Editorials
Contents Volume CXIII, Number 12 commonweal Correspondence 354 Editorials ...
...Mr...
...and Nicaraguan policies are alive in the Spirit and the church...
...writers Mario Vargas Llosa ABM Treaty...
...At least in the U.S., theologians are hardly in the cardinal spoke in Toronto on theology and the church...
...No clear principles to the withdrawal of military personnel and to restrict arms emerge for adjudicating the difficult cases where development acquisitions from those nations...
...The Diary of Beatrice Webb: Neville Braybrooke 381 This need not be surprising...
...All seems a matter of emphasis, must agree to accept a verifiable security agreement achieved of interpretation of certain ambiguous terms, of balance...
...In real life, the maintenance of the boundaries Editor: Peter Steinfels Assistant Editors: David Toolan, Karen Sue must persist day to day, the effort to face, withstand, and perhaps even convince an Smith, Patrick Jordan adversary...
...Reagan has consistently had a low tolerance for SALT (Strategic Arms Books Limitations Talks) from its inception...
...p. 357, photo by Wagner & mates that without SALT each superpower could more than double its strategic Baroody...
...The recent document on liberation aimed at both the supply and demand sides of the problem: theology, for instance, acknowledges modern strides toward "Nothing is more important in the fight against drugs through- freedom and presents the church as their true source, interpreout the hemisphere than a sustained reduction in U.S...
...He is the driving force behind something called the Farmers are victims of a lousy trade balance...
...The same arguments that the administration and Carlos Fuentes...
...Yet other nations must support democratic govern- tions...
...But his words pointed toward politics, like business and thought, works best when there is more common ground than perhaps even the cardinal recog- competition...
...Though Mainstream, when asked, identifies itself with the likes of George Bush and senatorial candidate Jim Broyhill, its members take positions that are almost impossible to imagine "For heaven's sake, Ellen - I didn't ask to be contained in a GOP presidential platform or congressional born a conservative Republican...
...But there is one thing Movies: Tom O'Brien adversaries of SALT, including the president, must take into account concerning the Staff: Karen F. Silva, Harriette Balsky, Patricia Mazzola accord's failure: To abandon SALT is to forsake what little restraint the superpowers Advertising Manager: Ruth E. Taylor have observed in respect to strategic weapons in the last decade...
...Would this be the kind cerned citizens" in the published report ("Rebuilding Coopof arms race we could tolerate or afford...
...The line for reaping much academic prestige anyway...
...reduce its however, and the practical controversies now agitating the military ties with Cuba and the Soviet bloc nations by agreeing church, a considerable gap remains...
...Valerry...
...But the SPIRIT OF TORONTO...
...Pete Domenici are on their side...
...Yet it can't be denied that in vigorously expand the number of areas in which we compete...
...sented a real step toward dialogue...
...pants provides a clue...
...Doctors, now Mainstream Forum, a small band of Republicans who wish to they are overpaid...
...Current heads of arms control...
...sustained call for regular face-to-face meetings among nations Second, Cardinal Ratzinger tends to cast conflicts over and for openness to "new approaches" to problem-solving...
...Life must still be lived...
...Perhaps Senator Gore puts too much weaponry, the secretary of defense insists that "we must reliance on those numerical limits...
...This is stuff...
...The human rights'and freedom of the press are observed...
...But the real some of his critics...
...constraints of SALT II be abrogated, the Soviet Union could quickly increase the number of warheads on its heavy SS-18 missile from ten to thirty apiece, and according to Paul WE, THE AMERICAS Warnke, who negotiated the 1979 treaty, the USSR could Why pay special attention to one ad hoc group's discussion augment the number of its combat-ready warheads in short of problems in the Western Hemisphere...
...Reagan was in a better position to achieve as the means to solve the problems of "the Americas" is to arms control than any other recent president...
...One must note, but perhaps not dwell upon, the dare not be so - optimistic : as to assume this augurs a change in dangers of a self-serving paternalism in this use of the "simple policy...
...They want an Economic Equity whose confidence in the church's teachings on sexual morality Act to combat discrimination against women in credit matters, have been shaken by Rome's apparent distance from the reality stronger fair-housing legislation, a test-ban treaty, a comof their own marital experience...
...The next issue will he dated July matters relating to arms control and a critic of the president's it, SALT decision, noted recently that with but a few exceptions the Soviet Union has "scrupulously abided by the numerical devoted to "competitive strategies...
...T HERE are not many mavericks in Congress today...
...question-and-answer session Cardinal Ratzinger accorded to So, whether or not one approves the five-point plan recom- members of the theological faculties associated with the Unimended in this report, the case is convincingly made for a versity of Toronto...
...stood indifferent to so many of these struggles is hinted at only While neither the descriptions of these four problems nor the in a reference to "errors of judgment and serious omissions for proposals to remedy them are original, the report is a terse but which Christians must be responsible...
...defense strategy by sitting on our side of the bleachers...
...though, not surprisingly, often inconclusive...
...schedule, only one issue will be published each month Senator Albert Gore, Jr., an astute congressional observer of during July and August...
...church is Christ's body but also, again and again, an obstacle *Curbing the drug trade requires long-term strategies to conversion and rebirth...
...Sol Linowitz, former U.S...
...Like them, the Peter Steinfels 382 president's SALT declaration has cleared the air...
...The Congressional Research Service estiHachfeld, Germany...
...Hightower says that Leach, a thoughtful, courageous young representative Ronald Reagan's idea of a good farm program is Hee-Haw...
...Richardson repudiated tant realities involving humanity are brought about by simple the party platform at the 1984 convention...
...At the same time, the U.S...
...And his session with the theological faculties repre- advocate a new variation on the current wisdoms and pieties...
...They will fight...
...p. 360, Edd Uluschak, Canada...
...who distancing of the United States from Israel...
...But it cannot be very easily boil down to church versus university, the Gospel achieved unilaterally or even bilaterally...
...Why was NATO abashed at the president's an- Studies, Washington, D.C...
...What an irony, as report: "It is time to rebuild inter-American cooperation...
...report issued April, 1986 by the Inter-American Dialogue is Why have the Soviet Union's proposed moratorium on nuclear that this brief consensus statement - enhanced by the twentytesting, its recent offers on verification, and its apparent flexi- four individuals whose exceptions to precise points are printed bility on SDI research all been greeted with apparent disregard in the appendix - is clear, balanced, and sound...
...who are scandalized by the prehensive arms-control treaty, an expanded peace corps, and contrast between the church's defense of individual rights in more environmental protection...
...They do not nizes...
...Although public opinion pressures and the precedent of previous presidential initiatives may have constrained Mr...
...who are Mainstream hints at the need for a tax increase and greater wounded by their second-class status as women or laity...
...Reagan's eventual decision to shell Beirut, invade Grenada, and bomb Libya...
...concerns as much as weigh them against other considerations • The emerging and still fragile democracies of Latin - which is easier to do if you are the one reading the scale...
...It was, however, a bit of decency worth underlining in people" and the "little ones," as though they had not been, the face of ludicrous opinions about Father Curran held by endowed with active capacities of their own...
...problem is that these "simple" are always imagined as shaken Another noteworthy development was the face-to-face and scandalized by theological revision and development, Commonweal: 358 never by the lack of it...
...Up to the time of the president's that still remain in our governing apparatus to propose real announcement, they appeared ready to do so...
...admirers of Lincoln...
...The proof of this Publisher: Edward S. Skillin constraint is considerable, undeniable in terms of rocket launchers and the number of nuclear warheads alone...
...History, good sense, and sometimes an insight that can cut more than one way...
...All came like thunder claps from the Benjamin Constant and the Making humid clouds that had invariably compressed round the white summit on Pennsylof Modem Liberalism: Richard M. Valelly 382 vania Avenue...
...But the wing collapsed with the political and personal burnout of Nelson Rockefeller...
...He has repeatedly called the process "fatally flawed...
...But what follows that "moment...
...America can be consolidated best by debt relief, domestic In Toronto as elsewhere, Cardinal Ratzinger displayed three attention to social equity, and the resolution of inter-state characteristics of his thought that have very practical implicaconflicts...
...say that the Republican party is not just for Reaganauts but Texas populism inveighs against homogenization, bureaucother kinds of conservatives (Burkeans...
...He got 53.8 percent of the vote...
...Rocky left primacy of the faith of the simple people": "The truly impor- politics in disappointment and disgust...
...It would be naive to think that Cardinal Ratzinger's Toronto An even more interesting group has risen up in the Demomessage promises any easy resolution of the current disputes cratic party...
...They are the New Populist Forum, and though there are some congressional members of the forum like Senator Tom Party politics Harkin of Iowa, the driving force behind this mini-movement is Jim Hightower, Agriculture Commissioner of Texas...
...The cardinal's replies were serious al"stumbling from crisis to crisis...
...The broader and more Caspar W. Weinberger (Foreign Affairs, Spring 1986) was subtle picture of inter-American relations as presented in this report is a welcome perspective...
...They are so many they invite a Poetry: Rosemary Deen certain consensus even among traditional partisan opponents...
...To abandon SALT is to realize that a liquid hydrogen is Illustrations: Cover and p. 364, Rainer escaping from another of our 0 rings...
...The Democratic governor, Mark White, Jr., a neo of some kind or other, had token MAINSTREAM CURRENTS opposition...
...Ratthrough negotiations, rather than trying to overthrow the zinger did not appear to reply directly to the theologians' Nicaraguan government...
...Meaning that the notion that most farmers are there is one exception who proves the need...
...At any rate, rooted not in theologians' divided loyalties between church some five thousand people were listening last April 19 when and university...
...p. 372, Punch...
...To suggest such cooperation [June 6], that Mr...
...But asking the Rea- recent U.S...
...No, these Republiperception that is accessible to everyone...
...has as often been broken by theology's refusal to respond to The new independent Republican is not an Eastern elitist new realities as by its precipitous innovation...
...by Washington's designated arms control arbiters...
...362, 369, 376, & 383, Paul nuclear weapons by 1992...
...As though the probsophisticated primer for hemispheric relations, emphasizing a lems had only been individual and not corporate and structural...
...questioner, obviously sympathetic to Ratzinger, made harsh Third, the cardinal once again underlines the church's - comments on Father Charles Curran, the cardinal warmly and the theologian's.- responsibility to care for "the faith of affirmed Curran's "great faith" and Catholic loyalty...
...367 abandon the provisions of the 1979 SALT II agreement later this year may be Anne Porter, Theodore Deppe 373 more ominous than the reports from Chernobyl...
...He is Jim overly subsidized is seen as nonsense...
...p. 359, Baloo,.Rothco...
...accord with the 1979 pact, the Soviets have dismantled more At this point it is necessary to register alarm in the court of weapons than the U.S., and they would be required to disman- moral and public opinion, and for those farsighted elements tle even more in the future...
...Modestly calling themselves "conIs this the security Americans want...
...from Iowa...
...The questions were polite but substantial comprehensive solution rather than the present policy of and often pointed...
...It appears to be all clubs and spades...
...First is a spiritualized, ahistorical view of the church that ments by symbolic and material backing, especially where does not come to grips with its failings, its sinfulness...
...Reagan dismissing them both as "pseudo Feinstein, McNamara, Muskie, and Vance...
...and names like Hesburgh, ABM treaty, Mr...
...Like them, the president's SALT decision was issued not as an Christians and the Military: anomaly, but as the revelation of essential intent and character...
...In Toronto, like Rockefeller or Elliot Richardson...
...have concluded that the most serious of the purported Soviet breaches are at best 20 June 1986: 355 ambiguous in their impact, and have marginal effect on American national security, especially when weighed against the In keeping with Commonweal's usual summer more numerous achievements of the SALT agreement...
...The Goldwater people Cardinal Ratzinger said some intriguing words about "this finally won that old battle for the heart of the GOP...
...Production Editor: Anne Robertson It has never been difficult to list the flaws of SALT...
...Once that breed occupied what was called a "wing" of the party, and boasted senators like Clifford Case and Jacob Javits...
...Healy 371 PRESIDENT Reagan's announcement that the United States is prepared to Verse: LeRoy Smith, Jr...
...p. 356 & 366, Bas., Tachydronws...
...Now a new age demands a new kind of alternative GOP-er...
...The bitter fact that the church opposed or mand...
...This crowd is not exactly what you would call liberal...
...There was much deserving of thoughtful discussion - and Such measures now being discussed by members of the Con- resistant to summarization - in Ratzinger's rich reflections on tadora group are obstructed by military and paramilitary ef- the intimate relationship of theology to conversion in Christ forts in the region...
...Their existence is also premised on the notion that over theology and the church...
...foreign ministers, finance ministers, acacites for abandoning SALT II it has applied equally to the demicians, corporate executives...
...These observations are They hark back to earlier traditions, principally what is called made in that spirit...
...Should the alternatives...
...and forlorn souls once known as liberal and (jafoa moderate Republicans as well...
...populism...
...Between these reflections, blamed for the impasse: "Nicaragua must...
...More important 0 A secure peace in Central America - read Nicaragua, was the simple fact of the exchange: the successor to the Holy because the negotiations called for in El Salvador are an Inquisitor was engaged in direct, open give-and-take with internal matter and confound outside action - depends upon theologians...
...This is at once the community versus the norms (and prejudices) of secular scholgood news and the bad...
...asking Captain Ahab to rethink whaling rights...
...Reagan to abide by Brave New People/Making Babies/ A Question of Life: SALT up until now, forcing him to go through at least the motions of arms control, Thomas A. Shannon 379 finally the president's deeper instincts for competition and deregulation in all matters have come to the fore - even in the area of the arms race...
...What a failure correct the misconception which seems to lurk behind much should such an opportunity be misspent...
...Yet experts 368 & 370, Emil Antonucci...
...On the contrary, it would seem that the candidate's stump speech...
...Witness Mr...
...But Meaning...
...Unless, of course, Staff there is embedded in the revelation a profound death wish, one that not only gambles on the world's fate, but invites it...
...Secretary of State George Screen: Tom O'Brien 374 Shultz's subsequent announcement to NATO ministers at Halifax that SALT H is "obsolete" (in biblical terms, fit to be trampled under foot), led Canadian Minister The need for superstars: Robert G. Middleton 375 of External Affairs Joe Clark to respond with a number of other Western allies that this most recent development is "profoundly disturbing...
...The culminat- Canada, when remembered at all, is but a silent spectator ing section of a recent statement on U.S...
...chairman of the Dialogue, articulates the message which runs After six years, the president's deck is finally face-up on the like an undercurrent through each of the four chapters of the table...
...and continuity are in tension...
...Ambassador to the have concluded, a brief and ineffective hiatus in all-out arms Organization of American States (OAS) and current coescalation...
...It is commonly said that Texas is "conservative," but Hightower says it is populist...
...We may have seen nothing yet...
...And they call for in dark moments and moral crises feel that the living individual deeper defense cuts than do Democratic leaders like Les Ashas been abandoned for abstract law...
...Why has General Abrahamson said, just be- national governments were excluded...
...Contents Volume CXIII, Number 12 commonweal Correspondence 354 Editorials 355 Mainstream currents: Keith C. Burris 359 The dogs never lie: Philip McManus 360 r, More than sentiment: John Garvey 361 Nuclear ethics for strategists & policymakers: J. Bryan Hehir 363, The precarious road: Peggy Rosenthal 364 SALT Contemplation & controversy: FREE Eva Fleischner 368 A witness to the world: T.R...
...the world and its centralization of authority within...
...One the simple...
...Writing about limits" of SALT II...
...negotiating verifiable and enforceable security arrangements...
...we wrote in our last editorial, "Rethinking Arms Control" Simply stated...
...The roster of particiorder by more than 6,000...
...They just had a primary in Texas...
...Soviet non-compliance with SALT II is real in a number of areas...
...Posed that way, the problem can that a democratic hemisphere is within reach...
...Both the U.S...
...fore the president's announcement, that for SDI to be effec- Of course, the primary reason to read and heed the third tive, it must be within the context of an arms control strategy...
...Hightower also VARIATIONS ON A POPULIST THEME had token opposition for renomination, but he got 81.3 percent...
...Comings out'" offer at least this: the welcome release of a climactic if impermanent moment of honesty...
...de- ter, and defender...
...are the former presidents of nouncement...
...In fact, the real wonder is that his May announcement didn't come much The First Coming: William M. Thompson 377 earlier in his administration...
...Such tension is the prelude to every tomorrow, if there is to be one...
...Of course, the magnetic pull of secular standards is always real for the Catholic scholar - just as the magnetic pull of power is always a temptation for the church official...
...The Creator has cans, like Leach and Lowell Weicker, are made of sterner gone about his work in a thoroughly democratic way...
...Madisonians...
...They are more practical, policy-oriented, and some might say humane, than their brethren to the right...
...arship...
...urgently needed...
...They oppose a constitutional ban on "little ones" should also include all those ordinary Catholics abortion and endorse the ERA...
...One chapter each is devoted to making the following points, with nuance and detail which can barely be suggested here: • The present financial crisis in Latin America, worsened since the global recession of the eighties despite an increase in productivity, requires restructuring of the debt and an infusion of capital to stimulate growth...
...For one thing, when a church...
...policy: that Latin America is merely one more gan administration to rethink arms control is apparently like playing field on which to wage the U.S.-Soviet competition...
...Will future What is more, presenting the issues as hemispheric conhistorians look on SALT not as a prelude to essential arms cerns serves to reshape and refocus the current debates about reduction, but merely, as the Reagan administration seems to the region...
...Rather, the event was noteworthy for several reasons besides the, lecture most intense conflicts center around what is best for the itself and the size of the audience...
...truth is that the theological conflicts currently most intense are When Cardinal Ratzinger talks, people listen...
...How does it sit with eration in the Americas," Aspen Institute for Humanistic our allies...
...Is this a test balloon for abandoning the 1972 Ecuador, Panama, and Costa Rica...
...20 June 1986: 359...
...theological scholarship in terms of service to the church versus Finally, the authors' doggedness in pursuing political rather individual academic independence and "the objective freethan military solutions is rooted in a well-substantiated hope dom of scientific thought...
...The faith of "little ones" pin...
...Their road will not be easy...
...But the recently proposed Baker plan, which focuses on fifteen of the largest debtors, is too (Continued on page 358) Commonweal • 356 small in scope to bring about the necessary economic stability...
...They might be called the non-neos...
Vol. 113 • June 1986 • No. 12
