January January 2020 2020 Issue 534 €3· Issue £2.50·534 $4
€3 · £2.50 · $4
Beginning the New Year Beginning with a Smile REV. DONNCHA Ó HAODHA the New Year with a Smile
A part of Ireland’s heritage PAT A HANRATTY part of Ireland’sF Iheritage L M RE V I E W : PAT HANRATTY The Two Popes
REV. DONNCHA Ó hAODHA
JAMES F I LBRADSHAW M REVIEW:
The Two Popes
JAMES BRADSHAW
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A REVIEW OF CATHOLIC AFFAIRS
CONTENT Editorial 2 by Fr Gavan Jennings
In Passing: The corruption of conscience 4 by Michael Kirke
The Crown and the Primacy of Grace 8 by Bishop Robert Barron
Beginning the New Year with a Smile 11 by Rev. Donncha Ó hAodha
A part of Ireland’s heritage 16 by Pat Hanratty
The deadly dance of perfectionism 18 by Susan Martin
Character Built on Virtue 24 from opusdei.org
Books: The Madness of Crowds 28 by Margaret Hickey
Films: The Two Popes 33 by James Bradshaw
Films: Little Women 38
Editor:
Rev. Gavan Jennings
Assistant editors:
Michael Kirke, Pat Hanratty, Brenda McGann
byKurt Jensen
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Editorial M
any of us may be tempted to look back on the year and decade which has just slipped by with deep regret as at a time when our country stumbled deeper and deeper into moral nihilism. We might also justifiably be looking with trepidation at the course this moral implosion will take in the year and decade to come. But such regret and trepidation bespeak a learnt fear which is one of the greatest obstacles in the way of the re-evangelisation of Ireland. In October of 1995 Saint John Paul II gave a now famous address to the UN General Assembly. On that occasion he spoke words which we would do well to hear again as we begin a new year, and new decade: In order to ensure that the new millennium now approaching will witness a new flourishing of the human spirit, mediated through an authentic culture of freedom, men and women must learn to conquer fear. We must learn not to be afraid, we must recover a spirit of hope and a
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spirit of trust … [and] regain sight of the transcendent horizon of possibility to which the soul of man aspires. Despite all that has happened, and threatens to happen in the near future, it is imperative that we Christians “learn to conquer fear”. How often we see those words “Do not be afraid” repeated throughout Sacred Scripture. Believe it or not, all together some form of “Do not be afraid” is repeated 365 times throughout Scripture! Once for each day of the year we have just begun! Fear and pessimism produce paralysis. As Pope Francis graphically puts it in his Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium: One of the more serious temptations which stifles boldness and zeal is a defeatism which turns us into querulous and disillusioned pessimists, “sourpusses”. Nobody can go off to battle unless he is fully convinced of victory beforehand. If we start without confidence, we have already lost half the battle and we bury our talents. While painfully aware of our own frailties, we have to march on without giving in, keeping in mind what the Lord said to Saint Paul: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor 12:9). As Christians the conviction that the grace of God is “sufficient” for us has to be transformative for us: we work on the basis of guaranteed victory both in our personal struggles, as well as the battle to transform Irish society. In that vein, I would like to wish all our readers a very happy – and fearless – new year.
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In Passing: The corruption of conscience
by Michael Kirke
W
hen we read between the lines of a non-story in the Irish Independent late last year we found a sad and genuine story about the creeping new penal laws against Catholics in Ireland, returning the country, it would seem, to the dark days of the eighteenth century. We also find in it a story reflecting the current confused state of the conscience of a sizeable proportion of the Irish nation.
The real story here is that of the sad departure of true servants of the Irish people – but God’s first – from health-care provision. It is a story of new penal laws for conscientious Irish Catholics. Just like our forefathers who would have been entitled to keep their property in the eighteenth century had they been prepared to abandon their religious principles, the Sisters of Charity would have had no problem remaining on the board of any hospital they The paper reported on what was liked had they been prepared to essentially a non-issue. They as abandon their moral principles good as said so. It was about the and acquiesced in the termination carefully orchestrated process of of the lives of children waiting to transferring the property of the be born. Sisters of Charity to the State for the purposes of building Dublin’s The second related story here, again new Maternity Hospital on the discoverable by reading between St. Vincent’s site on Merrion the lines of this report, is one which Road. Canon law required that Irish establishment media refuses the Catholic Church’s highest to tell because it undermines its authority, the Holy See, needed to own chosen narrative for the Irish sign off on this before it could be people. It is the story of how the a done deal. new Progressivist Ascendancy in 4
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Ireland has worked for decades to corrupt the consciences of the Irish people to the point where they no longer subscribe to the moral principles which have been the backbone of our culture and western civilization for close on two thousand years. The story of the Sisters of Charity and St. Vincent’s Hospital today is that story in microcosm. Sadly, no one bats an eyelid when they read now that these heroic people are being driven out of Irish healthcare because of their consciences. How did this happen?
to run the two hospitals on the St Vincent’s site.” Not so long ago the collective conscience of the Irish would be screaming “Injustice” on perceiving something like this being perpetrated in their name. The drip, drip, drip of TV mockery of religion, the exploitation of scandalous behaviour of a minority – a very small minority – of clerics, and the hostility to religious education are among the catalogue of causes to which we can ascribe this degeneration of our Christian conscience.
The Independent report blandly The overriding truth is that stated: neither our State nor our media want the Irish people to reflect on The religious order said that anything that might trouble their “in May 2017 the Religious consciences. Conscientious people Sisters of Charity issued a can be a contrary lot – as a brave statement confirming that cohort of Irish medical personnel we were relinquishing all are now showing and are proving involvement and shareholding to be painful thorns in the side of in St Vincent’s Hospital Leo Varadkar, Simon Harris, Peter Group and would be stepping Boylan and Mary McAleese, to down from the St Vincent’s Healthcare Board”. “Our two sister directors resigned from the board with immediate effect,” they said. “Since then, they have no part in the ownership or management of the new hospital, nor have shares in the new entity being established 5
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name but a few in the vanguard of Any opposition, parliamentary or the Irish Progressive Ascendancy. otherwise, is negligible because of the dumbing down of the moral They want – and have been actively sense of the people. Shameful promoting for decades – the scandals have been outrageously removal of all remnants of genuine manipulated to undermine the Christian belief and values from authority of the only agency in the consciousness of the nation. the culture which still proclaims They are seeking to replace it with the perennial moral value of the the egregious and baseless moral principles which have sustained principles of what is now bizarrely our civilization for millennia. called “progressivism” – although Those who dare to protest the new it has nothing to do with genuine status quo of politically correct human progress. It is as progressive morality are branded populists – as Communism was and is. or worse. Before Christmas, in the ultrapopular annual “Toy Show” on national television’s Friday night entertainment flagship we watched a very carefully managed parade of diversity with the new progressive gender-fluid morality centre stage. It was all presented and, it would seem from the audience reaction, accepted as the new normal. It was classic and blatant media programming of the consciences of the Irish population.
It took the Irish of another time over one hundred years to break free of the draconian laws which had excluded them from public life by a Protestant Ascendancy. At the heart of that act of exclusion was the conviction that because Catholics believed that the Pope was the Vicar of Christ they could not be trusted. Ultimately it failed. The Irish of that time resisted corruption and remained faithful to what they knew was the truth about God and his loving The grip of progressivism on the relationship with mankind. minds and hearts of a majority of Irish people is now frightening. Ireland today has come a long way As a result, encouraged, cowed from the time one hundred and and then applauded by Irish fifty years ago when St John Henry and Western liberal media, our Newman defended the right of the Government has put on our statute Irish who were resisting the efforts books one set of flawed laws after of Liberal Britain to undermine the another. More are in preparation. authority of the Catholic Church. 6
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What Liberal Britain failed to do in the nineteenth century, our own Government and our media have now apparently succeeded in doing. Newman put some questions to Britain’s Liberal leader, William Gladstone, who was leading that particular charge. He was responding to a Glenstone pamphlet which had attacked the Catholic Church for attempting to exercise its apostolic mission. Newman challenged him to “Go through the long annals of Church history, century after century, and say, was there ever a time when her Bishops, and notably the Bishop of Rome, were slow to give their testimony in behalf of the moral and revealed law and to suffer for their obedience to it?”
The Irish Government today would be happy if the Catholic Church stuck to merely administering spiritual consolation, or making the sick-bed easy, or training up good members of society, or “serving tables”. However, it would like it to shut up about the Ten Commandments. The new Progressivist Ascendancy in Ireland today now excludes from healthcare provision anyone who believes that human life begins at conception and that the child awaiting birth in its mother’s womb has as much right to life as any of us.
Most false political doctrines and their enabling unjust regimes have within them the seeds of their own undoing. This one surely has, with all its false manipulative language The Catholic Church, Newman and bizarre versions of what is pointed out, had a message to the essence of human nature. But deliver to the world, – not the task unravelling takes time – this time, merely of administering spiritual we hope, not too much time. consolation, or of making the sickbed easy, or of training up good members of society, or of “serving ...the Author tables” (though all this was included in their range of duty), – Michael Kirke is a freelance writer, a but specially and directly, a definite regular contributor to message to high and low, from Position Papers, and a the world’s Maker, the message widely read blogger at Garvan Hill which it is the very mission of (www.garvan.wordpress.com). Christianity to bear witness to the His views can be responded to at Creed and Ten Commandments in mjgkirke@gmail.com. a world which is averse to them. 7
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Spoilet Alert!
The Crown and the Primacy of Grace
by Bishop Robert Barron
L
ike, I daresay, most of the English-speaking world, these past couple of years I’ve been watching episodes of The Crown, the beautifully filmed, marvelously written program on the life and times of Queen Elizabeth II. The series deals with the psychological dynamics within the royal family as well as with the cultural changes and political challenges that the Queen has faced in the course of her long reign. But what has been, at least to me, most surprising has been the insightful and sympathetic way in which it has addressed issues of faith. Especially in the first season, we saw the fairly frequent conflicts between Elizabeth’s devotion to her family and her role as head of the Church of England. In season two, there was a deeply affecting episode on the visit of Billy Graham to the UK in the mid-fifties. We saw that, despite reticence regarding the American evangelist on the part of some in the British establishment,
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the Queen found his preaching illuminating and uplifting. But in season three, the religious theme has emerged with particular and surprising clarity, especially in connection with the figure who, for my money, is the most fascinating supporting character in the series – namely, Prince Philip’s mother, Princess Alice. An heiress related to most of the royal families of Europe, a first-class eccentric (possibly schizophrenic), a mystic, and toward the end of her life, a Greek Orthodox nun dedicated to the poor, Alice could certainly be the star of her own feature film. After political unrest in Greece, the princess-nun is spirited to Buckingham Palace for her own safety, and there she beguiles and/ or confounds most of those around her. When Philip comes to see her, it seems for the first time in quite a while, she inquires as to the Prince’s
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well-being. At the end of their brief conversation, she wonders about his faith. After he gives a diffident response, she looks at him and says, “You must find your faith; it will help you.” But then, realizing immediately the inadequacy of her characterization, she looks wistfully into the middle distance and insists, “No, it doesn’t just help. It’s everything.” I cannot think of a better way to express the all-determining, all-embracing quality of authentic religious belief. Though modern etiquette dictates that faith be one feature of a person’s private life, the great masters of the spiritual tradition know that such a compartmentalized religion is no religion at all. It’s everything, or it’s a waste of time.
himself with them and their kind of heroism will restore him to psychological health, peace of soul. As the Apollo 11 mission is underway, Philip is invited to visit a group of Anglican clergymen, who are experiencing burnout and depression in their ministry. Joining their circle of discussion, he hears tales of woe, hopelessness, and unrealized dreams. Showing not an ounce of sympathy, he launches into a purely Pelagian exhortation, urging these sad men to be like “Armstrong, Aldrin, and Collins,” finding their purpose through achievement and self-determination and to stop wasting their time with morbid introspection. To the utter consternation of these suffering clergymen, the Prince then leaves their company in a huff of pitiless Now, two episodes later, the series condescension. flashes forward a few years to 1969. Princess Alice has just died, and her After the moon landing, the Apollo son, the Prince, finds himself in a astronauts pay a formal visit to midlife funk: depressed, convinced Buckingham Palace and, more than that his royal activities are trivial, a little starstruck, the Prince asks utterly dismissive of religion. At the to see them privately. Face to face same time, he’s preoccupied with with his heroes, he asks not about the exploits of the American Apollo the technicalities of flying, but astronauts – Neil Armstrong, about meaning, vision, and what Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins they learned – in the deepest sense – making their way that summer of that term – when they were on to the moon. They strike Philip, the moon. Surely these paragons of himself an accomplished pilot, as achievement will give him what he models of healthy activity, scientific wants. Instead, they tell Philip that ingenuity, and courage. He begins they just didn’t have time to muse to feel that somehow associating on such matters – at which point 9
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they commence, with childlike enthusiasm, to inquire about the perks and privileges of the royal life. With that, something shifted in the Prince – something gave way. He seemed to realize that his program of vigorous activity and self-assertion, which he had boldly advocated to the suffering clergymen, would never in fact answer the questions that had welled up in his own soul. In a remarkably moving scene, the Prince subsequently returns to the circle of priests in crisis, whom he had previously mocked and chastised, and makes a kind of confession – and then humbly asks for their help. There is so much more going on here than mere psychological insight or development – and God bless the writers of The Crown for presenting it. Throughout this episode, Prince Philip was standing on one of the great fault lines in Christianity – namely, the divide between
auto-salvation and salvation through grace. In referring above to the “Pelagian” quality of his speech to the priests, I was referencing the fifth-century theologian Pelagius, who opined that we can save ourselves through a heroic exercise of the free will. St Augustine spent the last years of his life opposing Pelagianism and insisting that peace of soul, happiness, salvation – call it what you want – comes not through self-striving but precisely through a surrender that takes place at the limit of all possible achievement. It comes, as Prince Philip rather slowly and painfully realized, not through strenuous effort, but as his mother clearly knew, through faith – a surrender to what can only be called grace. The primacy of grace, it has been argued, is the central teaching of the Bible. How wonderful that it’s also a key lesson in an episode of one of the most popular television programs of our time.
...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.
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Beginning the New Year with a Smile by Rev. Donncha Ó hAodha
Cause of our Joy I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall exult in my God; for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation, he has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself with a garland, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels (Is 61:10).
T
he Church contemplates how Mary proclaims these words in the entrance antiphon of the solemnity of the Immaculate Conception. These words of the prophet Isaiah find their New Testament echo and confirmation in the Magnificat (Lk 1:46-55). Mary’s soul overflows with joy because she is full of grace. As the woman clothed with the sun, that is to say in intimate communion with the “Sun of Justice” (Mal 4:2) who is Christ, the Blessed Virgin overflows with joy. As the Mother who brings to us our Saviour, she is “Cause of our Joy”.
It is a beautiful thing to begin each year with the Solemnity of Mary Mother of God because in this way the first thing we experience on January 1 is the smile of Our Lady. Her smile says it all Benedict XVI contemplated the smile of Mary in his homily of September 15, 2008, Memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows, at a Mass for the Sick celebrated at Lourdes as part of the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary celebrations of the apparitions:
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In the course of the apparition of Wednesday 3 March 1858, Bernadette contemplated this smile of Mary in a most particular way. It was the first response that the Beautiful Lady gave to the young visionary who wanted to know who she was. Before introducing herself, some days later as “the Immaculate Conception,” Mary first taught Bernadette to know her smile, this being the most appropriate point of entry into the revelation of her mystery. Why is Our Lady’s smile “the most appropriate point of entry into the revelation of her mystery”? Surely because Mary shows us what it means to be divinised by grace, raised to the dignity of being a child of God the Father, in Christ, by the working of the Holy Spirit. Mary’s smile reveals her identity, and also ours. “In the smile of the most eminent of all creatures, looking down on us, is reflected our dignity as children of God”, says Benedict. The Blessed Mother’s smile reminds us of who God is and who we are. From this awareness, that of our divine filiation in Christ, flows the joy which will sustain us throughout the new year and throughout our entire life. As St Josemaría put it: 12
“Happy” – The question made me think. Words have not yet been invented to express all that one feels – in the heart and in the will – when one knows oneself to be a son of God” (Furrow 61). Our Lady of Sorrows, and of the Resurrection But what of suffering? How will we remain serene and joyful as we face the problems and difficulties that may well come our way in the new year? Mary too knows about suffering. We contemplate her at the foot of the Cross, suffering to a degree no one else has ever suffered. Her sensitivity of soul is greater than that of anyone else precisely because she is utterly without sin. Yet this suffering gives way to the overwhelming joy of the Resurrection. Mary truly shares in the Passion of Jesus. St Bernard declared that the Mother of Christ entered into the Passion of her Son through her “compassion”. However as Benedict XVI reminded the multitude of sick people in Lourdes, “today Mary dwells in the joy of the Resurrection. The tears shed at the foot of the Cross have been transformed into a smile which nothing can wipe away.” The Blessed Virgin teaches us
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how to suffer with faith in the ultimate and never ending joy of the Resurrection. As most-loving Mother she also accompanies and consoles us when we are finding things hard. Pope Benedict continued:
of her who became our Mother.”
The holy Curé of Ars, St Jean Marie Vianney seems to speak from experience when he affirmed that “the heart of this good Mother is nothing but love and mercy. She wants nothing other than to see us The smile of Mary is for all, but happy. It is enough to simply turn it is directed quite particularly towards her for our prayers to be to those who suffer, so that they answered.” can find comfort and solace therein. To seek Mary’s smile Mary and the joy of the Gospel is not an act of devotional or outmoded sentimentality, but Mary’s smile is also a lesson in rather the proper expression evangelisation. She is Queen of of the living and profoundly Apostles because she is the first human relationship which binds one to bring the good news of us to her whom Christ gave us as salvation to others. Our everyday our Mother.… Within the smile apostolate of seeking to share the of the Virgin lies mysteriously beauty of Christ with others finds hidden the strength to fight an unparalleled model in how against sickness and for life. Mary shares the joy of salvation. It is enough to contemplate the The simple and sublime joy of joyful event of the Visitation, as being Mary’s children Pope St John Paul II points out: Our Lady brings us happiness above all and simply because she is our loving Mother. Gifted to us by Jesus from the Cross (cf. Jn 19:2527), she never forgets her children, and desires only their happiness. Our Lady always smiles on us. “In the very simple manifestation of tenderness that we call a smile” says Benedict XVI, “we grasp that our sole wealth is the love God bears us, which passes through the heart
The atmosphere that pervades the evangelical episode of the Visitation is joy: the mystery of the Visitation is a mystery of joy. John the Baptist exults with joy in the womb of St Elizabeth; the latter, rejoicing in the gift of motherhood, bursts out into blessings of the Lord; Mary pours forth the “Magnificat”, a hymn overflowing with Messianic joy. But what is the 13
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mysterious, hidden source of from St Josemaría: this joy? It is Jesus, whom Mary has already conceived thanks When you launch out into the to the Holy Spirit, and who apostolate, be convinced that it is already beginning to defeat is always a question of making what is the root of fear, anguish people happy, very happy: and sadness: sin, the most Truth is inseparable from true humiliating slavery for man joy (Furrow 185). (Homily, 31 May 1979). A smile for everyone The Holy Father Pope Francis constantly reminds us that our “To seek this smile (of Mary), message is the “joy of the Gospel”. is first of all to have grasped the As we begin a new year, let us ask gratuitousness of love”, says the Holy Spirit to help us imitate Benedict XVI. The smile of the the example of the Blessed Virgin, Mother of God is for everyone who spreads the “joy of the Gospel” because God “desires all people by her life and by her smile. Yes, to be saved and to come to the there will be challenges ahead for knowledge of the truth” (1 Tim sure. As Benedict XVI said at the 2:4). Hence in our apostolate we start of his pontificate: form friendships with all kinds of people and we seek to build bridges The task of the shepherd, the with everyone, even if we do not task of the fisher of men, can share some of their opinions or often seem wearisome. But it priorities, or if they seem to be or is beautiful and wonderful, are distant from or antagonistic to because it is truly a service to the Church. May we have a smile joy, to God’s joy which longs to for everyone, learn from everyone break into the world (Homily, and offer Christ to everyone. We 24 April 2005). do not impose, but we propose constantly, because we want to be What matters is to seek to imitate the continuation of God’s smile Mary, the new “ark of the covenant”, through history. by bringing Christ with us in all the ordinary circumstances of daily As we begin a new year as apostles life, anywhere and everywhere, of Jesus Christ, we may find it with anyone and everyone. From helpful to pray about the words of Our Lady’s smile we learn the truth St Josemaria: of those words of encouragement 14
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Every generation of Christians needs to redeem, to sanctify its own time. In order to do this, it must understand and share the desires of other men - one’s equals - in order to make known to them, with a gift of tongues, how they are to correspond to the action of the Holy Spirit, to that permanent outflow of rich treasures that comes from our Lord’s heart. We Christians are called upon to announce, in our own time, to this world to which we belong and in which we live, the message - old and at the same time new – of the Gospel. It is not true that everyone today - in general - is closed or indifferent to what our Christian faith teaches about man’s being and destiny. It is not true that men in our time are turned only toward the things of this earth and have forgotten to look up to heaven. There is no lack of narrow ideologies, it is true, or of persons who maintain them. But in our time we find both great desires and base attitudes,
heroism and cowardice, zeal and disenchantment: men who dream of a new world, more just and more human, and others who, discouraged perhaps by the failure of their youthful idealism, hide themselves in the selfishness of seeking only their own security or remaining immersed in their errors. To all these men and women, wherever they may be, in their more exalted moments or in their crises and defeats, we have to bring the solemn and unequivocal message of St Peter in the days that followed Pentecost: Jesus is the cornerstone, the redeemer, the hope of our lives. “For there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12) (Christ is passing by, 132-133).
...the Author Rev. Donncha Ó hAodha is the Regional Vicar of the Opus Dei Prelature in Ireland, author of several CTS booklets and a regular contributor to Position Papers.
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A part of Ireland’s heritage
by Pat Hanratty
O
n a recent short visit to New York I had the chance to see the completed restoration work on St Patrick’s Cathedral. The last time I was there, it was like a building site –scaffolding everywhere. The finished job was worth the trouble. As the picture shows, it is absolutely beautiful inside. Normally I don’t like taking photos in churches or art galleries, but on a quiet Saturday morning in November, I allowed myself a couple of snaps! Though now surrounded and somewhat dwarfed by skyscrapers, when it was built in the 1870s, it was the highest building in Manhattan. It was the fruit of an amazing effort by the bishop, the clergy and the faithful of New York. It’s extraordinary to think that only a few decades earlier, the influence of the Catholic Church in the United States was very small. What is even more extraordinary is to think of the huge contribution to building up the Church in New
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York and other US cities by Irish immigrants fleeing from famine and destitution at home. When visiting St Patrick’s I always feel a sense of justifiable pride that our forebears played such a part in the erection of this great building. I suppose part of that stems from a lack of such a cathedral in our own capital city – I feel very much a sense that it is an Irish cathedral, although I know there have always been lots of Catholics of other ethnic origins in New York and elsewhere in the USA. Everyday it is filled with Mass goers – at the times of Masses, tourists (and there are very large numbers of them too) are politely, but firmly asked to stay away from the area where Mass is being celebrated. On a typical weekday, there are seven Masses, the first one being at 7.0 a.m. and the last at 5.30 p.m. And those Masses are celebrated with great reverence and one can almost say style – no messing about, no ad-libbing of
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the prayers. And when they sing, the ethnic origin of the first three! they do so with gusto. At a time when so many of my My attention was drawn to some compatriots seem to be abandoning notices near the front of the the practice of the faith into which cathedral which mentioned how they were born, it is always salutary almost every part of the building to visit places like St Patrick’s and was restored during the period elsewhere in USA where, despite of renovation – the stained glass difficulties they share with all is brighter, the ceiling cracks Western societies, the faith seems repaired, the pews polished and more vibrant. And just like the the organ pipes cleaned. But one churches built in so many towns corner is still dusty and stained and villages in Ireland in the and will remain that way forever. middle of the nineteenth century, the impoverished masses who In the South spire at the access emigrated sacrificed themselves to point to the great wooden attic, build so many fine churches and the windows are filthy, and marked indeed schools. It is a heritage we with strange graffiti – over the must never lose. years workers and even firefighters scrawled their names and on dates between 1999 and 2001 four men from the New York Fire Department left their marks while carrying out fire safety inspections. All four perished at Ground Zero on September 11, 2001. In 2006 the rector of St Patrick’s made the formal decision that those names would remain forever. The men were Michael Brennan, Paul Gill, Michael Lynch and Leonard Ragaglia – no marks for guessing ...the Author 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.
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The deadly dance of perfectionism
by Susan Martin
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s a child, I never knew exactly what my dad did, but I knew that his office was the first place where I had ever seen anatomical pink and magenta models of the uterus and the embryo. I remember sitting with my mother in our family station wagon and looking up into the exotic jungle of scarlet bougainvillea that pressed against the glass of his beautiful corner office, displaying its deeply ridged flowers, just like the pink plastic model. My father and I used to race each other up the stairs of the Population Center, and I remember the feeling of my heart pounding in my chest as I reached the last step before he did. I would triumphantly turn around and wait for his brown shoes and white cotton socks to appear on the top step before jumping out so that he could pretend to be surprised. Beating my father up the stairs
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confirmed my feeling that someone wanted me. I was strong and fast, and thus worthy of my father’s love. (Later, this would develop into a mania for long-distance running and endurance training.) “Wantedness” was originally a term coined to describe a mother’s attitude toward the birth of a child. Sociologists decided that the degree to which a birth was wanted could be measured by accounting for less than perfect timing, less than perfect finances, or simply emotional hesitancy on the part of the mother. Yet its wider applications had more to do with phenomenology than with science. It could describe a person’s value in the social economy and the environmental factors limiting that value. As I grew older, moved out, went to college, and began a career, my father would return periodically to the question of wantedness.
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He would ask me if I was content with my life’s circumstances, my partner or boyfriend, and so forth. It was his way of measuring my happiness.
and men who could only prove self-worth through professional achievement. As adults, we switched academic institutions and professional specializations frequently, and did not let He taught me that there was ourselves be taken in by marriage nothing more important than or even by long-term professional arranging your life in such a way commitments. Being depressed or as to create a balance between your heartbroken was just the price of “wantedness” and the events of having a career. your life. It was essential to make careful choices in order to achieve The unspoken promise that was the outcomes you wanted. Yet, to embedded in perfectionism was me, it seemed even more important that the political system would to make the right choices to eventually reward high-achieving ensure that I would continue to people by having our sexuality set be wanted by others. At any of free from the conditions of biology life’s crossroads, I might slip into a through advances in contraceptive state of “unwantedness” simply by technology – a promise especially making the wrong decision. aimed at women academics: do everything right, and the political Where family planning stated that system will make sure that sex educated reproductive choices stayed far away from sexual resulted in better families, the reproduction. unspoken assumption was that educated sexual choices would help The Gospel of public health separate sex from reproduction. As a child, I concluded that the “right” I grew up within the emerging behaviors were those that resulted culture of population studies and in being continually wanted by maternal and child health. My my parents, and then by friends father, J. Richard Udry, and his and peers. Surprisingly enough, colleagues sought to bring the new the result of being exposed to science of fertility measurement third-world countries, wantedness was not conformism, to thereby preventing an imagined but a rigid perfectionism based on population explosion of unwanted achievement. births. Behind the new science of My conclusions were shared by population studies, however, lay a whole generation of women the old science of eugenics. 19
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North Carolina, like many other southern states, still had sterilization programs in place until the mid-nineteen-seventies. Politically and culturally liberal social scientists reframed eugenics in updated language, emphasizing the need to give women control over their fertility and then rewarding them if they made decisions to have fewer children. In the fairy tale world of public health, no mother would ever again have a baby and then suffer with feelings of guilt or regret, and no child or teenager would ever again feel pressured into gender roles that didn’t suit his or her deepest inclinations. Potential fathers would voluntarily register for sterilization rather than produce children in less than ideal environments or prevent their wives from pursuing educational and financial opportunities. All this would come about by discipling communities in the new science of family planning. The gospel of public health said that women’s desire to have children and nurture the young could be modified through education. Educating the mother of the household about contraceptives would result automatically in smaller families, because that’s what “everyone wanted.” Public health continuously projected the 20
image of reproductive progress: a perfectible male and a perfectible female to go along with a perfectible human family, shorn of excesses to fit into a modern world. One of the target geographical areas for the new science of fertility control was southeast Asia, and Thailand in particular. As the Population Center’s funding grew, it began to attract large numbers of students from Thailand and India. On Friday nights, graduate students from Thailand would gather at our house to play table tennis and talk shop in the basement. Part of the idea of these get-togethers was to introduce the graduate students to American academic culture and to model the benefits of family planning and fertility control. The family was presented not just as a procreative and biological unit, but as an aesthetic and social one. The symmetrical ideal was a family of four, and this “family planning pyramid” began to appear everywhere on posters and flyers related to family health. As one part of a two-child family, my sister and I were supposed to model this ideal – the lower the number of children, the more likely it is that the individual child will be intelligent, gifted, and nurtured. I felt this pressure keenly. To be loved and wanted, and to do my
A REVIEW OF CATHOLIC AFFAIRS
part to spread the gospel, I knew that I had to play my part perfectly.
as a human being. Any time I attempted a new undertaking, it had to be perfect. I already knew A dangerous dance that I had to continually win my In his work, my Dad made parents’ approval and attention to numerous trips to Bangkok. Once, continue to be “wanted.” It was he brought me a little dancing only natural that the same should golden prince from Thailand, with apply to my other relationships. crescent shoes and a hat shaped When I was ten years old, my like a little, upside-down golden father’s sister died after an overdose cup. He danced with one arm up of sleeping pills. My parents told and one arm down, standing on me it was because “she could not the end of one of his long, pointed control her own fertility.” I did not shoes. know if they meant that she had In spite of his placid expression, suffered through an unplanned the prince’s dance looked very pregnancy and abortion, or if my difficult. If he moved too quickly four cousins were just too much to one side or the other, the pagoda for her. In any case, I concluded hat might slide off. If he did not that motherhood had gotten in stand correctly, his shoes would the way of what my aunt really surely bend, and he would stumble wanted: fewer children. to the ground. To me, negotiating Clearly, “being in control” was friendships felt like the dance of very important. I must learn the Thai prince: my ankles ached to do it very well, for if I failed, and my arms throbbed, but I I might pay with my life. The didn’t dare stop proving that I was prospect that losing control over worthy of being wanted. fertility could so quickly lead One day, in the fourth grade, to lethal “unwantedness” made we learned a polka in which we the idea of having a family very had to change partners. I was so dangerous. Since I was female and upset at the thought of my best soon to enter puberty, it seemed to friend dancing with someone make me dangerous, too. else that I walked up to the new The gospel of family planning was girl and kicked her sharply in the not only preached in Southeast shins. Any time I was rejected in Asia. It was also taught to us a friendship, I interpreted it as at school. “Health class” now a final judgment on my worth meant “sex” class, and sexual 21
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experimentation seemed to be the only acceptable way to become a healthy person. I was taught to apply the new philosophy of sexual freedom to constructing myself.
house – a form of verbal warfare in which science always won. Contempt was heaped on those of differing political, cultural, or intellectual views. Even as an adult, these lessons lingered. I had Any conclusions based on a pathological need to prove that I biological clues as to my sex were to was smart by putting others down be ignored on the grounds that they – a practice that has sadly become were too conservative and would a standard feature of social science. constrain me to follow traditional gender roles. All conclusions The language of “wantedness” based on my individual gifts, hurts children – and adults inclinations, and predispositions were to be evaluated according to Today, we are living in a society the social standard of progress, where the ideals of family planning and I was rewarded for making that were envisioned in the decisions that went counter to my seventies have largely been realized. The way couples talk about family own biological sex. size and fertility in casual settings Well into college and graduate has been so touched by “the magic school, my perfectionistic quest wand of family planning” that we to be wanted corroded my soul, imagine there is one-hundredmind, and body. There were now so percent correspondence between many conditions being placed on an imagined number of births and what could make me desirable – as the shape of the families we have. a student, as a potential mate, or as an employee – that I couldn’t win. Not only family size, but the I could no longer reliably know sex and genetic makeup of a how to make myself desirable in birth are subject to the rubric of the eyes of the world. It was better, “wantedness.” I decided, to work on fulfilling my Even when people talk about their own wants and desires. personal fertility, no one questions The fear I had developed about the logic of “wanted vs. unwanted friendships in grade school turned births.” Yet when this kind of into a tendency to verbally tear rhetoric permeates a society, the down other women who dared to first thing to go is the capacity challenge my fragile ego. Sarcasm to form and sustain long-term had been the daily catechism in our relationships of the kind that hold 22
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the family together, like marriage. The decision to have children ceases to be something that people plan for by becoming married. Instead, it is viewed as extraneous to marriage as an institution.
not be criticized, and any challenge had to be met with total resistance.
The effects of the family planning rhetoric of the 1970s changed a generation. One can hear the echoes in the way we talk about the family today. Classifying human beings as “wanted” and “unwanted” has insidious and enduring effects. Instead of family bonds, it creates groups of human beings who have to prove they are worthy of life before receiving it.
The ideology behind the perfect family was not nearly as pretty as the sterile plastic models of the womb looked. The beautiful pink and magenta models of the womb in the big, sunny office never became what they should have become: life. The ideology said that families would be improved when sex was kept far from birth, and that when a relationship or a person was no longer wanted, one simply did away with it, setting it aside to die like one of my father’s potted plants.
For my generation of late babyboomers, we were not so much career-driven as driven to achieve in any area. We delayed child-rearing, and opted for long-distance relationships that lasted only until the next academic opportunity arose. Instead of being resilient, we were unable to endure conflict and were crushed under criticism, a disease that ruined collegial cooperation and stifled academic discourse. Our assumptions could
Over time, anatomical models became frightening to me, because they never changed – the embryos were always suspended, never complete. The plants in the office window continued to fascinate me though, especially the “Crown of Thorns,” a tangled tree that forced scarlet flowers up through wooden thorns. Messy, tangled, and uncontrolled, it was a survivor, a desert tree, that continued to produce life even in old age. ...the Author
Susan Martin writes about gender, fertility and memory from the perspective of a non-Jewish person walking on the soil where the killing of millions of Jewish people took place. She studies the boundaries between historical record and the recording of memory in the body as it influences current cultural issues of gender identity. This article originally appeared in Public Discourse: The Journal of the Witherspoon Institute (see: www.thepublicdiscourse.com) and is reprinted with permission.
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Character Built on Virtue
from opusdei.org
A
s he was setting out on his journey, a man ran up and knelt before him, and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” (Mark 10.17). As disciples of our Lord, we witness the scene together with the Apostles, and may find ourselves surprised by his answer: Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. Jesus does not give a direct reply. With gentle divine pedagogy, he wants to lead that man to an awareness of the deepest meaning of his longing: “Jesus shows that the young man’s question is really a religious question, and that the goodness that attracts and at the same time obliges man has its source in God, and indeed is God himself. God alone is worthy of being loved ‘with all one’s heart, and with all one’s soul, and with all one’s mind.’” To enter Life Our Lord right away returns to that person’s daring question: what must I do? If you would enter life, he answers, keep the commandments. The Gospels portray the young man as an observant Jew who might have been satisfied with this reply. The Master has confirmed him in his convictions, by pointing to the commandments he has observed since early childhood. But he wants this new Rabbi who teaches with authority to spell them out clearly. 24
He rightly suspects that Christ can open up for him undreamt of horizons. Which?, he asks. Jesus reminds him of the duties that have to do with our neighbour: You shall not kill, You shall not commit adultery, You shall not steal, You shall not bear false witness, Honour your father and mother, and, You shall love your neighbour as yourself. These are the precepts of the so-called “second tablet” that safeguard “the good of the person, the image of God, by protecting his goods.” They are the first stage, the path towards freedom, and not yet perfect freedom, as Saint Augustine remarks. In other words, they are the first phase on the path of love, but not yet a mature, fully developed love. What do I still lack? The young man knows and puts into practice these prescriptions, but his heart is asking him for more. Surely there must be something more he can do. Jesus reads his heart, and looking upon him loved him. Our Lord puts to him the challenge of his life: You lack one thing; go, sell what you have, and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me. Christ has placed this man squarely before his own conscience, his freedom, his desire to be better. We don’t know to what extent he has understood the Master’s requests, although
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from his own question, What do I still lack?, it would seem that he was expecting other “things to do.” His dispositions are good, though perhaps he has not yet understood the need to interiorise the meaning of God’s commandments.
away sad, as happens to anyone who prefers to do things his own way, instead of letting God take the lead and surprise him. God has called us to live with his freedom: hac libertate nos Christus liberavit. And deep down, our heart cannot settle The life God is calling us to is not for less. simply a question of doing good To grow in maturity means to things, but of being good, of being learn to live our life in keeping virtuous. As Saint Josemaría said, it with high ideals. It is not just a is not enough to be “goodish”; rather matter of knowing a set of precepts, we must strive to be good, in keeping or of acquiring an ever clearer with the vast horizon Jesus opens up perception of the consequences before us: One there is who is good. of our actions. To decide to be Christian maturity means taking good, in a word holy, means to control of our life, asking ourselves identify ourselves with Christ, truly, before God, what we may still discovering the reasons for the way lack. We are spurred to leave the of life he offers us. Thus it requires comfort zone of merely “fulfilling” understanding the meaning of the the law, to discover that what really moral norms that teach us about matters is following Jesus, in spite the goods we should aspire to, how of our own mistakes. Then we will to attain a life that is truly fulfilled. allow his teachings to transform our And this is only possible if we enrich way of thinking and feeling. We will our way of being with the Christian experience how our heart, which virtues. used to be small and shrunken, expands with the freedom God places there: I have run the way of your commandments when you enlarged my heart!
Pillars of character
Moral knowledge is not an abstract discourse, nor a technique. The formation of our moral conscience requires a strengthening of our The challenge of moral formation character that is grounded on the The young man didn’t expect that virtues as its pillars. Virtues reinforce “what he was lacking” was precisely our personality, rendering it stable placing his life at God’s feet and and even-tempered. They enable serving others, shedding his sense of us to rise above ourselves, our selfsecurity as a “fulfiller.” And he went centredness, and focus our concern on God and others. A virtuous 25
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person is “poised,” with the right measure in all things, upright, selfpossessed and well-rounded. Those who are short on virtue, in contrast, will find it hard to undertake significant projects or to give shape to high ideals. They will be forever improvising and lurching to and fro, and end up being unreliable, even for themselves. Fostering virtues enlarges our freedom. Virtue has nothing to do with getting used to situations or acting out of routine. To be sure, a single action is not enough for a good operative habit to take root, to shape our way of being and make it easier for us to do good. Habits are formed thanks to repeated actions: we become good by being good. To act once and again upon the resolution of getting down to study at a set time, for example, renders every successive effort a little less costly. But we need to persevere in this effort in order to preserve the habit of study, or otherwise it might be lost. Renewing our spirit Virtues, both human and supernatural, direct us towards the good, towards the attainment of our deepest aspirations. They help us reach true happiness, union with God: This is eternal life, that they know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent. They make it easier to act in accord with 26
moral precepts, which are no longer seen as rules to follow but as a path leading to Christian perfection, to identification with Christ in the life marked out by the beatitudes. The beatitudes, a portrait of Christ’s face, “speak of basic attitudes and dispositions in life” that lead us to eternal life. The path of growth in Christian life then opens up before us, as Saint Paul exhorts: Be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may prove what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. Grace transforms the way we judge events and gives us new criteria for action. We gradually learn to adjust our way of seeing things to God’s will, expressed also in the moral law. This path leads to the forging, as Saint Josemaría said, of a “person of sound judgment.” But what are the characteristics of this sound judgment? Elsewhere he says that it “requires maturity, firm convictions, sufficient doctrinal knowledge, a refined spirit and an educated will.” What an excellent portrait of a Christian personality! We need the maturity required to make decisions with interior freedom and to take responsibility for them. Also firm and sure convictions, based on a deep knowledge of Christian doctrine, acquired through formational classes or talks, reading good books, reflection, and especially
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through the good example given by others, since “the true guiding stars of our life are the people who have lived good lives.”
gaze fixed on Him, not on ourselves. Therefore we need to reject any tendency to “perfectionism” that might arise were we to erroneously focus our inner struggle in terms of Fruit of love efficiency or results. While such an Thus moral behaviour, specified in approach may be quite common in living out the commandments under certain professional environments, it the impetus of the virtues, stems from disfigures the Christian moral life. love, which spurs us to seek and foster moral goodness. This love is much Holiness lies above all more than just feelings, which by in loving God their very nature are fluctuating and Maturity leads to harmonising the fleeting. It does not depend on our desire to act uprightly with the real mood or what we like or would prefer limitations that we experience in to do in a given situation. Rather, ourselves and in others. We may to love and be loved means to give sometimes feel inclined to make ourselves, in a self-giving grounded Saint Paul’s words our own: I do on the awareness that we are loved by not understand my own actions. For God, and on the high ideals that are I do not do what I want, but I do the worth staking our freedom on. very thing I hate . . . Wretched man Christian perfection is not restricted that I am! Who will deliver me from to fulfilling a set of rules, nor to this body of death? We won’t lose our striving for isolated goals such as self- peace, though, since God tells us, control or efficiency. Rather it leads as he did the Apostle: My grace is to surrendering our freedom to our sufficient for you. Lord, responding to his invitation with the help of his grace: Come, follow me. Rather than rules, it is a question of adhering to Jesus, of sharing in his life and destiny, in loving obedience to his Father’s will.
Here, too, Christians find a firm reference point in Jesus’ first reply to that young man: One there is who is good. The life of God’s children is grounded in his goodness. He gives us the strength to direct our whole life towards what is truly valuable, to Avoiding “perfectionism” understand what is good and to love The determination to grow in it, in order to render ourselves fit for maturity by strengthening the virtues the mission He has entrusted to us. is far removed from a narcissistic This article is a slightly shortened quest for perfection. We struggle out version of the original of love for our Father God, with our which appears in opusdei.org 27
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Books: The Madness of Crowds
by Margaret Hickey
The Madness of Crowds: Gender, Race and Identity Douglas Murray Bloomsbury, 2019
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h e Madness of Crowds explores the confusion and contradiction, the fury and fanaticism at the heart of identity politics. Under the headings of “gay”, “women”, “race” and “transgender”, British author and journalist, Douglas Murray, examines the inverse relationship between advances in rights for women and minorities and the escalating militancy of campaigns for justice and equality. What seemed like victory or breakthrough for one wave of activists appears in time to have been no more than an advance to a new position where an even greater battle has to be fought.
conflicts are complex and they can intersect. He traces the origin of the lexicon of grievances to fringe academic studies that have been edging more and more into the mainstream. Originating in the 1980s, Women’s Studies have been joined by Gender Studies, LGBT Studies, Queer Studies, White Studies and of course any number of unconscious bias training courses and workshops. This is where terms like “toxic masculinity”, “white privilege” and “male privilege” were minted.
One of the many ironies the book reveals is that the academic freedom that weaponised today’s social warriors is frequently denied to contemporary academics when their findings are seen to undermine the ideologies in vogue. Murray cites examples Murray delves deeply and widely including research that suggests across a social and political the differences between the sexes landscape criss-crossed with goes beyond genitalia. Authors of battle lines because identity such offensive findings, no matter 28
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how qualified, are denounced as purveyors of hate. The bizarre thing is that often colleagues and their employer universities do not support them allowing their careers to be destroyed by ideologues who have not read let alone understood their research and its methodologies. Leading feminist writer, Camille Paglia, has long acknowledged that issues for women around motherhood are largely unexplored. New terminology that replaces “mothers” and “fathers” with the single term “parent” is yet another ploy to shove such considerations out of acceptable discourse. Attending a women’s conference about the effects of “toxic masculinity” on womens” career advancement, Murray was struck by the aura of wealth and success around participants as well as their high maintenance glossy glamour. These were the women who “lean in” without it would appear toppling over. Yet to say they were angry and aggrieved would be an understatement. The mere fact of being female, particularly female and of child bearing years, held them back, they protested. They would always be held back until some great systemic upheaval overthrew the “patriarchy”. The narrative of oppression, Murray tells us, has geared up to
a point where it claims that it is women’s superiority, not just their equality, that is being suppressed. “Men are trash” is a common slogan and not just because they discriminate against women but because they are actually inferior. Even Christine Lagarde has stated that if Lehmann Brothers had been Lehmann Sisters, the banking collapse of 2008 might not have happened. Murray notes the apparent unawareness of the contradiction of claiming both equality and superiority, which
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denotes difference, at the same time. He does not however delve more into the wellsprings of the disproportionate anger and grievance. Other than a hand sweep in the direction of motherhood and its emotional and psychological implications for women, he leaves us alone to consider the question. Nor does he address the greatest contradiction of all which is the obsession with low stake inequalities while countless women across the globe and in the recesses of our own society suffer harrowing, unspeakable suffering and exploitation. Because of modern media we know of them. Some by name. Assia Bibi, Nasrin Soutedeh, Meliana. Sisterly solidarity like minority solidarity appears to stay within the peer group. The sexual and gender identities lumped together in the LGBT acronym are often described as “a community”. Murray however rejects this notion. They are disparate groups and their agendas often collide. Leading feminists have taken issue with the idea that a biological man who has socially transitioned can be regarded in the same way as those designated female at birth. Feminists with otherwise impeccable credentials 30
like Germaine Greer and Julie Bindel have been black listed, vilified and endlessly trolled whenever they surface in pubic life. Clashes of opinion also arise with gay parenting which is problematic on a number of counts for feminists. The feminist view that there are no differences between men and women “from the neck up” is at odds with transgender theory which holds that what you feel inside your head is what determines gender and that genitalia are largely irrelevant. The experience of transwomen who find that oestrogen combined with testosterone blockers changes their choices in books and films along with their emotional responses also challenges the feminist view that differences between the sexes is only genital. Murray recounts how the travel writer and journalist, James Morris who transitioned to Jan Morris found that as a man he had focussed more on “great affairs” and as a woman on “small affairs”. This paralleled a change in writing focus from places to people. The awarding of national accolades for women to transwomen like Caitlin Jenner is something else that riles feminists. Further differences arise between transgender people who insist that gender is hard wired and those who define themselves as gender fluid or non-binary. Murray uses the privilege his own
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gay status gives him to question if the rise in transgenderism isn’t to some degree about gay people searching for easier access to potential partners. When it comes to race, the contradictions and conflicts and the “catastrophising” anger are amplified to absurdity. In Yale university a world renowned sociology academic, Nicholas Christakis and his wife, also a tenured academic in Yale, were verbally abused on campus with a ferocity and venom reminiscent of Mao’s red guards’ attacks on those suspected of counter-revolutionary tendencies.The only difference was that the onslaught remained verbal. Their offence was that Erika Christakis had questioned the appropriateness of the university issuing guidelines to students about Halloween costumes. The menacing in the language and continued trolling was enough to force Erika Christakis from her job. The offence of cultural appropriation in dress and costume has become a proxy war for deep seated resentment rooted in the endless stoking of old wrongs. Even food can be a trigger. When British Labour MP, Dawn Butler, attacked chef Jamie Oliver for the temerity of appropriating and then adapting a West Indian recipe we get a good sense of just
how unpredictable the cultural minefield is. Again, it is not merely the taking of offence where one might think a compliment could be just as easily taken. It is the “catastrophising” of the offence. What might seem at most a lapse in etiquette is characterised as a desecrating violation, a new form of colonisation. As Murray points out many times, it is extraordinary that when things were never so good for minority rights that activists make is look like things were never so bad and not only bad but getting worse. Rows over the casting of white actors in stories about other ethnicities is yet another battle line which sits oddly with the inclusion of actors of colour in Shakespearean plays and opera, a development which is considered positive and progressive. All this inchoate anger needs further analysis. Disproportionate anger tends to be displaced. Murray’s book offers a vivid exposé of where we are now and the black knot of contradictions embedded in identity politics. He does not probe for root causes. He does, however offer some pointers. Postfaith culture has kept “the guilt, sin and shame without the means of redemption”. It offers “judgment without mercy”. At another point he observes that “virtue has 31
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taken the place of faith”. And the Internet, both social media and Big Data enforce the new religion even to the point where search engines are coded to imprint the new mores on the facts. A search for famous scientists for instance will throw up scientists of colour before Einstein or Darwin. Murray offers some bizarre examples across several subject searches.
“safe space” at some crucial point in childhood? What is behind the seemingly insatiable neediness, the insecurity, the emotional brittleness, the “snowflake” vulnerability?
Murray, who has described himself as “a Christian atheist” or “an atheist Christian” has probably found his way to the nub of the matter leaving it, for now at least, The demand for “safe spaces” to the reader to reflect further. And points to something even more that is a very good point for such a interesting. Having won signal stimulating book to end. victories, minority activists still cling to the barricades, “as if they had no home to go to”. When ...the Author Professor Christakis, defending Margaret Hickey freedom of expression, told has written articles on social, cultural a protester that Yale was “an and faith issues for intellectual space” she yelled, “it The Irish Examiner, is not an intellectual space, it’s Human Life Review (US), The Irish Times, The Furrow and The a home”. One must ask if our Irish Catholic. She is a mother of three boomer generation has not in some and lives with her husband in Blarney. way failed to give their children a
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adver tising
10minuteswithjesus.org
A REVIEW OF CATHOLIC AFFAIRS
Films: The Two Popes by James Bradshaw
Oddly, the director Fernando Meirelles suggests that some animosity has existed between the two men for a long time, even before the 2005 papal conclave in which Bergoglio finished as runner-up. An argument quickly he release of Netflix’s The Two ensues in the garden, one which Popes has achieved something will be renewed (though in friendly truly remarkable by drawing terms) throughout the two hour public attention not just to Pope film. Francis, but to his predecessor Pope Benedict XVI as well. Their disagreements are presented in simple form. Pope Benedict The basic idea and plot is a very is an arch-conservative and clever one. Towards the end obsessed with upholding Church of Pope Benedict’s papacy, the teaching; Cardinal Bergoglio is the Archbishop of Buenos Aires Jorge progressive moderniser. Bergoglio Bergoglio is summoned to the dresses as simply as he can, and is depicted living and preaching Vatican to discuss his intention amongst Argentina’s poorest to resign. Benedict is physically people. In contrast – and hardly a ailing and the Church is under moment goes by in the movie when immense pressure, not least due that contrast is not exaggerated to the sexual abuse crisis. When to the greatest possible degree – Bergoglio arrives at the Pope’s Benedict is detached, living in summer retreat, he is confronted relative opulence and near solitude in the garden by Benedict. behind his Church’s high walls. Director: Fernando Meirelles Produced by: Netflix Genres: Biography, Comedy, Drama
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“You have been one of my harshest critics,” Benedict scolds him as they sit together in the garden. “The way you live is a criticism.”
Anthony Hopkins (Benedict) and Jonathan Pryce (Francis) to work their magic. That they do, for two wonderful hours, and it is worth seeing The Two Popes to witness The dialogue between the two their performances alone. evolves as a rapport grows, and it gradually becomes clear to Fictional or not – and this story and Cardinal Bergoglio that this visit dialogue is most definitely fictional to Rome is no mere formality: he – there is something here which is has been summoned for a reason, deeply compelling. The loneliness one which only becomes clear as of the papacy must be hard to we begin to see a side of Benedict’s comprehend. There has not been mind which extends beyond the a time for almost a millennium upholding of tradition. where one Pope could meet with another. Pope Benedict and Pope The Two Popes is receiving very good Francis meet here on a near-equal reviews, which has surprised some footing, and the film is at its best secular observers. There is much to in those tender moments when the admire in it. The writer, Anthony two very different characters turn McCarten, is a terrific story-teller to one another while struggling who has written some of the most with the sins of the past: in what enjoyable movies in recent years: they have done, and in what they The Theory of Everything (about the have failed to do. life of Stephen Hawking), Darkest Hour (about Churchill’s decision But there is a great deal that to continue the fight against Hitler is wrong with this film, which in 1940) and last year’s wonderful presents an erroneous vision of the Bohemian Rhapsody. Catholic Church, not to mention of the two men who have most It is beautifully shot too: recently taken on the awesome particularly the engrossing scene responsibility of leading it. In where the two clerics converse particular, there is a clear agenda against the backdrop of the Sistine to damage the reputation of the Chapel. It is a story based around already much-maligned Pope a dialogue between two key Emeritus. characters, and so the director has a great deal of room to allow the From the initial conversation two magnificent Welsh stage actors onwards, the theological or 34
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philosophical differences between Benedict and Francis are greatly exaggerated, with the emphasis always being placed on the reasonableness of Cardinal Bergoglio’s supposed viewpoints, and how they contrast with the stubborn dogmatism of the pontiff he will eventually replace. Pope Benedict, his future successor as much as says to his face, is too obsessed with issues like compulsory celibacy, sexual morality or the Latin Mass. Cardinal Bergoglio is altogether more worldly. When asked by Pope Benedict what he would have done had he prevailed in the 2005 conclave, Bergoglio does not mention God or Catholicism. Instead, the Archbishop of Buenos
Aires says his first priority would be reforming the Vatican Bank, and then doing something about global banking system more generally. Towards the end, the film is peppered with scenes where Francis calls for greater solidarity with the poor, or where he engages in charitable deeds. This, it is implied, represents a new and more positive face of the Catholic Church, unlike Benedict who apparently never left the papal apartments except to condemn some vice or wade into some culture war. The director and the writer appear to be fervent believers in the dominant narrative about the Church being embroiled in a
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culture war between conservatives and liberals, disciples of Benedict and disciples of Francis. But the Vatican is not a state riven by political divisions, and a papal conclave does not resemble an American presidential primary. Pope Francis and Pope Benedict have both dedicated their long lives to the same 2,000 year-old Church. They follow the example of the same Saviour, they pray to the same God, they uphold the same Magisterium and they preach the same Gospel. There is no great division in worldview, only relatively minor ones, the sort of minor disagreements which always exist between families or friends.
make the Vatican the world’s first carbon-neutral state? Alternatively, would they know that Pope Francis has compared abortion to contract killing, denounced gender ideology repeatedly and slammed the “ideological colonisation” which would enforce liberal social policies on developing countries? Hardly: sometimes myths are easier to believe in.
In this film, the image presented of Francis is that of a man who has changed with time – in part due to the experiences of living under the right-wing junta in Argentina – and who now stands ready to dramatically change Church The obvious warmth between teaching as well. Disappointingly the Pope and the Pope Emeritus for those of that school of (which can be observed in their thought, almost seven years after public meetings) is proof of this, his election, Pope Francis remains and when accepted, the premise Catholic. of The Two Popes quickly begins to fall asunder. More importantly, And the smart money is betting the real-life records of the two men that the next Pope will be Catholic show that neither portrayal is fair too. or accurate. The greatest flaw in The Two Popes Would the director Meirelles or the is not to do with Francis however, writer McCarten be aware that Pope but with Benedict, and how he Benedict issued a papal encyclical, is portrayed. Given how many in Caritas in veritate, calling for a the Western media and cultural reformed United Nations with elite depicted Joseph Ratzinger increased powers to regulate the for so long, the fact that he is world’s financial systems, or that not made out to be an outright he presided over the efforts to monster might be considered a 36
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success. In fact, several reviewers – such as Hilary White in The Irish Independent, and Donald Clarke in The Irish Times – have suggested that Benedict gets off lightly here, thanks to the filmmakers’ decision to portray him as human. That being said, there is much less complexity in the portrait of the Pope Emeritus, and it is to the eternal credit of Anthony Hopkins that he manages to draw so much out of playing a role which is deliberately one-dimensional. The viewer is treated to a very powerful series of flashbacks about the young Bergoglio showing how the young man had a bright future with his scientific work and girlfriend before he decided to enter the seminary, and showing the great struggles he faced in defending his friends when Argentina was in the grip of tyrants. He is haunted by his failings, and confesses them to Benedict in the Sistine Chapel before receiving absolution from him. Touching, and well and good. But Joseph Ratzinger also had a past, one that is completely ignored by the director. It is as if Benedict came into the world as an ancient and curmudgeonly German. A more nuanced and more interesting film would have given the viewer a glimpse of a young
Bavarian boy who was precociously gifted, and whose family and Church endured persecution by a government far worse than that which governed Argentina in the 1970s. After his country had been reduced to rubble, the same boy would dedicate his life to God and scholarship. He would become an influential academic and distinguished theologian, and he would foresee generations in advance the challenges which Europe would face as Christianity fades away in its historical heartland. Sadly, The Two Popes fails to shine much light on either man, preferring to present viewers with a striking contrast between two walking caricatures. With the right script and direction, this could have been a masterpiece. It isn’t. But for all its failings, it is enjoyable: a good story about two very good men.
...the Author James Bradshaw works in an international consulting firm, based in Dublin, and is a regular contributor to Position Papers.
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Films: Little Women by Kurt Jensen
Director: Greta Gerwig Produced by: Columbia Pictures Genres: Drama, Romance
W
riter-director Greta Gerwig, who proved her bona fides as a screen moralist in 2017 with Lady Bird, has repeated the feat with her elegant, vibrantly emotional adaptation of the 19thcentury classic “Little Women” (Sony). This interpretation of Louisa May Alcott’s novel, the fourth major film version since 1933, turns it into a non-linear memory play. Its framing device consists of flashbacks in the mind of the adult Jo March (Saoirse Ronan). All four of the tight-knit March sisters, who grow up in Massachusetts during the Civil War, with their father away as a military chaplain, were artistically 38
inclined. But only Jo has become a professional writer. As a result of this look-back approach, there are no surprises. Gerwig shows, early on, how everyone has ended up. In this way, the much-beloved episodes of the novel – the burning of Jo’s first manuscript, selfish Amy (Florence Pugh) falling through the ice, sweet Meg (Emma Watson) at the debutante ball, and the saintly love of Beth (Eliza Scanlen) – are shown as foreshadowings of their future characters. The siblings are also seen happily settling into the
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adult responsibilities of marriage which demonstrate that the March and families. sisters are sadly aware of how the law and societal norms constrict This could possibly be off-putting their independence and ambitions. for those most familiar with the Women at the time were considered book and previous film versions, little more than male property, but Gerwig is patiently striving to with few legal rights of their own. make the story relevant. She’s not Amy and Meg would like to marry delivering a lecture, and neither for love. But they’re also intensely is she trying to confuse anyone. clear-eyed about how the power She clearly loves these girls, at the relationship between the sexes same time underlining historical works. context. “Don’t sit there and tell me The framing also lets Gerwig that marriage isn’t an economic sharpen the connection between proposition, because it is,” says Alcott and the free-spirited Jo, who Amy, the aspiring painter who knows how to handle a recalcitrant knows she’ll never be considered publisher, Mr Dashwood (Tracy a great talent. Jo, who longs to be Letts), adroitly after he dryly financially independent so she can advises her, “If the main character’s support her mother, reflects, “I a girl, make sure she’s married by can’t get over my disappointment at being a girl.” Even matriarch the end. Or dead. Either way.” Marmee (Laura Dern), as strong as Gerwig has added lines, some she appears, concedes, “I’m angry taken from Alcott’s other writings, nearly every day of my life.”
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Additional wry commentary about love and money is occasionally provided by rich Aunt March (Meryl Streep), who often makes pronouncements on what she thinks are the girls’ poor choices, although her love and generosity are never in doubt.
The film contains mature themes, including death. The Catholic News Service classification is A-II – adults and adolescents. The Motion Picture Association rating is PG – parental guidance suggested. Some material may not be suitable for children.
The powerful themes of motherhood, bonds of sisterhood and social service to help those in need are also clearly present. The girls ultimately all follow their hearts, which is the source of the story’s lasting appeal. Jo realizes that her critic, Friedrich Bhaer (Louis Garrel), isn’t as cruel as he first appears. Meg marries an impecunious tutor, John Brooke (James Norton). The vain Amy finally lands the feckless Laurie (Timothee Chalamet) after Jo turns him down. And Beth, whose beautiful piano playing brings neighbor Mr. Laurence (Chris Cooper) to tears, can’t avoid her destiny – a fatal illness. As literature brought to the screen, this version should endure for quite a long time. Moviegoers who already love these characters will get the lush presentation they hope to see. Gerwig’s occasional alterations, moreover, prove she’s equally adept at accurate history and subtle moral messaging. 40
...the Author Kurt Jensen is a guest reviewer for Catholic News Service. Copyright (c) 2019 Catholic News Service. Reprinted with permission from CNS. www.catholicnews.com
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