Position Papers – April 2019

Number 528 April 2019 €3 · £2.50 · $4

A review of Catholic affairs

Ukrainian Orthodox Church REV. PATRICK G BURKE

Cardinal Pell: Our Dreyfus Case GEORGE WEIGEL

Books: Alienated America JAMES BRADSHAW

If you would like to subscribe or donate to Position Papers (10 issues per year) just fill in the form below and return it to:

Subscription (One year, please tick the relevant box):

€35

£35

$45/€40

Position Papers a/c no. 32485030 Bank Sort code 931187

(overseas: Swift AIBKIE2D and IBAN IE16AIBK93118732485030)

Number 528 · April 2019 Editorial

by Fr Gavan Jennings

In Passing: “Rise and Grind”: on the pathology of work

by Michael Kirke

Tintoretto and the Reform of the Church

by Bishop Robert Barron

Now they come for the Ukrainians…

by Rev. Patrick G Burke

Cardinal Pell: Our Dreyfus Case

by George Weigel

Pope Francis: a Pope in a hurry!

by Pat Hanratty

Receive & share Christ’s light

by Monsignor Fernando Ocáriz

Books: Alienated America

by James Bradshaw

Books: Saints for the Family

by Rev. Donncha Ó hAodha

Films: Captain Marvel

by John Mulderig Editor: Assistant editors: Subscription manager: Secretary: Design:

2 6 12 15 21 24 27 30 38 39

Rev. Gavan Jennings Michael Kirke, Pat Hanratty, Brenda McGann Liam Ó hAlmhain Dick Kearns Eblana Solutions

Contact us The editor, Position Papers, P.O. Box 4948, Rathmines, Dublin 6 email: editor@positionpapers.ie; website: www.positionpapers.ie Tel.+ 353 86065 2313 For new or renewed subscriptions contact: info@positionpapers.ie

Articles ©Position Papers, who normally will on application give permission to reproduce gratis subject only to a credit in this form: ‘Reprinted, with permission from Position Papers, Dublin’. Please note: the opinions expressed in articles do not necessarily reflect those of the editor nor of the Opus Dei Prelature of which he is a priest.

Printed by Digital Print Dynamics, Unit 14 Millennium Business Park, Cappagh Road, Ballycoolin, Dublin 11.

Editorial

O

ne of the optional Easter Sunday Gospel readings is St Luke’s account of the risen Christ’s appearance on the road to Emmaus to those two disconsolate disciples, Cleophas and his unnamed companion. But before Christ reveals the resurrection to them he clearly feels that they are in need of a salutary rebuke: Then he said to them, “You foolish men! So slow to believe the full message of the prophets! Was it not ordained that the Christ should suffer and so enter into his glory?” Then, starting with Moses and going through all the prophets, he explained to them the passages throughout the scriptures that were about himself. (Lk.24: 25-27) The two gloomy disciples merit chiding for their failure to grasp that the path to Christ’s glorification is through suffering. They failed to understand the Old Testament prophets (and in fact a message that permeates the psalms also) who clearly show that evil – no matter how powerful it appears at one point in time or another – will never vanquish good. Good is always victorious; in a beautiful passage in Evangelii Gaudium Pope Francis describes the good as an “irresistible force”: It is an irresistible force. Often it seems that God does not exist: all around us we see persistent injustice, evil, indifference and cruelty.

But it is also true that in the midst of darkness something new always springs to life and sooner or later produces fruit. On razed land life breaks through, stubbornly yet invincibly. However dark things are, goodness always re-emerges and spreads.

Each day in our world beauty is born anew, it rises transformed through the storms of history. Values always tend to reappear under new guises, and human beings have arisen time after time from situations that seemed doomed. Such is the power of the resurrection, and all who evangelize are instruments of that power (EG, 276).

2

Something we might term a “law of rebirth”, the apparent victories of evil over the Church preceding sudden re-flowerings of her life, has repeatedly been manifested throughout the history of the Church. In 197AD Tertullian gave this rule an early formulation when he wrote: “the blood of the martyrs is the seedbed of the Church” (Apologeticus, ch.

50). And how historically accurate he was: the brutal persecutions of the early Church in imperial Rome came to their climax and conclusion in the great persecution of Diocletian (303AD) before the sudden, almost over-night, cessation of persecutions and the tremendous period of freedom and expansion for the Church inaugurated by the Edict of Milan (313). Similarly the turmoils following the barbarian destruction of the Roman Empire gave way to the 9th century Carolingian renaissance; the investitures crisis preceded the 12th century Gothic renaissance; and the 16th century Protestant Reformation of the 16th century lead to all the creativity and energy of the Counter-Reform inaugurated by Trent.

Such historical precedents should be before our minds when we survey the contemporary situation of the Church; they amount to the prophets that Christ refers to on the road to Emmaus. Such precedents strengthen our conviction that the Church is an Easter people, and that “The Church is alive!” as the then Cardinal Ratzinger proclaimed in his homily for the funeral Mass of Pope Saint John Paul II. And life means struggle. The Church does not enjoy the peace of something inert and lifeless, of something that has no struggles to survive and grow. The Church is alive and “militant”; indeed it is the unique locus of the cosmic struggle between good and evil, and as such there can be no surprise that the Church is buffeted from all sides. That these buffetings appear to be increasing in their hostility should be taken as a roundabout compliment as Mgr Charles Pope recently suggested: So, while it is irksome, take the special hatred of the world toward Christ and His Church as a compliment. Somehow, we are viewed as a unique threat. Despite all the scandals, despite the timidity of our clergy and laity, we apparently still pose a threat. It must be Christ shining through in spite of us.

3

Furthermore, the buffetings are alway purificatory for the Church.

Christ’s mystical body on earth will always suffer defections which, while they sadden us, and while we struggle against them, in the final analysis are necessary, as St Josemaría Escrivá described in the 1930s: The storm of persecution is good. What is the loss? What is already lost cannot be lost. When the tree is not torn up by the roots – and there is no wind or hurricane that can uproot the tree of the Church – only the dry branches fall. And they ... are well fallen (The Way, 685).

If the persecutions that the Church experiences daily around the world (we only have to think of manifestly unjust imprisonments, attacks on priests, and burnings of churches) makes us fall into the pessimism of Cleophas and his unnamed companion, then those words Jesus might well be directed at us: “You foolish men! So slow to believe the full message of the prophets!”

Furthermore, in words of the Pope we have already seen: “Such is the power of the resurrection, and all who evangelize are instruments of that power” (EG, 276). Far from succumbing to pessimism, the Christian has the mission to evangelise – to transmit and embody – the Good News of our faith. The gloomy Christian undermines the message of the Gospel, as even Nietzsche, a great hater of Christianity, famously observed: “They would have to sing better songs for me to believe in their Saviour: his disciples would have to look more redeemed!” (Thus spoke Zarathrustra, XXVI).

“The Resurrection of Jesus is the crowning truth of our faith in Christ” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 638). The optimism of Christians, especially in times of trial, is a most eloquent testimony of their faith in the “law of rebirth”. A striking example of this is the effect on the young, still unbelieving, Edith Stein, of the Christian faith of a recently bereaved colleague, Anna Reinach. In 1917 Edith

4

attended the funeral of Anna’s husband Adolf who had died at the front. She expected to find Anna disconsolate but was deeply impressed by her peace, such that, as she told a German Jesuit shortly before her own death, it was witnessing Anna’s faith after Adolf’s death that ultimately led to her decision to convert to Christianity.

The Christian must not carry about the heavy sorrow of the Emmaus disciples at the outset of that journey, but the joy of its close: the joy that sped them back to the nascent Church in Jerusalem where “they told their story of what had happened on the road and how they had recognised him at the breaking of bread” (Luke 24:35).

5

In Passing: “Rise and Grind”: on the pathology of work

by Michael Kirke

I

read a book many years ago entitled On the Theology of Work. It impressed me. I might go further and say that it was part of a process which set me on a road in which my vision of life and its purpose led me to a very good place.

before us now. She described a new culture of work and the workplace, “obsessed with striving, relentlessly positive, devoid of humor, and – once you notice it – impossible to escape.”

As an example of this she cited “Rise and Grind”, both the theme of a Nike advertising campaign and the title of a book by a “Shark Tank shark” – her words.

However, now, in the twentyfirst century, it seems that another book is called for. We still need that earlier book but more urgently we seem to need a book entitled “On the Pathology of Work”.

This new culture glorifies ambition not just as a means to an end, but as a lifestyle, an end in itself.

Not so long ago a cri de coeur went up from a writer in the New York Times, Erin Griffith, about a rather frightening world of work apparently unfolding

Life for the younger generation immersed in this culture, she explains, is just about ambition, grit and hustle – everything of

6

value about work comes from this striving. It is a culture in which work is about engaging in “a sweat session that sends your endorphins coursing” ... a vision which “expands your way of thinking.”

Just as when human beings dissociate their appetite for food from the purpose of that appetite they fall victim to obesity; just as when the sexual appetite is dissociated from its purpose, love itself is obliterated and men and women become slaves to that appetite.

Work for disciples of this new life-style never really stops – and they don’t want it to stop because it is the source of their “rapture”.

All these excesses have been with us forever, but they have not, I think, been with us as epidemics. Now they are, and this hunger-for-hustle is the latest. While those other excesses are promoted through advertising and popular culture in an indirect, often subliminal way, this one is straight up front.

When these people take exercise it is only to ensure that they can continue to get their highs on the job; if they take time off to relax with music it is a necessary evil – because if they don’t they might underperform in the job and lose the buzz. The buzz is all.

Where do you find it? You find it in the new media: One37pm, Hustle, The Work Company, for example; also in the coaching manual of Daymond John and Daniel Paisner, Rise and Grind: Outperform, Outwork, and Outhustle Your Way to a More Successful and Rewarding.

The evangelists of this new culture don’t say this, but in fact their model of work is a drug on which you get high and the more you engage with it on this level, the more you need to. It is a oneway ticket to “workaholism”.

But this is not just a path to “workaholism” and the destruction of individual lives, it is also a dark path to an

Is this not just one other symptom of our age falling victim to excess?

7

oppressive social and political philosophy.

The real human value of our work is rooted in much more than our self-centred personal satisfaction. Hustle culture seems to have no time for anything else.

It is utterly elitist, a path to a world where the weak and vulnerable will either be patronised, marginalised or worse: exploited. Who will do the myriad of jobs required to keep the ordinary world moving, jobs not particularly attractive in themselves but on which our lives may even depend: the supermarket check-out operator, the street cleaner; the security man who sits at a desk all night, the surgeon who tends our ailments in the lower gastrointestinal regions of our bodies.

Isabel Hardman, in a book about the shortcomings of our political systems – provocatively entitled Why We Get the Wrong Politicians – faulted elected legislators who neglected the tedious work of scrutinising pending legislation in the pursuit of what they saw as the more “exciting” work of government and the vanities it panders to. She wrote: Yes, the rewards in applying oneself to proper scrutiny are few. But this is a poor excuse

That a job does not give you kicks does not negate its value.

8

for those who are supposed to be public servants. The rewards for being a (GI) surgeon are also few, according to the measures that MPs use: spending a lot of time with the lower digestive tract is not glamorous given the sort of things you can encounter when that tract has gone wrong.

twiddling their thumbs. They were given an important job to do: “The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.” All this was no burden to the couple until they decided they knew better than the Lord God and messed up. Then came the blood sweat and tears – but that was their own doing.

The activity of work itself is amoral. It is simply the application of energy, skill and intelligence to a task. Good or evil may come from it.

Being an MP involves dealing with a different sort of s**t, but parliamentarians have ostensibly signed up to dealing with it in the same way as lower GI surgeons have signed up to the realities of their job.

The history of mankind is the history of mankind’s thought and action in this world and, in so far as we have a record of it, is a account of the good and evil done by us throughout time.

This history tells us of the glories of our civilisations, ancient and modern – the great art, the great monuments, the acts of kindness and mercy. It encompasses the work of Euripides, Euclid, Shakespeare, Beethoven, Mozart; the work of the great educators and, in our own time, the works of mercy of people like Teresa of Calcutta.

Work and the human race have been in partnership in this world for a long time – since the blissful days in the Garden of Eden of which the JudeoChristian account of our creation tells us.

What On the Theology of Work reassuringly brought to my attention all those years ago was that man and woman in that happy place were not just

9

These are all the fruit of not just work, but of work done for a purpose; it was the purpose for which their work was done as much as the effect achieved which made them great and good.

happens to be in its path. But for the persons who possess a moral framework to guide them in their actions, the work they do will truly be a fulfilling thing, even more fulfilling when it is in the service of humanity itself.

There have been other works, all of them requiring as much blood, sweat and tears, but they have been evil in their purpose and effect. For that reason we list them among the horrors inflicted on our race: brutal conquests of peoples; barbarities motivated by greed; the genocidal crimes of Genghis Kahn, Josef Stalin, Adolf Hitler, Mao Tse Tung and Pol Pot – all requiring hard and unrelenting work.

For the humanist without faith in the supernatural order, this will be true. But for the humanist with faith in the divine order it will in fact be holiness – because for them it will be a conscious participation in the work of creation, under the guidance of all that has been revealed by the Creator Himself.

Therein lies the danger of a new culture which elevates work as an end in itself and measures its value by the degree of personal satisfaction its performance gives us. Within that there is no moral framework.

The author of On the Theology of Work cites the founder of the Catholic organisation Opus Dei (the Work of God), St. Josemaría Escrivá, in his book. He recalls the saint’s words and comments on them: “Convinced that man has been created ut operaretur (Gen 2:15), we know well that ordinary work is the hinge of our holiness and the right supernatural and human means of bearing Christ with

Without a moral framework our work is at best a loose cannon, indiscriminately destroying anyone and anything that

10

us and allowing us to do good to all.”

This commandment to work, given by God at the very beginning of history, was a favourite reference point of the founder of Opus Dei in his preaching: God created man to work; that was his intention, even before man sinned: work is not a curse or punishment; no: work is a way, an opportunity, to share in God’s plans.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Michael Kirke is a freelance writer, a regular contributor to Position Papers, and a widely read blogger at Garvan Hill (www.garvan.wordpress.com). His views can be responded to at mjgkirke@gmail.com.

11

Tintoretto and the Reform of the Church

by Bishop Robert Barron

I

am in Washington, DC this week for meetings of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Since formal proceedings didn’t begin until the evening, I found myself yesterday morning with a little free time. So I made my way to one of my favorite places in the city, the National Gallery of Art, which I frequented when I was a student at Catholic University many years ago.

At the close of a long session of walking and musing, I was drawn by an empty and comfortable-looking couch situated at the end of one of the galleries. Plopping down to rest, I looked up at the picture right in front of me. At first glance, given the color scheme and the

peculiar modeling of the figures, I thought it was an El Greco, but closer examination revealed that it in fact was Tintoretto’s depiction of Christ at the Sea of Galilee. The drama at the center of the composition is the Apostles’ boat, buffeted by choppy waves, and St Peter taking a gingerly, tentative step onto the bounding main at the invitation of the Lord who beckons to him. My seated posture conduced toward contemplation, and I spent a good deal of time with this painting, first admiring the obvious technical skill of the painter, especially in the rendering of the water, but eventually moving to a deeper

12

perception of its spiritual theme, of particular resonance today.

Whenever the Gospels present the disciples of Jesus in a boat, they are, of course, symbolically representing the Church. So Tintoretto is showing the Church in its practically permanent condition across the ages: at sea, rocked by waves, in danger of going under. Indeed, with a handful of remarkable exceptions, every age has been, in some way, a perilous one for the Mystical Body of Christ. The boat is filled with the speciallychosen Apostles of the Lord, those who spent years with the Master, learning his mind, watching his moves, witnessing his miracles with their own eyes, taking in his spirit. One would think that even if everyone else failed to follow the Lord, these men would hold steady. And yet we see them cowering, timorous, obviously at a loss as the storm rages around them. And the Gospels, in a manner that sets them apart from most other literature dealing with religious founders and their disciples, do consistently portray Jesus’ inner circle as deeply flawed. Peter

denied the Lord at the moment of truth; James and John succumbed to petty ambition; Thomas refused to believe the report of the Resurrection; Judas betrayed his master; all of them, with the exception of John, abandoned him on the cross, protecting their own hides. And yet Tintoretto shows Peter tentatively placing his foot upon the sea, commencing to walk toward Jesus. The great spiritual lesson – shopworn perhaps to the point of being a cliché, but still worth repeating – is that as long as the Church keeps its eyes fixed on Christ, it can survive even the worst of storms. It can walk on the water.

The Catholic Church is once more enduring a moment of extreme trial in regard to sexual abuse. This time, the focus of attention is on the failure of some bishops to protect the vulnerable, and in at least one terrible case, the active abuse perpetrated by a cardinal archbishop. The whole world is rightly outraged by these sins, and the Church appropriately feels ashamed. Many wonder, understandably, how those

13

specially devoted to Christ could fall into such depravity. But then we recall that every bishop today is a successor of the Apostles – which is to say, of that band that both sat in easy familiarity with Jesus and denied, betrayed, and ran from their Master. In stormy times, the first Apostles cowered, and their successors, we have to admit, often do the same.

foreshortened in such a way that the disciples appear very small, almost doll-like, whereas Jesus, looming in the extreme foreground, looks gigantic. As John the Baptist put the principle: “He must increase and I must decrease.” When our anxieties and egos are placed in the foreground, Christ necessarily recedes. Crucial to the reformation of the Church is the reversal of that perspective.

But there are grounds for hope.

They are found, however, not in institutional reform (as important as that is), not in psychological analysis (as indispensable as that might be), not in new programs and protocols (as helpful as they might prove), but rather in a return to Jesus Christ. Eyes fixed on him, hearts attuned to him, minds beguiled by him, action determined by him, the leaders of the Church can, even now, walk on the water.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

This article first appeared at: www.wordonfire.org.

Bishop Robert Barron is an author, speaker, theologian, and founder of Word on Fire, a global media ministry. This article has been reprinted with the kind permission of the editors.

Tintoretto sheds considerable light on this issue of Apostolic weakness and strength in the very manner in which he has arranged the figures in his composition. The painting is

14

Now they come for the Ukrainians‌

by Rev. Patrick G Burke

T

he right to freedom of religion is a fundamental human right. One would therefore have expected an endless outpouring of outrage in the Western media concerning recent events in the Ukraine concerning the Orthodox Church there. Yet other than a few articles delighting in the way in which the Ukrainian government is interfering in the governance of the Church in that country little has been said.

Unfortunately, there is a great ignorance in the West about how the Orthodox Church is organised which helps allow the great injustice taking place in the Ukraine to take place without protest. This

article aims to alleviate that lack of knowledge and understanding somewhat, not only for the sake of faithful Orthodox Christians in the Ukraine but also for the dangerous precedent this sets for all Christians around the world.

The False Narrative The short version of how this matter is being reported is essentially as follows. As something of a hangover from the bad old days of the Soviet era, the Orthodox Church in Russia remained in control of the church in the Ukraine.

Many of the faithful in the Ukraine wanted religious independence along with

15

political, but the Russian Church run from Moscow refused to grant it. So they appealed instead to the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, the leader of worldwide Orthodoxy, and after due consideration he decided to grant their request.

There remains among the Church hierarchy some who owe their position to Moscow and are therefore unhappy with Constantinople’s decision. However, most of the faithful are pleased to have finally been granted their independence.

How the Orthodox Church is organised The above narrative is essentially “fake news”.

Orthodoxy is made up of a number of independent (termed “autocephalous”) churches which are in communion with each other.

For historical reasons, similar to that of the Roman Catholic Church, Constantinople is regarded as the See ranking first in honour among Orthodox Christians, but unlike the Roman Catholic

Church the bishop of that See, known as the Ecumenical Patriarch (EP), does not exercise universal jurisdiction over Orthodox Christians outside of his See. He is considered first among equals, but at the end of the day he is the head of one (very small) autocephalous church among many. He is not a kind of Orthodox Pope and he has no authority to interfere in the internal affairs of the other autocephalous churches.

Indeed, it should be noted that the Great Schism, which separated the Church East and West in the eleventh century, took place over this very issue, whether Rome had jurisdiction over the rest of the Church. The conclusion in the East was that he had not, and the Orthodox churches have operated independently ever since, united in doctrine, but each autonomous in governance. This means that the EP has broken Church law in doing what he has done – the technical term would be that he has acted uncanonically, against the

16

canons or law of the Orthodox Church. This fact has been recognised by the majority of the Orthodox churches, and of those few who have not openly condemned his actions none has spoken out on support of them.

Historical background of the Church in the Ukraine This does not answer, of course, the puzzling question for Western Christians as to why then should the church in the Ukraine be in some way under the authority of the one in Russia? The simple answer is that it was not, but rather that the Russian Church is Mother Church of Ukranian Orthodox Christians. This means that while the Ukrainian Church is not considered autocephalous, neither is it under the control of Moscow. It is fully independent, managing its own internal affairs. Indeed, when it comes to control it might be said that the Ukraine exercises more control over Moscow than vice-versa, as Ukrainian

bishops sit on the synods of the Russian Church, while Russian bishops are not accorded reciprocal privileges.

The connection between the two churches dates back to the time when Christianity first came to the region, a time when there were not two churches but one; a time before there was neither a Russia nor a Ukraine. When the faith was brought to that area, it was then a territory known as Rus, a kingdom made up of not only modern day Russia and the Ukraine but other states as well. This region was ruled from Kiev, the capital of modern Ukraine, and naturally the central authority of the Church was based there also.

Some centuries later the capital moved to St Petersburg, later to Moscow, and the centre of Church governance moved also. Some three hundred years ago Moscow decided the time had come to make the Ukrainian Church independent, and did so, following, it should be noted, all the correct

17

canonical procedures that were required.

The modern context Fast forward some centuries.

Communism has fallen; and the various Soviet states are now independent nations. A small movement arises in the Ukraine that an autocephalous church should be established there, free of all ties to Russia. But the movement does not come from within the Orthodox faithful of the nation, but from without, led by a man called Philaret, a former bishop of the Ukrainian Church who had harboured hopes of being appointed Metropolitan and leading the Orthodox Church in his nation, but instead ended being deposed from ministry amidst allegations that he was secretly married with a family (while Orthodox deacons and priests may be married, only monks – who are, of course, single men – may be bishops). His response was to establish his own rival “Orthodox” church – for which reason he was

excommunicated – and it was this organisation, along with another group of schismatics, who petitioned Constantinople with the request that they be granted autocephalous status.

As there already exists in the Ukraine a canonical Orthodox Church, recognised not only

by Moscow, but by all the other autocephalous churches as well including Constantinople as such, the Ecumenical Patriarch quite rightly dismissed their requests. Indeed, he made public statements to the effect that their requests were not to be considered and could not be considered as they were being made by a group of schismatics led by a deposed and excommunicated bishop.

What happened to cause the EP to change his mind and issue a decree that in all of Orthodoxy has been the subject of much speculation?

It has been pointed out that given that his own church is based in Turkey, a Muslim country, his own flock is tiny and there is much to be

18

gained for him in claiming to be the new mother church of the much larger one in the Ukraine. It has also been wondered whether, given the support for this move in the West due to the anti-Russian sentiment which is so prevalent, some form of pressure may have been brought to bear upon him behind the scenes. However, it is hard to know for sure what lies behind his actions.

An unprotested human rights violation But it is known that the cause of the schismatics has the backing of the Ukrainian government – why? Well, there has been much discord between Russia and the Ukraine in recent years. It is therefore hard not to interpret events as diplomacy by other means, an outrageous interference in the internal affairs of an independent church for the sake of scoring points in the political arena. Also, the government there is liberal with Western leanings and the traditional views of the

legitimate Orthodox Church are very much an inconvenience to it (and it is to be noted that this “new” church is already showing signs of being more liberal than the old). The result has been the seizure of properties from the legitimate church by the state for dispersal to the new, state recognised church, along with pressure being placed by the authorities on parishes and clergy to renounce their faith and join the schismatic groupings.

This is an egregious violation of their human right to religious freedom; and that Western democracies and the mainstream media should not only fail to name it for what it is but instead applaud it is shameful. Faithful Christians in the West should be outraged by what is happening and speak out for no other reason than the fact that fellows Christians in the East are being persecuted in this way.

However, there is another reason for alarm and another reason to speak out – sheer

19

self-interest. What we are witnessing in the Ukraine is an experiment as to just how far in the modern world a liberal, Western-alligned state may go when it comes not just to interfering in the internal governance of a church within its borders, but effectively taking control of it. This should terrify those churches in the West whose teachings pose a challenge to the liberal secularism that has become so prevalent. In Ireland, for example, the mainstream media has long felt entitled to call on the Catholic Church to change her teachings to match the tenor of the times, and our politicians increasingly feel comfortable

following suit. That the day might come when more direct action might be taken may seem implausible, but it seemed equally implausible to the Orthodox faithful in the Ukraine right up until the moment when it did.

It seems appropriate to end with the final line of Martin Niemöller’s famous poem First they came: “Then they came for me – and there was no one left to speak for me.”

We must speak out for the rights of Orthodox Christians of the Ukraine now … or when our turn comes there may be no one who will speak out for us.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

The Rev. Patrick G Burke is the Church of Ireland rector of the Castlecomer Union of Parishes, Co Kilkenny. A regular contributor to Position Papers, he was formerly a broadcast journalist with the Armed Forces Radio and Television Network. He blogs at http://thewayoutthere1.blogspot.ie/

20

Cardinal Pell: Our Dreyfus Case

by George Weigel

I

n December 1894, Captain Alfred Dreyfus of the French Army was convicted of treason on the grounds that he had given military secrets to France’s mortal enemy, Germany. The charge was false; Dreyfus, a Jew, was framed. His trial was surrounded by mass hysteria and people with no grasp of the facts celebrated when Dreyfus was condemned to life imprisonment on Devil’s Island in French Guiana, the horrors of which were vividly captured in the film Papillon.

and Catholic). The stench of anti-Semitism hung over it all; one Catholic who refused to succumb to that ancient psychosis was Pope Leo XIII, who told the editor of the Paris newspaper Figaro that Dreyfus’s suffering reminded him of Calvary. In 1906, the Dreyfusards saw their man vindicated, but the wounds in French society caused by the Dreyfus Affair remained open and festering long after Dreyfus returned to the army and served honorably in World War I.

The Dreyfus Affair roiled French politics for the better part of a generation, pitting “Dreyfusards” (mainly secularist and republican) against antiDreyfusards (primarily royalist

The conviction of Cardinal George Pell in December 2018 on charges of “historic sexual abuse” is this generation’s Dreyfus Affair.

21

Ever since those charges were laid a year and a half ago, an atmosphere of public hysteria, fueled by secularist antiCatholicism, has surrounded the case. That hysteria was intensified by the global Catholic sex abuse crisis, despite the fact that Cardinal Pell had been the leading Australian bishop fighting sex abuse. It is inconceivable that this Dreyfuslike public atmosphere did not have a distorting effect on Cardinal Pell’s two trials.

Though the trials were held under an Australian media blackout, irrationality and venom, stoked by media bias, had already done their work.

The cardinal’s first trial last fall ended in a hung jury that voted 10-2 for acquittal (the jury foreman wept on reporting the deadlock). The second trial, amazingly, ended with a 12-0 verdict for conviction: even though the accuser’s charges were never corroborated by anyone; even though police incompetence in investigating the alleged scene of the crime was fully demonstrated; and even though the cardinal’s defense showed that 10

implausible things would have had to occur simultaneously, within a carefully controlled space of Melbourne’s St. Mary’s Cathedral, for the charges to be true.

There are obvious dissimilarities between the Dreyfus affair and the Pell case: Dreyfus was defended by secular people, while the attacks on George Pell over the past quarter-century have come, in the main, from aggressive secularists. The unhinged loathing of French royalists and anti-Semites for the Jewish bogeyman Alfred Dreyfus is, however, ominously similar to the unhinged loathing of secular progressives for the bogeyman George Pell. Dreyfus embodied the fears and hatreds of royalist Frenchmen still fighting against the French Revolution; Cardinal Pell embodies what the cultural and political left in Australia fears and hates: Christian doctrinal and moral orthodoxy, including the robust defense of the right to life from conception until natural death and a commitment to marriage rightly understood.

Further, Pell compounded his offenses in the eyes of his

22

enemies by relishing public debates in which he challenged the shibboleths of the politically correct on everything from climate change to the New Atheism.

progressivism can proceed, unimpeded.

To the anti-Dreyfusards, Captain Alfred Dreyfus had no business in the French Army and was unfit to participate in a properly ordered French society; so he had to be destroyed. According to those who created a rancid public atmosphere in Australia, in which a 10-2 verdict for acquittal could be flipped to a unanimous verdict for conviction on uncorroborated and unproven charges, Cardinal George Pell must be destroyed, so that Australia’s revolution of lifestyle libertinsm and political

Cardinal Pell is now in jail awaiting sentencing, after which he will appeal his unwarranted and unjust conviction. Anyone who cares about justice, be they religious or not, must hope that the appellate panel of judges concludes that Pell’s conviction was what Australian law calls an “unsafe verdict” – one the jury could not rationally have reached on the evidence. Yet even if justice is done and Cardinal Pell is freed, Australia, and the rest of the West, is going to have to think long and hard about how this travesty could have happened – just as France did after the Dreyfus Affair.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR George Weigel is Distinguished Senior Fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C. His column is distributed by the Denver Catholic, the official newspaper for the Archdiocese of Denver.

23

Pope Francis: a Pope in a hurry!

by Pat Hanratty

I

s that for real? Surely a typical image of Pope Francis is one of an avuncular, smiling, grandfather-like octogenarian?

Well, anyone who follows the Zenit website with its almost daily (and sometimes more than daily) dispatches from Rome will know that the Pope has been extremely busy recently. In this article, I will refer to two events of perhaps historic significance – his journey to the United Arab Emirates and the Summit on the Protection of Minors.

In early February, Pope Francis paid a short visit to the United Arab Emirates. (Readers will be interested to know that the coordinator of the Papal Visit to UAE was Irishman Fr. Michael O’Sullivan, a native of Kilrush,

Co. Clare. Fr. Michael joined the White Fathers and has worked in many areas of the Middle East and North Africa.) The Irish media paid very little attention to the visit and yet it has the potential to be one of the most significant of all Papal visits. It was ground breaking enough for being the first visit of a Pope to the Arabian peninsula and providing the occasion of a huge open air Mass in a football stadium with a congregation of over 120,000 – mainly Filipino and Indian migrant workers, but also including an estimated 4,000 Muslims.

Even more significant is the Document on Human Fraternity signed by the Pope and Grand Imam Ahmed el-Tayeb. This joint

24

declaration on Human Fraternity, called for all concerned parties to promote religious freedom, protect places of worship, and offer citizenship, even to religious minorities. This is a lengthy document which can be read in full on the Vatican website (or by simply googling e.g. Pope Francis and Grand Imam joint declaration). Indeed near the end it is asked that the Document “become the object of research and reflection in all schools, universities and institutes of formation, thus helping to educate new generations to bring goodness and peace to others, and to be defenders everywhere of the rights of the oppressed and of the least of our brothers and sisters.”

It is refreshing to read that the United Arab Emirates have a Ministry for Tolerance, and that the joint document condemns all violence in the name of religion, supports human rights and refers to the two wings of peace namely education and justice.

to do the jobs their own citizens won’t, and therefore needs to keep the 10% of its population onside by granting such freedoms, and only does so reluctantly. Apparently, this is not the case – witness the growth since the 1960s of the Catholic Church (and Anglican and Orthodox Churches) in the region and the building often with help from the authorities of some wonderful church buildings.

At all events, let us rejoice that this visit took place and pray that the fruits of it will be felt in the months and years ahead.

In advance of the Summit on the Protection of Minors which was attended by 190 bishops from round the world later in February, Pope Francis had spoken in an address to the Curia just before Christmas in the strongest possible terms:

Of course we in the West might be inclined to look on the UAE as a country which, being oil rich needs the Filipinos and Indians

25

To those who abuse minors I would say this: convert and hand yourself over to human justice, and prepare for divine justice. Remember the words of Christ: “Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a

great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea. Woe to the world because of scandals! For it is necessary that scandals come, but woe to the man by whom the scandal comes!”(Mt 18:6-7).

In his closing address at the end of the Summit, while he touched on abuse of children in many areas of society including domestic abuse, trafficking, online abuse and sexual tourism, his strongest words were for those who committed abuse in the church and for those who covered it up.

No explanations suffice for these abuses involving children.... We need to recognise with humility and courage that we stand face to face with the mystery of evil, which strikes most violently against the most vulnerable, for they are an image of Jesus…. The Church has now become increasingly aware of the need not only to curb the gravest cases of abuse by disciplinary measures and civil and canonical processes, but also to decisively confront

the phenomenon both inside and outside the Church….. She feels called to combat this evil that strikes at the very heart of her mission, which is to preach the Gospel to the little ones and to protect them from ravenous wolves.

Pope Francis’ words were the strongest on this matter I think I have ever heard. Let us pray that they will set a tone for a future when our church will be free of the stain of this appalling crime.

Pope Francis – you may be 82, but we need you to keep going.

As the Irish expression goes: Go maire tú an chéad! (May you live to 100!)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

26

Pat Hanratty taught Science/ Chemistry in Tallaght Community School from its inception in 1972 until he retired in 2010. He was the school's first Transition Year Co-ordinator and for four years he had the role of home School Community Liaison Officer.

Receive & share Christ’s light

by Monsignor Fernando Ocáriz

1. Lumen Christi! This proclamation that the Church announces to us three times at the beginning of the Paschal Vigil brings us a truth that fills us with joy. Christ’s light blazes a trail through the shadows of sin and death! Jesus has risen!

This is the joyful message that we want to receive anew on this holy night.

Lord in the Passion lead us towards the light of the Resurrection. Jesus rewards their affection shown in embalming his Body by making them the first bearers of the joy of Easter.

We have tried to live the Paschal Triduum intensely, contemplating Jesus’ self-giving for us: from the institution of the Eucharist at the Last Supper to his death on the Cross. The Gospel this evening shows us that the darkness of Calvary is not the last word. The holy women who accompanied our

2. Like the holy women, we too receive the news of Jesus’ Resurrection as a new light for our lives. Saint Paul reminds the Romans, in the passage from the letter we just read, that we unite ourselves to the death of Jesus “so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life” (Rom 6:4).

Easter announces to us that we are not bound by our past sins, by the weight of our previous

27

errors, by the limitations we see in our lives. Therefore the Apostle insists: “consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus” (Rom6:11).

On this night, we want to respond to our Lord’s invitation to undertake a new life. But what is this new life He calls us to?

We might be tempted to think that everything we have experienced these days will soon pass, and we will return to our old routines: the same work, the same people, the same problems. Isn’t it naïve to think that simply because we have attended some ceremonies and prayed a bit more, the circumstances around us will change?

What does this newness consist in? In the light of faith—vivified by charity, sustained by hope— that fills our life. As Saint Josemaria tells us, “this certainty which the faith gives enables us to look at everything in a new light. And everything, while remaining exactly the same becomes different, because it is an expression of God’s

love” (Christ is Passing By, 144).

By faith we know that Jesus is alongside us in our daily life, helping us discover its true meaning. And then we carry out the same work, but with love for God and a spirit of service; we fight against routine in our dealings with others and, with the creativity of charity, we discover new ways to make their lives happy; and we are grateful for the Christian formation we receive and strive to grasp it more fully with new lights.

3. After announcing to the holy women the news of Jesus’ Resurrection, the angel adds: “go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going before you to Galilee; there you will see him, as he told you” (Mk 16:7). The disciples are told to return to Galilee, to where everything began for them, to the land they travelled through each day with the Master during the years of his preaching.

The same call is also addressed to us: to go back to our Galilee, to our daily life, but bringing to it the light and joy of Easter. As Pope Francis told us several

28

years ago: “To return to Galilee means above all to return to that blazing light with which God’s grace touched me at the start of the journey. From that flame I can light a fire for today and every day, and bring heat and light to my brothers and sisters” (Homily in the Easter Vigil, 19 April 2014).

with joy at the Resurrection of her Son.

So let us welcome this invitation from our Lord. May Jesus’ Resurrection be for us a source of joy. Let us receive the light He wants to give us and share it with those around us. Like the holy women, let us announce with joy the truth that Christ is alive. And let us ask for the help of our Lady, whose face we contemplate tonight shining

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Monsignor Fernando Ocáriz is the Prelate of Opus Dei. This homily was preached at the Easter Vigil in Our Lady, Queen of Peace church, Rome on March 31, 2018. It is reprinted from the website www.opusdei.ie.

29

BOOKS

Alienated America

by Timothy Carney Harper Collins Publishers

by James Bradshaw

A

lienated America: Why Some Places Thrives While Others Collapse is the latest in a series of recent books examining America’s ever-widening social fissures. It follows on from Charles Murray’s Coming Apart (2012), Robert Putnam’s Our Kids (2015), Yuval Levin’s The Fractured Republic and J.D. Vance’s Hillbilly Elegy (both released in 2016), among other similar works.

While the author Timothy Carney draws upon much of this recent work, he is by no means jumping on a bandwagon. The Washington Examiner journalist began thinking about these issues long ago while working the politics beat for his

newspaper. The shock election of Donald Trump to the presidency encapsulated the frustration which millions felt with their political leaders and governing elite. But Carney and other observers had detected the tensions bubbling below the surface long before they erupted, and the reporting which informs this book stretches back over many years.

Moreover – and to a greater extent than in the aforementioned works – the author of Alienated America focuses strongly on the issue of social capital: the communities that have it, and the communities that suffer due to its absence. Crucially, this

30

Catholic father-of-six dedicates a large portion of the book to the role that religion plays in sustaining a spirit of community in those places where it still exists: “This study turns out to be a study of place, of social capital, of civil society, of community, and of church,” Carney writes at the outset.

Throughout the book, Carney shows argues that the decline of religious practice across broad swathes of American society have been devastating.

married two-parent families are the norm.

Carney begins his account of social alienation in an unusual location: Chevy Chase, Maryland. Far from being a depressed post-industrial town in the Midwest, Chevy Chase is one of the most affluent communities in the United States. And that wealth can be measured in more than just financial terms. Chevy Chase is a reservoir filled with social capital. As in other parts of affluent America, there is a wide range of community activities constantly afoot. Churches are well-attended, political participation is high, and

Candidate Trump campaigned across the United States by repeatedly delivering a fairly bleak message: “The American Dream is dead” (this was usually followed by a modest affirmation that he alone could fix this).

Unsurprisingly, in the presidential election in 2016, Trump bombed in Chevy Chase.

He performed abysmally in a huge number of other affluent communities across the nation, where people opted for Hillary Clinton by landslide margins.

Parents in such an environment can be confident that their children will grow up to have lives as happy and comfortable as theirs are, if not even more so.

That sense of optimism and comfort within a community has important political implications, especially when voters are being encouraged to vote for a candidate who represents the antithesis of the status quo.

This is not too surprising: the Democratic Party has long ruled the roost in America’s wealthiest

31

metropolitan areas, which tend to be strongly socially liberal (in theory, if not in practice). What is noteworthy though is the extent to which Trump’s message was rejected in the Republican Party’s presidential primaries earlier in 2016. Even within the narrow Republican base in Chevy Chase, Trump was considered extremely unpalatable, gaining about 15% support.

It wasn’t just in richer communities where most Republican voters rejected him, either. Carney describes visiting the small town of Oostburg in rural Wisconsin. Most of Oostburg’s residents are ethnically Dutch, and affiliated to one of the town’s wellattended Dutch Reformed churches. While Oostburg’s denizens lack the financial status of their counterparts in Chevy Chase, the sense of togetherness is even stronger.

Locals look after each other, as Carney describes, and virtually everyone in the town is involved in its social and civic life.

This is where it gets interesting.

In spite (or perhaps because) of the little Dutch town’s conservatism, Oostburg was the site of one of Trump’s worst performances in the Republican primary in Wisconsin. As in Chevy Chase, grassroots Republicans preferred more traditional conservatives like Senator Ted Cruz or more moderate alternatives such as Ohio Governor John Kasich.

Wherever church and community were strong, Trump underperformed. Wherever they were weak, he swept all before him.

Mormons were particularly unreceptive to the MAGA message. In Utah – the home of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints – Trump garnered around the same percentage of the vote in the Republican caucus (14%) as he got in Chevy Chase and Oostburg.

Religious observance in Mormon-dominated Utah is higher than in any other state in

32

the union. Family stability is unmatched elsewhere. The economy performs well. A strong social safety net is in place, organised around the Mormon church wards (a rough equivalent of Catholic parishes).

Most relevant of all is the fact that the state has more upward social mobility than any other.

In an environment like this, Trump’s insistence that the American Dream was dead made no sense and won him few supporters.

Thus Carney identifies a clear pattern across religious communities and across more affluent or educated communities (in which religious practice is actually relatively strong) when it came to the 2016 election: “In the 2016 Republican primaries and caucuses, across more than three thousand counties in the United States, only about 1 percent of counties gave Donald Trump less than 20 percent of the vote. We listed three of them above – Arlington, Alexandria, and Montgomery Counties – the most educated

counties in the country. The rest, among counties with at least twenty thousand in population, are all, with one exception, exceptionally Mormon (at least 47 percent Mormon) or exceptionally Dutch (at least 25 percent Dutch),” Carney writes.

In fact, in 2016, church attendance was a very good predictor of how likely a Republican voter was to opt for Trump against his main opponent, the Texan Senator Ted Cruz. Among Republican voters who attended church weekly, Cruz was 15 points ahead of Trump. But among voters who did not attend, Trump led Cruz by a stunning 27 points.

Why have these voting trends not been the subject of more public discussion?

To be clear, religious voters did not let their initial reticence prevent them from voting for the winning candidate. In the general election between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, Trump swept the boards among religious voters, including in

33

little Oostburg where he beat Clinton in a landslide.

This is not surprising. As the Democratic Party becomes evermore fanatical about supporting late-term abortion and restricting the rights of religious believers, they are driving Christian voters away in droves.

As a result, whatever happens in President Trump’s re-election campaign between now and November 2020, the conservative Christian vote is almost certainly in the bag.

Whatever their difficulties, conservative Christians are not the group which is most alienated from mainstream American society, and the disconnect between Trump’s core support base in America’s white working class and the world around them is not going away anytime soon. Its emergence is the product of a wide range of social changes, any one of which could be the focus of multiple other books.

While the manufacturing sector has not died off, much offshoring to cheaper locations

has occurred. Moreover, American factories require far fewer workers than they used to in order to produce the same output. The problem of joblessness is not going away. As technological innovation continues apace, many more workers are going to find it hard to secure steady employment. At the very same time, changes in industry are making long-term employment in companies rarer and replacing the former norm with a more precarious economic model.

People aren’t working together and many people aren’t working at all: preferring to get by on whatever unemployment assistance or disability benefits they can draw down. In the midst of such despair, addiction to illegal drugs or opioids has become common. And it is not just in the world of work where atomisation is more prevalent.

Almost a generation after Robert Putnam wrote Bowling Alone, levels of civic engagement have continued to plummet in those communities which can least afford to suffer further alienation.

34

The percentage of people who are married, and the percentage of children who are being raised by married parents, has also fallen dramatically. Most importantly of all, the decline of religion among America’s working class has resulted in many churches shutting their doors for the last time.

statistician Ben Casselman, which is particularly clear.

In large portions of America, these trends have created deserts where social capital is all but absent.

It was in these communities where Donald Trump gained the extra votes he needed to win both the primaries and the presidency in 2016.

A large amount of social science data exists which shows just how close the correlation was between growing anxiety and disillusionment and the desire of the American working-class for a change in direction. Carney cites one study of the difference between Trump’s performance in 2016 and the Republican standard bearer Mitt Romney in 2012, carried out by the

“Trump significantly outperformed Romney in counties where residents had lower credit scores and in counties where more men have stopped working.” Casselman wrote, “The list goes on: More subprime loans? More Trump support. More residents receiving disability payments?

More Trump support. Lower earnings among full-time workers? More Trump support.”

Trump’s success in 2016 led to much analysis of these problems, and the publication of Hillbilly Elegy in that same year helped many to put a face – even an imaginary one – to what one kind of Trump voter looks like.

What sets Alienated America apart though is Carney’s strong focus on the role of religion in sustaining communities, and the role which the decline of religion has played in hollowing out the social support network which used to hold communities together. For Carney, this has

35

been even more consequential than the economic upheavals.

practices of ordinary people in the pews.

“The unchurching of America is at the root of America’s economic and social problems,” he argues. “The woes of the white working class are best understood not by looking at the idled factories but by looking at the empty churches.”

A church is not just a house of prayer. It is a focal point for community events; a repository for the shared memories of a community. Close that down, and you shut off a source of social capital which cannot be readily replaced. Yet churches and church-run social services are now closing all across the parts of America which need them most.

In Coming Apart, Charles Murray had already shone a light on the massive disparity between religious participation among America’s middle and upper-classes (which is holding up quite well, in spite of secularism’s gains) and religious participation rates in workingclass communities which have collapsed over the last half century.

This massive disparity is new, and was not the case throughout much of America’s history. Its significance cannot be overstated. While the charitable works which the churches engage in are widely known about, it is not generally understood just how much religion impacts the social

This book provides an excellent summation of an overall problem, and the author argues his point about social capital and religiosity convincingly. As with Coming Apart and Hillbilly Elegy however, a reader seeking for broad solutions will not be satisfied.

While Carney devotes much time to explaining the role that his own vibrant and multi-ethnic parish plays in suburban Washington DC (and suggests that Catholics could learn from Mormons by expanding the Church’s social supports further) he does not attempt to propose a

36

step-by-step guide for how the enormous damage which has been done might be repaired.

A conservative libertarian, Carney does not look to the federal government to solve the problem. The dearth of community life, by definition, needs to be solved at community level, and this will not be an easy task to accomplish. A greater examination of potential strategies for achieving this at a grassroots level would have strengthened this book considerably. In spite of that, by writing Alienated America, Carney has provided a timely reminder of how important the issue of religion is in determining whether a community will be blessed with hope, or plagued by hopelessness. For without the revival of those empty churches, a resurrection of community in those places that most need it will remain an unfulfilled American dream.

37

ABOUT THE
 AUTHOR

James Bradshaw works in an international consulting firm, based in Dublin, and is a regular contributor to Position Papers.

BOOKS

by John Murray 96 pages Dublin 2018

Saints for the Family

by Rev. Donncha Ó hAodha

“T

here is only one tragedy in the end, not to have been a saint”. These words of Léon Bloy, cited in this inspiring collection of holy lives, also figure in the recent Exhortation of Pope Francis on the universal call to holiness.

Bloy’s point is that the most natural thing in the world is for a Christian to become a saint.

Holiness is the flowering of baptismal grace.

Fr John Murray’s work, published in the year of the Holy Father’s visit to Ireland for the World Meeting of Families, is of longstanding value since it highlights the family as a natural place of sanctification, and marriage as a vocation to holiness, a truth St Josemaría was a pioneer in proclaiming.

Thomas More, Margaret Clitherow and Louis and Zélie Martin, parents of Thérèse. Some of those presented have not, at this point at any rate, been beatified or canonized such as Karol and Emily Woytyła, parents of Pope St John Paul II, and Jacques and Raïsa Maritain. Irish connections are not lacking either with portraits of Bl. Solanus Casey, Ven. Matt Talbot and Mary Martin.

This book can spur us all on in the hope of being saints.

Sts Joseph, Elizabeth and Zechariah, and the Holy Innocents, appear alongside

38

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Rev. Donncha Ó hAodha is a priest of the Opus Dei Prelature, author of several CTS booklets and a regular contributor to Position Papers.

FILMS

Captain Marvel

by John Mulderig

W

it, positive messages and lavish production values buoy the original story Captain Marvel (Disney). While some of the mythos in this adaptation of various strands of Marvel Comics lore, as well as other considerations, make it unsuitable for kids, the film is tame enough to be possibly acceptable for mature teens.

the alien Kree civilization that trained her as a warrior.

Much of the humor derives from the fact that most of the action is set in a 1995 version of America where Blockbuster Video stores still flourish, people still use payphones and dial-up internet takes forever to connect. The superhero of the title (Brie Larson) arrives in this primitive milieu while faithfully serving

Even as she follows her military mentor, Yon-Rogg (Jude Law), on his mission to the Blue Planet, though, Captain Marvel, known among the Kree as Vers, continues to be troubled and confused by persistent flashbacks to a previous life of which she has no coherent memory.

The Kree are in an ongoing struggle against the encroachments of the Skrull, an imperialist race of shape-shifters who have infiltrated and taken control of a series of planets.

Their forces on Earth are led by Talos (Ben Mendelsohn).

39

Separated from her Kree comrades, she eventually joins forces with Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), who, in the mid-‘90s, is a low-ranking officer in the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division, better known as SHIELD. Together they go in search of Dr Lawson (Annette Bening), the scientist who seems to be crucial both to the intergalactic conflict and to Vers’ missing past.

The need to work for peace and the resilience of the human spirit are among the themes emphasized in co-writers (with Geneva Robertson-Dworet) and directors Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck’s script. Plot complications also teach that time-honored lesson about not judging a book by its cover.

unlikely to pay lasting heed to this aspect of the story, though, and may take the elements listed below in their stride as well.

The film contains much combat violence, most of it stylized but some of it harsh, fleeting anatomical humor, a few mild oaths, at least one rough term and a handful of crude and crass expressions. The Catholic News Service classification is A-III – adults. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13 – parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.

The inclusion of an invisible being called the Supreme Intelligence might confuse youngsters still being formed in their faith, however. While not exactly a substitute for God, this entity, which rules the Kree, certainly has some godlike powers. Older adolescents are

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

John Mulderig is a reviewer for Catholic News Service.

Copyright (c) 2019 Catholic News Service.

Reprinted with permission from CNS. www.catholicnews.com

40

LEARN TO COMMUNICATE IN YOUR MARRIAGE Next Programme: 4-6 October 2019

Minds & Muscles for Africa!

ELY UNIVERSITY CENTRE

Workcamp in Kenya, June 2019

This summer a group of Dublin based students (with mentors and chaplain) will put their minds and muscles at the service of Kenyan children. They will give classes to young school children in the rural Machakos region, and will build latrines there.

But we need €8000 to make it happen… we’ve raised €4000.

Please donate, even a small amount! See www.locallives.org for details on how to donate, or post a cheque to:

Kenya summer project Ely University centre 10 Hume Street Dublin 2