Henri Nouwen -- a Spirtuality of Peace

Fr. John Dear, SJ, writes a regular column for the National Catholic Reporter on Henri Nouwen. I have long admired Nouwen as a writer, and once heard him speak at Seattle University. In the past I've used his book, The Wounded Healer, as a resource for our parish Camillus group, which does regular pastoral visits with families at nearby Children's Hospital.

I really enjoyed Fr. Dear's column, On the Road to Peace, which touched on various biographical details of Nouwen's life, and on elements of his Spirituality of Peace. Both make for enjoyable reading.

It might inspire further search/research into Nouwen's views on this topic. Nouwen is profound, and I hadn't realized that he'd written on this topic, which is one of the topics that I have strong feelings for. If someone checks this out, I'd love to exchange some thoughts.

Respect Life month: a really fine article

The first Sunday of the month of October is considered Respect Life Sunday. This year it fell on the weekend when St. Bridget was doing signups for its various ministries, so while we included this concern at Mass in our Prayers of the Faithful, there was little other mention of it.

I've felt for some time that we give this issue too little mention, but I've also struggled with a way that I could meaningfully speak about it. I've really loathed the way the "debate" in this country has proceeded, especially the way in which (I believe) our Catholic Church was used in the 2004 election.

I ran across an article in another blog, and thought it was very much worth posting here. It's entitled The Rhetoric of Abortion: Reflections from a Former Pro-life Activist, by Elizabeth Wardle, posted on Alternet.

I'd be interested in your thoughts.

Unjust and Indefensible

While on this trip I have had the time to catch up on my reading. One of the articles I read was a wonderfully written piece in the October 6th issue of Commonweal, entitled Unjust and Indefensible, by Chris Dowd, a former officer in the U.S. Navy. The article was an award winner in Commonweal's 2006 Theological Essay contest. What makes it theological is that Mr. Dowd takes the Iraq war through each element of the Just War theory, and demonstrates why accepted Catholic moral teaching renders the verdict that it is an "unjust and indefensible" war.

I also appreciate his remarks near the end:

Writing this essay has been a difficult task. I supported Bush in the 2000 election. In the days after 9/11, I fully supported our military action in Afghanistan, and still do. Moreover, I was inclined to believe the Bush administration's assertions about Iraq in 2002 and 2003 and to trust its case for war. Though I never thought the criterion of last resort was met, Colin Powell's appearance before the UN on February 5, 2003 did much to convince me that the time had come for military action. I believed there must be intelligence, too secret to share with the world, that justified it. I trusted that the administration was making morally responsible decisions, even as I wept over what would ensue when the bombs began to fall.

I now know that what Powell put before the world in February 2003 was an amalgam of speculation and misinformation, exaggerated to support our decision to go to war. That decision had, for all intents and purposes, been made just months after 9/11, and the rests was simply preparation and maneuvering. I believe that we were indeed misled, and that saddens me deeply. Knowing that this was an unjust war makes the violence and bloodshed of the occupation in its aftermath even harder to take.

I also appreciate his comments about where we are now. As much as I believed at the time that the war was immoral, I believe, as Mr. Dowd does, that we cannot simply withdraw. We owe it to the citizens of Iraq to help rebuild their country. We cannot simply leave the situation to chaos and civil war, and possibly intervention by neighboring Iran.

Unfortunately, I have no confidence in the current administration to carry out that rebuilding.

Follow the link, read the article, and let me know what you think.