Correspondence
Scouts, the Boy & Colombia & more & returns, Alleva
C O R R E S P O N O E M C E ception, with all its negative fallout, was reminded of the saying:...
...and coordinate the Campaign for stand it...
...Or, death, it's a very different matter from reverse the order and do the self-designed sabbatical first...
...Gar- tion in Colombia can simply be equat- the film, he never realizes the "inner's meticulous passions are enthralling...
...Greene was chester's urban professionals...
...Requirements inpoet, but he was fascinated by theo- Paul Saunders's recitation of the civil clude three to five years of parish sociallogical ideas and language and em- trial in which he represented Charles action work or community organizing, exployed them purposefully...
...21 to Dec...
...His weird (old-sense) writing tes- are serious about peacemaking is the gratitude, love, hate, anger, bitterness, tifies that you do not have to be an an- question...
...train and organize leaders to take necessarily mean he failed to under- action...
...You cannot petition the Lord...
...mute about their intrinsic self, their The editors reply: intrinsic worth...
...Nor do we share Fer- of the bomb that strikes his flat...
...To that could justify the liberties Jordan Catholic University in jeopardy...
...The harvest of this our families, our churches, our mili- dence in his grasp of the facts...
...I believe Email: elauer@ctu.edu or jbinderctu@aol.com that Neil Jordan feels that God is so Catholic Theological Union 5401 S. Cornell Chicago, IL 60615 radically unanthropomorphic that He/She/It heeds not the petty efforts Commonweal 29 June 16, 2000 Catholic," and described his experi- C L ASS I F I E D ence of faith as an adventure on a "turbulent sea...
...I also think Alleva underesti- payment required...
...That connection Greene makes between It alters radically after God accepts the movie's Sarah makes her promise Sarah's faith and the healing of the her bargain to give up her lover if to preserve her lover's life is a testa- atheist's affliction...
...Maufriend's improvisational service in sev- ris's conviction that U.S...
...She's dying...
...Commonweal 30 June 16, 2000...
...23 to May 17, 2001 Aug...
...13, 2001 Baumann equates this with the novel's Sarah deciding to leave her husband Retreat Week at the University of Notre Dame for Bendrix: "God stops her, Greene would have us believe, by having her A New Opportunity - 2 Sabbaticals in 1 Year...
...PAUL BUSSAN New Haven, Conn...
...Graham Greene's God don that the movie's Sarah displays ply stopping her self-torture-groovy...
...Sarah's capitulation to her husband was inevitable given her character...
...The thousands of people JOHN P. ELVIN who have worked to close the School Saint Petersburg, Fla...
...The military aid itself is a humanpersons are, of course, everywhere: in spired order" does not inspire confi- rights violation...
...Greene's Sarah all but falters many times...
...I've story...
...Discounts 5 percent, 3 times...
...Dianne Bergant Mary Catherine Hilkert Gene LaVerdiere Patricia Livingston Bryan Massingale Richard McBrien 3. "Jordan...
...Sarah, believing the severity of an impending bout of de- favor of the negotiated peace Presi- her prayer for Maurice's life to have pression by his response to the dinosaur dent Andres Pastrana is pursuing...
...Remem- Sarah's pity for the boy...
...Toler- la Human Rights Commission/USA...
...God will spare his life...
...Commonweal willing to partake in the pervasive ings...
...Why should vinely inspired order...
...Jorcated his life to saving the material and dan does not understand Greene's (Continued from page 4) folk culture of his native Cheshire...
...If, as Alleva argues, Jor- course, homosexual acts, to mention a group dan intended the movie to be a refuta- few, were in direct dissent to the moral tion of the novel, leaving the audience teaching of the church's magisterium...
...Greene realized that faith is a drama of persons and their personalities, human and divine...
...foreign military aid packThe "Sensation" art exhibit ["Virgins Commonweal incapable of making...
...Among the distinguished faculty: this admirably healthy, desirable, and desirous woman...
...Your fear is peared," know...
...If the movie succeeds on 2. "The direction in which [Neil] Jor- disfigurement, it may be a sign that its own terms, it does so as a refutadan takes the story-away from attributing Sarah's miracles to her steadfastness in chastity-is rooted in the novel...
...After a comprehensive Your final caveat, regarding toler- analysis of the question of the $ 1.6 Art appreciation ance, is one I would have thought billion U.S...
...Steinfels appears to approve of the but a sidebar to whether the church, The pained survivors of torture, in"devout Catholic" who poured white as she is presently knows herself and cluding students, doctors, labor union paint over the work...
...We confess that what the sponsible for the human-rights atrocirespectable obstructionists of an earli- proper attitude toward homosexuality ties of their graduates, know...
...The editors reply: of the Americas, and their leaders With accusations of bigotry and homo- who have gone to prison for their conScouts' honor...
...22 - Dec...
...Part of a nine-person staff, this indiPaul Bussan is more a matter of em- benign interpretation of Jordan's film vidual will recruit individuals and parishphasis than substance...
...But I was church...
...herence can be evaluated...
...I must now confess that our scheme to THE OFFICE FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE of the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minget Richard Alleva to return to writing neapolis seeks qualified individual for the The author replies: about movies has worked to perfec- position of Parish Social Justice OrganizI suspect that my disagreement with tion...
...When the little boy is relieved of his tentive to us...
...14, 2000 Jan...
...Although he does convey an enmentioned his essays before [Common- is not at all clear that the current situa- joyment of the plot in the first half of weal, April 71, and bet I will again...
...1-800-695-9599...
...and not meant to hold Greene's fiction But Saunders failed to tell the full up to any theological test...
...From there the story explores house...
...nuns, know...
...He was, at his best, a true poet who knew that this drama can be painful, exhilarating, and ultimately gripping, because it is a love story...
...er era did over intermarriage and inte- should be in the Boy Scouts or in the All of these know because their wisgrated housing...
...When homosexuals-and Central and South America, who have sex organs, as the writer suggests they women-are fully unleashed by the gone into exile in various countries all should...
...to the fashionable idea that "God is Love...
...join, simply send an e-mail took...
...When she tries to keep her vow, God is like making promises to the come so close to God that she she's needlessly torturing herself...
...is mysterious, unfathomable, but atwhen she recommences the affair...
...15 percent, 12 times...
...Could it be that her work, will...
...Garner clings ended...
...Yes, all but are the key The Hesburgh Center words here, though Baumann doesn't SABBATICAL PROGRAM seem to realize it...
...Here are my major problems with the argument...
...I age, including thirty Black Hawk heliNo More," May 191 may have seemed can imagine no other situation where copters, for Colombia, Commonweal offensive to some, including Margaret you would ask a vilified person or lamely asks: "Will increased U.S...
...Quite the contrary: the movie, Manuscripts Wanted like the novel, remains a story of BECOME A PUBLISHED AUTHOR...
...a resolution defeated by a willingness - Special "package deal" for 2 semesters to heed a spouse's pathetic plea...
...Dale has, scapegoated and banished dismiss those who disagree as acting The writer is a member of the Guatemato society's margins...
...and God's miracle...
...The group exthe movie is a "plausible variation on ed to fire Curran...
...Space does not permit me to distion of the book, not as a faithful vari- pute Alleva's specific points...
...Second, yes, Greene was a Curran's difficulties Human Development...
...latter case, free will and compassion defeat the resolution...
...Sarah falters, then at CATHOLIC THEOLOGICAL UNION holds fast to her promise, and the miracles she apparently performs are rooted 32 faculty every semester help provide a holistic experience of renewal in her steadfastness...
...San Rafael, Calif...
...Discounts and monthmates the degree to which Greene and ly billing available for repeat advertisers...
...It is more complicated than that...
...rules...
...The want ordinary corrupt human love" program includes concise presentations, reflection groups, spiritual testifies to what that steadfastness costs direction and growth counseling...
...405, New York, NY 10115...
...To do so is to confuse realms...
...I doubt that he expected RATES: $1.10 per word...
...uscripts...
...But her character isn't fixed...
...Or the essay where he measures Colombians have demonstrated in wardly unaffected...
...There he Paul Baumann, in "The Novelist & the a poet, in the true sense of the word, witnesses to an estranged past, retelling Director" [May 5], is far too generous and it is misleading and dangerous to England's most ancient stories...
...That said, Windsor, Conn...
...Commonweal is sponsoring an puzzling over a miracle was a strange Neither the Vatican nor The e-mail discussion group until way to do it...
...work...
...I tried to uncover opposition to the church's teaching on with articles and topics prethemes in the novel and elements of faith and morals that placed his manboth character and plot in the movie date to teach Catholic theology at sented in the magazine...
...Graham Greene's religious vision is tenaciously to the rural landscape of his neither heterodox, antinomian, nor ancestors, now lightly occupied by Man- Missing Greene driven by predestination...
...emphasizes the futility Demetrius Dumm Barbara Reid Gary Riebe-Estrell of Sarah's resolutions by having her Robert Schreiter Donald Senior Kenneth Untener make yet another promise-to marry Bendrix...
...My modest claim is that Catholic University of America want- July 1, 2000...
...Millions of sort of "experience," but remains inWar II...
...that the artist, Chris Ofili, intended to I am left with great sadness, but yet In truth, there are many people be insulting...
...She can't keep that vow eiSESSIONS ther-God won't let her...
...el he carried around for forty years until the moment Colombia's campesinos Maurice Bendrix and Sarah Miles museum experts finally confirmed his and others are more likely to be the have fundamentally different responsBronze Age dating...
...monweal demands that they keep raises for traditional morality be dis- PAUL FERRIS silent, lest they find themselves, as cussed honestly if advocates of change Annapolis, Md...
...Gay impending end of the "divinely in- aid...
...1. Baumann says that a Sarah who "Got a inomen t cowboy...
...But the dictum, "Character is fate," was never one of the tenets of Jansenism or Calvinism or, as far as I know, any other creed of predestination...
...If they are not, "more evil, and faith to the point that Maurice thropologist, elegist, National Socialist, or violence, and death" will surely be the asks to be left alone, ungrateful to be New Ager to keep faith with the folk and result regardless of U.S...
...equation between Sarah's goodness Catholic colleges and universities...
...Eagle Scout James Dale was regard- Does that mean we are complacent The United States has been there and ed as morally fit only when he was about injustice and ignore Jesus' teach- done that-many times...
...ocean...
...But Spend 1 semester in the Hesburgh Center's community-based program...
...By the end of ment to the fervor of her love-that's Making promises to Neil Jordan's Sarah's earthly existence, she has be- all...
...If U.S...
...The campesinos in Colomused fertility symbols in art, some so many in the church who are in the bia, Nicaragua, Guatemala, and El Salexaggerated that they are not usually grip of the fear that homosexuals, like vador whose villages have been reproduced in publications...
...You can if you want to, but it wouldn't evince the untroubled aban- When she breaks her vow, she's sim- doesn't listen...
...ed with the recent history of El Sal- scape" of the tale, to borrow a term Don't miss the essay on a wooden shov- vador or Guatemala...
...blind fate (or the will of God...
...My use of "canonical mission" were informative Send resume by July 1 to: Office for Sothe terms "heterodox," "antinomian," and interesting ["A Cautionary Tale," cial justice, 328 W. Kellogg Blvd., Saint and "predestination" was descriptive April 211...
...RICHARD ALLEVA however, is quite debatable...
...ology, and mental illness...
...01 principle or teaching of Jesus to this Wisdom comes from putting things To the Editors man and his untenable situation...
...Jordan may share a certain sensibility, For additional information call 212-662or even the same seasickness...
...breaks her vow isn't acting out of character...
...For job description, call (651) 291-4477...
...That she writes, "I through reflection on the major transitions in the Church and society...
...Each, Parish Social Justice Organizer ation on it...
...For one thing, at from Gerard Manley Hopkins...
...The refugees from feminists revolt over the depiction of justified...
...dom comes from bitter experience...
...How military aid for Colombia will be tary, even in our Boy Scouts...
...He only connected, by some reon myth, criticism and teaching, archae- Colombia can be reduced, if not arrangements, with the externals...
...recommends safeguards...
...Aug...
...It was Currari s own changes messages dealing Greene's design...
...A sober women, if allowed to be fully them- destroyed, bodies burned, children look at his Mary work conveys inno- selves, would wreak havoc on the di- massacred, and loved ones "disapcent beauty, not insult...
...I detect- 4200 or write COMMONWEAL, 475 Rivered no allusion to anything "groovy" or side Dr., Rm...
...es into the archdiocesan social-justice netdan changed Greene's story does not PAULBAUMANN work...
...No one really knows...
...in the former, Another Option - Israel and Hesburgh...
...Jean Mouroux's I Believe: The Personal Structure of Faith (Sheed and Ward, 1959) addresses this tension between theology and the nature of personal faith...
...over the world only to be hounded by What is really offensive is that Whether the Boy Scouts can survive is countries like the United States, know...
...Alleva returns Paul Baumann's defense of the film version of The End of the Affair was written with elan but didn't come even close to convincing me...
...Advance gests...
...aid O'Brien Steinfels, but it is not clear group to tolerate injustice...
...Alleva's insistence that the bro- Those who fear Ex corde ecclesiae message to commonweal-subken promise renders the movie non- should evaluate their own positions, scribeCegroups.com sensical rests on too moralistic an and perhaps seek employment in nonHappy e-mailing...
...There are luminous re- ables Pastrana to forge a negotiated dan never grasped the heart of the flections here on the vocation of writing, peace, the violence that now engulfs story...
...10 percent, 6 times...
...phobia, and his invocations of the "in- victions, know...
...His culture has always with hope...
...You implicitly suggest Remember Guatemala The dangers Paul Ferris refers to were that there is a societal value to be After reading Commonweal's editorial, acknowledged in the editorial...
...That's true only if you beCommonweal 28 June 16, 2000 lieve that Sarah's character remains of humankind to bargain, plea-bar- God is Love and is responding to fixed, that she is everlastingly the sen- gain, dicker with the Deity...
...support for alive and proclaiming himself too old reject a global cosmopolitanism based the Pastrana initiatives...
...Curran's teaching and publimoved by the miracle at the end of the cations over many years, in such mat- On-line movie and charmed by Jordan's faith- ters as the indissolubility of marriage, discussion fulness to the explicit supernaturalism abortion, euthanasia, premarital interof the book...
...aid en- and too tired to learn how to love...
...Combine 1 semester in the Hesburgh Center's community-based, Would Baumann have us believe that curriculum-centered program, then travel to Israel with one of CTU's Holy Land Studies programs...
...God's inscrutability and about the Quality subsidy publisher accepting manWhat would he think...
...Joron mass culture...
...OP, Directors Phone: 773.753.5359 or 753.7477 or 800.265.4560 Fax: 773.324.4360 in the way Baumann does it...
...WILLIAM J. DEVLIN Greene called himself an "agnostic Philadelphia, Pa...
...His refusal to accept my more er...
...What you ask of Dale and all the ance, we repeat, must work both ways millions like him in society, is to keep on this question...
...Paul, MN 55102, attn: Matt Gladue...
...The only cultural lie about the presence of ho- Glenn's confident prediction about the true safeguard is to say no to military mosexuality in all of human life...
...been answered, becomes profoundly fossil on the kitchen floor of his medieval Whether or not the guerrilla groups grateful...
...out of mere prejudice and fear...
...The movie can be defended, but not Eugene Lauer, Joris Binder...
...In the - Settle in your own room with kitchenette and stay for the year...
...when a resolution is annihilated by Then, design your own flexible sabbatical for the following semester: audit courses, attend lectures, create your own schedule and flow of life...
...way all human love ends...
...church remains a dilemma for us...
...together...
...Spirit, the present order will crumble...
...But contrast sual, jaded wife stuck in a loveless ber rock star Jim Morrison screaming that with the direct (though ironic) marriage...
...C O R R E S P O N O E M C E ception, with all its negative fallout, was reminded of the saying: "Knowlbut you fail to apply even the simplest edge comes from taking things apart...
...Or the fairy-tale victims of leftist guerrillas than gov- es to what has happened in the wake essay which begins with the story of a ernment troops...
...husband plead with her to stay...
...But it placed on this enormous universal de- "Colombia Conundrum" [May 5], I (Continued on page 28) Commonweal 4 June 16, 2000 British novelist Alan Garner has dedi- CORRESPONDENCE ham Greene's The End of the Affair...
...story of Curran's difficulties with the Like Richard Alleva, I prefer teaching authority of the Catholic Greene's original story...
...0 to Neil Jordan's film version of Gra- abstract theological concepts from the work of a poet (a good poet), or from the drama of a concrete life...
...Those Curran, and the article's background cellent writing and public-speaking skills, ideas can be identified and their co- information on the concept of a and knowledge of Catholic social teaching...
...I suspect you speak for who know...
...WILLIAM D. GLENN organizers, missionary priests, and an art appreciation course is in order...
...First, that Jor- is a small price to pay...
...Even the trainers at "Scouts' Honor" [Editorial, May 191 trinsic self," in this instance William the School of the Americas, who never craftily raised several shibboleths Glenn seems to be the master of shib- tire of telling us they cannot be reabout gay persons with the skill that boleths...
...12-word miniGod to listen in the way Alleva sug- mum...
...involvement rice does sense that he has had some eral armies, and on both sides, in World need always be malign...
...But Com- can the questions that homosexuality more evil, violence, and death...
Vol. 127 • June 2000 • No. 12
