Witness to Hope

by George Weigel

  Farmers everywhere provide bread for all humanity, but it is Christ alone who is the bread of life…. Even if all the physical hunger of the world were satisfied, even if everyone who is hungry were fed by his or her own labor or by the generosity of others, the deepest hunger of man would still exist…. Therefore I say, Come, all of you, to Christ. He is the bread of life. Come to Christ and you will never be hungry again….72

  A local Protestant minister from Granger, Iowa, told his neighbor, Joe Hays, “You got a Pope who knows how to pope.”73

  John Paul then flew to Chicago, where Polish-Americans in the tens of thousands continually serenaded him with Sto lat! [May you live a hundred years!]. “If we keep this up,” John Paul cracked, “they’re going to think it’s the Polish national anthem.”74 In the Windy City, the Pope spoke to all the bishops of the United States, reminding them that holiness must be “the first priority in our lives and in our ministry.” Living that holiness through his episcopal vocation, the bishop had to be willing to speak the truth, even in the face of cultural opposition. This, he said, the American bishops had done: in their public statements and conference documents condemning racism; rejecting the culture of divorce; defending the right-to-life of the unborn, the handicapped, and the terminally ill; challenging the sexual revolution; and calling the American nation to live the full truth of its commitment to liberty and justice for all. He also urged them to revitalize the practice of sacramental confession and to foster a renewed sense of reverence in the liturgy, which is “above all ‘the worship of divine majesty.’”75

  After Mass in Grant Park for half a million and a Chicago Symphony Orchestra concert at Holy Name Cathedral, John Paul flew to his last stop in the United States, Washington, D.C., where he was met at Andrews Air Force Base on October 6 by Vice President Walter Mondale. After a brief visit to St. Matthew’s Cathedral, John Paul was driven to the White House, where he was welcomed on the North Lawn by President Jimmy Carter with the Polish phrase Niech będzie Bóg pochwalony [May God be praised]. Carter and the Pope had been in private correspondence for some time, and while it is unlikely that either Vatican or U.S. policy was much affected by the unprecedented exchange, the very fact of its existence demonstrated how John Paul II’s first months in office had changed the papacy.76 After an hour-long discussion, Pope and President met 6,000 guests on the South Lawn of the White House, where Carter spontaneously created what Time later referred to as “one of the most moving moments of his presidency.” Speaking man-to-man and Christian-to-Christian, the Georgia Baptist told the Polish Catholic, “As human beings each acting for justice in the present—and striving together for a common future of peace and love—let us not wait so long for ourselves and for you to meet again. Welcome to our country, our new friend.” John Paul embraced the President as the guests erupted into prolonged applause.77

  That afternoon, John Paul spent several hours at the Vatican embassy in Washington discussing the international situation with Carter’s national security adviser, Zbigniew Brzeziński. The meeting hadn’t been on the official schedule. When Brzeziński, responding to the Pope’s invitation, mentioned that there were some family logistical problems that weekend afternoon, John Paul told him to bring his wife and children along. As they were finishing, Brzeziński said that, when he talked to President Carter, he sometimes thought he was talking with a religious leader, and when he talked with John Paul II, he had the impression of talking to a world statesman. The Pope laughed.78

  John Paul spent Sunday morning, October 7, at the Catholic University of America and in its environs. Prior to meeting with ecumenical leaders and the presidents of Catholic colleges and universities, he celebrated morning prayer and spoke with several thousand American nuns at the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception. Addressing the Pope on behalf of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, an organization of nuns known for its assertive feminism, Sister Teresa Kane, RSM, the LCWR’s president, said that women ought to be “included in all the ministries of the Church,” clearly a reference to the ordination of women.79 The atmosphere in the huge basilica was electric, but not with unalloyed approbation. Some of those present thought Sister Teresa’s speech a courageous act; other nuns regarded it as an exercise in bad manners. The Pope listened. Sister Teresa, dressed in a business suit, came up to the papal throne in the sanctuary, genuflected, and kissed the Pope’s ring. Then, as a small group of sisters stood in silent protest of what they regarded as their disempowerment, John Paul took what could have become an ugly moment to a wholly different level, speaking of the consecrated religious life of nuns as a love affair with Jesus Christ:

  Two dynamic forces are operative in religious life: your love for Jesus—and, in Jesus, for all who belong to him—and his love for you.

  Thus every one of you needs a vibrant relationship of love with the Lord, a profound loving union with Christ, your spouse….

  Yet far more important than your love for Christ is Christ’s love for you. You have been called by him, made a member of his Body, consecrated in a life of the evangelical counsels, and destined by him to have a share in the mission that Christ has entrusted to the Church: his own mission of salvation….

  Your service in the Church is, then, an extension of Christ, to whom you have dedicated your life…. And so your life must be characterized by a complete availability: a readiness to serve as the needs of the Church require, a readiness to give public witness to the Christ whom you love….80

  Although Sister Teresa Kane’s remarks drew extensive and understandable media attention, the Pope’s ecumenical meeting with leaders of other Christian communities in the chapel of Trinity College, across the street from the National Shrine, was also newsworthy. In his address, John Paul stressed that issues of marital chastity and public morality, not only questions of doctrine, had to be on the ecumenical agenda. “The moral life and the life of faith,” he said, “are so deeply united that it is impossible to divide them.”81 His comments created a considerable discussion in ecumenical circles that would be revisited many times in the future.

  The papal visit to Washington concluded Sunday afternoon with Mass on the National Mall for 200,000. His green vestments whipping about him in a crisp autumn breeze, John Paul ended his American pilgrimage where Thomas Jefferson began the Declaration of Independence, with the inalienable right to life. “Nothing,” John Paul insisted, “surpasses the greatness or dignity of a human person,” and for that reason, the Church “will stand up every time that human life is threatened”: by abortion, by child abuse, by economic injustice, by any form of exploitation, by the abandonment of the sick, the elderly, the inconvenient. In doing so, he argued, the Catholic Church was serving the noblest in the American tradition. Had not Jefferson himself stated that “the care of human life and happiness and not their destruction is the just and only legitimate object of good government?” The first Pope to preach in the shadow of the Washington Monument, the Capitol, and the Lincoln Memorial closed by praising all those Americans—members of “other Christian churches, all men and women of the Judeo-Christian heritage, as well as all people of good will”—who were united “in common dedication for the defense of life in its fullness and for the promotion of all human rights.”82

  Authoritarian or Authoritative?

  John Paul II’s American pilgrimage was lavishly covered in the press, for whom Time’s cover headline—“John Paul, Superstar”—defined one aspect of that remarkable week: the Pope’s personal magnetism. Still, several of the Pope’s addresses brought to the surface a question that had been bothering many commentators since Karol Wojtyła’s election. How could this passionate and persuasive defender of human rights be so “doctrinaire” in his approach to what had become firmly fixed in the media’s corporate mind as the issues in contemporary Roman Catholicism—birth control, abortion, divorce, and the ordination of women to the priesthood? Time spoke for many when its cover story claimed that the Pope’s address to the bishops
had reaffirmed “the thought that Christianity is a body of fixed beliefs rather than a faith that ought to be adapted to modern circumstances.”83

  John Paul II clearly thinks this is a false dichotomy. First of all, Christianity is, quite simply, the person of Jesus Christ. The Church, in bearing witness to Christ, adapts its presentation of the basic truths of its faith to the circumstances of the time and culture in which it finds itself. John Paul II’s UN address was a good example of this interaction of doctrine and culture. The unchanging biblical truth about the dignity of the human person, put into conversation with modern philosophy and political theory, had yielded a potent defense of human rights and a new form of Christian humanism.

  But the Church’s doctrine is not infinitely plastic. The Church is the custodian of a body of truths—the “deposit of faith,” as it is traditionally called—and if it shaves the edge off those truths it ceases to be the Church. There are, in other words, boundaries. They are important in themselves, because they consist of certain truths, and they are important for the development of doctrine—if there are no boundaries, how could one know whether a proposed development is authentically Christian or not? At the same time, there should be no boundaries to the charity with which the Church proposes the truths of which it is the custodian. The truth, the Pope had told the bishops in Chicago, must always be proposed in love.

  To defend the truths of Catholic faith was not to be “doctrinaire,” it was to be doctrinally serious. When he articulated those truths as the Bishop of Rome, John Paul was not imposing Karol Wojtyła’s personal theological views on Catholicism. He was giving voice to the tradition of which he was the servant, not the master. He was not an authoritarian. He was the voice of an authoritative tradition.

  It was not an easy distinction to grasp in a cultural climate like that of the United States, where doctrinal differences within and among religious communities are often regarded as matters of personal lifestyle choice, rather than of truth. It was even more difficult in a media environment in which the bobbing and weaving of politicians was the lingua franca of public discourse, and virtually every “position” was assumed to be negotiable. Grasping the distinction between the authoritarian and the authoritative is, however, essential to understanding John Paul II’s approach to his office and his responsibility.

  UNFINISHED BUSINESS

  Three weeks after the first anniversary of his election, John Paul launched another experiment in governing the Church.

  Although the College of Cardinals is sometimes described as a kind of ecclesiastical senate, in recent centuries it had functioned corporately only when electing a Pope. The only other times that significant numbers of cardinals met together were when the College received new members. But that happened as a result of papal nominations and hardly constituted an exercise in anything but pro forma collegial counsel to the Pope. John Paul wanted to make use of the College as a corporate body more frequently—an idea that had evidently been bruited among the cardinals during their meetings before the conclaves of 1978. The College of Cardinals, he believed, shared with the Pope the special papal sollicitudo omnium ecclesiarum: the “care for all the [local] Churches” and for the universal Church. Being a cardinal, in his view, was less a matter of personal privilege than of corporate responsibility for the entire Church, with and under the Pope.84 So he called the cardinals together for an innovative “plenary assembly” on November 5, 1979, which 120 members of the College attended. It was the first time in 400 years that the College of Cardinals had met for business other than a papal election.

  In his opening address, John Paul told the cardinals that, though he had some issues he wanted to discuss, he also wanted them to propose topics for future discussion. In addition to whatever was said in their conversation during these days of meetings, he welcomed written memoranda and proposals. He reflected on some of the recurring problems involved in implementing the Second Vatican Council, which “continues to be the main task of the pontificate.” A correct understanding of freedom in the Church, which was always “freedom for” rather than “freedom from,” was one issue. So was the need to rebuild a sense of “solidarity” within a Church too often riven by divisions. Solidarity in the Church also meant a more effective sharing of resources between the “rich and free” Church and the “poor and constricted” Church. That solidarity, in turn, should provide the impetus for the renewal of evangelism the Council had intended to promote. It was time to recover a sense of the fervor and enthusiasm that had marked the experience of Vatican II.

  John Paul asked the cardinals’ counsel on three specific questions: the restructuring of the Roman Curia, the revitalization of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, and the sorry state of Vatican finances. The Pope spoke somewhat obliquely on this third, always delicate subject: it is necessary, he said, “to formulate the question of economic resources.” The fact was that the Holy See had been running large operating deficits since 1970, and something had to be done to bring expenditures and income into line.

  None of these issues, large or small, was resolved by the four-day-long meeting, but a precedent of consultation had been set. A Commission of Cardinals was established to make recommendations about the financial situation.

  Five days later, on November 10, the Pontifical Academy of Sciences commemorated the centenary of Albert Einstein’s birth. John Paul II addressed the meeting in the first of a series of efforts to bridge the centuries-old gap between the Church and science. The Galileo case was the symbolic opening of that rift, and John Paul did not hesitate to praise “the greatness of Galileo” and to acknowledge that Galileo “had to suffer a great deal…at the hands of churchmen and Church institutions.” The Pope expressed the hope that “theologians, scholars, and historians, animated by a spirit of collaboration, will study the Galileo case more deeply and, in loyal recognition of wrongs from whatever side they come, will dispel the mistrust that still opposes, in many minds, a fruitful concord between science and faith….”85

  A week after affirming before scientists that the truth, from whatever source, was the truth, John Paul extended his reflection on reason and faith at his Roman alma mater, now formally known as the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, but still called “the Angelicum” by one and all. His lecture discussed the continuing importance for philosophy and theology of Thomas Aquinas, “a master who was deeply human because he was deeply Christian, and precisely because he was so deeply Christian was so deeply human.”86 John Paul suggested that Aquinas’s “openness to the whole of reality in all its parts and dimensions” made him particularly important for students today, who had grown up in a fragmented intellectual climate. Such openness to reality as a whole, he said, “is also a significant and distinctive mark of the Christian faith.”87

  Just short of a month later, on December 15, the question of the Church’s grasp on truth reoccurred when the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith clarified some doctrinal boundaries with one of Catholicism’s most famous dissidents, the Swiss theologian Hans Küng, longtime Professor of Catholic Theology at the University of Tübingen in West Germany. Handsome and articulate, Küng had been the first example of a new phenomenon in Catholic life in the years since Vatican II—the dissenting theologian as international media star. Küng had done important work in alerting the Catholic world to what would become key issues at the Council. His doctoral dissertation—which argued for a compatibility, if not identity, between the Catholic understanding of “justification” and the theology of Karl Barth, the foremost Protestant theologian of the century—was a pioneering work in ecumenical theology.88 In the eyes of at least some of his theological peers, though, Küng’s intellectual product had declined in quality over the years.89 Others worried that he had become so much the media personality that his penchant for making provocative statements was diminishing his ability to contribute to a truly ecclesial discussion inside the Church.90 Küng himself was admirably frank about his position. On cert
ain issues, including the Church’s capacity to make binding and irreformable doctrinal definitions through the exercise of papal infallibility, he did not hold to be true, and he would not teach as true, what the Catholic Church held to be the truth.

  On December 15, 1979, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith [CDF] agreed with Hans Küng. He was not teaching what the Church taught, and therefore, according to a formal declaration by CDF, he “could not be considered a Catholic theologian.” His ecclesiastical mandate to teach as a “Professor of Catholic Theology” was withdrawn.

  The Küng affair was a cause célèbre throughout the Catholic world, especially in theological circles. Much of the media attention focused, naturally enough, on Küng’s challenge to the doctrine of papal infallibility defined at the First Vatican Council. The crucial issue, the German bishops wrote in defense of the CDF declaration, was the ancient dogma that the Holy Spirit preserved the Church from fundamental error. Küng affirmed this as a general proposition, but claimed, as the Germans put it, that the Church could make “concrete errors in definitions of faith,” even in cases where “the magisterium of the Church had pronounced [the definitions] as irrevocable.” CDF had declared this unacceptable, since it called into question the fundamental Christian belief, based on Christian faith in the Holy Spirit, that the Church abided in a truth it could authoritatively articulate. The German bishops—who, as a body, could hardly be accused of theological obscurantism—agreed.91

  Hans Küng was neither excommunicated nor deprived of his functions as a priest. He continued teaching at Tübingen, but not as a “Professor of Catholic Theology.” Over time, he gradually faded from international media prominence. As he was no longer an officially certified Catholic theologian, his continuing dissent from the Church’s teaching was of reduced interest.92