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Page 2 • Faith Today Faith Today • Page 3 When people disagree By Joe Michael Feist NC News Service When it was published in May 1983. “The Challenge of Peace: God’s Promise and Our Response’’ generated intense debate in church and in society. The U.S. bishops’ pastoral letter on war and peace in the nuclear age was studied and discussed, praised and criticized. It is interesting to note that the bishops invited dialogue on their letter. They called the letter “a first step toward a message of peace and hope.’’ In their letter, the bishops pointed to some universal moral principles. Then they applied those principles to specific situa tions, acknowledging that not all people of good will would reach the same specific conclusions they had reached. For example, all would agree that war is evil and that a con scious effort must be made to work for peace. Those are general principles. There is room for discussion, however, on ways to avoid war. Father J. Bryan Hehir offered this example: “There is room, as the bishops acknowledged, for a vigorous debate about .the ‘no- firs't-use’ (of nuclear weapons) proposal of the pastoral; there is no alternative to the prohibition against the direct killing of civilians in a strategy of deterrence.” Father Hehir gave the com mencement address this year at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. He is secretary of the U.S. Catholic Conference Department of Social Development and World Peace What has emerged in the war and peace pastoral, and what continues to be discussed today, is the question of pluralism in the church — a variety of views on specific social issues. “On some complex social questions, the church expects a certain diversity of views even though all hold the same univer sal moral principles,” the U.S. bishops said in their pastoral. “There is a framework of moral principles which constitute the Catholic social vision; within this framework pluralism can, should and will persist,” said Father Hehir. In the Catholic tradition, he continued, such “pluralism is not anarchy; it has content, limits and rules of discourse which produce a struc tured pluralism. The meaning of structured pluralism is being worked out in theory and prac tice in the postconciliar church.” Father Hehir turned to several areas of social concern for ex amples of what he meant. —Labor and management: There can be differing views on the roles of labor and manage ment. But, said Father Hehir, there can be no disagreement on the basic right of employees to form unions. —Government’s role; The size and style of the state’s role in society can be debated. But “the principle that the state has a positive, active role to play, especially in defense of the poor, is beyond question in Catholic teaching,” the priest stated. Does this mean that the statements and pastoral letters of the bishops can be casually dismissed when they touch on specific points of public concern? In their peace pastoral, the U.S. bishops responded this way: “The moral judgments that we make in specific cases, while not binding in conscience, are to be given serious attention and con sideration by Catholics as they determine whether their moral judgments are consistent with the Gospel.” There is little doubt that in the future the world’s bishops will continue to issue statements on matters of public policy. Discus sion and debate will continue to be heard. Jesuit Father Joseph O’Hare, president of Fordham University in New York, has urged that a “Catholic style” mark this debate. That style, he said, should entail civility and a will ingness to listen to opposing viewpoints. (Feist is associate editor of Faith Today.) Transformation, yes. Annihilation, no. By Father John Castelot NC News Service Over and over again in the beginning of Genesis we hear the refrain: “God saw how good it was.” At the end of the sixth day of creation, “God looked on everything he had made and he found it very good.” What is the message in this? Clearly it was the basic truth that the universe is good, indeed precious. The universe is God’s handiwork. It is a gift to treasure and cherish. In the modern age of space ex ploration, when we confront the overwhelming magnitude of the solar system, we react instinctive ly as the psalmist did. “When I behold your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you set in place — What is man that you should be mindful of him, or the son of man that you should care for him?” * He continues: “You have made him little less than the angels, and crowned him with glory and honor. You have given him rule over the works of your hands, putting all things under his feet " (Psalm 8:4-8). i God entrusted this colossal yet delicate and finely tuned system to our care. He expects us not to exploit it with callous insensitivi ty, certainly not to vandalize and brutalize it. Instead, we are to use the universe constructively, • to cherish and love it. All of creation has been given to us as a sacred trust, for God has great plans for it. He has not revealed in detail just how he in tends to bring those plans to fulfillment, but one thing seems • certain. God plans to bring the universe to a glorious fulfillment involving a stunning transforma tion — not annihilation, not in cineration, but transformation. When the prophets envisioned God’s final triumph over evil, they did so in terms of just such a transformation of the universe. “Lo, I am about to create new heavens and a new earth. The things of the past shall not be remembered or come to mind” (Isaiah 65:17). Continuing in this tradition, the New Testament author of Revela tion gave this imaginative picture of the eternal city of God. “Then ■vl saw new heavens and a new earth. The former heavens and the former earth had passed away and the sea was no longer. I also saw a new Jerusalem, the holy ci ty, coming down out of heaven from God, beautiful as a bride -prepared to meet her husband” (21:1-2). If the author wrote of the pass ing of the former universe, it was in terms of a transformation. This transformation meant the elimina tion of all evil. It is toward a glorious destiny that we, under God, are to guide our universe. St. Paul expressed the idea in this memorable passage: “I consider the suffer ings of the present to be as nothing compared with the glory to be revealed in us. Indeed, the whole created world eagerly awaits the revelation of the sons of God” (Romans 8:18-20). In a very real sense, the glorification of Jesus’ body in the resurrection is not only the model of our ultimate glorifica tion but the pattern of the final transformation of the whole universe. (Father Castelot teaches at St. John's Seminary, Plymouth, Mich.) Random reflections on the pastoral By Ivan Kauffman NC News Service Have your feelings about nuclear weapons changed during the past year because of the U.S. bishops’ pastoral letter on war and peace? That’s the question I asked members of my parish recently, approximately one year after the bishops issued their letter ex amining many questions of a nuclear age and encouraging the people of the church to work for peace. Here are some answers I heard. “It’s raised consciousness on the issue,” said a businessman who served in combat in World War II. “There is a supreme moral issue here, whether these weapons can ever be used because of the tremendous destructive power they have.” “It’s all pretty scary,” said one woman. “I’ve thought about it more because of the bishops’ let ter,” she said, “but in a way I feel more helpless. I used to picket and march during the 1960s, but I don’t know if it does any good.” “My main concern is with human error,” the parish secretary said. “There’s too much chance of human breakdown. I’m from a military family — we’re » the ones who get killed if there’s a war.” Her husband is a real-estate in vestor who once worked at the Pentagon. “I’m really stymied,” he said. “We’re spending enor mous amounts of money we * could spend somewhere else.” But he indicated, “I’m afraid it’s a necessary evil.” He added that he doesn’t think the Russians can * be trusted. “It was what I was feeling but couldn’t put into words,” a psychiatric nurse and mother said of the bishops’ pastoral letter. “The symbolism of it was what mattered to me, that the church ’* was willing to get involved. It made me very proud.” “I don’t think men should ever, have come to this place where they can just push a button and <b blow up everything,” said an older woman with emotion. A young mother active in the peace movement said she ap preciated the process the bishops *went through. “I felt less alone, that there were leaders in the church who felt as I did. It gave ^me hope.” A priest said he had been strongly affected by the testimony of medical experts on "the effects of nuclear weapons. “Anything that destroys like that,” he said, “has got to have .some responsibility attached to it. That’s a moral issue.” “I don’t think my kids have paid much attention to it,” said "one father. But when I spoke with his daughter, the president of our teen club, she told me the •.pastoral is being discussed in her high school religion classes. “It’s a big thing there.” The person who supported the “bishops’ pastoral most strongly was a former Vietnam military of ficer. “When you create weapons .with that much devastation, you're talking about a lot of death. “I visited Hiroshima in 1951,” lie continued. “That one bomb wiped out family after family after family. I thought then, what a waste — wasting human beings.” He added: “I’ve seen death — and I’m not sure we need to con tinue to learn how to kill people.” What struck me as I spoke with these people was how deep ly concerned they are. And I was struck by their mostly positive feelings toward the pastoral. I had deliberately sought to inter view a cross section of parishioners, including several people who a year ago had op posed the bishops getting involv ed in this pastoral. Above all I was struck by a sense of frustration. People know something has to be done for peace, but they don’t know what to do. That bothers them. But as the bishops point out in the pastoral, faith gives hope and hope gives the “capacity to live with danger without being over whelmed by it.” (Kauffman is a free-lance writer in Washington, D.C.) FOOD... The threat of an industrial plant closing hung over a Midwestern city two years ago. At that time, a couple visiting from another ci ty were struck by a homily they heard during Mass. The priest spoke of the plant, a major source of jobs in the com munity. He pointed to the effects the plant’s closing could have on individuals who worked in the plant, on families, on the total community. The homilist focused the atten tion of the entire congregation on the lives of the people of that city — their need for hope, their current anxiety. The Christian community is directly concerned about these people who need hope, the priest suggested. The Christian community in that city was con cerned that people’s value and dignity not be lost from view as a large corporation worked toward a decision that would af fect so many jobholders. The homily that Sunday was just one more reminder of the scope of Christian concerns — concerns which stretch outward into the lives of people: to the rights of the unborn; to the jobless, the hungry; to those who suffer discrimination; to those fearful of what a modern war fought with the most powerful modern weapons could mean. ..for discussion 1. Why do you think the war and peace debate has captured the attention of so many people in the past few years? 2. What does the word “peace” mean to you? 3. What practical steps can you take to become a peacemaker — for example, at home or in socie ty at large? 4. Father James Bacik, inter viewed by Katharine Bird, thinks some people may avoid thinking about the issue of nuclear war because it is so painful. Do you agree? Is it a painful issue? 5. The issues of war and peace, abortion, racism and hunger have been called moral issues by church leaders. What makes these issues moral issues? ...for thought Recognition of the value of human life is what underlies these concerns of the church. In their 1983 pastoral letter on war and peace, the U.S. bishops put it this way: “At the center of the church’s teaching on peace and at the center of all Catholic social teaching, are the transcendence of God and the dignity of the human person. The human person is the clearest reflection of God’s presence in the world; all of the church’s work in pursuit of both justice and peace is designed to protect and promote the dignity of every person.” For the bishops, decisions about nuclear weapons rank among the most pressing moral questions. “While these decisions have obvious military and political aspects, they involve fundamental moral choices,” the bishops stated. But it is not a matter of exten ding the scope of church con cerns into purely political areas for purely political reasons. The content and context of Christian peacemaking is not set by a political agenda or by an ideological program, said the bishops. Christians, they added, are “called to be peacemakers, not by some movement of the mo ment, but by our Lord Jesus.” SECOND HELPINGS “Talking to Children About Nuclear War” is a new book by William Van Ornum and Mary Wicker Van Ornum. The authors present the book “for adults and young people who want to talk with each other about nuclear war but don’t know how.” The threat of nuclear war evokes strong feelings in peo ple — including “fear, anger, cynicism, bewilderment, denial, despair.” Often, the book in dicates, adults are surprised to learn that their children already are very aware of living in a nuclear age. The book helps adults overcome their reluc tance to discuss modem war fare with children. “We believe that talking to children about nuclear war is a responsibility that should not be left to ‘others,’” say the authors. (Con tinuum Publishing Co., 370 Lex ington Ave., New York, N.Y. 10017. Hardback, $12.95; Paperback, $7.95.)
