Catholicism & anti-Semitism: Novelist Mary Gordon's jaundiced view of John Paul II
Baumann, Paul
C ORRESPONDENCE A clarification In my letter inquiring about the church's agenda regarding a sexual orientation that it considers objectively disordered, the editors of Commonweal replied,...
...RAY TOLOSKO West Newbury, Mass...
...During the Gulf War (1991), more than 900,000 rounds of such ammunition were fired (compared to 31,000 rounds in Kosovo and 11,000 in Bosnia...
...casualties in Vietnam—and there has been a change in U.S...
...Indeed, the promised cut of $1.6 trillion was the first order of business in the Senate the Monday after inauguration day...
...God knows, the history of Christian anti-Semitism is horrible, but Carroll is not the first or the most authoritative to write about those crimes...
...While the Courant series in no way exonerated Hussein for his failure to meet UN requirements, and blistered him for refusing to release humanitarian aid to the Iraqi people, nonetheless it reported that during the period sanctions have been in place, percapita annual income in Iraq has dropped from $3,500 to $750...
...That bias leads directly to another: the government that governs least _5_ Hot or not...
...But her reaction lacked any sense of proportionality...
...My thought was: with my weak faith, do I really need to read discussions about the deficiencies in the Catholic church as perceived by others...
...If not yet, when might they...
...It's not hard to play to the worst suspicions of those who are either wholly ignorant of Catholicism or passionately disaffected from the church...
...That was rich indeed...
...It would be interesting to see an article explaining why the analogy is unreasonable...
...In March 2000, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan openly expressed concern about sanctions on Iraq...
...AmIGeekOrNot.com asks "How much of a geek are you...
...If I have an open mind to the Bible and to the magisterium, then those ideas can result in very wholesome and faithstrenghening thoughts...
...Catholic bishops' conference, wrote to Patriarch Raphael Bidawid of Baghdad, his Iraqi counterpart, saying that while the international community held the Iraqi government accountable for threatening the peace, world leaders must not "hold the Iraqi people hostage or harm innocent people...
...We have no right to ask anyone else to do anything the way we would do it," she announced...
...I have enough questions of my own...
...Yet, as carefully crafted as the speech was in its appeal for the nation "to seek a common good beyond your comfort, to defend needed reforms against easy attacks, to serve your nation, beginning with your neighbor," it also exposed the contradictions embedded in the Republican agenda—contradictions that belie the president's appeal to the common good...
...Writing in the May/June 1999 issue of Foreign Affairs, John and Karl Mueller describe comprehensive state sanctions as an "impressive method" of mass destruction...
...John Paul II's behavior in relation to the Jews is "simply an outrage," she said...
...Even more stark than the effect of radioactive contaminants on veterans and local populations, however, is another, continuing action against Iraq...
...The article by Luke Timothy Johnson attempts to take Pope John Paul II to task, thereby defining his deficiency, for not showing some "appreciation for the goodness of sexual pleasure...
...On average, 5,000 Iraqi citizens have died each month since the war, according to the Courant, as the result of UN sanctions leveled against the regime of Saddam Hussein...
...Even nihilists can find a home in cyberspace at the Web site "Am I not or not...
...Increasingly, religious people were "fundamentalists," true believers whose faith was rooted in "hatred and terror and uncertainty...
...It cost him nothing...
...Could someone explain that to me...
...Furthermore, down the line the cuts could turn out to be inflationary, bringing back the huge deficit that the Clinton administration inherited from the last Republican interregnum and finally tamed with the discipline supplied by the aforementioned Alan Greenspan...
...One is forced to ponder: If the purpose of sanctions is to oust Saddam Hussein, are they working...
...Simply stated: How will it respond, assuming no change in its present stance on nonheterosexual orientations, if the cause(s) of such orientations are uncovered in the future and subsequently the orientations themselves are subject to change within the canons of acceptable ethical norms...
...Robert j. comiskey Springfield, Va...
...cindy nolan Lincolnshire, III...
...He described them as a blunt instrument which "hurt large numbers of people who are not their primary targets...
...and mortality rates for children under five have quadrupled (UNICEF estimates some 500,000 premature deaths in that subgroup...
...Carroll, a laicized priest, has done that too often in upscale magazines and newspapers like the New Yorker, the Atlantic Monthly, and the Boston Globe...
...I think he's done an enormous amount of harm...
...The January 26 issue was the last straw...
...More than three years ago, Bishop Anthony Pilla, then president of the U.S...
...Others range from political satire ("Am I President or not...
...The principal issue, of course, is how to interpret orientation itself...
...Patrick Jordan I PAUL BAUNANN CATHOLICISM & ANTI-SEMITISM An evening with James Carroll & Mary Gordon When it comes to Catholic bashing—and especially pope bashing—the novelist Mary Gordon is in a class of her own...
...It is rare to find this in a single voice...
...In the immediate future, the Federal Reserve's lowering of interest rates is likely to work more smoothly and more quickly...
...other Western Europeans are not so sure...
...And morally, if not politically and militarily, when do sanctions become objectionable...
...Since then there have been an additional sixty thousand sanction-related deaths—more than the number of U.S...
...As noted in the original letter, until such time as the church can adopt a more neutral stance on the interpretation of the orientation itself, the dialogue will remain one of defensive posturing...
...D 8 (Continued from page 4) goodness of sexual pleasure" more than enough...
...Larger things are at stake than one politician's cynicism or one pope's bad decisions...
...C ORRESPONDENCE A clarification In my letter inquiring about the church's agenda regarding a sexual orientation that it considers objectively disordered, the editors of Commonweal replied, "We doubt that the official church is supporting research to eliminate gays through genetic surgery, or otherwise" (January 12, 2001...
...The Church and the Jews, A History...
...Who needs it...
...I never stated, or implied, that the church is supporting research to eliminate gays (human persons...
...You can upload pictures of yourself and be rated by visitors to the site...
...None of that is good enough for Gordon or her fans...
...Sex & the pope Luke Timothy Johnson has gotten it right ("A Disembodied 'Theology of the Body/" January 26,2001...
...Drawn up by Tom Campbell (R-Calif...
...Samples are being examined for toxicity in five European countries, and an official assessment is expected in March...
...In a time of budget surpluses, it is an offer that few will resist...
...According to Dennis Halliday, the UN's former coordinator of aid to Iraq, the UN embargo has "pushed the Iraqi people back toward Saddam," undermining the sanctions' stated goal...
...the deficit could reemerge if surpluses fail to materialize) was taken by Republicans as an order to move full speed ahead...
...When the home page appears you are greeted with an image of a man or a woman underneath a beauty ballot...
...Gordon was there to "pay homage" to James Carroll, who was launching the publicity tour for his new book, Constantine's Sword...
...I am not moved by him kneeling at the wall," she boasted...
...and John Conyers (D-Mich...
...Submit your picture and find out...
...Reducing the federal deficit used to be a Republican mantra...
...Or again, has anyone demonstrated that dissent from Humanae vitae has produced more stable and faithful marriages...
...I think we need to remember that John Paul II is a consummate actor and a media expert," Gordon said...
...In looking at the ecumenical movement, Ryan pointed out real possibilities and opportunities to come together and share our faith without our traditions inhibiting our worship and dialogue...
...When the metaphor is theft, tax cuts are taken as a form of restitution...
...In addition, a UN inquiry in Kosovo had found that eight of eleven areas where the shells had been used were still contaminated with low-level radiation...
...and British experts say no...
...In calling for civility, courage, compassion, and character, he spoke to the desire of many for greater national comity and citizen accountability...
...If s simply too easy...
...Take the promised tax cuts: the first and almost only extended round of applause during Bush's speech went to the reiteration of his campaign promise to cut taxes...
...Downright hilarious, though, was Gordon's analysis of the nature of faith in a postmodern age...
...ANTHONY DI RUSSO Greenville, N.H...
...Your attractiveness will be rated on a scale of one to ten—ten for hot, one for not...
...Hoping & praying I thoroughly enjoyed Jerry Ryan's "1054 & All That" (January 12,2001...
...I'm sending in my check today...
...As a candidate, George W. Bush called for a strengthening of sanctions, and Hussein will no doubt be a primary focus of Bush's foreign policy—in terms of energy security and family honor...
...My inquiry was directed toward the implications of the current, official institutional position of the church...
...John Paul II's agenda, Gordon told the audience, is to return the church to its triumphalist past...
...One of the joys and burdens of being alive today is that we know too much," she said...
...I caught her last month at the Interfaith Center of New York...
...I hope and pray that I will be able to see this happen in my lifetime...
...Why is contraceptive intercourse not like the Romans' vomitorium...
...Taxpayers know better than the government how to spend their money...
...One doesn't denounce the state of Israel, for example, because of the passing (we hope) popularity of Ariel Sharon...
...One member lists among her hobbies "drinking/getting drunk," "wrestling," and "building sand castles...
...A plea beneath the photo reads "Please help keep this site fun, clean, and real...
...Postmodern people know that there is not just one truth, and consequently must embrace what she called the "challenge of de-evangelization" (few people in the room evidently caught the reference to John Paul II...
...Lewis's Mere Christianity and his comparison of contemporary sexuality and gluttony...
...As many economists have pointed out, there appears to be little economic justification for tax cuts that will kick in after the current slowdown has ended...
...A year ago, seventy members of Congress sent President Bill Clinton a bipartisan letter stating that the UN sanctions offered the Iraqi government little incentive to comply...
...Goaded on by Gordon, the crowd turned the evening into an orgy of anti-Catholic speechifying...
...Humility," she said, "that is the virtue most called for in a pluralistic world...
...After thinking about the article, I concluded that it produced some very thought-provoking ideas...
...If not in ten years, in fifteen...
...It was related not to mad cow disease but to depleted uraniumtipped shells fired by NATO in Bosnia (1994-95) and Kosovo (1999...
...AmIHot.com, a similar site, has personal ads with each photo...
...This was a bit of a hoot, since the substance and tenor of her remarks rarely deviated from her outrage over the pope's refusal to do things the way she thinks they should be done...
...administrations...
...Such facts are slowly beginning to dawn on the American public...
...And I believe it is a greater insult to the murder of the Jews than if he had simply been silent...
...His widely praised overtures, such as his apology for historic violence against the Jews, his visit to Israel, and his pilgrimage to the Western Wall, are a fraud and a lie...
...The site has inspired copycats of several varieties...
...Yet everything that the Bush administration hopes to accomplish, from education reform to modernizing the military to providing Medicare prescription coverage, may depend on marshaling resources that lie in those surpluses, to say nothing of all that needs doing and currently goes unattended...
...Instead, Bush instinctively appeals to a hardy American prejudice: taxation is a form of confiscation...
...As an educator of adolescents and a married mother of three, I have searched for writings that present a balanced view of the gift of sexuality, including both its pleasurable and difficult aspects...
...There was much to applaud in Bush's brief address, though to his credit, the president did not play his lines for easy applause...
...One Canadian expert, the Courant reported, has warned of likely lung cancers developing among Gulf War veterans...
...But that was last January...
...Sources dose to the curia claim the Vatican is in talks with AOL / Time Warner to develop a site...
...Many of the details for cuts are still to be worked out and they may prove to be more prudent and equitable than they sounded during the campaign...
...But do we...
...the letter argued that "morally, it is wrong to hold the Iraqi people responsible for the actions of a brutal and reckless government...
...AmICatholicOrNot.com hasn't yet emerged...
...ben shafer Chicago, III...
...Pope John Paul II has a specific message to convey, and there are at least two of us who think his message is right on...
...I think he's too easy on the pope," Gordon began her remarks about Carroll's book, which, incidentally, does acknowledge that John Paul II has done more than any other pope to bring Catholics and Jews together...
...Moreover, as you are well aware, a sexual orientation is only one component of the totality of personhood...
...How hot ami...
...What might the center's next program be, "Mormonism: A Weird Religion for Weird People" or "The Hasidim: Haven't They Heard of Birth Control...
...Polio, meningitis, and typhoid—all nearly eradicated before the war—are also on the rise, and cases of cholera quadrupled between 1997 and 1999, from 486 to 2,398...
...I sure would like to know...
...Lest we forget, all of this was said at the Interf aim Center of New York...
...Absent the particulars, examine and consider the justifications for the cuts frequently repeated by Bush and Company: "The surplus belongs to the taxpayer, not to the government...
...Well, almost enough...
...Her barely contained anger at the pope prevents her from seeing what James Carroll honestly acknowledges: for all his failings, John Paul II sincerely reveres Judaism and has taken once unimaginable steps toward Jewish-Catholic reconciliation...
...Twenty?...And who is doing the counting...
...I think he's a dangerous figure...
...As Commonweal's reviewer Robert Louis Wilken persuasively showed (January 26), Carroll's book is deeply flawed, especially his insistence that any traditional Christian understanding of the Crucifixion is inherently anti-Semitic...
...Johnson is careful to be inclusive of concerns of men and women, heterosexual and homosexual, single and married...
...A smug, liberal caterwauling animated the evening...
...And by the way, for what it's worth from a nontheologian, I think the advertisers, media, celebrities and population in general, promote "the (Continued on page 30) 4 Taxing rhetoric To the surprise of many Americans, George W. Bush delivered an elegant inaugural address on January 20...
...6 NOTEBOOK SANCTIONS ON IRAQ Ten years & counting Last month, a wave of medical concern raised a hot debate in Western Europe...
...Gordon was particularly incensed over the beatification of Pius IX and John Paul It's support for Pius XII's canonization...
...And Alan Greenspan's mixed blessing a few days later (cut, but not too much...
...According to a series published last fall in the Hartford Courant (October 22-25,2000), birth defects in Iraq have nearly tripled since the end of the war, raising the issue of whether the use of depleted uranium-tipped weapons bears greater scrutiny there...
...Three years (and many prayers) later, the sanctions remain in force, scarcely reshaped or narrowed...
...REV...
...Paul O'Neill, secretary of the treasury, acknowledged at his confirmation hearings the high priority a tax cut has in the new administration...
...Where else can you get all this for $44 per year...
...At the same time, they argue that the UN's sanctions have neither undermined Hussein's will to survive nor significantly weakened his hold on power...
...Furthermore, since widespread water contamination persists, a result of bombed-out infrastructure and the curtailment of chemical production and importation, dysentery and gastroenteritis are rampant, affecting both the old and the young...
...If you've ever asked yourself that question, here's a Web site for you: www.AmIHotOrNot.com...
...Halliday warns that although the sanctions have failed to dislodge Hussein, they have turned a whole generation of younger Iraqis against the West, creating a veritable breeding ground for future extremists...
...Still, he was one of the more reasonable people in the crowded room at the Interf aith Center...
...The polarities of views on this question range from the "objectively disordered" to "a gift of God...
...I share that skepticism...
...All of this appeared to go down very well with those in the room...
...Did they cause a growing number of cancer- and leukemia-related deaths among NATO veterans...
...Johnson is also sensitive to the hidden sexist underpinnings of much of the current church teaching and to the basic logical flaws in many of its supportive arguments...
...It would be excellent for Johnson to expand these topics and to open the dialogue for those who would join him in his plea for a revisiting of Humanae vitae...
...per-capita daily protein intake has fallen from 81.6 grams to 53.3 grams, landing the country on the list of nations endangered by malnutrition...
...In the coming months, look for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith to issue norms for a Catholic Internet rating system, tentatively titled Ex corde Webesiae...
...Some, like "Am I capable of understanding basic logic or not...
...Not for the lukewarm "A Disembodied 'Theology of the Body'" reminded me to look again at C.S...
...The first question—or rather speech—from the audience was a stem-winder that started out expressing doubt over the possibility of change in the church and descended into a rant on the Catholic origins of civil violence around the world, the sinister immigration policy of the church, and predictably enough, the Catholic overpopulation problem...
...Postmodern people of faith, like Gordon and her admiring listeners, have access to a sense of humility that fundamentalists and so-called Catholic triumphalists explicitly renounce...
...He urged that we think of ourselves as "citizens, not spectators...
...It was enough to make a Catholic speed home with the intention of reuniting the procreative and unitive dimensions of the conjugal act...
...Gordon also warned the audience that the growth area in religion was not among the broadminded, compassionate New Yorkers gathered in the room...
...What a woman...
...President Bush insisted that we take our responsibilities seriously both in this country and in the world, reminding us that "compassion is the work of a nation, not just a government...
...Pilla noted that the UN sanctions should be "reviewed, reshaped, and narrowed to achieve their legitimate objectives of ending threats to peace," and promised that the American bishops would hold the Iraqis' sufferings "in our hearts and prayers...
...No small irony in the title of that venue...
...are nasty— a Bush /Cheney campaign poster is the first image you see—while others are plain bizarre ("Am I interested in weather shielding for my brickwork or not...
...to the philosophical ("Am I an existentialist or not...
...The new one is likely to take a harder line toward Iraq...
...Gordon was oblivious to the absence of humility and the unwarranted certainty with which she caricatured the pope's actions as well as the beliefs of those she deems "fundamentalists...
Vol. 128 • February 2001 • No. 3
