Further Reflection on the Winnipeg Statement (by Julian Barkin)
It is one thing to verbally spar in the blogosphere, but when a Contributor at Vox Nova makes your comment the occasion to post a critical (even if necessary) reaction, regardless of the degree of charity employed, this is serious and requires attention. A response here seems the most appropriate way of maintaining my own intellectual and journalistic integrity.
Regarding Kelly Wilson’s post (“The Winnipeg Statement”), I must address his continual insistence on lumping me with John Corapi. Until his recent crisis, I had never heard of John Corapi and his organization, religious order or enterprise. What I have since learned does not lead me to respect John Corapi.
Kelly has lumped me with an individual who blatantly disobeys the Church, or, at the very least, disobeys his ecclesiastical superiors, and I am not the kind of individual who would intentionally disobey the Church. In this regard, by lumping me in with John Corapi, I felt Kelly went above what needed to be said. In the comments section after his post, Kelly continued to place me with the disobedient Corapi, and I would have preferred Kelly to use more general terms like “people” or “angry people”, or even “prideful people” instead of “Corapi and Barkin”. Those general terms would have been fair and would not have angered me. However, with even one minute of listening to Corapi’s speech on the Statement, I understood why I had been placed alongside him.
Regarding the Winnipeg Statement itself, Kelly was correct to “put me on blast” for not reviewing the Statement in its entirety. I have reverted to the Catholic faith, and my knowledge of the Winnipeg Statement came primarily from a Canadian blogger whose commentary on Church matters is extreme.
Upon reflection, I maintain some specific, and significant, criticisms of the Winnipeg Statement (and I am not alone). However, I retract the initial comments made which motivated the post entitled “The Winnipeg Statement”.
First, I particularly retract my claim that the Winnipeg Statement was a “middle finger to the Pope.” Second, while I maintain specific, and significant, criticism of the Winnipeg Statement, I agree that the text is, to quote Kelly, rather “moderate”. In fact, there are even parts which come out as “winners” for me. Third, there is a clear connection between a number of Paragraphs in the Winnipeg Statement and Humanae Vitae and other Church documents on issues related to human sexuality, and I am pleased by this. Fourth, it does not seem to me that the Winnipeg Statement conflicts with later Church documents on the subject of conscience (Veritatis splendor).
To put it mildly, I was not too pleased with Kelly placing me next to a “rabid black sheepdog” like John Corapi. However, upon refection, I retract my initially expressed opinion and agree with Kelly in his assessment of the Winnipeg Statement as rather “moderate,” and I admit to having fallen into a mistaken evaluation of the document. Though I maintain points of difference with the Statement, having now read the Winnipeg Statement I have discovered a lot more positive points than I expected.
I can expand upon my general statements if you have specifics questions regarding my further reflection on the Winnipeg Statement.
-Julian Barkin is a freelance author and occasional commenter at Vox Nova
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Julian, at the close of my post on the Winnipeg Statement, I take the common suggestion that the Winnipeg Statement be retracted and instead suggest you model this whole retraction business by retracting the untrue statements you had made about the Winnipeg Statement.
It speaks volumes about your good will and honesty that you have chosen to do so. What you had written prior, quite simply, wasn’t true. That doesn’t make you a liar, but it did make your wrong. I am grateful that my post, which mentioned you by name, became the occasion for your own greater familiarity with the Winnipeg Statement.
Your greater familiarity with the Statement gives credibility to the criticisms you nonetheless can maintain. A number of times in the comment section of that initial post I maintain that the document is not above criticism, but that good criticism presumes familiarity. You, now, have taken this seriously, and I am glad that my post was the occasion for this.
As for coupling you with Mr. Corapi, I appreciate your desire not to be spoken of in the same sentence as Mr. Corapi, however, you were coupled to him in one very specific context, and that had to do with the extent to which you both were spreading untruths about this Statement. So far as I can tell, I prefaced both of your names by “Mr.” (about 90% of the time) and at no point was there character assassination, or a failure to maintain charity. Even in the com-box, my mention of you and Mr. Corapi was meant to refocus the discussion which quickly turned into an evaluation of the Winnipeg Statement. As I attempted several times, the point of the post was to faithfully identify the contents of the Winnipeg Statement, and, in doing so, evidence the poverty of the characterizations being made by persons like yourself and Mr. Corapi, and anyone else wishing to parrot such statements.
You’ve recognized this poverty yourself and you’ve sought to do something about it. I’ve singled out individual people before in blog posts and it’s always because I presume in them a willingness to re-engage with what they have written.
O if you had never heard of Fr. Corapi you were really missing a great opportunity. Corapi’s sermons, which I would occasionally catch on EWTN while channel-surfing, were like a grand summation of the entire right-wing Catholic blogosphere. He conveyed deep understanding and belief in the Magisterium again and again as an idee fixe. He waxed eloquent about the vast virtues of the reactionary Catholic approach. And then…like the most perfect exemplar of intrinsic faultiness of this hard-line thinking, the guy went up in a virtual poof of smoke, and the Magisterium became his putative persecutor. Of course reactionaries are dedicated to not ever allowing reality to intrude on them in any way, and they will just go on to the next Padre who gives them their fix of religious meth. There is so much obvious beauty in the Catholic tradition that could be expanded upon and celebrated. The Corapi-type pushers are dedicated only towards the cultic fix.
Kelly, if you were angry with Julian for his initial statement and then associated him with Corapi it was not charitable and thus harmful. Julian’s retraction of his initial statement revealed a humility that is admirable and a true gift of the Holy Spirit. Were you angry with him when you wrote your initial post?
Of course not Ronald. Associating him with Corapi was natural as their comments were based on the same lack of familiarity with the statement being criticised.
I asked this on the Internal Pages of Vox Nova, and perhaps you have some further insight on the matter: Why do people assume that because you disagree with someone, and want to use that disagreement as a learning occasion, that your feathers have been riled? Don’t people still disagree with one another without lessening their opinion of that person?
Julian’s retraction, as I said in the first comment of this current post, evidences his own good will and honesty, and his decision to further reflect on the matter now gives the criticisms he maintains a strengthened basis.
Kelly,
I suspect that people assume that disagreement equals anger or “riled feathers” is a direct result of our culture at large. People don’t disagree reasonably, they yell at each other, they call each other names, or they diminish each other. This is true of Cable TV, radio, the blogsphere etc. even “Catholic” sites.
And you, as you stated did not simply paint Julian as similar to Corapi in a general sense, (a comaprison that would, obviously be less than flattering, considering Corapi’s situation) You specifically compare the similarity of their statements. Then Vox Nova publishes Julian’s response. This is why I enjoy coming here. People are actually reflecting on what they say, and admitting error.
Julian, your post shows you to be a person of integrity.
What was your feeling in associating him with Corapi, because discussing Corapi is charged with emotional content, just as Julian’s criticism of the Winnipeg statement was emotionally charged. I ask this because highly intelligent people of faith, in my experience, tend to intellectualize and/or repress their aggressive feelings thus preventing the open expression of vulnerability and potential healing between competing camps. The gifted person, in my experience, is fearful of agressive feelings because of the damage she/he has witnessed in their lives and consequently the mind will repress anything that may potentially be harmful. There is always a feeling influencing every person in each encounter. The smallest most hidden hostility can be harmful to self and others if it is not acknowledged.
The post was made to correct Julian’s perception of the WS, and since such a discussion couldn’t arise in the context of David the SFO’s post (as the WS was off topic), then a new post was necessary.
As for grouping Julian with Corapi, the bulk of the article was submitted as an article after Corapi made his remarks last Spring/Summer. Instead of writing a new article from stracth, the contents of a previously written article were just applied to a new situation with some slight modifications.
I don’t deny that “there is always a feeling influencing every person in each encounter” but I’ve identified what influenced the response I gave, and I see no indication of anger in my response to Julian.
ok