Falling Out of the World

(Photo by D.L. Carson)


So last weekend was the end-of-term retreat, and my first return in a long time, longer than I like, to Holy Cross Monastery, a place that has always had a touch of the numinous for me. The brothers are warm, gracious hosts, the food is excellent, the grounds beautiful, the services--

ah, there's something about the regular services, in the beautifully simple chapel, with the voices chanting in unison, moments of silence to allow you to simply,

well, fall out of the world.

I don't mean run away from the world, I mean fall out of the world--disengage from the everyday, the routine, get a little perspective, and plunge back in, refreshed, rejuvenated, and possible renewed.

I first ran across that phrase on Philip Sandifer's blog, and if borrowing a theme from a highly intellectual discussion of Doctor Who seems a weird inspiration under which to gather some thoughts about a retreat, well, take it up with this guy. But "falling out of the world" appeals to me as a metaphor for a retreat, and there's even a Doctor Who metaphor for it--in the Russell T. Davies era, that lovely moment in the opening credits when the TARDIS, hurtling through the Time Vortex, suddenly takes an elegant, nice little pause so we can see her, and then, after getting her bearings and sauntering through our field of vision, why, hurtles back in.

Here it is (at 0:11-0:14):



Which explains why I haven't been posting much, right? After all, it takes a little, after falling out of and then back into the world to resume all of the routines of daily living.

Oh, and if you haven't already, get a chance to see The Way. It's a beautiful, touching and funny movie, well worth the time.

Wager of Battle

The friend whom I have alluded to as my "Best Critic" because of all the assistance I have received from his close reading of my work over the years and I made a bet yesterday, even though I'm generally not a betting man. Per the terms of the wager, I'm posting it here, and asking you all to remind us when it comes due.

The wager:

The parties hereto wager upon the proposition that, prior to the November 2016 elections, a measure to impeach or articles of impeachment against President Barack Obama shall be introduced in the House of Representatives, shall reach the floor and be debated, and that at least one-third of the Republican caucus shall vote in favor thereof.

Taking the affirmative: Anglocat.

Taking the negative: Best Critic. BC adds that he estimates his odds of winning at 60-40.

Anglocat adds that he can't compute odds, being nearly functionally innumerate.

Stakes:$10

Sworn to and subscribed this 14th day of May, 2013.

*******************end document*********************

A note: Neither of us believes that any actual high crime or misdemeanor or reasonable variant thereof is likely to be identified; it's all down to our estimation of how crazed the GOP base is, and how much the House Republicans will fall over themselves to pander to its hatred of the President.

So who thinks I've got this, and who thinks its a case of a fool and his money?

Anatomy of a Scandal

I was largely incommunicado for a few days, so missed a couple of things within my bailiwick. So, OK, let's get this clear:

1. This is not a scandal.

The attack on the consulate of Benghazi was a tragedy, and, until I see something other than primal screaming from the critical testimony at the hearings, I'm presuming that the Report of the State Department Accountability Review Board has it approximately right. I'm open to persuasion, mind you. But the hair-splitting headline chasing gymnastics of Darrell Issa? Unpersuasive is a flattering description. (On Issa, I'll outsource my commentary to congressional expert Anthony Clark, who knows wherof he writes.)

2. This is a scandal. Singling out groups for governmental scrutiny based on their political views is, whatever one thinks of the views in question, absolutely reprehensible, and one of the most overt violations of the First Amendment one can imagine. I am, as anyone who reads this blog regularly might have gathered, not a fan of the Tea Party. But the protections of the First Amendment are not, thank heaven, limited to those whose views are in favor with the Administration of the day, or even to people who are "mainstream." The use of tax audits as a political weapon has a dire provenance, and there is, simply, no justification for targeting taxpayers and organizations by political belief. It's not just illegal, it's profoundly subversive of democracy. The President's condemnation was a good first step, but I hope he will follow though and make sure that the investigation is thorough, and that the results are transparent, and that remedial action be taken as appropriate.



We the People should hold the President to those words.

Across the Great Divide...

I don't often visit the conservative Anglican blogs, but I sometimes sneak a peek. This post I found interesting, not because I agree with Sarah Hey on the specifics of her exchanges with the individuals in question (I seem to have missed that one), but because I think she is right, most regrettably on this:

I’m guessing that most of us within TEC have noticed that public exchanges between conservatives and revisionists within the Anglican Communion have grown far far more rare, now, with revisionists avoiding the conservative blogs and conservatives avoiding the revisionist blogs.

I personally think that’s probably a good thing. Once one has established the boundaries of the vast chasm between the two groups in foundational worldviews, there’s little left to say, other than running through the “prayer wheel” of arguments, which we all already know anyway. The problem is not “the arguments”—it’s that none of us accept the other side’s presuppositions or even basic definitions of the most basic of theological concepts.

Now, where I disagree with Ms. Hey is on that last sentence; I think that it is sometimes, maybe often, true, but I think that we're often missing our commonalities. Also, of course, I think it's not a good thing that we've lost the knack of talking to each other without yelling. Let me address both points.

In many ways, I am much more conservative than many of my fellow "reappraisers" or "revisionists" or whatever you want to call us. I am an actual honest to goodness creedal Christian who accepts the truth--not metaphorical truth, either, of the Creed. I believe that the Gospels are historically very reliable--at least as reliable as the biographies of the Roman Emperors who lived roughly contemporarily with Jesus; Suetonius, Cassius Dio, and Tacitus raise issues of historical accuracy and interpretation every bit as intractable as those presented by the differences in the Four Gospels, and yet the historicity of accounts of Claudius, or of Caligula, or of Augustus is not subject to the level of skepticism that th every existence of Jesus engenders in some circles. You can basically sign me up to Charles Gore's account in The Reconstruction of Belief (1921) of the historical veracity of the miracles and Resurrection, and the accounts given in that book and in Lux Mundi (1889) of the Atonement. I'm not a believer in Penal Substitutionary Atonement theories, but in the centrality of the Atonement? Yep.

So does that make me a conservative theologically?

Well, just as the Gospel has strengthened me in my belief in liberation and equality for women it has strengthened my evolution from a slightly conservative Roman Catholic childhood to a belief that my LGBT brothers and sisters must live into the fullness of their integrity, and that the strictures in the OT and St. Paul do not reflect the Holy Spirit, but the age in which Paul lived on both topics. I think that St. Paul's breakthrough moments are far more important than his moments of falling back into the spirit of his time--there is more truth in "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus" than in "Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. 12But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence."

And I believe, with all my heart in the critical importance of "Judge not, that ye be not judged."

I acknowledge many readings of the Gospel, and I'm not uncomfortable with my fellow "revisionists" and their efforts to take Scripture on board. That's because most of them are (the ones I know, at any rate) deeply in love with Christ and with his teachings. Efforts to square modern or (zoinks!) postmodern thought with the Gospel leave me cold, but my reaction to them is that of C.S. Lewis to John A.T. Robinson:

The Bishop of Woolwich will disturb most of us Christian laymen less than he anticipates. We have long ago abandoned belief in a God who sits on a throne in a localized heaven. We call this belief anthropomorphism, and it was officially condemned before our time. . . .We have always thought of God as being not only "in" and "above" but also "below" us....His view of Jesus as a window seems wholly orthodox (he that hath seen me hath seen the Father....Thus, though sometimes puzzled, I am not shocked by his article. His heart, though perhaps in some danger of bigotry, is in the right place.

I mention all this because I think that Ms. Hey overestimates the extent to which we do not share one faith; while I don't miss vitriolic flame wars, I think we lose something when liberals and conservatives divorce each other, a recognition that our way is not the only way, and that our assumptions that we understand God are partial, fragmentary and misleading--"For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face".

We get too certain of our premises, and of our conclusions. I've gotten too sure of myself at times, and have benefitted form more traditionalist comments that revealed the flaws in my own reasoning. And that has led to further exchanges, I'm glad to say. In addition to being pleasant and wholesome in and of themselves, friendships with those we disagree on subjects we are passionate about can help protect us from confusing our own commitments withthose required by God, and as well against that great danger Lewis warned us about: that of The Inner Ring.

Gun Shy

Now, let me be the first to admit that I'm a little, shall we say, gun shy? Not completely;I had an uncle who taught me to shoot one when I was a boy, and enjoyed it. But this story and this story, and, finally, this: Well, time for Uncle John tae tell the tale, innit? OK, when my sister and I were eleven, and my grandmother had died, our parents and we spent a lot of time over at my grandfather's house. We were all, I'm pretty sure, emotionally numb, and, having loved our grandmother very much, nobody was thinking too clearly, so my sister and I were left alone while the adults went to the funeral home. We did what children left alone in a house they know but which has mysteries would do: explore. As my sister and I were snooping around (more realistically), she opened a drawer, finding within it a small, snub -nosed gun. Thinking it was a toy, she assumed a firing stance a la Kate Jackson, called out to me,"Charlie's Angels!"

Well, I thought it was a toy, too, and swatted her hand away from pointing at my chest. She pulled the trigger, and a loud noise, a smell of cordite, and a surprisingly small hole in the wall later, we realized that it wasn't a toy. Oh, and that I was still there. And intact. So I had that going for me.

So it goes.

******

The thing that I find so bewildering about the gun debate is the nature of the interests asserted as so paramount that they must, must outweigh even the most minimal regulation of weapons in the interest of reducing avoidable carnage (more here)--carnage that continues to mount in the nearly 100 days since Newtown, and can be summarized thus:

In 2010, gun-related injuries accounted for 6570 deaths of children and young people (1 to 24 years of age). That includes 7 deaths per day among people 1 to 19 years of age. Gun injuries cause twice as many deaths as cancer, 5 times as many as heart disease, and 15 times as many as infections

Against this, we have asserted interests that are legitimate but, in essence, trivial--the sportsman's and sportswoman's enjoyment of hunting, target shooting, and the like, or, quite frankly, inextricably intertwined with neo-confederate weirdness. Leaving the latter to the side, the tragedy is that the former--worthy of accommodation, not a bad thing in esse--has been raised by our society to a shibboleth. Even the regulations expressly deemed constitutional by Antonin Scalia's opinion in District of Columbia v. Heller are opposed as if they were the harbingers of tyranny.

Why? When I first read Gary Wills's story Our Moloch, I thought it was too strident. Now, as I look at the failure of even minimal reform and see the pro-gun forces striving to force every community to live in the shadow of the gun, I'm not so sure. Culture of death? Sadly, yes.

Father Fugee Goes Down the Memory Hole!

The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Newark has now released a statement in which it has done a complete 180 degree turn in the story of confessed pedophile priest Michael Fugee:

On Thursday, May 2, Fr. Michael Fugee, a priest of the Archdiocese of Newark, wrote the following to The Most Reverend John J. Myers, Archbishop of Newark:

“For the good of the Church and for my peace, I have requested permission to leave public exercise of my priestly ministry.

“In conscience, I feel it necessary to make clear to all that my actions described in recent news stories were outside of my assigned ministry within the Archdiocese. The leadership of the Archdiocese of Newark, especially Archbishop John Myers, did not know or approve of my actions. My failure to request the required permissions to engage in those ministry activities is my fault, my fault alone.

“I am sorry that my actions have caused pain to my Church and to her people.”

Archbishop Myers granted this request on May 2.

****

Following the Memorandum of Understanding, the Archdiocese did not assign Fr. Fugee to any post involving ministry with minors. His assignments were supervised administrative positions located at the Archdiocesan Center in Newark. Fr. Fugee was under continual supervision during the exercise of these ministerial duties.

The Archdiocese only learned about two weeks ago when approached by a reporter that Fr. Fugee had engaged in other activities or ministries. The activities written about in recent news stories were not part of his assigned ministry. Had the Archdiocese known about them at the time, permission to undertake them would not have been granted.

Neither Archbishop Myers nor others in the leadership of the Archdiocese gave Fr. Fugee permission to work in any ministry other than those ministries that were physically located within the Archdiocesan Center. He did not seek, nor would it have been granted, permission to engage in activities involving minors either through the Archdiocese or at any other diocese in the state. He failed to follow established procedures and protocols in place among all of the dioceses in the state designed to prevent unauthorized ministries.

Ah, well. That story sounds much better. Of course, it's wildly inconsistent with the response of Jim Goodness, the Archbishop's spokesman as quoted in the Star Ledger on April 28:

But Goodness denied the agreement had been breached, saying the archdiocese has interpreted the document to mean Fugee could work with minors as long as he is under the supervision of priests or lay ministers who have knowledge of his past and of the conditions in the agreement.

"We believe that the archdiocese and Father Fugee have adhered to the stipulations in all of his activities, and will continue to do so," Goodness said. Even if Fugee heard private confessions from minors, those supervising Fugee were always nearby, Goodness said.

"The fact is, he has done nothing wrong," the spokesman said. "Nobody has reported any activity that is inappropriate, and I think that’s important to know, especially given that he’s a figure whose name is public and whose past is public."

So, a week ago, the Archdiocese defended allowing Fugee to act in the manner that it now denies knowing about. Now it denies having given him such permission, and states that Archbishop John Myers would have denied such permission.

Of course, the reliably reprehensible Bill Donohue seizes upon this radical change in story to reassert that this is all the fault of liberals:

Father Fugee now says he violated his agreement with the Newark Archdiocese and the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office; thus, his decision to step down. His dishonesty is appalling. Moreover, he has clearly impugned his character.
As I said in my report of May 1, “What is really going on here is an attempt to sunder Archbishop Myers—Fugee is not the man they want. They want Myers, and that is because they detest what he stands for.”
Fugee’s resignation does nothing to change my position. Indeed, had there not been calls for Myers to resign over this matter, there would have been no reason to comment on it.
There is a concerted effort on the part of left-wing Catholics and ex-Catholics, aided and abetted by some in the media, to take down a bishop. But not just any bishop: he must be a conservative. To this day, the way these activists have reacted to their hero, the disgraced former archbishop of Milwaukee, Rembert Weakland, is in stark contrast to their response to conservative bishops who have been embroiled in controversy (e.g., Bishop Robert Finn of Kansas City-St. Joseph and Newark Archbishop John Myers).
I’ve said it before, and I will say it again: any priest who is guilty of committing a crime, especially sexual abuse, should have the book thrown at him; he will get no defense from the Catholic League. But when we see that the clergy of other religions, as well as public school officials, are being held to a lesser standard than our bishops, that is cause for action. Not until we get a level playing field will we back off.

I quote the statement in its entirety because it is a breathtakingly mendacious document. I'm not sure that there is a statement in it that is truthful. Let's look at a couple:

1. Father Fugee now says he violated his agreement with the Newark Archdiocese and the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office: Er, no. He actually doesn't. He contends that his actions were outside his assignment, and that he did not request required permissions. That isn't an admission to violating the plea agreement, although it leaves him only with a narrow technical defense that he did not accept an assignment in violation of the plea agreement (which I covered here.)

2.Fugee’s resignation does nothing to change my position. Actually, it does. And pretty drastically, too. On May 1--three days ago--Donohue issued a "Special Report" in which he claimed that "the court agreement expressly allowed Father Fugee to have contact with minors, provided he was supervised. Nothing in either the news story or the editorial even suggests that Fugee was at any time unsupervised in his contacts with minors. If the Star-Ledger had such evidence, it would have said so....At bottom, the Star-Ledger has unfairly maligned Archbishop Myers, and has treated Father Fugee like a political football." The"Special Report" excoriates the Star-Ledger, demanding its editorial board resign en masse, for accurately reporting the very fact that Donohue now concedes--that Father Fugee's actions violated the Agreement. He does not even have the grace to note the inconsistency with his own prior position that this observation which he now accepts as a given was a mere three days ago compelling proof of the media's left-wing bias and iniquitous plot to "sunder" Archbishop Myers. (By the bye, Bill, get a dictionary, will ya?)

3. I’ve said it before, and I will say it again: any priest who is guilty of committing a crime, especially sexual abuse, should have the book thrown at him; he will get no defense from the Catholic League Now that's a whopper. Donohue, two days ago:

Some are saying that Fugee’s legal status is conditioned on a technicality that allowed him to return to ministry. Let me make this clear: If accused Muslim terrorists, who seek to kill as many innocent Americans as they can, are given (free of charge) attorneys prepared to exploit every legal loophole there is, then I want priests to be afforded the same measures.

Liar.

I could go on--Donohue assumes without demonstrating a left-wing cadre out to get only conservative bishops, and reasserts they, and the left wing media, and not Father Fugee's actions and the Archdiocese's initial support made this a story; he claims that the decades of ecclesiastical cover-up of sex abuse shouldn't be a story since isolated incidents of sex abuse in other contexts don't get "a level playing field" in the media (Bill, this isn't a game, and it's not a competition. There are no winners here, only losers. "We're less evil than the Methodists" would not be, even if true, a defense in the eyes of the law, let alone God). But the take away from this is Donohue's continued vitriol at those he now must admit were right on the facts is to reaffirm what I wrote yesterday. Donohue and his "Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights" are morally bankrupt, and have no interest in Catholic children, only in the hierarchy.

Archbishop Myers, The Catholic League, and Suppressio Veri

In the latest outbreak of the priest sex abuse scandal, Archbishop John Myers of Newark New Jersey has allowed a priest who admitted sexually groping a teenage boy to, in defiance of a plea bargain to which the archdiocese is a party, perform youth ministry and have ongoing exposure to children:

Six years ago, to avoid retrial on charges that he groped a teenage boy, the Rev. Michael Fugee entered a rehabilitation program, underwent counseling for sex offenders and signed a binding agreement that would dictate the remainder of his life as a Roman Catholic priest.

Fugee would not work in any position involving children, the agreement with the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office states. He would have no affiliation with youth groups. He would not attend youth retreats. He would not hear the confessions of minors.

But Fugee has openly done all of those things for the past several years through an unofficial association with a Monmouth County church, St. Mary’s Parish in Colts Neck, The Star-Ledger found.

He has attended weekend youth retreats in Marlboro and on the shores of Lake Hopatcong in Mount Arlington, parishioners say. Fugee also has traveled with members of the St. Mary’s youth group on an annual pilgrimage to Canada. At all three locations, he has heard confessions from minors behind closed doors.

What’s more, he has done so with the approval of New Jersey’s highest-ranking Catholic official, Newark Archbishop John J. Myers.

In the same story, the Archdiocese is quoted as defending these actions, not contesting them, on the ground that "the archdiocese has interpreted the document to mean Fugee could work with minors as long as he is under the supervision of priests or lay ministers who have knowledge of his past and of the conditions in the agreement. 'We believe that the archdiocese and Father Fugee have adhered to the stipulations in all of his activities, and will continue to do so,' [spokesman Jim] Goodness said."

Now, a couple of facts. First, Father Fugee in the course of questioning confessed to the crime, and the voluntariness and accuracy of the confession have not been questioned by either the Archdiocese, Myers, or Fugee himself.

The plea agreement between the District Attorney's office, Fugee and the Archdiocese recites, that the Appellate Division reversed Fugee's conviction and remanded for a new trial because "the jury instructions authored by the trial court failed to provide adequate guidance on the issue of defendant's supervisory authority."

As to the obligations under the agreement, the agreement itself provides in (as we lawyers like to say) pertinent part:

...[A]s part of his employment/vocation with the Roman Catholic Church, [Fugee] shall not have any unsupervised contact with or any duties that call for the supervision/ministry of any child or children under the age of 18.

Article 4 It is agreed and understood that the Archdiocese shall not assign or or otherwise place Michael Fugee in any position within the Archdiocese that allows him to have any unsupervised contact with or to supervise or to minister to any minor child or children under the age of 18 or work in any position in which children are involved. This includes, but is not limited to, presiding over a parish, involvement with a youth group, religious education/parochial school, CCD, confessions of children, youth choir, youth retreats and day care.

It is agreed and understood that Michael Fugee shall not accept any position within the Archdiocese of Newark or any other Archdiocese under which he is assigned or or otherwise placed Michael Fugee that allows him to have any unsupervised contact with or to supervise or to minister to any minor child or children under the age of 18 or work in any position in which children are involved. This includes, but is not limited to, presiding over a parish, involvement with a youth group, religious education/parochial school, CCD, confessions of children, youth choir, youth retreats and day care.

The use of the disjunctive "or" makes clear that the "unsupervised contact" provision does not modify the following stipulations, and that the Archdiocese's reading of the Agreement is simply untenable. Understandably, the Newark Star-Ledger has called for Myers' resignation.

In a "special report", the increasingly mis-named Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, per William Donohue, attacks the Star Ledger for this:

The editorial board intentionally distorted the agreement so it could make its case to hound Archbishop Myers out of office. It also smeared Fugee by suggesting that children are not safe in his company. Here is exactly what the agreement said:
“It is agreed and understood that the Archdiocese shall not assign or otherwise place Michael Fugee in any position within the Archdiocese that allows him to have any unsupervised contact with or to supervise or minister to any minor/child under the age of 18 or work in any position in which children are involved.” (My italics.) [Note: In the next paragraph, the identical language is used to hold Father Fugee to these terms.]
In other words, the court agreement expressly allowed Father Fugee to have contact with minors, provided he was supervised. Nothing in either the news story or the editorial even suggests that Fugee was at any time unsupervised in his contacts with minors. If the Star-Ledger had such evidence, it would have said so.

****

Now, all of a sudden, the plain words of the agreement are seen as open to interpretation. But if the agreement says Fugee was not supposed to have unsupervised contact, what other plausible interpretation is there? The newspaper would have the reader believe that the agreement is ambiguous about this condition, when, of course, it is not.

Note what Donohue has done? He has accurately quoted a snippet of the language, but stopped after the language he believes he can distort to exonerate the Archdiocese--that is, the specific examples in the explicitly non-exhaustive list, several of which (youth retreats, hearing confessions) the reports indicate Fugee has violated, and has further hoped that the reader who wants to believe that the Archbishop and Archdiocese is being smeared will miss that disjunctive "or." And since Donohue has not provided a link, and has himself omitted the adumbration of specific examples that are barred, the reader will miss those unless she goes looking.

It's our old friends, suppressio veri, suggestio falsi come to pay a call, isn't it? Donohue is so wedded to his vision of "my tribe, right or wrong" that he will distort, and outright lie while claiming those who are telling the truth are slandering a good man out of anti-Catholic bias. (Donohue stresses that the church court under canon law has acquitted Fugee, a fact that seems wildly improbable in view of the, y'know, confession, but which, if true, stresses the need for secular law enforcement to not allow canon law to stand in for it all the more.)

Apparently Donohue is getting some blowback on this story; he has added a follow up in which he responds to some critics by claiming that the Star-Ledger's coverage was a "contrived story emanating from a foe of the Catholic Church" since Fugee has not been accused of having reoffended. He also writes that

Some are saying that Fugee’s legal status is conditioned on a technicality that allowed him to return to ministry. Let me make this clear: If accused Muslim terrorists, who seek to kill as many innocent Americans as they can, are given (free of charge) attorneys prepared to exploit every legal loophole there is, then I want priests to be afforded the same measures.

This is a very helpful statement, in that it clarifies two facets of Donohue's thinking. First, he's not at all interested in protecting the children of Catholic parents; he's interested only in the priests and the hierarchy. Second, he believes that the word of the Catholic Church to secular law enforcement can be broken with impunity, and that a pettifogging legalism is a morally justified response to public criticism of the Church's betrayal of its own undertakings.

After all, it's ok when terrorists do it, so why shouldn't "the one true faith"?