What did Ratzinger write?

July 8, 2004 By

Joseph_RatzingerThe Washington Times’ Julia Duin (a friend of this blog) reported Wednesday on Vatican official Joseph Ratzinger’s tough six-point memo regarding Catholic politicians who defy church teaching on abortion and euthanasia. Drawing from a story in the Italian newspaper L’Espresso, Duin reports that Ratzinger called for a stronger discipline than indicated by Washington Cardinal Theodore McCarrick:

“I would emphasize that Cardinal Ratzinger clearly leaves to us as teachers, pastors and leaders WHETHER to pursue this path” of denying Communion, Cardinal McCarrick told the bishops in his speech, the text of which is posted at the U.S. bishops’ Web site, on www.usccb.org.

“The question for us is not simply whether denial of Communion is possible, but whether it is pastorally wise and prudent,” the cardinal said.

. . . However, the Ratzinger letter says that denial of Communion is obligatory “regarding the grave sin of abortion or euthanasia.”

Duin also reports McCarrick’s assertion that the L’Espresso report is incomplete:

“From what I have heard, it may represent an incomplete and partial leak of a private communication from Cardinal Ratzinger, and it may not accurately reflect the full message I received,” the cardinal said.

“Our task force’s dialogue with the Holy See on these matters has been extensive, in person, by phone and in writing. I should note I was specifically requested by the cardinal not to publish his written materials, and I will honor that request.”

Whatever Ratzinger may have written to McCarrick in a cover letter or other communications, his six-point memo as published in L’Espresso is straightforward:

1. Presenting oneself to receive Holy Communion should be a conscious decision, based on a reasoned [judgment] regarding one’s worthiness to do so, according to the Church’s objective criteria, asking such questions as: “Am I in full communion with the Catholic Church? Am I guilty of grave sin? Have I incurred a penalty (e.g. excommunication, interdict) that forbids me to receive Holy Communion? Have I prepared myself by fasting for at least an hour?” The practice of indiscriminately presenting oneself to receive Holy Communion, merely as a consequence of being present at Mass, is an abuse that must be corrected (cf. Instruction “Redemptionis Sacramentum,” nos. 81, 83).

2. The Church teaches that abortion or euthanasia is a grave sin. The Encyclical Letter Evangelium vitae, with reference to judicial decisions or civil laws that authorise or promote abortion or euthanasia, states that there is a “grave and clear obligation to oppose them by conscientious objection. [. . .] In the case of an intrinsically unjust law, such as a law permitting abortion or euthanasia, it is therefore never licit to obey it, or to ‘take part in a [propaganda] campaign in favour of such a law or vote for it’” (no. 73). Christians have a “grave obligation of conscience not to cooperate formally in practices which, even if permitted by civil legislation, are contrary to God’s law. Indeed, from the moral standpoint, it is never licit to cooperate formally in evil. [. . .] This cooperation can never be justified either by invoking respect for the freedom of others or by appealing to the fact that civil law permits it or requires it” (no. 74).

3. Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia. For example, if a Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment or on the decision to wage war, he would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion. While the Church exhorts civil authorities to seek peace, not war, and to exercise discretion and mercy in imposing punishment on criminals, it may still be permissible to take up arms to repel an aggressor or to have recourse to capital punishment. There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia.

4. Apart from an [individual's judgment] about his worthiness to present himself to receive the Holy Eucharist, the minister of Holy Communion may find himself in the situation where he must refuse to distribute Holy Communion to someone, such as in cases of a declared excommunication, a declared interdict, or an obstinate persistence in manifest grave sin (cf. can. 915).

5. Regarding the grave sin of abortion or euthanasia, when a person’s formal cooperation becomes manifest (understood, in the case of a Catholic politician, as his consistently campaigning and voting for permissive abortion and euthanasia laws), his Pastor should meet with him, instructing him about the Church’s teaching, informing him that he is not to present himself for Holy Communion until he brings to an end the objective situation of sin, and warning him that he will otherwise be denied the Eucharist.

6. When “these precautionary measures have not had their effect or in which they were not possible,” and the person in question, with obstinate persistence, still presents himself to receive the Holy Eucharist, “the minister of Holy Communion must refuse to distribute it” (cf. Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts Declaration “Holy Communion and Divorced, Civilly Remarried Catholics” [2002], nos. 3-4). This decision, properly speaking, is not a sanction or a penalty. Nor is the minister of Holy Communion passing [judgment] on the person’s subjective guilt, but rather is reacting to the person’s public unworthiness to receive Holy Communion due to an objective situation of sin.

[N.B. A Catholic would be guilty of formal cooperation in evil, and so unworthy to present himself for Holy Communion, if he were to deliberately vote for a candidate precisely because of the candidate's permissive stand on abortion and/or euthanasia. When a Catholic does not share a candidate's stand in favour of abortion and/or euthanasia, but votes for that candidate for other reasons, it is considered remote material cooperation, which can be permitted in the presence of proportionate reasons.]

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A case for separating church and pop

July 7, 2004 By

5neat 01An item from Episcopal News Service begins:

Picture this: an altar; an earth-shattering sound system; people of all ages “jamming to the groove”; and an Episcopal bishop rapping and feeling the beat.

“My sistas and brothas, all my homies and peeps, stay up — keep your head up, holla back, and go forth and tell like it is.” With this proclamation, Bishop Suffragan Cathy Roskam of New York sent people on their way at the Bronx’s third Hip Hop Mass, held Friday, July 2 at Trinity Church of Morrisania. . . .

OK, now we all know the agony of bishops who are down with the peeps. Now imagine If some musicians had only pursued the episcopacy:

Billboard
Top 10 High-Church Hits

1. Purple Reign, the Rt. Rev. Prince Rogers Nelson (Diocese of Minnesota)

2. You Picked the Wrong Bishop to F— With, the Rt. Rev. Ice Cube (Diocese of Los Angeles)

3. That Ain’t No Rag, it’s the Constitution & Canons, the Rt. Rev. Charlie Daniels (Diocese of Tennessee)

4. High on the Jesus Seminar, the Rt. Rev. Kinky Friedman (Diocese of Texas)

5. My Sweet Lord (theme song of the United Religions Initiative), the Rt. Rev. George Harrison (Diocese of California)

6. Goin’ to the (Civil but Obviously Nonsacramental) Chapel, the Rt. Rev. Phil Spector (Diocese of Massachusetts)

7. Imagine, the Rt. Rev. John Lennon (Diocese of Newark)

8. Obviously Five Believers (in the Hermeneutic of Oppression), the Rt. Rev. Bob Dylan (Diocese of New York)

9. Mennonite Surf Party, by the Rt. Rev. Billy C. Wirtz (Diocese of North Carolina)

10. Pass the Peace, the Rt. Rev. Maceo Parker (Diocese of West Tennessee [Memphis])

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Kerry, abortion and other faiths

July 6, 2004 By

ovum-lgAs first reported in the Dubuque Tribune Herald and given greater exposure by The Washington Post, John Kerry has elaborated on his long-stated personal opposition to abortion in contrast with his perfectly prochoice voting record.

“I oppose abortion, personally. I don’t like abortion. I believe life does begin at conception,” Kerry told the Tribune Herald. “I can’t take my Catholic belief, my article of faith, and legislate it on a Protestant or a Jew or an atheist.”

Kerry makes his belief in the sacredness of human life sound like a uniquely Catholic position, something akin to the Assumption of the Virgin Mary. But the debate among religions isn’t primarily about when life begins, or whether the number of abortions should be reduced.

Granted, most mainline houses of worship, whether Protestant or Jewish, support abortion rights in varying degrees. But they also express a wide consensus that abortion is a serious matter indeed.

Let’s begin with an admittedly contrarian voice from within the nontheistic community:

Atheist and Agnostic Pro-Life League
Every abortion involves the destruction of an innocent human being’s life, so abortion should be used, if at all, only in extreme cases. At a minimum, abortion should never be used as a substitute for contraception or a fallback position for irresponsible behavior. Accordingly, abortions for “convenience” should be illegal.

The Episcopal Church
All human life is sacred from its inception until death. The Church takes seriously its obligation to help form the consciences of its members concerning this sacredness. Human life, therefore, should be initiated only advisedly and in full accord with this understanding of the power to conceive and give birth which is bestowed by God. It is the responsibility of our congregations to assist their members in becoming informed concerning the spiritual and physiological aspects of sex and sexuality.

Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
Because we believe that God is the creator of life, the number of induced abortions is a source of deep concern to this church. We mourn the loss of life that God has created. The strong Christian presumption is to preserve and protect life. Abortion ought to be an option only of last resort. Therefore, as a church we seek to reduce the need to turn to abortion as the answer to unintended pregnancies.

Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)
While Presbyterians do not have substantial agreement on when human life begins, we do have agreement that taking human life is sin.

Reform Judaism
All life is sacred in Judaism. Although an unborn fetus is precious and is to be protected, Judaism views the life of the mother as paramount, placing a higher value on existing life than on potential life. Women are commanded to care for the health and well being of their bodies above all else. Therefore, there are several instances in Judaism where abortions are not only condoned, but are mandated.

The Southern Baptist Convention
Children, from the moment of conception, are a blessing and heritage from the Lord.

The United Church of Christ
God has given us life, and life is sacred and good. God has also given us the responsibility to make decisions which reflect a reverence for life in circumstances when conflicting realities are present. Jesus affirmed women as full partners in the faith, capable of making decisions that affect their lives.

The United Methodist Church
Our belief in the sanctity of unborn human life makes us reluctant to approve abortion. But we are equally bound to respect the sacredness of the life and well-being of the mother, for whom devastating damage may result from an unacceptable pregnancy. In continuity with past Christian teaching, we recognize tragic conflicts of life with life that may justify abortion, and in such cases we support the legal option of abortion under proper medical procedures. We cannot affirm abortion as an acceptable means of birth control, and we unconditionally reject it as a means of gender selection.

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Just another old-fashioned, fundamentalist way to die? Part III

July 5, 2004 By

decapitationThe way things are going, I think that I will soon run out of acceptable file art for beheadings.

Anyone know of any appropriate sources? I would prefer line drawings and paintings. Wouldn’t you? Let’s keep them on the blurry side of things.

I just received an interesting letter on the topic from the veteran religion-news specialist at the Post-Gazette in Pittsburgh. Clearly, there are — no surprise to veterans on this beat — different ways to translate and interpret the scriptures that are involved in this issue. Here is some of what Rodgers has to say:

… (Just) for the heck of it I decided to look up the two Koranic verses that your cited in my copy of the Koran. (the Muhammad Asad translation). Let’s just say that the translation is VERY DIFFERENT from that cited in your piece. It speaks of “striking the neck,” but the context of one of the verse clearly indicates that the one so stricken would still be alive afterward. …

Sura 47:4 says “Now when you meet [in war] those who are bent on denying the truth, smite their necks until you overcome them fully, and then tighten their bonds; but thereafter [set them free,] wither by an act of grace or against ransom, so that the burden of war may be lifted: thus [shall it be].

Clearly, if someone can be set free after his “neck is struck” we can’t be talking about beheading here. Frankly, the imagery conjurs up a more violent form of the “Spock pinch” from Star Trek.

I have no doubt that many of my colleagues often accept statements about Islamic theology too naively because they don’t even know how to look up a verse in the Koran. By the same token, I think the person who wrote the column you quoted also naively accepted the statements of someone with the opposite agenda. I think many of us know from our adventures with biblical translation that explaining an ancient foreign expression in today’s English is often a challenge. I can understand how “strike the neck of your enemy” could be translated as beheading. But context seems to argue for another interpretation.

Slate.com is not known as a right-wing source, of course, but this letter did send me back into Google land looking for other examples of writing on this topic. I found two D.C. articles that raise all kinds of interesting points. I recommend both to you.

The first is by reporter Steven Mufson of the Washington Post and it is essentially a short history of the symbolism of beheading — in Islam and elsewhere. It covers, for example, the accounts from 627 A.D. of the prophet Muhammad approving the beheading of 600 Jews from a tribe living near Medina. He believed tribe members had held talks with his enemies.

But it also notes that, in some cultures, beheading was considered the humane approach to killing a heretic or enemy. Note, for example, this passage from the cultural elites of Christian England.

When Sir Thomas More was convicted … in 1535, his sentence was “that he should be … hanged till he should be half dead; that then he should be cut down alive, his privy parts cut off, his belly ripped, his bowels burnt, his four quarters set up over four gates of the City, and his head upon London Bridge.” King Henry VIII commuted the sentence to beheading. As a warning to others not to defy the king’s will, as More had by refusing to take an oath recognizing Henry’s supremacy to the pope, More’s head was indeed placed on London Bridge, where it stayed for several months.

So there. Meanwhile, over at the Washington Times, veteran reporter Julia Duin found some viewpoints that echo points made my Ms. Rodgers. The verses in question do not automatically refer to beheading a person or even killing them. For example, consider the following from Sam Hamod, former director of the Islamic Center in Washington, D.C.

The executioners, who claim to act in the name of Islam, he said, “may find a hadith [or saying of Muhammad] that supports it, but the Koran doesn’t allow it.” The killers didn’t even do the job right, he said.

“If they are going to have an execution, the [executioner] must say a prayer and ask for forgiveness from God for what he is doing and pray for the person’s soul being killed,” he said. “You can’t do it like the idiots on TV. The right thing to do is slit the person’s throat, not cut off the entire head.” …

Any Islamic capital punishment, he added, must be handed down by a panel of judges plus there must be four credible witnesses of an extreme crime committed by the person to be executed. And civilians — but not soldiers — are protected under Islamic law.

Perhaps this is yet another example of why newspapers and networks need to hire trained, committed religion-beat specialists. It’s hard to cover a story if you do not know it exists. Or don’t want to admit that you don’t know it exists and, thus, go look it up.

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Just another old-fashioned, fundamentalist way to die? Part II

July 4, 2004 By

decap1As I write, the world continues to await news of the fate of Lebanese-born Corporal Wassef Ali Hassoun. The story is getting more confusing by the moment, with Reuters just reporting:

A militant group denied on Sunday it had beheaded a U.S. marine in Iraq who was seen earlier in televised pictures being threatened by his captors with a sword.

Fears for Lebanese-born Corporal Wassef Ali Hassoun, 24, had risen after a statement appeared on two Internet sites on Saturday saying the Army of Ansar al-Sunna had decapitated him. … There was no way to verify which, if either, of the statements attributed to Ansar al-Sunna was authentic.

Hassoun has been missing from his unit since June 21, according to U.S. officials. Reuters says that his Lebanese father has urged his son’s captors to have mercy on him as a Muslim and an Arab. Meanwhile, Al Jazeera has broadcast a video in which militants are said to have killed U.S. Private Keith Matthew Maupin.

It certainly does not seem that these bloody stories are going to go away in an age in which digital cameras and the Internet make it possible to send moments of shattering pain, torture and death around the world with a few clicks of a mouse. I wrote about this the other day for a simple reason: It seems almost impossible to discuss the topic of beheadings without bringing up radical, literalist versions of Islam. Yet it also seems that the mainstream press is unwilling to connect these dots at all.

Writing at Slate.com, Lee Smith has asked a simple question: Why is this? And, especially, why is the mainstream press allowing Muslim leaders to continue to say their scriptures are silent on this subject? Here is the opening of his article:

Following the recent beheadings of Americans and other foreigners in Iraq and Saudi Arabia, the U.S. press turned to various experts to identify a precedent in the Quran or Islamic history for this kind of gory murder. “Beheadings are not mentioned in the Koran at all,” Imam Muhammad Adam El-Sheikh, co-founder and chief cleric at the Dar Al Hijrah mosque in Falls Church, Va., told USA Today. Yvonne Haddad, a professor at the Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding at Georgetown University agreed, telling New York Newsday, “There is absolutely nothing in Islam that justifies cutting off a person’s head.”

Smith notes that reporters merely need to purchase and open a copy of the Quran — he plugs N.J. Dawood’s Penguin Classics translation — where they will find: “God revealed His will to the angels, saying: ‘I shall be with you. Give courage to the believers. I shall cast terror into the hearts of the infidels. Strike off their heads, strike off the very tips of their fingers.’ ” (Sura 8, Verse 12) Or how about: “When you meet the unbelievers in the battlefield strike off their heads.” (Sura 47, Verse 4)

This wave of journalistic fog raises some very disturbing questions. At some point, notes Smith, Americans should start worrying that journalists are afraid to tell them the truth. At this point, American media will begin to mirror the media in Arab cultures. They will have to start figuring out who is refusing to report what and why. Perhaps that is good, in the long run, but it would also be tragic to watch what he calls the “Al-Jazeera-fication of the U.S. press.”

As I stated earlier, the goal is for reporters to be able to report the facts — not bash away at the beliefs of millions of Muslims around the world. Islam did not invent beheading as a horrific way to end the lives of criminals and infidels. It is wrong to say that this terror is unique to Islam. But it is also wrong to say that the acts of these particular terrorists have nothing to do with their faith. Smith concludes:

Islamic history is giddy with heads separated from their bodies, a tradition detailed in news outlets that are generally considered right-wing and on conservative Web sites, but apparently whitewashed in the mainstream press.

Why? It can’t be that decapitation is too unbearably horrifying, since the image — from the head of John the Baptist to the grisly end of Gwyneth Paltrow’s character in the movie Seven — is familiar enough in Western culture. No, the press’ sensitivity seems to be triggered by the combination of Islam and beheading. Why? Do newspaper editors and TV producers worry that their audiences could turn into genocidal mobs ready to murder their American Muslim neighbors if they knew that Allah encourages beheading in the Quran?

If the press recognizes that most Muslims don’t want to behead infidels, then infidels should be given the benefit of the doubt as well. Of course we won’t kill our Muslim friends and neighbors, but we really wish the Muslims who are lending their expertise to our infidel press would tell the truth. Otherwise, this conversation between cultures isn’t going to work. We are surely destined for a very violent clash of civilizations if one dialogue partner will lie about something that is written down for anyone — even American journalists if they make the effort — to read.

Which raises another question: What are you seeing in your local media? Is the silence on this topic universal?

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"The only thing I hate is hatred"

July 2, 2004 By

tony_hendraAt The New York Times, the simple act of publishing a book review can lead to a news story. As noted on GetReligion in early June, Andrew Sullivan praised Tony Hendra’s confessional book Father Joe: The Man Who Saved My Soul in a cover article for The New York Times Book Review. (Hendra is on the left in the photo from This is Spinal Tap.)

That review brought forward Jessica Hendra, 39, a daughter from Hendra’s first marriage, to say the book had not been nearly confessional enough and to accuse her father of molesting her during her childhood. The Times’ story is even-handed and thorough, quoting extensively from Jessica Hendra, her mother and therapists who have treated her for anorexia.

As Sullivan’s review made clear, Hendra’s salvation was a decades-long journey under the gaze of an all-loving God who has no particular trouble with nonmarital sex.

Sullivan was impressed with this passage of Father Joe’s thoughts on sex:

“Sex is a wonderful gift, a physical way to express the most powerful force in all existence — love. Sex is a brilliant idea of God’s, I think. Almost like a sacrament.”

“Sex is a sacrament?”

“D-d-don’t tell the Abbot!”

“There’s no sin in having sex?”

“Yes yes yes. There can be. But sex is a sin less often than we’re led to believe. It’s all a question of context. If you have sex to hurt or exploit another, or to take pleasure only for me, me, me, and not return as much or more to your lover . . . then it becomes sinful. . . . They’ve made sexual sins the worst sins of the lot, haven’t they? Because sex is so powerful, people are fearful of it! We must take the fear out of sex as well.”

Hendra’s website, which mostly promotes Father Joe, includes some of his recent satirical pieces for The American Prospect and Details. The TAP pieces reflect a consistent hostility toward George W. Bush, other conservative politicians, the religious right and Mel Gibson.

A few sample paragraphs:

From Osama’s Endorsement

Today the Hard Drive has a surprise for its faithful Database. Let us praise Allah a thousand, thousand times for sending us George W. Bush! After his three and half years in office, could we have dreamed of the power and visibility we now have? Assuredly not, o my brothers. Thanks to the Beelzebub Bush, we are a global brand!

How has this happened? Consider:

The crusaders are even now hotly debating whose fault the 11th of September was. Let us answer for them: We would never have attacked America during the reign of the cloven-hoofed Bill Clinton. He was too wily a diplomat; he had curried too much favor abroad; he could have whipped up European and Asian and even Arab rage, forged a lasting worldwide coalition against us, strangled us in infancy.

From ‘Bell Curve’ — Levant Version:

From an unexpected quarter comes some rare good news for embattled U.S. military commanders trying to contain the widening prison-abuse scandals in Iraq. The conservative San Diego-based scientific review No Junk Science published an article today by a team of researchers from the Adolf Coors Center for Studying Arabs at Pepperdine and the Charles Murray Institute of Eugenics at West Texas Christian University. The study presents “overwhelming evidence” that Arabs are not, by any prevailing scientific standard, human.

From We See That Now:

And yes, it’s true, just as your more sagacious radio hosts have maintained: Hillary Clinton does owe her success to the practice of witchcraft. And no, it’s not true that ridiculing Chelsea at the most vulnerable stage in her development was the media equivalent of child molestation. Chelsea Clinton was fair game because she is the spawn of Satan. Scurrilous of us to suggest that the tirelessly moderate and civil proponent of these and so many other truths, Robert Bartley, now resides in the circle of hell reserved for hate-mongers and bigots! Mr. Bartley dwells in the bosom of his Republican creator. We see that now.

From The Last Word:

The Life of Brian takes the only approach possible to such explosive material: oblique, referential, and, above all, well-informed. Brian is based on solid biblical scholarship. The Passion isn’t. Gibson has admitted as much, claiming that it’s based solely on the New Testament as interpreted by his guiding light, the Holy Spirit. (A common cop-out of film directors — blame the screenwriter.)

From Divine Words (written as a memo from Jesus Christ to Mel Gibson):

You’re no different, Mel. The Christ you flog and flay and strip the meat from, the one you chew the ears and lips of, the one you smash the nails through the helpless palms of — that’s you, Mel. Because, for all the reasons that only you and I know, you hate yourself. Self-hatred drives you as it has driven so many self-flagellators and sunken-faced self-deniers, born-again, self-loathing sinners, washed in my blood, dripping with the precious blood that flowed from the bloody gash made in my side by the holy spear — all those terrible and murderous images that sublimate the anger and savagery in their hearts. But self-hatred is still hatred, Mel, and the only thing I hate is hatred.

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Finding (first person) ghosts in a stack of newspapers at Heathrow

July 2, 2004 By

heathrowSitting on my office desktop is a stack of British newspaper stories full of ghosts. Some easy to see and some a bit dodgy.

The problem is that the stories really are on my desktop — my wooden desktop, instead of my computer desktop. When you try to find the digital copies of these dead-tree-pulp stories, you end up caught in a maze of fees and registration forms. This prevents me from writing about these stories and then allowing you, with a few clicks of your mouse, to explore the texts yourself for context. This is, of course, the essence of blogging, the extra layer of content provided by this strange new medium.

I wanted to write about that special joy that comes when you have a chance to sit down with a stack of newspapers and then munch your way through them at your leisure. This is what happened with me yesterday as my wife and I had a long layover in London Heathrow as we connected between Athens and Miami. People leave newspapers lying around and cheap people like me pick them up and read them. So I just ripped some up and brought home the clips in my shoulder bag.

I wanted to share some of the results in a snapshot tour of those hours. But that’s hard to do without URLs. Right?

Take, for example, that screaming headline on the front of the Tuesday issue of the Daily Mail, the one that said, “At week 12 this foetus is walking. At 15, it’s yawning. The amazing pictures from inside the womb that shine new light on the abortion debate.” This lead into a pair of two-page tabloid layouts, leading off with that familiar dilemma in modern newspaper style — when does the word “baby” come in play?

He is making the most of having room to move.

A mere 12 weeks into a pregnancy, this unborn baby is wriggling his legs in the “stepping motion” characteristic of newborns.

The amazing images, taken by a revolutionary form of ultrasound scan, show the foetus “walking” in the womb at a much earlier stage than thought possible.

The article goes on to say that these images raise legal, political and ethical questions. (To see a BBC video of this, click here.)

But the Mail never really brings up the religious questions — until you turn to page 12 and hit an anguished op-ed by commentator Stephen Glover. In it, he quickly describes the Roman Catholic Church’s stance on unborn life and contrasts its clarity with the more muddled views of the British public, which, like the American public, is all over the map on this issue.

But at some point, stresses Glover, a “foetus” turns into a “baby.” The images seem to show “little human beings” for a simple reason. “They are little human beings,” he writes. It is hard to study the photographs and believe otherwise. Thus, it is hard to do journalism and pretend otherwise. Thus, it is hard to avoid the religious, ethical and moral implications of the words and photos that newspapers do and do not use. Glover concludes (and note the word “beliefs”) that:

History tells us that good people can hold beliefs which subsequent generations think are misguided. There is a movement gathering force — of men and women, liberals and conservatives, Christians and humanists. Its credo is not so revolutionary. Why can look at these pictures of tiny foetuses yawning and walking and jumping, and be certain that abortion is not wrong?

The question for journalists is not whether Glover is right or wrong. The question is how they can cover this story without digging into these religious and moral questions about the basic building blocks of journalism — words and images.

Let’s move on into that stack of clips.

* Similar questions show up in the Thursday Daily Express in an article about the roles that social class and education play in the lives of young women who become pregnant outside of wedlock. This was linked, again, to the new scientific images of the unborn. The moral questions come up. Religious issues do not, except that they are soaked into the spaces between the lines.

* Then, in The Independent, we find a magazine feature interview with Peter Singer, billed as the “world’s most influential philosopher.” Hey, I found that one online. So you get to read that one on your own. But the ghosts are dancing right out there in the open in this piece, by atheist Johann Hari. She notes the contempt that traditional theologians hold for Singer.” This is a long quote, so hang on.

So why do they hate him? He has a simple explanation. “We are living in an incredible time of transition,” he whispers. “In the West, we have been dominated by a single tradition for 2,000 years. Now that whole tradition, the whole edifice of Judaeo-Christian morality, is terminally ill. I am trying to formulate an alternative. Some of what I say seems obscene and evil if you are still looking at it through the prism of the old morality. That’s what happens when morality shifts: people get confused and angry and disgusted.”

Singer’s moral system is called preference utilitarianism, and evolved from the 19th-century philosophy of John Stuart Mill. It sounds convoluted, but many people in the post-religious societies of Europe take its central premise for granted. It has one basic idea: to be moral, you must do whatever will most satisfy the preferences of most living things. Morality doesn’t come from heaven or the stars; it comes from giving as many of us as possible what we want and need.

This isn’t some dry academic theory. It affects the most important decisions in every person’s life. Say you are old and sick and want to die. Under the old Judaeo-Christian ethic, you have an immortal soul given to you by God, and He will reclaim it from you when He’s good and ready. Under preference utilitarianism, your preference — which harms nobody else – should be met, with a lethal injection from a friendly doctor if necessary. The scale of Singer’s intellectual ambition is staggering. He is trying to lead an ethical revolution unparalleled since paganism was beaten and banished by the Judaeo-Christian ethic. “You can’t expect such a radical shift,” he says dryly, “without a few fights.”

* I could go on, writing about that story — which newspaper was that? — on a Muslim girl using mass transit to conduct a quick tour of the emerging world of Muslim Britain, where the parents have traditional faith and the children want to dance and party (but are mad about others misunderstanding their faith). Sorry, that one is not online. Then there are vandals who are attacking religious statues — in The Times and lots of other places.

And, in The Guardian, the U.S. keeps seeking sanctions against “Arab militias” in the Sudan. Why is this issue so important?

A diverse US constituency, combining the Christian right, African-Americans and Jews, has taken an interest in the wars in Sudan.

Well, that raises some interesting questions, doesn’t it? Sorry, the ghost slipped right back into hiding.

And the big question for me, after spending those hours in the airport, is this: Why do the religion ghosts come out in the open when journalists write in first person, but hide in the wire service reports? Can’t we find a way to quote people and write about these debates in factual language? Can’t we admit that the ghosts are real? Just asking. Back to looking for more ghosts in the clips — cyber and otherwise.

Please join the hunt.

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Filed Under: First Person, Godbeat

Back in the door: GetReligion cut off in Korea?

July 1, 2004 By

Just back in the door from Turkey and Greece and I am way, way jet-lagged. But there is always all of that back email to triage.

I will post tomorrow with my observations of a long layover today in a London lounge, mostly spent looking for religion ghosts in all those edgy, diverse British newspapers.

But first, this just in from a reader.

If anyone else out there has ideas about how to handle these kinds of things, please let us know.

Messrs. Mattingly and LeBlanc,

I thought it might interest you to know that GetReligion.org is now censored by the South Korean government.

In an effort to keep video and images of Kim Seon-il’s beheading from entering the country, the government has shut down numerous websites including livejournal, blogspot, and typepad. Neither I nor any of your other readers in Korea have been able to read GetReligion for several days now, and this is likely to continue indefinitely.

I actually don’t know too much about the situation– pertinent websites are blocked — but I believe that http://marmot.blogs.com (which I can’t access) has more of the details. I suppose this doesn’t actually have anything to do with religion and the press (though Kim Seon-il hoped to be a missionary in Iraq), but perhaps it’s pertinent in some manner.

Also, if it’s possible for me to receive GetReligion updates via email, I’m (private email address) and sure would appreciate it.

Covertly, James Hargrave

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