Pope Pius XII

, , , , , , , , , , ,

America's secular and religious death-by-choice debate is perennial and always newsworthy

, , , , , , , , , , ,
America's secular and religious death-by-choice debate is perennial and always newsworthy

By count of the Death with Dignity organization, which devised Oregon's pioneering 1997 law under which 1,905 lives have been ended as of January 22, 10 states plus the District of Columbia have legalized euthanasia and -- assignment editors note -- 14 more states are currently debating such proposals. Click here to check on the situation in each state.

To begin, writers dealing with this perennial and newly current issue should be aware of the verbal politics with what's variously known as "euthanasia" (from the Greek meaning "good death"), "the right to die," "death on demand," "assisted suicide," "physician-assisted suicide” or "mercy killing." The activists who use the “pro-choice” label dislike any blunt mention of "suicide" or "killing" and urge instead that we use "physician-assisted death," "aid in dying" or "death with dignity."

Coverage by some media outlets, to be blunt, replaces non-partisanship with cheerleading.

Britain's The Economist had this mid-November cover headline: "The welcome spread of the right to die." However, to its credit the news magazine's (paywalled) editorial and international survey did summarize problems and opposing arguments.

A November 16 New York Times roundup on U.S. action — “For Terminal Patients, the Barrier to Aid in Dying Can Be a State Line” — reported that in addition to states that may newly legislate death-by-choice, states that already permit it are weighing further liberalization such as ending in-state residency requirements, shortening or waiving waiting periods, dropping the mandate that only physicians handle cases, filing of one request rather than two or more and other steps to streamline the process.

Reporters can find non-religious arguments in favor from Death With Dignity, cited above. It also recommends procedures to avoid abuse of this right. On the con side, pleas and cautions can be obtained from various disability rights organizations (click here for information).

On that score, psychiatrist-turned-journalist Charles Krauthammer, a non-religious Jew, spent much of his adult life paralyzed from the waist down.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , , ,

Catholic news budget: (1) Again, Pius and the Jews (2) Despite Francis' dodge,  celibacy debate persists

, , , , , , , ,

The good news: After years of agitation among prelates, historians and Jewish leaders, on March 2 the Vatican will fully open its covert archives that cover Pope Pius XII’s performance during the Nazi era.

The bad news for journalists: It will take months, even years, for expert researchers to draw coherent conclusions from the estimated 16 million pages of documents. Neverthelessl, retrospectives on the Pius debate since the 1960s will be timely just now, drawing upon the massive material in newsroom morgues and online.

The issues surrounding this pontiff — a long-pending and controversial candidate for sainthood — are huge for Jewish relations. Beginning in 1920, Pius was the Vatican’s envoy to Germany, and during his years as secretary of state its top strategist on Nazism. Then his 1939 election as pope coincided with war and the Holocaust.

The big historic question: Did he say and do enough as Hitler’s regime oppressed Jews and eventually slaughtered them by the millions?

The Vatican completed a partial release of historical texts on Pius in 1981 but the new, complete batch is expected to be more enlightening. The Holy See is offering assurances that scholars are welcome to apply for access to the collection regardless of religious views or ideologies. What historians are in line, and what journalists will be on the list?

Sources to note from Nicole Winfield’s Associated Press scene-setter include Brown University historian David Kertzer and Rabbi David Rosen, the American Jewish Committee’s international interreligious director (based in Jerusalem but reachable via AJC publicist Kenneth Bandler, bandlerk@ajc.org or 212-891-6771).

Now, here is a second subject for this week’s Memo package.

The news media are pondering Pope Francis’ February decision to dodge proposals from South America that the church experiment with ordaining married men as priests in places with severe need.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , ,

December Vatican I anniversary could prod press to ask: Is Christian reunification dead?

, , , , ,

On Dec. 8, 1869, the feast of Mary’s Immaculate Conception in the Catholic calendar, the resoundingly conservative Pope Pius IX opened the First Vatican Council. The following July 18, Pius and the gathering of global bishops climaxed a long-running church struggle and issued a constitution that defines papal authority in the strongest terms.

The upcoming 150th anniversary is a good moment for writers to tap ecumenists, historians, and theologians and ask them point blank: Is it a pipe dream to suppose the world’s Christians will someday, somehow reunite within a single fellowship?

The Second Vatican Council raised hopes with Unitatis Redintegrtio, its 1964 decree on ecumenism. The result is respectful talks and far friendlier relationships among separated churches, but perhaps that’s the best one can hope for. If so, Vatican I is the chief reason. Will your sources will think that’s an overstatement?

Those who’ve heard something about Vatican I will know it proclaimed that the pope is infallible. However, a pope exercises divinely given infallibility only when he defines “a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole church” and “speaks ex cathedra.” That Latin phrase, literally “from the chair,” refers to formal exercise of his office’s authority. More broadly, Vatican II declared that Catholics must show “submission of will and of mind” to any authentic teachings by a pope.

In the usual understanding, infallibility applies only when a pope specifies this. This action has been very, very rare, with only one case since Vatican I. See this summary from the U.S. Catholic website:

There is no set list of ex cathedra teachings, but that’s because there are only two, and both are about Mary: her Immaculate Conception (declared by Pope Pius IX in 1854 and grandfathered in after the First Vatican Council’s declaration of papal infallibility in 1870) and her bodily Assumption into heaven (declared by Pope Pius XII in 1950).

But neither of these was earth-shattering to Roman Catholics, because these beliefs had been nurtured through devotion, prayer, and local teaching for centuries before becoming official papal teaching.

Importantly, Vatican I stated that such papal teachings are, and “not by the consent of the church, irreformable,” and pronounced an “anathema” against anyone who dissents.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , , ,

Vatican archives coverage was missed chance to dig into John Paul II's Jewish outreach

, , , , , , , ,

The announcement by Pope Francis that the Vatican had decided to open up the its archives on World War II-era Pope Pius XII — long criticized by many for staying largely silent during the Holocaust and the horrors committed by the Nazis — flooded the internet.

Got news? Words like “secret” and “files” are catnip for editors looking to fill news budgets at the start of the week.

That’s why the so-called “Friday news dump” has become such a thing in recent years, especially among politicians attempting to bury bad news at the start of the weekend when people pay less attention. In the case of Pope Francis, there’s no hiding an announcement that could forever alter Catholic-Jewish relations going forward.

Lost in all the intrigue of these Holocaust-era archives was the chance by mainstream news outlets to give some broader context for what all this means regarding Catholic-Jewish relations and the complicated history between these two faith traditions. There are several factors as to why the news coverage didn’t feature more depth. The lack of religion beat writers (an issue discussed on this website at great length over the years) and the frenetic pace of the internet to write a story (and quickly move on to another) are two of the biggest hurdles of this story and so many others.

A general sweep of the coverage shows that news organizations barely took on the issue — or even bothered to give a deeper explanation — of past Christian persecution of Jews and the efforts made since the Second Vatican Council, and later by Saint Pope John Paul II, to bring healing to this relationship.

The news coverage surrounding the announcement that the archives would be released in 2020 — eight years earlier than expected — was largely collected from an article published in Italian by Vatican News, the official news website of the Holy See. In it, Pope Francis is quoted as saying, “The church is not afraid of history. On the contrary, she loves it and would like to love it more and better, just as she loves God.”

What would have triggered a “sidebar story” or a “timeline” in the days of newspapers, is largely lost in the digital age. Both would have certainly included the name and work of John Paul II.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , , ,

The pope’s Myanmar plight recalls church struggles with rotten regimes of the past

, , , , , , , ,
The pope’s Myanmar plight recalls church struggles with rotten regimes of the past

Journalists might tear themselves away from U.S. evangelicals’ moral entanglements with Donald Trump and Roy Moore to consider how church leaders should handle rotten regimes overseas as grist for a reflective essay.

Pope Francis’s visit to Buddhist Myanmar put this on the news docket. Beforehand, Father Thomas Reese said Francis risked “either compromising his moral authority or putting in danger the Christians of that country,” so “someone should have talked him out of making this trip.”

That is, Francis might harm Myanmar’s tiny, persecuted Christian flock if he denounced the military’s campaign of rape, mass murder, arson and forced exile against Rohingya Muslims. Yet sidestepping of atrocities had already besmirched the moral stature of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Daw Aung San Suu Kyi.

The pope decided not to publicly utter the word “Rohingya” in  Myanmar,  offering only generalized human rights pleas. Only later, meeting Muslim refugees in Bangladesh, did he cite their name: “We won’t close our hearts or look away. The presence of God today is also called Rohingya.”

On the flight back to Rome, Francis told reporters that naming the victims in Myanmar “would have been a door slammed in my face.” Instead, he figured keeping silent  facilitated behind-scenes “dialogue, and in this way the message arrived.” So, did he defend the Rohingya when meeting the military? “I dared say everything I wanted to say.”

Despite criticism of the papal performance from human rights activists, Reese says Francis balanced his roles of “diplomat” and “prophet” to protect Christians while lobbying in private, and it’s unlikely public attacks “would have had any effect on the military.”

That recalls perennial complaints that Pope Pius XII should have more forthrightly denounced Nazi extermination of Jews.


Please respect our Commenting Policy