Archbishop Dolan, the NYT and a Plea against Anti-Catholicism
October 30, 2009
The following is an expanded version of an Op-Ed piece by Archbishop Timothy Dolan that the New York Times recently declined to publish:
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An extremely shallow piece by the Archbishop. I know he has better intellectual skills than that.
Anti-Catholicism is a more serious charge than one to be leveled over a disagreement about the subjective decision to place a news story above or below the fold or on what page.
Anti-Catholicism in today’s society is real. I wish the Archbishop addressed real instances of it.
Well of course NYT didn’t publish it. It was all about how biased they are.
Just the same I found I agreed with everything Bishop Dolan said. He probably just have just been a bit more selective about who he approached with the article.
I am less and less impressed with Dolan.
Why? Was there something inaccurate in his article? Frankly, it’s about time someone started talking about anti-Catholic bias. At least, someone who isn’t as easily dismissible as Bill Donahue.
Was there something inaccurate in his article?
Was there something objectively accurate in the article?
I think anti-Catholicism still exists in the united states, sure, but it’s way more complex and debatable than Dolan or Donahue have it.
On the other hand, I think we are to expect a certain amount of anti-Catholicism if we are being faithful, and especially if we are being faithful by being prophetic (which is usually not the case when, say, Donahue gets all huffy). It really doesn’t bother me any more than being called “anti-american.”
Now you want to talk real anti-Catholicism, pay attention to other parts of the world. Not the New York Times.
I think the article could well have been rejected as not being enough about Maureen Dowd’s piece principally.
It was as though he was using the occasion of her piece to proceed to do a larger issue and he dealt little with her as a result. He simply should have asked for an op-ed piece that stood alone apart from whatever Dowd had said.
I also think the Arthur Schlesinger Sr. quote he made (shades of Benedict and Regensburg…are our leaders becoming ventriloquists?) which referred to anti-Catholic bias as “the deepest bias in the history of the American people”…offended the editors since however much we suffered, the black man actually was beaten, hung, had his women used sexually by slave masters, and was always liable to have his family sold apart which according to Noonan’s recent book (“The Church That Can and Cannot Change”), even our Sulpician order did at the end of the 18th century selling a woman away from one of her babies with the nearby Jesuits not being surprised or scandalized….and next to all that kind of suffering, we sound like whiners to claim precedence (through Schlesinger) in victimhood.
The Archbishop also means “Peter Viereck” when he writes “Paul Viereck.” Very small matter, but still …
Neil
Was there something objectively accurate in the article?
Yes. He called Rep. Patrick Kennedy’s recent remarks “inaccurate and uncalled for,” which they were. Of course, in criticizing a Democratic politician by name – and a Kennedy, no less – the Archbishop was certain to incur the smug disapproval of Democratic partisans.
Bill –
I think you are right on the first point. He could have written a legitimate article in response to Dowd, though I think his gripe can be better phrased as anti-clericalism than anti-Catholicism. But at least Dolan did not stoop to the low of the undignified parody of President Obama that Bishop Tobin wrote.
And I will defend Schlesinger and maybe even the use of the quote. In the context, Schlesinger used “deep” not in the sense as most profound but deep as in hidden. Racism goes wide, deep and also stays at the surface. American anti-Catholicism has bored deep and hides there. It makes it difficult to treat. Sadly, Dolan doesn’t seem to be a very good physician for this ill.
Kurt
Then he should have used his own words and called it “subtle and pervasive” etc. Schlessinger’s
“deepest bias in American history” not only is dismissive of blacks’ greater suffering; but the various American Indian tribes excepting the gambling magnates would also wonder…since their incomes and their depopulation vis a vis Catholic incomes and Catholic increased population is a comparison that does not back up “deepest” in resepct to us. Also one has to distinguish when a given period in the US really resented Catholicism per se as opposed to really resenting low income sectors of Catholic nationalities like the Irish and Italians who could be very rough and tumble on a city’s peace. I grew up in a very violent NE city section wherein my fellow Irish and Italians were no bargain for the peaceloving. One Catholic dance which was held weekly had at least two street fights per week with one guy knocking out a priest and then being hired weeks later to be a bouncer. Sounds humorous until one really knows that there are people serving manslaughter sentences for a fist fight that resulted in cerebral trauma that resulted in death sometimes days later.
So…was US prejudice always about religion or sometimes about lower income populations of Catholicism and their rough ways? You will see the same thing now with the mix of hard workers from Mexico combined with lethal drug gangs from Mexico.
I found the “everybody does it” rationalization over the Catholic clergy being singled out disturbingly insensitive. Trying to defend the indefensible by saying that other religious sects and secular groups have the same problem reeks of a misplaced persecution complex. Let’s get our house in order before we cast stones.
Not impressive — he seems to have let the adulation go to his head — does he now know that all the points he makes about anti-Catholicism apply as well to many critical and discontented members of his own flock — is that the very reason he made them?
And yes, bishops are in no position to cast stones. It is a requirement to become a bishop or to remain a bishop that you subscribe wholeheartedly to Humanae Vitae. Now Humanae Vitae has had the evil effect of condemning thousands of people to death in Africa. Thus Humanae Vitae is a mistake with gravely evil consequences. Thus to subscribe wholeheartedly to Humanae Vitae is to subscribe wholeheartedly to evil. This means that all Catholic Bishops subscribe wholeheartedly to grave evil. This means that all Catholic Bishops are evil men.
So let them put their own house in order.
SV2′s post makes me pine for the good old days when post were unmoderated and a comment policy not in place. But I do have to say it ranks up there with the abortion is OK because a large percentage of embryos fail to plant naturally.
It is perfectly OK to offer an opinion that Archbishop Donlan’s piece was not effectively written or argued; I happen to aggree. And for some to use the scandal to silence all bishops is par of the course for some and all they have. But arguing that bishops are some how murdering people by teaching HV is true is well bizarre.
But I do have to say it ranks up there with the abortion is OK because a large percentage of embryos fail to plant naturally.
Kevin,
Could you point out any instance of such an argument being made?
HV is indeed murdering people. I add that it is not only bishops all Catholics who are losing credibility as a result. HV is a major source of anti-Catholicism just as the Iraq War was a major source of anti-Americanism.
What exactly do you disagree with?
Can’t speak for Kevin, but adherence to the teachings of Humanae Vitae is not murdering people. Monogamy and respect for the marriage act, and confining it to marriage does NOT result in the spread of AIDS. How can anyone think AIDS would be so widespread on the African continent if people’s sexuality were governed by HV?
I also refuse to believe that AIDS is spread by promiscuous people who don’t care about violating church teaching by having sex outside of marriage, but somehow suddenly want to follow church teaching by foregoing condoms. That’s insane. It’s simply not the fault of Church teaching that there is epidemic AIDS in the countries of Africa.
R
R, I don’t know if you are really unaware of the issues or just sticking doggedly to the talking-points of those who “refuse to believe” what they don’t want to see.
The distribution of condoms saves lives. In oppposing Catholic bishops expose their flock to danger. Something else is more important to them than saving lives.
Aids is transmitted within marriage too. The present Cardinal Archbishop of Bologna, when he was John Paul II’s speech-writer, stated that a wife of a HIV positive man should not use condoms for protection, and neither should she refuse her marital duty; rather she should trust in Providence.
The successful Ugandan ABC campaign used condoms as one of its three planks. To oppose C because of Humanae Vitae is to be guilty of the resultant deaths.
See http://www.theglobeandmail.com/archives/a-passionate-voice-in-hiv-fight/article839400/
http://www.advocatesforyouth.org/%20%09%20index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=60
Here we see murder in action, in the name of a medieval ideology. AND ALL CATHOLIC BISHOPS SUBSCRIBE TO THIS IDEOLOGY. If they gave any sign of having problems with it, they would not be made bishops. Thus all bishops are evil men.
SVII,
Sometimes your comments are a voice of reason. This isn’t one of those times. Your recent comments sound more like an irrational rant, and lack all sense of proportion.
It’s part of Catholic moral theology that condoms may be used some times as a lesser evil. So perhaps some bishops wrongly oppose all access to condoms and so prevent those who might use them as a lesser evil to have them. You could criticize those bishops for that, but what does that have to do with HV? HV doesn’t talk about how to promote condoms or about when and where they might be considered lesser evils.
Even if some bishops were guilty of this, you could hardly describe it as murder. Are the bishops more to blame than the reckless behavior of some people who are having sex outside of their marriage?
If you have a problem with HV just come out and explain what is wrong with it. Calling it ‘medieval’ is not an argument. As a married man, I find the sexual teaching of the Church to be difficult, but totally realistic and intuitive. But since I ‘believe’ in HV, I guess I’m just completely evil.
Fr. O’Leary (SV2),
Your best argument that all bishops are murderers and Catholics who happen to believe in HV are also complicit is a three year old article in Globe and Mail quoting Melinda Gates who is paraphrasing the CDC? Really?
And a link to Advocates for Youth whose president spent 7 years working for naral and another director who worked for planned parenthood? Really?
Maybe you’ll listen to someone who is a reasearcher, head of a reasearch institute at Harvard and not a Catholic…
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/27/AR2009032702825.html
You are a very learned man and a Jesuit. What do you think St. Ignatius would say about HV?
“It’s part of Catholic moral theology that condoms may be used some times as a lesser evil.”
Yes, the Vatican considered such an idea, but was far from declaring it loudly and clearly. In 1996, Cardinal Cottier, theologian of the papal household of John Paul II, sad on the lesser of two evils idea: “this is the question that moralists are asking themselves, and it is legitimate that they ask it.” A few moral theologians claim that this issue cannot be handled responsibility without revisiting HV itself.
Despite this slight opening from the Vatican national hierarchies are still opposing condom use by invoking the immutability of HV. Melinda Gates was thinking of them when she made her wellknown 2006 plea.
“We say NO to condoms” is what the Congolese bishops came out with recently after the papal visit — in a country where visceral dislike of condoms has led to many deaths.
“what does that have to do with HV? HV doesn’t talk about how to promote condoms or about when and where they might be considered lesser evils.”
It has everything to do with HV. Without HV there would not have been this fanatical resistance to condoms that has caused many deaths. There would not have been condom-burning ceremonies at Catholic rallies in the Philippines. There would not have been Cardinal Trujillo’s long screed against condoms on the Vatican website. (A distinguished Spanish Jesuit moral theologian, Juan Masia, who criticized the bishops’ obsession with condoms, was sacked, on the instance of Card. Trujillo.)
Bishops have been as insensitive to the practical implications of propagating a false doctrine that has been rejected by the faithful as they have been on other issues. Pleasing Rome trumps helping people.
Most bishops have preferred to be silent, whether from their personal but hidden disbelief in HV or because they know it is not accepted by the faithful or just to avoid trouble with Rome. Silence equals death for many in this case.
A bishop might murmur under his breath that condom use is OK in life-and-death situations, but something much stronger is called for. And to repeat: national hierarchies, even in AIDS devastated countries, have taken a hard line on condoms, apparently thinking this pleases the Vatican, who of course have not corrected them. This is the bitter fruit of the anti-contraceptive mentality, based on a biologistic concept of morality that is a hold-over from the past (and is not based on modern rational and responsibible ethical thinking that takes all factors into account).
Edward C. Green has been trotted out again and again as offering supposed scientific support for the “Catholic” idea that condoms increase Aids. It is not noticed that Green does not actually support that idea. The papal statement and its sycophantic embrace by his enablers proves what I am saying about the criminal consequences of HV. If you can distinguish supporting HV from not opposing condom distribution, please point out the bishops who have made that distinction in the wake of the papal statement. Their silence speaks volumes — about cowardice, hypocrisy, careerism, and crass disregard for human suffering.
Btw, I am a secular priest, not a Jesuit.
SVII,
The point is that perhaps some bishops are wrong to oppose in such an absolute manner all condoms. I maintain that there is no *logical* connection between HV and this invoking of HV as an excuse to ban all use of condoms, and I believe this for two reasons:
1. HV is not inconsistent with the moral doctrine of lesser evils.
2. The context of HV is married couples with the intent to avoid pregnancy through contraception. It does not apply to nuns who are in danger of being raped, people who’s intention is to avoid disease, etc.
Ironically (from your point of view), it is precisely the personalist approach of JPII that allows for a more nuanced interpretation of HV and rejects such a rigorist view of it that would insist, for example, that a nun in danger of being raped must never use a barrier method of contraception. It is exactly because of the insufficiencies of an overly biological natural law approach that JPII put such energy into a more personalist account of the Church’s teaching.
Of course, it’s nonsense that all the faithful reject HV, since I am one of the faithful and I don’t reject it at all. I think it stands up quite nicely to reason illumined by experience and revelation.
If you want to argue it, I would be happy to oblige.
Brian,
Why has there been absolute silence from the Vatican on the study (see below) given to the pope in 2006?
Regarding the last paragraph, there was not unanimity of opinion when Paul VI wrote Humanae Vitae. And if they are really remaining silent because they think what they would say “would only invite confusion in the media and among Catholics,” that strikes me as indefensible. I suspect that some think condom use would actually be licit in some circumstances, but they believe the Church shouldn’t admit it, because the message so far has been so anti-condom.
Brian Killian, the moral theology you expound does not seem to be what the Vatican have approved. Here is a glimpse of the state of play three years ago:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/1626130/posts
I would call this “Nero fiddling while Rome burns”.
As a priest ordained in 1973 I saw at close quarters how the faithful simply made up their own mind and more or less told the clergy to shut up on this issue. Forty years of squealing from Rome has made not the slightest dint on this situation. “Theology of the Body” only has a narrow, cult-like appeal; it does not represent the broader sensus fidelium at all. No one is preventing people from using NFP. What is rejected, massively, is the imposition of it on all as the only licit method of contraception. My quarrel is not with those who adopt NFP for reasons of conscience and see it as a moral ideal. My quarrel is with HV supporters who think everyone should adopt this vision under pain of sin or being considered as second-rate Catholics. The faithful saw through this bullying quickly and rejected HV as an outrageous piece of moral blackmail. (By HV I refer only to the specific ruling that each and every sexual act must be open to the transmission of life; the text of HV of course contains good things.) If you are willing to impose this burden of conscience on all Catholics, including those for whom NFP does not work, I think the onus of proof is on your side. The bishops who sign the dotted line on this (that is, all bishops) are very careful to avoid dialogue or debate — they lay burdens on people’s shoulders but do not lift a finger to help them.
In Ireland John Paul II denounced Contraception in the very same breath (literally) as “the abominable crime of abortion” — speaking to huge numbers of Irish people he found no time to be personalist or to distance himself from rigorism. Can you quote him on the points you make above, or are they just your own deduction from his personalism?
David and SVII,
Why do we need a statement by the Vatican? Isn’t the moral doctrine of the lesser evil already an approved part of moral theology? It’s just a matter of applying it.
I disagree with the idea that there has been a ‘blanket’ ban on contraception. There never was such a thing. Just look at the Church documents on the subject, the context is always the *conjugal* act and the intent to render a sexual act that is likely to result in pregnancy infertile.
HV doesn’t represent a blanket ban on contraception any more than the teaching against murder constitutes a blanket ban against killing.
I am not a moral theologian, and I have never heard this contextual limitation of what HV says.
It seemed to me that HV says that contraception is always intrinsically immoral, intrinsice inhonestum. In contrast, killing in self-defense or in a just war etc., is not intrinsically immoral; it depends on context.
As I understand it, what HV condemns is not the “intent” to render an act infertile, but the actual rendering of the act infertile. The use of condoms might have another “intent” but it would still render the act infertile, which is why the church hierarchy including the Pope are in such a tizzy about condoms that they have put millions of lives at risk. Moreover, by a double whammy, use of condoms means that the male seed would be expended in a manner the Church considers intrinsically immoral, as in masturbation.
If a potential bishop explained HV in your way, I wonder would it help his chances of becoming a bishop?
The “lesser evil” — it’s “just a matter of applying it”, you say.
But that argument was used from the start by those who said that in many cases married couples use contraception as the lesser evil to the strains not doing so can cause their marriage or the straits they will be in if they have any more children. That might seem a straightforward application of the lesser evil principle to some, but, unless I am very seriously mistaken, the Vatican does not accept it, and will not make anyone who accepts it a bishop.
Wasn’t Charles Curran suspended from teaching theology at Catholic University for just such commonsense application of the “lesser evil” argument?
And the suspender, by the way, was the present Pope.
Humanae Vitae itself rejects lesser evil reasoning:
14. Neither is it valid to argue, as a justification for sexual intercourse which is deliberately contraceptive, that a lesser evil is to be preferred to a greater one, or that such intercourse would merge with procreative acts of past and future to form a single entity, and so be qualified by exactly the same moral goodness as these. Though it is true that sometimes it is lawful to tolerate a lesser moral evil in order to avoid a greater evil or in order to promote a greater good,” it is never lawful, even for the gravest reasons, to do evil that good may come of it (18)—in other words, to intend directly something which of its very nature contradicts the moral order, and which must therefore be judged unworthy of man, even though the intention is to protect or promote the welfare of an individual, of a family or of society in general. Consequently, it is a serious error to think that a whole married life of otherwise normal relations can justify sexual intercourse which is deliberately contraceptive and so intrinsically wrong.
Thanks you Fr. o Leary for your frank words regarding key aspects of HV. Of course you are aware that at this point in time the kind of debate we are having here is more than past its due date. Indeed the faithful have long ago concluded that celibate Priests and Bishops are not exactly the first ones one would be inclined to consult in such matters. The damage you describe has indeed long been inflicted – honestly if the Vatican would change gear tomorrow this would not make a dent. Whom are we kidding – the average catholic in the childbearing age bracket at this point is really not holding his/her breath for some belated Vatican words of wisdom. Water under the bridge really
Perhaps the next Pope -likely a bishop from some Latin American country will try to shake some things up a bit – who knows. I still do not expect this issue to be one of the top items on the list – married Priesthood on the other hand might make a lot of sense and might be an important change endorsed by the rapidly emerging large majority of African and Latin American Catholics.
Certainly innocent fun to speculate -but who knows.
Yes, that passage does give the impression that lesser evil is not valid. Nevertheless, the lesser evil is part of moral reasoning and the application of the lesser evil is a bit more complex than simply ‘tolerating’ evil. Note that the passage you quoted is mainly directed at the ‘totality’ argument, that’s the one used in the majority report given to the pope.
I still maintain that was is being singled out as wrong, is the *intent* to render what is fertile infertile. This is why it’s OK for women to take birth control pills for medical reasons, even though the contraceptive effect is the same. And it should be remembered that the general context of these documents is the conjugal act, which is more narrow than a ‘blanket’ ban of contraception.
BTW, as a married man I believe that, although HV contains some problematic language, the general thrust of the Church’s position on sexuality is correct. What is at stake here is chastity itself, and I believe that chastity is as important today as it was for the early Christians.
I could never see what NFP has to do with chastity. Married women say that the process involved is unnatural and makes sex feel dirty.
Chastity has more to do with love, I think.
grega is of course correct. In real life the last time I met someone defending HV’s ban on contraceptives (except for medical purposes in view of double effect) was a fanatical Irish missionary in the Philippines in 1987.
The US Bishops have a draft statement seeing contraception as a threat to marriage — they come across as weirdly unrepresentative of Catholic thinking. They are selected on the basis of enthusiasm for HV, so their eccentricity is easily explained.