January 1, 2008
                                                                                    Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God
                                                                                    World Day of Peace 

Dear Brothers, 

This year, 2008, is an important year for our country. I am speaking, of course, of our national elections. By the time you receive this, the Iowa caucuses will have taken place. Yet there remain primaries and months of campaigning ahead. 

It would be easy for us to size things up quickly on ideological grounds. We need a president from the left or one from the right. I always vote Democrat or I always vote Republican.  

It would also be easy for us not to confront the challenges of these elections in our preaching or to withdraw from such conversations. After all, politics is one of the things about which we ought not speak lest disagreement divide us.  

However, ought we not ask ourselves: What can we as Dominicans, as preaching friars, as men dedicated to truth, contribute to the upcoming national debates? Do we simply choose and defend a preferred candidate and, like many, ask: who are you for? Or can we contribute something more toward making this a year of reflection on the direction our country will take at a crucial moment in its history? Can we promote analysis at a deeper level than usual and not simply succumb to media reports with their vested interests?  

There are many issues of importance and the emphasis we place on them will vary. For many those issues are war, national security, terrorism, global poverty, immigration, stem cell research, the right to life, other human rights, climate control, social security, health care, and so on. All these issues are extremely important to be sure.  But, as Dominicans, can we deepen the conversation in the country in some way, not by defending “our” candidate, whom undoubtedly in the end each of us will have, or by focusing on specific issues alone, but by asking questions that help people deepen their thinking? In other words, our contribution is not to get people to think like we do but to get people, including ourselves, to think beyond our current horizons.  

The particular candidate of choice may not even be as important as the questions we raise or the substance of our reflection. Perhaps it would be good to place a moratorium on discussing the candidates themselves. If people suspect that we are trying to persuade them to vote as we do, without respect for their own judgments and reasoning, will they be open to discussing what is at stake – the future of our country and the impact of the most powerful nation in the history of humanity on the world?  

We can probably agree already, before all the primaries take place, that no candidate will be completely satisfactory when judged in terms of our Catholic values. Does that mean we should not vote for one of the two major candidates who will emerge, that we ought to vote for a third party candidate, or write in a name? There is something to be said for this in terms of our integrity. It is unlikely, however, that a third candidate will be any more in line with our values and concerns than one of the two major candidates. It also has little impact since it is improbable that a third party candidate will be elected. Yet perhaps I will have preserved my integrity and not have voted for a candidate with whom I disagree on an issue of importance. 

Would it be better not to vote at all? This too is an option one might consider so as to avoid casting a ballot for someone whom I oppose on some significant issue. Will this, however, improve the situation and make for a better world? Do I have some moral obligation to vote in a democratic society even if the one for whom I vote is not completely to my liking? Most of us will in the end vote for a candidate with whom we disagree on some substantive issues. This is a consequence of living in a secular democracy. 

So the challenge is how to engage others as well as ourselves in such a way that we learn in the process, that we deepen our understanding, and that we help others to think substantively about a bigger picture than just this candidate and this election. Perhaps our contribution will come simply in raising questions, like, “Where are we going as a people and a nation?” or in opening doors for someone to see a bigger picture.  

There will be much information available to Catholic voters, websites that help people see how a candidate’s program is aligned with Catholic values and exhortations from varied bishops. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ statement, “Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship, A Call to Political Responsibility from the Catholic Bishops of the United States,” is an excellent document.[1] Other exhortations and aids, however, although helpful to varying degrees, ought not be our primary guides. These do not necessarily help people to think for themselves. A particular website can have its own agenda. A particular bishop has his own prudential take on issues. There may not be agreement among all of them. Our own considered assessments will also undoubtedly vary. We can, however, find common ground on substantive questions that need to be raised. 

We might begin by raising questions like:

-- What is a proper role for our country within the community of nations? What kind of leadership do we want to provide? What example given?

-- Is integrity possible in public life, and if not what does that mean?

-- What is the commitment in our country and in political discourse to truth and honest speech?

-- Is the gospel relevant to the challenges of the contemporary world, and if so, how can it become more enfleshed in our country’s vision for itself? 

Questions like these could be topics for preaching. Perhaps some would like to prepare a homily addressing one of these or other questions, a homily that can be helpful to others as we preach during these months ahead. Perhaps these questions could be a topic for a community study meeting as well. 

I would like to return, however, to the topic of slipping too quickly into an ideological frame of reference, of looking too simply at things in terms of red and blue, and see how our own Christian theology can help us forge a direction.  

There are in cultures and societies, it has been suggested, a principle of conservation and a principle of rejuvenation, a conservative principle, if you will, and a progressive principle, to be held together in close harmony.[2] Some of us may consider ourselves progressives or liberal, others of us may consider ourselves conservatives or traditional, still others may find that these categories do not work.  That is not a difficulty. The difficulty comes in not seeing each of us as parts of a larger whole, of a deeper harmony, as instruments of the Spirit. The challenge is whether we can have mutual respect and even affection for each other, seeing one another as friends rather than as enemies – and not only among us as brothers but as people in the nation as a whole. 

As are the faiths of Judaism and Islam, we are a people of the Book. We are grounded in our respective Scriptures. The risk, however, if we emphasize the book alone, the Word alone, is that we might lose a sense of the Spirit who is equally essential. Some may find themselves more at home in a theology of the Logos, of the Word, others with a theology of the Spirit, but in the Trinity itself there is no competition between the two.  

The Source for understanding all diversity, and all unity, from a Christian perspective, is of course the life of the Trinity. The Word expresses itself in creation and history. The life divine becomes incarnate. Our Scriptures and our faith give witness to this. Without the Spirit, however, the Word is dead. Without the Word, the energy and mission of the Spirit is diffused, lost, wasted. The missions of the Word and the Spirit are essential to each other. They complement each other. Neither is more essential than the other. As both are at the core of divine life, so each is essential to our human lives. 

A difficulty with Logos as written word, the Book, is that we can confine ourselves too literally to its words. It needs to be supplemented by Tradition, a history of interpretation, a progressive principle that continues to allow it to live, to unfold in our present moments. In trying to be faithful to the Word, a fundamentalist limits the power of the Word. We are well aware today of Islamic fundamentalism and the havoc it foists on the world order. But there are currents of fundamentalism in all the major religious traditions including our own. And an unbridled nationalism is just as dangerous. In Christianity, evangelical Protestantism has been more susceptible to forms of fundamentalism than has Catholicism, simply due to its emphasis on Scripture alone with little allowance for the dynamic principle of tradition. From within Protestantism wherein Christian fundamentalism arose, however, this fundamentalist tendency has crept into Catholicism as well – wherever the traditional principle of rejuvenation gets disregarded. The Word speaks; the Spirit gives it life. Neither one ought be emphasized at the expense of the other. As risky as engaging the world and modernity may be, the challenge must be undertaken. This was the challenge addressed by the Second Vatican Council, by Pope John Paul II in Fides et Ratio, as well as by Pope Benedict XVI at Regensburg. 

The Word and the Spirit are the two hands of God, to use the phrase from Irenaeus. Both conservatives and progressives are likewise two hands of God. We must see in one another a deeper mystery at work. They are not to be seen in opposition to each other, as contradictory, but as manifesting contrasting emphases. The challenge is to see in the other God’s providence at work. 

Most of us may be at ease with this seemingly benign perspective, as long as the principle we embody most has a little advantage, a leading edge. That, however, would destroy the harmony, create an imbalance, or build a house on sand. Both foundation stones are necessary, Word and Spirit, Scripture and Tradition, conservation or consolidation and rejuvenation or advance. We are only drawn deeply into the life of God, and God’s project for the universe, by a respect for both, for one another. The wise scribe in the Gospel of Matthew draws forth treasure that is both new and old (Mt 13:52).  

To discover the gift or wisdom of the other, while it may not be my own gift or wisdom, is nevertheless important. In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places (Jn 14:2). In the body there are many functions. The ear cannot say to the eye: What good are you? You can’t hear anything (1 Cor 12). The Spirit proclaims the Christ, and Christ gives the Spirit. The Spirit is what Christ came to unleash. He is the gift of the Risen Christ. And the Spirit leads us back to Christ, the Word of God. There is reciprocity, mutuality, always perichoresis – what our ideological wars cannot fathom and what they destroy.  

For some, the coming election will be all about abortion. For others, it will be all about the war. Or it is about national security and terrorism. But in one sense it is not about any of these. It is not about AN issue, or even all the issues, as important as all the issues are. The United States is a powerful, powerful force in the world and it is a question of what we are to do with it. There’s no going back. So how do we move forward? We do not as a country, I believe, have an accurate picture of ourselves. We think of our nation as benign, as generous, as guided by God. But none of these is currently true. We can ask how others see us, and whether rightly or wrongly, they do see in us something we do not see in ourselves and do not want to see. The challenge is to unveil this false consciousness, enabling us to see ourselves more clearly as who we are, and then to ask whether it is too late to be otherwise. Who do we as a nation, as a people, want to become within the larger world community? How do we want to use our influence and power? 

Blessed are the meek (Mt 5:5). The word does not strike positive chords. It not only rhymes with but seems to imply “weak.” Blessed are the weak! When I am weak, then I am strong (2 Cor 12:10). Blessed are the weak, for the strength of God will be theirs.

Does God hear the cries of the poor, the displaced, the unborn, the dead? Blessed are the weak. Blessed are the meek. How do we fit into this? God’s strength will be theirs. When we discover in the end, when the last line is written, that they will inherit the earth, what will that have said to our power, our corporate gains, our gross national product, our seeming ability to do what we want, when we want it, and where we want it? This coming year can be an opportunity not to be missed for national self-reflection on who we choose to become. The “issues” are important but as separate issues each is secondary. What difference does it make if my side wins the election and it remains business as usual and a false consciousness sustained for another four years? What difference does it make if we conquer the whole world but lose our soul (Mt 16:26)? In order for anyone to inherit the earth, we must move to a new consciousness.  

In returning to the reality we face during this coming year, let us not simply be critics of the candidates, or focused on them alone. The world does not need more negativity. Can we move discussions to another level when they get caught in the banal, the already having been said ten thousand times, the complaints about what our political process has to offer? Can we be agents of hope as well as of challenge? Pope Benedict’s most recent encyclical on hope, Spe Salvi, as dense as it is, is equally profound.[3] Hope may be the greatest challenge of our time. Other countries have faced more difficult challenges than our own, but few countries have wielded as much influence as ours currently does. We owe it to ourselves, to our people, and to God to be more like leaven and to find breakthroughs where none seem to exist. Simple solutions and dogmatic decrees will not do. Yet many look for easy answers. Let us rather raise difficult questions that can guide us in our thinking. Let us contribute something constructive to the consciousness and discourse of the nation. With minds open to learning, and hearts full of hope, can we as a province during this coming year offer ourselves as instruments of the Spirit’s wisdom?  

Your brother in Dominic,
Donald J. Goergen, O.P.
Provincial Promoter of Social Justice