No, of course not. But you wouldn’t know it from Diogenes’ post on the magazine’s recent editorial on British Prime Minister Gordon Brown. Here it is, in its entirety:

America ♥ Gordon

Posted by: Diogenes
- Oct. 29, 2007 1:51 PM ET USA

America Magazine is editorially enraptured by British Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

The son of a Presbyterian minister, Brown seems guided
by a moral vision that sees it as the government’s duty to help the
less fortunate.

Translation: he’s pro-abortion.

I encourage you to read the “Current Comment” to which ur-Diogenes links. (For some reason, you still have to register in order to read anything on America‘s Web site.) You’ll notice that none of the editorial’s 253 words endorses Brown’s views on abortion.

So what is ur-Diogenes up to? The latest post is one in a long line of attacks on America–all of which proceed from bad-faith assumptions about the editors’ motives. Take, for example, Diogenes’ commentary on the “Extra Virgin” incident. The editors were duped into running a fake ad for a statue of Mary clothed in a condom. Editor Drew Christiansen, SJ, quickly issued a public apology for the mistake.

That was not enough for ur-Diogenes. After urging Catholic World News readers to protest to the New York Jesuit provincial, the papal nuncio, and the Vatican–providing contact information for all of them–he accused the editors of lying. “There is probably no group, in the entire universal church, that is less likely to let that particular form of sacrilege slip by unnoticed than the Jesuits of America magazine in Manhattan,” ur-Diogenes wrote. Then, without a shred of evidence, he asserted that “some person or persons in-house brought off the stunt, the predictable
flap occurred, and we’re getting the predictable damage control, the
minimum necessary force required to keep America in the boundary-bending business.” (This amounts to libel, and if ur-Diogenes had the courage to sign his name to his posts the editors might take him to court. Or perhaps CWN.) And then the kicker: “They must be wetting themselves laughing.” Classy.

And now this apparently disgruntled Jesuit is insinuating that America magazine and its editors, most of them Jesuits, are “proabortion.” Perhaps he missed the October 29 editorial on Amnesty International’s new position on abortion, in which the editors pointedly ask, “How can an organization dedicated to the protection of human rights oppose the right to life of unborn children?” But given the attention ur-Diogenes has paid to America in the past, that’s awfully hard to believe. Maybe he just thinks they’re lying again.

The Lawrence Downes column about the denigration inherent in the “illegal immigrant” tag, cited here on Oct. 28, prompted several letters in today’s NYTimes. Almost all of the writers rejected Downes’ argument (which I support), and the tone of the letter-writers struck me by the focus on a rather puritanical legalism. (Forgive me for denigrating the Puritans.) One typical excerpt:

“The word ‘illegal’ is not a dirty word. It is to the point and honest, as it spells out the obvious difference in this case between those who are here lawfully and those who are not. To suggest that it is a ‘code word for racial and ethnic hatred’ is disingenuous at best and only adds fuel to the fire. It has been used over and over in an attempt to stifle honest discussion on this topic as well as on a range of others. We need an honest debate. Let’s keep the question of race out of it.”

Debating “illegal immigration” without realizing the racial and ethnic implications strikes me a disingenuous.

Remember the end of the Sopranos last June? David Chase, the creator weighs in.
That makes sense to me; I never thought Tony was wacked in the diner. I thought life was going on–that didn’t mean Tony wouldn’t be killed someday, of course–but probably not then. What a wonderful show=thanks, Mr.Chase.

There is a very interesting study just out in the International Journal of Health Services that reports on a survey conducted among U.S. medical students. The study sought to ascertain how much medical students know about military medical ethics. The authors of the study note that very few medical students (or Americans generally) know that in 1987 Congress authorized the Health Care Personnel Delivery System that provides a mechanism by which the President can activate a draft of civilian physicians within a matter of weeks, if there is a shortage of military medical personnel. Given that current medical students could conceivably by drafted, the authors wanted to know how much the students knew about military medical ethics. Here are some of the distressing results.

- Only 3.5% knew that they could be drafted
- Only 37.4% correctly answered that the Geneva Conventions apply regardless of whether or not one’s country has formally declared war.
- More than 37% did not know that the Geneva Conventions stipulate that it is never acceptable to deprive prisoners of war of food or water.
- More that 25% incorrectly stated the code of military medical ethics to be that they should “treat their own soldiers according to level of severity and then attend to the wounded enemy,” rather than treating the sickest first, regardless of nationality.

The study can be found here.

So the World Series is over, and we enter into the dark desert of a world without baseball. Has anyone considered the possibility that what is called Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) might actually be caused, not by the decline in the hours of daylight in winter, but by the absence of baseball?

Rudy says that whether waterboarding is torture “depends”–not only on what’s being done but also, remarkably, who’s doing it. John McCain disagrees.

“All I can say is that it was used in the Spanish Inquisition, it was used in Pol Pot’s
genocide in Cambodia, and there are reports that it is being used
against Buddhist monks today,” Mr. McCain, who spent more than five
years in a North Vietnamese prison camp, said in a telephone interview.

Of presidential candidates like Mr. Giuliani, who say that they are
unsure whether waterboarding is torture, Mr. McCain said: “They should
know what it is. It is not a complicated procedure. It is torture.”

Rudy’s senior military adviser, retired Adm. Robert J. Natter, offered this response:

“The highly politicized nature of political campaigns makes that forum
a poor arena in which to debate the distinctions between torture and
different forms of interrogation,” Admiral Natter said. “Is
waterboarding torture? I don’t know. I was waterboarded as part of my
military training, and I would say that it falls into a gray area.”

Yes, especially when you know that the person waterboarding you has no intention of killing you.

And what about Rudy’s blithe dismissal of sleep deprivation as a form of torture? “They talk about sleep deprivation. I mean, on that theory,
I’m getting tortured running for president of the United States. That’s
plain silly. That’s silly.” It seems he doesn’t know much about that either.

Update: Andrew Sullivan links to a post on waterboarding by Malcolm Nance, a former master instructor and chief of training at the U.S. Navy Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape School (SERE) in San Diego, California. The post is titled “Waterboarding Is Torture.”

I know the waterboard personally and intimately. SERE staff
were required undergo the waterboard at its fullest. I was no
exception. I have personally led, witnessed and supervised
waterboarding of hundreds of people. It has been reported that both the Army and Navy SERE school’s interrogation manuals were used to form the interrogation techniques used by the US army and the CIA for its terror suspects. What was not mentioned in most articles was that SERE was
designed to show how an evil totalitarian, enemy would use torture at
the slightest whim. If this is the case, then waterboarding is
unquestionably being used as torture technique.

The carnival-like he-said, she-said of the legality of Enhanced Interrogation Techniques
has become a form of doublespeak worthy of Catch-22. Having been
subjected to them all, I know these techniques, if in fact they are
actually being used, are not dangerous when applied in training for
short periods. However, when performed with even moderate intensity
over an extended time on an unsuspecting prisoner – it is torture,
without doubt. Couple that with waterboarding and the entire medley not
only “shock the conscience”
as the statute forbids–it would terrify you. Most people can not stand
to watch a high intensity kinetic interrogation. One has to overcome
basic human decency to endure watching or causing the effects. The
brutality would force you into a personal moral dilemma between
humanity and hatred. It would leave you to question the meaning of what
it is to be an American.

Update 2: In case you don’t want to read Nance’s entire post, have a look at the section on waterboarding here:

Waterboarding is not a simulation. Unless you have
been strapped down to the board, have endured the agonizing feeling of
the water overpowering your gag reflex, and then feel your throat open
and allow pint after pint of water to involuntarily fill your lungs,
you will not know the meaning of the word.

Waterboarding is a controlled drowning that, in the American model,
occurs under the watch of a doctor, a psychologist, an interrogator and
a trained strap-in/strap-out team. It does not simulate drowning, as
the lungs are actually filling with water. There is no way to simulate
that. The victim is drowning. How much the victim is to drown depends
on the desired result (in the form of answers to questions shouted into
the victim’s face) and the obstinacy of the subject. A team doctor
watches the quantity of water that is ingested and for the
physiological signs which show when the drowning effect goes from
painful psychological experience, to horrific suffocating punishment to
the final death spiral.

Waterboarding is slow motion suffocation with enough time to
contemplate the inevitability of black out and expiration –usually the
person goes into hysterics on the board. For the uninitiated, it is
horrifying to watch and if it goes wrong, it can lead straight to
terminal hypoxia. When done right it is controlled death. Its lack of
physical scarring allows the victim to recover and be threaten with its
use again and again.

Read the rest of the post right here.

An article from the New York Times describing the turmoil within Evangelical circles.
It seems some evangelicals are tiring of the culture war lanaguage as well.

Lawrence Downes, who recently wrote a comment-catching “Editorial Observer” column about the return of the Old Rite, is back with a column in today’s New York Times titled “What Part of ‘Illegal’ Don’t You Understand?”. Amid the freeway pile-up of commentary about immigration reform, I found this an eloquent appeal for a return to first principles, and to human dignity–and a reminder of the power of language to wound people. Indeed, the piece resonates with a Catholic ethos:

“Since the word ["illegal"] modifies not the crime but the whole person,” Downes writes, “it goes too far. It spreads, like a stain that cannot wash out. It leaves its target diminished as a human, a lifetime member of a presumptive criminal class. People are often surprised to learn that illegal immigrants have rights. Really? Constitutional rights? But aren’t they illegal? Of course they have rights: they have the presumption of innocence and the civil liberties that the Constitution wisely bestows on all people, not just citizens.”

It should also be noted that Pat Zapor of Catholic News Service (which is serially under-appreciated, and under-funded) had a similarly-themed story back in March. Zapor noted how the term “illegal” as regards immigrants is a recent coinage, and her lede says it all:

“WASHINGTON (CNS) — Here’s a little-understood fact about immigration law: Until well into the 20th century, pretty much anyone who showed up at a port of entry or walked across a border got to stay in the United States.”

Archbishop Thomas Collins of Toronto gave the keynote address at the annual “Cardinal’s Dinner” to support Catholic charities in the Archdiocese.

His address builds upon the declaration of Pope Benedict of a “Pauline Year;” but it also shows a contemporary sensibility (perhaps the Archbishop has been reading fellow-Canadian Charles Taylor).

He says in part:

In our lives as individual disciples, and as communities of faith, we should like Paul be contemplatives in action. Through our lives and our example we proclaim the Lord whom we have first encountered in prayer. All our bold apostolic initiatives – so necessary if we are to follow in the footsteps of St. Paul and engage our world as effectively as he engaged his – will be mere busyness if we do not like Paul root our creative action in the experience of Christ. Fruitful action flows out of adoration, and in adoration we realize that all life-giving action is a response to the grace of God. We do not save the world. We are only servants, and we must be attentive to our Master, in whom alone we find our strength.

Some practical implications for us as an archdiocese:

The celebration of the Sunday Eucharist should be the spiritual focal point of our life. This means practically that in each parish we need to be attentive to the way in which we dispose ourselves for the encounter with Christ in Word and Sacrament each Sunday. The music, the homily, the service at the altar and in the congregation, the welcoming of friend and stranger, the preparation for a fruitful hearing of the Scriptures, the prayerfully attentive celebration of the rites, and all such elements of our Sunday celebration dispose us to the encounter with the Lord at the Sunday Eucharist, which then impels us, as Paul was impelled, to a life of practical service – to the washing of the feet which was at the heart of the Last Supper. Thanks be to God if after each Mass, fortified by the encounter with God through Word and Sacrament, we go in peace to love and serve the Lord and our neighbour throughout the coming week. Not only the Eucharist, but each of the sacraments which Our Lord has given to us allows us to encounter our Divine Master in this earthly world.

Individually, and as communities of faith, we must recognize that it is not merely a set of doctrines that we proclaim, but the person of Jesus. So the experience of Eucharistic adoration, the occasions for studying the living faith of the Church, the practice of Lectio Divina in which we listen to the voice of God through prayerful reading of the Bible – all these things will enable us to be more effective servants of God in engaging the problems and opportunities of our society.

If we follow in the footsteps of Saint Paul, our apostolic action will arise out of a deep personal encounter with the Master.

He suggests further implications:

We need to become involved wholeheartedly in the world of popular culture and the media. People spend more time at the computer and TV than in Church. We should also not be shy in engaging in the public conversation regarding social issues, and Christians need to be encouraged to engage in public service as politicians.

We need to give a reason for the hope we have to the people we meet day by day. That means we have to know our faith, and also be ready to explain it and, if necessary, defend it.

Paul did preach to the choir, but not only to the choir. We too need to seek creative ways to shine the light of the Gospel into every corner of our society. We can do this most effectively by the witness of a life well lived in our families and in the wider community, and amid the activities of the secular world of work and entertainment. Vatican II spoke of the universal call to holiness, and whatever our role in society or the Church we can make our baptismal commitment real by living day by day with Christian integrity as we go about our tasks in the world. All that we do, we do well, for we do all for the Lord.

The full address is here (with thanks to Whispers in the Loggia for the link).

Just in case you were wondering about the Obama-Cheney Relationship.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Vice President Dick Cheney said Friday he hasn’t reached out to ”Cousin Barack” Obama since reports that the two share a distant relatives.

In an interview for CNBC’s ”Kudlow & Company,” Cheney was asked whether he and Obama, a Democratic presidential candidate, have discussed their ancestral link.

”Cousin Barack?” Cheney said. ”No, we haven’t — haven’t had the opportunity to talk about it.”

Lynne Cheney, the vice president’s wife, told MSNBC last week she uncovered the long-ago ties between the two while researching her ancestry for her latest book, ”Blue Skies, No Fences.”

The vice president said he was unsure about bringing it up with the Illinois senator.

”Well, I didn’t know whether that would help him or hurt him, so I thought I’d probably stay away from him,” he said.

Obama is a descendent of Mareen Duvall, said Ginny Justice, a spokeswoman for Lynne Cheney. The French Huguenot’s son married the granddaughter of a Richard Cheney, who arrived in Maryland in the late 1650′s from England.

The vice president’s full name is Richard B. Cheney.

Lynne Cheney told MSNBC the relationship was eighth cousin. But last month, the Chicago Sun-Times traced it as ninth cousins once removed.

John Allen’s weekly online post is devoted to the publication in English of a book on the Dominican Bishop of Oran, Algeria, Pierre Claverie. Claverie was assassinated in his residence in 1996, along with his Muslim driver and friend.

Here is part of Allen’s report:

“I know enough Muslim friends who are also my brothers to think that Islam knows how to be tolerant, fraternal,” Claverie said. “Dialogue is a work to which we must return without pause: it alone lets us disarm the fanaticism, both our own and that of the other.”

Claverie was never one for fashionable, politically correct forms of inter-religious dialogue. He shunned large-scale Christian/Muslim meetings, feeling that the slogans such encounters tend to generate, such as that we are all “children of Abraham” and “people of the Book,” or that we all believe in the “one God,” artificially gloss over deep theological and spiritual differences.

Claverie was certainly no Pollyanna when it came to the reality of the Islamist threat, frequently denouncing “the cowardice of those who kill in the shadows.” His clear-eyed assessment led him into conflict with the Community of Sant’Egidio, an international Catholic movement known for its efforts in conflict resolution. In the mid-1990s, Sant’Egidio sponsored a “Rome Platform” for dialogue among the warring Algerian parties, including the extremists. Claverie and the other Algerian bishops felt betrayed, arguing that the negotiations lent legitimacy to forces butchering anyone who stood up for a non-Islamist state. They also struggled to explain to democratic activists in Algeria, who were laying down their lives to resist the Islamists, that the Sant’Egidio initiative did not represent the official position of the Catholic church.

Yet for all that, Claverie staked his life on two convictions: first, that a democratic, tolerant Islamic society is possible; second, that it’s better to build up alternatives than to tear down what he opposed. He worked tirelessly to foster a genuine civil society in Algeria, creating libraries for students and researchers, rehabilitation centers for the handicapped, and centers for educating women. He would not permit “our love to be extinguished despite the fury in our hearts, desiring peace and building it up in tiny steps, refusing to join the chorus of howls, and remaining free while yet in chains.”

Claverie understood the peril such a choice implied.

“Reconciliation is not a simple affair,” he wrote in 1995. “It comes at a high price. It can also involve, as it did for Jesus, being torn apart between irreconcilable opposites. An Islamist and a kafir (infidel) cannot be reconciled. So, then, what’s the choice? Well, Jesus does not choose. He says, in effect, ‘I love you all,’ and he dies.”

Those words proved chillingly prophetic. Claverie was killed on Aug. 1, 1996, just two months after the brutal beheading of seven Trappist monks in Tibhirine, Algeria. He died alongside his Muslim friend and driver, Mohamed Bouchikhi, when a bomb exploded in the bishop’s residence. As the two men lay dying, their blood mingled on the floor, offering a metaphor for their common humanity running deeper than differences of ethnicity, ideology and creed.

In the end, Claverie offers an antidote to facile theories about Islam, of whatever sort, crafted at a distance. He was an artisan of the patient, and often painful, work of building relationships, overcoming stereotypes, and confronting painful truths with both honesty and hope.

Jerry Renner, former RNS editor and longtime religion writer at the Hartford Courant, has died. Jerry was born a Catholic and raised a journalist, and brought honor to both vocations, perhaps most notably in his investigative work on the Legionaries of Christ. He started digging in the 1990s, before anyone else caught on, and teamed up with Jason Berry to produce the definitive accounting of alleged abuses by Legionaries founder Father Marcial Maciel Degollado. That work allowed the victims to be heard, the truth to be known, and at least some small measure of justice to be done.

Jerry was an old hand at the trade and in the guild. He could spin yarns at the bar and saw through every imaginable tall tale. The Courant has a fine obit. The best part: A colleague recalls Jerry interviewing a local cult leader (not Maciel) who claimed to be Jesus Christ himself (with huge real estate holdings). The man told Renner, “If I blinded you right now physically, would you believe that I’m God?” Jerry shot back: ”No, I’d have you arrested for assault.”

Over on the “Backlash?” thread Robert Reid posed this question when one of the respondents suggested non-Christian young people had imperiled their salvation:

“Do you actually, truly, in your heart of hearts believe that anyone’s “salvation” is imperiled simply by not being a Christian? In other words, that God actually does divide the world into Christians and non-Christians, with the Christians truly getting a better deal based on their beliefs?”

I was curious about why Robert asked the question, and in a pleasant offline exchange, he said he found the view “unexpected,” since he saw the Commonweal blog as “liberal, possibly even universalistic.”

Anyhow, rather than clutter up the “Backlash?” thread with off-topic comments, I’ve set up this thread, so you can here offer your opinions, unexpected or otherwise, about the conditions for salvation.

(For the record, I hope salvation is not imperiled by not being a Christian, since I lost two infants to miscarriage. However, I believe Christianity is requisite to MY salvation. While this might sound wishy-washy, the Church, to my knowledge, has never taught that any individual is actually in Hell, so I don’t feel compelled to condemn where the Church has not. Liberal? Universalistic? You decide.)

At an Iowa town-hall meeting, Linda Gustitus, president of the National Religious Campaign Against Torture, put a couple of questions to America’s mayor. Noting that Attorney General-nominee Michael Mukasey had “fudged” when asked whether waterboarding is torture, Gustitus said:

“I wanted to ask you two questions,’’ she said. “One, do you think
waterboarding is torture? And two, do you think the president can order
something like waterboarding even though it’s against U.S. and
international law?’’

Mr. Giuliani responded: “Okay. First of all, I don’t believe the
attorney general designate in any way was unclear on torture. I think
Democrats said that; I don’t think he was.’’

Ms. Gustitus said: “He said he didn’t know if waterboarding is torture.”

Mr. Giuliani said: “Well, I’m not sure it is either. I’m not sure it
is either. It depends on how it’s done. It depends on the
circumstances. It depends on who does it. I think the way it’s been
defined in the media, it shouldn’t be done. The way in which they have
described it, particularly in the liberal media. So I would say, if
that’s the description of it, then I can agree, that it shouldn’t be
done. But I have to see what the real description of it is. Because
I’ve learned something being in public life as long as I have. And I
hate to shock anybody with this, but the newspapers don’t always
describe it accurately.”

(Applause)

“If I can’t figure out that there’s been a significant media bias
against this war, then I shouldn’t be running for president of the
United States.”

(Applause)

This is a dodge. There are two definitions of waterboarding, a very old form of torture–neither one was made up by “the media.” And neither is secret. One: a prisoner is bound to a board and repeatedly lowered into water to the point of drowning. Two: a prisoner is bound to a board, which is tilted so that his head is below his feet; then fabric is pulled across his mouth and water is poured on his face to the point of drowning. (The latter is more common.)

In his repetition of the meaningless mantra “we do not torture,” Rudy sounds like President Bush. But can anyone extract a useful definition of the term from Rudy’s ramble? He wants to sound common-sensical by pointing out the “delicate line” between “aggressive questioning” and torture–but nothing he says does anything to clarify where the line is. He was provided with one of the most obvious examples of torture by Gustitus, and he danced around it. “It depends.” No it doesn’t. I’m afraid so-called liberal media bias doesn’t cover this one, Rudy, no matter how much applause it garners. Waterboarding is as old as the Inquisition. The United States has prosecuted those who have used it. The longer we pretend not to know torture when we see it, the farther down this dangerous rabbit hole we go.

Update: for those whose stomach isn’t strong enough to read to the end of his circular monologue, have a look at Rudy’s concluding remarks–equal parts hilarious and frightening.

“I have known every American president since Gerald Ford. I knew
Richard Nixon, but before he was president. I met him, I didn’t know
him. I can’t say I knew Richard Nixon. But I’ve known every American
president since Gerald Ford. Some Republicans, some Democrats. I can’t
think of a one that would ever want to see somebody tortured. Also
can’t think of a one that wouldn’t have the courage to make some tough
decisions to protect the lives of the American people. And that’s the
kind of person you have to have as president of the United States.”

I knew Richard Nixon, too. Well, I met him once in the mid-1990s. I got off on the wrong floor in the Capitol Building, and there he was with Bob Dole. We shook hands. Wouldn’t call us close. Actually, we barely touched. I wouldn’t even call it a shake. More of a brush. And I don’t think he would remember me. If he were alive. Anyway, it was well after he had those offices broken into. You know what, forget I even mentioned it. Keep America safe.

Congressional hearings on the absurdly unfair postal rate hike will be held on October 30 at 10 a.m. Victor Navasky of the Nation and Jeff Hollingsworth of Human Events are going to testify about the damage the rate increase is doing to political and cultural periodicals. Remember, the National Catholic Reporter just halved its output because of this–they’re suffering a mailing-cost increase to the tune of $100,000. For papers with smaller operating budgets, the rate hike has dealt a devastating blow. Commonweal is trying to figure out how to absorb the shock of a 15-percent jump in our mailing costs. So please consider signing the petition at this Web site set up by the Free Press.

Evangelical pollster George Barna (whose research on Catholics was discussed in these precincts a few months back), has released a new study of attitudes of young adults toward Christianity.  Here are a couple of interesting excerpts from the Barna press release:

The study shows that 16- to 29-year-olds
exhibit a greater degree of criticism toward Christianity than did
previous generations when they were at the same stage of life. In fact,
in just a decade, many of the Barna measures of the Christian image
have shifted substantially downward, fueled in part by a growing sense
of disengagement and disillusionment among young people. For instance,
a decade ago the vast majority of Americans outside the Christian
faith, including young people, felt favorably toward Christianity’s
role in society. Currently, however, just 16% of non-Christians in
their late teens and twenties said they have a “good impression” of
Christianity….

One of the groups hit hardest by the criticism is
evangelicals. Such believers have always been viewed with skepticism in
the broader culture. However, those negative views are crystallizing
and intensifying among young non-Christians. The new study shows that
only 3% of 16 – to 29-year-old non-Christians express favorable views
of evangelicals. This means that today’s young non-Christians are eight
times less likely to experience positive associations toward
evangelicals than were non-Christians of the Boomer generation (25%)….

Interestingly, the study discovered a new image
that has steadily grown in prominence over the last decade. Today, the
most common perception is that present-day Christianity is
“anti-homosexual.” Overall, 91% of young non-Christians and 80% of
young churchgoers say this phrase describes Christianity. As the
research probed this perception, non-Christians and Christians
explained that beyond their recognition that Christians oppose
homosexuality, they believe that Christians show excessive contempt and
unloving attitudes towards gays and lesbians. One of the most frequent
criticisms of young Christians was that they believe the church has
made homosexuality a “bigger sin” than anything else. Moreover, they
claim that the church has not helped them apply the biblical teaching
on homosexuality to their friendships with gays and lesbians.

In a rejoinder to those who view the media as inimical to religion, and to the church in particular, the Providence Journal-Bulletin has been running a lavish–and largely positive–series on Bishop Thomas J. Tobin of Providence. At the same time, however, court documents sought by BishopAccountability.org have revealed that the diocese apparently had twice as many clerical abusers (125) than the diocese accounted for in the John Jay survey, in which it reported 56 priest-abusers over the past decades. In an Oct. 19 report in the Journal-Bulletin the diocese put the disparity down to “a difference in reporting criteria and methodology.” That does not seem to explain it all, however.  

J.K. Rowling, in a CNN story Saturday, confirmed that Hogwarts headmaster Albus Dumbledore is gay.

This bit of news was buried in another thread over the weekend, so here’s your chance to talk about it without derailing other topics. But first I get to throw in my two cents.

While it’s clear that the Harry Potter characters “live” for Rowling beyond the boundaries of the page and have extensive backstories that aren’t included in the books, I was surprised to learn that Dumbledore has any sexual orientation whatever. Rowling’s news is particularly interesting since she has contemplated writing a book about Dumbledore’s early life.

Dumbledore is not a warm and fuzzy character. His humor is as withering as his manners are pleasant. He reminds me of George Saunders in “The Picture of Dorian Gray.” He seems to have many admirers, but no friends. And we learn in Book 7 that he has toyed with the wizarding equivalent of fascism. His relationship with Gellert Grindelwald is faintly Leopold-and-Loebian.

If a book about Dumbledore appears, here a few guesses about how it might play out and why Catholics ought not to fear it:

First, Rowling isn’t interested in writing about sex. In the Potter series, there’s a bit of snogging and groping, and that’s pretty much it. I imagine that a story about Dumbledore and Grindelwald would be equally restrained, particularly since she knows lots of young adults will be reading it.

Second, Rowling set up the Dumbledore-Grindelwald theme at the end of Book 2 of the Potter series, where Dumbledore himself says: ”It is our choices, Harry, that show us what we truly are, far more than our abilities.”

A book about Dumbldore would explore how a young man, who has used his genius to shield him from the unpleasantness of his difficult family–and possibly his own true self–responds when the only love of his life urges him to evil.

We already know how it turns out, of course. But I think Dumbledore’s journey will be every bit as inspiring as Harry’s.

And maybe we’ll also find out what Dumbledore’s brother Aberforth was doing with that goat …

Update Oct. 24: This post elicited 99 comments, and  I think we’ve about played it out. Since the discussion has been more about homosexuality and how we should respond to it, whether in or outside of the world of Harry Potter, please see the post above about the Barna study.

Just to recap for those of you who may have tuned in late, the conversation went something like this:

• Comments in support of Rowling, the books and/or a gay character: 39 percent, with 11 individuals weighing in.
• Comments against Rowling, the books and/or a gay character: 30 percent, with two individuals weighing in.
• Tangential comments, smart-aleck remarks (most of which were welcome comic relief), or those who found a heated discussion about the sexuality of a fictional character absurd or irrelevant: 24 percent with 10 individuals weighing in.
• My posts: 7 percent.
• Few individuals directly answered the question about whether they’d read the HP stories to their kids despite the fact that we now know Dumbledore is gay, but the responses were approximately 5 “would read” (if you count me) to 1 “would not.”

I thank everyone for their responses.

Apropos Colbert’s appearance on Meet the Press, David Carr has a lengthy reflection in today’s Times.

Here is part of what he writes:

[T]he message I draw from Mr. Colbert is not that members of the
media-political complex need to laugh at themselves, but that they need
to take a hard look. The incipient generation of news consumers has
made it clear that it does not want to see a bunch of guys with really
nice neckware standing on the White House lawn talking about what they
did not learn in the press room behind them and then flick at “sources”
who suggest that “one thing is clear.”

One thing is, in fact,
clear, from the plummeting numbers for network news: the jig is up.
Consumers have decided that network news and talk shows are every bit
as fake and not nearly as funny as “The Daily Show” and “The Colbert
Report.”

“Why shouldn’t a comedic fake newscaster feel right at
home in a news format that itself verges on fakery?” said Mark
Feldstein, a journalism professor at George Washington University.
“After all, these shows aren’t all that different from televised
wrestling, with the shouts and grunts that simulate combat during what
is really a fixed fight, followed by everyone involved in the charade
going out for drinks afterward.”

On television, and on the campaign, everybody is playing someone else; Mr. Colbert is just a bit more upfront about it.

Kudos to Associated Press national writers Martha Irvine and Robert Tanner for a series on a story that has gone largely unreported until now: the plague of sexual abuse of children by educators.

The mainbar story is here along with a sidebar here and here (that I’ve found thus far). They point to a situation that obviously has terrible parallels to the Catholic Church’s own abuse scandal, but with a much wider scope and much less accountability.

Anyone who has covered abuse stores at all knew this was the case. It was the shame of many in the Church to cite other fields–like education–in hopes of excusing or diverting attention from the Church’s problems. Yet it was the shame of the media to focus for so long on the Catholic Church to the exclusion of the schools, or other arenas we might cite.

Let’s hope this prompts the broader awareness and investigation that is needed–and without which, I fear, some of the suffering of the Catholic crisis will have been for naught.

The Tribune‘s Mark Silva has a partial transcript.

RUSSERT: You know, if you look at the voting blocs that exist in
South Carolina and around the country, I’m quite surprised the way you
treat them in this book. Senior citizens — this is what you call them
– “old people.” “Sorry, but retirement offends me. You don’t just stop
fighting the middle of a war because your legs hurt. So why do you get
to stop working in the middle of your life just because your prostate
hurts?”

COLBERT: Well, Tim, I just don’t understand pensions or Social
Security. Why do you get paid after you stop working? That doesn’t make
any sense to me.

RUSSERT: Abolish Social Security?

COLBERT: Yes.

RUSSERT: Abolish Medicare?

COLBERT: Yes.

RUSSERT: Abolish all pensions?

COLBERT: Abolish tipping waiters and waitresses because I’ve gotten my
food, and they get paid by the hour. Why am I giving them extra money?
That’s all pensions and Social Security are — it’s a tip at the end of
your life.

The full MTP transcript can be found right here (scroll down for Colbert). He did the interview in character (mostly), but also did an out-of-character interview with Tim Russert that is available only online:

Take two: Colbert on comedy

The Blackwater scandal of American (and other) mercenaries in Iraq and elsewhere popped up on my radar as yet another dark chapter in this national nightmare surrounding Iraq. Yet I didn’t explore it as much as I would have liked (or should have) until channel-surfing the other night I came across a Bill Moyers’ interview with Jeremy Scahill, author of an impressive book of investigative reporting on Blackwater. The interview and parsing of the media counter-attack by Blackwater CEO Erik Prince was illuminating, and chilling. And Scahill’s dedication, work and presentation were beyond impressive, to me.

I was not aware, however, that Scahill and Prince are both Catholic, until last night I read an Oct 12 profile of Scahill in NCR. Scahill was raised in a Catholic Worker home, and went to live at Jonah House with the Berrigans in Baltimore for a year in the 1990′s.

“It had a profound impact on me,” he told NCR. “I think that being alive in the times that we live in means to be a resister…For me, media is a nonviolent weapon in that struggle.”

Today’s Washington Post has an article on the “World Digital Library.” It begins: “As ideas go, they don’t come much bigger: Digitize the accumulated wisdom of humankind, catalogue it, and offer it for free on the Internet in seven languages.”

What wonderful possibilities are opening up!

Two very bright and very balanced graduate students at my university (one a former columnist for “Commonweal”) have told me that they are home-schooling their children, which leads me to wonder what information is available about this phenomenon, which, I think, is now some twenty or thirty years old–who are choosing to home-school? why they choose to do it? what have been the results? the effects? what state-regulations govern it, if any? Etc., etc.

Has “Commonweal” published anything on it?

If moderate Christians are forced to to choose between a secular liberal world and a conservative Christian world, which will they choose?

Isn’t there somewhere in between?

Stories like these two make me fear there really is no other choice, given the polarization in American politics today.

This is going to be great!

This just on the BBC

Cheney, Obama ‘distant cousins’

They
may be polar opposites politically but US Vice-President Dick Cheney
and Democratic candidate Barack Obama are related, Mr Cheney’s wife
says.

Lynne Cheney
said she had discovered while doing family research for a new book that
her husband and the Illinois senator were eighth cousins.

She said she traced a common ancestor of the two men to be a 17th century immigrant from France.

She described the connection as “amazing”.

“This is such an
amazing American story that one ancestor… could be responsible down
the family line for lives that have taken such different and varied
paths.”

According to Mrs
Cheney’s spokeswoman, Mr Obama is distantly related to Mareen Duvall,
whose son Samuel married the granddaughter of Mr Cheney’s ancestor,
also called Richard Cheney.

Mr Obama’s spokesman, Bill Burton, responded to the news by saying: “Every family has a black sheep.”

Mr Cheney, the
brooding neo-conservative closely associated with the decision to
invade Iraq, has little else in common with Mr Obama.

Mr Obama, the
son of a Kenyan man and a white woman from Kansas, has earned epithets
like “rock star” because of his popularity among young Democrats, and a
reputation as a liberal because of his voting record in the Senate

This is why I am a Catholic. The “Bonfire of the Inanities” image of JPII in flames arrives just as “sugar shock” artist Cosimo Cavallaro tries to resurrect his “Chocolate Jesus” sculpture (which rotates counter-clockwise. I think). Coincidence? Hardly. Get the two together, and all church problems solved!

Column by Archbishop George H. Niederauer, to be published Oct. 19th in Catholic San Francisco:

A recent event that greatly concerns me needs some additional explanation — and with it an apology. On Sunday, October 7, 2007, I celebrated Mass at Most Holy Redeemer Parish here in San Francisco, during my first visit there. The congregation was devout and the liturgy was celebrated with reverence. I noticed no demonstration, no protest, no disruption of the Eucharist.

At Communion time, toward the end of the line, two strangely dressed persons came to receive Communion. As I recall one of them wore a large flowered hat or garland. I did not recognize either of them as wearing mock religious garb.

Afterward it was made clear to me that these two people were members of the organization “Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence,” who have long made a practice of mocking the Catholic Church in general and religious women in particular. My predecessors, Cardinal William Levada and Archbishop John Quinn, have both denounced this group’s abuse of sacred things many times in the past. Only last year, I instructed the Administrator of Most Holy Redeemer Parish to cancel the group’s use of the hall on the parish grounds, once I became aware of it.

In the year and a half since I arrived in San Francisco, there have been several instances of offensive attacks on Catholic faith and devotional life. Only two weeks ago Catholic San Francisco carried my remarks condemning the derisive use of the image of the Last Supper on a poster printed by another local group.

Although I had often seen photographs of members of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, I had never encountered them in person until October 7th. I did not recognize who these people were when they approached me.

After the event, I realized that they were members of this particular organization and that giving them Holy Communion had been a mistake.

I apologize to the Catholics of the Archdiocese of San Francisco and to Catholics at large for doing so.

The manner of dress and public comportment of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence is deeply offensive to women religious and to the witness of holiness and Christian service that women religious have offered to the Church and to the world for centuries. The citizens of San Francisco have ample reason to be grateful to women religious for their unfailing support of those most in need, and to be deeply offended when that service is belittled so outrageously and offensively.

Someone who dresses in a mock religious habit to attend Mass does so to make a point. If people dress in a manner clearly intended to mock what we hold sacred, they place themselves in an objective situation in which it is not appropriate for them to receive Holy Communion, much less for a minister of the Church to give the Sacrament to them.

Therefore I conclude that the presence of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence at the Mass on October 7th was intended as a provocative gesture. In that moment I failed to recognize it as such, and for that, as I have said, I must apologize