#464: Is the Common Good the Enemy of Sovereignty—or Vice-Versa?

  A recent Harvard discovery suggests why this Sunday's French Presidential Elections French should interest Americans, and especially American Catholics.

"France for the French" vs. France, member of Europe

The French Election

Some observers have said the 2017 election for president of France is all about sovereignty, since Marine Le Pen wants to pull France out of the European Union and Emmanuel Macron wants to stay in the EU but reform it.

Le Pen’s supporters believe the EU Impinges on France's sovereignty as a nation; they want their country back, their money back, their borders closed, their industries protected, their immigrants expelled. They want “France for the French.”

Macron's supporters often do not actually support his politics or agenda, but they support France's continued membership in the EU. They know this means sacrificing some of the nation’s sovereignty: the Euro replaced the Franc, trade is subject to EU "free trade" regulations, the borders are open to anyone from the EU, even the traditional French license plates have been replaced by euro-style plates. But those prepared to vote for Macron believe that giving up some national sovereignty serves the common good of both the French people and Europe as a whole, especially in bringing peace to a chronically war-torn continent (see CrossCurrents # 463).

Catholic Social Teaching (CST) acknowledges the dilemma here. On the one hand, CST makes promoting the common good a top priority, which leaves little room for a self-serving agenda that ignores the effects on others. Pope Francis in particular has decried the “Exclusion” of others that occurs when policy is set to benefit some narrow part of any population.

On the other hand, CST also values “subsidiarity”—the principle of keeping decisions at the most local level possible, and solving problems by the participation of those closest to the problem.

The EU clearly aims to serve the common good of Europeans, but that means decisions get made, not at the local or regional or even national level, but at the international level which sometimes is far removed from the people affected. So common good and subsidiarity sometimes clash. How can this clash be addressed?

Some, like Julius Krein, editor of American Affairs, take a hard line view of sovereignty. He argues that internationalism of any kind cannot really achieve the common good: for him, the real common good comes only with national sovereignty:

“The only democratic institutions that we have are national institutions.  So if you get rid of the nation-state, what you’re really doing is getting rid of democracy.”

In other words, Krein considers that, to serve common good, all sovereignty must be national.  This is exactly what Le Pen is proposing in her campaign, and it is exactly what Macron is opposing.

Wednesday Night's Debate

But it strikes me that such a hard line is completely arbitrary and also completely contrary to our experience as Americans.  That’s why last week’s Harvard discovery is so interesting.

The Harvard Find

Two Harvard researchers, Danielle Allen and Emily Sneff, have recently reported the discovery of an early handwritten parchment copy of the Declaration of Independence--only the second such copy in existence.  They call it the “Sussex declaration” after the location of its discovery in England. 

The significance of the discovery is that this version is slightly different from the one in the national archives.  That original in 1775 reflected the practice of the Continental Congress of having state delegations sign official documents as a group, with state labels for each group.

But the Sussex declaration dates from the 1780s.  By then the War is over, and war debts have led to conflicts among the states, especially farming states vs. the coastal mercantile states.  Eventually these conflicts would lead to a constitutional convention, but already the clash was between federalists (who saw the new nation as a single united people) and anti-federalists (who saw it as a collection of states).  The issue here was whether sovereignty would belong to the nation as a whole, or whether each state would retain its own sovereignty. 

The Sussex Declaration

This newer version shows the balance shifting to the federalists. Allen points out the key difference:

“The Sussex Declaration scrambles the names so they are no longer grouped by state. It is the only version of the Declaration that does that…This is really a symbolic way of saying we are all one people.”

Of course, during the time between these two versions, the US was governed by the Articles of Confederation, adopted in 1777 and ratified in 1781.  The guiding principle here was to preserve the independence and sovereignty of each state.  It legalized the Continental Congress, but gave that Congress very little power. There was no president, no judiciary, no executive agencies, no tax base--which meant no way to pay off the war debts.  Even the Congress had only one body, comprised of state delegations.

Shifting Sovereignty

The Articles of Confederation failed, because the national government lacked enough power to perform its essential duties.  This provoked a Constitutional Convention and eventually led to the U.S. Constitution which governs us today.  The essential difference is that the U.S. Constitution shifted much of our sovereignty from individual states to the nation as a whole.  But the shift involve major compromises, including a Congress split into two houses; Senate representing the states, and the House of Representatives representing the people by proportional vote.

In other words, US history is rooted in a compromise which recognized that sovereignty needed to be shared between the nation and its member states.  When Krein says that our only democratic institutions are national institutions, he is simply ignoring our own history.

What is happening in Europe follows a direct analogy to U.S. history.  If we think of France as a member state of the European Union, we can see that the issue of sovereignty, and the conflict over how much sovereignty France should sacrifice to the common good of Europe, is precisely the same issue as the argument over States’ rights vs. Federal power in the US.

From the point of Catholic Social Teaching, this means that American history can help show us how the tension between the common good and the principle of subsidiarity can be resolved.

We don’t need to look into the distant past to observe this history.  Recent events provided ample examples.  These show that debates over shifts in sovereignty reflect a tension that still exists in American Life.

Current Examples

1. Death Penalty. When Dhzokar Tsarnaev was tried for his role in the Boston marathon bombings, his trial took place in Massachusetts, which rejects the death penalty—and yet he received a death sentence, because his crime was determined to be a violation of Federal law.  Thus Massachusetts could not control the judicial process because the authority of the Federal government prevailed. The state does not enjoy absolute sovereignty

2. Sanctuary Cities. When Donald Trump attacks the notion of sanctuary cities, he is pitting the rule of local law enforcement in preserving public safety against the interests of the immigration authorities to locate and detain illegal immigrants.  Most states that have sanctuary cities are claiming that their law enforcement officials cannot be forced by the Federal government.

3. Healthcare. The current struggle to repeal Obamacare involves the question of whether the U.S. government will continue to mandate coverage, or the states will have the option to seek alternative plans.  Obamacare relied on the sovereignty of the Federal government; the repeals are pushing for state sovereignty.

4. Border Wall. Donald Trump’s border wall involves the Federal government imposing construction in many border states that oppose a wall.  Here again, the common good becomes the rationale for overruling local decision-making.

5. Tribal Sovereignty. When the Wampanoag Tribe tries to establish a casino on Martha’s Vineyard, this pits the tribe as a sovereign nation vs. the power of the local community, and invokes both state and Federal power to resolve the issue.  In this case, the dispute is about sovereignty on four different levels.

6. Gay Marriage. In 2003, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court legalized gay marriage, exercising its own authority to regulate marriage on the state level.  But when the US Supreme Court imposed its Federal authority over state laws and regulations, gay marriage became legal across the US. 

7. “Romneycare.” Obamacare’s rules for health care were remarkably similar to the rules that already existed in Massachusetts under the program supported by a Republican Governor Mitt Romney. Romneycare reflected the state’s sovereignty, Obamacare reflected the federal government’s sovereignty

The Moral of the Story

In all of these cases, the question of sovereignty has been resolved on a case-by-case basis.  It is true that some people would prefer the Federal government to always impose its will over states, while others would prefer that states always get to decide all matters for themselves without any Federal interference.  But the vast majority of Americans accept a constant balancing act between two (or more) levels of legitimate authority.

Thus life in “these United States” involves a chronic but healthy tension between the sovereignty of the nation and the sovereignty of the states.  Neither sovereignty is absolute, so a Federal System like ours requires repeated negotiation to redefine the shifting limits of each sovereignty.

And that is exactly what Europe is going through today, especially if we think of each country as something like our states. 70 years after the Treaty of Rome established the idea of a united Europe, its federal system is still being formed.

The European Union has reached a moment much like the crisis caused by the Articles of Confederation.  In other words, its governing treaties are failing to provide the right mix of sovereignty between the European Union itself and the member states. 

It seems that, if Europe is to serve both the common good and honor the principle of subsidiarity, it will need to find ways to democratize its operations and reflect comment local and national interests and preferences rather than make all decisions by some remote process that does not reflect public will.

But the failure of the Articles of Confederation did not lead to the failure of the United States; it required instead a reformed federal system. Europe faces the same challenge, and France’s commitment to meeting that challenge (rather than quitting to protect its own sovereignty) will say much about Europe’s future prospects.

 © Bernard F. Swain PhD 2017

#421: Would Jesus Send Them Back?

As tens of thousands of unaccompanied minors flood across our southern border, Americans face a growing moral challenge.  And this challenge touches on both our national character and on  Catholic identity itself. 

When Massachusetts Governor Duval Patrick offered temporary shelter to 1000 immigrant youths, he unleashed a firestorm of protest in supposedly “liberal” Massachusetts.  Officials of the towns where Patrick proposed sending children for shelter said that their communities should not be burdened with the responsibility, explaining “we need to take care of our own.”

When Patrick compared the current crisis to the case in World War II, when a ship carrying Jewish families was refused entry to the United States (and those families mostly ended up in NAZI death camps), people howled that the comparison was inappropriate.  Letters to the editor argued that we should “send them back where they belong.” And on Saturday, July 26, thousands cheered a “Stop the Invasion” rally at the Massachusetts State House, chanting “Send them home!  Send them home!”

For many, it seems, these children are simply “illegals,” case closed.  As one rally speaker explained:

Our government sees no difference between law-abiding, freedom-loving, taxpaying citizens and lawbreaking aliens.

All this makes me fear that, as the ghost of nativism rears its ugly head, our national character might be recoiling from generations of social progress.

The fact is that hospitality to migrants in trouble is a longstanding tradition in this country.  I recall my third grade teacher announcing the arrival of Hungarian children in her hometown.  Refugees from the 1956 Soviet invasion of Hungary, they came to the U.S., often unaccompanied, because it was not safe to stay home.

To an 8 year old like me, this announcement contained three life lessons.  First, the world beyond our borders was sometimes dangerous.  Second, our nation is seen to be--and was--a place of safe haven for “refugees” (which was a new word to me!).  Third, Americans by nature sacrifice for those who need our help.

Four decades later, my church work repeated these lessons, when some of my client parishes sponsored summer programs (offering housing, host families, recreation, and health care) for “Chernobyl Children.” These minors were fleeing the unsafe milk, crops, and spaces contaminated by the Chernobyl nuclear explosion.  Despite presenting itself as a temporary relief program, “Chernobyl Children” naturally encouraged these young Russian guests to think of America as a desirable permanent home.

Catholic social teaching clearly calls for this kind of “open arms” embrace for refugees.  In fact, our tradition holds that people have a human right to migrate if their current location makes them threatened, endangered, oppressed, or destitute.

This certainly applies to at least some of the minors now flooding into the U.S..  And Catholic leaders are championing their cause. John Allen reports that Pope Francis himself sent a clear message to last week’s crisis summit in Mexico City:

Such a humanitarian emergency demands as the first urgent measure that these minors be protected and duly taken in. [They] cross the border under extreme conditions, in pursuit of a hope that in most cases turns out to be vain. (http://www.bostonglobe.com/news/world/2014/08/02/immigration-takes-its-place-pro-life-issue-for-catholic-church-leaders/LwwqcL3WlOhyWqMdiWtgqL/story.html)

The pope’s message echoes the consistent position of U.S. bishops, especially those from the areas most affected by border crossings.

Bishop Eusebio L Elizondo of Seattle heads the U.S. Bishops Migration Committee.  In a July 17 letter to members of Congress, he spoke against Republican efforts to roll back the legal protections for migrating children, saying “this vulnerable group is fleeing violence from organized criminal networks.”

This claim was verified by Richard Jones of Catholic Relief Services, who said:

We have seen the homicide rates grow, forced displacement increase and Mexican and Colombian drug cartels battle over who controls the moves through Central America…In El Salvador and Honduras, there are more gang members than police.

David Fiske, president of Marygrove College (a Catholic school in Detroit), issued a statement calling the situation a “classic” refugee crisis typical of “war-torn regions in which unprotected civilians will take extreme measures to reach a safe haven.”

That safe haven is, of course, the United States--yet millions of Americans (including, I fear, American Catholics) reject this historical badge of humanitarian honor in favor of “you don’t belong here” and “send them back.”

How striking is the difference between this attitude and the way Los Angeles Archbishop Jose H. Gomez spoke of such migrants at a July 20 Mass held to focus attention on the crisis:

We celebrate the immigrant spirit that gives life to our great country and our great city.  As we all know, this land was built by the blood and sacrifice and the vision of missionaries and immigrants from every race of language and every nation.  Today we give thanks for all those men and women who left the places where they were born--to bring their faith and values, their talents and gifts--to create a new life and the new world here in America.  We thank God also for the spirit of our new immigrants--those  joining us every day to be our neighbors and friends and family members.

In addition to praising the migrant spirit itself, Gomez used the occasion to spell out the link between immigration policy--especially the treatment of refugees--and Catholic identity itself:

Pope Francis is right, and in the face of this emergency, our first duty must be to protect these children.  My brothers and sisters, what we are doing for these children as a church--it’s not about politics.  We all know that.  It’s about who we are as Catholics… We don’t do it because we are “social workers” or “nice people.” We do it because we are being faithful to our identity and duty as Catholics.  We do it because Jesus calls us to do it.

As a Catholic, I’m proud of my tradition’s strong and clear message that protecting migrants’ human rights reflects true gospel values.  As an American, I am troubled and even ashamed that so many citizens cannot see beyond the red tape of customs regulations and our newfangled and arbitrary immigration quotas.

Once we acknowledge that migrants in need are exercising their human rights, any talk of them as “illegals” becomes nit-picking.  It is like jailing a poor man for fishing to feed his family, just because he could not afford a fishing license.  The law is there to serve people, and for our common good.  Laws that violate a human right are unjust.  And, as Saint Thomas Aquinas wrote, unjust laws are not really laws at all--they are a form of violence.

For me, this begs two questions.

First, why are so many Americans afraid to embrace our longstanding tradition of humanitarian hospitality?  After all, any talk of who “belongs here” is just ignorant.  If “belongs here” means “was always here,” then nobody belongs here.  Even Native Americans migrated here from Asia, and that was long before Europeans and Africans migrated here, and that was long before Asians and South Americans migrated here.  Originally, all our ancestors “belonged” somewhere else--not here.

But millions of Americans continue to ignore this, or deny this, or just shut their eyes.  They prefer to believe that they have a “right” to be here while others do not--and they hide behind the law to avoid the truth.  What are they afraid of?

Second, I wonder about American Catholics.  Does ours faith impact our attitude?  Do U.S. Catholics know the Church’s position on migration and refugees?  Do we know what our traditional beliefs mean?  Do we know our own Catholic identity? 

Or are there millions of Catholics who, if they were asked “What would Jesus do?” would answer: “Jesus would send them home!”?

Pope Francis has called this response the “globalization of indifference,” and my worry is that too many Catholics believe such indifference is compatible with our faith.  I hope I am wrong.

  © Bernard   F. Swain PhD 2013

#390 Revisited: The Blasts Heard ’Round the World

On the anniversary of the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings, I am re-posting the blog I wrote the day after. It remains my most-read posting.

Initial reflections  on the day after the bombs went off...

      Patriots day is perhaps the quintessential American holiday, even though (or perhaps because) it is celebrated only in Massachusetts.  It marks simultaneously the beginning of the end of Britain’s occupation of the American Colonies and the birth, in rebellion and blood, of a new country. 

The iconic images surrounding Patriots Day are familiar to all Americans.  “One if by land, two if by sea.” “The midnight ride of Paul Revere.” “The British are coming!  The British are coming!” The shot heard round the world.  The Minutemen. Lexington and Concord.

And so each year, just after dawn, the Redcoats arrive again at Lexington Green to be confronted once more by the local Minutemen.  A shot rings out, and a skirmish ensues.  Men on both sides fall, and the colonial militia is driven back, and the Redcoats proceed toward Concord.  But along the way the British troops are terrorized by the rebels harassing them along their route and sniping at them from behind trees and rocks.  Meanwhile tourists follow the rebels, clicking photos of the reenactment.  Local churches offer pancake breakfasts for the visitors.

Schools and most workplaces are closed, so baseball fans leave home early for the annual 11:00 Red Sox game.  With luck, the Red Sox will win and the game will end early enough for the Fenway faithful to stream into Kenmore Square in plenty of time to watch the runners passing by.

More than 20,000 of those runners begin their day early far from Boston in the small New England Town of Hopkinton.  They’ve come from all over the world, and the runners with numbers have qualified for Boston by running other marathons with impressive times.  For many years, Boston was the only non-Olympic marathon that required runners to qualify this way.  It is, after all, the oldest annual marathon in the world. It was a sacred tradition here long before marathon running became popular.

More than 200,000 fans line the streets along the 26-mile route from Hopkinton to Boston. Boston’s quarter-million college kids take Patriots day as an annual rite of spring, cheering on the runners while partying outside for the first time since football season.

Patriots Day is the day Boston’s cityscape finally returns to vibrant life after the relative quiet of the long cold New England winter. It is the day Bostonians remember why they are blessed to live here.

Given all this, the crowds along the entire length of the marathon course are unrivaled for numbers, enthusiasm, and hospitality. The day I observed the 100^th running with my youngest son, we joined hundreds of thousands of spectators cheering for passing runners for five hours until we had clapped our hands raw and yelled our voices hoarse. For participants, Patriots Day is the day Boston opens its arms to the world and offers a running experience no other marathon can match.

But Patriots Day 2013 was unlike any other.  In Lexington and Concord, the battle reenactments were long finished. The winners of the wheelchair races had finished; the women’s and the men’s winners (both from Africa) had already earned their victories, the Red Sox had already won a walk-off 10^th inning victory, and the mass of “weekend warrior” runners were approaching the finish line flanked by the world flags lining Boylston Street.

And then at 2:50 the bombs created a new kind of Boston massacre.  These truly were blasts heard ’round the world, since the heavy media presence guaranteed that the images and sounds of explosions would achieve global reach within minutes. It is hard to imagine a more symbolically-rich venue to attack. 

As of this writing, there’s no public information about who did this or why.  But as shock gives way to outrage, two difficult truths are worth keeping in mind.

First, while the victims were innocents (including a family from my own Dorchester neighborhood) we should not project their innocence onto ourselves as a collective nation. It is tempting to pretend that such villainy is only for “others,” that we are only the victims and never the perpetrators of violence, and that America never attacks innocent victims. This is, unfortunately, just not true.

In fact, American has proved especially prone to using revenge as a pretext for killing innocents. After Pearl Harbor took nearly 2000 American lives, Harry Truman thought the Japanese got their just deserts when our atom bombs killed more than 100,000, mostly civilians—and most Americans agreed. When 9/11 killed nearly 3,000, Many Americans accepted the death of more than 150,000 Iraqis (mostly women and children) as just vengeance. We Americans are proven masters of overwhelming retaliation. Perhaps some of us are proud of that, but we cannot pretend we do not have blood on our hands.

Even now our country inflicts suffering on innocent victims. Some even make the case that American violence is the evil twin of the Boston bombing: http://earthfirstnews.wordpress.com/2013/04/15/the-boston-marathon-and-u-s-drone-attacks-a-tale-of-two-terrorisms/ . So while our outrage is certainly justified, we do well to avoid becoming self-righteous about our place in a violent world.

Second, while the perpetrators of the marathon bombing must be caught and punished, we should resist thinking that destroying all evil-doers will solve the problem of terror and violence in our world.

For Christians, this is an impossible dream. We believe we belong to a fallen humanity, a race who by nature can never completely purge evil from our midst. We can never destroy all the bad guys, for there will always be more of them in the next generation.

This means that true security only comes when we learn how to deal with evil even while knowing we cannot eradicate it.

This is, of course, what Jesus meant by his terrifying saying “Love your enemies.” He and his followers believed—and still believe—that evil and violence are NOT the strongest powers in our world, that retaliation is not the ultimate solution, and that there exists a love that can conquer hate.

For us, this poses a simple but tough challenge. Either Christianity is right, that love is ultimately stronger than violence, or else it is wrong. Either Gandhi and King and Jesus were right, that we must love our enemies, or they were wrong. But what we cannot doubt is that stamping out all evil people is a silly, naïve, and dangerous dream.

Martin Richard, 8, killed in the bombing

Bostonians are already acting to “retaliate” with love. The stunningly rapid and effective action of the first responders (some of them mere bystanders) seems to have reduced the death toll to unthinkably low numbers. The heroic marathon-like services of those working Boston's emergency rooms and operating theaters likewise minimized death and suffering. The flood of blood donors to Boston blood banks, and the widespread offers of housing and hospitality reflected the depth of Bostonians' care for the victims.

Some people have decided to join the ranks of the 8500 marathon volunteers in 2014. Some have vowed to run again. Some will host visitors. Some will simple turn out to observe, determined that next year’s crowd will outdo 2013.

Maybe someone will even propose making Patriots Day a national holiday.

After all, this is the city where the Revolution began. We know there are villains in the world, and we know it took force to expel the occupiers before. We are determined not to be occupied by villains again, and not to be driven by terror, but to live as we should, as a joyful and peaceful people, and thus deprive the villains of their victory.

And when we prove that no one can defeat the courageous hope and generous spirit of Boston, that message will be heard ’round the world.

  © Bernard F. Swain PhD 2013

#391: The Finish Line

With the 2014 Boston Marathon less than 4 weeks away, the  finish Line has just been repainted on Boston's Boylston Street. So I am re-posting my blog about how last year's bombing transformed that iconic image.

An additional note: since I first posted this, the World Series Champion Red Sox paraded through Boston in November. When they reached the Finish Line, they stopped and placed their trophy on the line with a "Boston Strong" shirt draped over it. Now there are plans for a permanent memorial near the site.

     During the entire week following the Boston Marathon attack, the phrase that stuck in my mind was “the finish line”--for so many reasons.

For Bostonians, the Marathon Finish Line on Boylston Street has now become sacred ground--perhaps it is even becoming a sacred symbol, value, or idea.

Of course, the finish line has always been where the race ends, where the victors are crowned with laurels, where some arrive with arms raised in triumph while others stagger across or even collapsed onto it.   

But for all, since 1897, it has denoted the gold standard of running, since for most runners at Boston the aim is not to win but rather to finish the planet’s most prestigious road race.  Crossing that line is a personal victory for all of them.

But now that finish line has been transformed. It means more than before. One churchgoer returning to one of the Copley Square churches closed off as part of the crime scene said, “Now it’s a starting line too.”

From now on, the finish line is also where the bombs went off.  Future runners will finish only by passing the two spots where three people died and more than 200 others bled.  And very likely the finish line will soon have a memorial to the victims attacked on April 15, 2013.

     For Christians, of course, the symbolic power of the finish line is nothing new, since the Apostle Paul long ago employed the image of athletic achievement to describe his own life as his and approached:

“I have fought the good fight, I have run the good race, I have kept the faith:”--2 Timothy 4:7

And Paul himself was echoing the way the prophet Isaiah viewed life’s need for strength and endurance:

“But those who trust in the LORD will find new strength. They will soar high on wings like eagles. They will run and not grow weary. They will walk and not faint.”--Isaiah 40:31

The stress in both images is not on competition, but on accomplishment, not on winning the race but on finishing the course, not on the contest but on the journey and its destination.

Later Christians built on these images to establish a long tradition of seeing our life as a journey.  This view evolved from seeing life as a race to the image of a pilgrimage which follows its path to its end—but the idea of the race to the finish line was never lost. 

No doubt part of the popularity of the Boston marathon lies in its power to evoke our life’s long struggle to endure all trials and overcome all obstacles until we finally arrive at our natural end.

Sometimes someone’s life actually fits this image.  When my father died last year at 94, my wife said, “He died at the end of his life”--a life that really was a long, fully lived journey to its natural finish (see CrossCurrents #370, “A Quietly Heroic Life”).

But this is not always so.  As Boston 2013 showed and life teaches, the finish line can be moved. 

Runners still on the Boston course after the bombing were stopped short of 26.2 miles.  Yet they were awarded medals for finishing, which meant that for some the finish line was Kenmore square, for others Commonwealth Ave., for others someplace further back along the course.  The finish line moved, caught them unawares, and suddenly ended their races.

The same is true in life, since for some of us the finish line of life arrives well before anyone expects.

I have already written about the child whose life was more like a sprint than the marathon, ending only eight short weeks after his birth (see CrossCurrents #378, “Precious Child”).

As I drafted this piece, another young Boston University student died in a house fire, the 11th BU student to be killed (counting the marathon victim) in the last 12 months.

And on Wednesday, April 17—two days after the bombs and 24 hours before the suspects’ images became public—another runner reached his early finish line.  Our close friends’ son Matthew Shea had suffered leg pains while running high school track; these led to a 10-year-long effort to outrun the cancer infecting his body.  Through several remissions and relapses he not only persevered but filled his life with more acts of courage, generosity, and love than many people achieve in three times his lifespan. He died at 27 knowing, as did his loved ones, that he had run the good race with steadfast hope no matter how fast his finish line was approaching.

In reality, the same is true for all of us.

We are all alike in living our lives as a journey that (for most) is more like a marathon than a sprint.  But we are all unique in that, while we all run the same race of life, each of us runs a personal race on a different personal course.  For each of us, the finish line is different.  For each of us, the finish line is a moving target.  For each of us, its final location cannot be known.  

We may pace ourselves like marathoners, looking forward to careers and vacations and children growing and marriages and grandchildren and retirement. But that is like saving enough energy to get over Heartbreak Hill and still have enough left for the last few miles to the official end of the race. The fact is that our own personal finish line may not be at the end of the official course (called “life expectancy”). For each of us, the finish line may be just round the next corner.

Yet we run on, filling our lives with as much joy and love and hope and courage as we can before our finish line arrives—and trying always to be prepared for it.

For those who died on April 15, 2013, the marathon’s finish line was their unexpected finish.  For the injured, it was a turning point; their lives are changed forever.  And for all of us, it was the reminder that none of us controls the course we run.

Six days after the Boston bombings, the London Marathon was held amid heightened security.  The runners wore black memorial ribbons and made their intentions clear: they are determined to make a show of strength in the face of violence at Boston 2014. 

So next year we can expect more runners, more wheelchair racers, more midnight cyclists, more volunteers and spectators and memorial honors.  The 118^th running of the Boston marathon may well surpass the record numbers of the 100^th running.

And for all those hundreds of thousands along the course in whatever capacity, as well as the millions watching on TV and Internet, that famous and now sacred finish line on Boylston Street will mean more than ever, especially at 2:50 PM.

Perhaps there will be some special moment of commemoration.  Perhaps the church bells will toll.  And if they do, all of us will know they toll not only for those who died, not only for those injured or traumatized, but for all of us who each day, all our lives, run toward life’s certain, sacred, but unknown finish line.

And that will be our shining moment to show that Boston has found new strength, and will not grow weary.

  © Bernard F. Swain PhD 2013

#392: On OUR Honor—Or Just Lip Service?

When the Boy Scouts of America decided last Thursday that “no youth may be denied membership on the basis of sexual orientation or preference alone,” that might have seemed a story of interest only to those in the gay community or in scouting.  Not so.

For American Catholics, this may be a landmark test case of whether the Catholic Church will really practice what it preaches about homosexuality.

Catholic teaching is quite clear (as the National Catholic Committee on Scouting noted): “[People] who experience a

homosexual inclination or a same sex attractions are to be treated with respect recognizing the dignity of all persons.” Of course, they are also expected to follow church teaching that sex outside marriage is morally wrong.

In principle, these teachings are unambiguous, but in practice they are proving difficult to reconcile.  That’s because, in matters of public policy, if you give gay people rights, it’s disingenuous to think they will not use them.  In other words, once you say people have the right to be gay, it’s not a realistic to think they will not act gay as well.

That’s why Catholic teaching has reserved a loophole, by saying that the Church opposes “all unjust discrimination” against gay people.  The loophole is, of course, the word “unjust,” since it implies that there may be cases of “just” discrimination--that is, cases where excluding gays is justifiable.

The US Bishops have used this loophole to oppose same sex marriage, arguing that it is damaging to marriage and family life.  But the criteria for justifying discrimination against gays remain somewhat vague, as the experience in Massachusetts suggests. 

Same-sex marriage here was the act of the state’s Supreme Judicial Court, not its legislature.  The court found that the ban on same sex marriage was unconstitutional on two grounds.  First, it found that previous case law in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts had already established civil marriage as a civil right.  Second, it declared that denying any civil right to gays could only be justified if significant and demonstrable social harm could be identified.   

Chief Justice Margaret Marshall wrote that the Attorney General's office "has failed to identify any constitutionally adequate reason for denying civil marriage to same-sex couples."

The court majority could find no such harm.  Ten years later, no one else has proven them wrong--and growing numbers of Americans agree.

This creates pressure on church officials to define more clearly the criteria that would justify discrimination against gays.  Given its own principles, the Church cannot just exclude gays wherever it wants to.  In order to really practice what it preaches, it will need strong justifications for discrimination that are at least as clear as those in our civil laws, if not more so.  Otherwise, the Church’s own teaching will demand that Catholics oppose such discrimination.

This pressure will be especially intense if the US Supreme Court follows Massachusetts this month in rejecting federal bans on same-sex marriage.  What will the Bishops do then?

This is why the scouting case is such a clear litmus test.  Here is one instance where the distinction between being a homosexual and practicing homosexual activity actually makes practical sense.

First, this is not a constitutional issue, since in the 2000 case Boy Scouts of America v. James Dale, the U.S. Supreme Court declared in a 5-4 ruling that the Boy Scouts of America was within its rights to set its own membership standards, (including the exclusion—or inclusion) of gay youths.  So the scouts have the legal right to discriminate against gave members.  The question is rather is such discrimination morally justified?  In other words, does the Catholic loophole apply here?

Second, the scouts are, after all, for kids, and operate on the assumption that its members are not yet sexually active.  So the Boy Scouts of America itself has made it clear that will it will allow members to be gay but not act gay:

[The resolution] reinforces that Scouting is a youth program, and any sexual conduct, whether heterosexual or homosexual, by youth of Scouting age is contrary to the virtues of Scouting.

Thus the BSA resolution seems to reflect almost perfectly the Church’s teaching, by including gay members while banning gay sex.

So how will the Church react?  This is no small question, since 70% of all scout troops are church-based, and Catholic institutions are the third largest religious sponsors of scouts (Catholic-chartered units total 8,397 with 273,648 members.)

So far, the response of church officials has been a mixed bag. The National Catholic Committee on Scouting had previously supported the ban on gays (according to Fox News) but (according to ABC News) took no official position on the new policy that repeals the ban. The NCCS released a statement Thursday saying it hoped to maintain the strong relationship the Catholic Church has had with the Boy Scouts for more than 100 years.  Now it says that, since the policy change will not go into effect until January 2014, it will have “adequate time to study its effects.”

Not every bishop or pastor is prepared to wait, however.  Bishop Paul Loverde of the Diocese of Arlington (Virginia) issued a statement which read, in part:

I deeply regret that the leadership of the Boy Scouts of America, after years of principled and steadfast resolve, has now wavered in their commitment to the values that the scouting movement has traditionally embraced and taught.

…As Bishop, it has always been my firm hope that we might continue sponsorship of Boy Scout troops in a manner that is consistent with the Church’s teaching and mission.

Sadly, yesterday’s decision forces us to prayerfully reconsider whether a continued partnership with the BSA will be possible.

… As an organization founded on character and leadership, it is highly disappointing to see the Boy Scouts of America succumb to external pressures and political causes at the cost of its moral integrity.

One Northern Virginia pastor, in fact, had already made his decision before the BSA acted:

This new proposal does not change my previously announced decision: if it is adopted by BSA next month, St. Raymond’s association with BSA will end (effective in September). I continue to pray and hope that this does not happen. But if it does, I will give all the support I can to forming a new scouting group, independent of BSA, that will defend Christian values.

Meanwhile, the Archdiocese of Denver released this statement:

The Church agrees that no group should reduce a person to their sexual orientation or proclivity…However, the moral formation of youth must include a firm commitment to respecting and promoting an authentic vision of sexuality rooted in the Gospel itself.

The Archdiocese stated it will continue to allow parish-chartered Scouting organizations, but would be "steadfast in articulating a Christian understanding of human dignity and sexuality.”

And the Archdiocese of Washington took a similar, but even stronger, position:

[The Boy Scouts of America policy change] does not affect the teachings of the Catholic Church and the manner in which the Archdiocese of Washington conducts the Scouting programs under its purview.

Scouting programs seek to instill the importance of duty to God and to country, and groups chartered through the Catholic Church witness to the faith while continuing to provide an opportunity to involve youth in the life of the local parish.

The church, through its clergy and lay leaders, has the responsibility to teach the Gospel and encourage all people to live out the teachings of Christ -- regardless of their sexual preference.

This range of reactions is not a hopeful sign.  If each Diocese establishes its own independent position or—worse—if individual pastors are left to decide they want to abandon the BSA for some gay-banning alternative, Catholic officials will be hard pressed to demonstrate that Church teaching is being honored.  Many people will be convinced that our teaching on “the dignity of all persons” gets just lip service.  More and more, it will appear that the loophole of “unjust discrimination” opens the door for hypocrisy.

In fact Catholic teaching as it stands may prove to be a ticking time bomb.  It requires church officials, as well as rank and file Catholics, to distinguish which discrimination is “just” and which is “unjust.” That will always be a judgment call.  And each time Bishops make a bad judgment, they will inflict more damage on their moral credibility.

Moreover, as Americans adapt to the open presence of gays in sports, schools, the workplace, family gatherings, and even churches, justifying discrimination will only become more difficult.  In fact, I foresee the day when any attempt to “justify” discrimination against gays becomes an academic exercise with no practical effect.  At that point, the Catholic “loophole” will be closed.  That will make practicing what we preach less complicated, but it may also make it more difficult.

For now, the Scouts have given the bishops a golden opportunity to prove that we will honor our teaching, not just give it lip service.

  © Bernard F. Swain PhD 2013

#391: The Finish Line

During the entire week following the Boston Marathon attack, the phrase that stuck in my mind was “the finish line”--for so many reasons.

For Bostonians, the Marathon Finish Line on Boylston Street has now become sacred ground--perhaps it is even becoming a sacred symbol, value, or idea.

Of course, the finish line has always been where the race ends, where the victors are crowned with laurels, where some arrive with arms raised in triumph while others stagger across or even collapsed onto it.   

But for all, since 1897, it has denoted the gold standard of running, since for most runners at Boston the aim is not to win but rather to finish the planet’s most prestigious road race.  Crossing that line is a personal victory for all of them.

But now that finish line has been transformed. It means more than before. One churchgoer returning to one of the Copley Square churches closed off as part of the crime scene said, “Now it’s a starting line too.”

From now on, the finish line is also where the bombs went off.  Future runners will finish only by passing the two spots where three people died and more than 200 others bled.  And very likely the finish line will soon have a memorial to the victims attacked on April 15, 2013.

     For Christians, of course, the symbolic power of the finish line is nothing new, since the Apostle Paul long ago employed the image of athletic achievement to describe his own life as his and approached:

“I have fought the good fight, I have run the good race, I have kept the faith:”--2 Timothy 4:7

And Paul himself was echoing the way the prophet Isaiah viewed life’s need for strength and endurance:

“But those who trust in the LORD will find new strength. They will soar high on wings like eagles. They will run and not grow weary. They will walk and not faint.”--Isaiah 40:31

The stress in both images is not on competition, but on accomplishment, not on winning the race but on finishing the course, not on the contest but on the journey and its destination.

Later Christians built on these images to establish a long tradition of seeing our life as a journey.  This view evolved from seeing life as a race to the image of a pilgrimage which follows its path to its end—but the idea of the race to the finish line was never lost. 

No doubt part of the popularity of the Boston marathon lies in its power to evoke our life’s long struggle to endure all trials and overcome all obstacles until we finally arrive at our natural end.

Sometimes someone’s life actually fits this image.  When my father died last year at 94, my wife said, “He died at the end of his life”--a life that really was a long, fully lived journey to its natural finish (see CrossCurrents #370, “A Quietly Heroic Life”).

But this is not always so.  As Boston 2013 showed and life teaches, the finish line can be moved. 

Runners still on the Boston course after the bombing were stopped short of 26.2 miles.  Yet they were awarded medals for finishing, which meant that for some the finish line was Kenmore square, for others Commonwealth Ave., for others someplace further back along the course.  The finish line moved, caught them unawares, and suddenly ended their races.

The same is true in life, since for some of us the finish line of life arrives well before anyone expects.

I have already written about the child whose life was more like a sprint than the marathon, ending only eight short weeks after his birth (see CrossCurrents #378, “Precious Child”).

As I drafted this piece, another young Boston University student died in a house fire, the 11th BU student to be killed (counting the marathon victim) in the last 12 months.

And on Wednesday, April 17—two days after the bombs and 24 hours before the suspects’ images became public—another runner reached his early finish line.  Our close friends’ son Matthew Shea had suffered leg pains while running high school track; these led to a 10-year-long effort to outrun the cancer infecting his body.  Through several remissions and relapses he not only persevered but filled his life with more acts of courage, generosity, and love than many people achieve in three times his lifespan. He died at 27 knowing, as did his loved ones, that he had run the good race with steadfast hope no matter how fast his finish line was approaching.

In reality, the same is true for all of us.

We are all alike in living our lives as a journey that (for most) is more like a marathon than a sprint.  But we are all unique in that, while we all run the same race of life, each of us runs a personal race on a different personal course.  For each of us, the finish line is different.  For each of us, the finish line is a moving target.  For each of us, its final location cannot be known.  

We may pace ourselves like marathoners, looking forward to careers and vacations and children growing and marriages and grandchildren and retirement. But that is like saving enough energy to get over Heartbreak Hill and still have enough left for the last few miles to the official end of the race. The fact is that our own personal finish line may not be at the end of the official course (called “life expectancy”). For each of us, the finish line may be just round the next corner.

Yet we run on, filling our lives with as much joy and love and hope and courage as we can before our finish line arrives—and trying always to be prepared for it.

For those who died on April 15, 2013, the marathon’s finish line was their unexpected finish.  For the injured, it was a turning point; their lives are changed forever.  And for all of us, it was the reminder that none of us controls the course we run.

Six days after the Boston bombings, the London Marathon was held amid heightened security.  The runners wore black memorial ribbons and made their intentions clear: they are determined to make a show of strength in the face of violence at Boston 2014. 

So next year we can expect more runners, more wheelchair racers, more midnight cyclists, more volunteers and spectators and memorial honors.  The 118^th running of the Boston marathon may well surpass the record numbers of the 100^th running.

And for all those hundreds of thousands along the course in whatever capacity, as well as the millions watching on TV and Internet, that famous and now sacred finish line on Boylston Street will mean more than ever, especially at 2:50 PM.

Perhaps there will be some special moment of commemoration.  Perhaps the church bells will toll.  And if they do, all of us will know they toll not only for those who died, not only for those injured or traumatized, but for all of us who each day, all our lives, run toward life’s certain, sacred, but unknown finish line.

And that will be our shining moment to show that Boston has found new strength, and will not grow weary.

  © Bernard F. Swain PhD 2013