Monday, February 22, 2021
Monday, February 1, 2021
Lex Anteinternet: Cliff notes of the Zeitgeist Part I. Observations on current events, political, economic, religious, and otherwise.
Lex Anteinternet: Cliff notes of the Zeitgeist Part I. Some Observa...: 1. Populism and racism aren't the same thing, even if some populist are racist. Theodore Roosevelt. He was a populist, and a progressi...
The entry it self is fairly long. I'm only linking in the ones that are relevant here.
Cliff notes of the Zeitgeist Part I. Some Observations on current events, political, economic, religious, and otherwise.
5. Apparently "innocent until proven guilty" is something that nobody really believes. . . or at least it doesn't apply to Catholic clerics.
I haven't commented on this before and perhaps I shouldn't here, but I'm going to anyhow.
The Tribune has been following, understandably, the legal woes of retired Wyoming Bishop Joseph Hart now for years. Bishop Hart was accused of sexual ickyness with male minors.
During the same period of time during which Hart has been dealing with this, three local Protestant ministers have faced the same accusations, and they all proved true. Mention of it in the Press was very brief. No following story occurred. Hart's story has, however, proven different.
The initial investigation lead the Laramie County authorities to pass on doing anything. They didn't see enough evidence. The current Bishop, however, Bishop Biegler, chose to revive the matter within the church itself and that lead to it being looked at by the authorities a second time. On that second occasion, the prosecutor in Natrona County again determined not to charge Bishop Hart with anything. That lead to criticism, he reopened the file and, after some time had passed, he once again determined not to file charges.
The internal church matter, however, went on to some sort of tribunal at the Vatican. And now it also has determined that there's not enough there to do anything.
With this being the case, Bishop Hart, over a period of decades, has endured and prevailed over four separate prosecutorial episodes, three at the state level, and one at hte Vatican level.
The American myth is that you are innocent until proven guilty. Hart hasn't been proven guilty of anything. The Tribune, however, continues to treat his as if he is guilty adn getting away with it. Indeed, Bishop Biegler isn't helping much either as, having gotten this rolling, he's still basically sending out signals that he believes that Hart is guilty and will be crediting his accusers in spite of yaers and years of such efforts having failed. This gets to something regarding Bishop Biegler we'll deal with in a moment, but we'll note this here.
Bishop Hart gets this sort of attention as he's Catholic. The Catholic Church has gone through a horrific episode recently, now mostly addressed, with clerics who are now all older having committed terrible sexual transgressions. Most of these, however, seem to have arisen due to a vareity of factors that let in priests who were not there for the right reasons, although their views are ones that the press also genuinely celebrates. Indeed, this takes us back to the culture wars item above, as Catholic clerics that are loyal to the Church's traditional beliefs and dogma are ones that the press really doesn't like.
And for that reason, it doesn't like the church itself, which is why this gets so much press but real proven accusations by protestant minister is the same readership field, do not.
6. Bishop Biegler and the rearward gaze.
We're now a full year into a present massive crisis that has caused a crisis in the Church but to look at the Diocese of Cheyenne, you'd not know it.
The Bishop has suspended the obligation to attend Mass on what is now running up on a year. I had real doubts about this early on, but as the pandemic deepened, I have to admit that at some point, that's valid. As soon as the churches were opened back up, I started going back to Mass, but in the recent deepened episode, I suspended going, taking advantage of the dispensation as I had a childhood asthma condition and I really don't want to get virus, particularly with vaccinations come on so soon.
Anyhow, if you check in on the Diocese website the first thing you are going to find is a statement by Bishop Biegler about retried Bishop Hart.
Bishop Hart was the bishop here from 1978 until 2001. I.e., he hasn't been the bishop for 20 years. He's been retired for 20 years. We're on our third bishop since that time.
Wyoming, as we've noted above, is a highly transient state. There's a core of us diehards who were born here, and who will die here, and who are watching people come and go in the meantime. And quite a few of us, although its a minority in the state's population, are Catholic. Quite a few of the transients are too.
Most of the people in the pews have very low interest, in this point, in the Joseph Hart saga. It doesn't impact our daily lives whatsoever. When Hart was last Bishop, I was 37 years old and my youngest child was a baby.
The pandemic does impact my daily life.
During the entire pandemic, I haven't had a representative of the parish reach out even once. I've reached in several times, but at the time the pandemic struck I'd only recently gone off of a parish council.
Indeed, the pandemic struck at a particularly bad time, in this context, for me, as I'd gone off of the council and I stepped down as a lector as the Mass time didn't work well for my spouse and both kids were headed off to Laramie. I'd been a lector at that point for years and years, and I do miss it. But as that occurred it was also the case that the downtown parish was clearly being changed into the Hispanic parish. That's fine, but Mass times were also altered for reasons that aren't clear to me, and therefore I went across town to another parish. The entire process left me feeling a bit unmoored as the parish that I'd served at quickly became pretty unrecognizable, the new Priest had no idea who I was, the focus was on a demographic that needs to be focused on but which I'm not part of, and then the pandemic hit.
The parish I was going to did a good job at first at dealing with the crisis but then the Bishop ordered the doors closed. I'm sure I'm just lost to where I was at, and now I'm barely known where I am. I get that.
What I don't get, quite frankly, is why there wasn't a full scale effort to require the parishes to reach out to parishioners. There wasn't. Or at least there wasn't one that I could see. And to check in on the Diocese website to learn the latest in regard to the church and the pandemic is a disappointment, as the information is hard to find. News on Bishop Biegler and Bishop Hart is easy to find, however.
And here's the point. In a pandemic in which our connections with our parish is now strained and souls stand to be lost, dealing with a problem that's now 20 years in our review mirror should not be front and center.
Friday, December 25, 2020
Lex Anteinternet: Merry Christmas! Καλά Χριστούγεννα, Frohe Weihnac...
Merry Christmas! Καλά Χριστούγεννα, Frohe Weihnachten!, Поздравляю со cветлым праздником Рождества!, Häid jõule, Mutlu Noeller, Priecīgus Ziemassvētkus, क्रिसमस की बधाई, Linksmų Kalėdų, Bella da Nadel!, کریسمس مبارک, สุขสันต์วันคริสต์มาส, Ya Krismasi, Felix dies Nativitatis, Nollaig Shona Daoibh!, Vrolijk kerstfeest!, Noflike krystdagen! Nollaig Chridheil, Krismasi njema, Natale! Joyeux Noël !, Gleðileg jól, ¡Feliz Navidad!, Feliz Natal!,God jul!. めりーくりすます, 행복한 크리스마스 되십시오, Chúc Giáng Sinh Vui Vẻ!, 圣诞节快乐, Maging maligaya sana ang iyong pasko, Hyvää Joulua! щасливого Різдва, Wesołych Świąt, Eguberri on, Eedookh Breekha, عيد ميلاد سعيد, חג מולד שמח, Craciun Fericit, Boldog Karácsonyt!, Cestit Bozic!
Now there were shepherds in that region living in the fields and keeping the night watch over their flock. The angel of the Lord appeared to them and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were struck with great fear.
The angel said to them, “Do not be afraid; for behold, I proclaim to you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.For today in the city of David a savior has been born for you who is Messiah and Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find an infant wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger.”
And suddenly there was a multitude of the heavenly host with the angel, praising God and saying: “Glory to God in the highest fand on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.”
When the angels went away from them to heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go, then, to Bethlehem to see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us.”
So they went in haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the infant lying in the manger. When they saw this, they made known the message that had been told them about this child. All who heard it were amazed by what had been told them by the shepherds.
And Mary kept all these things, reflecting on them in her heart.
Then the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, just as it had been told to them.
Καὶ ποιμένες ἦσαν ἐν τῇ χώρᾳ τῇ αὐτῇ ἀγραυλοῦντες καὶ φυλάσσοντες φυλακὰς τῆς νυκτὸς ἐπὶ τὴν ποίμνην αὐτῶν. Καὶ ἄγγελος κυρίου ἐπέστη αὐτοῖς, καὶ δόξα κυρίου περιέλαμψεν αὐτούς• καὶ ἐφοβήθησαν φόβον μέγαν. Καὶ εἶπεν αὐτοῖς ὁ ἄγγελος, Μὴ φοβεῖσθε• ἰδοὺ γάρ, εὐαγγελίζομαι ὑμῖν χαρὰν μεγάλην, ἥτις ἔσται παντὶ τῷ λαῷὅτι ἐτέχθη ὑμῖν σήμερον σωτήρ, ὅς ἐστιν χριστὸς κύριος, ἐν πόλει Δαυίδ. Καὶ τοῦτο ὑμῖν τὸ σημεῖον• εὑρήσετε βρέφος ἐσπαργανωμένον, καὶ κείμενον ἐν φάτνῃ. Καὶ ἐξαίφνης ἐγένετο σὺν τῷ ἀγγέλῳ πλῆθος στρατιᾶς οὐρανίου, αἰνούντων τὸν θεόν, καὶ λεγόντων, Δόξα ἐν ὑψίστοις θεῷ, καὶ ἐπὶ γῆς εἰρήνη• ἐν ἀνθρώποις εὐδοκία. Καὶ ἐγένετο, ὡς ἀπῆλθον ἀπ' αὐτῶν εἰς τὸν οὐρανὸν οἱ ἄγγελοι, οἱ ποιμένες ἐλάλουν πρὸς ἀλλήλους, Διέλθωμεν δὴ ἕως Βηθλέεμ, καὶ ἴδωμεν τὸ ῥῆμα τοῦτο τὸ γεγονός, ὃ ὁ κύριος ἐγνώρισεν ἡμῖν. Καὶ ἦλθαν σπεύσαντες, καὶ ἀνεῦραν τήν τε Μαριὰμ καὶ τὸν Ἰωσήφ, καὶ τὸ βρέφος κείμενον ἐν τῇ φάτνῃἸδόντες δὲ διεγνώρισαν περὶ τοῦ ῥήματος τοῦ λαληθέντος αὐτοῖς περὶ τοῦ παιδίου τούτου. Καὶ πάντες οἱ ἀκούσαντες ἐθαύμασαν περὶ τῶν λαληθέντων ὑπὸ τῶν ποιμένων πρὸς αὐτούς. Ἡ δὲ Μαριὰμ πάντα συνετήρει τὰ ῥήματα ταῦτα, συμβάλλουσα ἐν τῇ καρδίᾳ αὐτῆς. Καὶ ὑπέστρεψαν οἱ ποιμένες, δοξάζοντες καὶ αἰνοῦντες τὸν θεὸν ἐπὶ πᾶσιν οἷς ἤκουσαν καὶ εἶδον, καθὼς ἐλαλήθη πρὸς αὐτούς.
Tuesday, December 22, 2020
Churches of the West: On the morality of the Coronavirus Vaccines.
Churches of the West: On the morality of the Coronavirus Vaccines.: This is something that you have to be pretty attuned, I think, to the Catholic world to pick up on, and to appreciate. There's been som...
For most rank and file orthodox Catholics this will in fact be the end of this debate, but my prediction is that for some it will not for some Rad Trads who have headed off in the Dr. Taylor Marshall/Patrick Coffin direction.
Tuesday, December 15, 2020
On the morality of the Coronavirus Vaccines.
This is something that you have to be pretty attuned, I think, to the Catholic world to pick up on, and to appreciate. There's been some questioning in Catholic circles on whether its morally permissible to take the Coronavirus vaccines.
Before I get any further, let me state that at least in the Diocese of Cheyenne, where I live, it is. Our Bishop has so declared.
Okay, how does this all come up?
Well, not the way that you might suppose, at least if you are an American. There isn't a raging debate in the Catholic World about the efficacy of vaccinations. While that debate might exist in American society at large, where there's an anti Science tradition that's very long in standing, and which has been reamplified in recent years due to a decrease in science funding in education which was sufficiently pronounced such the standards of education could fall so low that a twit like Jenny McCarthy, who is only qualified as a big boob model, is actually taken seriously on a scientific matter (who would listen to McCarthy on anything is beyond me). No, this topic comes up due to a long standing Catholic moral principle holding that life can only be taken by a person in self defense.
Catholics are extremely serious about this. Much more so than other non pacifist. Catholics aren't overall pacifists, but the Church's view on when life can be taken is quite strict. It's often highly misunderstood, in part because the majority of Christians in the world are Catholic and lots of people in every religion will fail to follow the tenants of their faith.* And its also a standard that has evolved a bit as society and technology has evolved, while the wider facet of that being ignored has also tended to be ignored in some quarters. Perhaps the most dramatic examples of that might be the bombing campaigns of World War Two, a war for which the Allied cause is often cited as being about as close to a "just war" as a war can be. Be that as it may, it's nearly impossible to reconcile some of the Allied bombing efforts of the Second World War with justly fighting a war, and the use of the Atomic Bombs at the wars end almost certainly cannot be. Be that as it may, there were plenty of Catholic aircrewmen on bombers during the war.
And what isn't at issue is a religion based disagreement with science. Indeed, in spite of the intrusion of Protestant beliefs into the pews of Catholic Americans to some extent, the Catholic Church as a whole is hugely supportive of and a supporter of science. Indeed, ironically, at least one of the common scientific beliefs that some fundamentalist Protestants really have trouble with is one that a Catholic cleric came up with, that being the Big Bang Theory. Catholics generally love science.
So what's the problem here?
Well stem cells.
If you read the entry above you'll see that at least one of the vaccines was developed using stem cells at some point, but at the same time neither of the current ones used stem cells from a directly aborted baby. Given this, the Bishop of Cheyenne has given them a pass.
But the fact that this letter was issued also means that somebody had a question about it and it had to be addressed.
This isn't a majority of Catholic Bishops, we'd note. Whatever happened (the Jesuit magazine America claims it was due to misinformation regarding the vaccines) at least two American Bishops issued statements that condemned at least one of the vaccines. This lead to a corrective memo being issued by the United States Conference for Catholic Bishops which addressed that issue, which reads much the letter that is set out above. The vaccines are okay. The memo also apparently cited to a pro life organization that termed the vaccines as ethically uncontroversial.
The British Catholic Bishops went further and urged their flock to get the vaccines, noting that getting them was "not a sin".
In contrast, Auxiliary Bishop Athanasius Schneider of Kazakhstan declared the vaccines morally impermissible. And this is what makes this sort of peculiarly interesting.
Bishop Schneider is a traditionalist and is well known in traditionalist circles. He's an opponent of much of what was derived from Vatican II and is very outspoken.
Now, Catholics in the Diocese of Cheyenne are not obligated to follow the pronouncements of Bishop Schneider that are contrary to those of Bishop Biegler. The Bishop in your diocese, in the Catholic order of things, is the one that you need to pay attention to on certain things and can rely upon in others. Catholics owe their diocesan Bishop a degree of loyalty. If you are in a diocese in which the Bishop has said its morally impermissible to receive the vaccine, you can't simply just ignore that.
But in the current Internet Fueled Age considering the views of our local Bishop has become less common in areas in which people want to pick and choose their beliefs. Trad or Rad Trad Catholics latch on to statements like those from Bishop Schneider that fit their views and will reject them over their own Bishop.
Indeed, this has the odd impact of distorting the Catholic order pretty significantly. Even well into the mid 20th Century Catholics were much more in tune with what their own Bishops had to say than what the Pope might be doing. The Pope was far away and the Bishop was fairly near. This reflected the order of the Church. On day to day matters in the Catholic world, the Bishop was likely to be the one that Catholics heard from.
But now many Catholics tend to follow the Pope almost as if he was present in the local parish. In reality, what the parish Priest is doing tends to be immediately important to Catholics real lives more than what the Pope may be doing, on a daily basis. But if you read Catholic commentary now, particularly that of Trads and Rad Trads, you'd get the other view.
And not completely without reason. This Pope has been upsetting to orthodox Catholics. But that in turn as fueled a sort of hyper orthodoxy that predated Pope Francis.
I'm expecting that to develop here.
As for what I'm doing, vaccination wise, I'm receiving it as soon as I conceivably can, and I'm an orthodox Catholic.
And I think there may be another moral issue afloat here. In this day and age there's a massive amount of scientific bogosity that's circulating in society and many Americans, at least, have come down to believing things that are absolutely false. Indeed, on this issue, the irony is that there will be some Trads that will abstain from receiving the vaccine due to having views that are supported by pronouncement of Bishops like Bishop Schneider, who have a bit of a fan following, while other rank and file Protestant and non religious Americans will abstain as they've bought off on the blatherings of anti vaxer boob model Jenny McCarthy and her fellow travelers.
We'll deal with the strange era of anti scientific thought elsewhere on one of our companion blogs, but on an issue like this, for sincere Catholics, the issue thus becomes this. If it takes 70% of the population to become immune from a virus to achieve "herd immunity", and if we now that the virus kills, if we refuse to participate in achieving herd immunity, are we morally complicit to some degree in unnecessary deaths?
*One of my favorite examples was one of Cromwell's lieutenants who fought to prosecute the Anglican Church and the Catholic Church but who asked for, and received, permission for his mistress to be in prison with him rather than his wife. Granted, Crowwell's people were generally very serious Calvinist who believed in double predestination, something most who claim to be Calvinist today do not, but that's really taking that a bit far.
Sunday, December 13, 2020
On the ongoing dispensation for Mass attendance
The Bishop of Cheyenne has continued his disposition to attend Mass due to the Coronavirus Pandemic. His decree on the same is here:
First of all, I'm going to be blunt. The Diocese of Cheyenne has done a remarkably bad job during the Coronavirus Pandemic in getting the news out on anything.
Bad.
The Diocese seems to be of the view that Catholics in this state all check the web all the time, will log into parish websites, or maybe are in some sort of day to day communication with the parish.
They aren't.
Some are, and I can vouch for that as I was once on a Parish Council. There's a group of dedicated parishioners who are in constant contact with the Priest and their parishes, but there are a lot who very much are not.
Indeed, one of the real ironies in all of this is that Bishop Steven Biegler, who has only been in that position for a couple of years, has a fairly apparent interests in trying to reach Hispanic Catholics, who very much need to be reached. But to understand why we have so many Hispanic Catholics here, you also have to understand that we have a high transient population, much of which is based in the oilfield. I defended the depositions of two Mexican oilfield workers just a couple of weeks ago, and this is common. My guess is that the Hispanic population itself here has dramatically reduced in numbers over the past year, due to the oilfield depression, but be that as it may, I am extremely doubtful that Hispanic parishioners are going to be reached by their logging into the website of the Diocese or their Parish.
To add to that, neither are a lot of average parishioners. I haven't been contacted even once during the pandemic and I was a Parish Council member up until just before it hit, which also was just before the last Priest rotation. My guess is that I'm probably not on the active Parish roles anymore even though its my home Parish, as I started attending an across town Parish (I'm equidistant from all the Parishes in town) when the Mass schedule was changed as part of an evident effort to make it more convenient for Hispanic parishioners. I'm not complaining about that change, as its clear to me that they need to be reached, but when I switched where I normally go, I also started making my donations there, as I was there. As other family members also attend there, and as its a parish that I've attended at various points in the past (as I noted its just as close as my home parish, in terms of time of travel), they recognized me pretty quickly.
I suppose my overall point is is that I have had for a long time a vague feeling that Bishops don't always understand their Diocese very well. Our current Bishop is from South Dakota, a neighboring state, and that cuts against my argument. The prior one was from Wisconsin and a farmer by background, and a hunter, so he did have a grasp of the nature of where he was and seemed to appreciate that (he's now in Alaska). But cutting against that, it seems to me, are the seeming assumptions that everyone knows what is going on and everyone is checking in. Those sorts of parishes sound more like the ones the Priests on Catholic Stuff You Should Know discuss in Denver, rather than here, but maybe that's just me.
Even if it is just me, somebody should be reaching out. That isn't happening locally.
And as evidence of that, I only learned about the continued dispensation as the old one was running out, I think, on December 15, and I logged on a couple of weeks ago to see if my recollection was correct. To my surprise, it had been continued.
You'd have thought that there would have been an effort to reach out to people about this.
If there was, it didn't reach me.
So hence my complaint.
I'll further note that I was not happy with the churches closing in the first place. I'll admit now that my view was wrong. I was also very much unhappy with the suspension of all sacraments, which has been lifted. I don't think completely suspending Confession the way that itw as done was the right thing to do and I don't think it should have been done. I was nearly as glad to see the ban on Confessions lifted as I was to see Masses restored, as odd as that may seem.
When Masses were restored I started going again, but as the pandemic heated back up, I dropped back out the last few weeks. Hence the reason for my checking.
During this crisis I've learned that I miss Mass for sure and as a lifelong Catholic I've come to admire, as odd as that may seem, dedicated Protestants and Orthodox who go every Sunday not because of a church law but because they choose too. And when things opened back up, and I could go, I chose to. My suspension the last couple of weeks is because I'm one of those folks who have "conditions".
I'm in good health, but I had asthma pretty severely as a kid and it resumed after I went to law school for a period of time. When I was a kid I had to take shots weekly, or maybe it was biweekly, for what seemed like years, although the way such recollections work probably means it was not as great of period of time as I recall. The shots made things less worse, but not better. Fall was always a period of agony for me until I went to university the first time, and then they oddly left for the most par. I was aware that allergies could come and go, but I didn't expect it to occur to me.* I was very glad they had.
And then they returned when I was in law school. Pretty severely, in fact, and to some plant pollens I'd never been allergic to before. That caused me to have to resort to shots once again.
That helped clear things up for years, and indeed the allergies mostly seemed to go away. Here a couple of years ago we got a dog for the first time in our long marriage, and it was a breed advertised as hypoallergenic. It really seems to be. Before that, we obtained a cat as well, which we had for years. He simply moved in.
Having the cat caused me to believe that my animal allergies, which were widespread, had likely vanished. Cats are one of the things that I knew for certain that I was allergic to. Prior to getting the dog I went in to be tested and, nope, all the things I'd ever been allergic to, I still am.
Why aren't I reacting to them?
I have no idea.
I do know that in the fall in a bad year I'll get sick. I generally recognize what it is, but frankly it's very difficult to determine at the onset if its a cold, severe cold, allergies, or severe allergies. Long experience lets me generally guess right. Usually I only have to worry about this in the fall, as noted, and some falls, like this past one, not at all. Usually during the winter I'll experience some mild allergy symptoms all year long, which I think is due to working in a building that's over 100 years old. There's something in it, and when its really locked up and airtight, that gets to me. I can tell that's not a cold.
One of the things about having had a fairly pronounced asthma condition is that if you've had it, and probably early on before you knew you had it, you may very well have experienced nearly dying. Some asthmatics experience that repeatedly. I have. The experience is something nearly unique to asthmatics and its something that psychologist state that they rarely will describe to anyone. There's good reason for that, one being that its nearly indescribable.
The best actual description I've ever seen is set out in the book Mornings On Horseback, which is about Theodore Roosevelt's youth. TR was a severe asthmatic as a kid. The description is right on. What is hard to relate about it is that when a severe attack sets in you reach a point where you know that you are in real trouble and you are headed for death. It's pretty obvious. When you pull back out and recover you are exhausted, but also, oddly, euphoric, as you've cheated death. Those who have been asthmatics for a period of time, if they're conditions is serious, have experienced that again and again.
You also really learn to avoid what is trying to kill you like nothing else.
Which brings me back around to this.
Nobody ever recovers from an injury or affliction, really. If you've had some sort of severe condition, its' done its damage. Asthmatics that were well treated as kids usually have overcome it in part because they've been forced to develop their bodies. It's an oddity for sure, but at 57 years old I'm in a lot better shape than most 57 years old, a byproduct in part of the way our family has always lived but also in part due to my parents making sure I was active when I was young, mostly in swimming which is a good sport for asthmatics. But nonetheless, if you get a severe cold or flu, you remember the condition of your youth. When the wheezes stats to set in you recall what it was like and that death was always right around the corner. "Feeling poorly?" comes the question. "Having a hard time breathing" comes the answer. But in reality, you're laying on the sofa and death is in the chair across the room, you know it.
Most asthmatics also tend to become fairly fatalistic. There are those who claim that people can't imagine their own deaths and don't ever really accept that it will occur. I think that's baloney, and in reality what that might mean is pampered modern Americans can't imagine it and always imagine that in their 80s they'll really be in their 30s, but people who have had asthma can. Death has come and saddled you up on his horse plenty of times, and then simply dropped you back off. You know that one day he's coming again and won't let ago.
Generally we don't hope that's earlier than it needs to be, and hence why I've sat out the past few weeks.**
I frankly feel horrible about it and I don't think I personally do well without going to Mass and experiencing Christ in the Mass. I don't do well with alternatives. I'm hoping this is all over very soon.
I guess I understand the continuation of the dispensation, although at this point it frankly isn't worded very clearly. It seems we have a dispensation, and I think that my concerns qualify me for it, but it almost seems to be a qualified dispensation.
But at this point, somebody really needs to reach out.
*Indeed one of the features of having severe allergies is not only this mystery, but the common misunderstandings about it. I retain allergies, but I've endured a lecture from a person at one time who insisted that all childhood allergies vanish, something you can't tell somebody for whom they have not vanished.
**Which brings me to hypocrisy. I've gone in to work the entire time, which seems hypocritical, but I've also tried to avoid contact as much as possible with as many people as possible.
Sunday, November 29, 2020
Lex Anteinternet: Pope Francis in the New York Times and the Fatigue...
Pope Francis in the New York Times and the Fatigued Audience.
In the past here, up until this past year, when a Pope made a major statement I usually commented on it. I've pretty much given up doing that with Pope Francis. Indeed, I've come to the point where I dread his new proclamations as all too often they're followed by clarifications and explanations, and the like, and generate confusion.
Indeed, I find the Catholic Answers responses to this interesting. I tend to find that the apologist who comments there that I like the most, Jimmy Akin, simply doesn't comment on them as they come up in general, an overall wise approach in my view. Others take to trying to explain them which can be difficult not because they aren't explainable, but because the Holy Father simply isn't a good writer, at least in so far as the English translations of his works would have it, and he tends to speak without really internally vetting what he's saying. Tim Staples, whom I normally don't listen to, was simply gushing in his praise of the Pope's most recent encyclical declaring it absolutely brilliant, for example, which probably was really only persuasive to those who were already convinced, and pretty much turned off by those who were.
The entire recent "Pope approves of civil unions" matter was such an example. Put in context the Pope was in fact not declaring that the Church now approves of civil unions nor was it modifying its positions on marriage in general. But his remarks frankly were hard to explain and caused at least one really orthodox but not rad trad apologist, Matt Fradd, to react with despair. Indeed, the Pope allowing his comments to end up in a public medium being misconstrued yet again, even if they predate his Papacy (which they seem to have) was pretty much the tipping point for a lot of orthodox Catholics who are not rad trads. If he couldn't have prevented his comments from being used, which he very well might not have been able to do, and if they predated his Papacy, there should have been some quicker response than there ultimately was so that there wasn't a widespread press declaration confusing the rank and file in the pews and causing figures like Fr. James Martin to declare them to be "first steps", which they were not. I.e., I think orthodox Catholics have sort of turned Pope Francis off, and "liberal" or "progressive" Catholics are an aging declining demographic whose views, frankly, really don't matter. The support, therefore, by Fr. James Martin, SJ, really matters only to the Press, not so much the people in the pews.
Compounding this, while the Pope isn't a good writer, he's a proficient one, and its gotten so a person can hardly turn around without a new Papal writing appearing. Just in the last couple of months he issued a new encyclical that was an extremely lengthy text which appeared to a be a summation of all of his prior encyclicals. Indeed, this was so much the case I wondered if it was some sort of final compilation prior to a resignation. It doesn't appear to be, but its hard to figure out why he issued an encyclical which is a lengthy summation of his prior encyclicals.
That wasn't his only writing, however, this year. Just a few weeks ago the Pope issued Let Us Dream: The Path to a Better Future, which I have not read and which I'm very unlikely to. This book was apparently written during a Coronavirus lockdown and comments on a lot of contemporary social matters, including protests in the United States. And now, over the past few days, he has an op ed in The New York Times.
I'll note here that I don't expect the Pope to really be familiar with the Times, and I'll give the Times credit for running it. The Times does have one highly orthodox Catholic columnist on its staff who writers very Catholic themed articles. Having said that, the Times isn't what it once was, so to a degree choosing the Times is an interesting choice by whomever made it.
Additionally, the Times has a "pay wall" and that means people who regularly read it will probably not be able to unless they're a subscriber, which there's no point in being. Be that as it may, I did read it.
I was frankly prepared to dislike it as I'm frankly very tired of the Pope saying things that have to be explained as they creep up on falling outside of orthodoxy. I'm like Matt Fradd and a lot of other loyal orthodox Catholics that way in which there's been so much, I'm just tired of it and probably have the volume on pretty low at this point. A lot of us, rightly or wrongly, are at this point just marking time until the Boomer generation ages out of high Church offices and a new age of orthodoxy resumes, which it will. It's not that we're not respectful or loyal to the Pope, but we're probably resuming the mental attitude of Catholics of the 18th Century or 19th Century who didn't really expect to hear from the Pope much and are accordingly sort of tuning out now. Or maybe more accurately we may have the view of Eastern Rite Catholics who are fully Catholic in every sense but are more insular and traditional in ways that don't allow the outside world to impact them to the same degree. Indeed, quite a few orthodox Catholics were headed in that direction anyhow.
Well, at any rate, the Pope has published in the Times with an op ed entitled:
A Crisis Reveals What Is in Our Hearts
To come out of this pandemic better than we went in, we must let ourselves be touched by others’ pain.
We should note that headline writers, and not the authors, write headlines for papers like the times. If that seems sort of an un Francis like headline and subheading, it probably is. It was no doubt written by the Times.
Anyhow, I read the entire op ed and didn't find anything unorthodox or shocking, although it may be signaling an intended effort, which I'll address below. So as is frequently the case, I was a bit pleasantly surprised. So far on Francis' encyclicals, I've found them that way. I also find their views often uniquely foreign in a way, but then he isn't an American, after all.
A lot of the Pope's article is personal about the events leading up to his lung removal many years ago, and the experience of pain and illness. A lot of it is, in fact, deeply personal and an homage to two sisters who were nurses when he was ill, noting as he ties it back in:
Whether or not they were conscious of it, their choice testified to a belief: that it is better to live a shorter life serving others than a longer one resisting that call. That’s why, in many countries, people stood at their windows or on their doorsteps to applaud them in gratitude and awe. They are the saints next door, who have awakened something important in our hearts, making credible once more what we desire to instill by our preaching.
My conservative friends, I'm afraid, aren't going to like it. There's pretty clearly a swipe at Americans, and perhaps the Trump Administration, and a common view in the United States, where he states:
With some exceptions, governments have made great efforts to put the well-being of their people first, acting decisively to protect health and to save lives. The exceptions have been some governments that shrugged off the painful evidence of mounting deaths, with inevitable, grievous consequences. But most governments acted responsibly, imposing strict measures to contain the outbreak.
Yet some groups protested, refusing to keep their distance, marching against travel restrictions — as if measures that governments must impose for the good of their people constitute some kind of political assault on autonomy or personal freedom! Looking to the common good is much more than the sum of what is good for individuals. It means having a regard for all citizens and seeking to respond effectively to the needs of the least fortunate.
It is all too easy for some to take an idea — in this case, for example, personal freedom — and turn it into an ideology, creating a prism through which they judge everything.
This gets into an interesting Catholic belief which is that governments, all governments, derive their authority from God and therefore are charged, accordingly, with responsibilities. That belief is the one that causes people to misconstrue the old "Devine right" of kings, which isn't what it means, so much as it means that all authority is ultimately God's and any legitimate exercise of authority, whatever it is, is only to the extent that God permits it, and therefore must be used accordingly.
Of course, this is also a lecture aimed at individualist who value personal freedom or collective safety in this context, which is something that has been seen all over the globe. The Pope clearly disapproves.
And that's where the op ed then takes a big turn, returning to common Francis themes.
God asks us to dare to create something new. We cannot return to the false securities of the political and economic systems we had before the crisis. We need economies that give to all access to the fruits of creation, to the basic needs of life: to land, lodging and labor. We need a politics that can integrate and dialogue with the poor, the excluded and the vulnerable, that gives people a say in the decisions that affect their lives. We need to slow down, take stock and design better ways of living together on this earth.
The pandemic has exposed the paradox that while we are more connected, we are also more divided. Feverish consumerism breaks the bonds of belonging. It causes us to focus on our self-preservation and makes us anxious. Our fears are exacerbated and exploited by a certain kind of populist politics that seeks power over society. It is hard to build a culture of encounter, in which we meet as people with a shared dignity, within a throwaway culture that regards the well-being of the elderly, the unemployed, the disabled and the unborn as peripheral to our own well-being.
To come out of this crisis better, we have to recover the knowledge that as a people we have a shared destination. The pandemic has reminded us that no one is saved alone. What ties us to one another is what we commonly call solidarity. Solidarity is more than acts of generosity, important as they are; it is the call to embrace the reality that we are bound by bonds of reciprocity. On this solid foundation we can build a better, different, human future.
In doing this its interesting to see the references to the Catholic Social Teaching of Solidarity. Solidarity and Subsidiarity are old Catholic themes, prominent in the writings of Pope Leo XVIII and best recalled from Rarem Novarum. A really well schooled Catholic will recognize the references to Solidarity right away, but Protestants, and frankly most Catholics for that matter, won't.
The editorial also recalls themes that Pope Francis has had throughout his papacy in regard to economics, and which seemingly have evolved towards a certain type of internationalism in a way more recently, but it's not specific on them. Criticism of capitalism, however are nothing new in Catholic circles and indeed Rarem Novarum criticized both capitalism and socialism, giving rise to the development of distributism. Interestingly, that latter fact is hardly noticed anywhere, and hasn't been by Pope Francis himself, perhaps because capitalism has come to so dominate free market economies that the free market concept of distributism is hardly known to even exist outside of the small population of (somewhat gadfly) distributists.
At any rate, it's not a bad editorial. I doubt it'll be very impactful, however. Pope Francis has spoken too much, and too vaguely, and written too much, and too vaguely, to really be noticed very much now outside of Catholic circles, and the orthodox, who would be most likely to normally listen and try to heed what he says, have assumed a sort of fatigued state of indifference. There's some sort of lesson in all of that.
And part of that lesson has to deal with his intent. If you read all of his works that touch upon the economy, and there's a bunch, what you are left with is a pretty clear impression that Pope Francis is arguing for a overhauling of the entire global economy in a way that reflects his writings. This would emphasize a certain sort of international Solidarity (in Catholic social teaching terms) acknowledging everyone as our brothers and sisters, with a certain sort of regionalism reflecting, vaguely, Subsidiarity, while also stress the need to aid the poor and not fall into the vices of consumerism. Here too, however, the problem is that those themes have been intertwined with numerous other ones and never clarified, so they're lost, irrespective of whether we agree with them or not.
Popes, contrary to what some Rad Trads tend to believe, have never decreed anyone system of anything, including economics, to be "the" Catholic ideal. And they're not going to. So Pope Francis isn't straying off the well paved road in that respect. But Pope's have been a lot more direct and succinct. As Pope Francis hasn't been, it'd take a clear, limited and precise encyclical or writing to do that. If that's coming, it's coming late in the day and after so much has already been written that getting everyone to turn the volume back up to listen will be difficult.
Lex Anteinternet: More on Societal Scurvy
More on Societal Scurvy
Thursday, November 26, 2020
Churches of the East: Justices lift New York’s COVID-related attendance ...
Wednesday, November 18, 2020
November 18, 1966. The Latin Rite of the Catholic Church relaxes the Abstention Rule.
On this day the Latin Rite Catholic Bishops of the United States relaxed the rule on abstaining from meat on Fridays throughout the year. This followed a Papal direction in 1962 that the Friday penitential requirement be adopted to local conditions, reflecting a move by the Church focused on that goal. The same move resulted in the vernacular replacing Latin in the Mass at about the same time.
In the case of the Catholic Bishops of the United States the removal has created some confusion. Fridays retain their penitential character and Catholics are urged to substitute something for abstaining from meat but few do. Indeed, there's debate on whether there's any requirement to do and the fine, orthodox, Catholic apologist maintains there is not. Some others maintain there very much is, with those holding that view tending towards the Catholic Trad community.
To the surprise of American "Roman" Catholics, the rule was not done away with globally and it remains a matter of Church law in many other localities in the world. It also remains one, of course, during Lent.
There are a lot of rumors in the Protestant world about this practice, a lot of which are frankly absurd. Old anti Catholic myths regarding fish on Fridays were one of the things that I still heard in school when I was a teen, usually centered around some completely bogus economic theory. The actual basic reason for the practice is that it was a remaining Latin Rite penitential practice of which there had once been many, but which had dwindled down to just a few in the Latin Rite over time. In the Eastern Rite and the Orthodox Churches, however, they remain numerous and occur throughout the year.
Indeed, the practice in the Eastern Rite and Orthodox Churches is instructive in that their fasts often extend beyond abstaining from meat and to other things. During Great Lent, for example, they ultimately extend to oils, dairy and alcohol.
The reason for abstention from meat (there was never any requirement that people actually eat fish) reflected the logistical economy of an earlier time. Today fish is readily available on the table no matter where you are, but in earlier times this wasn't so. Abstention from meat limited diets and protein sources other than fish were regarded, and frankly usually still are, as more celebratory. People like fish, of course, but not too many people are going to sit down to a big Thanksgiving dinner of flounder. The goal wasn't to starve people, but to focus on penance while still sustaining their needs. Limiting food to the plain, and fish for most people, if available, was plain, emphasized that.
As with a lot of things, over time in Protestant countries this practice tended to mark Catholics and also became subject to silly myths. Even now, over fifty years after the practice was relaxed in the United States, you'll occasionally find somebody who will insult Catholics with a derogatory nickname from the era related to fish. Likewise, like a lot of dietary practices that have long ceased, people born far too late to really experience "fish on Fridays" will claim they did.
Ironically, of course, fish has gone from a less favored food even fifty years ago to a dietary and culturally prized one. It's one of the odd ways in which the religious practices of Catholics, to include fasting, has come back around as a secular health practice. And as Catholic orthodoxy has returned as the Baby Boomers wane, fish on Fridays has been reintroduced voluntarily among some orthodox or simply observant Catholics, even where they are not required to do it.
Saturday, October 10, 2020
Lex Anteinternet: October 10, 1920. The passing of Hudson Stuck
Monday, October 5, 2020
Comments on Fratelli tutti.
I don't know how many encyclicals on average any one Pope typically issues, and frankly it probably wouldn't be a fair question to start with, given the 2,000 year existence of the office. It seems like Pope Francis has issued a lot of them, but maybe he hasn't. At any rate, he just issued a new one, that being Fratelli tutti.
Or is it a new one really?
Well, of course it is. But in some ways, to the extent I've scanned it, it's a summation of his prior views.
Conservative Catholics, by which to at least some extent we mean simply orthodox Catholics, have britled to varying degrees on Pope Francis' writings and indeed on his Papacy. They have, by and large, gone from cautious, or even not so cautious, optimism to horror or even disdain for a variety of reasons, although not all to the same degree. Even middle of the road American orthodox Catholics tend to have at least some reservations towards the current Pope, while trying always to keep in mind a Catholic's duty to honor the office and occupant of Peter's chair. Others, of more radical bent, don't seem to try that.
The first writing that started to get conservatives in at least the United States rolling was the Pope's Laudato si'. Like a lot of Pope Francis' other writings it was unfortunately muti topic and long. Doing this tend to cause the documents to take on a certain manifesto quality and it also tends to lead to some confusion. Laudato si' not only addressed economics, but it also took on the environment and other topics. In contrast, Pope Leo XVIII's Rerum Novarum, which was short, took on one topic. . . economics.
I note Rerum Novarum as that May 15, 1891 encyclical took on capitalism and socialism. People seem to forget that the Papacy has been on record about its concerns on capitalism back that far. FWIW, Pope Pius VIII issued a writing expressing his concerns all the way back in the early 1840s, prior to Karl Marx writing The Communist Manifesto.
Anyhow, when I read Laudato si' I didn't take it to be terribly radical in that regard, but some people I new surely did and that was when murmurs of "the Pope is a Socialist" began to be heard.
Real concern amped up enormously, and very understandable, with Amoris laetitia, which raised all sorts of questions about at the sacraments and the people in irregular unions. The imprecision of the discussion opened all sort of doors in that area that have been left partially opened and partially shut. Orthodox Catholics were, in my view, justified in their disconcertion over the document and orthodox Bishops who issued dubias regarding it were acting properly. The storm started by Amoris laetitia has never abated and it seems clear that Pope Francis doesn't intend to try to quiet it down. It's issuance began a frightening open rift in the Church between conservatives and liberals that has not only not closed, it continues to open.
Following this the Pope, in 2018, caused a change in the Catechism which brought the death penalty off of the list of things the Church could sanction in terms of criminal penalties. A singular Catechism is actually something the Church has not had for a long time, actually, and dates back only to St. Pope John Paul the Great. Prior to that, to discern Catholic doctrine, you have to mine the various Magisterial documents to figure out what the Church's precise position, if it had one, was.
Pope Francis' position on the death penalty didn't strike me as revolutionary as St. Pope John Paul II had almost gone that far himself. The basic position he held is that he didn't see a situation in which the death penalty could be justified in modern times, not that it wasn't justified at any point in human history. That doesn't seem really radical but it cemented conservative opposition to the Pople in some quarters with some maintaining that the change is not Magisterial. I don't have an opinion on this but I was opposed to the death penalty in the first place, so its' not big deal to me.
After that came the Amazonian synod and an encyclical that followed it, much like Amoris laetitia being associated with the Synod on the Family. Going into that synod there were real fears that Pope Francis was going to open the door to some things, just as there was real fear that he was going to do so with the Family Synod. In neither case did that prove to be the case. The fear in the latter examples was that he was going to open the door to married priests, although I frankly think, even though I'm an orthodox Catholic, that this is merited. We didn't always have unmarried Latin Rite priest and priests in the Eastern Rites are married right now. Anyhow, that didn't happen.
Goings on at that synod, however, were sufficient to shock even some Catholics who almost never make negative comments about a Pope. The following document that was issued mostly was met with s shrug by most and has gone on to not really receive much attention. It seemed to call for close attention to local cultures, but in a very long format. Most people would support that, but the very long format was problematic for the message.
Now comes Fratelli tutti.
My prediction is that this will not be well received.
For one thing, it's way too overlong and it addresses way too many questions. There will be debate on the extent to which any of these are regarded as having moral imperative nature to Catholics, which means that many will be regarded as probably not having them. And, as an encyclical that touches upon a bunch of the prior ones, at least to some extent a person has to ask why this was issued. Indeed, without taking the point to far, it has a bit of an appearance of being a summary theological testament, which tends to be something that people might issue when they don't expect to issue any more.
Which causes me to pose this hypothetical. Is Pope Francis preparing to step down?
I seriously wonder.
If not, does he expected to pass on soon?
To take this further, I really think this is a final theological testament from this Pope. He might issue more writings, but this will be the last significant one.
It'll also be controversial, and as one covering too many topics, I suspect in the future, to at least some extent, it'll be regarded as personal to this People, rather than as a ground breakign document.
In some ways its a long lament and condemnation of the way societies are acting in general. A lot of hte document deals with human relations and local cultures. I'm not going to try to go into any of that here, and it seems to me that it explores a topic Pope Francis has already explored. As has been noted by commentators, it decries globalization and capitalism to a degree, noting in regard to the former:
With the Grand Imam Ahmad Al-Tayyeb, we do not ignore the positive advances made in the areas of science, technology, medicine, industry and welfare, above all in developed countries. Nonetheless, “we wish to emphasize that, together with these historical advances, great and valued as they are, there exists a moral deterioration that influences international action and a weakening of spiritual values and responsibility. This contributes to a general feeling of frustration, isolation and desperation”. We see “outbreaks of tension and a buildup of arms and ammunition in a global context dominated by uncertainty, disillusionment, fear of the future, and controlled by narrow economic interests”. We can also point to “major political crises, situations of injustice and the lack of an equitable distribution of natural resources… In the face of such crises that result in the deaths of millions of children – emaciated from poverty and hunger – there is an unacceptable silence on the international level”. This panorama, for all its undeniable advances, does not appear to lead to a more humane future.
In today’s world, the sense of belonging to a single human family is fading, and the dream of working together for justice and peace seems an outdated utopia. What reigns instead is a cool, comfortable and globalized indifference, born of deep disillusionment concealed behind a deceptive illusion: thinking that we are all-powerful, while failing to realize that we are all in the same boat. This illusion, unmindful of the great fraternal values, leads to “a sort of cynicism. For that is the temptation we face if we go down the road of disenchantment and disappointment… Isolation and withdrawal into one’s own interests are never the way to restore hope and bring about renewal. Rather, it is closeness; it is the culture of encounter. Isolation, no; closeness, yes. Culture clash, no; culture of encounter, yes”.
In this world that races ahead, yet lacks a shared roadmap, we increasingly sense that “the gap between concern for one’s personal well-being and the prosperity of the larger human family seems to be stretching to the point of complete division between individuals and human community… It is one thing to feel forced to live together, but something entirely different to value the richness and beauty of those seeds of common life that need to be sought out and cultivated”. Technology is constantly advancing, yet “how wonderful it would be if the growth of scientific and technological innovation could come with more equality and social inclusion. How wonderful would it be, even as we discover faraway planets, to rediscover the needs of the brothers and sisters who orbit around us
As an aside, quoting a Grand Imam will not win Pope Francis any fans among those who have noted that Islam continues on it its 1600 year war against Catholics and Orthodox in the Middle East. More on something related to that in a moment.
On capitalism, it does address the failures of capitalism, which isn't something new for the Popes. It doesn't really do that in a radical way, however. It does discuss property in a semi radical way, and its my prediction that, while nothing he says is shocking in this regard, that it will bring a firestorm of criticism from American conservative Catholics. What the documents states in this regard is:
RE-ENVISAGING THE SOCIAL ROLE OF PROPERTY
118. The world exists for everyone, because all of us were born with the same dignity. Differences of colour, religion, talent, place of birth or residence, and so many others, cannot be used to justify the privileges of some over the rights of all. As a community, we have an obligation to ensure that every person lives with dignity and has sufficient opportunities for his or her integral development.
119. In the first Christian centuries, a number of thinkers developed a universal vision in their reflections on the common destination of created goods. This led them to realize that if one person lacks what is necessary to live with dignity, it is because another person is detaining it. Saint John Chrysostom summarizes it in this way: “Not to share our wealth with the poor is to rob them and take away their livelihood. The riches we possess are not our own, but theirs as well”. In the words of Saint Gregory the Great, “When we provide the needy with their basic needs, we are giving them what belongs to them, not to us”.
120. Once more, I would like to echo a statement of Saint John Paul II whose forcefulness has perhaps been insufficiently recognized: “God gave the earth to the whole human race for the sustenance of all its members, without excluding or favouring anyone”. For my part, I would observe that “the Christian tradition has never recognized the right to private property as absolute or inviolable, and has stressed the social purpose of all forms of private property”. The principle of the common use of created goods is the “first principle of the whole ethical and social order”;it is a natural and inherent right that takes priority over others. All other rights having to do with the goods necessary for the integral fulfilment of persons, including that of private property or any other type of property, should – in the words of Saint Paul VI – “in no way hinder [this right], but should actively facilitate its implementation”. The right to private property can only be considered a secondary natural right, derived from the principle of the universal destination of created goods. This has concrete consequences that ought to be reflected in the workings of society. Yet it often happens that secondary rights displace primary and overriding rights, in practice making them irrelevant.
121. No one, then, can remain excluded because of his or her place of birth, much less because of privileges enjoyed by others who were born in lands of greater opportunity. The limits and borders of individual states cannot stand in the way of this. As it is unacceptable that some have fewer rights by virtue of being women, it is likewise unacceptable that the mere place of one’s birth or residence should result in his or her possessing fewer opportunities for a developed and dignified life.
122. Development must not aim at the amassing of wealth by a few, but must ensure “human rights – personal and social, economic and political, including the rights of nations and of peoples”. The right of some to free enterprise or market freedom cannot supersede the rights of peoples and the dignity of the poor, or, for that matter, respect for the natural environment, for “if we make something our own, it is only to administer it for the good of all”.
123. Business activity is essentially “a noble vocation, directed to producing wealth and improving our world”. God encourages us to develop the talents he gave us, and he has made our universe one of immense potential. In God’s plan, each individual is called to promote his or her own development, and this includes finding the best economic and technological means of multiplying goods and increasing wealth. Business abilities, which are a gift from God, should always be clearly directed to the development of others and to eliminating poverty, especially through the creation of diversified work opportunities. The right to private property is always accompanied by the primary and prior principle of the subordination of all private property to the universal destination of the earth’s goods, and thus the right of all to their use.
Anything really shocking?
Well, no. But the statement "that “the Christian tradition has never recognized the right to private property as absolute or inviolable, and has stressed the social purpose of all forms of private property”." has come to be contrary to the right wing American civil religion, and that's going to result in all sorts of criticism.
Going on, in the same section, the document states:
124. Nowadays, a firm belief in the common destination of the earth’s goods requires that this principle also be applied to nations, their territories and their resources. Seen from the standpoint not only of the legitimacy of private property and the rights of its citizens, but also of the first principle of the common destination of goods, we can then say that each country also belongs to the foreigner, inasmuch as a territory’s goods must not be denied to a needy person coming from elsewhere. As the Bishops of the United States have taught, there are fundamental rights that “precede any society because they flow from the dignity granted to each person as created by God”.
125. This presupposes a different way of understanding relations and exchanges between countries. If every human being possesses an inalienable dignity, if all people are my brothers and sisters, and if the world truly belongs to everyone, then it matters little whether my neighbour was born in my country or elsewhere. My own country also shares responsibility for his or her development, although it can fulfil that responsibility in a variety of ways. It can offer a generous welcome to those in urgent need, or work to improve living conditions in their native lands by refusing to exploit those countries or to drain them of natural resources, backing corrupt systems that hinder the dignified development of their peoples. What applies to nations is true also for different regions within each country, since there too great inequalities often exist. At times, the inability to recognize equal human dignity leads the more developed regions in some countries to think that they can jettison the “dead weight” of poorer regions and so increase their level of consumption.
126. We are really speaking about a new network of international relations, since there is no way to resolve the serious problems of our world if we continue to think only in terms of mutual assistance between individuals or small groups. Nor should we forget that “inequity affects not only individuals but entire countries; it compels us to consider an ethics of international relations”. Indeed, justice requires recognizing and respecting not only the rights of individuals, but also social rights and the rights of peoples. This means finding a way to ensure “the fundamental right of peoples to subsistence and progress”, a right which is at times severely restricted by the pressure created by foreign debt. In many instances, debt repayment not only fails to promote development but gravely limits and conditions it. While respecting the principle that all legitimately acquired debt must be repaid, the way in which many poor countries fulfil this obligation should not end up compromising their very existence and growth.
127. Certainly, all this calls for an alternative way of thinking. Without an attempt to enter into that way of thinking, what I am saying here will sound wildly unrealistic. On the other hand, if we accept the great principle that there are rights born of our inalienable human dignity, we can rise to the challenge of envisaging a new humanity. We can aspire to a world that provides land, housing and work for all. This is the true path of peace, not the senseless and myopic strategy of sowing fear and mistrust in the face of outside threats. For a real and lasting peace will only be possible “on the basis of a global ethic of solidarity and cooperation in the service of a future shaped by interdependence and shared responsibility in the whole human family”.
The Pope's comment that "what I am saying here will sound wildly unrealistic" shows that he is cognizant of the criticism he frequently takes. Really, the comments in this section aren't "wildly unrealistic", but in some quarters they surely will not be well received.
He makes an interesting comment about modern communications, something many have widely observed to be an odd modern problem.
42. Oddly enough, while closed and intolerant attitudes towards others are on the rise, distances are otherwise shrinking or disappearing to the point that the right to privacy scarcely exists. Everything has become a kind of spectacle to be examined and inspected, and people’s lives are now under constant surveillance. Digital communication wants to bring everything out into the open; people’s lives are combed over, laid bare and bandied about, often anonymously. Respect for others disintegrates, and even as we dismiss, ignore or keep others distant, we can shamelessly peer into every detail of their lives.
42. Digital campaigns of hatred and destruction, for their part, are not – as some would have us believe – a positive form of mutual support, but simply an association of individuals united against a perceived common enemy. “Digital media can also expose people to the risk of addiction, isolation and a gradual loss of contact with concrete reality, blocking the development of authentic interpersonal relationships”. They lack the physical gestures, facial expressions, moments of silence, body language and even the smells, the trembling of hands, the blushes and perspiration that speak to us and are a part of human communication. Digital relationships, which do not demand the slow and gradual cultivation of friendships, stable interaction or the building of a consensus that matures over time, have the appearance of sociability. Yet they do not really build community; instead, they tend to disguise and expand the very individualism that finds expression in xenophobia and in contempt for the vulnerable. Digital connectivity is not enough to build bridges. It is not capable of uniting humanity.
44. Even as individuals maintain their comfortable consumerist isolation, they can choose a form of constant and febrile bonding that encourages remarkable hostility, insults, abuse, defamation and verbal violence destructive of others, and this with a lack of restraint that could not exist in physical contact without tearing us all apart. Social aggression has found unparalleled room for expansion through computers and mobile devices.
45. This has now given free rein to ideologies. Things that until a few years ago could not be said by anyone without risking the loss of universal respect can now be said with impunity, and in the crudest of terms, even by some political figures. Nor should we forget that “there are huge economic interests operating in the digital world, capable of exercising forms of control as subtle as they are invasive, creating mechanisms for the manipulation of consciences and of the democratic process. The way many platforms work often ends up favouring encounter between persons who think alike, shielding them from debate. These closed circuits facilitate the spread of fake news and false information, fomenting prejudice and hate”.
46. We should also recognize that destructive forms of fanaticism are at times found among religious believers, including Christians; they too “can be caught up in networks of verbal violence through the internet and the various forums of digital communication. Even in Catholic media, limits can be overstepped, defamation and slander can become commonplace, and all ethical standards and respect for the good name of others can be abandoned”. How can this contribute to the fraternity that our common Father asks of us?
47. True wisdom demands an encounter with reality. Today, however, everything can be created, disguised and altered. A direct encounter even with the fringes of reality can thus prove intolerable. A mechanism of selection then comes into play, whereby I can immediately separate likes from dislikes, what I consider attractive from what I deem distasteful. In the same way, we can choose the people with whom we wish to share our world. Persons or situations we find unpleasant or disagreeable are simply deleted in today’s virtual networks; a virtual circle is then created, isolating us from the real world in which we are living.
48. The ability to sit down and listen to others, typical of interpersonal encounters, is paradigmatic of the welcoming attitude shown by those who transcend narcissism and accept others, caring for them and welcoming them into their lives. Yet “today’s world is largely a deaf world… At times, the frantic pace of the modern world prevents us from listening attentively to what another person is saying. Halfway through, we interrupt him and want to contradict what he has not even finished saying. We must not lose our ability to listen”. Saint Francis “heard the voice of God, he heard the voice of the poor, he heard the voice of the infirm and he heard the voice of nature. He made of them a way of life. My desire is that the seed that Saint Francis planted may grow in the hearts of many”.
49. As silence and careful listening disappear, replaced by a frenzy of texting, this basic structure of sage human communication is at risk. A new lifestyle is emerging, where we create only what we want and exclude all that we cannot control or know instantly and superficially. This process, by its intrinsic logic, blocks the kind of serene reflection that could lead us to a shared wisdom.
50. Together, we can seek the truth in dialogue, in relaxed conversation or in passionate debate. To do so calls for perseverance; it entails moments of silence and suffering, yet it can patiently embrace the broader experience of individuals and peoples. The flood of information at our fingertips does not make for greater wisdom. Wisdom is not born of quick searches on the internet nor is it a mass of unverified data. That is not the way to mature in the encounter with truth. Conversations revolve only around the latest data; they become merely horizontal and cumulative. We fail to keep our attention focused, to penetrate to the heart of matters, and to recognize what is essential to give meaning to our lives. Freedom thus becomes an illusion that we are peddled, easily confused with the ability to navigate the internet. The process of building fraternity, be it local or universal, can only be undertaken by spirits that are free and open to authentic encounters.
Going on, a section already being misinterpreted is his section on war and the death penalty, which he oddly links. That section starts off:
255. There are two extreme situations that may come to be seen as solutions in especially dramatic circumstances, without realizing that they are false answers that do not resolve the problems they are meant to solve and ultimately do no more than introduce new elements of destruction in the fabric of national and global society. These are war and the death penalty.
Most people aren't keen on war. The Pope comments on it, as numerous Popes have before. This is already, in my view, being misinterpreted. In that section he states:
256. “Deceit is in the mind of those who plan evil, but those who counsel peace have joy” (Prov 12:20). Yet there are those who seek solutions in war, frequently fueled by a breakdown in relations, hegemonic ambitions, abuses of power, fear of others and a tendency to see diversity as an obstacle. War is not a ghost from the past but a constant threat. Our world is encountering growing difficulties on the slow path to peace upon which it had embarked and which had already begun to bear good fruit.
257. Since conditions that favour the outbreak of wars are once again increasing, I can only reiterate that “war is the negation of all rights and a dramatic assault on the environment. If we want true integral human development for all, we must work tirelessly to avoid war between nations and peoples. To this end, there is a need to ensure the uncontested rule of law and tireless recourse to negotiation, mediation and arbitration, as proposed by the Charter of the United Nations, which constitutes truly a fundamental juridical norm”.The seventy-five years since the establishment of the United Nations and the experience of the first twenty years of this millennium have shown that the full application of international norms proves truly effective, and that failure to comply with them is detrimental. The Charter of the United Nations, when observed and applied with transparency and sincerity, is an obligatory reference point of justice and a channel of peace. Here there can be no room for disguising false intentions or placing the partisan interests of one country or group above the global common good. If rules are considered simply as means to be used whenever it proves advantageous, and to be ignored when it is not, uncontrollable forces are unleashed that cause grave harm to societies, to the poor and vulnerable, to fraternal relations, to the environment and to cultural treasures, with irretrievable losses for the global community.
258. War can easily be chosen by invoking all sorts of allegedly humanitarian, defensive or precautionary excuses, and even resorting to the manipulation of information. In recent decades, every single war has been ostensibly “justified”. The Catechism of the Catholic Church speaks of the possibility of legitimate defence by means of military force, which involves demonstrating that certain “rigorous conditions of moral legitimacy” have been met. Yet it is easy to fall into an overly broad interpretation of this potential right. In this way, some would also wrongly justify even “preventive” attacks or acts of war that can hardly avoid entailing “evils and disorders graver than the evil to be eliminated”. At issue is whether the development of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, and the enormous and growing possibilities offered by new technologies, have granted war an uncontrollable destructive power over great numbers of innocent civilians. The truth is that “never has humanity had such power over itself, yet nothing ensures that it will be used wisely”.We can no longer think of war as a solution, because its risks will probably always be greater than its supposed benefits. In view of this, it is very difficult nowadays to invoke the rational criteria elaborated in earlier centuries to speak of the possibility of a “just war”. Never again war!
259. It should be added that, with increased globalization, what might appear as an immediate or practical solution for one part of the world initiates a chain of violent and often latent effects that end up harming the entire planet and opening the way to new and worse wars in the future. In today’s world, there are no longer just isolated outbreaks of war in one country or another; instead, we are experiencing a “world war fought piecemeal”, since the destinies of countries are so closely interconnected on the global scene.
260. In the words of Saint John XXIII, “it no longer makes sense to maintain that war is a fit instrument with which to repair the violation of justice”. In making this point amid great international tension, he voiced the growing desire for peace emerging in the Cold War period. He supported the conviction that the arguments for peace are stronger than any calculation of particular interests and confidence in the use of weaponry. The opportunities offered by the end of the Cold War were not, however, adequately seized due to a lack of a vision for the future and a shared consciousness of our common destiny. Instead, it proved easier to pursue partisan interests without upholding the universal common good. The dread spectre of war thus began to gain new ground.
261. Every war leaves our world worse than it was before. War is a failure of politics and of humanity, a shameful capitulation, a stinging defeat before the forces of evil. Let us not remain mired in theoretical discussions, but touch the wounded flesh of the victims. Let us look once more at all those civilians whose killing was considered “collateral damage”. Let us ask the victims themselves. Let us think of the refugees and displaced, those who suffered the effects of atomic radiation or chemical attacks, the mothers who lost their children, and the boys and girls maimed or deprived of their childhood. Let us hear the true stories of these victims of violence, look at reality through their eyes, and listen with an open heart to the stories they tell. In this way, we will be able to grasp the abyss of evil at the heart of war. Nor will it trouble us to be deemed naive for choosing peace.
262. Rules by themselves will not suffice if we continue to think that the solution to current problems is deterrence through fear or the threat of nuclear, chemical or biological weapons. Indeed, “if we take into consideration the principal threats to peace and security with their many dimensions in this multipolar world of the twenty-first century as, for example, terrorism, asymmetrical conflicts, cybersecurity, environmental problems, poverty, not a few doubts arise regarding the inadequacy of nuclear deterrence as an effective response to such challenges. These concerns are even greater when we consider the catastrophic humanitarian and environmental consequences that would follow from any use of nuclear weapons, with devastating, indiscriminate and uncontainable effects, over time and space… We need also to ask ourselves how sustainable is a stability based on fear, when it actually increases fear and undermines relationships of trust between peoples. International peace and stability cannot be based on a false sense of security, on the threat of mutual destruction or total annihilation, or on simply maintaining a balance of power… In this context, the ultimate goal of the total elimination of nuclear weapons becomes both a challenge and a moral and humanitarian imperative… Growing interdependence and globalization mean that any response to the threat of nuclear weapons should be collective and concerted, based on mutual trust. This trust can be built only through dialogue that is truly directed to the common good and not to the protection of veiled or particular interests”. With the money spent on weapons and other military expenditures, let us establish a global fund that can finally put an end to hunger and favour development in the most impoverished countries, so that their citizens will not resort to violent or illusory solutions, or have to leave their countries in order to seek a more dignified life.
I've seen commentary already that the Pope has abrogated the "Catholic doctrine of just war". That doesn't appear to be the case to me, and it wasn't a "Catholic doctrine" to start with. Rather, it's a very well respected Theological view.
Going on, this statement is being noted:
In view of this, it is very difficult nowadays to invoke the rational criteria elaborated in earlier centuries to speak of the possibility of a “just war”. Never again war!
Statements like "Never again war" must read better in other languages than in English, or at least in the Romance languages, as in English this is ineffectual and seems oddly stated. That aside, we'll have to wait for clarification on this, but frankly the rational criteria for just war is just as possible to imagine as it ever was when we're considering defensive war.
Indeed, in my view, this statement suffers from the modern assumption that war now is more horrific than ever before, when in fact war is getting less lethal, at least when conducted between modern nations. Moreover, we live in the most peaceful era in human history. If just wars of some sort were justified mid 20th Century, when war was at its destructive apex, they certainly must be now, when they are at their destructive basement, and going lower. And the reference, as is so often made, to chemical, biological and nuclear war imagines a world that really pinacled in the 1960s. Modern armies may have these weapons, but they don't use them as there's no point. We oddly live in an era when technology has rendered our most destructive weapons obsolete by their precision, and accordingly their reduced lethality.
Offensive war is something that the Popes have decried for a long time. I can't say that its been completely ruled out due to nuances in what constitutes an offensive war, but it seems clear that by and large this isn't really much of a change. The Pope isn't endorsing, it seems to me, pacifism, but rather resort to war to settle international disputes. If I'm correct, this isn't a change. In other words, if Poland is invaded by Russia, Poland, a Catholic country, is still entitled to resist, it seems to me.
I really question, however, whether Pope Francis should have gone into this at all. While wars are increasingly rare, in recent years where they have existed they've often pitted Islam in aggressive violence against Christians in general and the Catholic and Orthodox in particular. It's easy to be against war of any kind for Europeans or those living in the New World. It might not be if you are facing the Islamic State on the Lavant.
I also don't' think the new writing changes Catholic doctrine on the death penalty, as some seem to be stating, where it states:
263. There is yet another way to eliminate others, one aimed not at countries but at individuals. It is the death penalty. Saint John Paul II stated clearly and firmly that the death penalty is inadequate from a moral standpoint and no longer necessary from that of penal justice. There can be no stepping back from this position. Today we state clearly that “the death penalty is inadmissible” and the Church is firmly committed to calling for its abolition worldwide.
264. In the New Testament, while individuals are asked not to take justice into their own hands (cf. Rom 12:17.19), there is also a recognition of the need for authorities to impose penalties on evildoers (cf. Rom 13:4; 1 Pet 2:14). Indeed, “civic life, structured around an organized community, needs rules of coexistence, the wilful violation of which demands appropriate redress”.[249] This means that legitimate public authority can and must “inflict punishments according to the seriousness of the crimes” and that judicial power be guaranteed a “necessary independence in the realm of law”.
265. From the earliest centuries of the Church, some were clearly opposed to capital punishment. Lactantius, for example, held that “there ought to be no exception at all; that it is always unlawful to put a man to death”. Pope Nicholas I urged that efforts be made “to free from the punishment of death not only each of the innocent, but all the guilty as well”.During the trial of the murderers of two priests, Saint Augustine asked the judge not to take the life of the assassins with this argument: “We do not object to your depriving these wicked men of the freedom to commit further crimes. Our desire is rather that justice be satisfied without the taking of their lives or the maiming of their bodies in any part. And, at the same time, that by the coercive measures provided by the law, they be turned from their irrational fury to the calmness of men of sound mind, and from their evil deeds to some useful employment. This too is considered a condemnation, but who does not see that, when savage violence is restrained and remedies meant to produce repentance are provided, it should be considered a benefit rather than a mere punitive measure… Do not let the atrocity of their sins feed a desire for vengeance, but desire instead to heal the wounds which those deeds have inflicted on their souls”.
266. Fear and resentment can easily lead to viewing punishment in a vindictive and even cruel way, rather than as part of a process of healing and reintegration into society. Nowadays, “in some political sectors and certain media, public and private violence and revenge are incited, not only against those responsible for committing crimes, but also against those suspected, whether proven or not, of breaking the law… There is at times a tendency to deliberately fabricate enemies: stereotyped figures who represent all the characteristics that society perceives or interprets as threatening. The mechanisms that form these images are the same that allowed the spread of racist ideas in their time”.[This has made all the more dangerous the growing practice in some countries of resorting to preventive custody, imprisonment without trial and especially the death penalty.
267. Here I would stress that “it is impossible to imagine that states today have no other means than capital punishment to protect the lives of other people from the unjust aggressor”. Particularly serious in this regard are so-called extrajudicial or extralegal executions, which are “homicides deliberately committed by certain states and by their agents, often passed off as clashes with criminals or presented as the unintended consequences of the reasonable, necessary and proportionate use of force in applying the law”.
268. “The arguments against the death penalty are numerous and well-known. The Church has rightly called attention to several of these, such as the possibility of judicial error and the use made of such punishment by totalitarian and dictatorial regimes as a means of suppressing political dissidence or persecuting religious and cultural minorities, all victims whom the legislation of those regimes consider ‘delinquents’. All Christians and people of good will are today called to work not only for the abolition of the death penalty, legal or illegal, in all its forms, but also to work for the improvement of prison conditions, out of respect for the human dignity of persons deprived of their freedom. I would link this to life imprisonment… A life sentence is a secret death penalty”.
269. Let us keep in mind that “not even a murderer loses his personal dignity, and God himself pledges to guarantee this”. The firm rejection of the death penalty shows to what extent it is possible to recognize the inalienable dignity of every human being and to accept that he or she has a place in this universe. If I do not deny that dignity to the worst of criminals, I will not deny it to anyone. I will give everyone the possibility of sharing this planet with me, despite all our differences.
270. I ask Christians who remain hesitant on this point, and those tempted to yield to violence in any form, to keep in mind the words of the book of Isaiah: “They shall beat their swords into plowshares” (2:4). For us, this prophecy took flesh in Christ Jesus who, seeing a disciple tempted to violence, said firmly: “Put your sword back into its place; for all who take the sword will perish by the sword” (Mt 26:52). These words echoed the ancient warning: “I will require a reckoning for human life. Whoever sheds the blood of a man, by man shall his blood be shed” (Gen 9:5-6). Jesus’ reaction, which sprang from his heart, bridges the gap of the centuries and reaches the present as an enduring appeal.
The Church already was taking the point that it was hard to find an area, in modern times, when the death penalty was morally justified.
The encyclical touches on much more than this, indeed on darned near everything, but will it hit the mark? I doubt it.
By this point I think that conservative Catholics in many places are pretty much ignoring the Pope directly and are more likely to listen to Catholic pundits who share their own views or who ratify their own suspicions. And part of that is due to Pope Francis' failure to address their concerns. In parishes where the seminary failures of the 50s, 60s and 70s produced unorthodox clergy and, worse yet, priests with disordered inclinations who preyed on some parishioners, that failure looms larger. With a young Church that's much more orthodox than the Church of their parents, older Boomer clergy that keeps on keeping on is something that draws more attention. Wars and economics are real problems, to be sure, but so is the legacy of the Boomer influx. Actions speak the loudest of all and action seems to have been lacking that can be appreciated. Dealing with the spectre of war, which doesn't touch most Catholics today, is one thing, but dealing with a rebellious German church, which touches all Catholics to some degree, is another matter.