity during the11th century, and Jerusalem was con-sidered the holiest place on earth.Pope Urban II’s fusion of penitentialand pilgrimage language with warfare inproclaiming the First Crusade receivedgreat support throughout Europe. Hismessage resonated especially with thosewho felt weighed down by an aching senseof sinfulness—namely the knightly class.While the audience was ripe, recruitmentefforts were still necessary to secure theinvolvement of potential enlistees.Crusade preachers employed a variety oftechniques and approaches. Some arguedwhat a great bargain crusading was, sincethe punishment for one’s sins would bewiped away in exchange for participatingin the expedition. Other preachers usedmotifs that played particularly to aristo-cratic audiences. For example, the HolyLand was portrayed as Christ’s fief and thecrusaders as his vassals, who needed toregain their lord’s lost domain.

The fact that they were motivatedchiefly by piety does not mean that allcrusaders maintained entirely puremotives. Some certainly enlisted to gainworldly riches. Others probably saw thisas a secondary advantage to taking thecross. However, the old argument thatcrusading was mainly undertaken forfinancial reasons is no longer viable. AsHousley convincingly demonstrates,crusading was a financially drainingenterprise. At different times the crownor the church tried to help underwritethe costs, but most crusaders had to relychiefly on family resources to fund theirexpeditions. Cash was crucial, and toraise it lands were often sold for a frac-tion of their actual value. Many werebankrupted by crusading.

Others have claimed that crusadingwas mostly for younger sons who had noprospects for inheritance. It was the “land”

part of the Holy Land that moved theirhearts. Studies of the crusaders’ back-grounds, however, have indicated that theoldest sons were the most likely to partic-ipate. On the other hand, if the Crusadeswere really a thinly veiled land-grab byimpecunious younger sons, the evidencedoes not support such a view. When theFirst Crusade ended, after venerating the

Holy Sepulcher most of the remain-ing participants returned home.

While the sections onpreparation and motivationmight be the most interesting

parts of the book, the chapterson travel and warfare are enlight-

ening on a number of issues. Gainingconverts was a minimal concern for eitherside. Famine and disease were often moredeadly than combat. The crusaders’ hors-es were extremely important. TheMuslims understood their great militaryvalue and began targeting these animals.The Christian sources often indicate howcrippling food shortages were for both thecrusaders and their steeds and sometimesdiscuss casualties in terms of horses lost.An anecdote about a crusader lamentinghaving to ride a donkey (since all his hors-


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Wisdom Fromthe BeastsThe Truro Bear andOther AdventuresPoems and EssaysBy Mary OliverBeacon Press. 96p $23ISBN 9780807068847

Mary Oliver’s newest book, The TruroBear and Other Adventures: Poems andEssays, will certainly please connoisseurs ofher work and will likely win her new read-ers as well. The 35 poems and prosesketches in the collection that have beenpreviously published present themselves asfamiliar friends to Oliver fans, while the10 new selections bear the stamp of hersignature style. The pleasures that awaitthe reader just discovering the work of thePulitzer-prize-winning poet are thosedelivered by her previous 18 volumes: herkeen eye for telling detail, the surprise ofthe unexpected and, most important, theauthoritative voice that portrays our worldas both ordinary and enchanted, full ofnatural beauty and supernatural holiness,and marvelous in its many perfections.

The Truro Bear covers familiar terrainin terms of genre, yet Oliver makes use ofthe traditions she borrows from in inter-esting ways. The strain most evident in thepoems is that of environmentalism, a sub-genre deeply embedded in American liter-ary tradition. Oliver’s poems hearken backto her 19th-century mentors—particularlyEmerson, Thoreau and Whitman—intheir attentiveness to the natural worldand what it teaches us about ourselves; andyet they are compellingly current, giventhe fragile condition of the earth and itscreatures. Her prose sketch “At HerringCove” begins as a description of the beach,Thoreauvian in its detailed account of thesand’s composition and the nine-foot riseand fall of the tide, but then moves in anunanticipated direction as the speakerrecites a litany of unnatural articles—including beer cans, plastic bottles andhypodermic needles—that wash up on theshore. The catalogue grows more disturb-ing as she names not only the refuse werelease into the environment but also thecreatures it has killed: “Dead harbor seal,


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dead gull, dead merganser, dead gan-net...dead dovekie in winter.” The list,with its anaphoric repetition, seems tosound the death knell of nature and iden-tifies human waste as, at best, a contribut-ing cause.

This characterization of animals asvictims of human indifference is counter-balanced in the volume with those of avery different sort. Another generic modelfrom which Oliver borrows is the fable.True to the ancient genre, the animals inmany of these poems assume human char-acteristics, including the ability to speak,and each tale imparts a moral usually hav-ing to do with some human folly and itscorresponding virtue. Yet, again, she doesnot conform strictly to the genre. Theconversations are mediated by a veryhuman poet who intervenes in the naturalworld, self-consciously so. As in poems byher predecessors Whitman and Frost,wherein mockingbirds and ovenbirdsspeak, the poet serves as interpreter, pre-senting what the beasts have to teach us inlanguage the reader can understand.

The use of personification in the col-lection performs the important function ofreminding us that human beings are butone part of a much larger community ofcreatures, but overuse of the techniqueruns the risk of sentimentality. This ismost evident in the 13 pieces that featurethe poet’s dog, Percy (named after thepoet, Shelley) and serve as the final move-ment of the volume. “The Percy Poems”can be funny and sweet (particularly fordog lovers) in the dog’s-eye view of theworld they present, and there is poignan-cy in some of them. In the fourth poem ofthe series, the poet, who is grieving thedeath of her beloved companion, findssolace in the simple actions of feeding andplaying with her little dog. Clearly, helends her life order, continuity and pur-pose at a moment when the reality of losshas her teetering on the brink of chaos.But the speaker’s attachment to himsometimes borders on fondness in the old-fashioned sense of the word. Poets whowrite poems about their children run asimilar risk: a child’s amusing sayings arerarely as charming to strangers as they areto their smitten parents.

By the same token, there is a franknessand vulnerability in the voice of thesepoems as the speaker surrenders,unabashed, to this humble creature who

enchants her. Indeed, along with listening,the attitude the poet most frequentlyassumes is that of kneeling before the cre-ation in recognition of its holiness. Thistenderness is reminiscent of the work of thePersian poet Rumi, another of Oliver’smasters, who once wrote: “There are ahundred ways to kiss the ground,” a line sheechoes elsewhere in her poems. And kissthe ground she does, over and over again.

The most compelling pieces in TruroBear are those wherein the poet acknowl-edges the dark, inscrutable qualities of the

creatures she meets (“Alligator Poem” and“Swoon,” among others). These piecesprovide a corrective to the domesticatedview of the natural world prevalent inother poems and bear witness to nature’spower and mystery, qualities bound upwith our own mortality and ineffable des-tiny. The speaker in “Alligator Poem” sur-vives an encounter with death “in beauti-ful Florida” and describes her resurrec-tion, amazed at “how I rose from theground/ and saw the world as if for thesecond time,/ the way it really is.” This is


the redemptive vision the best of MaryOliver’s poems offer, that of a fallen worldimplicitly governed by an unnamed god ofsecond chances. Like Lazarus before her,the poet experiences the inexhaustiblepossibilities of nature in meeting its limithead on, and lives to tell the tale he didnot. Angela O’Donnell

ConstantlyRenewedThe ChurchThe Evolution of CatholicismBy Richard P. McBrienHarperOne. 528p $29.95ISBN 9780061245213

Is the Catholic Church a lifeboat or a light-house? In the storms that wrack the world,is the church the means of salvation for itsmembers alone, or a beacon that wouldlead all to safe haven? The distinguishedscholar and professor of theology at theUniversity of Notre Dame, whose previ-ous works include Catholicism, Ministry andLives of the Popes, Richard P. McBrienoffers us a history of ecclesiologies—thatis, a review and an analysis of the church’sevolving self-understanding over time.

Too vast a project for a single volume,this book follows Karl Rahner’s division ofthe history of the church into three greateras and focuses mainly on the third, ourown present situation, after briefly pre-senting the first and second. Rahner iden-tified two axial moments when the churchrecognized it was changing radically: thefirst was the Council of Jerusalem (c. 50A.D.), when the Jewish Christian move-ment entered into the Greco-Romanworld; the second was the Second VaticanCouncil (1963-65), when the movementbecame a world church.

Among the chief purposes of any workof history (besides telling a good story well)is to locate its readers in the present and toorient them toward the future; here,McBrien helps the reader to understandthe church in the post-Vatican II era. Sincethere is no little debate within the churchas to exactly what the council intended,much of the present volume is a close read-ing of texts, within the context of theircomposition and the immediate historybefore the council, but with regular


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Holy Spirit, sent by the Father through theSon, who animates, informs, reforms andguides the church, so that the same HolySpirit, working within and beyond the vis-

ible limits of the church, can lead peoplein faith to the Son, who in turn

shows them the Father.Ideally suited for undergradu-

ate courses and for the educatednonspecialist, this is a hopeful book.

As the author candidly sketches outthe pastoral challenges to, and the internaltensions within, the church today, he is notpessimistic. Neither is he optimistic as herecalls the great gifts of the Holy Spiritthat inspired those papal and conciliar textsthat point the way forward for the churchin the new millennium. Rather, he is hope-ful as he urges the church to conform itselfto the pattern of Christ, the paschal mys-tery, whereby the church, trusting fullyand finally in God alone, can die to formsof being and doing that are no longer apt.Such “reform in head and members,”guided by the Spirit, will allow the churchto serve as a renewed instrument for God’songoing project, the salvation ofhumankind and the perfection of all cre-ation. Paul J. Fitzgerald

recourse to the person of Jesus, seen in theGospels and epistles of the early church.

McBrien sketches the current debatesabout the nature and mission of the churchas a polarity between two guiding andunderlying images: the church as people ofGod and the church as communion.Advocates of the former image would putthe emphasis on the mission of the churchad extra—the church as an agent of Godfor the salvation of humankind. Advocatesof the latter image put the emphasis on thelife of the church ad intra—the churchgathered in orthodox worship and adora-tion of the triune God. McBrien adopts aboth/and position, showing how the“Dogmatic Constitution on the Church”and the “Pastoral Constitution on theChurch in the Modern World” are organ-ically linked and mutually necessary. More,to be a church for the whole world obligesCatholics to repair the fissures that dividethe visible body of Christ by seeking everfuller degrees of communion with theOrthodox and Protestants. Here McBrienaccepts Pope John Paul II’s invitation,issued in Ut unum sint (1995), to imagine arenewed primacy and collegiality thatcould promote Christian unity in authen-tic, apostolic faith.

Like the author’s other great works,The Church is encyclopedic. It covers a vastrange of topics, including authority andministry, magisterial teaching and recep-tion, sacraments and liturgy. In each case,McBrien provides not only a sense of thedevelopment of tradition but also a certainbreadth of opinion by important (mostlyCatholic) theologians, as well as a carefulexplication of official church teaching onthe issue at hand. Such breadth typicallyprecludes depth, yet while the sketches areoften quite brief, there are ample biblio-graphical notes to point readers towardfurther investigation and study. McBrien isparticularly helpful in providing the inter-ested reader with references at differentlevels of complexity: for example, toexplore the cultural context and the style ofconciliar language, one could read thebook by John O’Malley, S.J., Four Culturesof the West; or one could get the gist of theargument in O’Malley’s article “The Styleof Vatican II” (America, 2/24/03).

While he does a fine job of sketchingout many ecclesiologies from across thetheological spectrum, from conservative toprogressive, McBrien tips his hand in favorof one: that of Yves Congar, O.P., towhom he dedicates the book andwhom he calls “the most impor-tant ecclesiologist of the twentiethcentury and probably of the entirehistory of the Church.” Congaranticipated Vatican II by illuminat-ing six major components that make upthe reality of the church. (1) As the peopleof God, the church is constantly renewedby the active participation of all her mem-bers, lay, religious and clerical alike. (2)Hierarchical authority is servant leader-ship. (3) The church is an instrument forthe eschatological victory of God. (4) Thechurch is continually called to institutionaland communal reform in head and mem-bers. (5) As a communion of local church-es, the universal church’s structures ofcommunity and authority serve her mis-sion. And (6) the church is ecumenical innature and scope.

Key to appreciating Congar’s ecclesio-logical thought is to understand it as a con-sequence of his pneumatology: it is the


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Richard P. McBrien on "WhatTheology Is and Is Not," atamericamagazine.org/pages.

demonstrated advanced level skills in MicrosoftWord, Excel, PowerPoint and Publisher. Haveexcellent interpersonal, pastoral listening andcommunication skills, both verbal and written, in aculturally diverse working environment. Haveexcellent skills and confidence in making presenta-tions or conducting training, coupled with abilityto work with minimum supervision.Demonstrated strong organizational and collabo-ration skills and strong ability to multitask and pri-oritize work flow. Must be able to handle highlyconfidential information in a discreet and profes-sional manner. Will be required to undergo an in-depth reference and background check. Must haveown transportation for travel throughoutRiverside and San Bernardino Counties asrequired. Please send résumé, including salaryrequirements, to: Diocese of San Bernardino,Attn: Human Resources, 1201 E. Highland Ave.San Bernardino, CA 92404; Fax: (909) 475-5189;e-mail: [email protected].

ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR FOR LITURGICAL MUSIC,Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston. Join growingOffice of Worship staff serving 1.5 millionCatholics. Responsibilities: oversee liturgicalmusic for nonparish episcopal liturgies at co-cathe-dral and basilica; direct/develop/oversee arch-diocesan choir(s) and ensembles, liturgical musi-cian formation; assist with preparation of arch-diocesan liturgies, projects and programs; resourceto parishes, organizations. Requirements:Practicing Catholic; M.A. in liturgical music orcomparable; five years’ experience as parish musicdirector; thorough knowledge of Roman Rite;proficient in organ/piano, conducting or vocal per-formance; MS Office and music notation software.Bilingual (Spanish/English) strongly preferred.Send résumé, cover letter and salary requirementsto: [email protected]. Open until filled.

DIRECTOR, Volunteer Program, Society of thePrecious Blood. The Missionaries of the PreciousBlood, centered in Kansas City, Mo., is lookingfor a qualified person to become the director of itsinitial volunteer program, to be sponsored by theprovince. The Precious Blood is an internationalcommunity that furthers the work of reconcilia-tion, lay ministry and the mission of the PreciousBlood through parishes, retreats, education/teaching and emphasis on the Word of God. It isin 20 countries worldwide.

The Director will be responsible forrecruitment, training and placement of volun-teers, with the assistance of an advisory board.Qualifications for the position include energyand experience of volunteer programs, beingCatholic, some flexibility for travel, an interestin social justice and a willingness to work withyoung people. Salary and benefits are commen-surate with other directors.

For more information or to apply please con-tact Rev. Jim Urbanic, C.P.P.S., P.O. Box 339,Liberty, MO 64069; Ph: (816) 781-4344. E-mail:[email protected]. Applications and contactinformation submitted by Oct. 20, 2008.

THE HARVARD CATHOLIC CHAPLAINCY seeks a

qualified and experienced individual as a campusminister. The chaplain’s primary outreach isdirected toward Catholic undergraduates attend-ing Harvard College. The chaplain serves thiscommunity with a priest chaplain along withthree other Catholic chaplains who minister tothe wider university community in various ways.The candidate should have a mature, activeCatholic faith, be articulate in the pastoral appli-cation of church teachings and possess a wel-coming presence. Areas of responsibility includepastoral availability and organizational coopera-tion with student leadership, fellow chaplainsand staff. The chaplain would be involved inplanning and executing ongoing faith formation,student liturgical life, retreats and service trips.The chaplain must also work with a Director ofDevelopment in order to raise funds for theChaplaincy. The chaplain would be expected toattend regular meetings with the HarvardCatholic chaplains as well as the meetings withthe interdenominational chaplains at HarvardUniversity. Experience in serving undergradu-ates, particularly young Catholic women, isrequired as well as relevant education to a mas-ter’s level. Interested persons should submit acurriculum vitae and cover letter to: Rev. RobertJ. Congdon, Senior Chaplain, 29 Mount AuburnStreet, Cambridge, MA 02138, or to [email protected].

THE SAN MIGUEL SCHOOL of Camden, a CatholicLasallian middle school for boys, seeks an energet-ic and visionary PRINCIPAL for its curricular andco-curricular programs. The Principal reports tothe President. The qualified applicant must have atleast a master’s degree in educational administra-tion and previous elementary and/or middleschool administrative experience, preferably inCatholic schools. Interested candidates shouldsend their résumé, statement of educational phi-losophy and three references to: The San MiguelSchool of Camden, Attn: Principal SearchCommittee, 836 South Fourth Street, Camden NJ08103 or by e-mail to: [email protected]. Deadline for applications is Nov. 1, 2008.

RetreatsBETHANY SPIRITUALITY CENTER, N.Y.,announces the following fall retreat: “Open YourHeart...Transform Loss...Enjoy New Freedom inLater Life,” an interactive guided retreat withAnn Billard, O.L.M., Nov. 16-20. Bethany is onehour northwest of New York, in the mid-HudsonValley. Offering: $325. Please visitwww.bethanyspiritualitycenter.org, or call (845)460-3061.

Spiritual PrintsMETAPHORS FOR THE JOURNEY. Photographicprints for spiritual direction work or prayer.www.smallsmallacts.com; Ph: (888) 707 6255.

TranslatorSPANISH TRANSLATOR, Luis Baudry, specializedin Catholic matters (Bible, spirituality, ministry,etc.). Books, articles and Web sites. Ph: (646) 257-4165, or [email protected]

EducationOBLATE SCHOOL OF THEOLOGY offers an M.A.degree in spirituality. Regular semester and inter-session courses. Visit www.ost.edu.

Parish MissionsINSPIRING, DYNAMIC PREACHING: parish mis-sions, retreats, days of recollection. www.sab-bathretreats.org.

PositionsASSOCIATE DIRECTOR. The Diocese of SanBernardino is currently accepting résumés for theposition of Associate Director of EcclesialServices. This position is jointly responsible forcoordinating the ecclesial ministries of the dio-cese, including clergy, religious and lay leadershipof parishes such as pastoral coordinators and pas-toral associates, vocations, seminarians, parishtransitions and related matters.

The ideal candidate will have a master’sdegree majoring in theology, psychology, socialstudies, business administration or similar fields ofstudy, plus five or more years of working experi-ence showing progressive responsibility or equiva-lent experience. Must be a practicing Catholic witha good understanding of church teachings andfamiliarity with how the church is structured andfunctions day to day. Bilingual/biliterate,English/Spanish abilities (speak, read, accuratelytranslate) are required. Computer literate with


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Father Klein has underrated the power-ful role that Newman Centers and otherchaplaincies have played in recent years.Having spent nearly 40 years inCatholic, public and other private uni-versities, I am of the opinion that staffpersons serving schools that are notCatholic regularly find themselves invery important situations and are oftenmuch better prepared to meet studentswhere they live and work. I also haveexperienced strong and sensitive rela-tionships with university administratorsand faculty, as these professionals havediscovered just how important churchpeople are in assisting them in teachingand forming students.

Both Catholic and non-Catholicinstitutions share a task, and each seeksto manage that task well. I see no rea-son to think that asking the importantquestions, and finding people who areexpected to respond to them, is easieror more effective in a Catholic institu-tion. Actually, I have experienced justthe contrary.

Patrick LaBelle, O.P.Stanford, Calif.

Still StandingThe Sulpician Fathers are grateful toAmerica for publishing a glowing birth-day tribute to Father Jean-Jacques Olier(“Christians Who Can Breathe AndLaugh,” by William Thompson-Uberuaga, 9/15). Thompson-Uberuaga iscorrect in writing that we are a smallcommunity today without the nationalprominence we may once have had.Nevertheless, as our Web site(www.sulpicians.org) shows, we are not“down to two” seminaries in this country.The Holy Spirit, who inspired FatherOlier, continues to call us to find newways to serve the church by serving thepriesthood.

(Very Rev.) Thomas R. Ulshafer, S.S.Acting Provincial Superior

Society of St. SulpiceBaltimore, Md.

Educational AdvancesReading “Religious Life in the Age ofFacebook,” by Richard G. Malloy, S.J.(7/14), I emphatically disagreed that stu-dents today simply “can’t handle” Rahneror any other rigorous theological text.Students today are asked to synthesize awider array of data and take into accountmany different perspectives. The greateducational advances of the day havebeen around the process of thinkingitself—not merely the memorization ofstories from previous generations, but theability to process critically and reflect onthe world around us (including organizedreligion).

Also, Father Malloy is right that stu-dents today are exploring different reli-gious traditions, but I do not understandwhy that is a negative. There is some-thing to be said for knowing one’s owntradition; but ultimately a blending ofworld religions is conducive to intercul-tural understanding, cooperation andpeace.

Justin McMahonChicago, Ill.

Time for a BoycottRegarding your editorial on the situationin India (“Persecution in Orissa,” 9/22): itseems to me that much of the impetus forthe growing religious intolerance in Indiastems from the booming economicstrength of India that has empoweredethnic and religious majorities to expressthemselves in unprecedented ways. Moraleducation has not kept pace with thisgrowing economy, and such education isnot likely to occur until economic incen-tives are brought into the equation.These can encourage a spirit of tolerance,interfaith cooperation and education.Perhaps a worldwide boycott of Indiangoods and services, supported by reli-gious leaders, would encourage India’spolitical leaders to work more ferventlyto rekindle the vision of unity that was sobrilliantly fostered by Mahatma Gandhiand his followers.

Dan Callahan, S.A.Toronto, Ont.

Higher LearningRe the Rev. Terrance W. Klein’s “ASpace for Inquiry” (9/15): I believe that


Letters

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N BIBLICAL TIMES when ancientIsraelites tried to imagine what thefullness of God’s kingdom would belike, one of their favorite images was

a banquet. Today’s passage from Isaiah 25provides a good example. The prophetpictures God’s kingdom as a grand ban-quet with “a feast of rich food and choicewines.” In a society in which such foodand drink were in short supply, the imagewas powerful. The one who supplies thisextraordinary meal is “the Lord of hosts,”and it is open to “all peoples.” It takesplace on “this mountain,” most likely theTemple Mount in Jerusalem, which itselfwas an image of God’s dwelling place. Atthis banquet God will destroy death, endall suffering and bring about salvation. Atthis banquet the hopes of God’s peoplewill be fulfilled.

Psalm 23 (“The Lord is my shep-herd”) is most famous for its pastoralimagery of God’s care for us, leading usthrough the dark and dangerous places inour lives. The second half of the psalm,however, shifts the imagery and portraysGod as the host at a lavish banquet. In theancient Near East the two images—shep-herd and host—were often applied tokings. Psalm 23 uses them to describe Godas the king of kings and lord of lords.

The third banquet image in thisSunday’s readings, the parable of the royalbanquet in Matthew 22, develops theimagery further to make two importantpoints about God’s kingdom. We have toaccept the invitation to the banquet, andwe have to behave in an appropriate man-ner when we are allowed in.

In Matthew’s version of the parable,the invitation is to a royal wedding feastfor a king’s son. Most people invited tosuch a banquet would feel honored and

make every effort to attend. What is pecu-liar in this case is that those initially invit-ed (the “A list” guests) refuse to come.They do not even bother to give goodexcuses, and they proceed to abuse andmistreat those who were sent to deliverthe invitation.

We know from the start that this para-ble concerns the kingdom of heaven. Inwhat is a kind of allegory, the king is God,the servants are the prophets, and the onesrefusing their invitation are those whoreject Jesus’ invitation to enter God’skingdom. The point of the first part of the

banquet parable is that if you hope to par-ticipate in God’s kingdom, you must firstaccept the invitation. In Matthew’s con-text, the king’s harsh treatment of the city(“the king was enraged and sent histroops”) alludes to the destruction ofJerusalem and its temple by the Romans inA.D. 70. And the rejection of the invita-tion by the “A list” people (like the scribesand Pharisees) opens up the banquetguests to include marginal persons (liketax collectors and sinners) and eventuallyeven Gentiles.

The second part of the parable (whichmay well have once been a separate para-ble) insists that it is not enough merely togain entrance to the banquet hall. Oncethere, you must behave in an appropriatemanner. What if you had been invited tothe White House for dinner and arrived inclothes that you normally use for yardwork or painting? You would probably be

asked to leave. The point is that havingbeen admitted to God’s kingdom by faithand baptism, we will be expected to act inways that befit who we have become “inChrist.”

The Eucharist we celebrate as thesacrament of ongoing Christian life standsin the biblical banquet tradition. It is thebanquet of God’s Son and points towardfullness of life in God’s kingdom. But it isnot enough simply to show up. Rather, weneed to participate actively, let the mys-tery of the Eucharist shape our identity,and we must act appropriately in oureveryday lives.

The excerpts from Paul’s awkward“thank you” note in Philippians 4 can helpus grasp better the proper framework forappropriate Christian action. In wordsoften compared to the teachings of Stoicphilosophers, Paul first offers a classicstatement of independence and self-reliance: “I have learned, in whatever situ-ation I find myself, to be self-sufficient.”Yet Paul was more reliant on God than onhimself: “I can do all things in him whostrengthens me.” Moreover, in carryingout his mission to found new communitiesall over the Mediterranean world, Paulrelied on a team of co-workers. And hepraises the Philippians for sharing his dis-tress during imprisonment and for send-ing him some kind of gift. Paul’s exampleindicates that at its best, Christian lifecombines self-reliance, reliance on Godand reliance on others.

Daniel J. Harrington

God’s BanquetTwenty-eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time (A), Oct. 12, 2008

Readings: Is 25:6-10; Ps 23:1-6; Phil 4:12-14, 19-20; Mt 22:1-14

“The kingdom of heaven may be likened to a king who gave a wedding feast forhis son” (Mt 22:2)

DANIEL J. HARRINGTON, S.J., is professor ofNew Testament at Boston College School ofTheology and Ministry in Chestnut Hill,Mass.

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Praying With Scripture• Why was the banquet an effectiveway for biblical authors to describe thekingdom of God?

• How might Jesus’ banquet parableenrich your appreciation of and partici-pation in the Eucharist?

• In your everyday life, how do youcombine self-reliance, God-relianceand reliance on others?

Documents

F IT’S OCTOBER, - America · The Shack: Where Tragedy Confronts Eternity, by William P. Young? The book appeared late last year, but I learned about it only this past spring, by