Saints and Commencement Speakers- UPDATE
I have to say, I really don’t get it.
It’s not okay for the University of Notre Dame to ask a pro-choice politician to give a commencement speech, and receive an honorary degree, because abortion is the new Holocaust. . . and we shouldn’t honor in any form those who who acquiesce in its legality, claiming that this is the best we can do realistically and pragmatically.
But it is okay for the Roman Catholic Church to advocate the cause of sainthood for Pope Pius XII, who was at best lukewarm in his opposition to Nazism and the original Holocaust, and Pope John Paul II, whose apparent negligence in failing to investigate the charges against Maciel and the Legionaries will not be investigated as part of his cause–thanks to changes in the canonization process made by the selfsame Pope John Paul II,who eliminated the Devil’s Advocate.
Saints don’t have to be perfect.
And in canonizing Pope Pius XII, the Church really doesn’t mean to endorse his approach to Nazism. And in canonizing Pope John Paul II, the Church really doesn’t mean to endorse his handling of the Maciel case. But their whole lives cannot be reduced to one position, one action, one set of judgments, as John Allen carefully explains to us.
Mmm. I thought that was essentially the argument made by Notre Dame about the commencement invitation–rejected by many of those who are likely to support the canonization of Pius XII and JPII.
Oh. . . but it’s there’s a difference. Obama was a commencement speaker –not a candidate for sainthood.
Saints don’t have to be perfect. But commencement speakers apparently do.
Update: Let me make it entirely clear: I think the standards for being a saint ought to be higher than the standards for being a commencement speaker. And I think we need a Devil’s Advocate. Otherwise, how can the faithful trust that making saints isn’t a process of pure expediency?
UPDATE: Needless to say, I am aware of the dispute about Pius XII’s role with respect to the Holocaust. There are studies of questionable merit on both sides of the issue–more study is needed. What I found quite striking–and helpful–is this summary of the status questionis.
Note that the question for the detractors of Pius XII are very much the same as those who now oppose abortion. Was the Holocaust such a monumental evil that he was bound to speak out against it?
And hence my analogy.
First, I think the main crux of the objection was President Obama receiving the honorary degree, not being a commencement speaker, so you are not fairly representing the position of those who opposed it.
Second, I don’t think “at best lukewarm” is a fair description of Pope Pius’s opposition to Nazism. Considering how Commonweal howls the moment a bishop criticizes a pro-choice politician, I’m not sure you are well-positioned to condemn bishops for being insufficiently strident in opposing government actions contrary to life.
Third, I think a key difference is that JPII and Pius XII are not currently engaged in the actions for which they are being honored, whereas President Obama was very much engaged in preserving unrestricted abortion at the time he received the honor. President Obama’s abortion policies aren’t everything, but they aren’t nothing, either, especially right now.
Indeed, part of the reason President Obama accepted the invitation was to send a message that his abortion policies were compatible with Christianity in general and Catholicism in particular. I don’t think that objecting to UND being used in this way compels one to also oppose the canonization of JPII because of his handling of the Maciel case.
True, you really don’t get it.
What we need is an Abortion Museum.
Cathleen: You’ve missed the point. As long you just articulate the correct position on abortion (i.e. abolition immediately, no other issues matter, test everyone accordingly), no matter what you do (see Bush 43, Brownback, etc.), well, then you can be a saint, speak at Notre Dame, and receive communion from Bishops Tobin, Naumann, Rigali, and Chaput. Nothing else matters. – TL
As Bernard noted in the thread below re Frank Rich, there is the Robert George point of view – one approach in a divided Church -I see Cathy is mentioned in the Times article on the other side.
But like so much with political points of view, there is little unitive and much bubble in which folks tell others that they don’t get it -meaning you are not in my bubble.
Just my point of view: the more division goes on, the more some sort of collapse draws closer.
Of well….
Sorry, Cathy, but this seems like a weak analogy to me.
I say this as someone who is ambivalent about this whole issue. I am ambivalent about ND’s giving an honorary degree to the President, not only because of his position on abortion, but also because I am ambivalent about Catholic Universities whoring after the biggest name they can get as a commencement speaker — something my own institution also does, in a bush-league, pathetic sort of way. At the same time, I am equally annoyed at the Notre-Dame-has-ceased-to-be-a-Catholic-university crowd. I am likewise ambivalent about the declaration of the heroic virtue of Pius XII. I certainly would have preferred that he had died a martyr in protecting the Jews of Europe, though (as noted above) the historical record about what efforts he did make is far more unclear than your “lukewarm at best” would indicate.
Yet the analogy fails because sanctity is in the end not about this or that particular judgment but about the overall shape of one’s life. Politics, on the other hand, is (at least in a liberal democracy) entirely about this or that particular judgment, and not really at all about the overall shape of the politician’s life.
As I recall, the President was not being honored for being a good person, but for being a political leader — i.e. for his particular judgments. And in this case, he is a politician whose judgment on the matter of abortion is difficult to square with the Church’s.
Pius XII’s sanctity will continue to be a pyoblem until all of the materials in the Vatican Archives are made available to scholarss. As it stands now, locking away some of them just confirms the suspicions that the Vatican in engaging in another cover- up.
Ah, the Vatican Archives. Until its policies are chsnged there will always be the Dan Browns of thus world.
If I were Devil’s Advocate in the case of JPII, I would theorize that JPII was as much influenced by Col. Jaruselski as Jaruselske was influenced by JPII. Evidence? JPII’s extraordinary reliance on secrecy and on the consolidation of power that were so typical of Communist leaders.
And I should have added the insistence oh strict adherence to his party’s line.
Actually, I think JPII was probably a saint, but he did lean strongly towards his own brand oftotalitarianism, including its fundamentalist frame of mind.
So, Cathy, would you have a problem if a higher-up in the LC who has been directly complicit in covering up Maciel’s crimes were given an honorary degree and be the commencement speaker at ND?
(Not that it’s going to happen, I’m just wondering where you draw your lines.)
There’s much that I agree with here — although I do think John Paul II was a good and holy man, I think that he certainly had his failings, and that
before any canonization effort, we really DO need to ask questions about what level of responsibility he has in the sex abuse scandals. Just to give one example, why in the world did he appoint Cardinal Law to that prestigious post at that basilica?
I really don’t understand why many “conservative” Catholics (labels are tricky) will criticize bishops and sometimes even popes for various other things, but not really demand accountability and reform, etc. when it comes to the sex abuse scandals. Yes, of course there is outrage and calls for reform from “conservative” Catholics with regard to getting abusers out of the priesthood (and of course there’s controversy over how that should be done, whether homosexual persons should be banned from the seminary, etc.), but when it comes to holding the bishops and the pope(s) accountable on sex abuse, there seems to be a disconnect. We DO see criticism of bishops on other matters (e.g., liturgical issues, attendance at Ted Kennedy’s funeral, etc.) — and look at the outrage, demands for change, even calls for people to withhold donations, when it comes to things like the recent controversy over the Catholic Campaign for Human Development, covered a lot by Raymond Arroyo on EWTN’s “The World Over.” And yet we generally don’t see that from “conservative” Catholics when it comes to sex abuse scandals. (I hesitate to use the label “conservative,” because it oversimplifies things, and also because although I wouldn’t call myself “conservative,” I do see myself as both “traditional” and “liberal.”) Overall, I do like both John Paul II and Benedict XVI, but I don’t understand why there’s this disconnect for many of their uncritcal admirers — why aren’t they upset about things like appointing Cardinal Law to that post at the basilica, or not forcing more bishops resign over the scandals, etc.?
On another note, with regard to Pius XII’s cause for canonization and the issue of the Nazis — I really don’t understand how he came to be criticized over this. I mean, in his own time, he was PRAISED for how he acted. The Catholic League (yes, yes, I know…) has a section on its site that deals with this: http://www.catholicleague.org/pius.php Golda Meir praised him; the New York Times praised him on Christmas 1941… what happened?
As an appendix to my previous post, I’ve copied and pasted the New York Times editorial from Christmas 1941 praising Pius XII, along with their praise for him on Christmas in 1942; it’s available at http://www.catholicleague.org/pius.php?id=21 :
“The Pope’s Message”
The voice of Pius XII is a lonely voice in the silence and darkness enveloping Europe this Christmas. The Pope reiterates what he has said before. In general, he repeats, although with greater definiteness, the five-point plan for peace which he first enunciated in his Christmas message after the war broke out in 1939. His program agrees in fundamentals with the Roosevelt-Churchill eight-point declaration. It calls for respect for treaties and the end of the possibility of aggression, equal treatment for minorities, freedom from religious persecution. It goes farther than the Atlantic Charter in advocating an end of all national monopolies of economic wealth, and so far as the eight points, which demands complete disarmament for Germany pending some future limitation of arms for all nations.
The Pontiff emphasized principles of international morality with which most men of good-will agree. He uttered the ideas a spiritual leader would be expected to express in time of war. Yet his words sound strange and bold in the Europe of today, and we comprehend the complete submergence and enslavement of great nations, the very sources of our civilization, as we realize that he is about the only ruler left o the Continent of Europe who dares to raise his voice at all. The last tiny islands of neutrality are so hemmed in and overshadowed by war and fear that no one but the Pope is still able to speak aloud in the name of the Prince of Peace. This is indeed a measure of the “moral devastation” he describes as the accompaniment of physical ruin and inconceivable human suffering.
In calling for a “real new order” based on “liberty, justice and love,” to be attained only by a “return to social and international principles capable of creating a barrier against the abuse of liberty and the abuse of power,” the Pope put himself squarely against Hitlerism. Recognizing that there is no road open to agreement between belligerents “whose reciprocal war aims and programs seem to be irreconcilable,” he left no doubt that the Nazi aims are also irreconcilable with his own conception of a Christian peace. “The new order which must arise out of this war,” he asserted, “must be based on principles.” And that implies only one end to the war.
On Christmas Day, 1942, the Times once again editorialized on the papal Christmas Message and again praised Pius XII for his moral leadership:
“The Pope’s Verdict”
No Christmas sermon reaches a larger congregation than the message Pope Pius XII addresses to a war-torn world at this season. This Christmas more than ever he is a lonely voice crying out of the silence of a continent. The Pulpit whence he speaks is more than ever like the Rock on which the Church was founded, a tiny island lashed and surrounded by a sea of war. In these circumstances, in any circumstances, indeed, no one would expect the Pope to speak as a political leader, or a war leader, or in any other role than that of a preacher ordained to stand above the battle, tied impartially, as he says, to all people and willing to collaborate in any new order which will bring a just peace.
But just because the Pope speaks to and in some sense for all the peoples at war, the clear stand he takes on the fundamental issues of the conflict has greater weight and authority. When a leader bound impartially to nations on both sides condemns as heresy the new form of national state which subordinates everything to itself: when he declares that whoever wants peace must protect against “arbitrary attacks” the “juridical safety of individuals:” when he assails violent occupation of territory, the exile and persecution of human beings for no reason other than race or political opinion: when he says that people must fight for a just and decent peace, a “total peace” — the “impartial judgment” is like a verdict in a high court of justice.
Pope Pius expresses as passionately as any leader on our side the war aims of the struggle for freedom when he says that those who aim at building a new world must fight for free choice of government and religious order. They must refuse that the state should make of individuals a herd of whom the state disposes as if they were a lifeless thing.
Right on Cathy! This rush of papal canonizations is not edifying. For one thing what about all those bishops that JP2 in his wisdom chose to appoint who turned out to be more interested in protecting the “church” (read “clerical reputations) that the victims of sexual abusers, “victims” who were as much the church as anyone else.
And then there is this question: when are Leo XIII and Pius XI going to be considered for canonization? Perhaps they are already in the wings. But one must wonder: if not, why not? I look forward to JA’s answers to these questions.
Prof. Kaveny – nice post and realize your point is to compare to the ND fiasco.
But, would like to add to the discussion above on both popes:
a) Pius XII – Back in March we had a discussion with Paul O´Shea who had just returned from a Symposium of Pius XII in Jerusalem. I can understand the argument put forward in support of Pius XII that he did not want to make matters worse by speaking out against Hitler – an argument by the way with which many people disagree.
But one thing O’Shea cannot understand is Pius’s silence about the mass killing of the Serbs, Jews and Muslims by Pavelic who was the head of Catholic Action and in direct contact with the Catholic hierarchy. Further, many of his concentrations camps were headed by priests, mainly Franciscans. Pius may not have had any control or influence over Hitler, but he certainly had it over Pavelic and his Franciscan priests.
Per Paul O’Shea: “All of this is true. And outside my immediate competency. I recommend reading Phayer’s books – “The Catholic Church and the Holocaust 1930-1965″ (Indiana UP 2000) and “Pius XII, the Holocaust and the Cold War” (Indiant UP 2008). That is a good starting point. On Stepinac – the jury is still out. I discussed this with a Serbian priest who is studying at Yad Vashem at some length. I think Jovan Culibrk is right on saying that on some things Stepinac was a good man (his condemnation of the killiing of Jews and Serbs) but weak on other things (his support, however tepid, of the Pavelic regime). As more and more documentary sources are collected and studied from the former Yugolsavia I fear the picture will get much worse. Jovan’s research so far makes for very sad reading as far as the Catholic Church is concerned. (On a related matter – it does help explain the reticence expressed by many Orthodox towards rapproachement with Rome – the history is too bloody and still too raw) As for what Pius knew … until the archives are opened we only have a sketchy picture, but it is safe to say that he had a pretty clear picture of an awful situation. Did he know Franciscan friars were killing Serbs? I suspect he did. Pius was a micro-manager – it would be odd if he did not know something as major as priests killing people. As for his action or inaction … it does not look good. As Paul had earlier explained the Vatican opened its archives in relation to Germany, but it has never opened its archives in relation to the activities of Pavelic and the Croatian clergy.
b) JPII – Both JPII & Benedict’s reputation is in tatters as a result of their 2001 instruction to the Bishops to pervert the course of justice and cover up pedophile crimes.
http://www.bishop-accountability.org/resources/resource-files/churchdocs/EpistulaEnglish.htm
http://www.opusbonosacerdotii.org/ad_exsequendam_ecclesiasticam_legem.htm
One section: “In tribunals established by ordinaries or hierarchs, the functions of judge, promoter of justice, notary and legal representative can validly be performed for these cases only by priests. When the trial in the tribunal is finished in any fashion, all the acts of the case are to be transmitted ex officio as soon as possible to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
All tribunals of the Latin church and the Eastern Catholic churches are bound to observe the canons on delicts and penalties, and also on the penal process of both codes respectively, together with the special norms which are transmitted by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith for an individual case and which are to be executed entirely.
Cases of this kind are subject to the pontifical secret.
Through this letter, sent by mandate of the supreme pontiff to all the bishops of the Catholic Church, to superiors general of clerical religious institutes of pontifical right and clerical societies of apostolic life of pontifical right, and to other interested ordinaries and hierarchs, it is hoped not only that more grave delicts will be entirely avoided, but especially that ordinaries and hierarchs have solicitous pastoral care to look after the holiness of the clergy and the faithful even through necessary sanctions.”
Whether or not Pious Xii or John Paul II should be cannonized is a legitimate discussion and yes, I can understand there are different, non-traditional ways to be “pro-life”, and that some are tired of the more strident, traditional pro-lifers and their approach.
However those folks (especially Catholics) who parrot that tired old canard about Pope Pious XII demonstrate incredible ignorance, and frankly, ought to be ashamed of themselves.
La Repubblica of yesterday reports that the Chief Rabbi of Rome, Riccardo di Segni, the president of the Italian Union of Jewish Communities, Renzo Gattengna, and the president of the Roman Jewish community, Riccardo Pacifici, recall in a joint statement critical of Pope Benedict’s decision the deportation to Auschwitz of a number of Italian Jews, including 1,021 from the Stazione Tiburtina in Rome on 16 October 1943.
This is certainly a vexed question, and the Archives may not settle things. But why not wait? Is there really evidence of great devotion to the cause of Pius XII among Catholics worldwide?
Correction in spelling: Renzo Gattegna
Why do we need Pius XII and John Paul II as saints? What is the case in favor of it?
Whenever I think of Pius XII, I remember this passage from Paul Johnson’s A History of Christianity.
Sounds like style-wise anyway, that (gold-handled) Caddy would put the current pope-mobile to shame.
I wonder what year was that Caddilac, and who has it today; it must be worth a lot!
:-)
I wonder what year was that Caddilac, and who has it today; it must be worth a lot!
Ken,
Imagine trying to find the answer to that question before the Internet!
Coding error. The last paragraph above should not be part of the blockquote.
Benedict’s urgent desire to make saints of these two recent predecessors raises some questions. Saints are often proposed to us as role models for those in different walks of life . What does Benedict say to the Church and the world about what makes for a good pope by commending these two men for the way they served in that role? What does his choice tell us about his own way of being pope, and perhaps his hopes about how he will be remembered and assessed? What might canonizing these men say to future Cardinals weighing their selection of Benedict’s eventual successor?
History suggests that good human beings may have enough personal weaknesses and blind spots to be poor kings, teachers, judges, popes. Wouldn’t pushing for the canonization of these two candidates, each of whom carries a lot of as yet unexamined baggage, be unwise, and a willful and uncritical rush to judgment?
A saint in heaven is a saint in glory; a saint on earth is a different story.
One good thing to come out of this recent “old boys club” stroking of the 2 least worthy of sainthood among B16′s successors: the idea of sainthood has become so skewed toward clerics and religious — and is patently obvious to most of the “lower classes” in the church — that it will soon lose any meaning that a more judicious approach might foster.
Welcome of the saint of the day club.
I agree with Susan Gannon. As I said on the lower thread by David Gibson, this naming of the five most recent popes as either Venerable or Blessed is a startling innovation. It is something like naming practically every pope during the first three centuries a martyr when evidence suggests that a fair number died in their beds. Are we canonizing popes or the papacy itself? Is each man on election suddenly a saint? Is this a legitimate development or a further exaltation of papal authority, with a concomitant increase in Roman centralization?
I agree with John Page. We have now arrived at the point where canonization is virtually considered a right to anyone elected pope. If a pope’s cause does not progress speedily, then questions are raised as to why others’ causes are moving more quickly. And then we get “If Pope X, why not Pope Y?” and it snowballs.
It is DANGEROUS DANGEROUS DANGEROUS (yes, shouting caps and all) to assume that every pope will be canonized. And we are basically already there. It will bring the entire practice of canonization into disrepute. Prediction: within days of whenever Benedict dies, someone will begin talking about his process for canonization. Why? Because he was pope.
This is not to say that these men did not achieve personal sanctity. But saints are proposed as models of particular heroic virtue that can be imitated by the faithful. Doctrinal orthodoxy, defense of the institutional church, etc. are not models of heroic virtue that can be practiced by the faithful, who typically do not churn out encyclicals and such.
And when a cause for canonization becomes a political football with one side seeking to win approbation for their viewpoint by a canonization (I’m looking at you, Pius XII fan club), then the entire process is corrupted and in dire need of reform. And the Vatican is only to glad to advance the idea of popes as saints, hence the ridiculous yoking of the beatification of John XXIII with Pius IX: “We’ll give you Good Pope John, but you have to take Pio Nono too.” So the Vatican got a two-fer.
It’s time to take a good long hard look at the process of canonization.
It is time to take a good hard look at ultramontanism. Again.
Cathleen: good comparison.
As I mentioned in another thread below, I don’t think Pius XII should be made a saint. I can see no reason to have disallowed the International Catholic-Jewish Historical Commission from seeing the info in the Vatican archives, except a fear of the truth.
Saints should be examples to us of how to act in difficult situations, and Pios is an example of the opposite. Here’s a quote from an article about hiim (sorry it’s so long) ….
“[...] not once in the twelve years of Nazi rule or in the six years of World War II did the Pope use the instrument or even the threat of excommunication against leaders of the Nazi regime or against their subordinates or against their accomplices …. only a few years after World War II ended (1 July 1949), he did exactly this in a blanket condemnation of Communism and of those of its adherents who mistakenly believed that their polit ical allegiance was compatible with a commitment to Catholicism; those adherents, he warned, would have to make a choice: Either/Or. Yet during the years leading up to and then of the “Final Solution” he refused to take any such action with respect to the Nazis …. Against this charge, the standard argument from prudence–that if the Pope had availed himself of this means (more than just speaking out) , he would have made things worse than they were- seems at once mistaken and irrelevant. Mistaken, because however the Nazi hierarchy might have intensified its racist campaign as a consequence of such action (how, one asks, could that have been made “worse” …. The argument from prudence on this point is also, it seems-even if, contrary to the fact, one granted its force-irrelevant, and only in part because prudential arguments are as such always to some extent morally irrelevant. If individuals can be called on (by the Church, among others) to sacrifice practical interests in the name of principles or ideals, would it be too much to propose the same expectation for the Church itself?
A second instance of the moral refusal of an obligation provides the title for Susan Zuccotti’s book-what Pius XII refused to do at the time of the roundup of Jews in Rome on October 16, 1943. One point here remains inexplicable, quite apart from any judgment of the act itself: the failure of the Vatican, which almost certainly knew of the impending roundup before it happened, to convey a warning to the Rome Jewish community-a warning that would have allowed them to go into hiding. It is difficult even to imagine a plausible explanation for this omission; the hypothesis that fear of being held accountable for such warning prevented it would itself condemn as much as it explains. A still more notable breach in moral terms, however, is the fact that once the roundup took place–”under the very windows of the Pope” in the words of Ernst von Weizsacker, the German Ambassador to the Holy See-and with the trains waiting to deport more than a thousand Roman Jews (the “Pope’s Jews”) to Auschwitz, not a single public word of protest was uttered then or subsequently by the Pope himself.
Soon after the event, then, Weizsacker could, accurately and in good conscience, report back to Berlin that the Pope “has not allowed himself to be carried away making any demonstrative statements against deportation of the Jews… he has done all he could… not to prejudice relationships with the German government.” (3) Once again, the argument from prudence surfaces here among the Pope’s defenders, principally, the threat uttered by Hitler to occupy Vatican City and to take the Pope prisoner: Would not this have been sufficient reason for a muted response, for resorting to “silent diplomacy” rather than open opposition? Putting aside the substantial question of just how active the alleged “silent diplomacy” in fact was, we may well in this context ask an alternate question: Is there no moment imaginable when the Vatican and the Pope himself should be willing to place themselves, even their lives, at risk? One dare not speak for anyone else or perhaps even for oneself of an obligation to choose martyrdom. B ut there was no reason for anyone to believe that the Nazis had in mind literal martyrdom for Pius XII-and why should something less than that (or even for that matter, in reference to the spiritual leader of the Church, that?) stand itself as a sufficient reason for silence and acquiescence? One would have thought that, so far as concerns the Church, the question had been long answered of whether man had been made for the laws or the laws for man …”
In brief, it seems clear enough that Pius was cautious. That will suggest to most people that he was not heroic.
One might add that in his caution Pius was not so different from the young Joseph Ratzinger.
If Pius XII had walked to the train station with two volunteer Swiss guards[I am certain at least two would heve volunteered] and attempted to block the train deporting the Roman Jews to the death camps Pius.. 1. might have made a rescue 2. should be canonized or 3. since he didn’t forgetaboutcanonization. Would an un-restrained father not go to the train station if his children were on their way to a death camp.. would we call such a man a prudent saint?
Ooh Joseph and Ed – Have you any other Vatican secrets to whisper around about? Did you know Pope Benedict is really a German ? What about that, oh my gosh, just imagine . . . whisper, insinuate, whisper, etc.. Would you look for a moment at the sort of nonsense you are spouting or the sort of adolescent logic you are using?
Really it is sad to see this sort of thing going on among otherwise reasonable and intelligent people. Neither of you, nor any of the other Pious XII bashers are in any position to know what went on and in any case, none of us can not possibly understand the situation in which he worked, or indeed what was at stake.
Discussing whether or not someone should canonized is legitimate enough, but your trying to guess the actions of (and sometime even the intentions) such a man in such a situation is the height of arrogance and a sad display of ignorance and bad form.
I hope there are more saints in heaven than commencement speakers on earth.
But Mr. Bauerschmidt put it correctly about the ‘whoring around’ of Catholic institutions. We are starting to look at ridiculous as the Nobel committee. It is amazing to see how the Church in the US is divided. If you were disgusted with the reaction to Obama speaking at ND and clamored around the ‘Big tent/multiple issue’ argument for the Church, you cannot in good conscience try to exclude those who did oppose the honourary doctorate from the Church militant. The big tent church south of the 49th is starting to look like a circus tent.
As someone who believes abortion is a big issue, that Obama was not born in Bethlehem and the school-girl crush the world continuously displays towards Obama (especially Europe) is embarrassing, I think it is time the issue is dropped. At best Notre Dame provided an opportunity for the US to renew the debate (we are too afraid to have in Canada) and at worst they looked like the rest of the pathetic hollywood elite gushing over the “anyone but George W. Bush” crowd.
Yech, not Notre Dame again. Rather than engaging in the mental gymnastics of Professor Kaveny’s analogy, wouldn’t it be easier if people just came out and said that they ultimately don’t believe that abortion is that big of an issue? It would save us all from further embarrassment.
Easier –for whom–you? I believe that your smart enough to handle complexity. If you don’t want complexity, the Catholic moral tradition isn’t for you.
Distinctions, analogies. Mental gymnastics. Whether you like it or not, Adeodataus, that’s the stuff of our moral tradition–the Catholic moral tradition. Concepts like praeter intentionem. Remote material cooperation with evil. Intrinsic evil. Finis operans. Finis operantis. What is the object of an act? What are the circumstances of the act? Under what conditions do the circumstances enter into the object, and uner what conditions do they remain mere circumstances. All questions are highly technical. All answers are somewhat controversial. They draw distinctions. In hard cases, the distinctions are disputed.
Analogy, too, is the lifeblood of Catholic moral theology–it’s casuistry. Why is one case different from another? You seem to like the pre-Vatican II world–well, learn about it. Pick up Zalba on moral theology. You will see some real mental gymnastics. And you ought to be impressed.
But that would require actual study–and why do that? It’s so much easier to sneer.
And by the way–I think abortion is a big deal. I also think child abuse and obstinate refusal to take it seriously as a problem is a big deal. I think that the Holocaust was a big deal. And I think the Church should investigate these matters, rather than giving Pius XII and JPII’s kid-glove treatment in their application for sainthood because they were popes.
Discussing whether or not someone should canonized is legitimate enough, but your trying to guess the actions of (and sometime even the intentions) such a man in such a situation is the height of arrogance and a sad display of ignorance and bad form.
Ken,
So are you saying that the controversy surrounding Pius XII’s posture regarding the Nazis during the time of the Holocaust should just be set aside? Saints are supposed to serve as models for Catholics to emulate. Should there be a footnote that says, “In looking to St. Pius XII, please disregard his actions in the matter of the Nazis, which may or may not have been exemplary?”
You seem to imply that any questions about the wisdom or propriety of Pius XII’s actions regarding the Nazis and the Holocaust have been satisfactorily answered and that there should be no controversy among “reasonable and intelligent people.” That is, of course, not true.
What the Vatican is afraid of is this….
Somewhere deep in the Vatican archives there is a document that shows Pius actually held the Kennedy-Obama position about the killing of Jews.
It will show that, of course (!!!), Pius was personally against the killing of Jews, but that killing Jews should never be against the law. What we should address instead is the underlying REASON that Jews are killed. It is unreasonable to always insist ad nauseam that killing Jews should be illegal! Rather, let us give the Nazi’s good reasons not to kill Jews. Above all, let us dialogue. Let us find common ground.
Now, doesn’t this sound silly?
wouldn’t it be easier if people just came out and said that they ultimately don’t believe that abortion is that big of an issue
Adeodatus,
I don’t think abortion is that big of an issue in judging Obama when compared to the issue of the Holocaust when judging Pius XII.
Now, doesn’t this sound silly?
Eggloff,
Worse than silly.
Adeodatus,
The question, again and again and again, is not whether abortion is an important issue, but whether it is The Only Issue That Matters.
“But that would require actual study–and why do that? It’s so much easier to sneer.”
Cathy, you don’t know my credentials, so it might be wise to refrain from judgment. I think your analogy is strained. The gravity of the acts described are not comparable, not to mention that your analogy relies on the MOST uncharitable interpretation of Pius XII’s role in WWII.
“You seem to like the pre-Vatican II world–well, learn about it.”
That is just plain obnoxious. I don’t live in your pre or post Vatican II world. I’m an all-times Catholic and I find that sufficient. I hope that doesn’t grate too much. Are you a Gaudium et Spes Catholic? The whole thing or only certain paragraphs?
In your post you state that people opposed Obama’s appearance as a commencement speaker. Can we put that canard to rest? They opposed granting him an honorary degree.
Finally, most people here know that you have or had some connection to the president as an adviser during the campaign. It would be good to note that in posts related to, you know, Obama and Catholics.
David N, as much as I find your views of abortion, as stated here, morally reprehensible, I do admire your candor in being forthright about them. You exhibit great logical consistency.
RP, the question always remains one of proportion.
Lets look at the very times Pius XII did nothing to stop the death train with a thousand Roman Jews on Oct 16 1943. And he knew all about it.. Just weeks before king Victor Emmanual ‘went over’ to the Allies. Not the bravest thing but at least Victor took action as Kings/leaders are expected to do. . Thousands of soldiers and civilians were being killed south of Rome. Pius XII bishop of Rome, His Holiness would not walk a few blocks to try and stop the death train. No German officer would stopped him without Berlin orders. Such a man is a saint? Ken says this is … ‘nonsense you are spouting or the sort of adolescent logic you are using?’
The same clerical culture that gave us the abuse cover-up is now naming saints! PHEW
If Benedict wanted to make an impact he would have several Eucharists commemorate victims of clergy abuse. Is it not ironic that this was the first mass said for victims.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/21/nyregion/21diocese.html?_r=1&sq=Catholic&st=cse&adxnnl=1&scp=1&adxnnlx=1261421410-LfyYEupUV29xJ6B QFCpTA&pagewanted=all
Canonizations have been grandiose for centuries. These two will not be the first who had questionable activities to say the least. Those canonized have mostly been clergy and politically correct. It is more grandstanding than dealing with substance.
For a church who really neglected Jews and contributed towards their hatred, this is an act of hubris of great magnitude. It is clergy right or wrong and we are not seeing what we are seeing.
When the Federal government starts taxing churches we will see how fast the bishops will invite politicians who are pro choice to speak at their churches.
David – First of all, I am not big on the Church canonizing folks who only passed away recently, but that (my opinion) is not important.
I agree with you that in considering a person for canonization, the Church naturally needs to make a thorough review of the person’s life. I also think however, considering the scope and awfulness of WW2, that is quite wrong for various chattering classes to mislead the faithful and the general public for that matter, unwittingly or otherwise, into buying the notion that WW2 was as simple and straightforward as the old wartime movies would portray it and that somehow, the Pope’s behavior was scandalous.
Certainly the enemy was easier to identify than in subsequent wars like Korea or Vietnam, but it was not all black and white. And certainly there was no “scandal” regarding the wartime actions of the Vicar of Christ.
Also, since there are groups in America and abroad who despise the Catholic Church and would love nothing more than to paint the Roman Catholic Church as Jew-hating nazi sympathizers, something which could not be farther from the truth of course, it is important to not just blather around casually about so important a matter as the Pope’s actions before and during that terrible war.
I would keep in mind a few things; people in those days (especially the pope) did not travel much, there was no internet or TV, and so intelligence was hard won and not common; as a practical matter much information was shadowy and murky. In fact a fair amount of information about the Pope’s actions in those days has not yet been made public.
I would also note that the Jews admired Pius XII enough to where after the war Israel officially thanked him for his efforts. Finally, of course more should have been done; millions were slaughtered after all. Old Herr Schindler should have done more too, but he did what he could under the circumstances in which he found himself. Everyone should have done more; nobody did enough.
But of course not everyone is up to be declared a saint.
I only ask, in discussing Pius XII’s prospects for canonization, that people try to limit the seemingly-in-the-know comments, and that they avoid ignorant speculation and insinuation.
Considering that not all pertinent information has yet been made public, buy the fact that the story is not fit for sound-bite style appetite of the general public i.e., that it requires more thoughful attention than most are willing to dedicate to it, and that not all critics of the Roman Church have the best of intentions, quite frankly I would err on the side of silence and let Rome tend the entire matter.
As I said, I think it is too soon to declare either of these fine men to be saints, but in any case I certainly am not worthy to even review a matter such as that.
I only tuned into this thread when I saw the old nazi-Vatican canard being employed.
I will not stay silent when folks are hinting and winking that Pius XII, the Vicar of Christ and pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church was any sort of nazi sympathizer. I understand that while obviously neither the Pope nor anyone else did enough to stop the Holocaust, that Pius XII indeed did much during the war to help the Jews.
David N, as much as I find your views of abortion, as stated here, morally reprehensible, I do admire your candor in being forthright about them. You exhibit great logical consistency.
Adeodatus,
Why, thank you! :-)
Adeodatus/Robert Evans: if you want to stand on your credentials, you’ll have to drop the pseudonym. And if you want to accuse others of being obnoxious, you’ll have to drop the sneer.
Ken: You are always welcome to err on the side of silence. Let’s all try dialing down the obnoxiety in here.
“And if you want to accuse others of being obnoxious, you’ll have to drop the sneer.”
I’m sorry if you and Cathy thought I was “sneering” in my original comment. I can assure you, I wasn’t. As for the pseudonym, I thought I’ve been through this before, but once more can’t hurt. I used to study under/ have communication with a few of the contributors on the blog. To avoid any feelings of ill will and misunderstanding, I decided to use a pseudonym when I registered on the site. What started selfishly as an attempt to preserve my GPA continues as a means of avoiding conflict with people with whom I’m still friendly.
I didn’t use the term “credentials” to sound more educated than I am. I don’t have a licentiate, no Phd. But I was a theology major and do have an MTS. I admit that my theological education was inadequate. But I’ve tried to supplement it ever since through my own study.
All analogies limp, but this one never stood. Did the Nazis endorse Pope Pius XII when he ran for election? Was the pope the highest official in the Nazi regime? Did he receive campaign contributions from the Nazis?
There is a grave moral issue, present among us, which, yes, is a greater threat to human life and flourishing than all other problems combined. Its most powerful and effective champion–note, not reluctantly silent moral leader, but champion–is not a good role model for Catholic undergrads.
I’m not at all sure why that has to be said.
During WW II George Orwell argued that “Pacifism is objectively pro-Fascist. This is elementary common sense.” Those who agree might have concerns about the proposed sainthood of Dorothy Day. Clearly she spoke out against anti-semitism, early and often, admirably so. But was her pacifist stance any more effective than that of Pius XII in challenging Hitler and should it be now endorsed as a model in the face of such horror?
If the rehabilitated Devil’s Advocate reads his Orwell he may have some concerns with the approach of Pius XII but also that of his “loyal opposition’ in the Church.
There is also the matter that the USCCB had released a statement about commencement speakers and honorary degrees. The Obama invitation was, if not in outright defiance of the bishops’ request, was at the least in a very grey area.
Again, it seems to me one could oppose such defiance without intellectually committing oneself to opposing the canonizations of JPII and Pius XII.
The role of Pius XII in com batting Nazism continues to be highly contested among scholars. Look at the link to the essay from the Shoah research center I posted on the main post. I think it’s a very good overall summary.
Adeodatus–the name of St. Augustine’s son–literally, “Given by God”- when you accuse someone of not saying what they really think, you’re crossing a line..
when you accuse someone of not saying what they “really think,” you’re crossing a line.
Cathy, in all honesty, it seems no more over the line than your response at 12/21 at 6:12 pm. In fact, it seemed to me somewhat less over the line.
I’m not sure “obnoxiety” is really a word, but it should be.
PS What Kathy said.
I ought also to make clear: I think the loss of the pre-Vatican II tradition of casuistry was a tremendous loss. And I think everyone ought to learn about it–because while it had its deficiencies, it at least was attempting to deal with the complexities of human life and human action –with all its mental gymnastics.
I say, “bad form”, you think, Ken. Where is Jeeves when you need him!
The merits, or otherwise, of casuistry have been discussed before, in the pamphlets of their own day: http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/p/pascal/blaise/p27pr/
At best, casuistry can be a helpful navigational tool for confessors, in particular cases. Right and wrong do not change, but in assessing complicity with wrong, circumstances can signify.
But cases do not affect principles.
Let’s stipulate there is a conflict between supporting JPII’s and Pius XII’s canonizations and opposing the honorary degree to President Obama. How should that be resolved?
Should we support both?
Or should we be more rigorous, and oppose both?
Is the converse position (supporting the invitation, opposing the canonizations) also incoherent?
Let’s not stipulate that at all. There is no conflict.
It is a terrible analogy to start with but for argument sake: Obama supports the killing of unborn children including up to and after birth. It might work as an analogy if Pius supported the killing of Jews or if JP II supported homosexual predation of teenage boys (80% of the cases where this and not pedophilia). If these criteria are not met, then an already weak analogy falls apart completely.
Do you have no shame?
Kathy–as it happens, my next column talks about Pascal’s critique of casuistry–in the context of mental reservation and the Irish abuse case.
Eggloff, the question is the standard of review–not the substance. So let me, one time, run my argument step-by-step:
1 In the ND case, the opponents of Obama as a commencement speaker-honorary degree argued that a) Obama’s actions on one issue –pro-choice on abortion– was disqualifying, and that b) it was impermissible to look at the situation holistically, and evaluate his case holistically. That one issue was disqualifying.
2. If you read the Allen column and the Shoah Research Center article I supplied in the post, it is clear that the opponents of the rush to canonize Pius XII and JPII are arguing that their respective actions on one issue (the Holocaust and Maciel) ought to disqualify the push for sainthood. They’re single issue people too
3 In response, the supporters of the canonization process are arguing 1) that the two men ought to be judged more holistically, not on their attitude or handling of one issue; and 2) that canonizing Pius and JPII does not mean endorsing their handling of the Holocaust or the sex abuse crisis.
4 This is precisely the structure of the argument that supporters of the ND invitation used to defend the invitation 1) Obama ought to be judged holistically; and 2) In honoring Obama, ND did not mean endorsing his stance on abortion.
My two observations.
1. As this blog post shows, the people who adopt a “single issue” approach to honors and abortion do not adopt a “single issue” approach to prophetic denunciation of the Holocaust (see the Shoah link). And maybe, vice versa Why?
2 The very same nuancing of position that one sees with reepect to Pius in some quarters (Pius XII did the best he could, he never supported the holocaust, he was afraid of practical repercussions) is precisley the same sort of nuancing of position that is rejected with respect to abortion–often by the same people (it”s impractical to oppose legal abortion, it would do more harm than good, other, less confrontational strategies work better)
Obama supports the killing of unborn children including up to and after birth.
Egloff,
Killing unborn children after birth is a logical impossibility.
The analogy that Cathy makes between the incident at ND and the proposed canonizations is a good one. The heat attached to both gets in the way of reasoned discourse. If you want to nuance with Pius XII then you have to nuance with Obama.
What bothers me is the clear superiority that the abortion issue holds in some Catholic circles. In the Commonweal discussion of present and former editors, Peter Steinfels mentioned something which I have always felt. He said that the Commonweal editors backed off somewhat at the abortion issue because the bishops stressed that to the virtual exclusion of everything else.
It has gotten to the point where people seem to think that their touting of this single issue justifys everything because it is a good question whether other virtues are important to this group. Almost all of them had no sympathy for the victims of clergy abuse and they still abuse them by making fun of any lawsuits they are pursuing. As if that is the whole issue. So many of the same group championed the Legionnaires and the unjust Iraq war.
If one were to use fundamentalist jargon, one might say that even though you are against abortion does not mean you are not going to hell. The point is what are your other virtues besides orthodoxy and anti-abortion?
The museum needs to be about a clueless hierarchy and the ones they have duped.
“. . . . I think that a lot of opposition to abortion is sheer moral sentimentality which turns the fetus into a fetish. . . . Talking about abortion is a way of not talking about the autonomous individual, the latest ideological guise of libido dominandi, discussion of which would topple quite a few idols and not just reproductive choice.”
From Britney Spears and the Downward Arc of Empire: An Interview with Eugene McCarraher
The monumental ignorance and even downright deceit being voiced here is appalling.
“4. In response, the supporters of the canonization process are arguing 1) that the two men ought to be judged more holistically, not on their attitude or handling of one issue; and 2) that canonizing Pius and JPII does not mean endorsing their handling of the Holocaust or the sex abuse crisis.”
I do not believe that is accurate. You seem to be attributing a position to the supporters they do not have in reality. The actual position of these people, I believe, is the opposite of this in fact – ie they DO endorse the way these matters were handled. By way of example, I saw somewhere around here someone reproduced some of the NYT Editorials praising Pacelli’s actions in support of their argument.
What MAT said (except 3., not 4.)
There is no comparison here, only obfuscation. No one, not even his detractors, accuses Pius XII of positively willing or promoting the extinction of European Jewry. The pope never said that he wouldn’t want someone in his family punished with a Jewish baby. He never promised to sign bills into law in order to make the “right” to kill Jews ever more widely available. He never said this, never did it, and certainly never did it while admitting that the ethical questions involved were above his pay grade.
The most that people say is that he was silent. He made a prudential decision. In other words, he made the kind of decision which, unlike the positive promotion of abortion, can legitimately be made and explained through casuistry.
“Egloff,
Killing unborn children after birth is a logical impossibility.”
David N. –
When has that ever stopped some people we know?
Prof. Kaveny – allow me to interject a different context in which to view what appears to be a sliding back into partisan positions on any question raised especially your well reasoned comparison of these events and where/how folks consistently view them:
“The anthropologist Anthony F.C. Wallace teaches that major transformations of thought and behavior happen in a society when it discovers that a once-common set of religious understandings have become impossible to sustain.
At that point, Wallace says, society begins to undergo a “revitalization movement” of four major stages. Stage one is a period of serious individual stress. In this stage, people begin to question past values and start to establish new patterns of thought and behaviors. They don’t think about things as they once did. What the generation before them took for granted–divorce, mixed marriage, birth control, segregation, homosexuality, capital punishment, in vitro fertilization, cloning, stem cell research, the role of women–they begin to debate and discard.
In stage two, there is alienation everywhere. Wide-reaching social stress becomes apparent. What we once called “our culture” is now barely recognizable. And people begin to decide that their problems aren’t personal. Others feel the same. Groups form, organizations grow. Their problems, they decide, are a result of failure in the institutions they had always depended on for stability and direction. The churches are out of tune with their needs, they say; the schools remote from their life questions, they feel; the government corrupt and corrupting. There is political rebellion in the streets and schism in the churches.
In stage three of a revitalization process, though people as a whole agree there is a problem, they can’t agree on how to cope with this new social situation. Some want to change the system, to wipe it out and begin again. Others want to send in the troops and get the old system back in order. And the two groups quarrel and divide and blame authority.
Then, inevitably, in stage three a revitalization movement, a nativist, or traditionalist movement arises. Nativists argue that the danger has come from the failure of the people to adhere more strictly to old beliefs and values and behavior patterns. They want to do more of the same-old, but do it better. They want the “old time religion” and they find scapegoats aplenty: the economy would be all right if it weren’t for unions, they argue; marriages would be all right if it weren’t for feminism, and; the country would be fine if it weren’t for liberalism.
In the fourth and final stage, Wallace points out, comes the emergence of a new world view and the restructuring of old institutions to enable it. But how do we get there?
In more complex cultures, like our own, multiple spokespersons–many leaders, a chorus of voices–are needed to lead the people to new understandings about old values.
The role of these spiritual leaders is not to repudiate the older worldview entirely, but to shed new light on it so that it can be remembered that God’s spirit always manifests itself in new ways to meet new needs.
Then, more flexible people begin to understand and experiment with the new consensus and cultural transformation–the movement from death to life–of an entire people begins to happen.
Finally, Wallace points out, it will not be the older generation, the spiritual wanderers who brought with them the old ideas, goals, values and designs from one desert to another, who will lead today’s institutions–it will be the new generation!
As Wallace says, it will be the generation that “grew up with” the emerging insights, who never lived in the old world; who spent their life wandering in a social desert, and knew no other, who will come to maturity.
Then, the old institutions find themselves with new leadership. And the institutions are restructured. But that will happen only provided that they listen, if someone brings them up with the new questions and the new insights.
Not exactly sure how this impacts your question, comparison, and insight on consistency in approaching shared issues but it appears that, as a church, we are stuck between Wallace’s stage two and stage three. Wonder if your positing a position of nuance is not a desire to reach step three if not move towards step four (which Wallace would say can only happen if the ND students listen and revitalize the church; for example) and wonder if the papal canonization process is not a step forward but a desire to reinforce stage two by asserting past values.
As Peter Steinfels says well in his earlier post: “Tradition is the living faith of the dead; Traditionalism is the dead faith of the living.” Was the ND event the living faith of the dead or the dead faith of the living? Was the papal process the living faith of the dead or the dead faith of the living? As some earlier posts said well (e.g. Dr. John Page, others), is this ultrmontane or honest revitalization – the ND event did not establish new customs; did not blaze new traditions (inviting presidents has always occurred) but the papal canonization process is a relatively new phenomenon in our church – what does that say?
Oh, dear. My short post was quite incomprehensible. I meant that some people we know do blithely accept logical impossibilities when they suit their arguments.
There are two distinct parts to this thread with some overlap:
-Canonization of 2 popes: I think Susan’s comment and Mr. Micken’s comment are most germane.
–Obama at ND (again) and abortion.
I thought this had been beaten to death a couple of times, butthe rhetoric of Obama is the most abortion president is aontinuance of the idiocy (I deliberately choose the word) of some pro-lifers.
the problem is that the issue of principle and application is conflated by some into their application of the principle is the principle itself.
The overlap seems to me to be is the movement towards canonization somewhat hypocritical by those angry at ND?
By the way. I think everyone knew at the start that Cathy was on a team for Obama and that she teaches at ND, and there’s no disingenuosness on that score.
I wonder how much value though she sees in the former casuistry,
Of course, distinctions and complexity matter but I’m not sure numbers and kind morality do it.
The fair comparison is between Pope Pius XII and St. Thomas More. More kept silent, even though he might have encouraged underground Catholics by speaking out against the king. It was a prudential judgment, a discernment.
In Robert Bolt’s play, More explains his course to Meg:
“Listen, Meg, God made the angels to show Him splendor, as He made animals for innocence and plants for their simplicity. But Man He made to serve Him wittily, in the tangle of his mind. If He suffers us to come to such a case that there is no escaping, then we may stand to our tackle as best we can, and, yes, Meg, then we can clamor like champions, if we have the spittle for it. But it’s God’s part, not our own, to bring ourselves to such a pass. Our natural business lies in escaping. If I can take the oath, I will.”
More, like Pius, was deciding between 2 good courses: silence, for the sake of safety, and speech, to correct injustice.
Bill deHaas ==
Piagetians corroborate step one in individuals. They see all cognitive development as a series of formulating or being given explanations of events then learning later that these explanations are not consistent with facts, especially what are new facts to them, and they then invent new explanations. At one stage w typically accept the value judgements of our society, but then we sometimes see that some of them are not as wise as they seemed at first. But some adolescents never do admit that their culture could be wrong, so they stay adolescents for the rest of their lives.
I might add that Piaget himself thought that the highest, most difficult level of rationality was achieved when a person is capable of discovering analogies between things and situations, analogies of the form A : B :: C : D , the sort Cathy is doing in her post. That generally happens about age 12 at the earliest (or so said Piaget). It’s even moree difficult than the p implies q kind of thinking. Some people never progress that far. They can’t (or won’t ?) do it, and I fear that schools aren’t into encouraging that kind of thinking.
(I should note that later Piagetians think there are even higher levels of thinking which involving grasping large social facts.)
What did Piaget have to say about logical fallacy?
The most that people say is that he was silent. He made a prudential decision.
Kathy,
That certainly isn’t the most that people say. If there were a convincing case that Pius XII kept silent because he sincerely believed that speaking out would do more harm than good, there would be no controversy. And when has the Catholic Church believed that speaking the truth about evil does more harm than good?
Cathleen,
If you’re still reading. Here are some thoughts I’ve not seen articulated that I would like to think could add something new to the discussion.
You Wrote: In the ND case, the opponents of Obama as a commencement speaker-honorary degree argued that a) Obama’s actions on one issue –pro-choice on abortion– was disqualifying, and that b) it was impermissible to look at the situation holistically, and evaluate his case holistically. That one issue was disqualifying.
Response: Those who objected to UND’s decision were not so much responding to Obama’s actions. In point of fact, he’d DONE little to be considered for the honor (the reason Arizona State University declined to award him with an honorary degree, btw). The primary reason people objected to UND’s decision to honor Obama was his belief that abortion is a social good—or at least worthwhile public health intervention. His beliefs are contrary to the Church’s teachings.
You might argue that Obama has stated that he wants there to be fewer abortions, but his actions have always been to promote expansion of abortion “rights” and he has never indicated even once that he thinks abortion is evil. He may think it is a necessary ugly reality that he’d like to see less of for some vague, undeterminable reason, but he certainly does not view abortion as an evil act that does violence to women, children, and society.
Bringing it around to Pope Pius, while many take issue with what he did or did not do, no one states that Pope Pius thought it was a good idea to kill Jews. That’s the difference. Pope Pius did what he did (and, the evidence suggests, did not do what he did not do) with the intention of preventing even more instances of what he viewed as a grave moral evil. One might argue that he did not do enough, but even his critics would not argue that he thought that Nazi’s should have unrestricted access to the ovens, or that protestors of the Nazi atrocities should be punished, or that world governments had a moral obligation to use funds to help the Germans improve the gas chambers.
Obama does however, believe that women should have unrestricted access to abortion clinics, that protestors should be prosecuted, and that federal and international funds should be used to expand and improve abortion coverage.
Obama’s mission and the mission of the Catholic Church are at odds. That is the issue.
You Wrote: If you read the Allen column and the Shoah Research Center article I supplied in the post, it is clear that the opponents of the rush to canonize Pius XII and JPII are arguing that their respective actions on one issue (the Holocaust and Maciel) ought to disqualify the push for sainthood. They’re single issue people too.
RESPONSE: Perhaps, but as I explain above, the ant-Pope Pius people are failing to make important distinctions that pro-life “single-issue” people make. The pro-life mind is more subtle than you would care to admit.
YOU WROTE: In response, the supporters of the canonization process are arguing 1) that the two men ought to be judged more holistically, not on their attitude or handling of one issue; and 2) that canonizing Pius and JPII does not mean endorsing their handling of the Holocaust or the sex abuse crisis.
RESPONSE: No, again. The issue is Obama’s commitment to calling “good” that which is evil. Pope Pius did not think killing Jews was a social good. Pope John Paul II did not think that abusing children was an admirable pastime. They may have been slow to realize the gravity of the problem or failed to do everything we would have liked but they never thought promoting evil was the thing to do. People might argue that they made mistakes, or were ignorant, but mistakes and ignorance aren’t sins (thank God.) Calling evil, “good” however, is gravely sinful.
YOU WROTE: This is precisely the structure of the argument that supporters of the ND invitation used to defend the invitation 1) Obama ought to be judged holistically; and 2) In honoring Obama, ND did not mean endorsing his stance on abortion.
RESPONSE: The argument of those who support UND’s decision to honor Obama seems, to this reader, simplistic in its grade school CCD student attempt to create some fictitious ledger sheet where Obama’s good marks on some issues outweigh the bad marks he gets for abortion. For mature Catholics, moral judgments are never made this way.
Culpability for actions is mitigated by intention to serve the mission. I can commit an objective evil and still not be morally culpable if I was genuinely intending to do good and serve God. Likewise, if I serve an evil mission and accidentally do some good along the way, that may not count in my favor. Obama’s mission is nearly impossible to reconcile with that of the Church’s. He may not be an evil man, but he serves an evil agenda (even you admit “his stance” on abortion is contrary to the Church’s mission), and that is the reason his award by a Catholic university was inappropriate. The moral argument is simply more subtle than you present it. It isn’t so much about actions, it’s about mission and which kingdom one’s mission compels them to build; The Kingdom of God or the Kingdom of Moloch. Honoring a chief architect of the Kingdom of Moloch is an inappropriate action for a Catholic University even if he does manage to get the trains to run on time.
Now, if Obama shows, by his actions, to be more latter-day Cyrus than servant of Moloch, then we could talk about heaping all kinds of praise upon him. But until then, his mission makes him an oppressor of God’s children and the People of God are obliged to oppose him–while respecting the office he holds and the country he serves.
Hopefully, this clarifies your points of confusion or, more likely, leads to a new round of questions. Nevertheless, I hope that you can see that it is your fundamental misunderstanding of the arguments against the UND award that is the issue, not the alleged inconsistency of the pro-life argument against the UND award.
Thank you for your consideration.
Greg Popcak
What you said, Greg.
David,
You wrote: “when has the Catholic Church believed that speaking the truth about evil does more harm than good?”
One of the principles of Just War teaching is that in opposing evil, the anticipated benefits of engaging in conflict must proportionate to the harm or evil that may result from the intervention.
If Pius had thrown his body in front of the death train (metaphorically or literally)to which one commenter keeps referring, Pius may or may not have stopped it, but how would that paltry effort be proportionate to the the retaliation the Nazi’s would have exacted against Jews, Catholics, and any other person they saw as a convenient instrument of revenge? When the Dutch bishops protested the Nazi arrest of Jews in 1942, the Nazi’s responded by arresting 40,000 more Jews.
Proportionality is a legitimate moral argument for avoiding direct and open conflict.
Greg Popcak
Staying silent in the face of evil is wrong, whether what you might say would lead to actual change or not. Pius’ silence killed people. An example ….. the deportations of over 1,000 Jews from Rome in October 1943. He knew it would happen and could have warned them, probably without the Germans knowing anything about it, but he didn’t. Just to put a human face on that, you can read a story in the Telegraph about the only human being among those 1000+ who survived, Settimia Spizzichino.
Some say Pius didn’t speak out because it may have made things worse for the Jews …. one has to ask, how could things really get much worse? Our hagiography is full of saints who fought for good causes, died for a good causes – Pius is the antithesis of that.
Kathy, Bolt’s More doesn’t entertain the notion of speaking out to encourage other dissenting Catholics. His choice is between signing the oath and not signing it.
More crucially, though, I’m not sure a comparison to Thomas More (even the historical More) favors Pius XII. More lost his head, for one thing. And if he could wait 400 years to be declared a saint, surely Pius’s cause can afford a generation’s delay.
Oops – I meant to say that Settimia Spizzichino was the sole female survivor.
Greg,
What you say above seems to me the direct opposite of what you said to me in a private e-mail titled “Brief Follow Up” and written on Mon, October 15, 2007 7:27:03 PM. If you don’t still have the e-mail, I will be happy to reproduce it here, with your permission.
Ken said on 12/21 @ 8:01 PM:
“I would keep in mind a few things; people in those days (especially the pope) did not travel much, there was no internet or TV, and so intelligence was hard won and not common; as a practical matter much information was shadowy and murky. In fact a fair amount of information about the Pope’s actions in those days has not yet been made public.”
The RCC has long crowed that its system of nuncios and legates has given it world-wide access to seats of power and information. At one time it most likely had THE best organized system of governance and information in the Western world. To imply that PXII didn’t have access to information about what was going on is disingenuous at best.
“According to historians David Bankier and Hans Mommsen a thorough knowledge of the Holocaust was well within the reach of the German bishops, if they wanted to find out. According to historian Michael Phayer, “a number of bishops did want to know, and they succeeded very early on in discovering what their government was doing to the Jews in occupied Poland”. Wilhelm Berning, for example, knew about the systematic nature of the Holocaust as early as February 1942, only one month after the Wannsee Conference. Most German Church historians believe that the church leaders knew of the Holocaust by the end of 1942, knowing more than any other church leaders outside the Vatican. “
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catholic_bishops_in_Nazi_Germany
Throughout the beginning part of WWII, Pius XII was consistently besieged with pleas for help on behalf of the Jews and was informed about the Holocaust.
In the spring of 1940, the Chief Rabbi of Palestine, Isaac Herzog, asked the papal Secretary of State, Cardinal Luigi Maglione to intercede to keep Jews in Spain from being deported to Germany. He later made a similar request for Jews in Lithuania. The papacy did nothing.
Within the Pope’s own church, Cardinal Theodor Innitzer of Vienna told Pius XII about Jewish deportations in 1941. In 1942, the Slovakian charge d’affaires, a position under the supervision of the Pope, reported to Rome that Slovakian Jews were being systematically deported and sent to death camps.
In October 1941, the Assistant Chief of the U.S. delegation to the Vatican, Harold Tittman, asked the Pope to condemn the atrocities. The response came that the Holy See wanted to remain “neutral,” and that condemning the atrocities would have a negative influence on Catholics in German-held lands.
In late August 1942, after more than 200,000 Ukrainian Jews had been killed, Ukrainian Metropolitan Andrej Septyckyj wrote a long letter to the Pope, referring to the German government as a regime of terror and corruption, more diabolical than that of the Bolsheviks. The Pope replied by quoting verses from Psalms and advising Septyckyj to “bear adversity with serene patience.”
On September 18, 1942, Monsignor Giovanni Battista Montini, the future Pope Paul VI, wrote, “The massacres of the Jews reach frightening proportions and forms.” Yet, that same month when Myron Taylor, U.S. representative to the Vatican, warned the Pope that his silence was endangering his moral prestige, the Secretary of State responded on the Pope’s behalf that it was impossible to verify rumors about crimes committed against the Jews.
Wladislaw Raczkiewicz, president of the Polish government-in-exile, appealed to the Pope in January 1943 to publicly denounce Nazi violence. Bishop Preysing of Berlin did the same, at least twice. Pius XII refused.
Here is an extensive listing of statements made by Pius during the course of the war, many of which are subject to dispute as to their meaning: http://wapedia.mobi/en/Public_statements_of_Pope_Pius_XII_on_the_Holocaust
The issue, of course, is what caused Pius to be so reticent about doing what he could have done to at least mitigate some of the actions against the Jews.
I simply cannot see where his actions, or lack thereof, are any example of “heroic virtue” declared on his behalf on December 19th that one can reasonably expect of a saint.
Mollie,
Yes and no. What do you suppose “clamor like champions” means?
The Nazis enacted and enforced systematic oppression and murderous policies. Nobody realistically suggests that Pope Pius XII did that. But people do realistically say that the Obama administration seeks to broaden and ensure the availability of abortion on demand.
Kathy, I suppose it means “tell the King and all his supporters we think they’re wrong.” Perhaps More did agonize over whether he should set an example for “underground Catholics,” but for evidence you will have to look outside Robert Bolt’s play. Meanwhile, as I said, quoting either Bolt or the historical record on More in defense of advancing Pius’s cause for canonization seems like a big mistake to me. Maybe in a century or two.
Kathy;
‘Obama administration seeks to broaden and ensure the availability of abortion on demand.’ News flash !!!!House and Senate bills have no fed funds for abortion. all Republicans vote no on these bills in Senate. some House Republicans vote for Stupak amendment. I’ll Give 100 to 1 Obama signs bill when passed. .
How istheobama administration seeking to broaden access to abortion?
I thought the goal was to reduce the number of abortions, but that’s not even acknowledged by a view that is decidely onesided.
Kathy said: “But people do realistically say that the Obama administration seeks to broaden and ensure the availability of abortion on demand.”
Gregory Popcak said: “The primary reason people objected to UND’s decision to honor Obama was his belief that abortion is a social good—or at least worthwhile public health intervention.”
I don’t believe these two statements can be proven.
Obama has repeatedly stated he would like to reduce the number of abortions; that doesn’t sound like an agenda to broaden abortion. And how does Gregory see into the mind of Obama to know exactly what he believes about abortion?
So the argument is: assume the worst of intentions for Obama, and assume the best of intentions for Pius. Yeah, doesn’t sound just to me.
Mollie, I’m not going to get out my annotated Bolt, but one can’t read the play without coming away with the idea that More–and Henry–carefully discerned the effects of public speech. One of those effects would undoubtedly have been the encouragement (or not) of Catholics.
But the point is not whether the play or More has this in mind, but whether the Church did, in evaluating More’s cause for canonization. Whether such considerations did enter into the evaluation is a matter of historical record, so if you’d like to investigate, feel free. My guess, though, is that you would find more questions regarding his politics and humanism than his silence.
In any case, More obviously did not positively will or promote schism, any more than Pius promoted Nazism. However, President Obama does promote abortion access, or he wouldn’t have a 100% NARAL rating. That’s not just speech but votes. You have to earn that one. You have to make it real.
The Nazis enacted and enforced systematic oppression and murderous policies. Nobody realistically suggests that Pope Pius XII did that. But people do realistically say that the Obama administration seeks to broaden and ensure the availability of abortion on demand.
Kathy,
The point is not to compare Pius XII to Obama. It is to compare Pius XII’s suitability for sainthood to Obama’s suitability as a commencement speaker and recipient of an honorary degree. Realistically speaking, did giving Obama an honorary degree send a message to any Catholics that they ought to be pro-choice? Did Obama even argue at Notre Dame that people should become pro-choice?
On the other hand, Pius XII will be held up as a model of “heroic virtue” to be emulated. Has anyone spelled out exactly what he did that was heroically virtuous? My impression is that he was cold and arrogant. His silence regarding the Holocaust may have been a matter of prudential judgment made in the best interest of Jews, or it may have been a matter of timidity, indifference, excessive belief that Nazism was a necessary evil in keeping communism at bay, concern over a break with the German Church. In short, Pius XII’s motives may have not been heroically virtuous. And as someone else suggested, caution may be wise, but it hardly amounts to heroic virtue.
David,
On what do you base your impression of Pope Pius XII?
In the fourth entry on this thread, Bob Nunz captured the essence:
“But like so much with political points of view, there is little unitive and much bubble in which folks tell others that they don’t get it -meaning you are not in my bubble.
Just my point of view: the more division goes on, the more some sort of collapse draws closer.
“Of well…”
Yes. And the presumption of ‘some sort of collapse’ is all too prescient.
It is so sad to see this dance reenacted here so frequently and so predictably. The most strident voices on both sides of this interminable conversation are determined to hold the floor. We have among us prolife devotees for whom abortion is the only issue, who insist that no nuance be introduced into conversations about the topic, and who are hostile to consistent ethic of life context formulations. We have among us prochoice devotees who are remarkably sanguine about the abortion status quo and never tire of displaying their scorn for prolife advocacy and contempt for prolife sensibilities
Centrist ‘both/and’ voices have apparently given up on the consistent ethic and gone fishing. Or perhaps they have come to the conclusion that the two dominant frames are intractable and there is no room for other voices. Both those who enact the minority anti-abortion role and those who enact the apparently majority anti-anti-abortion role betray little interest in sympathetically understanding points of view that don’t fit into their narrow frames. But both are great at scoring points. And both are wounded. We focus way too much on the ideas and way too little on the common experience of having our deepest values burlesqued here and elsewhere.
Paradoxes abound. Both camps claim Cathy for their own purposes. Our anti-abortion brethren attack her allegedly insufficient zeal and our anti-anti-abortion brethren celebrate her departure from the party line as if she shares their hostility to the abortion cause. Her consistent ethic views serve neither narrow agenda and thus are distorted in threads such as these.
Crystal says “Staying silent in the face of evil is wrong, whether what you might say would lead to actual change or not. Pius’ silence killed people.”
Ken – Please drop the drama; this is not high school or college. Pius XII did not kill anyone. There are other ways of opposing evil than head-on confrontation. Just look at how Pope John Paul II worked year after year under the thumb of a repressive Soviet regime. Ultimately John Paul II, and freedom, prevailed, and most would say his efforts were both important and prudent. Are you saying then, of the many Poles who suffered under Communism from the late 1940’s until the late 1980’s, that their suffering and in some cases their deaths, are the fault of John Paul II not engaging the Soviets in head-on fashion; direct confrontation?
Crystal: “An example ….. the deportations of over 1,000 Jews from Rome in October 1943. He knew it would happen and could have warned them, probably without the Germans knowing anything about it, but he didn’t.”
Ken – “Probably”? How exactly could you possibly know? The pope in fact was not permitted to leave the Vatican. Also, he did not have civil authority over Rome or Italy; his civil authority was limited to the Vatican state.
Crystal “…Some say Pius didn’t speak out because it may have made things worse for the Jews …. one has to ask, how could things really get much worse?”
Ken – I was not there, and would not presume to ask such a question of such a man, in such dire circumstances. You were not there are do not know the full story either.
Crystal: “Our hagiography is full of saints who fought for good causes, died for a good causes – Pius is the antithesis of that.”
Ken – Along with your second-guessing, this remark demonstrates a dramatic ignorance.
I am sorry to have to speak to frankly about your posting Crystal, but I really could not let it stand without critique.
Again, I am not saying the man should be cannonized.
I am simply saying that whatever faults the man had, that implying that Pope Pius XII somehow collaborated or went soft of Nazis is way out of bounds.
Dear Ken,
Whatever your stand on the question of Pope Pius XII and whether he was courageous or timid, please be sure of your facts. Pius XII was not prohibited from leaving the Vatican in 1943, or at any time during the war. In fact, he famously and dramatically went to console the people of the San Lorenzo fuori le Mura district in Rome after great devastation caused by Allied bombing in July 1943. Photographs of the Pope addressing the people of his diocese while standing in the back of an open car have been often reproduced.
Posted by Jimmy Mac
on December 22nd, 2009 at 5:02 pm
Jimmy Mac made an excellent post. No one here has come close to refuting. Kathy, to quote a play as a fact is to insult everyone’s attention. More was much more complicated than that play. Today we have access to many more facts about him and there is a different side to More…. Time to leave that fantasy land.
This thread is bordering on 100 again mainly due to abortion which I have repeatedly insisted is the fraud issue of our times. W Bush, who cared nothing about it , exploited it with several Catholic clergy catering to him and let him exploit the issue while they militated for the Iraq war.
It is time for many of the anti-abortion, single issue crowd to exhibit other virtues.
Mr. Nickol: you appear to have captured Prof. Kaveny’s post concisely: “The point is not to compare Pius XII to Obama. It is to compare Pius XII’s suitability for sainthood to Obama’s suitability as a commencement speaker and recipient of an honorary degree. Realistically speaking, did giving Obama an honorary degree send a message to any Catholics that they ought to be pro-choice? Did Obama even argue at Notre Dame that people should become pro-choice?
On the other hand, Pius XII will be held up as a model of “heroic virtue” to be emulated. Has anyone spelled out exactly what he did that was heroically virtuous?
Ms. Olivier – thanks for picking up on my various levels of moral development. Your point about stage 3 or 4 being able to use analogies seems to be at the heart of the original post. Yet, Mr. Nickol appropriately indicates that this analogy needs to include nuance and be better defined. Leader of the world’s largest religion vs. the current leader of a western democracy – the differences are too numerous to label. Canonizing one vs. inviting the other to a university commencement – worlds apart in terms of meaning.
Mr. Nickol – if I may add, the story of the Holocaust and Pius XII extends over years and many countries – doubt that most here even know the extent of church bishops and their priests who were complicit or more in the Jewish massacres that occurred in the Ukraine, in the area once known as Yugoslavia, in Poland (not just the camps); in France (there continues today agitation and hard feelings between religious collaborators and resistance folks), etc. This gets to Prof. Kaveny’s point about universal vs. specific or single issue. The facts (at least to a great extent) are in the Vatican archives (so, why the haste to move forward before opening these archives to reasonable historical analysis)? Here is another breakdown in the analogy – as Mr. Nickol’s said well – canonization says something about the “universal” deeds of a person.
Like Mr. Nunz – I find the statements from most here about abortion or pro-life to be less than accurate; at times, appear to be reading Obama’s mind; lots of projection; and completely missing the point that Obama’s role as an elected representative of the American people puts him in a very different place than a war time pope in a different century. Prof. Kaveny – your summation about universal vs. single issue reminds me of the bitterness around the recent church funeral for Senator Kennedy – in fact, he might be a better analogy – no saint; most say pro-abortion (that needs to be nuanced?); but over a very long career he remained true to his belief in helping the down and out even tho he admitted to being a deeply flawed human being. Per some arguments here, he could be on the path to canonization.
Bill, I assure you that I had no intention of insulting anyone’s attention, whatever that might mean. No insult intended at all.
I merely quibble with the blatant illogic of the original post, in which an attempt is made to compare a prudential judgment, i.e. a proportional good, with obdurate, intentional, positive and effective complicity with intrinsically evil acts. There is no comparison.
Bill, and David, you’re right. Thanks for the concise summary.
I too find it rather strange when people cite a Man for All Seasons as if it’s a straight history rather than a play — it’s almost as misguided as people who cite the Screwtape Letters as if it were really written by the devil.
Apparently literature is confusing? All right. Perhaps moral theology?
Kathy –
I’m not sure what you mean by “logical fallacies”. In they broad sense it can mean any conscious mental process that leads to an unjustified conclusion. This includes “linguistic fallacies” such as changing the meaning of a word in premises and/or conclusion. Piaget was not much interested in that ind, if at all.
He was concerned with so-called “formal fallacies”, the purely logical ones that can be identified simply by the relations among the logical parts of premises and conclusion. One such fallacy, expressed abstractly is:
All A’s are B’s.
Some C’s are B’s.
Therefore, some C’s are A’s
An instance of that form is:
All Marxists are Communists.
Some screen-writers are Communists.
Therefore, some screen-writers are Marxists
Note: it might happen that both premises and the conclusion are all true. But the conclusion premises and the conclusion are all true. But the conclusion conclusion is not assured by those particular premises, so the whole argument is said to be “invalid”.
Piaget was concerned with our learning to think validly and with our learning to recognize invalid (fallacious) thinking, many other things.
Sorry for the garbling — it didn’t appear when I tapped Submit. Just skip the second sentence in the second to last paragraph.
Pius XII is important because he claims or is acclaimed to be the spiritual leader of the most chosen people; Catholics. However you cut it the greatest massacre in history happened under his watch and the alarm bells were hardly ringing. So much so that many Catholics and Christians were not really as aware of what took place until Jewish leaders raised the decebels in the early sixties onward.
Nowadays, the leadership is an abysmal failure in Latin America. Not only not helping but condemning the clergy who are at the forefront of aiding the downtrodden. It just cannot be ignored; the blatant ignoral of Romero, the oscillation on torture. Thank God, Rome got it right on Iraq. Yet abortion even trumped that.
There is a history here that many of us are not facing. The clear approval of violence by Augustine and Athanasius. They encouraged violence. The Fathers of the church catering to the rich. The approval of the crusades….
There is a context for the proposed canonizations of these two popes. It is the continuation of the exaltation of Empire over the gospel. It is more we are right despite the facts and Rome will tell you what reality is.
What Mike McG said at 7:09 p.m.this evening.
Seems only proper that his excellent insights should be channeled as the 100th post in this thread.
“The point is not to compare Pius XII to Obama. It is to compare Pius XII’s suitability for sainthood to Obama’s suitability as a commencement speaker and recipient of an honorary degree. Realistically speaking, did giving Obama an honorary degree send a message to any Catholics that they ought to be pro-choice? Did Obama even argue at Notre Dame that people should become pro-choice?”
That is inconsistent with the very nicely detailed exposition of the analogy written at December 22nd, 2009 at 11:56 am by Ms. Kaveny. In fact, it is the opposite. That second, updated formulation was about disqualifying conditions. It has now been turned on its head again back to something resembling its original form such that one no longer needs to show why Pacelli’s actions during the War are NOT disqualifying of canonization, but essentially requiring people to make the entire case FOR his canonization in order to defend their opposition to ND’s choice of honorary award recipient.
So, since we are back at the beginning as they say, and at the risk of repeating things already stated, it is a red herring whether Pacelli’s cause for canonization should be looked at holistically or whatnot because he never did or said anything we have any record of which would indicate he approved of, cooperated in, or endorsed the Final Solution in whole or in part; or any other intrinsically evil acts for that matter. The same is not true of ND’s commencement speaker vis-a-vis intrinsic evils such as abortion and the extrajudicial assassination of civilians in war. That is why the analogy is not appropriate.
The level of detail here about P12 is amazing, particularly Jimmy Mac, Crystal Watson, John Page and others too numerous to mention — trying to retain it all.
Suggestion for simpler blog structure here: please consider numbering the posts, (dare I say as America does), to facilitate locating a particular item. I’ve been trying again to find the parts about P12 and the Croatian regime. They are very pertinent to evaluating his approach.
I find the sum of the evidence against P12 very damning, but I’d like to clarify one detail regarding the deportation of Jews from Rome in Oct 1943.
A JSB at America’s blog #20
http://americamagazine.org/blog/entry.cfm?blog_id=2&id=37140944-3048-741E-1499706375540878
says P12 did not know in advance, and objected strongly to the German ambassador when he found out:
“Robert Katz’s book, Black Sabbath in 1969 was the first to argue without any contemporaneous evidence that Pius allegedly had foreknowledge of this deportation. Katz’s source was German diplomat Eitel Mollhausen, who passed information about the October 1943 deportation to German’s ambassador to the Vatican, Ernst von Weizacker. Mollhausen assumed that the German ambassaor would tip off the Vatican, but this has never been proved in any way.
Weizsacker himself never claimed that he passed this info. on to anyone in the Vatican, let alone Pius himself. Against this flimsy non-evidence, we have the testimony of Princess Aragona of Italy, who met with Pius the morning of October 16th to tell him what was happening. She stated that he was “shocked and angry” and that he then took action. He immediately protested to the German ambassador Weizsacker, demanding that the arrests stop.” per JSB
Crystal notes above (12/21 4:40PM) that “A still more notable breach in moral terms, however, is the fact that once the roundup took place–”under the very windows of the Pope” in the words of Ernst von Weizsacker, the German Ambassador to the Holy See-and with the trains waiting to deport more than a thousand Roman Jews (the “Pope’s Jews”) to Auschwitz, not a single public word of protest was uttered then or subsequently by the Pope himself.
Soon after the event, then, Weizsacker could, accurately and in good conscience, report back to Berlin that the Pope “has not allowed himself to be carried away making any demonstrative statements against deportation of the Jews… he has done all he could… not to prejudice relationships with the German government.”
Question, anyone: Is there any indication in Weizsacker’s papers that P12 contacted him and “immediately protested … demanding that the arrests stop,” per JSB’s post?
Crystal’s quote indicates W’s pleasure that P12 made no public protest, but what about a private objection? But, how would W speak of P12 not being carried away by it all, and taking care not to prejudice relationships with the Nazis, if P12 indeed had demanded arrests stop?
Crystal, any further W quotes to draw upon? And where do you find these? Fascinating.
Carolyn,
The quote is from an article – “Not Enough” vs. “Plenty”: Which did Pius XII do?, Judaism, Fall, 2001 by Berel Lang – which references a couple of books – Susan Zuccotti, Under His Very Windows: The Vatican and the Holocaust in Italy (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000), and Saul Friedlander, Pius XII and the Third Reich, translated by C. Fullman (New York: Knopf, 1966), pp. 207-208. That second book is the source of this line … Soon after the event, then, Weizsacker could, accurately and in good conscience, report back to Berlin that the Pope “has not allowed himself to be carried away making any demonstrative statements against deportation of the Jews… he has done all he could… not to prejudice relationships with the German government.”.
There’s a Wikipedia page on Pius’ role in the roundup of the Roman Jews – Pope Pius XII and the Roman razzia – which goes into some detail on the subject.
The thing is, there’s only so much available evidence and what there is gets interpreted in plausibly opposite ways by different factions. Too bad the Vatican won’t allow the relevant documents in the archives to be seen by scholars like the six (3 Jewish, 3 Catholic) of the International Catholic-Jewish Historical Commission. Their preliminary report with 47 questions is interesting reading.
A kind of interesting if disturbing aside …. mentioned in that Wikipedia page on Pius and the roundup of Roman Jews is Catholic bishop Alois Hudal, a guy I had read about a few months ago. He ran a “ratline“from Rome – an escape route for Nazis after the war. One of the people he helped to escape was Adolf Eichmann.
MAT, you seem to be using the term intrinsic evil quite incorrectly–it refers to masturbation as well as intentional killing of the innocent. You might want to qualify your language
The underlying theoretical issue is of course the same–the intentional killing of the innocent –on a broad socal scale. There are two men–Obama an Pius XII–who may not have acted appropriately with respect to the practice that they did not create. How one views fats, is obviously contested in both cases. That’s part of my point.
When the Catholic Church or one of its institutions confers an honor on them, do we assess the appropriateness of this honor –by looking at the recipient’s stance on that one issue, or by looking at their entire life and context?
Ann,
By logic I mean, what if Piaget interviewed a child who said, “Look, my cat is just like a bird (throws cat across the room). It can fly!”
David
You ask -
“The point is not to compare Pius XII to Obama. It is to compare Pius XII’s suitability for sainthood to Obama’s suitability as a commencement speaker and recipient of an honorary degree. Realistically speaking, did giving Obama an honorary degree send a message to any Catholics that they ought to be pro-choice? Did Obama even argue at Notre Dame that people should become pro-choice?”
That has never been the issue. What the situation did was send the signal that abortion is not that serious an issue, and certainly not one on which Catholics ought to make a stand. In other words, Obama wasn’t aiming at making anyone pro-abortion, he was aiming at minimizing it as an issue. Yes, yes, people are entitled to their opinions, but we ought not let that get in the way of progress.
Imagine if the health care bill would cover 99.5% of everyone, but the remaining .5% were those who due to illness, deformation, or disability had been determined not worth spending money on. If you fell in that .5% your only entitlement is euthanasia. Would that be OK? Should one support it because it promotes the common good?
Cathleen,
I notice that John Breen makes essentially the same argument I do at Mirror of Justice.
I would be interested in your response to the correction of your misunderstanding of the nature of the oppostion to Obama’s award at UND.
Greg
Greg, was that what you were you saying?
At any rate, I did respond to John–may not have been posted yet.
“MAT, you seem to be using the term intrinsic evil quite incorrectly–it refers to masturbation as well as intentional killing of the innocent. You might want to qualify your language”
Forgive me, as the hour was rather late, but you are quite correct. In fact, I will do you one further – I have no idea what “intrinsic evil” is and should not have used the term at all, let alone twice.
The post hinges on the apparent absurdity of having a higher bar for commencement speakers or honorary degrees than for canonization.
And yes, that sentiment has an obvious appeal. But I’m not sure it stands up to critical examination.
We acknowledge the greatness of Washington and Jefferson despite their owning slaves*. There is little danger that in constructing the Washington Monument or the Jefferson Memorial, we are endorsing slaveholding. And if President Obama were to succeed in leading us to constructive solutions to health care and climate, we can honor him as a great president without condoning his positions on abortion.
With historical perspective, we can indeed take on a nuanced view of a person’s life.
This is a separate question from whether it is prudent for a Catholic institution to confer honors today on a very important issue of justice that hangs very much in the balance now. There is certainly a danger that it would send a message, or be used by those who share that position, that it is compatible with Christianity in general and Catholicism in particular.
If Pius XII had approved Catholic institutions honoring Nazi politicians, I don’t think we would even be discussing the possibility of his canonization.
So even if we assume that Pius XII’s response to the Holocaust represents a greater evil than President Obama’s positions on abortion and embryonic research, I don’t think it follows that it is inconsistent to oppose President Obama’s invitation and degree and support Pius XII’s canonization.
*Please insert here whatever disclaimer will prevent you from replying about how objectionable it is to draw a parallel between slaveholding and President Obama’s abortion policies.
What the situation did was send the signal that abortion is not that serious an issue, and certainly not one on which Catholics ought to make a stand. In other words, Obama wasn’t aiming at making anyone pro-abortion, he was aiming at minimizing it as an issue.
Sean,
The issue regarding Obama and Notre Dame was not whether abortion was an important issue. It was about whether abortion is the only issue that matters. In his speech, he did not minimize the issue of abortion. He said that people who disagree on abortion can still find common ground and work together.
Some of these arguments are old but still valid. Bush was invited to speak at Notre Dame after having signed, as governor of Texas, more death warrants (152) than any other governor in the history of the Unite States. If principles, and not just numbers, are important, shouldn’t there have been some controversy?
Imagine if the health care bill would cover 99.5% of everyone, but the remaining .5% were those who due to illness, deformation, or disability had been determined not worth spending money on. If you fell in that .5% your only entitlement is euthanasia.
Euthanasia would not be okay, but it is a fact that decisions are made in hospitals every day that further treatment would be futile. Surely you are not suggesting that heroic measures must be taken in every single case to prolong life (death) just because medical science can do it. This is not a Catholic belief.
By the way, the treatment of illegal immigrants by both the House and Senate bills is unjust. Have the bishops said health care reform must not be passed until illegal immigrants are covered?
The issue regarding Obama and Notre Dame was not whether abortion was an important issue. It was about whether abortion is the only issue that matters.
What would a politician need to do to disqualify himself from such an invitation. Would President Bush’s prosecution of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, establishment of torture, and enthusiasm for the death penalty be sufficient?
Or would that also send a message that someone’s position on the government’s use of force is the only issue that matters?
Clearly, it is possible for a person to act in one dimension so horribly that an invitation would be completely inappropriate. That doesn’t mean that that single dimension is “the only issue that matters,” just that it does matter a great deal.
There is certainly a danger that it would send a message, or be used by those who share that position, that it is compatible with Christianity in general and Catholicism in particular.
John McG,
As a result of Obama being honored at Notre Dame, how many people do you think now believe Catholics approve of abortion?
Would that the American bishops had come anywhere close to taking the kind of united stand on slavery that they have taken on abortion. Would that the German bishops under Hitler had taken a clear stand on the Holocaust.
As a result of Obama being honored at Notre Dame, how many people do you think now believe Catholics approve of abortion?
It is manifestly apparent that some Catholics approve of abortion, as the Senate vote against the Nelson amendment demonstrated.
I don’t think anybody thinks the institutional Catholic Church approves of abortion.
I do think that, on the margins, a significant number of people may believe that the current legal abortion regime is acceptable, or maybe less than optimal, but not that big a deal.
Would that the American bishops had come anywhere close to taking the kind of united stand on slavery that they have taken on abortion. Would that the German bishops under Hitler had taken a clear stand on the Holocaust.
What is your point here? Let’s stipulate that American bishops were insufficiently strident in opposing the Holocaust and slavery. Should they compound that error by being insufficiently strident against abortion?
—
That’s what is angering me so much about this debate. Anytime an American bishop so much as raises an eyebrow about abortion politics, you can count on a Commonweal editorial expressing grave concerns about the possibility that the bishops might be perceived as Republican partisans.
But now, Pius XII’s insufficient stridency is reason to oppose him.
So which is it? Should bishops be engaged in opposing political injustice or not?
while many take issue with what he did or did not do, no one states that Pope Pius thought it was a good idea to kill Jews.
Obama does however, believe that women should have unrestricted access to abortion clinics, that protestors should be prosecuted, and that federal and international funds should be used to expand and improve abortion coverage.
Greg,
A) None of the statements you make about Obama means “Obama believes women should abort”, which is the equivalent of “it is a good idea to kill Jews.”
People have been saying:
B) Obama’s actions to allow and protect access to abortion are parallel to Pius’ actions to allow and protect Hitler’s Final Solution.
These analogies are oversimplified, but each person has a different good that they wish to protect, largely having to do with stable government. For Pacelli, his career was made up of fashioning concordats so that Catholics could live with oppressive governments; that continues during WWII, with little indication that such a policy is an endorsement of oppressive governments. For Obama, protecting constitutional rights of individuals is a primary obligation of government, but there is no indication that this policy endorses abortion as something women should do.
Mixing statements from A & B above obscures the issue. Neither leader wishes to promote killing; both wish to protect government. You can disagree with the political philosophies, but that does not justify equating their political philosophy with killing in one case and not the other.
Carolyn Disco – Pius XII and Croatia – see my post on 12/23 at 12:43 PM.
What would a politician need to do to disqualify himself from such an invitation. Would President Bush’s prosecution of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, establishment of torture, and enthusiasm for the death penalty be sufficient?
John McG,
I think the problem is that the Catholic Church has sacrificed standing on principle and become too involved in practical politics. If giving an honorary degree to Obama was an endorsement of his stand on abortion, then giving an honorary degree to Bush was an endorsement of his stand on capital punishment. The current position of the Church is that capital punishment is never, or almost never, acceptable. Why should the Church “agree to disagree” on capital punishment, but draw the line at abortion. If something is wrong, then it is wrong. Drawing the line anywhere means tolerance of anything on one side of the line.
Example: The Bishop’s absolute insistence on the Stupak Amendment in the House bill and their rejection of the Nelson compromise in the Senate gets them so involved in practical politics that they are now making it clear that they will go to the mat on the issue of abortion but not on the issue of coverage of illegal aliens. If they had made strong statements that the bill must cover illegal aliens and must not be used to expand abortion and left it at that, it would not now appear that they care less for illegal aliens than for the unborn.
Can a politician do something so outrageous that he should never be invited to Notre Dame or any other Catholic university to speak and receive an honorary degree? I would say yes, but it would, it seems to me, be something outside of mainstream American politics, and being pro-choice is not outside the mainstream of American politics.
I do think that, on the margins, a significant number of people may believe that the current legal abortion regime is acceptable, or maybe less than optimal, but not that big a deal.
John McG,
I think that is their right, and I think such a position can be held in good conscience. Any Catholic who held that it was acceptable to obtain an abortion would be dissenting from a clear moral teaching of the Church. However, it seems to me that a Catholic who, for example, voted against the Stupak Amendment or the Nelson compromise, or, for that matter, who did not support the reversal of Roe v Wade as an anti-abortion tactic, would be making a prudential decision about how the government of the United States ought to deal with abortion at this particular time and under very particular circumstances. It may be an infallible teaching that abortion is always wrong, but it is not an infallible teaching that Roe v Wade must be overturned or that health care reform should not be passed unless the Stupak Amendment is enacted.
Well stated, Mr. Nickol. Your comments about principles resonates. Look at the other pope in this process – JPII. He is held up as a paragon of defending against the culture of death; yet, his stand on aborition is all but negated by his failures of leadership; acts of commission and omission in regards to bishops and cover-ups, movement of pedophiles, etc.
So, we declare this pope has heroic value – but the sexual abuse scandal is so large; how do you reconcile these “principles?”
A couple of interesting stories today:
http://ncronline.org/node/16174 – interesting points about papal history and some of the recent changes noted by Dr. John Page earlier in this thread
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/top/all/6784227.html – current Vatican response to papal process outcry
But now, Pius XII’s insufficient stridency is reason to oppose him.
There is a major difference between silence and “insufficient stridency.” It seems to me the reason some progressive Catholics criticize some bishops on the issue of abortion is because those bishops are interjecting themselves into the political process in ways that give an impression (whether true or false) of being partisan.
Evangelium vitae: http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_25031995_evangelium-vitae_en.html
Abortion and euthanasia are thus crimes which no human law can claim to legitimize. There is no obligation in conscience to obey such laws; instead there is a grave and clear obligation to oppose them by conscientious objection.
I am not up on what is infallible and what is not infallible. But it is a clear teaching of the Church that Catholics have a duty to oppose laws legitimizing abortion (which Roe V. Wade would qualify as).
The priority that must have with regards to other issues is a matter of prudential judgement. But if a Catholic accepts laws like Roe v. Wade, he is going away from the Church’s teachings.
I find it difficult to reconcile voting against an amendment preventing government funding of abortion with conscientious objection to laws legitmizing abortion.
Movement of Catholic opinion away from conscientious objection to laws legitimizing abortion is a bad thing.
“Why should the Church “agree to disagree” on capital punishment, but draw the line at abortion. If something is wrong, then it is wrong.”
The victims of capital punishment have been judged guilty of a grave crime(s) by society. There is no doubt as to the innocence of the victims of abortion.
“Can a politician do something so outrageous that he should never be invited to Notre Dame or any other Catholic university to speak and receive an honorary degree? I would say yes, but it would, it seems to me, be something outside of mainstream American politics, and being pro-choice is not outside the mainstream of American politics.”
Waterboarding is in the mainstream of American politics (http://www.pollingreport.com/terror.htm). Should someone who supports the use of the practice recieve an honorary degree from ND?
“I think the problem is that the Catholic Church has sacrificed standing on principle and become too involved in practical politics.”
Amen to that!
I am not up on what is infallible and what is not infallible. But it is a clear teaching of the Church that Catholics have a duty to oppose laws legitimizing abortion (which Roe V. Wade would qualify as).
John McG,
Catholics have a majority on the Supreme Court. Why don’t they do something about Roe v Wade? Are they all “bad Catholics”?
I try not to call anybody a bad Catholic.
I also think that makers of policy have different responsibilities than those who judge the Constitutionality of a policy.
Having said that (as Larry David might), I would consider upholding Roe v. Wade to be inconsistent with Catholic understanding of personhood.
And the beat goes on, including a superficial attack on Cathy through more anonimity. At least it doesn’t clainm to come from a gift from God.
See how these Christians…
I will add one personal reflection: while some here keep arguing about Pius XII , I woory about the canoniztion of JPII – because, while it presumably should be about his personal holiness, many might see it as a total endorsemen tof how he manged things – and that will just open up more division – as we see in the continued (and I often think endlessly repetitive) argumentation here.
I would consider upholding Roe v. Wade to be inconsistent with Catholic understanding of personhood.
Of course, Catholic justices should definitely not interpret the word “person” in the Constitution according to the Catholic understanding of personhood. But the American Bishops said in Faithful Citizenship, “A legal system that violates the basic right to life on the grounds of choice is fundamentally flawed.” There are certainly many times where a judge may be required to make a ruling that is in conflict with his own personal beliefs. Jurors, too, must set aside their personal beliefs and make a decision based on the testimony they hear and the judge’s instructions on how to apply the law. In a perfect system, or even a good but imperfect system, I believe all are duty bound to follow the law (or pay the consequences). But in a legal system that is “fundamentally flawed,” how much is a Supreme Court justice absolved of personal responsibility for his rulings?
No David, it’s not that it is the “only” issue, it is whether it is an issue of such importance that it should be a disqualifier.
I think any reasonable person will agree that there are some positions or actions that would disqualify a person from not only receiving an honor, or even speaking at a Catholic University. For example, a person who was an exemplary citizen in every regard but was a vocal advocate for the reimposition of slavery or the legalization of sexual relations between adults and children under 12 or the arrest and quarantine of homosexual people would not be invited to speak at the commencement.
This is ultimately a question of degree. Many Catholics happen to believe that abortion on demand is a moral scourge on our society every bit as deplorable as slavery was. If you believe that you would not honor a person who supports not only the maintenance but the expansion of that system. It is that important.
So when I hear people berate pro-life advocates as “single issue,” I have to ask what’s your single issue? I doubt there is a person reading this blog that doesn’t have one, that wouldn’t think it inappropriate to honor a person because of a single position that person holds or acts on. David Duke anyone?
No David, it’s not that it is the “only” issue, it is whether it is an issue of such importance that it should be a disqualifier.
Sean,
As I said to MAT, it would seem to me that anyone who is inside the mainstream of current American politics would be acceptable as a speaker. David Duke would not be inside the mainstream. Someone who advocated the reimposition of slavery, or lowering the age of consent to 12 would not be in the mainstream. Whether Catholics like it or not, abortion is currently a constitutional right, and the pro-life position is clearly in the mainstream of American politics.
By being in the “mainstream” I mean holding a position that there is either clear agreement on, or an agreement to disagree. I think it is recognized that when inviting or honoring a mainstream politician, one is not necessarily endorsing everything he or she stands for. That is the way our system of government works. The president (at least up until recently) represents all of us, and though we may not all agree with him, a president who wins an election honestly is the leader of the country and deserves respect.
I do not see how a president who holds a position that is merely the law of the land can be considered persona non grata, no mater how strongly one disagrees with that position. Obama is the president, he was elected honestly, and many people voted for him in spite of his position on abortion. He is far more than someone who is pro-choice. On the other hand, someone like David Duke, on the other hand, is defined by his positions on race. That is the sole reason for his prominence.
An interesting question, it seems to me, is whether it would be unacceptable to invite someone like Elie Wiesel as a commencement speaker at a Catholic University. He disagrees with Catholics on the most profound issue of all — was Jesus God incarnate? Would he be an unacceptable speaker on those grounds?
No David, it’s not that it is the “only” issue, it is whether it is an issue of such importance that it should be a disqualifier.
For all practical purposes, abortion is the only issue for many people. It is so huge that anything else — nuclear war, the destruction of the planet, global depression — pales into insignificance. If the issue of abortion is so critical that it must determine the way you vote for president (under pain of mortal sin) no matter what else is at stake, it is the only issue.
That’s because no other issue is quite so, “Let’s put the baby in a blender. Prosperity will follow.”
This will turn out to be another blunder by Benedict with the usual “I did not mean to offend anyone.” The Times is on it today which means that it will be a hot international topic for the next few months. This is the usual hubris from Benedict. Naturally, we will hear that the Times is anti-Catholic; always a good counter when you have no argument.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/24/world/europe/24pope.html?hp
Pius X!! and Benedict are very suspect when it comes to the Jews. No they do not want Jews exterminated. They just stand silently by while others do it. As the allowing of the Latin Mass shows which includes the anti-semitic language.
I don’t think Karol W should be declared a saint either. (The process is triumphal, I contend, rather than edifiying) But Karol was great in ecumenism. This is why we constantly wondered who was in charge or who was talking when Ratzinger countered John Paul’s efforts with anti-ecumenical retorts.
That’s because no other issue is quite so, “Let’s put the baby in a blender. Prosperity will follow.”
As much as people seem to believe that Obama performs abortions in his spare time just so he can thrill at the feel of fetal blood on his hands, nobody in the government performs abortions. The government guarantees the right to individuals to choose abortions, or not, of their own free will. If we had forced abortions in the United States (as in China) it would be quite a different matter.
If we had general agreement that life begins at conception and that abortion is the killing of an innocent human being, that would also be a different matter. But as I have pointed out elsewhere, opposition to abortion based on the premise that a fetus is a human person with a right to life is unprecedented in this country or in common law. The “right to life” movement is based on no existing law or legal premise. It is based on a religious belief that God infuses a soul at the moment of conception. I would not want to claim to know whether or not that happens, but it is not reason that can be used to criminalize abortion in the United States. This is not to say that some other grounds would not be sufficient. But the “right to life” implies that an unborn child is a human being with rights, and there is no legal precedent for this.
One of the principal justifications for anti-abortion laws in the past was safeguard the health of the mother, since abortion was often dangerous. Now that it is not, it is difficult for me to see what the justification is for anti-abortion laws. I understand that Catholics believe that a person exists from the moment of conception, but as I said, that is a religious belief and not a scientific fact or a legal principle. So I don’t know on what basis a secular law prohibiting abortion (in the early stages of pregnancy) would be justified.
As for the “baby in the blender”
I do not see how a president who holds a position that is merely the law of the land can be considered persona non grata, no mater how strongly one disagrees with that position. Obama is the president, he was elected honestly, and many people voted for him in spite of his position on abortion.
You do understand that the same could be said for many of history’s greatest villains, correct? This is not to say that President Obama’s abortion policies put him in their company, just that I don’t think this is a useful standard for evaluating the fitness of honoring someone.
What you are advocating in essence is that the salt lose its flavor. That the Church should outsource its discernment to mainstream America, the same America that just launched a war of aggression, had slavery for 75 years and segregation for 100 years after that, engaged in mass extermination of American Indian population, and has engaged in various other evils, all with the approval of most of the public.
I love our country, but I love the Church more. Being a Catholic institution has to mean something. I would rather suffer through a million arguments like this about what it means to be a Catholic institution than just throw up our hands and go with the prevailing culture.
For all practical purposes, abortion is the only issue for many people. It is so huge that anything else — nuclear war, the destruction of the planet, global depression — pales into insignificance. If the issue of abortion is so critical that it must determine the way you vote for president (under pain of mortal sin) no matter what else is at stake, it is the only issue.
Lost of people think lots of thing.
Other people think abortion is a positive good. But for me to address my posts to that position in this particular forum would not be productive.
Generally, discussion is advanced by addressing the arguments in front of you, rather than the worst argument or position someone on the other side has.
Several posters here have demonstrated that is is possible to not consider abortion the *only* issue, and still find President Obama’s invitation problematic, which was one of the topics of the original post.
If you would like to rail against those who think abortion is the *only* issue, be my guest. But they’re not in this thread, and so nobody is going to be moved by you doing so.
“By being in the “mainstream” I mean holding a position that there is either clear agreement on, or an agreement to disagree. I think it is recognized that when inviting or honoring a mainstream politician, one is not necessarily endorsing everything he or she stands for. That is the way our system of government works.”
But David, it is a mainstream view – a majority view in fact – that it should be licit to waterboard terrorism suspects. Surely, however, you agree that a polititian holding this mainstream position should not be given an honorary degree from ND.
“The president (at least up until recently) represents all of us, and though we may not all agree with him, a president who wins an election honestly is the leader of the country and deserves respect.”
I will leave aside the striking irony of this in light of the past eight years and just note that opposition to someone receiving an honorary degree is not disrespectful.
John McG,
My point is simple, I think. Obama is in the mainstream of American politics and even has Supreme Court rulings and precedent on his side. This does not mean people cannot disagree with him profoundly. Catholics, or so it seems to me, have chosen to be mainstream Americans. If the American system of government is so flawed that it can produce one of history’s great villains, then Catholics should think of opting out of the American system.
I don’t think I am saying anything extreme or controversial here. Catholics have bought into the American system in a big way and show no signs, as a group, of being alienated from it. The disagreement over abortion is entirely within the American system. No Catholic has said, for example, “I cannot in good conscience serve on the Supreme Court while the American system is so fundamentally flawed.” We have not seen a mass resignation of Catholic judges or Catholic legislators or Catholic federal employees because they can’t, in good conscience, cooperate with the American system.
I am perfectly open to the argument that Catholics ought to opt out of the American way of life. See my post above of December 22nd, 2009 at 12:39 pm. Eugene McCarraher makes an argument that goes much farther than merely condemning abortion. It is an argument I take seriously. But for people who buy into American democracy and the American way of life, Obama is not a monster. He’s a mainstream politician in a system most Catholics are content to be integral parts of. You can’t ostracize Obama and still claim to buy into American democracy. You can’t be happy about having five Catholic justices on the Supreme Court if you believe American law is “fundamentally flawed.” You can’t cooperate in every single way with American democracy and then claim it legitimately produced a moral monster for a president.
I see the Vatican is calming the water now; thanks for the link Bill M: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/24/world/europe/24pope.html?hp
However I really doubt if either Pope Pius or Benedict ever stood siliently by while other slaughtered Jews. Frankly thanks sort of commentary is over the top to say the least.
Eventually though, even the Pape-bashers will somehow manage to find their way down from the withering and dramatic heights of hysteria to which they have climbed. And by then it will probably time for them to start climbing again, over something else.
Oh well, it is good that Benedict has that tough German hide; he can take the criticism.
:-)
Woa – many typos in that last one – sorry:
Pope, not Pape
Guess I am getting nervous about gift wrapping – Merry Christmas to all!
:-)
But David, it is a mainstream view – a majority view in fact – that it should be licit to waterboard terrorism suspects. Surely, however, you agree that a polititian holding this mainstream position should not be given an honorary degree from ND.
MAT,
I would say the mainstream in American politics is not to be gauged by public opinion polls without taking other matters into consideration. I would presume the majority would disagree with the Supreme Court decision that found flag burning to be protected speech. I don’t have time to look them up now, but I think there are public opinion polls that have shown a majority being perfectly happy to take away First Amendment freedoms. I think American democracy is based on the idea that a representative government arrives at what out to be better than a public opinion poll. It’s why we have the constitution and why it is not easily changed.
Waterboarding was illegal torture when it was done, and everybody involved knew it, in my personal opinion.
By the way, I would say that Catholic schools have absolute freedom to invite or not invite anyone they want to speak, and to give honorary degrees or withhold them as they will from any individual. What I am saying is that trying to ostracize or demonize the president as a political act is illegitimate for those who buy into American democracy. It is illegitimate to maintain that a legitimately elected president is some kind of moral monster. Notre Dame seems to like to invite presidents. It seems to me it’s an American thing and a political (although nonpartisan) thing. If a legitimately elected, popular president is not fit to receive an honor at Notre Dame, then there is something objectionable about the American system, and Catholics ought not to participate in it.
Now, the question of whether one can be a good Catholic and a good American, too, is an interesting one, and I am not sure what the answer is. But to those who reject the question out of hand, I would say they are stuck with honoring the president, who is, in the American system, far more than a collection of political positions.
And you are correct David; President Obama certainly is not a monster. Not only should people refrain from slandering Pius XII, but they should not get so shrill about our President either.
Regarding that ND scandal, I was sad to see the President dragged into the mess. It was not his fault – at all. He was invited and he graciously accepted and attended.
The problem it seems to me, was between the ND leadership and the US Bishops. Frankly, ND probably made a mistake and once the Bishops pointed it out to them, ND was too proud to be obedient to the Magisterium of the Church.
Now, none of that was Obama’s fault. In fact I think given the circumstances – stubborn liberal or progressive Catholics who busied themselves digging in their heels arguing with loud, almost hysterical traditional or conservative Catholics – that President Obama did a very reasonable job.
Ugh, what a sight that had to be for Protestants!
I realize it takes time, but I would be surprised if the Vatican did not eventually (in irts own timeframe of course) react in some way to that ND stink.
However I really doubt if either Pope Pius or Benedict ever stood siliently by while other slaughtered Jews.
Ken,
If you mean Pius XII stood silently in a room where Jews were being slaughtered right before his eyes, then you are probably right. However, it is a simple fact of history that he knew of the Holocaust and, for whatever reasons, remained silent. He said nothing in the aftermath of Kristallnacht, but American Catholics spoke out. There was nothing from the Pope Pius XII or the Vatican.
Pius XII did remain silent while 6 million Jews were slaughtered. It is a fact of history. What we don’t fully know is why. It is not whether or not he remained silent that is subject to debate. It is why he remained silent.
Well David, most people, most nations, most governments, including our own I think, “remained silent” while the Nazis were murdering Jews. That is not news.
When they open the Vatican archives on that period, much will be explained. Meanwhile it is important not to be anachronistic about this. We should bear in mind the times in which Pius XII lived, and the situation in which he found himself.
What was the best way to help the Jews in those days? The US government more or less settled on defeating the Nazis militarily as soon as possible as being the best way to help the Jews. Was that the correct approach? The Vatican of course, has no real military, and so could not engage them on that level. The Nazis were not at all respectful of religion, natural law, or the Papacy, and so engaging them on that level would have been difficult as well.
What was the then Vicar of Christ thinking, and why did he react as he did? As I said, we will know more when the pertinent archives are opened. Perhaps we will never know his exact reasoning.
Meanwhile I would simply tone down the shrill level and the dramatics, and I would refrain from calling President Obama a murderer as well. I think we all can agree that neither Mr. Obama nor Pius XII are any such thing.
Wow – I just caught this part of your post David “…If you mean Pius XII stood silently in a room where Jews were being slaughtered right before his eyes, then you are probably right. ..”
“Probably right”?! What can you possibly mean by that? If I am “probably” right, then there is some real chance (albeit a small one) that I could also be wrong. You cannot honestly mean what you posted.
That is what I mean by the discussion being too shrill and dramatic. Surely you can say (admit) with absolute certainty that Pius XII never “stood silently in a room where Jews were being slaughtered right before his eyes’.
Kristallnacht took place in the closing months of the pontificate of Pius XI. Yes, the Cardinal Secretary of State was Cardinal Pacelli. But he was not pope until four months later.
“Pius XII did remain silent while 6 million Jews were slaughtered. It is not whether or not he remained silent that is subject to debate”
Are you sure? I thought Golda Meir said of Pacelli in the late ’50′s: “When the most appalling martyrdom ever struck our people during the ten years of the Nazi terror, the voice of the pontiff was raised in favor of the victims.” (http://chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it/articolo/207151?eng=y ; http://www.nytimes.com/1982/10/26/opinion/l-what-golda-meir-thought-of-pope-pius-xii-245767.html ) How could such a prominent Jewish figure have made such a factually incorrect statement on public speaking regarding the defining event for the Jewish people in the 20th Century, especially given her role in the resettlement of Nazi refugees during the War? And as far as I can tell, there seems to be no contemporary outrage at her fallacious comment. Wasn’t she Israel’s Foreign Minister or something at the time?
That is what I mean by the discussion being too shrill and dramatic. Surely you can say (admit) with absolute certainty that Pius XII never “stood silently in a room where Jews were being slaughtered right before his eyes’.
Ken,
I can’t say that with absolute certainty, but on the other hand, there has never been any evidence or suggestion that Pius XII witnessed anything of the kind, and I didn’t mean to suggest that he did or even might have. If someone were to suggest such a thing without indisputable proof, I would presume it to be wrong. I’m just trying to go by the evidence and facts here rather than trying to see Pius XII in the most positive light possible. Not every Pope has been a saint, and some have not even come close.
Close it out Cathy. Mercy!
Geez–I go away to do a little Christmas shopping–and see all this email in my inbox! You all must be much further along than I am!
But Bill’s right. Tomorrow’s Christmas Eve.
Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.