Correspondence
FLEET, ROBERT C. & WILGRESS, JANE & WHITE, ROBERT J. & THOMSON, DAVID & MAGLIERY, FRANK & NOE, ELEANOR JEANNE & JR., CHARLES DONAHUE & VITRANO, SAL
CORRESPONDENCE Fleet wrote a diatribe As a surgeon who has lectured and practiced within the Soviet health-care system for over a quarter-century, I found Robert Fleet's article "Being Sick in...
...White seeks to denigrate medical treatment in Poland by labeling it "third world...
...We need to discover or rediscover a topology in which feminine learning has its true and primal place...
...To all, moreover, I would urge consideration of the "constitutional" question with which my article closed: Has it been revealed to us, or is it necessarily entailed in what has been revealed to us, that we as church have no power to ordain women to the priesthood...
...Saint Paul happened to cite the love of a bridegroom for his bride to make clear how devoted and tender is God's love for us, his people, his church...
...Noe and Ms...
...Third world...
...Middle Ages...
...On substance: Dr...
...The Catholic priest is essentially a sacrificer, a man perpetuating the redemptive bloodshed of Calvary, and also representing, as I understand it, the spiritual enactments from antiquity of the priest Melchizedek...
...But even if Clinton were spiritual and political "dead meat," would the story Carlin suggests be the sort of religious revelation Americans need...
...To contrast American medicine with Polish health care in a technical and professional sense and conclude that we fail in the comparison is not only ridiculous but borders on the bizarre...
...A good answer to that question would have to take into account the insights of both Ms...
...Let it be clear, however, that this was not a single "hospital from hell" experience...
...According to our correspondent, Richard R. Gaillardetz of the University of Saint Thomas School of Theology, an apostolic letter is "an ecclesiastical document of significantly less authority" than an apostolic constitution...
...Those who carry premium health insurance are naive to believe that they will be able to choose any course of treatment they desire...
...JANE WILGRESS Pacific Grove, Calif...
...The religious angle Re: David Carlin's column on the need for better religious reporting ["Beliefs Matter," July 14]: Good point, bad example...
...How many times I wanted to put my arms around all your people, just as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you would not let me...
...The author replies: Before commenting on these letters, let me acknowledge two errors in the article pointed out by another correspondent: "filibration" should be "fibrillation" and "epiglottal ulcer" should be "epiglottal problems and a stomach ulcer...
...These concrete everyday images made the concept of God's love and care much more real to people...
...They may be fine for treating your sore throat, but not for replacing your heart valve...
...To those who find Ms...
...I also sadly conclude that we in the United States apparently do not have a commitment to health care as a human right...
...Many of us would find that a very reasonable bargain...
...Our experience suggests that America's "best system in the world" does not automatically insure that these criteria will be met-nor does "socialized medicine" mean that medical treatment cannot be good, caring, and efficient...
...Sadly, Dr...
...All humanity is at our altars, the feminine no less than the masculine-how else does the man come to be standing there...
...Faith-based journalism succeeds best when humility and love have guided, enlightened, and restrained its voice...
...Fleet should remember that even today thousands of physicians from all over the world, including Poland, travel to our academic centers for advanced training in medical and surgical specialties...
...Robert c. fleet Don't mix up the imagery Grateful thanks to Professor Charles Donahue, Jr., for his fascinating article, "Theology, Law, and Women's Ordination" [June 2]-a splendid analysis, historical and psychological, of a subject too often these days treated without perspective...
...david Thomson Houston, Tex...
...And that there is a wise, lawful ministry of women is certain...
...Furthermore, the level of training for physicians in Poland is about the same as that for nurse practitioners here...
...I am not an apologist for Poland or for socialism...
...eleanor jeanne noe Cincinnati, Ohio The author replies: I must take responsibility for the sentence: "For a woman to perform this function [offering the sacrifice of the Mass] would be, to say the least, to get the imagery mixed up...
...Or would news stories adding spiritual context to important issues serve us better-stories that avoid personalities and judgmentalism, that might add the dimension of faith to our daily work and worldview...
...Families earning $250,000 a year could easily find themselves in financial crisis if hit with a costly type of medical emergency...
...The reason for their clinic's failure was the existence of widespread corruption among officials and health-care professionals-those with the "vocation" of which Mr...
...Still another put down a room visit for a day when he was very specifically absent...
...Jerusalem, Jerusalem...
...Managed health care is here to stay...
...The disputants are hesitant to concede any point to the opposing side or sides for fear of stepping on to a slippery slope leading to Armageddon...
...in fact, officials of even the most deluxe insurance programs impose financial constraints on treatment...
...CORRECTION With thanks to a careful reader, we note that 'Theology, Law, & Women's Ordination" [June 2] consistently refers to Pope John Paul II's Ordinatio sacerdotalis as an "apostolic constitution...
...In earlier experiences in Poland, working as a film-maker, I had been victimized by that country's systematic corruption of values under communism, so that I had many fears going there...
...As Professor Donahue says, the priest is not just an actor, a "poor player," at the altar: he embodies God the Son...
...To those who find Ms...
...A cogent argument can be made that national health-care systems, such as are found in much of the industrialized world, necessarily require trade-offs: In exchange for fewer choices, everyone can be covered by insurance...
...But the Apostle's use of this metaphor no more bars women from the priesthood than Christ's metaphor involving a mother hen bars males...
...References by my critics to "managed care" and "health maintenance organizations" are inappropriate...
...Wilgress...
...It seems that, even in responding to a factual article, agendas dominate the health-care debate, whether or not those agendas are relevant...
...Too often, discussion of this most vital subject is bogged down in ideological dogmatism...
...Indeed, it is the medically indigent-those with jobs but without health insurance-who are among its greatest victims...
...The icons are clear...
...They were all aired on C-SPAN, and revealed an extraordinary level of affirmation, boisterous approval, and even love for the president...
...In fact, the document was issued as an "apostolic letter...
...I can recall a few years ago, when we were literally begging our hospitals in this country to help us supply medicines and equipment for Polish hospitals, since medical care had deteriorated to such a degree that we were looking at that of a third-world country...
...The argument is only hinted at in the pope's recent Ordinatio sacer-dotalis, which relies more heavily on the fact that Jesus chose only men to be apostles...
...odyssey showed evidence of a systematic corruption of doctors' commitments to providing medical treatment...
...The real medical issue Robert Fleet's article points out the practical dilemmas of obtaining professional medical treatment within our Western democracies...
...Equally certain is its disastrous undervaluation today, in the church and in society, by men and women alike...
...But the hyperbole used in the article does little to advance the argument for needed reforms...
...What muddied kind of thinking desires to scramble them...
...But both Ms...
...Robert j. white, m.d...
...5:32...
...What is "mixed up" is the misconception of the differing functions of literal and metaphorical language when one uses the bridegroom/bride metaphor as a basis for barring women from the priesthood...
...Witness the amazing, adoring madon-na-and-child thrust in Western art over the ages, along with portrayals of Jesus the man...
...The limits of metaphor With respect to the comments by Professor Charles Donahue, Jr...
...It is really Poland's move toward a free-market economy and capitalism that is responsible for some improvement in medicine in that country...
...frank magliery Carmel, Ind...
...But this experience in Poland was positive-that is a fact- while the U.S...
...CHARLES DONAHUE, JR...
...it is intellectually dishonest to argue otherwise...
...Don't get me wrong...
...White uses "Soviet Union" and "Poland" inter-(Continued on page 26) CORRESPONDENCE (Continued from page 4) changeably: they are not the same country...
...I wrote only about Poland...
...To be viable, any conversation about health care must confront a cold reality: Only the very wealthiest of individuals-probably less than 1 percent of the population of the civilized world-will be able to escape dealing with the bureaucracy of a managed health-care system...
...on imagery, I suggest that one must be careful to distinguish metaphorical language from literal language...
...Then again, with my wife's life at stake, is there any reason for me to strive for calm detachment...
...One of her five doctors taught in the United States...
...In contrast, my impression of the Polish health-care system, from talking with colleagues who recently attempted to establish an American-style clinic there, is that it may be long on compassion, but that's all...
...Wilgress have focused on what, at least in my view, is a key link in a chain of argument supporting the proposition that the church has no power to ordain women...
...For most of us, then, the only real question is whether the bureaucrat we will argue and plead with will belong to the private or the public sector...
...Consider, for example, Exodus 19:4: "You saw what I, the Lord, did...and how I carried you as an eagle carries her young on her wings, and brought you here to me" (all italics mine...
...Both Christ and Saint Paul spoke metaphorically to make the abstract concept of God's love clearer to peo-pie...
...The argument embodied in that sentence, however, is not mine: It comes from the 1976 declaration of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Inter in-signiores...
...Such venality exists both within and outside medicine in this country, but is hardly the standard of care anywhere...
...You kill the prophets and stone the messengers God has sent you...
...A premise of my article was that one should value medical treatment on the basis of its accessibility and the ability and commitment of the care-givers...
...When it is a battle just to get a doctor to speak with patients as an intelligent, caring human being, something is wrong...
...SAL VITRANO Alpine, Calif...
...But indicting American health-care professionals while extolling the virtues of a health-care system stuck in the Middle Ages is hardly a productive argument for the cause...
...I am delighted that his wife is doing so well, but in all probability the surgical techniques and instrumentation used for her heart operation were learned and designed in this country...
...Fleet spoke...
...The team was connected via modem to a worldwide diagnostic network...
...In Matthew 24:37, he compares his solicitude and love for his people, his Jerusalem, to the care a mother hen has for her chicks...
...For a woman to say Mass would not "get the imagery mixed up," as Charles Donahue asserts...
...The purpose of a metaphor is to make an abstract idea, such as the love of God, clearer to listeners or readers by the use of concrete images of persons or things with which they are more familiar...
...As a "perfect illustration" of needed religious reporting, Carlin proposed a story on how President Bill Clinton was offensive to his Baptist brethren and virtually a sure loser in the 1996 elections, because he is a "Benedict Arnold" to his faith and because he campaigns on "quasi-Marxist" theories ("It's the economy, stupid...
...To assign this sacrifical deed to feminine energy is indeed to "get the imagery mixed up"-and the imagery, after all, is rooted in the human configuration of male and female...
...In that poor agricultural society, people were quite familiar with such a scene, just as they were of a shepherd searching for a lost sheep or a woman scouring the house for a lost coin...
...One wrote up a 'detailed' examination that had lasted less than a minute and involved no physical contact at all...
...Wilgress's argument attractive, I would ask why the distinction between male and female is, in this context, more significant than that between Jew and Greek or slave and free...
...Flawed by hyperbole Robert Fleet's article highlights some of the greatest shortcomings of the American health-care system...
...CORRESPONDENCE Fleet wrote a diatribe As a surgeon who has lectured and practiced within the Soviet health-care system for over a quarter-century, I found Robert Fleet's article "Being Sick in America: Try the Polish Cure" [June 16] extremely disturbing...
...I am sorry that to some readers I sound less than objective about certain doctors...
...Your columnist must not have seen the several huge Baptist assemblies prior to and since his "snubbing" at which Clinton was invited to speak...
...What his diatribe really comes down to is not a criticism of our technical prowess but more the fact that he and his wife had a series of unfortunate adventures in dealing with the new world of managed care and health maintenance organizations in California...
...Not a single health-care professional would condone this behavior, and hospitals and medical staffs do a very credible job of policing such activity...
...Continued on page 28) Christ himself often used various metaphors to describe the love of God and the kingdom of heaven...
...Blame it on a heavy mouse-button finger...
...Noe's argument attractive, I would ask whether the sharp distinction that she draws between the metaphorical and the literal sits comfortably within a tradition that confesses the presence of Christ in the form of bread and wine and which has developed a rich notion of the sanctity of married love out of the phrase: "This is a great mystery, and I am applying it to Christ and the church" [Eph...
...it involved two hospitals, seventeen different medical-care personnel, and four doctors' offices...
...experience was with private doctors and institutions...
...I summarized, of course: enumerating details, however factual, would have made the article sound even more like a "diatribe...
...In Poland the medical team, using German equipment for diagnosis, put a U.S.-made valve in my wife's heart...
...neither should anyone seriously argue that Saint Paul meant that Christ is literally a bridegroom and the millions of people who make up the church are "a bride" (however romantic the notion...
...Carlin discovered all this by reading that a 1993 Baptist convention had not invited Clinton to be a speaker...
...Noe and Ms...
...Cleveland, Ohio The writer is professor of surgery in the school of medicine at the Case Western Reserve University...
...Fleet says that, during his wife's hospitalization in California: "Few [physicians] bothered to look at her medical records...
...Surely no one would suggest that Christ literally meant that he is a hen and his people are chicks (however nurturing this notion...
...The terms seem to me bizarre...
...our U.S...
Vol. 122 • September 1995 • No. 15
