CATHOLIC CHURCH DIVIDED OVER WAR:

Two cathedrals, two world views (John Allen, National Catholic Reporter, 3/28/2003)

Anyone who knows the Catholic world must realize that the present anti-war chorus from church leaders is a better index of the force of John Paul II’s personality than of any genuine consensus on the Iraq conflict. Under the papal banner are grouped Catholics with very diverse ideas about the causes of this war, its rights and wrongs, and what its implications are for global geo-politics.

Example: Italy’s left-leaning Catholic Action movement is marching under the slogan “no to the war, yes to peace”; the right-wing Communion and Liberation movement says “no to the war, yes to America.”...

These divisions were transparent in two public events in Rome on Monday evening, March 24. All one had to do was to move across town, from the Basilica of the Holy Apostles to the Cathedral of St. John Lateran, to move in two different Catholic worlds.

Holy Apostles was the site of a Mass commemorating the 23rd anniversary of the murder of El Salvador’s fabled Archbishop Oscar Romero, long a hero to progressive Catholics....

The rainbow peace banner, along with a sky-blue United Nations flag, was carried at the head of the offertory precession during the Mass to bring up the gifts.... The first prayer at the Mass was a meditation which, among other points, stated that the Church “repudiates” the war....

[The Lateran hosted] a lecture on “Work, Solidarity, Liberty: A Global Society in a Humanistic Key?” by Cardinal Diogini Tettamanzi of Milan. The event was part of a series called “Dialogues in the Cathedral” sponsored by Cardinal Camillo Ruini, the pope’s vicar for the Rome diocese and John Paul’s personal choice as president of the Italian bishops’ conference....

I bumped into Bishop Rino Fisichella, rector of the Lateran University and a trusted Vatican advisor. Fisichella was one of the primary contributors to the 1998 papal encyclical Fides et Ratio. Fisichella, an auxiliary bishop of the Rome diocese, is also considered the “chaplain” of the Italian parliament.

Fisichella, whose English is exceptionally good, is a long-time friend of the United States. He was the main celebrant at last December’s Immaculate Conception Mass at the North American College, the feast that also marks the foundation of the American seminary in Rome during the pontificate of Pius IX.

Fisichella told me that “this direction we are moving in, of isolating the United States, is terrible.” He said that in Italy there are forces “manipulating” the anti-war humor of the moment to grind ancient ideological axes against the United States and against the West....

Ruini struck a similar note in an address earlier in the day to the Italian bishops’ conference. He called for “constant discernment … in order that the commitment to peace not be confused with markedly different objectives and interests, or polluted by arguments that are really based upon conflict.”

To those with ears to hear, it’s clear what kind of “pollution” Ruini had in mind — a secular leftist peace movement that shades off into opposition to the Atlantic alliance.

Ruini later made an explicit plea for solidarity with the United States....

There are signs that the Vatican, especially in the Secretariat of State where the diplomatic heavy lifting is done, is becoming sensitive to the risk that its peace message could be construed as an ideological choice against the U.S.-led coalition.

Well they should be sensitive, because an ideological choice is apparently what it was.

As I pointed out earlier, the Vatican's anti-war stance has few roots in the Christian tradition, and is arguably contrary to tradition. It is no surprise, therefore, that the Vatican stance is dividing the Church. Moreover, the divide is clearly along ideological lines. The Church's left is not only turning away from tradition, but sacralizing the United Nations. The "peace" they seek is not genuine peace, as the Church has always understood it, but passivity on the part of the West in the face of continued violence from Saddam and his terrorist allies. Their beloved "peace" is merely perpetual warfare.

In light of this ideological divide within the Church, it is hard to understand why the Vatican took such an aggressive stand on an issue about which, tradition says, duly constituted public authorities are the appropriate and best-informed decision-makers. Church officials are creating a deep muddle in the moral theology of war and public governance, and they are going to be increasingly embarrassed by it.

Posted by Paul Jaminet at March 29, 2003 9:34 AM