First Things | On the Square

God Save the Queen: A Canadian Reflects on Why the Monarchy Still Matters

ft@firsthings.com (Mathew Block ) — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 00:01:00 -0500

Yesterday was the Diamond Anniversary of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth IIs accession to the thrones of the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand Christians in these countries and throughout the Commonwealth thanked God for her sixty years of service, remembering St. Pauls admonition to pray for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and godly lives in all quietness and holiness." In the Great White North, for example, Robert Bugbee, president of Lutheran Church-Canada expressed the gratitude of the church in a letter to the Queen: We wish you to know," he wrote, that we acknowledge your reign as an undeserved gift from God Himself, and count it a joy to name you in our public prayers on many occasions in our parishes across the country."

That might strike some people as odd-especially those in the United States of America. The Queens role is largely ceremonial, it is often said. So for what aspect of her reign" are we thanking God? What authority does she actually exercise?

Perhaps the simplest answer is the Queens private influence on other leaders. While the Queen is careful not to express her political opinions publicly, that does not mean she wields no political power. As an adviser, she has tremendous influence. When they are both in London, she holds private, weekly meetings with the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. She often meets privately with the Privy Council of the United Kingdom (a six hundred-member body of political leaders, lords, archbishops, and others-though, in practice, a much smaller number of these leaders are invited to any given meeting.)

I doubt that there are many leaders who would scoff at the opportunity for such advice. The Queen has served now for sixty years, has seen the rise and fall of numerous governments, has reigned in peace-time and in war, and is the most widely travelled head of state in the world. And over the past sixty years, she has seen the radical transformation of the world in so many ways-politically, socially, technologically, and religiously. She is keenly aware of current events, studying daily, for example, the proceedings of the British parliament.

In short, when the Queen advises you, you really ought to pay attention.

Of course, while the Queen may be a wise adviser to government, much of her official power remains largely ceremonial. But what is wrong with a monarch whose role is largely ceremonial? The way some commentators speak, youd think a queen without power is one of the seven deadly sins of political systems.

Having a monarch separate from the political system has the wonderful effect of distinguishing national identity from the governing political party. Canadians know that the Queen is the Queen of Canada regardless of which party is in power. In that way, she becomes a symbol of unity-Canadian identity is not, her position reminds us, bound up with the particular political persuasion of those currently governing. Canadians are Canadian regardless of who is serving as Prime Minister. Likewise, Britons are British no matter who leads Parliament.

Thats one of the reasons why youll seldom here political leaders north of the border referring to others as un-Canadian"-except when they begin to make discriminatory, divisive remarks. Unity is paramount; its an ideal weve treasured since the birth of our nation. While the American Declaration glorifies life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," Canadians at their founding devoted themselves instead to peace, order, and good government."

The Queen-even if her power is primarily ceremonial-helps maintain that unity. By fulfilling her duties faithfully and diligently, by being a good and gracious role model who does not get caught up in partisan politics, she encourages her subjects to live in unity. In short, she helps bring about exactly what St. Paul tells us a good monarch should: an environment in which we may live peaceful and godly lives."

As she does so, Queen Elizabeth II quietly calls us to remember Christ and the reconciliation he won for us, encouraging us to make that forgiveness the basis for our loving one another-the cause for which we give up our animosity and live in peace. She expressed it well in her 2011 Christmas Address:

Although we are capable of great acts of kindness, history teaches us that we sometimes need saving from ourselves-from our recklessness or our greed. God sent into the world a unique person-neither a philosopher nor a general (important though they are)-but a Saviour, with the power to forgive. Forgiveness lies at the heart of the Christian faith. It can heal broken families, it can restore friendships, and it can reconcile divided communities. It is in forgiveness that we feel the power of Gods love.

And so, while Americans squabble over party politics, I join the throng in Canada and abroad-diverse though we may be-in thanking God for his servant Queen Elizabeth II. And Ill sing with gusto when the time comes: God save our gracious Queen! Long live our noble Queen! God save the Queen!"

Mathew Block is manager of communications for Lutheran ChurchCanada and editor of The Canadian Lutheran magazine. He is on Twitter as @captainthin .

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

The Role of Hospice in Assisting a Good Death

ft@firsthings.com (Michael Gemignani ) — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 00:01:00 -0500

In a previous article, I offered as a possible slogan for hospice, A good life deserves a good death." But what is a good death, exactly, and what would have to happen to make it that way?

My first wife, Carol, died of a particularly virulent form of stomach cancer. By the time the first symptoms appeared it was too late to save her life. Both her surgeon and her oncologist were deeply religious Christians and compassionate human beings who spoke openly and honestly about Carols condition and prognosis.

Carol and I received the active support of friends, members of my office staff, and colleagues at the university where I was Dean of Sciences and Humanities, and members of the church where I assisted as a priest. We also had the support of hospice, whose chaplain was a gentle and holy man who was himself suffering from Parkinsons Disease.

When Carol died, there were three others in her room with me: The rector of our church, a nurse from another ward who had come to visit Carol, and my office administrator who had been so supportive to Carol and myself throughout the time of her illness and who is now my beloved wife, Nilda. The Bishop of Indianapolis had visited barely hours before.

Being a companion to Carol through her terminal illness was one of the most powerful spiritual experiences of my life. At Carols funeral, the church was filled, the parish hall was filled, and many simply had to be turned away.

Was Carols death a 'good death? Surely, you are thinking, if there could be such a thing, this must be one. But a good death for whom? For Carol? For me, who had to watch my wife die, but who was able to sense both closure and peace at the end? For those who witnessed Carols strength and were inspired by it? Or for our two teenage children who shared terrible anger at the impending loss of their mother, who refused the ministrations of hospice, and who could not bring themselves to visit her at the hospital in her last days?

The same death that is viewed as a good death for some may be a devastating loss for others. Even hospice cannot be all things to all those affected by the terminal illness of a loved one. But I do offer the following as elements of a good death, elements that were blessedly present to me in Carols last days.

First, we must accept that there is a finality about death that must be faced. We cannot resurrect the deceased to do what he or she should have done before dying. Nor can those who should have made their peace with the patient make it after death. Those demons we cannot exorcize while the patient is alive will remain to torment the living after the patient dies. Guilt is a terrible legacy. A good death should bring a healthy sense of closure.

Second, one of the greatest fears of any dying patient is loss of control. A patient must be allowed to make as many decisions as practicable concerning every aspect of his or her living. The patient must be given as much information as possible, and medical and legal jargon should be translated into laypersons language so the patient can better understand what he or she is being told. Information can be as important a palliative for the dying patient as analgesics. Information is part of a good death.

I might point out that information goes beyond medical information. Someone should do a review with a dying patient to make sure his or her will is up to date, its location is known, and it is safe from loss, tampering, or destruction. The family, too, should be kept well-informed and helped to find ways by which the patient might be reconciled with any family member who has become alienated.

Third, another of the greatest fears of most dying patients is excessive pain. Hospice should help the patient be comfortable. But comfortable does not necessarily mean pain-free. Some patients do not want excessive analgesics because they want their mind to be sufficiently clear until important business has been attended to, or they have been able to talk to members of the family that are coming in from out of town. It is the patient who must be allowed to set the parameters of his or her care.

As I wrote in my earlier column: Hospice must never become another mechanism by which society can hide death, or through which society can abdicate its responsibility toward the dying and those who love them." The role of hospice is to educate society about dying and a to make the three criteria outlined above a reality. When hospice workers are clear in their own minds what constitutes a good death, they can help their patients achieve it.

Michael Gemignani is a retired Episcopal priest, a lawyer, and a former university administrator. He has authored books in the areas of mathematics, law, computer science, and spiritual formation, as well as numerous articles in professional and trade publications.

RESOURCES

Michael Gemignani, Hospice in a Death-Denying Society"

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

How Would St. Germanus Site Your Church?

ft@firsthings.com (Dino Marcantonio ) — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 00:18:00 -0500

In recent years, much work has been done to restore the traditional principles of church design; one principle, however, is still often overlooked: siting. St. Germanus is brief and clear on the subject, as always. In the final section of Ecclesiastical History and Mystical Contemplation, which deals directly with architectural matters, he says:

Praying toward the East is handed down by the holy apostles, as is everything else. This is because the comprehensible sun of righteousness, Christ our God, appeared on earth in those regions of the East where the perceptible sun rises, as the prophet says: "Orient is his name" (Zech 6:12); and "Bow before the Lord, all the earth, who ascended to the heaven of heavens in the East" (cf Ps 67:34); and "Let us prostrate ourselves in the place where his feet stood" (cf Ps 67:34); and again, "The feet of the Lord shall stand upon the Mount of Olives in the East" (Zech 14:4). The prophets also speak thus because of our fervent hope of receiving again the paradise in Eden, as well as the brightness of the second coming of Christ our God, from the East.

For St. Germanus, praying toward the east meant that at Mass, the priest and assembly were both on the same side of the altar. The priest was not facing the people; all faced God together. Likewise, church buildings, including St. Germanus Hagia Sophia, were commonly orientated, that is, the front doors were located toward the west and the sanctuary was located toward the east.

Note in his last sentence St. Germanus mentions two goals: Eden and the Second Coming. Thus one's movement through the church building, from west to east, darkness to light, front door to Sanctuary, is a metaphor for the personal Christian life: conception in original sin; baptism and life in sanctifying grace; increasing sanctifying grace through a life of virtue assisted by the sacraments; and finally, death, judgment, and (we hope) the Beatific Vision, that is, Eden. This structural orientation is also a metaphor for all of salvation history: from the Old Testament age of prophecy, to the New Testament age of grace, to the Second Coming and the end of the world.

There is a prominent exception to this basic rule for church siting. The earliest church buildings in Rome, built centuries before St. Germanus was born, were oriented in the exact reverse direction, that is, with the doors to the east and the sanctuary to the west. The priest in these churches stood on the west side of the altar and effectively faced the people on the other side. Liturgical scholars tell us that, at a certain point in the Mass, the assembly turned around, the church doors were opened, and all faced the rising sun in the east.

So far as I know, we can only speculate as to why these basilicas were sited this way. Three reasons are commonly offered: first, it may have been to accommodate the confessio, the tomb of a saint located underneath the high altar, often with steps leading down to it (as at St. Peter's Basilica in Rome), or the sanctuary and altar can be raised up a few steps so that the confessio is at the same level as the nave (as at San Clemente, for example). Either way, a small, simple confessio prevents the celebrant from standing on the same side of the altar as the congregation. Second, it may have been an attempt to imitate the Temple at Jerusalem, whose doors were to the east, and Holy of Holies to the west. Finally, some claim the orientation was intended to imitate synagogues, which pointed toward the Temple at Jerusalem.

The confessio below the high altar at Santa Maria in Trastevere
makes it impossible to say Mass from the assembly's side of the altar.

St. Germanus' explanation of the symbolism of the parts-that the sanctuary is Christ's tomb; and that the apse is the cave in which He was buried; and that the altar is the spot in the tomb in which Christ was placed suggests a fourth possible reason: as one moves from east to west, from light to darkness, one joins Christ's Passion, death, and burial. When one turns around part way through the liturgy and moves from west to east, one is joined to his resurrection and ascension, and is ready to greet him when he comes again.

As beautiful as the architectural symbolism of this reverse orientation is, it strikes most people as a rather awkward arrangement for liturgy. Yet the orientation of church buildings was considered so important that people were willing to live with unusual siting in order to get it. The result sometimes produces churches like Saint Agnes Outside the Walls in Rome, where the front door is not located on the main road (the Via Nomentana) but rather near the apse. To gain access from this side, a small portico just to the north of the apse leads to the side aisle mezzanine, the ancient matroneum. This was a difficult architectural problem. On the other hand, it is just this sort of problem which sets the stage for an original and memorable solution.

A contemporary view from the Via Nomentana.

After the Middle Ages, Christians gradually stopped insisting on orientated churches. Nevertheless, we continue to refer to the sanctuary as "liturgical east" whether it is truly east or not. Of course, the orientation of our church buildings is wrapped up in liturgical questions which are beyond the scope of the architect, to be sure. But so far as this profession is concerned, a recovery of the practice would be most welcome. For a church which prays toward the east is architecturally, if not necessarily spiritually, richer for it.

Dino Marcantonio is an architect practicing in New York City, a co-founder of the Catholic Artists Society, and a board member of the Society for Catholic Liturgy. He has taught at the Yale School of Architecture and the University of Notre Dame. His Twitter account is @DinoMarcantonio.

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

The Weirdness of Commanding Love

ft@firsthings.com (Howard P. Kainz ) — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 00:01:00 -0500

The greatest commandment, Jesus tells us, is: You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. The second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself."

Well, of course. But a commandment? I tend to empathize with the Danish Philosopher, S�ren Kierkegaard, who writes, in Works of Love,

'You shall love... is the very mark of Christian love and is its distinctive characteristicthat it contains this apparent contradiction: to love is a duty.... Is it not remarkable that in the whole New Testament there is not a single word about erotic love in the sense in which the poet celebrates it and paganism idolized it? Is it not remarkable that in the whole New Testament there is not a single verse about friendship in the sense in which the poet celebrates it and paganism cultivated it?

But how can love ever be commanded? How can it be a duty? If it is a duty, doesnt this detract from its worth? Isnt love something that happens spontaneously when we are confronted with something or someone that is immensely good and attractive? It almost seems that the commandment to love is a command to do the impossible. Sigmund Freud, in his Civilization and Its Discontents, categorizes it as an unhealthy psychological ideal that can become embedded in a culture:

'The commandment, Love thy neighbor as thyself," is the strongest defense against human aggressiveness and an excellent example of the unpsychological proceeedings of the cultural super-ego. The commandment is impossible to fulfill; such an enormous inflation of love can only lower its value, not get rid of the difficulty.

In other words, the commandment, although noble and imbedded in Christian culture, seems to imply per impossibile that we can have control of our inner emotions-something for which we can grit our teeth, stiffen our upper lip, and just . . . do.

Could anyone, for example, credibly order even their children to love? Rather, we order our children to do things connected with love: Be generous with your little sister." Forgive the boy who said that mean thing." Give your Aunt Emma a kiss, even though she scolded you." Pray for those bad people you heard about."

The challenge seems greater when it comes to loving enemies; and immensely greater with God, whom we cannot see.

One might surmise from Our Lords admonition that we can, by an act of will, just start loving God, of whom even the best of us have only the slightest knowledge and little first-hand experience. Of course, grace is supposed to help us overcome recalcitrant feelings. But what if we just dont seem to have the grace?

The key seems to be in the prepositional phrases that accompany the great commandment:

With all your mind." We can, by an act of will, work to increase our knowledge of God-in the Scriptures; in creation, especially living things; and in particular by recognizing the goodness of fellow human beings, developing the ability to discern the image of God in others (maybe, in some exceptionally difficult cases, looking for redeeming qualities or insufficiently activated potentialities).

With all your heart." We are told, Where your treasure is, there will your heart be." And we can control where we put our priorities, and what we treasure." We can make efforts to move our focus from distractions that interfere with our service of God. Even in prayer or meditation, the effort to avoid distractions and a wandering imagination is itself a loving act.

With all your soul." It is quite possible to carry out tasks just bodily or mechanically; or half-heartedly; or with resignation; or with commitment. We do have control over whether our soul" is invested in what we are doing.

And loving our neighbor as ourselves" is basically a restatement of the Golden Rule-doing unto others as we would want them to do to us. We are hardwired" to love ourselves. So the commandment consists in extending to others the same rights and care that we would want from others-acts which may or may not be accompanied by feelings of love.

It must have been difficult for Jesus fellow Jews to understand that the whole law and the prophets" were based on this commandment of love. The multiple ceremonial laws and sacrifices in the Old Testament were said to number exactly 613-even more than the laws we are faced with in our country, governing income taxes, Obamacare, etc. The Old Testament laws included laws in the Decalogue about avoiding theft, murder, adultery, lying, idolatry, and working on the Sabbath; laws regarding circumcision and ritual purity; abstaining from pork and other forbidden meats; observance of Passover, Atonement, and the other five feasts; tithing; laws regarding marriage, slavery, retribution for crimes, etc. Carrying out these duties in the right spirit could translate for Jews into the love of God and neighbor that Jesus characterized as the greatest" commandment. The danger, of course, was that some Jews, like some of the Pharisees, would become involved in this law-keeping mechanically and ritualistically-the sort of legalism that St. Paul in his epistles contrasted with Christian freedom.

But for the Jews in Jesus time, as well as for contemporary Christians, the fulfillment of the greatest commandment boils down to the duties of increasing our knowledge of God, constantly resetting our priorities and purifying our intentions, and implementing the Golden Rule.

Howard P. Kainz is Professor Emeritus in the Philosophy Department at Marquette University.

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

What a Young Husband Ought to Know

ft@firsthings.com (Russell E. Saltzman ) — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 00:14:00 -0500

In my last column, I reviewed What a Young Wife Ought to Know (1901) by Emma Drake. It was part of a sex and self" series that focused on what a young woman should do to establish a successful Victorian-like home at the turn of the last American century and one of two books my wife plucked off the shelf at a used book store. She spent eight dollars for the pair. I may have mumbled about more antiquarian books coming into the house but that ended right after I found a copy of Young Wife selling on eBay for thirty-eight dollars.

The other of the pair was a companion volume, What a Young Husband Ought to Know (1897) by a then prominent Lutheran pastor, Sylvanus Stall. Young husbands are of much less interest to me than young wives but the outcry from readers-well, one reader-for a review of Young Husband was so great, I must oblige.

I did not enjoy Stall nearly as well as Drake. Whereas Drake had a few silly medical ideas and some really ungenerous notions on heredity, Stall is awash in both. He is also heavy on moralistic preachments (a hazard, I guess, of being a preacher). While Drakes goal was to produce successful women, in Stalls account the young wife appears to be little more than a dependent in need of guidance and care and company and, golly, just everything. A wise young husband will provide it.

He intersperses his commentary with old wives tales regarded as veritable and self-evident truths. His notions on pregnancy and the effects external influences have on unborn children, for example, are outrageously, um, Victorian. An expectant mother who saw a child with a sixth finger and dwelled on it obsessively gave birth to a child with the same condition. A pregnant woman could not dismiss from her mind the image of her brother-in-law who had lost a hand by amputation and the child was born missing a hand. A Jewish mother once smelled fried pork during pregnancy and ached to taste it. The child born was colic and would not nurse unless first given some bacon to suck on. Pregnant women, Stall concludes, who entertain low" and base" thoughts during pregnancy risk birthing children of low" and base" appetites. For healthy, hygienic (a favored Victorian word), and intelligent children the mother must have elevated" thoughts of a refined" sort.

Nonsense, of course, but dangerous nonsense for the possible mental mischief such ideas imposed upon women. But such were the times that Stalls Young Husband carries a strong endorsement by one Dr. Paul F. Mund�, at the time a Dartmouth College professor and gynecologist at Mt. Sinai Hospital.

Before erupting in mocking laughter, however, I recall contemporary advice on creating a comfy ambience for the gestating baby, all to produce a precociously gifted child. Placing headphones over mommys tummy and playing Mozart concertos, for example, was supposed to insure higher test scores. Prenatal flash cards were all that was missing. Of course, employing American Sign Language for non-verbalizing toddlers today has gained traction among some and comes about as close. Maybe we are not as far removed as we would like from the notions Stall and Mund� endorsed.

Yet for all the ridiculous stuff Stall offered, there is something yet to take away. If Stall saw the young wife as something of an object to be tended and Drake saw her definitely as the equal of the husband, both were nonetheless keen to create the home as the center for both their lives.

This is where I start to like the guy. A young husband, Stall admonishes, should continue to court his wife. He should, in dress and attire around the home, remember he has but one woman to captivate by his manly charms" (I think he uses that in an ironic sense), and, being a man, it will likely require continuous effort. A father should be prepared and able to care for the children while his wife is out, and a proper one will find time to play with his kids. A real husband should be home after work, avoiding bars and clubs, and he should quiet the house when he gets there so the wife can get an hours rest. He should keep the house trim and the yard clean; even a modest house will benefit from male attention.

In Stalls view being a successful young husband comes down to being a husband who will sacrifice his personal luxuries and self-indulgences" for his wife and the family, a man who will scorn the saloon . . . give up his cigar, and spend his time and his money" for the happiness of his family. He crosses a line of course with the cigar thing, but Im with him on the rest of it. I even hear a Lutherans echo of Martin Luther in here, who once talked of God and angels smiling in approval as a father washes diapers.

Russell E. Saltzman is a Lutheran pastor, an online homilist for the Christian Leadership Center at the University of Mary, and author of The Pastors Page and Other Small Essays . His previous On the Square articles can be found here.

RESOURCES

What a Young Husband Ought to Know

Luther on diapers in The Estate of Marriage

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

Seekers or Finders?

ft@firsthings.com (George Weigel ) — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 00:02:00 -0500

On the Solemnity of the Epiphany, I heard a sermon-a rather well-delivered one at that-about the Magi as religious seekers." The same note, Ill wager, was struck from pulpits and ambos across the country, perhaps across the world.

But isnt there something a bit askew here?

Isnt the point of Matthews tale of the wise men from the East" (Matthew 2:1) that they were finders, not just seekers? Moreover, isnt the further point that what was found was he who has been born king of the Jews," to whom they, gentiles from afar, wished to offer gifts? Dont we lose the evangelical thrust of this charming story of seers, stars and caravans, gold and frankincense and myrrh" (Matthew 2:11), when we focus on the seeking, not the finding, which was the first moment of messianic encounter with the gentile world (meaning most-of-us)?

I dont want to overstate the indictment. All believers are seekers," in that we obey the prophets injunction to seek the Lord while he may be found" (Isaiah 55:6). Still, the point is not about the seeking, but about the finding. More than two millennia after they trekked across the Levant following a star, the Magi are of interest-indeed, compelling interest-because of who awaited them at the end of their search: a Jewish child who would become the redeemer, not only of his own people, but of all people. If the Magi had wandered about Central Asia and the Middle East for decade after decade, they would be of little interest, save perhaps as chroniclers of ancient cultures. No, the point is that the Magi were religious finders, not just religious seekers. And what they found was the fulfillment of their search.

Theres another problem with our contemporary emphasis on religious seeking": It tends to miss the fundamental dynamic of biblical religion and to confuse faith in the God of the Bible with spirituality." Go through the spirituality" section of an online bookstore or browse the spirituality" stacks of an old-fashioned bookshop, and youll find a lot about the human quest for God. That is not what biblical religion is about, however. Biblical religion is about Gods coming into history in search of us, and our learning to take the same path into the future that God is taking.

Abraham, whom the Roman Canon calls our father in faith," was not some generic spiritual seeker. Abraham, or Abram (as he then was), was a unique individual to whom God spoke disturbing and challenging words: Abram was to go on a journey to another land, led by God, who was now entering history in a new and saving way. In that promised land, God would make of Abram, who would be re-named Abraham, a great nation and ... a blessing" (Genesis 12:2). Abram-become-Abraham was to follow Gods path through history. God has the salvific initiative; God comes in search of us. We are not seekers without a compass. Nor are we just finders; we are those who have been found.

The same dynamic pervades the Gospels. There, Jesus does not appear as a homely sage who attracts disciples because he does better cures than the local medical people and tells interesting moral stories. No, Jesus says, bluntly, Follow me" (Matthew 4:19; Mark 1:17). In Johns account, two disciples of the Baptist ask Jesus, Where are you staying?" To which Jesus replies, Come and see" (John 1:38-39). The initiative in salvation history is always a divine initiative. God leads; we follow. God comes into history in search of us; we learn, often slowly and with difficulty, to follow the divine lead.

In the terms in which it presents itself today, the notion of the Christian life as a matter of spiritual seeking" usually has more to do with our culture of self-absorption than with biblical religion. In the Bible, Gods revelation is discerned in history, not outside of it, inside our heads. Seeking, in the sense of deepening our friendship with Jesus, is good; but lets first understand that we have been found.

George Weigel is Distinguished Senior Fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C.

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

Obamacares Great Gift: Clarification

ft@firsthings.com (Elizabeth Scalia ) — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 00:48:00 -0500

Recently we have learned that under Obamacare-that is, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act-employer insurance plans must provide free non-medical contraception, abortifacients, and sterilization for their employees.

Free is as affordable as it gets; for an accountability-spurning culture, its just the right price, indeed. Let us pay nothing in order to beget nothing and, says this government, let us force those interfering churchy" institutions-who keep insisting that there is something worth contemplating beyond ourselves-to pick up the tab, for good measure.

There is an odd we are nothing" philosophy behind this HHS decision and the Secretary who made it, and the President who supports it-a chilling promise of emptiness where tomorrow should be. Humanity, cajoled away from fertility and trained in sterility, is being weaned from those thoughts that travel beyond the present moment; we are self-interested beyond reason, and thus profoundly bored; condom-strangled, tube-snipped, and detached from the essential materials of reproduction either through artificial means or artificial equivalencies, our vision of the future is as limited as a pay-telescopes viewer: tick, tick, tick and then a resolute click!, and it is gone.

With the administrations decision, the covert culture of death has finally made a truly overt move against the culture of life. On one side, there is cheering. Womens groups" are happy. Anti-religionists, particularly those with an animus toward the Catholic church, are nearly delirious. On the other side, there is a grimness that is interesting in its unity, particularly as it is playing out in Catholic media. The furor of more conservative Catholics is unremarkable, but the reactions of the so-called progressive" church may surprise some for the intensity of their disappointment. At the National Catholic Reporter Michael Sean Winters-furious on behalf of those Catholics who took some punches" for the sake of President Obama-declares he cannot, in good conscience, cast another vote Obamaward. He now suggests that the bishops chain themselves to the White House fence in order to bring attention to the direct assault this administration is making against the churchs constitutional right to its own conscience-its right to be what it is.

Some, just as disappointed, but looking for a way to continue supporting Obama, are calling the decision botched," as though the thing simply wasnt sufficiently thought-through. Others are hoping that one states exemption rules might somehow be adapted to Obamacare, so consciences might be assuaged by November. On NPR, Cokie Roberts expresses concern that Obama may have created problems" for himself and his re-election.

But HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and President Obama botched" nothing. The decision put forth is a purposeful one, transparently provocative. If the administration had simply wanted to provide free contraception and sterilization to those who want it, they could have inserted that notion into any one of a number of spending or entitlement bills. Had they meant to demonstrate respect for conscienceand according to Archbishop Timothy Dolan the president said he considered the protection of conscience sacred"the administration could have taken the advice of others and looked closely at how Hawaii managed conscience exemptions under their law.

There are questions as to whether HHS has authority to issue exemptions to Obamacare, although quite a few have been issued for reasons other than conscience. There appear to be no questions in the presidents mind, or in Secretary Sebelius, that they have the authority to intrude on freedom of religion. With this ruling they insist that church-affiliated institutions either act against their own belief or so narrow the scope of their community service as to be removed from the public square; either way, the government is deliberately affecting the free exercise of religion. Considering some Catholic schools, hospitals and charities were serving their communities before the secular governments even thought to follow suit, that is a damnable, and damning, legacy for a president who once taught constitutional law.

To be sure, this situation is cause for concern, but there are some bright spots in all of this. Although the mainstream press has reported very little about this event-a close examination might prove uncomfortable for their own worldviews-the unified public expression of righteous defiance by the U.S. bishops is a powerful development.

Just as importantly, the laity-divided for decades on issues ranging from felt-banners to dress to dogma-has found a line in the sand upon which they can come together; conservative" Catholics are reassured to see their more progressive" brethren defending the churchs right to be who and what she is; more progressive" Catholics may be coming to realize that-as relentlessly single-minded as some of their opponents could be-had they not held the line all these years, much could be crumbling at this moment.

Now is the time for all good Catholics to come to the aid of providers-the schools, hospitals, charities, and soup kitchens who serve communities in need without asking affiliations. And, in coming together, perhaps now is the time to ponder their long-held presumptions, each about the other, and broaden our own outreach as well.

If nothing else, in declaring war against our consciences, the Obama administration has given American Catholics a great gift of clarification; a fractious family we may be, but-as the saying goes-we are church. And we have the right to be who we are.

Elizabeth Scalia is the Managing Editor of the Catholic Portal at Patheos and blogs as The Anchoress. Her previous articles for "On the Square" can be found here.

RESOURCES

HHSs ABCs; Anybody but Catholics

American Bioethicists: not really wrong" to take a life

Michael Sean Winters

Obama has botched" it

What about Hawaii

Cokie Roberts on NPR

Unified Bishops

Sebelius' Contraception Mandate and the Media

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

Perpetual Adolescence: A Review of Young Adult

ft@firsthings.com (Thomas Hibbs ) — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 00:01:00 -0500

The new film Young Adult, the latest from the writer/director team of Jason Reitman and Diablo Cody of Juno fame, features Charlize Theron as Mavis Gary, a writer of young adult fiction living in the Twin Cities who returns to the small town of Mercury, MN to relive her glory days as a high school prom queen and to reclaim her former beau, Buddy Slade (Patrick Wilson). Although it is not without its funny moments, Young Adult is hardly a pleasant film. Yet it is a compelling and instructive one; in a Hollywood culture that celebrates perpetual adolescence, Young Adult is a rarity, an unsparing depiction of what it is like to remain trapped in adolescent fantasy.

Therons performance as a hard-drinking narcissist is garnering her the sort of critical acclaim she received for Monster, in which she played a sexually abused prostitute turned vengeful serial killer. Hollywood fell all over itself praising her transformation from a delicately gorgeous blonde to a disfigured, coarse, and violent woman. Here, she keeps her physical beauty but that only serves to highlight the harsh and unfeeling soul that lurks beneath the facade.

When we meet Therons character, she is desperately lonely and facing unemployment, as her once-popular series of books is being cancelled. An alcoholic who ends her days with Makers Mark and begins each morning with Diet Coke, she is, with little success, trying to write the series finale, when she is a recipient of a group email with news that her now married high school flame, Buddy Slade, has just had a baby. With memories of their youthful romance and of her dominance of the social scene in Mercury, she decides to return to her town and repossess her boyfriend. That she never pauses over the implausibility or impropriety of her plan provides us with an early indicator of just how astonishingly self-absorbed she is. The films writing and the supple performance of Theron make the character of Mavis, despite her delusions, believable.

She encounters her parents only by chance, not having thought to alert them that she was back in town. During an uncomfortable dinner conversation, she broaches the topic of her drinking and they change the subject. The awkward silence strikes just the right disconcerting tone and is highly suggestive concerning the roots of Maviss disordered psyche. Maviss odd friendship with another classmate, Matt Freehauf, a guy she knew in high school only as the object of cruel humor and a brutal beating, is at once twisted and revelatory of her longing for human fellowship and understanding.

Young Adult keeps its distance from its main characters disorder, but another critically acclaimed film released in recent months, Lars von Triers Melancholia, which also features a deeply depressed young woman (Kirsten Dunst) incapable of adapting to adult life, embraces the main characters deeply hostile judgment about the human race, namely, that it is evil and merits destruction. Dunsts performance is at times arresting, as are the films visuals, mood, and music (Wagner). But von Trier is less interested in developing her character than it is in deploying her as a vehicle for the expression of a cynical cosmic truth that she alone apprehends.

Young Adult is a more measured film, which does not end up confirming the worst judgments of the depressed, perpetual adolescent, even if, in a convincing twist at the end, it portrays her as retreating to that comfortable universe in which everyone" in her hometown, is fat and dumb."

The denigration of small town life is common enough in Hollywood films. One of the refreshing things about Young Adult is its rather straightforward portrayal of the ordinary families of this small town, particularly the family and friends of Buddy Slade. They are not fashionable or particularly clever or well informed about life beyond their town. But they arent fat and stupid either. They are decent, hard working members of their town, intent on building families and supporting one another.

One of the women does call Mavis a psychotic, prom-queen bitch," but they also feel sorry for her and thus Buddys wife, even after being warned by her friends about Mavis, makes sure she is invited to their house for a party for their newborn baby. Oblivious, Mavis elects to use this public occasion to declare her intentions to Buddy. What follows is public humiliation for Mavis, who is forced to see not only that her plan never had a chance but also that she has been the object of pity from folks she would have spent most of her life pitying, had she ever had a thought or feeling for them.

Mavis has moments of fleeting insight, issuing confessions such as Im crazy and no one loves me" and even I need to change." Yet, the closer she comes to realizing how much such change would cost, the less likely it is. If that makes for a somber ending, it is, I think, superior to many Hollywood films in which confronting the limitations of prolonged adolescent fantasy leads to an all too facile conversion and a happy ending. As somber and unpleasant as it is, Young Adult is a refreshing take on the motif of the perpetual adolescent.

Thomas Hibbs is dean of the Honors College at Baylor University. His first book on popular culture, Shows About Nothing (2000), is being rereleased in a revised, updated, and expanded version by Baylor University Press.

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

A Tale of Two Imperialisms

ft@firsthings.com (Peter J. Leithart ) — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 01:33:00 -0500

It is common these days to read the Bible as an anti-imperial epic, the story of God and Israel, then (for Christians) God and Jesus, against empire. Come out, come out from Babylon, my people!" is the theme.

Its a hard sell for all sorts of reasons. Jeremiah urges the people of Judah to enter not exit Babylon (Jeremiah 27, 29). Isaiah invests Cyrus the Persian conqueror with Davidic titles-he is the Lords servant" and shepherd" and anointed one" (Isaiah 44-45). Heroes like Joseph, Daniel, and Mordecai end up as chief advisors to emperors. In Scripture, there is no such thing as empire" but only empires, and they are not all the same. Some are Babels, some beasts; some are rods of discipline, some provide refuge for the people of God.

God does frustrate empires of the Babelic and bestial sort. In the Bibles earliest account of empire (Genesis 11:1-9), human beings erect a city and tower in the plains of Shinar. The fourfold repetition of one" (Genesis 11:1, 6) shows their goal is uniformity. Babel, the prototype of all later Babels," is intolerant of linguistic, cultural, and religious difference.

The men of Babel want to make a name" for themselves. Like the later king of neo-Babylon, they want to set a throne among the stars, ascend above the clouds, make themselves like the Most High" (Isaiah 14:13-14). Augustine recognized similar idolatrous motivations behind the Roman drive for imperial mastery. Lust for glory first inspired Romans to overthrow tyrants, but, having toppled the Tarquins, they remained full of the same lust. Only mastery of the world could satisfy. Desire for freedom morphed into a libido dominandi.

At the same time, Roman desire for glory was infused with anxiety and fear, which paradoxically increased in proportion to Roman success in conquest. Fear of enemies within and without inspired the manly virtus of the Roman warrior. Babels founders are also driven by anxiety about scattering" (Genesis 11:4). Babelic empires are designed to fend off insecurity and fear of dissolution. Anxious glory-seeking takes political form in an empire that permits only one lip and one set of words. God created humans to spread throughout the earth, multiplying to fill the earth (Genesis 1:26-28), but Babelic empires attempt to arrest movement, to stop time and history. Babel aims to be the end of history, beyond which there is nowhere to go and nothing to do. It is the political embodiment of a hyper-realized eschatology, which is always also an eschatology of fear. Babels eternal walls are built to ward off the ravages of time. Long before Virgil, Babel announces the formation of an imperium sine fine.

Unlike Ozymandias, Babel learns its limits. As soon as he appears in the narrative, Yahweh begins to dismantle Babel brick by brick, as he ensures that all they fear happens to them. He confuses their unified lip and speech (v. 7) and scatters them (vv. 4, 9). They wanted to build a city reaching to heaven (v. 4), but Yahweh has to come down to see" it (v. 8). They want a name, and they get one, the mocking name Confusion" (v. 9). In a laconic nine verses, the narrative exposes the folly of an imperialism that tries to compete with the Creator.

After Babels fall, Yahweh calls Abram from Ur to initiate his counter-Babel program (Genesis 12:1-3). Given Yahwehs vigorous opposition to Babel, its surprising that his promises to Abram share many features of Babelic imperialism. He promises Abram a great name" (12:2). He assures Abram that he will produce a great and mighty nation" (18:18), but not just one: I have made you a father of a multitude of nations" (Genesis 17:4-6, 16). Abram will become the father of kings (Genesis 17:6, 16), a patriarchal king of kings." The two great promises-land and seed-echo the dual aim of Babel to build a city and a tower. Abrams children eventually conquer the land and build in it a city and a tower-Jerusalem and its temple, the true gate of God," which is the meaning of the name Babylon."

On the basis of these Abrahamic promises, the prophets envision a peaceful world order centered in the imperial" capital of Zion (Psalm 72:8-11; Isaiah 2:2-4; 60:10-11), and these prophetic visions inform the climactic chapters of the Christian Bible. After the harlot city is burned and the Roman beast is tossed into the lake of fire (Revelation 17-19), John sees an imperial vision of kings entering the heavenly city with tribute for the Lamb who bears the imperial title Lord of lords and King of kings" (Revelation 21:22-27; cf. 17:14). Postcolonial readers bemoan this unfortunate reinscription" of imperial aspirations, titles, and structures into Scripture. Reinscription" is the wrong word. Empire is inscribed from the moment Yahweh speaks to Abram.

Israel has an imperial vocation to realize in truth what Babel sought in rebellion-unity among peoples, a link to heaven, a great name, righteousness and peace and security. Abrahamic empire is not a Babel imposing its will but the center of a unified world community under Gods rule" (Oliver ODonovan). Israels hope, and the churchs, is not peace in isolation" but a peaceful international community" gathered around Zion (ODonovan).

The Bible is not a story of Israel in opposition to empire. It is a tale of two empires, written to assure believers that all Babels will crumble and that Abrams empire will shine forever.

Peter J. Leithart is pastor of Trinity Reformed Church in Moscow, Idaho, and Senior Fellow of Theology and Literature at New St. Andrews College. His most recent book is Athanasius (Baker Academic). This article is taken from the authors Between Babel and Beast: America and Empires in Biblical Perspective, forthcoming from Wipf & Stock.

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

Why My Friends Dont Like Homeschooling

ft@firsthings.com (Matthew Hennessey ) — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 00:01:00 -0500

My wife homeschools our seven-year-old daughter, so I read with sympathy David Mills piece in the January issue of First Things on the suspicion he encounters when discussing publicly the homeschooling of his two children. Opting out of the public education system feels a bit like jumping off a moving train. As you tumble down the side of the embankment and struggle to gain your footing, passengers on the still-moving train crane their necks and crowd to the windows to stare at you with wide eyes and slack jaws.

They jumped? What are they, nuts? This train is so nice.

As the locomotive puffs into the distance-it must, after all, keep to its schedule-you dust yourself off and begin to plot the rest of your journey on foot. Suddenly you realize you are alone in the wilderness. Oh boy," you think. Maybe weve made a terrible mistake." Then it hits you: The air smells great out here. The landscape, previously just a wooshing blur in the trains window, is suddenly alive with colors and sounds.

Hey, we can stop and study this patch of wildflowers for a while if we want to!" We can wander away from the train tracks and into the wilderness if we choose. The best part? We no longer need to keep to the schedule. We can plot a course around the next station. We can sprint, we can crawl, we can stand on one foot for half an hour if it suits our fancy.

But how will they survive all alone? Theyll starve! Theyll be eaten alive! Those poor children.

As Mills notes, modern homeschoolers have inherited the counter-cultural mantle once borne by the 1960s left. Its a reversal that inspires dissonance and puzzlement in nearly all quarters. We live in the northeast, where homeschooling is a rare choice and generally viewed as a socially radical act. That my wife is a former Catholic school teacher has helped some digest the news.

Well, yes, but she didnt teach all subjects in all grades, did she? What will you do when your daughter gets to high school?

We havent thought that far ahead. This alone provokes barely-disguised astonishment from some. Im sure many imagine our daughter will now suffer terrible, right-wing indoctrination at our hands. Taken together with the other well-known public fact about our family-we are also parents of a five-year-old with Down syndrome-things must come suddenly into focus.

Down syndrome. Homeschool. Okay, I get it. These are Sarah Palin people. Wow. And right here in Connecticut. Whod have guessed? They look so normal.

In places such as Iowa, Im told, candidates win elections on waves of support from homeschoolers. I could sooner imagine a Connecticut politician courting the support of a Wiccan coven than of the local homeschooling community. Indeed, as word spread of our decision to homeschool, previously well-oiled relationships with neighbors and friends suffered from a noticeable uptick in uncomfortable silences and forced smiles.

Ooooh, thats so interesting. We thought for a while about doing it, but my husband didnt like the idea. Arent you worried about socialization?

As Mills correctly points out, there is widespread anxiety over the socialization of homeschooled children. I met more than a few anti-social kids when I was in public school, so Im not inclined to lose sleep over this. Of greater concern to me is the prevailing conventional wisdom holding that a modern definition of parental duty encompasses not just the socialization of ones own children, but of the children of others as well. I imagine this is a notion that would appeal to Elizabeth Warren, who would only have to slightly alter her stump speech to highlight it.

There is no one in this country that got socialized on their own. Nobody. Youve got a socialized kid, good for you. God bless! Keep a big hunk of it. But part of the underlying social contract is you take your socialized kid and socialize the next kid who comes along.

Socialization is education school code for, Give your kid to us. Let us raise her." Im not much interested in having the talent, creativity, and faith socialized out of my daughter, so I am happy to play a small part in frustrating the systems designs on her. Yet I am always mindful that we homeschool only at the pleasure of the state. As a wise man once said, If you think youre free, try not paying your taxes for a while." At any moment, I know, we can be forced back on that train. I can hear it now.

All aboard!

Matthew Hennessey is a writer and editor who lives in New Canaan, CT. You can follow him on Twitter @MattHennessey .

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

A Stem Cell Report

ft@firsthings.com (Rebecca Oas ) — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 00:07:00 -0500

Generally speaking, the American public is well accustomed to the concept of tissue and organ transplantation, as stories of life-saving heart and kidney transplants, or American Red Cross blood drives collecting blood and platelets for transfusions have become commonplace. Since these procedures typically require a transfer of tissue from one patient to another, physicians must be careful to choose well-matched donors to avoid rejection by the recipients immune system.

But what about other specialized tissues that can be affected by disease, such as those of the eye? A recent study published in the journal Stem Cells by Winston Kao and colleagues describes a method of tissue engineering using stem cells from hair follicles to treat patients suffering from a specific type of corneal disease. The study also provides a fascinating insight into the ways in which adult stem cell research is being used to advance the field of personalized medicine, a growing field which seeks to customize treatments based on the individual patient, especially in terms of genetics.

When stem cells are lost, so is the reservoir for new cells, and this can be a cause of disease in organs such as the human eye. The corneal epithelium, which covers the front of the cornea and protects it from the outside environment, requires limbal stem cells to replenish it, and limbal stem cell deficiency (LSCD) is associated with a loss of vision. If a patient suffers from LSCD in one eye, the most obvious solution is to use tissue from the healthy eye to repair the damage. However, when LSCD occurs in both eyes, an alternate source for stem cells is required.

In Kaos study, stem cells were isolated from the hair follicles of adult mice, cultured into corneal epithelial cells, and successfully transplanted onto the eyes of mice in which the limbal stem cells had been removed. While this approach has not yet been tried in human patients, there is a great deal of confidence that the treatment will translate effectively. And there are several potential benefits to such treatment. First, it could be used in patients suffering from LSCD in both eyes. Second, the source of the cells would be the same patient, thus minimizing the potential for rejection of the transplanted tissue by the immune system. And third, the cells of the hair follicle share many commonalities with those of the corneal epithelium, including their origins in the developing embryo, which would seem to make them a promising choice for this type of treatment.

A qualification is in order: These findings have great potential to help only one specific group of patients suffering from bilateral LSCD, for whom there has been a lack of effective treatment thus far. Nevertheless, Kaos report is but one of many detailing the advances being made using adult stem cells, both in isolation techniques and in potential therapeutic use. From a pro-life perspective, it is always good news when medical advances can be made without ethical compromise, and this is why the benefits of adult stem cell research are often cited by those seeking to argue against the use of human embryonic stem cell isolation, which requires the destruction of human embryos.

Yet such advances are not sufficient, either practically or morally, to address the problems with human embryonic stem cell research and potential therapies derived therefrom. Scientific research is done with specific goals in mind, but by design its results are not known until they have been obtained in a replicable manner; and although the contributions to medicine by adult stem cell research may dwarf those obtained in human embryonic stem cells, this fact might reasonably point to a both-and" rather than an either-or" attitude toward their use. That is, successes in adult stem cell research do not by themselves necessarily entail the abandonment of embryonic stem cell research, especially since the ephemeral promise" of embryonic stem cell research is so deeply rooted in the minds of many advocates of the practice.

Solid ethical argument will be centered upon the recognition that some research methods disregard the dignity and integral good of the person while other methods uphold it. It is essential that the basis of our arguments against embryonic stem cell research be made primarily, if not exclusively, on the fact that innocent human life is taken. Evil acts must be rejected regardless of their real or potential efficacy in producing a desired effect. As Blessed John Paul II wrote in Veritatis Splendor, Only the act in conformity with the good can be a path that leads to life."

Still, in a culture in which the protection of life is such a contentious issue in healthcare and biomedical research, it is heartening to see examples of treatments emerging in which the life of one does not have to be taken for the treatment of another.

Rebecca Oas is a Fellow of HLI America, an educational initiative of Human Life International. She is also a postdoctoral fellow in the Cell Biology Department at Emory University. Her writings may be found on HLI Americas Truth and Charity Forum.

RESOURCES

From hair to cornea: toward the therapeutic use of hair follicle-derived stem cells in the treatment of limbal stem cell deficiency. Meyer-Blazejewska EA, Call MK, Yamanaka O, Liu H, Schl�tzer-Schrehardt U, Kruse FE, Kao WW. Stem Cells. 2011 Jan;29(1):57-66

Pope John Paul II, Veritatis Splendor .

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

Doubt and the Creed

ft@firsthings.com (Tim Kelleher ) — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 00:01:00 -0500

There are times, even in polite company, when a believer can feel like the last duck left in hunting season, flapping past the blind in a bulls-eye patterned sweater.

In such circumstances, I will occasionally describe myself as a liturgical agnostic.

Despite the apparent cheek, its not a joke. The phrase means something important to me that is, I suggest, consonant with a point made by Benedict XVI, writing as Joseph Ratzinger, in 1967.

In his signal Introduction To Christianity, he proposes that for believers and secularists, doubt is common ground-fertile and largely untilled. Certitude, however, is a very different thing. Despite the appeal of its show room gloss and near-aerodynamic neatness, its a lemon of an epistemic disposition. Sharing with nature only the abhorrence of vacuums, it seeks to fill them with the self-reference of ideology, draped in robes of righteousness.

Unfortunately, the common ground identified by Ratzinger is getting harder to spot. At a time when certain cultures are said to be experiencing spring," the West is well into a frostier season, caught in a front of bamboozlement whose gusts would sweep the common square of all but a fading echo of religious wisdom.

In an interview with Sally Quinn, a certain uber-atheist professor traced his familiar views on religion, reserving special outrage for the arrogance of Christians who claim to know-not only that there is a God, but that its this God..." I bring it up because the way he frames the issue exposes a key component of the current bamboozlement-one to which many of us, at times tacitly, subscribe.

What lifts his hackles can be observed each Sunday in most churches throughout the world. It is the Creed. And, it is in some sense a startlingly agnostic manifesto. The first of its twelve articles is, in fact, an action-rooted in the performative language of the first person. Rendered either singular or plural, it reads, I believe..." Contrary to the charge, the term is unambiguous. It cant be construed as, I know." This is not a minor point. It goes to that which is not merely important to knowing-but is its very matrix.

Later in the interview the professor appears to exercise a moment of epistemological chastity: I cant say Im convinced God doesnt exist." Those bracing for a coy, but," are not kept waiting. For, in the next breath he adds, . . . Im not convinced unicorns dont exist either." Rascal.

To explain why this is grievously disingenuous would involve an excursion into the most intriguing issues of philosophy, and the reader has far abler guides available. But, our coy brother ought at least be aware that the Nicene Creed is the result of a struggle, undertaken in urgent circumstances, to forge expressions resonant with experience. In this case, the experience of God as disclosed in Jesus and realized by the community he engendered.

Maybe I cut class the day it was explained how the experience of unicorns-or flying spaghetti monsters flowered into the likes of, say, the Mass in C Minor and the Pieta. Does it turn out that Mozart was a covert Monocerophile-Michaelangelo a Pastafarian?

Recently, I directed a film for First Things that is a consideration of the Nicene Creed. The process of making it opened my eyes to how-in the words of participant Luke Timothy Johnson-under-examined, under-appreciated and under-utilized" an instrument it is.

I heard people speak candidly about their relationships to the Creed. More than a few expressed concern that they dont always fire on all twelve cylinders; that perhaps it is dishonest to stand up on any given Sunday, and struggle to give equal emphasis to all twelve articles. We might respond to this concern with the parallel of how our bodies work. When a particular part is injured or otherwise impaired, others often hasten to assume the workload until the affected part is restored. It would seem that St. Paul points to this in what is perhaps the most powerful and provocative image we have of the Church: the Body of Christ.

Since its origins in baptismal liturgies, the Creed has taken its place within the liturgy of the Eucharist. The eminent Robert Taft, S.J. reminds us that the Eucharist is Gods gift to us, not the reverse. And, it is in this gathering that what is professed in the Creed is incarnated as that Body of Christ. Orthodox theologian and bishop John Zizioulas offers insights into the nature of the relationships involved here: I-We," the inter-personalism of the Trinity itself, and by implication, the ontological kinship of these parties. Of the first, he writes, All being is, by necessity, inter-being." Of the second, Love, as Gods mode of existence, 'hypostasizes God."

As the purpose of a body part is realized most fully through its union with the whole, likewise for members of Christs body. Each I is most fully realized in the communal, We, transfigured ultimately into the I AM of Christ, in the Father, made manifest in the Holy Spirit. This is a clunky way of describing the Churchs role within the context of theosis, the doctrine rendered so elegantly by St Athanasius, God became human so that humans can become God." It is a breathtaking view of the dignity with which humans are endowed. Against it, the worst that can be leveled is the protest that its just too good to be true.

Ironically, its hard to deny that we Catholics are especially susceptible to what might be called dogmatic fundamentalism, i.e., I dont need to think or work my way through these questions-the Church has done it for me." By way of illustration, a brief return to Joseph Ratzinger on the issue of doubt may be useful.

In the face of doubt, fundamentalism of this kind appeals to dogma for a resolution. This, I suspect, lies somewhere on the subtle end of the temptation scale. For dogma is about something far more thrilling. As the fruit of deep struggle with the mysteries of grace-planted and harvested by the community in due season-its purpose is to facilitate faith capable of experiencing the living God. In this, doubt is not resolved, but dissolved. There is a world of difference. One risks being reduced to a talisman or bludgeon, the other, being opened to the intimacy of relationship. Only the latter can set heart and world ablaze.

In these chilly days, far too much possibility falls needlessly into the widening gaps between bulwarks such as, secular and sacred, atheism and faith. The present pope has proposed an alternative that is wise and impressively pragmatic.

We will be reminded that no matter how lofty it may sound, what we profess in the Creed depends upon on an Entity that, like all things metaphysical, is conveniently invisible. Like unicorns, critics will say. Like love, we will say-that invisible, irreducibly metaphysical gift that makes life well worth its slings and arrows.

Tim Kelleher is the new media editor for First Things.

RESOURCES

Joseph Ratzinger, Introduction To Christianity

The Creed: What Christians Profess, And Why It Ought To Matter

John Zizioulas, Being As Communion

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

Child sacrifice in 21st Century America

ft@firsthings.com (George Weigel ) — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 00:24:00 -0500

The Hebrew Bible is not for the squeamish. And its harshest maledictions are called down upon those who practiced the abomination of child-sacrifice.

Thus the Psalmist:

They sacrificed their sons and daughters to the demons/they poured out innocent blood, the blood of their sons and daughters, whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan; and the land was polluted with blood./Thus they became unclean by their acts, and played the harlot in their doings./Then the anger of the LORD was kindled against his people, and he abhorred his heritage./... they were rebellious in their purposes, and were brought low because of their iniquity" (Psalm 106:38-40, 43).

And the prophet Ezekiel, delivering the word of the Lord:

And you took your sons and your daughters, whom you had borne to me, and these you sacrificed to them to be devoured. Were your harlotries so small a matter that you slaughtered my children and delivered them up as an offering by fire to them?... Behold, therefore, I stretched out my hand against you, and diminished your allotted portion, and delivered you to the greed of your enemies..." (Ezekiel 16:20-21, 27).

Thirty-nine years after Roe v. Wade created an unrestricted abortion license in the United States, and during the week when hundreds of thousands of Americans pray and march for life, all Americans ought to ponder these words-and the kind of country to which Roe v. Wade led.

It was supposed to be a country in which women were liberated; it became a country in which women were ever more the victims of predatory and sexually irresponsible men, left alone with their rights" to find a technological fix" to the dilemma of unwanted pregnancy. It was supposed to become a more humane country; it became a country in which morally coarsened pundits can describe as extreme" and weird" the faith-filled response of the Santorum family to the loss of a newborn shortly after birth. It was supposed to be a country of greater equality; it became a country in which the fantasies of those who believed that America was for white Anglo-Saxon Protestants only, with emphasis on white," were realized beyond the wildest imaginings of the most crazed racists and eugenicists of the 1920s.

These hard truths have too often been hidden, especially where abortion is widely prevalent. Thus it is to the immense credit of the New York-based Chiaroscuro Foundation that it has compelled the New York City Department of Health to itemize separately abortion and pregnancy statistics in its annual reports. The 2010 numbers, just released, would make both the Psalmist and Ezekiel blanch:

Of the 208,541 pregnancies in New York City in 2010, 83,750 were terminated by abortion: 4 in 10. Among non-Hispanic blacks, there were 38,574 abortions and 26,635 live births: thus for every 1,000 African-American babies born, 1,448 were aborted. Those numbers were even more chilling among non-Hispanic black teenagers: for every 1,000 African-American babies born to teenagers, 2,630 were aborted. The overall teenage abortion rate was 63 percent in a city where 16 percent of all pregnancies were teen pregnancies.

New York City is not America, of course. And there is encouragement on various fronts in the battle for life. The national abortion rate is down over the past several decades. Science has vindicated the pro-life position. The pro-life/pro-choice opinion balance has tilted, if slightly, in favor of the pro-life cause. Younger people are more likely to be pro-life than aging baby-boomers. Legislated regulation of the abortion industry has driven abortuaries out of business in many places.

Yet the fact remains that America is a country in which almost 1 in 4 pregnancies ends in the willful, violent death of the unborn child. And this slaughter of the innocents has been going on, often in higher percentages, for almost four decades.

As the Psalmist and Ezekiel might have told us, feeding the demons inevitably leads to a terrible hardening of sensibilities. The warnings from ancient Israel about where that hardening leads are worth pondering in this election year, and indeed in every year.

George Weigel is Distinguished Senior Fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C.

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

A Time for Catholic Action and Catholic Voices

ft@firsthings.com (Archbishop Jose H. Gomez ) — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 00:01:00 -0500

Last Thursday in Rome, Pope Benedict XVI delivered a remarkable address to a group of visiting American bishops. He praised Americas founders for their commitment to religious liberty and their belief that Judeo-Christian moral teachings are essential to shaping citizens and democratic institutions. The Holy Father warned that our heritage of religious freedom faces grave threats" from the radical secularism" of political and cultural opinion leaders who are increasingly hostile to Christianity."

Last Friday, the day after the Popes address, our federal government issued a ruling that confirmed his worst fears about our countrys anti-religious and anti-Christian drift. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced a final decision to mandate that every U.S. employer must provide health insurance coverage that makes birth control, sterilization, and even abortion-causing drugs available to its employees free of charge.

The government rejected the U.S. bishops efforts to negotiate an exemption for faith-based employers-including Catholic hospitals, charities and colleges-that are morally opposed to abortion and contraception. Instead, the government is giving us until August 2013 to obey or suffer the consequences-fines so large they could drive some Catholic employers out of business. It is hard not to see this new mandate as a direct attack on Catholic consciences and the freedom of our Catholic institutions.

The mandate does not promote any civil liberties and it does not advance any significant public health goals. The government justifies the mandate by arguing that employers who do not provide these services are discriminating against women. But access to free contraception has never been a basic human right. And there is no evidence that birth control has any effect on womens health; pregnancy is not a disease for which preventive medicine" is required.

The Health Department justifies denying exemptions to Catholic charities, hospitals, and colleges because it says they are not really religious" institutions. This may be the most troubling part of this new mandate. In effect, the government is presuming it has the competence and authority to define what religious faith is and how believers should express their faith commitments and relationship to God in society. These are powers our government has never before assumed itself to have.

In this case, the government is imposing a narrow, radically individualistic idea of religion-defining religion as only worship and moral teaching. As many have noted, under this definition, much of what Jesus Christ did would not qualify as a religious" ministry. The fact is that everything the Church does is religious." All our ministries and institutions are motivated by our love for God and our mission to the spread the Gospel. We dont do these things because we are social workers or philanthropists. We do them because we are disciples.

The Catholic Church is the only visible religious group in American public life that holds consistent beliefs regarding the morality of life issues, including abortion and contraception. And Catholic institutions make a major contribution to our social fabric-healing, educating, and caring for the needs of millions of our fellow citizens, especially the poor. So it is hard to escape the conclusion that the government is singling out the Church with this new mandate.

But the issues here go far beyond contraception and far beyond the liberties of the Catholic Church. They go to the heart of our national identity and our historic understanding of our democratic form of government. In his address last Thursday, Pope Benedict gave us some prophetic advice for these troubling times:

Here once more we see the need for an engaged, articulate and well-formed Catholic laity endowed with a strong critical sense vis-�-vis the dominant culture and with the courage to counter a reductive secularism which would delegitimize the Churchs participation in public debate about the issues which are determining the future of American society. The preparation of committed lay leaders and the presentation of a convincing articulation of the Christian vision of man and society remain a primary task of the Church in your country; as essential components of the new evangelization, these concerns must shape the vision and goals of catechetical programs at every level.

There will be much more to say about this in the weeks ahead. But this much is clear at the present moment: Now is a time for Catholic action and for Catholic voices. We need lay leaders to step up to their responsibilities for the Churchs mission. Not only to defend our faith and our rights as Catholics, but to be leaders for moral and civic renewal, leaders in helping to shape the values and moral foundations of Americas future.

Jos� H. Gomez is Archbishop of Los Angeles. He writes regularly at: www.facebook.com/ArchbishopGomez.

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

Is Great Oratory Over and Done?

ft@firsthings.com (Elizabeth Scalia ) — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 00:05:00 -0500

The passing of his federal holiday gave me an opportunity to ponder what my friend Lisa Mladinich calls the holy courage" of Martin Luther King, Jr, who found strength in knowing that his cause was a just one, despite threats, despite difficulties. Watching the old videos, I found myself as moved as ever by his stunning oratory. King was capable of using imagery; he understood the power of cadence; how to energize an idea with the forward-thrust of repetition. He knew how to prompt the memory retention of a listener with alliteration: . . .they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."

There are no more grand orators in America, and nothing could illustrate that better than the sometimes incoherent, woefully delivered remarks made in the days before and after Kings holiday. Attempting to analyze Secretary of State Hillary Clintons recent address to the United Nations, writer Russell Shaw quotes a not-untypical muddled passageone that reads like the first half of the Barney" song, as explained to lobotomized apes-and writes, With all due respect, what on earth does [it] mean? The strikingly confused venture into reasoning in this passage would provide rich material for a logicians intellectual scalpel."

Mrs. Clinton makes a great many speeches, and sometimes they contain a memorable phrase, but even when they do, her delivery is uneven; it can range from shrill to schoolmarmish. Youd think she would be more persuasive from the podium.

Our presidential choices are not much better. If a recent GOP debate was notable for Newt Gingrichs populist smackdown of the press, every candidate took a turn at tongue-tumbling and homina-homining his way through a response. Our current president-who, sans teleprompter, is as prone to stumble-stuttering as his predecessor-has not managed a memorable phrase since yes we can." His remarks this week on the anniversary of Roe v Wade were so disinterested and vague that they could have been called empty, except where they displayed insensitivity.

Great oratory is about more than being able to smoothly read a teleprompter, or sufficiently rehearse (or over-rehearse) a bit of rhetoric. Great oratory requires both a love of ideas and the words that bring them forth and make them seem not just plausible but noble, not just noble but unstoppable. Great oratory can so enlarge a thought that everyone listening wants to ride on its wings to the soaring heights. Could Winston Churchill have inspired Britain during World War II with some mealy, designed-not-to-give-offense sentence promising mere protection?

We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender. . .

Fine structure; powerful imagery, delivered in a voice full of certitude: great oratory.

I think what is missing from our current crop of gushers and gasbags is the ability to find poetry in their texts, or even to purposely include it. Whether this is because there is something lacking within them or because they believe their audiences too stupid to appreciate a well-struck image or relate to metaphor, I cannot say. These are all highly credentialed people, but I am not sure that is the same thing as being broadly educated.

Bill Clinton was a very good speaker, indeed; his well-documented love of talk, and the clear delight he took in using words-in pronouncing them, teasing them, timing their release and even droppin the occasional g"-made him an entertaining speaker, if one ultimately conviction-hobbled by a need to be loved. Ronald Reagan was also very good, and with his actors training he was capable of putting across the powerfully poetic image, as he did when eulogizing the Challenger astronauts. Thanks to his then-speechwriter, Peggy Noonan-the Fairleigh Dickinson graduate who knew and drew upon on the words of John Gillespie Magee and placed them perfectly into context-Reagan pronounced, Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth . . . put out my hand, and touched the face of God."

And in those scant lines, with the economy of language only poetry brings, the president lifted a nation off its knees and into wonder.

Perhaps the last great American orator was Bobby Kennedy; like King, he (and for that matter his brothers) understood the techniques of oratory: cadence, repetition, alliteration. But RFK also had the ability to extemporaneously pull poetry out at the appropriate moment, and insert it into his remarks in a way that was constructive, instructive, and ultimately bracing. Upon learning of the death of Reverend King, Kennedy had to announce the terrible news to a campaign crowd, and his remarks were breathtaking. They were real; they hit every point that needed making, and then they they applied an immediate balm of respect and shared grief to a stricken crowd he trusted to understand:

For those of you who are black and are tempted to be filled with hatred and mistrust of the injustice of such an act, against all white people, I would only say that I can also feel in my own heart the same kind of feeling. I had a member of my family killed, but he was killed by a white man. But we have to make an effort in the United States, we have to make an effort to understand, to get beyond, or go beyond these rather difficult times. My favorite poem, my favorite poet was Aeschylus. And he once wrote: Even in our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God."

After a few more consoling and temperate words, Kennedy concluded, . . . lets dedicate ourselves to what the Greeks wrote so many years ago: to tame the savageness of man and make gentle the life of this world. Let us dedicate ourselves to that, and say a prayer for our country and for our people."

Overpopulated with over-polished politicians whose careful, empty words lull-into-stultification even the most besotted listener, America might be well-served by a voice that can speak to her with a respectful erudition that assumes she can understand, and with a naked passion for encouraging her to all she can yet be.

Elizabeth Scalia is the Managing Editor of the Catholic Portal at Patheos and blogs as The Anchoress. Her previous articles for "On the Square" can be found here.

RESOURCES

The Holy Courage of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Hillary Clinton and the Laws that Teach

Hillary Clinton's memorable phrases

Debate Transcripts

Obama's Roe v Wade remarks

High Flight

Robert Kennedy's remarks on the death of Martin Luther King

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

In Defense of Ambition: Esolens Curious Overstatement

ft@firsthings.com (Carson Holloway ) — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 00:01:00 -0500

Is ambition evil? In an October 2011 essay in First Things that offers an otherwise insightful and provocative critique of Stephen Greenblatts theologically tone-deaf interpretations of Shakespeare, Anthony Esolen appears to say as much. This is an important mistake.

Esolen rightly calls out Greenblatts ignorance of-or insensitivity to-the great moral tradition of Western civilization. Yet Esolen goes too far, asserting, contra Greenblatt, that ambition itself is evil. It subordinates others to the good of oneself and thereby inverts the whole message of both Judaism and Christianity."

No doubt ambition is a dangerous thing, but Esolens remark here is an error. This excessive condemnation is inconsistent with common sense, with the classical and biblical tradition on which Esolen draws in his criticisms of Greenblatt, and even, I think, with Shakespeare as well. It is, moreover, a practically harmful mistake, one that undermines the classical and biblical traditions power to inform and improve our present culture.

In ordinary speech, the word ambition often indicates a desire to win the praise of ones fellows. Such ambition can lead men astray, as when, for example, they seek to win praise through deeds that merely flatter the passions of an unreflective and enraged mob. Such ambition can also, however, be intimately bound up with a desire to do what is right and just, and a longing to serve others. This is the ambition" that a young Abraham Lincoln, aspiring to political office, announced to his fellow citizens in 1832: Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition. Whether it be true or not, I can say, for one, that I have no other so great as that of being truly esteemed of my fellow-men, by rendering myself worthy of their esteem."

A different but related sense of the word ambition signifies a desire to rule. This is the meaning with which Esolen is more particularly concerned, and, again, it would be foolish to deny that such a desire is fraught with moral danger. Ambition can be wrong, just as it can be wrong to eat an apple if it belongs to someone else; it can be wrong to have sexual relations with a woman if she is married to another; and it can be wrong to seek to rule if the community already has a legitimate ruler. But none of this means that hunger, sexual desire, or ambition is in itself an evil.

Here, again, Americas greatest statesman provides an apt example. Of Lincolns efforts to win a seat in the United States Senate, his law partner, William Herndon, famously said his ambition was a little engine that knew no rest." In 1860, responding to a friends inquiry about his presidential intentions, Lincoln admitted that the taste is in my mouth a little." Lincoln wanted to be president, but this desire was inseparable from his intention to do good.

We learn from the greatest thinkers in our tradition that man is by nature a sociable animal. Such a being cannot help but to cherish the praise of his fellows, or to feel ambition of the sort that the young Lincoln expressed. Those who feel no such ambitions we call sociopaths. Moreover, as we learn from Aristotle, man is not merely a sociable animal but a political animal: men do not just live together, but they live in authoritative communities constituted by law and by relationships of ruling and being ruled.

Aristotle, indeed, presented magnanimity or greatness of soul-the disposition of the man who knows he is worthy of the greatest honors, especially the honor of ruling-as a virtue. Saint Thomas Aquinas, who noted that honor is very desirable" and necessary to human life, did not disagree. Even the more otherworldly Augustine was careful to condemn the Romans for their excessive love of honor, holding not that the love of glory should be utterly abandoned, but surpassed by the love of righteousness.

As Esolen suggests, Shakespeares moral vision was informed by this tradition. It is therefore hard to believe Esolens claim that Shakespeare intended to teach that ambition itself is evil." Is this the meaning of Macbeth? Certainly Macbeths ambition was inordinate, and not only because he was willing to murder for it. Shakespeare, however, sets this perverse and selfish ambition alongside more wholesome versions. Is there not in Malcolm a just and noble ambition to overthrow the tyrant and assert his own legitimate claim to rule? Banquo also shows signs of ambition. Yet he is a faithful and noble subject who never lowers himself to a single wicked act.

Esolens disdain for ambition has practically harmful consequences. Now more than ever our culture needs the ennobling influence of the classical and biblical tradition, from whose wisdom we have wandered far. That tradition cannot exert this needed influence, cannot speak to our cultures multitude of lost souls, unless it is presented in its true grandeur and beauty. This is impossible, however, if it is made to seem inhuman through unjust caricature.

Teaching the best citizens to shun social and political leadership seems a sure way to topple an already teetering civilization. Ambition is indeed dangerous, precisely because its objects-honor and rule-are so lofty that they may obscure our vision of what is even higher: love of God and of our fellow men. But this is a reason to purify our ambition, not to condemn it, any more than we would condemn erotic love, patriotism, piety, or any other good that can be perverted.

Carson Holloway is a political scientist and the author of The Way of Life: John Paul II and the Challenge of Liberal Modernity (Baylor University Press).

RESOURCES

Anthony Esolen, Greenblatts Curious Omission

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

The R Word

ft@firsthings.com (Matthew Hennessey ) — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 00:20:00 -0500

I hear the word a lot. Less than I used to, but more than Id prefer. The word is retarded." To many it remains a humorous synonym for words like uncoordinated" or stupid." I probably hear it more than most because Im really attuned to it. When I was a kid, it was common for boys to tease each other with the word gay." But that was ultimately declared unspeakable by polite society. We forced it out of our vocabularies.

That hasnt yet happened for what families like mine call the R" word. People-even those in polite society-still use it. They use it casually. Even in my presence. Even when they know that my daughter has Down syndrome. It seems they just cant help it.

There are those who say that retarded" is a medical term which has been used for decades to describe developmental disability and so it cant be or shouldnt be excised from the language. To which I reply, when was the last time you heard someone referred to as a cripple, or a spastic, or a vegetable? All terms once considered medically appropriate, but which have given way to more sensitive-and, I might add, more accurate-terminologies.

At times, Ive summoned the courage to have really uncomfortable conversations with people that I genuinely like and who I knew werent trying to hurt my feelings or insult my daughter. Sometimes I wonder if I should lighten up. Maybe people dont intend harm when they casually toss off this humiliating and dehumanizing word. Maybe I should try to give people the benefit of the doubt. Sometimes when youre going for a laugh you cross the line. Its innocent. Chill out.

And then something like this happens, and I realize that words matter. They matter a lot.

In case you missed it, let me summarize for you the case of Amelia Rivera and her family. Three-year old Amelia was born with Wolf-Hirschhorn syndrome, a chromosomal abnormality that results in distinctive facial features, low muscle tone, delayed growth and development, and a variety of other signs and symptoms. Like many families of children with these types of disabilities, the Riveras know their way around our health care system. For our families, life sometimes seems like an endless string of appointments, lab visits, tests, treatments, and therapies.

The hardest part for most families is maintaining the advocacy mindset. You really have to fight sometimes. There are a lot of obstacles to getting a child like Amelia the health care and educational services she needs. It takes extraordinary dedication and stamina to not simply give up or give in when a so-called expert recommends a course of action that to you seems wrong, lazy, or just plain stupid. Sometimes, you are torn between trusting someone with lots of abbreviations before and after his name, and listening to the voice of warning in your head. Sometimes you feel paranoid. You wonder if everyone isnt out to trip you up.

Sometimes, as with my R"-word obsession, you wonder if you should maybe just chill out.

Amelias kidneys arent working the way they are supposed to and she needs a transplant. According to the Riveras, the surgeons at Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) have refused to provide Amelia with the life-saving transplant for a very simple reason: Because she is mentally retarded. According to the Riveras, a doctor declared Amelia ineligible for a transplant-even if the family were able to arrange their own donor-because of her mental disability and for no other medical reason. There would be complications down the road, the doctor said. Difficult complications. Because of her disability, Amelia probably wouldnt be able to remember to take her medication. Furthermore, this doctor insinuated that it was not his decision alone, but the decision of a committee of CHOP doctors.

That committee may not have an embossed plastic nameplate with the words Death Panel" on its conference room door, but it ought to. Its very hard to read the decision of the Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia as anything other than an Obamacare-emboldened shot across the bow of those who would deign to waste expensive and risky health care treatments on retards.

One of my favorite little games to play with people who think that words dont matter is to ask them to replace the word R" word with the N" word. Your daughter wont remember to take her medication because shes a [N" word]," doesnt quite seem as acceptable for a doctor to tell a parent, does it?

I have met people who have fought tooth-and-nail with school districts to keep their kids out of special education classrooms, who have battled with bureaucrats to avoid having label such as developmentally disabled" and mentally retarded" placed on their children. Some say, Why? Why do you fight so hard for such a seemingly small thing?"

Because words matter. They matter a lot.

Matthew Hennessey is a writer and editor who lives in New Canaan, CT. You can follow him on Twitter @MattHennessey.

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

Keeping the (Year of) Faith in 2012

ft@firsthings.com (Ryan N. S. Topping ) — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 00:01:00 -0500

Coinciding with the 50th anniversary of the opening of Vatican II, the twentieth year since the publication of the Catechism, and the first-ever Synod on the New Evangelization, 2012 has been declared the Year of Faith." As Benedict underscored in his 2011 Christmas address to the Roman Curia, the Year of Faith is meant to incite more than lively belief; its celebration is also a call to glance backward and to look forward.

The Year of Faith provides a chance to remember both the fruits and the failures of the Second Vatican Councils implementation, with honest clarity. The failure to transmit the habits of piety coupled with the advance of an aggressive secularism led many young people, often after years of sitting at the desks of parochial classrooms, simply to abandon the Church. Such baptized but unformed souls never have nor ever will attend the fraternities, Catechism classes, or processions that their parents took for granted.

An alternative response has been the revival of energetic orthodoxy. The cultural conditions that alienated some young people and their parents have galvanized others. These youth are the fruit of Blessed John Paul IIs call for the New Evangelization and have been emboldened by the courage of Benedict XVI. Increasingly, seminaries and monasteries are filled with young men and women such as these.

With the 2012 worldwide Synod on the New Evangelization, we must consider anew what strategies are congruent with the task of preaching in our time. Of course, we should be leery of grand plans that would propose to remake the Church in the name of relevance. Even so, as Cardinal Newman once said in relation to the development of doctrine, since the Church militant needs to march through time, she must in a certain sense constantly be on the move.

If in this generation the Church is to advance her world-transforming mission we can aim for no less than these four practical objectives: the ending of abortion; the return of large families; the renewal of classical education; and the building of better churches. These correspond, so it seems, to the most pressing political, social, educational, and liturgical needs of the Church in the West.

As grace builds upon nature, so Catholic culture builds upon certain goods, like society. If low birth rates are both a symptom and cause of cultural decline, then killing your children is an act of cultural suicide. (Christians cannot be fooled by those who would reduce abortion to an evil equal to, say, unfair immigration rules. They are not equivalent. The good of life is more basic than the good of mobility.) Next, besides defending children, Christians need to have more of them. Even the UN now admits that demographic meltdown chills the economy. The Church, for her part, has never abrogated its longstanding commendation of large families. As from the Catechism: Sacred Scripture and the Churchs traditional practice see in large families a sign of Gods blessing and the parents generosity." (The italics are in the original.)

Third, we must take control of our own childrens education. Since John Dewey the professional guild of educators have been trained according to a progressive philosophy that destroys memory. Teaching Latin conveniently forges a link to the history, art, literature, and philosophy of the West that has been largely shaped by the Catholic Church. Catholic parents feel a need to introduce their children to what is noble and fine in the Christian intellectual tradition, which explains, at least in part, the rise of independent Christian academies and of home-schooling (which grows at a rate of 7 percent per year).

A final objective: let us build better churches. Culture follows cult. If Christian culture depends upon learning, it presupposes piety. Activism and education-necessary as these are-will lose their way if not nourished by a rich liturgical experience. So, alongside this Year of Faith, believers need to remember again what it means to celebrate that faith with solemnity. Given the often reckless liturgical experimentation of the last fifty years, any effort at re-evangelizing the West will depend on a renewal of liturgical piety. With the new translation of the Novus Ordo and a new lease on life given to the old form of the Mass, this renewal is now well underway.

Pope Benedicts call for the Year of Faith is a call, at the least, for the defense of life, for the flourishing of the family, for the renewal of education, and for the revival of cult. But all programs for reform must be taken in the right spirit. It is not committees or conferences that will ultimately bring about the New Evangelization. It will be our Lord himself. Who knows under which florescent bulb the next great saint is studying, or serving? In one very real sense, the Year of Faith should teach us that there is nothing for us to do. As the Russian monastic Seraph of Serov memorably said, Acquire a peaceful spirit and then thousands of others round you will be saved."

Ryan N. S. Topping, is the Visiting Chair in Studies in Catholic Theology at the John XXIII Centre for Catholic Thought at St. Thomas University, Fredericton, Canada. These reflections are adapted from a manuscript which he is completing titled Lazarus Rising: The Catechism and the Renewal of Catholic Culture".

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

Votes for Felons

ft@firsthings.com (James R. Rogers ) — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 00:01:00 -0500

While reading of the exchange between Rick Santorum and Mitt Romney on voting rights for felons last week, it occurred to me that in the 20-plus years since I started going into prisons as a volunteer, none of the men on the inside has told me what he misses about the free world is voting.

The men-Ive only worked with men-tell me that they miss their mothers (although, poignantly, very few mention missing their fathers), they miss their wives, children, and jobs. Several have even mentioned missing Dr. Pepper. But none has mentioned to me that he misses the voting booth.

Over the same time period, Ive heard numerous scholarly presentations and political discussions on the same topic. While I do not pretend that the men I associate with on the inside constitute a representative sample of the prison population, I have a suspicion that voting rights for felons is a bigger issue to folks on the outside than it is to the men on the inside.

I understand the reasons for opposing votes for felons. Almost all of the men on the inside have hurt people, either directly through violent offenses or indirectly through drug and alcohol offenses. In Lockean political theory, a person forfeits the privileges of civil society through violent aggression. Deprivation of the vote is one appropriate indicia of this forfeiture.

So I dont believe its an illegitimate consequence for most offenders to face for their actions. But the absence of illegitimacy doesnt answer the question: Is deprivation of the vote subsequent to release (and after any probation and parole) a useful additional penalty for society to impose on offenders?

Without minimizing or rationalizing the impact that crime has on victims and society at large-which is a tendency that is important to avoid both for the spiritual growth of the men as well as for the volunteer who receives Jesus in ministering to these men (Mt 25.36)-it seems to me that there are practical reasons that offenders who have completed their sentences should be welcomed back into civil society by being re-granted the suffrage.

The recidivism rate for released offenders remains very high. Even for men actively involved in the church on the inside, the transition from prison to the free world is fraught with difficulty, and many do not succeed.

While there are certainly those men in prison who play the church game, its not true of all of the men. And in some ways, the transition to the free world for Christians seems to me even more difficult than for those who arent.

Men who have converted or returned to the faith on the inside and who walk the talk" often find a warm, supportive community of faith inside prison walls. Many are respected-by the other offenders as well as by guards and staff-and many even hold positions of leadership and responsibility in their prison churches.

When released, even the strongest Christians typically face suspicion and fear from their families, from society at large, and from churches on the outside. These are not entirely unjustified reactions from people who knew the offender before prison but who have no closely participated in their transformation.

Nonetheless, at the precise moment these men need support to succeed in the free world, they lose the social and spiritual support they knew inside the walls, and they often find no alternative welcome on the outside (except perhaps from their old friends).

Without this support, and faced with the personal upheaval of release into a free world that can be significantly different than the one they understood before then went in, its not a surprise that the men find themselves tempted to revert to the only behavior they have experience with in the free world, even though its behavior that lead to their incarceration in the first place.

I dont pretend that returning the vote to these men will change all of that. But I see no gain to us by piling on after their release. Its a difficult enough transition without the continuing reminder that even after youve served your sentence, youre not really welcomed back into civil society. And its in our interest-societys interest-to help ex-offenders successfully transition back into the free world.

James R. Rogers is associate professor and department head in the Department of Political Science at Texas A&M University.

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.

In Praise of Evelyn Hooker

ft@firsthings.com (Stanton L Jones ) — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 01:28:00 -0500

Dr. Evelyn Hooker is arguably historys most revered gay-affirming activist scientist, and so it is that, at a time when social science is frequently abused in public discussions of same-sex issues, Hooker should be remembered and praised for her clearheaded allegiance to proper scientific standards.

No single piece of research contributed more to the demise of the idea that homosexuality is a mental illness than Hookers 1957 study. In an era in which homosexuality was considered intrinsically pathological, and in which almost all studies of homosexual persons drew on patient or prison populations and thus reinforced the disease concept, Hooker set out to obtain a sample of overt homosexuals who did not come from these sources [clinics, psychiatric hospitals or prisons]; that is, who had a chance of being individuals who, on the surface at least, seem to have an average adjustment."

Hooker was remarkably clear about the scientific logic of her study. Implicitly invoking Popperian falsificationism, Hooker recognized that in the face of an absolute claim that all homosexuals are pathological, it only required one disconfirming case to bring the professional consensus crashing down. It was her goal to gather a sample of homosexual men who demonstrably were not mentally ill, and to thus challenge the hegemony of the disease conception.

How, in an era when homosexuality was highly stigmatized, did Hooker assemble a sample of psychologically healthy homosexual individuals? Building on initial contacts with the leadership of the highly secretive Mattachine Society, she slowly worked to gain access to and the trust of a cadre of subjects. By her own account, she accepted invitations to gay parties, gay organizations, gay after-hours clubs, and gay bars"; she even tells of being invited into the gay baths of Santa Monica, though she was coy about whether she actually went.

Hooker assembled 30 homosexual and 30 heterosexual males painstakingly matched pairwise for age, IQ, and education. Her homosexual sample was anything but random. She attempted to secure homosexuals who would be pure for homosexuality; that is, without heterosexual experience," and she screened out of her homosexual sample individuals who gave evidence of psychological fragility.

Hooker tested her subjects using the gold standard of the day: the projective assessment methods of the Rorschach Ink Blot Test, the Thematic Apperception Test, and a few other tests. Subject responses were transcribed, scored objectively, and then evaluated by premier scholars of the day in each of these projective methods who each offered their diagnostic judgments for each of her subject protocols while blind" to the sexual orientation status of each of the subjects.

The results were stunning. With almost total agreement, the expert diagnosticians rated the psychological adjustment of the homosexual sample as equivalent on average to the heterosexuals, and could not do better than chance in discriminating the homosexuals from the heterosexuals. It was clear in the data from this select sample that sexual orientation had no necessary direct bearing on psychological adjustment. The prevailing scientific hypothesis had been refuted; in Hookers terms, clearly there is no inherent connection between pathology and homosexuality."

Fifteen years after her initial publication, the American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from its diagnostic manual as a distinct diagnostic category. Hooker had succeeded, with one well-designed study, in demolishing the reigning consensus of her day. Science had said that homosexual persons were necessarily, inherently, and absolutely pathological. Hookers subjects and results confounded that claim.

Hookers work was a model of transparent, careful and defensible methodological standards. Sadly, too many gay affirming scholars following in her footsteps have not embodied the same virtues, as I attempt to demonstrate in my companion essay.

The Achilles heel of research into the homosexual condition today is the issue of sample representativeness. To make general characterizations about any population or subpopulation, scientists must know that they have sampled individuals who truly represent the broader group about which they are going to make generalizations.

Hooker was able to avoid this problem entirely, because a representative sample is not needed to refute an absolute assertion about all members of a group; it only takes one non-white swan to refute the absolute claim that all swans are white. She noted the problem, even impossibility at the time, of making assertions about homosexuals in general": It should be stated at the outset that no assumptions are made about the random selection of either group. No one knows what a random sample of the homosexual population would be like; and even if one knew, it would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to obtain one."

Hookers skepticism is now long lost. As discussed in my recent article for First Things, it is now becoming clear that findings of important earlier studies on such crucial issues as the emotional well-being of homosexual persons and on the causation of the homosexual condition are severely distorted by volunteer bias created by the way unrepresentative samples have been gathered.

Further, Hookers example of successful dissent by conducting creative, good scientific research is a particularly important one for todays conservative minority. The failure of dissenting voices to appear in the contemporary research dialogue is striking. Researchers who dissent from the dominant professional viewpoint can do good science, can contribute something valuable, and can be agents of change. Today we need more such researchers in the mold of Evelyn Hooker.

Stanton L Jones is provost and professor of psychology at Wheaton College (IL) and the author of this months feature article on the�problems with same-sex science. An expanded version of his original essay, from which both of the First Things contributions are derived, is available at www.christianethics.org , as is a document offering the specific citations for the February feature article.

Become a fan of First Things on Facebook , subscribe to First Things via RSS, and follow First Things on Twitter.