John and Yoko

Climategate Blah Blah Blah

Daily Telegraphy blogger and columist James Delingpole has been covering Climategate: leaked emails, lies, hockey sticks and all. I heartily invite you to go have a look!

Pope Benedict General Audience 16/12/09: John of Sailsbury

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

In our catechesis on the Christian culture of the Middle Ages, we now turn to John of Salisbury, an outstanding philosopher and theologian of the twelfth century. Born in England, John was educated in Paris and Chartres. A close associate of Saint Thomas Becket, he was involved in the crisis between the Church and the Crown under King Henry II, and died as Bishop of Chartres. In his celebrated work, the Metalogicon, John teaches that authentic philosophy is by nature communicative: it bears fruit in a message of wisdom which serves the building up of society in truth and goodness. While acknowledging the limitations of human reason, John insists that it can attain to the truth through dialogue and argumentation. Faith, which grants a share in God’s perfect knowledge, helps reason to realize its full potential. In another work, the Policraticus, John defends reason’s capacity to know the objective truth underlying the universal natural law, and its obligation to embody that law in all positive legislation. John’s insights are most timely today, in light of the threats to human life and dignity posed by legislation inspired more by the “dictatorship of relativism” than by the sober use of right reason and concern for the principles of truth and justice inscribed in the natural law.

Brief biography of John of Sailsbury

Going without communication technology.

What would it be like if we went without mobile phones, iphones, email, SMS etc for a day? What about for a few days or even a week? I wonder what would happen to the ways we communicate. Not only the ways, but also the amount, the time span and the quality. Let's say we get rid of:

Mobile phone
iphone/Blackberry inc. apps.
Personal and work email
SMS messenger
Facebook
Twitter
Home phone
Pagers
Blogs and personal websites


What could Happen?

1. We would stay in contact with fewer people for a start. However, the people we would stay in contact with would be the relationships we value more. We would be more willing to make the effort to write, meet-up with and visit these people. We would be less likely to move long distances away from family and friends too.

2. The quality of our communication would improve. Compare a txt msg (text message!) or the common three line email, with a long catch-up between friends or letters between relatives and lovers. Consider the great diaries and letters from history that we still enjoy reading and studying: Cicero, Alexander the Great, the letters of St. Paul in Sacred Scripture, Jerome, Augustine, Erasmus, Pepys, Mozart and more recently the papal letters for various occasions. These can be held onto, treasured, and passed onto the next generation, unlike text messages, twitters and emails that get deleted or lost in cyberspace.

3. Spelling, grammar and vocabulary would improve and expand. 

4. We would probably have better quality leisure time. A few weeks ago I read that people with Blackberry or iphone's work an extra 7-8 hours on average. Simply travelling home from work on the train becomes time to check emails and follow up work related voicemail messages A night out with friends or a few days away becomes an occasion to document every single moment with millions of photos to be displayed on Facebook. Anyone and everyone are kept up to date with one's comings and goings via twitter updates and Facebook status updates via iphone.

Anyway, these are just a few ideas I'd thought I could share wiv any1 n' every1 who may read dis blog. Updates and photos to follow... 

To him who ever thought with love of me

Works of Mercy, by the Master of Alkmaar in 1504, for the St. Lawrence church in Alkmaar. The panels show the works of mercy in this order: feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked, bury the dead, shelter the traveler, comfort the sick, and free the imprisoned.

To him who ever thought with love of me

Or ever did for my sake some good deed

I will appear, looking such charity

And kind compassion, at his life's last need

That he will out of hand and heartily

Repent he sinned and all his sins be freed.

                                             (Gerald Manly Hopkins) 

Our Lady of Guadalupe

Today is the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe. The image above is of the Virgin Mary that miraculously appeared on the tilma of St. Juan Diego.

"My dear little son, I love you. I desire you to know who I am. I am the ever-virgin Mary, Mother of the true God who gives life and maintains its existence. He created all things. He is in all places. He is Lord of Heaven and Earth. I desire a church in this place where your people may experience my compassion. All those who sincerely ask my help in their work and in their sorrows will know my Mother's Heart in this place. Here I will see their tears; I will console them and they will be at peace. So run now to Tenochtitlan and tell the Bishop all that you have seen and heard."

There are lots of websites and books to read on Our Lady of Guadalupe and St. Juan Diego. A brief bit of information can be read here.

Prayer of Pope St. Pius X.

Our Lady of Guadalupe,

Mystical Rose,

make intercession for the holy Church,

protect the Sovereign Pontiff,

help all those who invoke thee in their necessities,

and since thou art the ever Virgin Mary

and Mother of the true God,

obtain for us from thy most holy Son

the grace of keeping our faith,

sweet hope in the midst of the bitterness of life,

burning charity

and the precious gift of final perseverance.

Amen.

This prayer was approved and enriched with an indulgence of five hundred days by Pope Pius X at all audience held on August, 1908, and was included in the official edition of approved indulgenced prayers (1950). Raccolta number 389, 500 days Indulgence, Pope Saint Pius X audience, August 15, 1908.

Prayer of Pope John Paul II.

O Immaculate Virgin, Mother of the true God and Mother of the Church!, who from this place reveal your clemency and your pity to all those who ask for your protection, hear the prayer that we address to you with filial trust, and present it to your Son Jesus, our sole Redeemer.

Mother of Mercy, Teacher of hidden and silent sacrifice, to you, who come to meet us sinners, we dedicate on this day all our being and all our love. We also dedicate to you our life, our work, our joys, our infirmities and our sorrows. Grant peace, justice and prosperity to our peoples; for we entrust to your care all that we have and all that we are, our Lady and Mother. We wish to be entirely yours and to walk with you along the way of complete faithfulness to Jesus Christ in His Church; hold us always with your loving hand.

Virgin of Guadalupe, Mother of the Americas, we pray to you for all the Bishops, that they may lead the faithful along paths of intense Christian life, of love and humble service of God and souls. Contemplate this immense harvest, and intercede with the Lord that He may instill a hunger for holiness in the whole people of God, and grant abundant vocations of priests and religious, strong in the faith and zealous dispensers of God’s mysteries.

Grant to our homes the grace of loving and respecting life in its beginnings, with the same love with which you conceived in your womb the life of the Son of God. Blessed Virgin Mary, protect our families, so that they may always be united, and bless the upbringing of our children.

Our hope, look upon us with compassion, teach us to go continually to Jesus and, if we fall, help us to rise again, to return to Him, by means of the confession of our faults and sins in the Sacrament of Penance, which gives peace to the soul.

We beg you to grant us a great love for all the holy Sacraments, which are, as it were, the signs that your Son left us on earth.

Thus, Most Holy Mother, with the peace of God in our conscience, with our hearts free from evil and hatred, we will be able to bring to all true joy and true peace, which come to us from your son, our Lord Jesus Christ, who with God the Father and the Holy Spirit, lives and reigns for ever and ever.
Amen.

His Holiness John Paul II
Mexico, January 1979. Visiting Her Basilica during his first foreign trip as Pope.

Prayer of Pope Benedict XVI.

Holy Mary, who under the title of Our Lady of Guadalupe are invoked as Mother by the men and women of Mexico and of Latin America, encouraged by the love that you inspire in us, we once again place our life in your motherly hands.

May you, who are present in these Vatican Gardens, hold sway in the hearts of all the mothers of the world and in our own heart. With great hope, we turn to you and trust in you.

Hail Mary, full of grace,

the Lord is with thee,

blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.

Holy Mary, Mother of God,

pray for us sinners,

now and at the hour of our death. Amen.

Our Lady of Guadalupe,

Pray for us.

His Holiness Benedict XVI
Prayer before the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe in the Vatican gardens. May 11, 2005.

Cardinal Dulles on the Commandments and Modern Society

Ordination Video of Cardinal Dulles

Memorial of Cardinal Avery Dulles Today

December 9th marked the 30th anniversary of Bishop Fulton Scheen's passing from this life. Today marks 1 year since the passing of Cardinal Avery Dulles ( August 24, 1918 – December 12, 2008).

Cardinal Dulles was a Jesuit priest, theologian, cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church and served as the Laurence J. McGinley Professor of Religion and Society at Fordham University from 1988 to 2008. Dulles was raised a Presbyterian but had become an agnostic by the time he began college at Harvard in 1936. His religious doubts were diminished during a personally profound moment when he stepped out into a rainy day and saw a tree beginning to flower along the Charles River; after that moment he never again "doubted the existence of an all-good and omnipotent God." He noted how his theism turned toward conversion to Catholicism: "The more I examined, the more I was impressed with the consistency and sublimity of Catholic doctrine." He converted to Catholicism in the fall of 1940.

Upon his discharge from the Navy in 1946, Avery Dulles entered the Society of Jesus, and was ordained to the priesthood in 1956. After a year in Germany, he studied at the Gregorian University in Rome, and was awarded the doctorate in Sacred Theology in 1960.

Dulles was created a cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church in Rome on February 21, 2001 by Pope John Paul II. At the time of his elevation to cardinal, he was not a bishop, as is normally the case, but only a priest. However, he successfully petitioned the Pope for a dispensation from episcopal consecration due to advanced age. His titular assignment was Cardinal-Deacon of SS. Nome di Gesù e Maria in Via Lata (the Most Holy Names of Jesus and Mary). Because he reached 80 before becoming cardinal, he was never eligible to vote in a conclave. Because he was a cardinal but not a bishop, Dulles became an honorary, non-voting member of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Cardinal Dulles served on the faculty of Woodstock College from 1960 to 1974 and that of The Catholic University of America from 1974 to 1988. He was a visiting professor at: The Gregorian University (Rome), Weston School of Theology, Union Theological Seminary (New York), Princeton Theological Seminary, Virginia Theological Seminary, Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg, Boston College, Campion Hall, Oxford, the University of Notre Dame, the Catholic University at Leuven, Yale University, and St. Joseph's Seminary, Dunwoodie. He was the author of over 700 articles on theological topics, as well as twenty-two books.

Past President of both the Catholic Theological Society of America and the American Theological Society and Professor Emeritus at The Catholic University of America, Cardinal Dulles served on the International Theological Commission and as a member of the United States Lutheran/Roman Catholic Dialogue. He was also a consultant to the Committee on Doctrine of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops. Over his life, his awards included Phi Beta Kappa, the Croix de Guerre, the Cardinal Spellman Award for distinguished achievement in theology, the Boston College Presidential Bicentennial Award, the Christus Magister Medal from the University of Portland (Oregon), the Religious Education Forum Award from the National Catholic Educational Association, America magazine's Campion Award, the F. Sadlier Dinger Award for contributions to the catechetical ministry of the Church, the Cardinal Gibbons Award from The Catholic University of America, the John Carroll Society Medal, the Jerome Award from the Roman Catholic Library Association of America, Fordham Founders Award, Gaudium Award from the Breukelein Institute, and thirty-three honorary doctorates.

 In his later years, the Cardinal suffered from the effects of polio from his youth. On Tuesday April 1, 2008, Cardinal Dulles gave his Farewell Address as Laurence J. McGinley Professor of Religion and Society. As Cardinal Dulles was unable to speak, former President of Fordham University Father Joseph O'Hare, S.J. read the Cardinal's address. In addition to the loss of speech, the use of his arms was impaired but his mind remained clear and he continued to work and communicate using his computer keyboard. Current Fordham President Father Joseph McShane, S.J. also presented him with the University's President's Medal that evening. April 1, 2008 also marked the date the Cardinal's book, Church and Society: The Laurence J. McGinley Lectures, 1988-2007 (Fordham University Press, 2008) was released.

In his Farewell Lecture, the Cardinal reflected on his weakening condition:

"Suffering and diminishment are not the greatest of evils but are normal ingredients in life, especially in old age. They are to be expected as elements of a full human existence. Well into my 90th year I have been able to work productively. As I become increasingly paralyzed and unable to speak, I can identify with the many paralytics and mute persons in the Gospels, grateful for the loving and skillful care I receive and for the hope of everlasting life in Christ. If the Lord now calls me to a period of weakness, I know well that his power can be made perfect in infirmity. "Blessed be the name of the Lord!"

On April 19, 2008, Pope Benedict XVI gave the ailing Cardinal Dulles a private audience during his apostolic trip to the United States. The Cardinal prepared his written remarks to the Pope prior to the visit.

Cardinal Dulles wrote many very intersting articles for the journal First Things. You can view a list of them by clicking HERE.

Jesus Son of God: The crucified Rabbi.

Friday 11th marks the eight-day Jewish festival of Hanukkah, the story of which is recounted in 1 Maccabees. Christians are familiar with the eight-day festival of Hanukkah because of its proximity to Christmas. It is commemorated on the twenty-fifth day of of the Jewish month of Kislev, and falls sometime in late November or December. It is the most recent Jewish festival, dating to the second century before Christ.

In 167 B.C., the Syro-Greek king Antiochus IV Epiphanes began to persecute the Jewish people. Antiochus IV Greek forbade circumcision, burned Jewish Scriptures, forced Jews to eat unclean swine’s flesh, and desecrated the Temple in Jerusalem by commanding an un-kosher sacrifice of swine on the Temple’s altar.

Horrified by the sacrilege of Antiochus IV, an elderly priest Mattathias and his son Judah Maccabaeus (“the Hammer”) formed a militia and waged a war of guerilla tactics against the occupying Greek forces: “Every man who has zeal for the Law and maintains the Covenant, let him follow me!” (1 Macc 2:27). The revolution succeeded and the Temple was rededicated in 164 B.C. on the twenty-fifth day of Kislev. The festival commemorating the event is called Hanukkah, meaning “Dedication.”

The feast of Hanukkah lasts eight days because Judas Maccabaeus wanted to imitate King Solomon. After all, Solomon had dedicated the original temple during the eight-day feast of Tabernacles. However, the feast of Tabernacles falls in the month of Tishri, not Kislev. Instead of waiting another ten months, Judas Maccabaeus decreed that a new eight-day festival be created in imitation of the festival of Tabernacles, beginning on the twenty-fifth day of the Jewish month of Kislev. The book of 2 Maccabees records that Judas Maccabaeus instituted the eight-day festival because, “Solomon also kept the eight days,” when the original Temple was dedicated (2 Macc 2:12).

The Jewish Talmud offers another tradition to explain the eight days of Hanukkah. When the Jews recaptured Jerusalem from the tyrannous Greeks, the Jewish priests did not have enough oil to keep the Temple’s menorah lit. There was only enough sacred oil to burn for one day and it would take at least a week to mix a fresh supply of holy oil. Yet, the one-day supply of holy oil lasted for eight days by a divine miracle. For this reason, faithful Jews light the menorah during the eight days of the festival.

Many Christians are unaware of these connections. As a result, they miss the important “Hanukkah message” of Christ in John’s Gospel. The presence of Christ at the Temple during Hanukkah is important because Hanukkah recalled how the Maccabees dedicated the Temple after the Greeks had defiled it. However, the presence of God’s glory did not manifest itself at the re-dedication of the Maccabees and fill the Temple as it did in the days of King Solomon. Since the time of the Maccabees, God had not inhabited the Temple as He had before the Jews’ Babylonian exile. The presence of Christ in the Temple at Hanukkah shows that God’s presence had once again entered to the Temple.

It was the feast of the Dedication [i.e. Hanukkah] at Jerusalem. It was winter and Jesus was walking in the Temple, in the portico of Solomon. So the Jews gathered round him and said to him, “How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us openly” (Jn 10:22-24).

It was during Hanukkah that Christ answered them by boldly proclaiming: “I and the Father are one” (Jn 10: 30). Christ entered into the Temple at the feast of Hanukkah and presented himself as the God of Israel. His enemies immediately understood His claim in light of Hanukkah’s significance. We know this because they took up stones to stone him and said “we stone you for blasphemy, because you, being a man, make yourself to be God” (Jn 10:31-33). Hence, the festival of Hanukkah serves as a sign of Christ’s fulfillment of the Temple and the entire Old Covenant. Jesus was not only a gifted rabbi from Nazareth—He is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. As it turns out, Jesus’ relationship with Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and all the righteous of the Old Testament sheds light on why Catholic Christians honor and revere the saints.

[This blog post was adapted from The Crucified Rabbi: Judaism and the Origins of the Catholic Christianity as seen on the blog 'Canterbury Tales' by author Taylor Marshall.]

Letter of the 138 Muslims to Pope Benedict, and and some responses.

You may remember that after Pope Benedict XVI Regensburg Lecture, 138 prominent Muslim scholars composed and sent a letter to Pope Benedict XVI. The following documents are too long to simply reproduce here, so I've provided the links.

• Pope Benedict XVI Regensburg Lecture.
• Letter of the 138 Muslim scholars to Pope Benedict. 
• A response to the Letter of the 38 Muslim Scholars.
• Samir Khalil Samir, 'When Civilisations Meet: How Joseph Ratzinger sees Islam.'
• Aref Ali Nayed commentary on the Regensburg Lecture.
• Khaled Fouad Allam commentary on the Regensburg Lecture
• Alessandro Martinetti response to Aref Ali Nayed.
• Aref Ali Nayed response to Martinetti.

Apostolicam Actuositatem 29.

• Since the laity share in their own way in the mission of the Church, their apostolic formation is specially characterized by the distinctively secular and particular quality of the lay state and by its own form of the spiritual life.

• The formation for the apostolate presupposes a certain human and well-rounded formation adapted to the natural abilities and conditions of each lay person. Well-informed about the modern world, the lay person should be a member of his own community and adjusted to its culture.

• However, the lay person should learn especially how to perform the mission of Christ and the Church by basing his life on belief in the divine mystery of creation and redemption and by being sensitive to the movement of the Holy Spirit who gives life to the people of God and who urges all to love God the Father as well as the world and men in Him. This formation should be deemed the basis and condition for every successful apostolate.

• In addition to spiritual formation, a solid doctrinal instruction in theology, ethics, and philosophy adjusted to differences of age, status, and natural talents, is required. The importance of general culture along with practical and technical formation should also be kept in mind.

• To cultivate good human relations, truly human values must be fostered, especially the art of living fraternally and cooperating with others and of striking up friendly conversation with them.

• Since formation for the apostolate cannot consist in merely theoretical instruction, from the beginning of their formation the laity should gradually and prudently learn how to view, judge and do all things in the light of faith as well as to develop and improve themselves along with others through doing, thereby entering into active service to the Church.(2) This formation, always in need of improvement because of the increasing maturity of the human person and the proliferation of problems, requires an ever deeper knowledge and planned activity. In the fulfillment of all the demands of formation, the unity and integrity of the human person must be kept in mind at all times so that his harmony and balance may be safeguarded and enhanced.

• In this way the lay person engages himself wholly and actively in the reality of the temporal order and effectively assumes his role in conducting the affairs of this order. At the same time, as a living member and witness of the Church, he renders the Church present and active in the midst of temporal affairs.(3)

Jordman on Medieval Philosophy I.

The book that inspired this text was The Legend of the Middle Ages: Philosophical Explorations of Medieval Christianity, Judaism, and Islam by Rémi Brague, a French professor and specialist of medieval religious philosophy. He is also the author of the fine book Eccentric Culture: A Theory of Western Civilization, which I have written an extensive essay about previously. Thematically this text overlaps to some extent with some of the material from my book Defeating Eurabia. I will supplement it with some quotes from two good online interviews with Mr. Brague.

Medieval Muslims were reluctant to travel to infidel lands. According to Islamic jurists Muslims should not stay for too long in the lands of non-Muslims if they cannot live a proper Muslim life there. Muslims had little knowledge of or interest in any Western languages. Only Italian had some currency for commercial purposes, but mainly involving Jews and Eastern Christians, especially Greeks and Armenians. Few Muslims knew any non-Muslim languages well, the knowledge of which was considered unnecessary or even suspect.

Consequently, the translators of Greek and other non-Muslim scientific works to Arabic were never Muslims. They were Christians of the three dominant Eastern denominations plus a few Jews and Sabians. The language of culture for these Christians was Syriac (Syro-Aramaic or Eastern Aramaic) and their liturgical language was Greek. The translators already knew the languages they were to translate. We do have examples of translators who traveled to Greece to perfect their skills, but they were Christians for whom Greek was already at least a liturgical language. Here is Rémi Brague in The Legend of the Middle Ages, page 164:

“Neither were there any Muslims among the ninth-century translators. Almost all of them were Christians of various Eastern denominations: Jacobites, Melchites, and, above all, Nestorians (though I am not sure why the latter predominated). A few others were Sabians, a somewhat bizarre religious community with an intriguing history, whose elites were perhaps the last heirs of the pagan philosophers of the School of Athens. No Muslim learned Greek or, even less, Syriac. Cultivated Christians were often bilingual, even trilingual: they used Arabic for daily life, Syriac for liturgy, and Greek for cultural purposes. The translators that helped to pass along the Greek heritage to the Arabs were artisans who worked for private patrons, without institutional support. One often hears tell of the ‘House of Wisdom’ (bayt al-hikmah), a sort of research center subsidized by the caliphs that specialized in producing Arabic translations of Greek works. This is pure legend. The further back in time we go, the less the chroniclers connect the activity of translation with that ‘house.’ As an institution it was above all a propaganda office working for the Mu`tazilite doctrine supported by the caliphs.”

The Baghdad-centered Abbasid Dynasty, which replaced the Damascus-centered Umayyad Dynasty after AD 750, was closer to pre-Islamic Persian culture and influenced by the Sassanid Zoroastrian practice of translating works and creating libraries. Even Dimitri Gutas admits this in his pro-Islamic book Greek Thought, Arab Culture. There was still a large number of Zoroastrians, Christians and Jews and they held a disproportionate amount of expertise in the medical field. According to author Thomas T. Allsen, Middle Eastern medicine in Mongol ruled China was “almost always” in the hands of Nestorian Christians.

One prominent translator was the Christian scholar Hunayn ibn Ishaq (808-873), called Johannitius in Latin. He was a Nestorian (Assyrian) Christian who had studied Greek in Greek lands, presumably in the Byzantine Empire, and eventually settled in Baghdad. He, his son and his nephew translated into Arabic, sometimes via Syriac, Galen’s medical treatises as well as Hippocratic works and texts by Aristotle, Plato and others. His own compositions include the Ten Treatises on the Eye, which transmitted a largely Galenic theory of vision.

Thabit ibn Qurra (ca. 836-901) was a member of the Sabian sect of star worshippers who had adopted much of Greek culture. His native language was Syriac but he knew Greek and Arabic well. He worked for years in Baghdad where he produced influential Arabic translations or revised earlier ones of Ptolemy’s Almagest and works by Archimedes and Apollonius. Later Arabic versions developed from his version of Euclid’s Elements. He was also an original mathematician who contributed to geometry and the theory of numbers.

Aramaic is a Semitic language related to Hebrew and Arabic. It was once the lingua franca of much of the Near East after the ancient Persians had made it their Imperial language. It was supplemented by Greek after the conquest of this region by Alexander the Great. A young Jew such as Jesus of Nazareth in Roman-ruled Palestine would probably have known some Hebrew, still the religious language but no longer the spoken language of the Jews. He would most likely have used Aramaic for preaching although it is possible that he knew some Greek.

Syriac or Syro-Aramaic gradually gave way to Arabic after the Arab conquest of this region, but when the Koran was composed, Arabic did not yet exist as a written language. Author Ibn Warraq estimates that up to 20% of the Koran is incomprehensible even to educated Arabs because parts of it were originally written in another related language before Muhammad was born, if Muhammad as he is described to us ever existed at all, that is.

The author of the most important work on this subject, a German professor of Semitic languages, due to potential threats writes under the pseudonym Christoph Luxenberg. According to him, certain obscure passages of the chapters or suras of the Koran usually ascribed to the Mecca period, which are also the most tolerant ones as opposed to the much harsher and more violent chapters allegedly from Medina, are not “Islamic” at all but based on Christian hymns in Syriac, Biblical texts adapted for liturgical use:

“In its origin, the Koran is a Syro-Aramaic liturgical book, with hymns and extracts from Scriptures which might have been used in sacred Christian services…Its socio-political sections, which are not especially related to the original Koran, were added later in Medina. At its beginning, the Koran was not conceived as the foundation of a new religion. It presupposes belief in the Scriptures, and thus functioned merely as an inroad into Arabic society.”

While many philosophical and scientific works (but hardly any literary or historical ones) were translated into Arabic, Muslims didn’t preserve the originals as these were now seen as unnecessary. This made the phenomena of “renaissances” impossible – that is, a return to the original texts to reinterpret and study them with fresh and unbiased eyes. Muslims themselves virtually never learned Greek. Here is The Legend of the Middle Ages again, page 168:

“Those who knew Greek had been raised bilingual because they were sons of an Arab father and a Greek mother. No Muslim seems to have ever learned a foreign language for theoretical reasons rather than, for example, commercial reasons. The one exception is perhaps Farabi. One of his biographers relates that he is supposed to have spent years in ‘Greece’ in order to study there. This information is all the more interesting because the word used is not ‘Rum,’ which designated Constantinople, but rather ‘Yunan,’ which can mean only Greece. One might well wonder where, to what center of teaching, in Greece of the time might a student from the Muslim world have possibly gone. Farabi does not seem to have shown proof of a very profound knowledge of Greek. He does indeed cite a few words of that language. But the etymological explanations that he gives of the titles of some of Plato’s dialogues are sheer fantasy. The only real exception is Biruni. But he is an exception that proves the rule: the language that he learned was not Greek, but Sanskrit. Biruni had learned that language to the point of being able to translate into it from Arabic.”

Islamic civilization, in sharp contrast to the European one, never used its knowledge of the foreign as an instrument that would permit it, through comparison and distancing in relations to itself, to understand itself by becoming conscious of the non-obvious character of its cultural practices. An extremely rare exception to this rule may be the eleventh century Persian polymath al-Biruni. As Brague states in his book Eccentric Culture, page 112-113:

“It may be that its geographers made a eulogy of India and of China in order to address a discreet critique of the Islamic civilization of their time, often compensated in the last instance by an affirmation of the religious superiority of the latter. The examples that one could find of such a vision ‘reflected’ in the mirror are exceptional and come from marginal or heretical thinkers. Thus, the contact with the Brahmin Hindu thinkers whose religion does quite well without prophecy (which the Islamic religion declares on the contrary necessary to the happiness of man and to a good social order) posed a problem for the Muslim thinkers; the real or fictitious dialogue with the Brahmins was able to serve to mask a critique of the Islamic religion in a free thinker like Ibn al-Rawandi. The only incontestable exception is without doubt the astonishing work of Al-Biruni on India. This universal scholar (973-1048), astronomer, geographer, historian, mineralogist, pharmacologist etc., had taken the trouble to learn enough Sanskrit to be able to translate in both directions between this language and Arabic (for him also a learned language). He presented a tableau of Hindu society and beliefs with perfect impartiality.”

Greek translations heavily influenced Middle Eastern scholars. Al-Kindi (died ca. AD 873), commonly known as “the Philosopher of the Arabs,” lived in Baghdad and was close to several Abbasid Caliphs. Al-Kindi did significant work on optics and made notable mathematical contributions to cryptography. Al-Farabi (ca. 875-950), “perhaps the greatest” Muslim philosopher according to Brague, came to Baghdad from Central Asia, emphasized human reason and was more original than many of his successors. In How Greek Science Passed to the Arabs, writer De Lacy O'Leary states that “It is significant that almost all the great scientists and philosophers of the Arabs were classed as Aristotelians tracing their intellectual descent from al-Kindi and al-Farabi.” The attempt to reconcile Islam with Greek philosophy was to last for several centuries and ultimately prove unsuccessful due to religious resistance. Are you an author? Learn about Author Central For various reasons, al-Kindi and al-Farabi were not much translated into Latin.

As Rémi Brague states, “in the oft-romanticized city of Cordoba, the family of the Jewish philosopher Maimonides was banished, Averroes was exiled, and many Christians martyred.” Ibn Rushd, or Averroes (1126-1198), was born in Cordoba, Spain (Andalusia). He faced trouble for his freethinking ways and is today often hailed as a beacon of “tolerance,” yet he was also an orthodox jurist of sharia law and served as an Islamic judge in Seville. He approved, without reservation, the killing of heretics in a work that was wholly philosophical in nature. Nevertheless, he is remembered for his attempts to combine Aristotelian philosophy and Islam. He had a major influence on Latin scientists but was practically forgotten in the Islamic world, where philosophy went into permanent decline. The very influential al-Ghazali argued that much of Greek philosophy was an affront to Islam. Virtually all freethinkers within the Islamic world were at odds with Islamic orthodoxy and frequently harassed for this.

European Christians re-conquered Toledo in Spain and Sicily from the Muslims in 1085 and 1091, respectively. The great Italian (Lombard) translator Gerard of Cremona (ca. 1114-1187) was by far the most prolific translator from Arabic to Latin of works on science and natural philosophy. He lived for years at Toledo, aided by a team of local Jewish interpreters and Latin scribes. David C. Lindberg argues that Alhazen’s Book of Optics probably was translated during the late twelfth century by Gerard or somebody from his school; it was known in thirteenth century Europe. Many works initially translated from Arabic by Gerard and his associates, among them Ptolemy’s great astronomical work the Almagest, were later translated directly from Greek into Latin from Byzantine manuscripts. Obviously, Alhazen's work had to be translated from Arabic since it was written in that language in the first place.

The basic principle of the astrolabe, a working model of the heavens, was a discovery of the ancient Greeks. Stereographic projection, one way among several of mapping a sphere onto a flat surface, was probably known to the great mathematical astronomer Hipparchus in the second century BC and was certainly in use by the first century BC when Vitruvius, the Roman writer on architecture and engineering, mentioned it. The first treatise on an astrolabe in the modern sense was probably written by Theon of Alexandria (ca. AD 335-405). He was a teacher of mathematics and wrote commentaries on the works of Ptolemy, including the Almagest, and made an influential edition with added comments of Euclid’s Elements. Writer James E. Morrison is the author of the book The Astrolabe. As Morrison says:

“The earliest astrolabes used in Europe were imported from Moslem Spain with Latin words engraved alongside the original Arabic. It is likely that European use of Arabic star names was influenced by these imported astrolabes. By the end of the 12th century there were at least a half dozen competent astrolabe treatises in Latin, and there were hundreds available only a century later. European makers extended the plate engravings to include astrological information and adapted the various timekeeping variations used in that era. Features related to Islamic prayers were not used on European instruments. The astrolabe was widely used in Europe in the late Middle Ages and Renaissance….Astrolabe manufacturing was centered in Augsburg and Nuremberg in Germany in the fifteenth century with some production in France. In the sixteenth century, the best instruments came from Louvain in Belgium. By the middle of the seventeenth century astrolabes were made all over Europe.”

The oldest surviving, moderately sophisticated scientific work in the English language is a Treatise on the Astrolabe, written by the English poet and philosopher Geoffrey Chaucer (ca. 1343-1400) for his son. His The Canterbury Tales are studded with astronomical references.It should be noted that while it was a very popular device, the astrolabe was not a precision instrument even by medieval standards. Its popularity stemmed from the fact that approximate solutions to astronomical problems could be found by a mere glance at the instrument. The invention of the pendulum clock and more specialized and useful scientific devices such as the telescope from the seventeenth century on replaced the astrolabe in importance.

Nevertheless, its medieval reintroduction via the Islamic world did leave some traces. Quite a few star names in use in modern European languages, for instance Aldebaran or Algol, can be traced back to Arabic or Arabized versions of earlier Greek names. Today astronomers frequently identify stars by means of Bayer letters, introduced by the German astronomer Johann Bayer (1572-16259) in his celestial atlas Uranometria from 1603. In this system, each star is labeled by a Greek letter and the Latin name of the constellation in which it is found.It is true that there were translations from Arabic and that these did have some impact in Europe, leaving traces in star names and some mathematical and chemical terms. Yet far too much emphasis is currently placed on the translations themselves and too little on how the knowledge contained within these texts was actually used. After the translation movement it is striking to notice how fast Europeans vastly surpassed whatever scholarly achievements had been made in the medieval Middle East based on largely the same material.

Moreover, it is simply not true that these translations “rescued” the Classical heritage. This survived largely intact among Byzantine, Orthodox Christians. When Western, Latin Christians wanted to recover the Greco-Roman heritage they translated Greek historical works and literature as well, in addition to philosophy, medicine and astronomy, and copied works by Roman authors and poets in Latin which had been totally ignored by Muslims.

It is easy to track how Arabic translations of Greek texts from Byzantine manuscripts, almost always made by non-Muslims, made their way from the Islamic East to Sicily and southern Italy or to the Iberian Peninsula in the Islamic West where some of them were translated by Jews and Christians, for instance in the multilingual city of Toledo in Spain, to Latin. It is true that some ancient Greek texts were reintroduced to the West via Arabic, sometimes passing via Syriac or Hebrew along the way, but these were usually based, in the end, on Byzantine originals. The permanent recovery of Greco-Roman learning and literature was undertaken as a direct transmission from Greek, Orthodox Christians to Western, Latin Christians.

The greatest translator from Greek to Latin was the Flemish scholar William of Moerbeke (ca. 1215-ca. 1286), a contemporary of the prominent German scholar Albertus Magnus. He was fluent in Greek and made very accurate translations, still held in high regard today, from Byzantine originals and improved earlier translations of the works of Aristotle and many by Archimedes, Hero of Alexandria and others. Like his Italian friend the great theologian Saint Thomas Aquinas (c. 1225-1274), William of Moerbeke was a friar of the Dominican order and had personal contacts at the top levels of the Vatican, including several popes.

Thanks in part to William of Moerbeke’s efforts, by the 1270s Western Europeans had access to Greek works that were never translated into Arabic, for instance Aristotle’s Politics. This benefited Thomas Aquinas and his great theological work the Summa Theologica. The Spanish-born Jewish rabbi and philosopher Moses Maimonides (1135-1204), famous for his The Guide for the Perplexed, attempted to reconcile Aristotelian philosophy with Biblical Scripture. Aquinas was well aware of his work as well as Muslim Aristotelian commentators such as Avicenna and Averroes, but he could be critical of Averroes and his use of Aristotle.

Renaissance figures in Italy and Western Europe had at their disposal a more complete body of Greek thought than any of the major Muslim philosophers ever did. The translation movement, which began in the late eleventh century, continued during the Renaissance and culminated in its final and arguably most important phase during the second half of the fifteenth century and into the sixteenth with the introduction of the printing press. This invention vastly increased the circulation of books as well as the accuracy of their copying.

It was a major stroke of historical luck that printing was introduced in Europe at exactly the same time as the last vestige of the Roman Empire fell to Muslim Turks. Texts that had been preserved in Constantinople for a thousand years could now be permanently rescued. As Elizabeth L. Eisenstein says in her monumental The Printing Press as an Agent of Change:

“The classical editions, dictionaries, grammar and reference guides issued from print shops made it possible to achieve an unprecedented mastery of Alexandrian learning even while laying the basis for a new kind of permanent Greek revival in the West.…We now tend to take for granted that the study of Greek would continue to flourish after the main Greek manuscript centers had fallen into alien hands and hence fail to appreciate how remarkable it was to find that Homer and Plato had not been buried anew but had, on the contrary, been disinterred forever more. Surely Ottoman advances would have been catastrophic before the advent of printing. Texts and scholars scattered in nearby regions might have prolonged the study of Greek but only in a temporary way.”

Muslims and Christians treated Greek philosophy very differently, partly because Judaism, Islam and Christianity are monotheistic in very different ways. Brague points out that there are fundamental differences between them. It is a misunderstanding that there are “three religions of the book” because the meaning of the book is very different in each religion.

According to Rémi Brague, “In Judaism, the Tenakh is a written history of the covenant between God and the people of Israel, almost a kind of contract. In Christianity, the New Testament is the history of one person, Jesus, who is the incarnate Word of God. In Islam, the Koran is ‘uncreated’ and has descended from the heavens in perfect form. Only in Islam is the book itself what is revealed by God. In Judaism God is revealed in the history of the Jewish people. In Christianity God is revealed as love in the person of Jesus. Judaism and Christianity are not religions of the book, but religions with a book. The third misconception is to speak of ‘the three Abrahamic religions’. Christians usually refer to Abraham as a person who binds these three religions together, and who is shared by them. In Judaism, he is the ‘founding father’. But in the Koran it is written: ‘Abraham was neither a Jew nor a Christian.’ (III, 67)….According to Islam, the first prophets received the same revelation as Mohammed, but the message was subsequently forgotten. Or it was tampered with, with evil intent. So according to Islam, the Torah and the Gospels are fakes.”

In Islamic lands, falsafa remained a private affair, an unofficial matter for individuals in fairly restricted numbers. Philosophy was always marginal in the Islamic world and was never institutionalized there as it was in the European medieval universities.

According to Rémi Brague, theology as such is a Christian specialty. He even claims that “‘theology’ as a rational exploration of the divine (according to Anselm’s program) exists only in Christianity.”

Brague states that “The great philosophers of Islam were amateurs, and they pursued philosophy during their leisure hours: Farabi was a musician, Avicenna a physician and a vizier, Averroes a judge. Avicenna did philosophy at night, surrounded by his disciples, after a normal workday. And he did not refuse a glass of wine to invigorate him a bit and keep him on his toes. Similarly, among the Jews, Maimonides was a physician and a rabbinic judge, Gersonides was an astronomer (and astrologer), and so on. The great Jewish or Muslim philosophers attained the same summits as the great Christian Scholastics, but they were isolated and had little influence on society. In medieval Europe, philosophy became a university course of studies and a pursuit that could provide a living….You can be a perfectly competent rabbi or imam without ever having studied philosophy. In contrast, a philosophical background is a necessary part of the basic equipment of the Christian theologian. It has even been obligatory since the Lateran Council of 1215.”

Demand usually precedes the presence of a product on the market and it is the demand that needs to be explained. As Brague notes, translations are made because someone feels that a certain text contains information that people need. The real intellectual revolution in Europe began well before the wave of translations in Toledo and elsewhere. This was demonstrated by the American jurist Harold J. Berman in his important 1983 book Law and Revolution. The efforts of the Catholic Church to make a new system of law required refined tools, which meant that the West sought out Aristotle’s and other Greek work on logic and philosophy.The “Papal Revolution” starting in the eleventh century was an effort to apply ancient Greek methods of logic to the remnants of Roman law dating back to Late Antiquity and the reforms of the active Eastern Roman Emperor Justinian the Great. Justinian’s revision of existing Roman law, the Corpus Juris Civilis (Body of Civil Law) was compiled in Latin in the 530s AD and later influenced medieval Canon Law. While they did utilize Roman law and Greek logic, medieval Western scholars through their intellectual efforts created a new synthesis which had not existed in Antiquity. Prominent among them was the twelfth century Italian legal scholar Gratian, a monk who taught in Bologna. His great work, commonly known as the Decretum, appeared around 1140 as a synthesis of church law. Harold J. Berman writes in his book Law and Revolution: The Formation of the Western Legal Tradition, page 225-226:

“Every person in Western Christendom lived under both canon law and one or more secular legal systems. The pluralism of legal systems within a common legal order was an essential element of the structure of each system. Because none of the coexisting legal systems claimed to be all inclusive or omnicompetent, each had to develop constitutional standards for locating and limiting sovereignty, for allocating governmental powers within such sovereignty, and for determining the basic rights and duties of members….Like the developing English royal law of the same period, the canon law tended to be systematized more on the basis of procedure than of substantive rules. Yet after Gratian, canon law, unlike English royal law, was also a university discipline; professors took the rules and principles and theories of the cases into the classrooms and collected, analyzed, and harmonized them in their treatises."

With the papacy of the dynamic and assertive Gregory VII (1073-1085), the Roman Catholic Church entered the Investiture Struggle, a protracted and largely successful conflict with European monarchs over control of appointments, investitures, of Church officials. Edward Grant explains in his book God and Reason in the Middle Ages, page 23-24:

“Gregory VII began the process that culminated in 1122 in the Concordat of Worms (during the reign of the French pope, Calixtus II [1119-1124]), whereby the Holy Roman Emperor agreed to give up spiritual investiture and allow free ecclesiastical elections. The process manifested by the Investiture Struggle has been appropriately called the Papal Revolution. Its most immediate consequence was that it freed the clergy from domination by secular authorities: emperors, kings, and feudal nobility. With control over its own clergy, the papacy became an awesome, centralized, bureaucratic powerhouse, an institution in which literacy, a formidable tool in the Middle Ages, was concentrated. The Papal Revolution had major political, economic, social, and cultural consequences. With regard to the cultural and intellectual consequences, it ‘may be viewed as a motive force in the creation of the first European universities, in the emergence of theology and jurisprudence and philosophy as systematic disciplines, in the creation of new literary and artistic styles, and in the development of a new consciousness.’…the papacy grew stronger and more formidable. It reached the pinnacle of its power more than a century later in the pontificate of Innocent III (1198-1216), perhaps the most powerful of all medieval popes.”

Jordman on Medieval Philosophy II.

The power of the secular states grew as well, but the separation between Church and state endured because the Papal Revolution had established a virtual parity between them. It was the internal dynamism of Europe during the High Middle Ages that drove the recovery of Classical learning. Here is The Legend of the Middle Ages by Rémi Brague, page 180:

“The European intellectual renaissance preceded the translations from the Arabic. The latter were not the cause, but the effect of that renaissance. Like all historical events, it had economic aspects (lands newly under cultivation, new agricultural techniques) and social aspects (the rise of free cities). On the level of intellectual life, it can be understood as arising from a movement that began in the eleventh century, probably launched by the Gregorian reform of the Church.…That conflict bears witness to a reorientation of Christianity toward a transformation of the temporal world, up to that point more or less left to its own devices, with the Church taking refuge in an apocalyptical attitude that said since the world was about to end, there was little need to transform it. The Church’s effort to become an autonomous entity by drawing up a law that would be exclusive to it – Canon Law – prompted an intense need for intellectual tools. More refined concepts were called for than those available at the time. Hence the appeal to the logical works of Aristotle, who was translated from Greek to Latin, either through Arabic or directly from the Greek, and the Aristotelian heritage was recovered.”

Rémi Brague is a highly competent scholar and I can easily recommend his works to those who have a serious interest in studying these subjects. I will conclude by adding some other books that people can read. About Islam I recommend essentially everything written by Robert Spencer. Bat Ye’or’s books are groundbreaking and important. The Legacy of Jihad by Andrew Bostom should be considered required reading for all those who are interested in Islam. It is the best and most complete book currently available on the subject in English, possibly in any language. Ibn Warraq’s books are excellent, starting with Defending the West. Understanding Muhammadby the Iranian ex-Muslim Ali Sina is worth reading, as are Defeating Jihad by Serge Trifkovic and A God Who Hates by Wafa Sultan. For European readers I could add my own book Defeating Eurabia. Paul Belien's book about the EU, A Throne in Brussels, is also well worth reading.

For books about the history of science, I recommend everything written by Edward Grant. The Beginnings of Western Science by David C. Lindberg is good, though slightly more politically correct than Grant when it comes to science in the Islamic world. The Rise of Early Modern Science: Islam, China and the West by Toby E. Huff is highly recommended. Huff’s work is carefully researched and should be considered required reading for those who are interested in this subject. These books are easy to read for an educated, mainstream audience.

For books that are excellent, yet more specialized and slightly more challenging, I can recommend Victor J. Katzfor the history of mathematics and The History and Practice of Ancient Astronomy by James Evans for the history of pre-telescopic astronomy up to and including Kepler. Evans’ book is extremely well researched and detailed, almost too much so on European and Middle Eastern astronomy, but contains virtually nothing on Chinese or Mayan astronomy. For a more global perspective, Cosmos: An Illustrated History of Astronomy and Cosmology by John North is good and not too difficult to read.

Theologian of the Papal Household on Aquinas

Fr. Wojciech Giertych OP is the theologian of the papal household. I found a website called Christ's Faithful people, whcih has looks of good things. Below is an extract on St. Thomas Aquinas.

We have categories coming from modern philosophy which hamper the understanding of Saint Thomas. In the modern classification, we have a division between moral and dogmatic theology; between moral and spiritual theology; and between philosophy and theology. These divisions are not really present in Saint Thomas. If we have these preconceptions, we arrive at false conclusions. For some critics, Saint Thomas’s treatise on happiness seems too philosophical, as is his treatise on acts. The treatise on emotions seems to be outside of the realm of morals, whereas for Saint Thomas this treatise is very important for reasons we will see later. Next, we have a treatise on the virtues, the dispositions to do good acts arising from within, whereas many textbooks treat morals as a list of obligations. Next is the treatise on the Gifts of the Holy Spirit. Then there is a treatise on sin, and another on law and moral law. The law of the Gospel is often dismissed as an appendage in post-Tridentine books. Finally, Saint Thomas has a treatise on grace, which was transferred in the post-Tridentine period to dogmatic theology.

In the manualist tradition, the most Christian — the most theological — aspects of Saint Thomas’s teaching were banished to other disciplines like spiritual and dogmatic theology. Is the core of Saint Thomas’s teaching Aristotle or the Gospel? Is it a theological philosophy or a philosophical theology? The commentaries of Cardinal Cajetan on the Summa (in the 16th century) called the more evangelical aspects of the summa good for spiritual reading, but not for his dialogue with Luther.

The Notion of Sacra Doctrina

Most 20th century Thomists were philosophers, whereas Saint Thomas’s main job was a Biblical teacher. So to interpret correctly his Summa, we must take into consideration his commentaries on Scripture. It is possible to study the Summa purely philosophically within the study of the history of philosophy, but we will neglect the foundation of the work. Our modern understanding makes us unaware of the theological emphasis of the Summa. In the first question, Saint Thomas begins with Sacra Doctrina, which encompasses more than we understand today by theology. He uses it often in connection with Scripture and he calls it a science. He occasionally uses the word theology, aware that theology anticipates something much greater, sacra doctrina, which uses theology, metaphors, Scripture, and anything that can lead us more deeply into the mysteries revealed by God. Sacra doctrina encompasses theology, Scripture, the preaching of the Popes, Doctors, and Fathers. This instruction, sacra doctrina, is called science. This is used differently than today, where it means the studying of phenomena with means of study. It is also different from Aristotle’s use. For Aristotle, it was a certain knowledge, where the mind makes a judgment (going beyond an intuition), a judgment made within a process of reason, and that this process is inter-subjectively transmittable. This science searches for the necessary reasons of truths, the causes, asking the question "why?" Modern scientists are afraid of final causality.

Saint Thomas uses these Aristotelian processes to describe science, but sacra doctrina isn’t a science because it uses these methods. Rather, it is because it transmits a sure knowledge coming from the source of all knowledge, God himself. So the Latin scientia should be translated "knowledge" and not "science." It concerns truths, knowledge, which has been given by God. So Saint Thomas isn’t trying to jam theology into Aristotle’s philosophy, which would subordinate the superior truths of faith to the lesser claims of knowledge. Saint Thomas ascribes the primary role to revelation, knowledge coming directly from God, which confers to sacra doctrina the status of scientia. God reveals the mysteries of himself and his plans bestow to the believer knowledge of our salvation and invite him to participate in the knowledge of God himself. These divine mysteries Saint Thomas calls sacra doctrina. Some sciences draw their knowledge from other sciences, Saint Thomas says, whereas sacra doctrina draws its knowledge from sacred scripture, an expression of divine wisdom having been given to humanity. Both the private guidance of people by the Holy Spirit and the public revelation of God are divine, but the knowledge required in sacra doctrina comes from effort in scrutinizing the divine knowledge and communicating it to other people. This scrutiny cannot be chaotic if it is to be transmitted.

With the aid of precise notions from philosophy, we compare what has been revealed by God to what has been attained by reason, attempting to see the inner logic of what has been revealed by God. This is why sacra doctrina satisfies our reason. We can reflect on the revealed mysteries. Our reason may fall into error, but we cannot deny reason the opportunity to understand these revealed truths. But this reasonable investigation into matters of the faith must been undertaken in faith. If our reason were to try to judge faith by rational criteria, it would ruin faith. It would be a replacement of faith by human wisdom, against which Saint Paul warned.

Philosophy has an ancillary function in theology, namely, that of providing precise concepts and the knowledge discovered by reason. It has a secondary role in theology, that of a handmaid. The arguments put forward to defend theological truths don’t give the truths of faith their ground, but can make critics and adherents see that they are reasonable. Our faith is gets its ground because God has revealed it. The knowledge that God shares with human beings is the subject of sacra doctrina. The method to understand it must accord with the capacities and hungers of man. But the main source of what theologians have to say is the self-expression of God. God is the subject matter. Saint Thomas rejects other theologians’ thoughts that the sacraments, the redemption, the Church, etc. are the subject matter of theology. For Saint Thomas, the focus must be on God. The whole of the Summa gives us an answer to the question of Who is God. We can study ancillary subjects in theology, the history of spirituality, Biblical archaeology, ethics, etc., but this is not the sacra doctrina that Saint Thomas is studying. Saint Thomas is studying God, not just as the metaphysical source of everything, but as the revealer of himself who engages in a dialogue with human beings.

Such a notion of theology is very purifying. Von Balthasar said that any theology must have the character of adoration, of a doxology. God cannot be a neutral object of study. We cannot reduce Him so. The point of departure must be your knees. The subject matter must bring with it an attitude, a fascination. We base ourselves on a revealed gift. He is mysterious. We will never comprehend him, which is an invitation for us to love. A revealed mystery, rather than acquired knowledge, brings fascination and nourishment of our faith.

Why Saint Thomas wrote the Summa
Saint Thomas wrote the Summa to answer the question whether we need something beyond the study of philosophy. He says we need a study that is ordered to the end outside of the capacities of our intellect. He just states this, he doesn’t prove it. We need a theology going outside of the realm of rational thinking and philosophy. He places the thesis that salvation is the end of our life. Without an answer to the question of our destiny, there is no point in asking any questions about any science. If we don’t know that we’ve been destined for God, that there’s a point to our life, there’s no point in studying anything. We can use knowledge in other spheres to help us in our purpose.


Saint Augustine says that theology must do the following four things: generate, nourish, defend, and strengthen salutary faith. Sacra Doctrina has a specific function towards faith, to generate it, to get reason to bow before the mystery, in a decisive way for the spiritual life. Theology won’t give us faith, which is a gift, but it will help us to bow down. Sacra Doctrina is to nourish faith, to encourage perseverance. It defends faith against accusations coming from the world, saying the reason is the ultimate arbiter. Sacra Doctrina cannot prove the revealed truths, because then it would be knowledge, but it can show that it is reasonable, and that it doesn’t distort human nature. It also strengthens faith, bringing us more deeply into the mystery.

Saint Thomas describes theology, hence, in maternal terms, to generate, nourish, defend, and strengthen the great gift of God. If we are to exceed the limits of our reason, we need a support to undertake the risks of faith. So theology uses philosophical concepts to give us support. Theology leads the hand of the believer into the divine mysteries. So Saint Thomas’s practical end was to widen the intellectual horizon of his students so that their faith would grow. This is much more important than the pastoral formation of future priests. We won’t find great texts for catechesis, marriage preparation, etc.

John Allen Follow-Up on Swiss Minaret Ban

Like everybody else in this hyper-political age, Catholics are conventionally divided into "liberals" and "conservatives." (Whenever that taxonomy is rolled out, I'm reminded of a line from G.K. Chesterton: A progressive is someone who keeps making the same mistake, while a conservative is someone who prevents a mistake from ever being corrected. Chesterton is a patron saint for those of us who don't recognize ourselves in either camp.)

However useful that distinction can sometimes be, it's hardly the only way to slice the pie. Another is what we might call the difference between "institutional" and "populist" Catholicism. In a nutshell, institutional types (however grudgingly) like to be on the same page with the pope and the bishops [The Magisterium, rather than individual members of the heirarchy according to personal prefernce right?] , while populists (however respectfully) think the powers that be are occasionally full of it, so other Catholics have to say and do the things that bishops, for political or bureaucratic reasons, can't or won't.[Seems Allen's black and white picture is a bit weak. He has already noted this above. Surely he could have come up with something better, or just avoiding such a simplistic and inaccurate picture?]

Americans are certainly familiar with populist Catholicism, both on the right (including pro-life groups that sometimes seem as mad at the bishops for their timidity as at Planned Parenthood for its ideology) and on the left (think Patrick Kennedy's insistence that disagreeing with the hierarchy doesn't make him any less Catholic). Among other things, this proves the point [Really? Does it?] that populists of all stripes often have more in common with one another than with the institutional psychology against which they're reacting.[Psychology? Does a lay person have to have the same "psychology" as an individual bishop(s)? What does Allen mean by "psychology"? Couldn't it be argued that the "popularist" isn't reacting against "institutional psychology" but rather the understanding of the Faith and its application? I think the difference between, let's say, a solid pro-life group and Catholics for a Free Choice, is greater than any perceived similarity. Allen's approach reminds me of Cardinal Francis George recent book The Difference God Makes. Cardinal George draws the dividing line between conservative and liberal in the understanding of of the bishop.]

Recent events in Europe, however, illustrate the growing political punch of populist Catholicism on the global stage.

Last Sunday in Switzerland, voters approved a constitutional ban on the construction of minarets, the spires atop Islamic mosques where the call to prayer is issued five times a day.[It doesn't have to be done from a minaret. Cf. Dr Taj Hargey article in The Times. There are currently only 4 minarets, and these are not used for the call to prayer] The result came over the explicit opposition of the country's Christian leaders, including the Swiss Catholic bishops, who issued a statement before the vote warning that "fear is a poor counselor." Afterwards, an official from the Vatican's Pontifical Council for Migrants as well as L'Osservatore Romano, the Vatican newspaper, called the outcome a blow to religious freedom.[How confusing of Allen to say this. Archbishop Agostino Marchetto, president of the Pontifical Council for Migrants and Travelers, has said that religious freedom has not be called into question at all. Muslims are still free to build mosques and worship. For the Zenit article click [HERE].

Despite that, 56 percent of Swiss voters favored the minaret ban. I haven't seen any exit polls, but one has to imagine that a decisive bloc was formed by those Swiss most concerned with their country's Christian identity, which would include a cross-section of Catholics. Switzerland is 46 percent Catholic, so the measure could not have passed without substantial Catholic support.

Officials of the Council of Europe said this week that the Swiss measure may be reviewed by European courts as a potential violation of freedom of conscience and human rights protections.

In Italy, meanwhile, a recent proposal from the far-right Northern League to add a cross to the national flag is producing a similar split between institutional and populist Catholic sentiment.

The Northern League, which routinely draws between five and fifteen percent of the national vote, is part of Italy's ruling center-right coalition. Historically the party has been fairly anti-clerical, seeing the Vatican as an expression of Roman centralization against the interests of its base of support in the north. Recently, however, the party has repositioned itself as the voice of populist Catholic anxieties, directed against both the European Union and Islamic immigration.

Roberto Maroni of the Northern League, currently Italy's interior minister, says his party is committed to the defense of grassroots Catholic values, "not what the elites want" – a catchy way of saying that while the Northern League may be taking up the Catholic banner, it's not taking cues from the Italian bishops or the Vatican.

From a populist calculus, the proposal to put a cross on the flag is a potent political double play. It comes in the wake of a controversial decision from a European court which held that displaying crucifixes in Italian public school classrooms violates church/state separation, and it also makes a statement about the Christian identity of Italy in the teeth of the country's rising Muslim population.

How serious the idea may be in a country where the tricolore, the three-colored flag, is something of a national fetish remains to be seen. What it illustrates, however, is a growing political sophistication among populists about the manipulation of symbolism.

This arousal of populist Catholicism poses a real headache for Pope Benedict XVI.

In recent decades, the Vatican's highest priority for Europe has been recovery of the continent's Christian identity, and Benedict in particular has argued that Europe would be culturally incoherent if cut off from its Christian roots. Yet at the same time, Benedict also has no higher inter-faith priority than outreach to Islam, the defining expression of his transition from "inter-religious" to "inter-cultural" dialogue. In essence, Benedict sees Christians and Muslims as natural allies in the struggle against secularism.

Benedict also has to worry about the fate of Christianity not just in Europe, but also in the Middle East, Africa, and India – places where the intersection of nationalism and religious identity makes life difficult for Christian minorities.[This is a good point. How things are perceived in Europe and the USA can have repercussions in the Middle-East and Asia] Many church leaders fear that provocative acts such as the Swiss vote could trigger anti-Christian backlash in other parts of the world.[It seems Christians get treated badly anyway] Italian essayist Massimo Franco recently described this as the Vatican's "geo-religious" perspective.

Looking down the line at the rest of the 21st century, declining fertility rates in the Middle East and North Africa suggest that the current high levels of Islamic immigration into Europe won't be sustained.[A point Phillip Jenkins makes in God's Continent] Long term, therefore, the Vatican may be able to hope for a "demographic fix" to its headache, since immigration might no longer be such a volatile force in European politics.[Or perhaps Christians could be given religious freedom in predominantly Islamic countries?? What Pope John Paul II called 'reciprocity']

In the meantime, however, Benedict XVI has to walk a tightrope. He doesn't want to discourage those forces in Europe most passionately committed to a defense of Christian identity, but somehow he also needs to prevent them from upsetting his geo-religious applecart.

So far, there's been no comment from the pope himself[Hang on, I thought Allen said all this was a 'real headache' for Pope Benedict?] about either the Swiss vote or the proposal to put a cross on the Italian flag. The first test of Benedict's balancing act may come when, and if, this consummate European chooses to wade into these burning European debates.[Or perhaps Pope Benedict has been leading the way already?]

Novena in Preparation for the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception.

DAY 3. 
O God, who by the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, did prepare a worthy dwelling place for Your Son, we beseech You that, as by the foreseen death of this, Your Son, You did preserve Her from all stain, so too You would permit us, purified through Her intercession, to come unto You. Through the same Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son, who lives and reigns with You in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, world without end. Amen.

O Blessed Virgin Mary, glory of the Christian people, joy of the universal Church and Mother of Our Lord, speak for us to the Heart of Jesus, who is your Son and our brother. O Mary, who by your holy Immaculate Conception did enter the world free from stain, in your mercy obtain for us from Jesus the special favor which we now so earnestly seek...

(State your intention here...)

O Mary of the Immaculate Conception, Mother of Christ, you had influence with your Divine Son while upon this earth; you have the same influence now in heaven. Pray for us and obtain for us from him the granting of my petition if it be the Divine Will. Amen.

Ratzinger and Dalí on beauty

The beautiful wounds, but this is exactly how it summons man to his final destiny. What Plato said, and, more than 1,500 years later, Cabasilas, has nothing to do with superficial aestheticism and irrationalism or with the flight from clarity and the importance of reason. The beautiful is knowledge certainly, but, in a superior form, since it arouses man to the real greatness of the truth. Here Cabasilas has remained entirely Greek, since he puts knowledge first when he says, "In fact it is knowing that causes love and gives birth to it. ... Since this knowledge is sometimes very ample and complete and at other times imperfect, it follows that the love potion has the same effect" (Cardinal Ratzinger, message to Communion and Liberation Meeting, Remini, Italy, 2002)

Salvador Dali. Self-Portrait in the Studio. ca 1919. Oil on canvas Salvador Dali Museum USA.

Salvador Dali. Portrait of the Cellist Ricard Pichot. 1920. Oil on canvas. Private collection.

A beauty that is deceptive and false, a dazzling beauty that does not bring human beings out of themselves to open them to the ecstasy of rising to the heights, but indeed locks them entirely into themselves. Such beauty does not reawaken a longing for the Ineffable, readiness for sacrifice, the abandonment of self, but instead stirs up the desire, the will for power, possession and pleasure. It is that type of experience of beauty of which Genesis speaks in the account of the Original Sin. Eve saw that the fruit of the tree was "beautiful" to eat and was "delightful to the eyes." (Ibid)

Although the two paints above by Dalí are not sacred art works, they do have that quality about them that can lead the beholder out of themselves. I think the subject matter-artist and musician- and the use of windows opening out onto the horizon and the sun make these paints beautiful and full of religious content.

Minarets in Switzerland?

On Sunday the people of Switzerland voted to ban the building of minarets in their country. 57% of voters and 22 out of 26 cantons - or provinces - voted in favour of the ban. The proposal had been put forward by the Swiss People's Party (SVP), the largest party in parliament, which says minarets are a sign of Islamisation. The minaret is a tall tower that forms part of a mosque. It functions as a vantage point from which the call to prayer (adhan) is made. Call to prayer in Islam happens five times each day. These times are at sunrise, noon, day, sundown, and evening. In most modern mosques, the adhan is called not from the minaret but from the musallah, or prayer hall, via a microphone and speaker system.

The Muslim population in the European Union rose from 5 million in 1985 to 15 million in 2005, representing 200 percent growth. The largest Muslim community in the EU zone is in France, with five million Muslims, or 8.3 percent of a population of 60.4 million. Germany is in second place with 3.5 million Muslims, or 4.3 percent of its population, and the United Kingdom has 1.6 million, or 2.7 percent of its population."

By 2025, the National Intelligence Council projects a Muslim population in the EU of 28 million; by 2050 it anticipates 40 million, which would represent 15 percent of a population of roughly 500 million Europeans. (That estimate does not include the possibility of Turkey’s admission to the EU). In some nations, the Muslim share may be higher. By mid-century, Muslims could be 25 percent of the population in France and Germany.

Today I've read two articles on this, one by John Allen Jr of National Catholic Reporter, and one by Dr Taj Hargey. Dr. Hargey is the chairman of the Muslim Educational Centre of Oxford and the imam of the Summertown Islamic Congregation in Oxford.

John Allen sets up a bit of a black and white image of Pope John Paul II and his relations with Muslims as a rebuff to the Swiss people's vote against the building of minarets. Allen Highlights the concept of Reciprocity-"that Christians and other religious minorities in Islamic nations ought to have the same freedoms as Muslims now enjoy in the West." This would have to include the free building of churches. Allen makes no mention of Catholic-Muslim relations under the papacy of Pope Benedict XVI. Allen also casts the Swiss vote as simply 'anti-Islamic' and driven by 'European fear.' The whole article can be read [HERE].

The second article, by Dr. Hargey, can be found in The Times [HERE]. I have copied the whole article in full as I think it's worth a read.

"Switzerland’s referendum vote to ban minarets is needlessly xenophobic [opinion more than fact] but it does not infringe the religious liberty of Swiss Muslims [are they Swiss Muslims, or Muslims in Switzerland?]. Minarets remain emblematic of mosques in the Muslim heartlands but there is no theological reason why houses of worship in the West have to incorporate such towers. [Good, theology is not cut-off from politics and culture]

Their original purpose was to relay the prayer call with the unamplified voice. Today this is done by modern technology, so minarets are not integral to contemporary mosque design. European mosques should stop mindlessly mimicking Eastern design and create prayer halls that blend into the landscape.

Muslims who have settled in Switzerland (and elsewhere in Europe) should not confuse culture with creed. [But creed has a culture-forming influence. Belief wants to express itself in external, public forms] To become integrated into their surroundings, they must relinquish the cultural baggage [massive claim. How easy is it to separate the Islamic religion from the cultures it has developed and continued in?] of their ancestral homelands. They should practice a Swiss Islam that is rooted in the society in which they live. [Doesn’t this require the society to know itself and its values? How can this be done if Europe continues to cast-off its own Greco-Roman, Judeo-Christian heritage?]

Although the Swiss have been convinced by right-wing zealots [perhaps the Swiss public worked it out on their own too? I doubt that every person who supported and voted for the ban was a right-wing zealot] that minarets are a problem, local Muslims should not embrace a victim mentality. They must confront the toxic radicalisation of their faith that is imported from overseas.

The Wahhabi denomination (and its kindred sects), which has unlimited petrodollars and exclusive jurisdiction over Islam’s holiest mosques, engenders rampant misogyny, anti-democratic obscurantism and an archaic legal code, which includes an un-Koranic prohibition on non-Muslim religious buildings in Islamic lands. Switzerland now joins Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan in banning the buildings of non-dominant faiths. [No, it has voted on a referendum banning minarets only. Muslims are free to build mosques in Switzerland.]

When European Muslims unthinkingly endorse this warped theology by desiring medieval Sharia, defending honour killings, stoning to death, forced marriages, Muslim exceptionalism and a separatist society, they only invoke fear and exacerbate anti-Muslim sentiment. When Europe’s Muslims extol such un-Koranic doctrines as the niqab (face veil), they exclude themselves from the mainstream.

Only when Muslim immigrants and converts in Europe reject the twisted ideology of a fundamentalist male clergy will the chief causes of anti-Muslim prejudice in Europe recede. Meanwhile, despite the Islamophobic [hum] minaret ban, the religious rights of Swiss Muslims remain intact. They do, however, have a rare opportunity to cut the link with the dominant theology of the East and to restore Islam’s pristine beliefs."

Southwark Archdiocese Pastoral Letter

If you're fortunate enough to belong to the Archdiocese of Southwark, you would have heard Archbishop Kevin's pastoral letter for the 33rd Sunday 2009, solemnity of Christ the King. Preparation for Christmas and the Advent liturgical season, year for Priests and vocations, centrality of the Eucahrist, young people and the Virgin Mary, it's all there. The Archdiocese website also carries a majestic painting of Christ by Fernando Gallego (1492).

Renoir and Picasso

Pierre-Auguste Renoir. The Lunch. c. 1879. Oil on canvas. Barnes Foundation,USA.

Vincent Van Gogh. Starry Night. c.1889. Oil on canvas. Museum of Modern Art, New York.

What if Rowan Williams had said this...

"It is all too easy to get caught up and even fixated with single issues, whether this is in religion or politics. So many people tend to focus on liturgy – even the language of the Mass – as if this somehow expresses the core of our beliefs. Others campaign on the moral issues of the day – someone said recently that a person’s attitude to Humanae Vitae was a ‘litmus test’ of being a Catholic, whereas many might not know what Humanae Vitae is. These are all undoubtedly important issues, but they will never get anywhere near expressing our faith in its entirety, and we can ask if some of these questions are actually fundamental to faith at all."

This is from Bishop Kieran Conroy's pastoral letter for the 33rd Sunday of the year 2009. I reckon if Rowan Williams had said this the blogsphere would be buzzing. I've only found one blog that has picked this up- John Smeaton of SPUC Blog.

First, I think it mistaken to suggest that people who desire the Latin language for the Mass, or 'campaign' for a culture of life are fixated. I have never met or heard of a Catholic who thought that the Latin language or being pro-life expressed the entirety of the Faith. Further, liturgy and the culture of life are very significant concerns for the Church throughout the whole world. Consider Pope Benedict's Sacramentum Caritatis or Caritatis in Veritate, or perhaps Pope John Paul II Evangelium Vitae and Ecclesia de Eucharistia, or the CDF's Dignitas Personae, or Bishop Patrick O'Donohuge's Fit for Mission and Fit for Marriage or even the documents of Vatican II? Need one go on?

Second, some people may never of heard of Humane Vitae? Really, why might that be?

Third, 'we can ask if some of these questions are actually fundamental to faith at all.' What? Does this mean we can do without the authentic teaching of the Church at a time when it is more urgent than ever? There is no point giving the divorce, STD and abortion stats, we know the story they tell.

Lucky there are people like Fr. Tim Finigan who founded the Assocaition of Priests for the Gospel of Life, Bishop Patrick, John Smeaton et al of SPUC, Robert at Love Undefiled blog, Greg Clovis, LIFE, and catholics in the pew who know better.  

Interview with Cardinal Francis George

A little while back Francis Cardinal George of Chicago brought out a book titled 'The Difference God Makes: A Catholic Vision of Faith, Communion and Culture.' I haven't read it, but I did find an interview Cardinal Geroge gave to John L. Allen Jr from the National Catholic Reporter. I enjoyed reading it. I am intrigued by the Cardinal's analysis of what he calls 'liberal' 'conservative' and 'simple' Catholicism.

"In essence, George argues that liberals too often function as “chaplains of the status quo,” taking their cues from the prevailing secular mindset, while conservatives often end up in a sectarian dead-end, clinging to a narrow and triumphalistic version of Catholic identity sealed off from the surrounding culture."

"In fact, George argues that while liberals and conservatives may think of themselves as having little in common, in truth they’re two peas in the same intellectual pod. Both, he argues, share an implied ecclesiology that George traces to the 15th century Jesuit thinker St. Robert Bellarmine, who styled the church as a “visible society” comparable to the Republic of Venice. Both liberals and conservatives, George says, focus far too much on the bishops – how much power they have, and the ways in which they exercise it – and not nearly enough on Christ."

"Instead, George argues for what he calls “simply Catholicism,” meaning a clear sense of Catholic identity that’s nevertheless open to the world. As examples, he points to Mother Teresa, the origins of the Catholic Worker movement, and the Community of Sant’Egidio – all, he says, share a “simply Catholic” concern for prayer and serving the poor."

Astrophysics

Here is the text of a story from CNA:

Contemporary astrophysics hold the scientific key to prove the existence of God, but unfortunately very few know the scientific facts, said Fr. Robert J. Spitzer, S.J, PhD, during a conference delivered on Sunday at the John Paul II Center for the New Evangelization in Denver, Colorado.

The Honolulu-born Jesuit is the past president of Gonzaga University and is also well-known philosopher and physicist who is involved in bringing science and theology together.

Fr. Spitzer is currently engaged in an ambitious project to explain the metaphysical consequences of the latest astrophysical discoveries, mainly, the existence of a Creator.

The conference in Denver was sponsored by John and Carol Saeman as well as the California Catholic philanthropist Timothy Busch.

“The arguments of Fr. Spitzer are addressed to every honest human being who is trying to reach to God through science,” said Mr. Busch, during the introduction.

“Atheism and pop culture have had a significant impact on Theism and it has to be confronted especially because Secularism and the negation of God are becoming pervasive,” began the 57 year-old priest.

“Theism, in fact, can be better explained by contemporary science and modern philosophy better than ever before, but particularly interesting is what is happening in the field of astrophysics ... to the point that I can't imagine why agnosticism and Atheism are still popular,” Fr. Spitzer said.

“That is why we need contemporary ‘translators’ that are capable of bringing today's science to regular people, and especially, to bring the astrophysical response to atheism,” he added.

Fr. Spitzer explained that, since science is based on a empirical model, it can change at any time. Nevertheless, as science develops and the so called “Big Bang” theory of the origin and existence of the universe becomes more refined, “it becomes less and less possible for other explanations (of the universe) to be scientifically viable.”

The theory, developed by the Belgian Catholic priest and astronomer Georges Lemaître, proposes that the Universe has expanded from a primordial dense initial condition at some time in the past (currently estimated to have been approximately 13.7 billion years ago), and continues to expand to this day.

The model, according to Fr. Spitzer, has been revised, refined and scientifically established to a point that any other theory of the origin and existence of the universe has become harder and harder to defend.

Fr. Spitzer explained that, what we know from the most recent scientific evidence is that “the universe is not the universe of Mr. Newton anymore, it is not infinite, it is finite, it started at some point, and is in constant expansion.”

He then explained the complexity of the universe, saying it is based on “an incredibly delicate balance of 17 cosmological constants. If any of them would be off by one part of a tenth at a forty potency, we would be dead and the universe would not be what it is.”

“Every single Big Bang model shows the existence of what scientists call a ‘singularity,’ and the existence of each singularity demands the existence of an external ‘element’ to the universe,” Fr. Spitzer said.

The priest physicist then proceeded to explain the different, complex versions of the various Bing Bang theories.

He quoted Roger Penrose, the world-famous English mathematician and physicist, who corrected some of the theories of his friend and colleague Stephen Hawking to conclude that every Big Bang theory, including the one known as Quantum theory, confirms the existence of singularities. Therefore, said Spitzer, the need to find an explanation to the universe’s existence drives us to seek “a force that is previous and independent from the universe.”

Fr. Spitzer also quoted the 2003 experiments by three leading cosmologists, Arvin Borde, Alan Guth, and Alexander Vilenkin, who were able to prove that any universe which has, on average, been expanding throughout its history cannot be infinite in the past but must have a past space-time boundary.

“The concept at this point is clear: nothing is nothing, and from nothing, nothing comes, since nothing is... nothing!” Fr. Spitzer said, to explain the fact that contemporary astrophysics demands “something with sufficient power to bring the universe into existence.”

“It sounds like a theological argument, but is really a scientific conclusion.

“There is no way to ignore the fact that it demands the existence of a singularity and therefore of a Creator outside space and time,” he added.

According to Fr. Spitzer, “this theory has become so scientifically solid, that 50% of astrophysicists are “coming out of the closet” an accepting a metaphysical conclusion: the need of a Creator.”

The Jesuit priest explained that this theory is not what is currently known as “Intelligent Design.”

“Intelligent Design is a biological theory, this is an anthropic universe theory, based on the question: Can our universe sustain forms of life no matter what, without any external energy?”

According to Fr. Spitzer, Professor Penrose “has provided a mathematical model in which the possibilities of a universe that would not be gobbled without the existence of a Creator are simply improvable, to a point of mathematical impossibility.”

"What can we conclude of this? First that the Creator is really smart... and second that it must be a loving one, because He could choose so many more violent and chaotic alternatives, that it really has to make you wonder.”

Fr. Spitzer explained to CNA that “all this information must be conveyed in a simple manner to our seminarians, our college and high school students, who are mostly ignorant of the powerful Theistic message of today’s astrophysics.”

The Jesuit physicist, with the help of some Catholic philanthropists, is working on a project to create a 90-minute curriculum, divided into three 30-minute segments, that will offer the astrophysics-based response to atheism. “It will be a high quality production that will involve 12 physicists, as well as dynamic and engaging graphics,” he explained.

“The idea,” he told CNA, “is to make not only DVDs that can be distributed to all Catholic high schools or Newman centers around the U.S., but to make it available for free via the Internet.”

Fr. Spitzer is working in another three more 90-minute curricula: “The historical evidence of Jesus,” “Suffering and the love of God” and “Contemporary philosophical responses to Atheism.”

Pope Benedict XVI Letter to Artists 21/11/09

Below are a few extracts from a letter Pope Benedict XVI recently addressed to artists from all the artists disciplines. Click Here for the whole text.

"Dear friends, let us allow these frescoes to speak to us today, drawing us towards the ultimate goal of human history. The Last Judgement, which you see behind me, reminds us that human history is movement and ascent, a continuing tension towards fullness, towards human happiness, towards a horizon that always transcends the present moment even as the two coincide. Yet the dramatic scene portrayed in this fresco also places before our eyes the risk of man’s definitive fall, a risk that threatens to engulf him whenever he allows himself to be led astray by the forces of evil. So the fresco issues a strong prophetic cry against evil, against every form of injustice. For believers, though, the Risen Christ is the Way, the Truth and the Life. For his faithful followers, he is the Door through which we are brought to that "face-to-face" vision of God from which limitless, full and definitive happiness flows. Thus Michelangelo presents to our gaze the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End of history, and he invites us to walk the path of life with joy, courage and hope. The dramatic beauty of Michelangelo’s painting, its colours and forms, becomes a proclamation of hope, an invitation to raise our gaze to the ultimate horizon."

"One may speak of a "via pulchritudinis," a path of beauty which is at the same time an artistic and aesthetic journey, a journey of faith, of theological enquiry. The theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar begins his great work entitled "The Glory of the Lord – a Theological Aesthetics" with these telling observations: "Beauty is the word with which we shall begin. Beauty is the last word that the thinking intellect dares to speak, because it simply forms a halo, an untouchable crown around the double constellation of the true and the good and their inseparable relation to one another." He then adds: "Beauty is the disinterested one, without which the ancient world refused to understand itself, a word which both imperceptibly and yet unmistakably has bid farewell to our new world, a world of interests, leaving it to its own avarice and sadness. It is no longer loved or fostered even by religion." And he concludes: "We can be sure that whoever sneers at her name as if she were the ornament of a bourgeois past – whether he admits it or not – can no longer pray and soon will no longer be able to love."

Aquinas on Study

I suggest you be slow to speak, and slow to go to the room where people chat.

Embrace purity of conscience; do not stop making time for prayer.

Love to be in your room frequently, if you wish to be lead to the wine celler

Show yourself to be likable to all, or at least try; but do not show yourself as too familiar with anyone; because too much familiarity breeds contempt and will slow you in your studies; and don't get involved in any way in the deeds and words of worldly people.

Above all, avoid idle conversation; do not forget to follow the steps of holy and approved men.

Never mind who says what, but commit to memory what is said that is true: work to understand what you read, and make yourself sure of doubtful points.

put whatever your can into the cupboard of your mind as if you were trying to fill a cup.

"Seek not the things that a higher than you"

Back on the blog

I haven't done a post for a while. These past weeks have been spent in fine libraries across London researching and writing a 10,000 word essay. My area of interest has been the doctrine of the Trinity in the theology of Hans Urs von Balthasar, and how this doctrine informs theological anthropology.

My other essay has been examining sacred art and music in the Church's worship. I've been looking at the philosopher Jean-Luc Marion, English theologian Oliver Davies, Joseph Ratzinger and Tracey Rowland. I explored the tensions within some of the documents of Vatican II and subsequent interpretations. Again, very interesting stuff.

While the momentum is up and running I've been thinking about the next area of research. I think I'd like to compare Rowan Williams and Aidan Nichols in their reception of Eastern theology of icons.

The Sacred Made Real.

The Sacred Made Real from Catholic Westminster on Vimeo.

This Thursday...

Session 1: The Word transforming

The composer James MacMillan and the poet Michael Symmons Roberts

Chaired by The Revd Prof Ben Quash
Thursday 29 October
12.00-1.30pm
Wren Suite, St Paul's Cathedral

The Sacred Made Real @ The National Gallery

The National Gallery London has an exhibition running from 21st October 2009- 24th January 2010. It is called 'The Sacred Made Real: Spanish Painting and Sculpture 1600-1700.' It has received glowing reviews in all the review magazines and newspapers.

Click here to go to the Ntional Gallery website.

Picasso: Science and Charity

Blogging Tips.

I found this on a website called Divine Life. I think it's pretty good so I'm copying the whole thing for you to have a look.

"I have been involved with Internet discussions and apologetics for a very long time, at least in Internet terms. I remember debating a man from the Netherlands via email about Catholic theology in 1992, before I was even officially received into the Catholic Church. Considering “Internet years” are somewhat like dog years, I figure that’s 119 years of online debates and discussions (and it even feels like more sometimes). Over that time I have developed some rules of engagement for Internet apostolate that might be helpful for others.


1) Always remember the superiority of the real world over the virtual world.

If you are spending more time interacting with people over the Internet than you do in the real world, then you need to seriously curtail your online activity. God made us physical beings and we cannot replace physical interaction with virtual interaction. It’s just not the same.

2) Your salvation is more important than your involvement on the Internet.

If frequenting a blog or forum disturbs your peace and makes you anxious, uncharitable and/or unkind to those around you, you should simply stop going to that blog or forum. I have had to abandon certain forums and blogs because I found myself too upset with those I encountered there. It is better to simply walk away.

3) Don’t ever say anything on the Internet that you wouldn’t say in person.[Maybe a note to those who prefer anonimity when leaving comments or have a blog themselves?]

This is a pretty common suggestion, but it is very true. If you wouldn’t call someone a putz to their face, don’t call them that online (and if you would call them that to their face, perhaps you need to see your confessor).

4) Don’t write anything in anger.[The internet allows for immediate access and response to information. This is good, but it has a negative side too: one can bypass the process of reflection and absorption. It beomes easy to rattle off any old comment in anger or make off-the-cuff remarks without reflection. One can end up looking stupid, getting details wrong or reacting to flawed information. Delay allows our response to mature.]

If you write a post or comment on a blog or on a forum in anger, be sure to preview it before posting. Then delete it.

5) Don’t stereotype people.[Bravo. Right vs Left, Liberal vs Conservative are rather flawed. Prof. John Haldane and Cardinal Francis George are just two people who have explained the problem with such langauge]

It is very easy to stereotype the people we “meet” over the Internet. If someone says he likes the Traditional Latin Mass, don’t assume that he is an “angry Traditionalist” who rejects Vatican II completely. If someone says something supportive of Rush Limbaugh, don’t assume she supports everything he espouses. The truth is that most people don’t fall into nice and neat categories. I remember encountering a person online who was devoted to the Latin Mass but also supported liberal Democrat politicians. Remember to just debate actual arguments raised, not positions you assume the person also holds. Don’t think you actually know people you only encounter online. You don’t.

6) Take at least one day off a week from the Internet.

Preferably Sunday. Remember that man was not made for the Internet, but the Internet for man. If you feel you need to be on the Internet every day, then you are showing signs of a dangerous addiction. This is unhealthy, even if the sites you go to are not harmful themselves.

7) Always assume the good intentions of others.

If someone writes something that could possibly be interpreted multiple ways, assume the best interpretation. I have seen countless examples of someone making a point, someone else misinterpreting it and attacking it, then a whole discussion ensues before the original poster returns to say that he never meant what he was accused of saying. Writing is a difficult task, and often what we write isn’t exactly what we mean. Give people the same benefit of the doubt that you want to be given.

8) Remember who the real Enemy is.

It’s not some heterodox blogger or pro-abortion advocate. It’s Satan. Those who do things that support his reign are slaves of Satan, and our duty is not to try to defeat them, but emancipate them and help them become sons of the True King. Yes, we must resist evil in all its forms, but those who advocate for evil need to be converted, not conquered.

9) Remember that God resists the proud.

Even when they are right. On the Internet you encounter people at all stage of their spiritual life. Many don’t know the first thing about the Faith yet still expound upon it. It is easy to look upon them like the Pharisee did to the Publican. Instead of quickly jumping in to tell them how they are wrong, first say a prayer for them and then gently lead them to a fuller understanding of the truth. I can guarantee that a prideful retort will do nothing other than turn them more away from an orthodox understanding of the Faith.

10) Don’t just go to Catholic sites.[ It's so easy to just look at the blogs which are similar to one's own point of view or interest. SOmetimes it can seem like singing to the choir. It certianly makes discussions between bloggers more interesting when we interactive with others.]

Part of the history of Catholics in America is that we have often lived in ghettos, completely excluded from those outside the Church. It sometimes feels like we are returning to that on the Internet. We only go to Catholic sites and Catholic blogs and Catholic forums (and usually only those we agree with) and it gives us an unbalanced view of the world. I spent over four years as the only Catholic at a Protestant apologetics forum, and it was a very fruitful experience for me. Not only was I able to defend and explain the Catholic Faith to many who would never hear about it, I also learned a great deal from the Protestants at the site and honed my apologetic abilities. Obviously we shouldn’t visit immoral sites that might lead us into the near occasion of sin, but we should be salt and light on the Internet and bring the Gospel of Jesus Christ to all corners of the virtual world.

If you have any helpful rules of engagement you use, feel free to leave them in the comments!

Abortion and Down's Syndorme.

Today I read this article in the Daily Telegraph. It presents figures from research conducted by Prof Joan Morris, professor of medical statistics at Queen Mary, University of London, showing an increase in the number of abortions because the child has Down's Syndrome.

"An increasing number of pregnant women are being told their babies have the condition because of a growing number of women putting off having children until their 30s and 40s and improvements in screening, doctors say. And around nine in ten women who are told they are going to have a baby with the problem opt for a termination."

"The research shows that around 1,100 babies in England and Wales are aborted every year because of Down's syndrome, an increase from 300 in 1989/90."

Click here to read the full article.

Pope Benedict Message to University Students.

On Saturday 10th October 2009 university students in Rome, the bishops of the Synod for Africa and university students from nine African univeristies via satellite joined the Holy Father in praying the Rosary.


Pope Benedict gave a short address after the rosary. Here are a few sections of it:

"I want to stress the importance of the education of young intellectuals and of scientific and cultural exchanges between universities in order to propose and to enliven integral human development, in Africa and on the other continents. In this context I have entrusted to you in spirit, dear young people, the Encyclical Caritas in Veritate."

"Dear university students of Rome and Africa, I ask you to work in the Church and in society for intellectual charity, which is necessary to tackle the great challenges of contemporary history. May you be sincere and enthusiastic seekers of the truth at your universities, building academic communities of a high academic standard where it is possible to exercise and enjoy that open, broad rationality which paves the way to the encounter with God. May you be able to build bridges of scientific and cultural collaboration between the different athenaeums, especially with those in Africa. To you, dear African students, I address a special invitation to live the period of your studies as a preparation for carrying out a service of cultural animation in your countries. The new evangelization in Africa is also counting on your generous commitment."

I've chosen these sections of the speech as I think they are examples of how Pope Benedict understands the relation between Faith and it's culturally forming and shaping influences. Pope Benedict also draws the reader's attention to the practice of building bridges between various disciplines. Pope Benedict's encyclical Caritas in Veritate presents the Church's socail doctrine as possesing an important interdisciplinary dimension. It allows faith, theology, metaphysics and science t ocome together in a collaborative effort in the service of humanity (31). 


On 1st April 2005 Pope Benedict, then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, gave a lecture at the convent of St. Scholastica, in reciept of the St. Benedict Award for the promotion of life and the family in Europe. Here is one of the closing paragraphs:

"Above all, that of which we are in need at this moment in history are men who, through an enlightened and lived faith, render God credible in this world. The negative testimony of Christians who speak about God and live against him, has darkened God's image and opened the door to disbelief. We need men who have their gaze directed to God, to understand true humanity. We need men whose intellects are enlightened by the light of God, and whose hearts God opens, so that their intellects can speak to the intellects of others, and so that their hearts are able to open up to the hearts of others."

What allows the exchange and bridge building between disciplines? How is it possible for an enlightened intellect to speak to others? What sort of truth and rationality is Pope Benedict presenting? Well, as Pope Benedict teaches time and again, it is the Logos (Christ). logos can mean word, reason/meaning. The Prologue of St. John's Gospel tells us about the Word, in Greek, Logos. We then understand Christ as both Word of God and reason/meaning. For Pope Benedict the meeting between Greek philosophy and Christian faith was providential, not merely a coincidence of history. logos, reason/meaning, is the ground of our existence, it is the unifiying and overreaching arch which brings together the unity of the disciplines. Hence interdisciplenary bridges can seek together the truth and meaning of things. This logos itself is grounded in and leads to the Logos who is Christ.

Back in London

I'm back in London studying for an MA.  It's been two weeks so far and going well. I'm studying a unit on modern doctrine (Christian doctrine in the works of the modern theologians) and a unit in theological aesthetics (Gregory of Nyssa, Aquinas, Hopkins, Von Balthasar etc). Next term I'll study foundations and methodologies in systematic theology; the dissertation over the summer. There's a real sense of wanting to learn and do interesting research amongst the staff and students on the MA courses. King's Philosophy Department is also home to Dr. Thomas Pink.

This past Monday and Tuesday I participated in a conference about 'Leadership in the Church' according to the theologies of Joseph Ratzinger and Rowan Williams. The speakers included Rev. Vincent Twomey SDV and Professor Siegfried Wiedenhofer, both part of the Ratzinger Schülerkreis (circle of students). The conference was organised in conjuction with the Pope Benedict Foundation in Germany. Short papers were given by three academics from King's Theology Department. One of these shorter papers dealt directly with Pope Benedict's Regensburg address.

Women who take the contraceptive pill prefer less macho men

The article, published in the Trends in Ecology & Evolution journal, also found that taking the pill may make women less attractive to men.

Scientists have now raised fears that these effects of the contraceptive may impact on future generations by affecting the ability of couples to reproduce.

Previous studies have found that ovulating women prefer partners with more masculine features and are particularly attracted to men showing dominance and male-male competitiveness.

They are also said to prefer partners who are genetically dissimilar to themselves.

Women taking the pill are said not to exhibit these ovulation-specific attractions.

The scientists, from the University of Sheffield, reviewed these studies and also looked at research suggesting that men are able to detect a woman's fertility status and prefer those who are ovulating.

They discussed whether this meant the use of oral contraceptives influenced a woman's ability to attract a mate by reducing her attractiveness to men.

The researchers found that an increasing number of studies suggested that the pill is likely to have an impact on human mating decisions and subsequent reproduction.

They said the fact that women taking the pill did not have an ovulation-specific attraction to genetically dissimilar partners was of particular interest because some evidence has suggested that genetic similarity between couples may be linked with infertility.

Covenant and Communion: The Biblical Theology of Benedict XVI

Theologian and popular writer Scott Hahn has written a soon to be published book entitled 'Covenant and Communion: The Biblical Theology of Benedict XVI.'  Published in the UK by Darton Longman Todd for October 2009, priced 12.95, 160 pages, hardback.

Click Here for a preview of the book and part of the first chapter.

Part 1: Blessed Virgin Mary According to Joseph Ratzinger

Part 2: Blessed Virgin Mary According to Joseph Ratzinger.

Der Schülerkreis von Joseph Ratzinger

Der Schülerkreis von Joseph Ratzinger are the circle of former doctoral and post-doctroal students of Rev. Prof. Joseph Ratzinger. They have been meeting annually for about 30 years, then Ratzinger became Benedict. They now meet annually at Castel Gandolfo with Ratzinger for a series of seminars and discussions, with some leisure time thrown in.

The Neuer Schülerkreis Joseph Ratzinger/Papst Benedikt XVI are up-and-coming Ratzinger scholars who also meet for seminars and meeitngs.

Click Here to view the website.

Opera Omnia of Joseph Ratzinger

The Institut-Papst-Benedikt XVI  is currently publishing the collected works of Joseph Ratzinger. The Institut was founded by Bishop Gerhard Ludwig Müller.

There will be a total of 16 volumes. The first published was Ratzinger's writings on the liturgy. This was at Ratzinger's request, for two reasons. First, the liturgy has been the central theme and area of importance throughout the theology of Ratzinger. Second, the need for an authentic understanding of the liturgy is of great urgency today.

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  Volumes I and II will include Ratzinger's undergraduate and doctorate theses, as well as other writings concerning Augustine and Bonaventure, the two doctors of the Church who are the subjects of his theses.
  
  
  

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  Volume III will open with Ratzinger's inaugural conference as a professor: "The God of faith and the God of the philosophers," delivered in Bonn in 1959, followed by writings on faith and reason and the historical-intellectual foundations of Europe.
  
  
  
  
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  Volume IV will open with the famous "Introduction to Christianity" of 1968. It will be followed by other writings on the profession of faith, baptism, following Christ, and the fulfillment of Christian existence.
  
  
  
  
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  Volume V will collect writings on creation, anthropology, the doctrine of grace, Mariology.
  
  
  
  
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  Volume VI will be on Christology, and will open with "Jesus of Nazareth," the only work in the collection that was written and published after the author's election as pope.
  
  
  
  
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  Volume VII will collect the writings on Vatican Council II, including notes and comments from that period.
  
  
  
  
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  Volume VIII will deal with ecclesiology and ecumenism.
  
  
  
  
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  Volume IX will collect essays on theological epistemology and hermeneutics, in particular on the understanding of the Scriptures, Revelation, Tradition.
  
  
  
  
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  Volume X will open with "Eschatology," published in 1977, followed by other writings on hope, death, resurrection, eternal life.
  
  
  
  
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  Volume XI is the one that has been published first. It is entitled "Theology of the Liturgy."
  
  
  
  
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  Volume XII, dedicated to the doctrine of the sacraments and to the ministry, will be entitled "Proclaimers of the Word and Servants of Your Joy."
  
  
  
  
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  Volume XIII will collect the many interviews conducted with Joseph Ratzinger, including the ones published in book form, with Vittorio Messori in 1984, and with Peter Seewald in 1996 and 2000.
  
  
  
  
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  Volume XIV will collect homilies from before his election as pope, many of which are little known and previously unpublished.
  
  
  
  
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  Volume XV will open with the book "My Life," published in 1997, followed by other writings of an autobiographical and personal nature.
  
  
  
  
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  Volume XVI will close the series with a complete bibliography of the works of Joseph Ratzinger in German, plus a comprehensive index of all the preceding volumes. The individual volumes will also be equipped with detailed indexes
  
  
  

Click Here to view the Institut-Papst-Benedikt XVI.

Pope Benedict to visit UK

Lots of newspapers, websites and blogs are reporting that Pope Benedict XVI will make a visit to the UK sometime in 2010. This will coincide with the beatification of Cardinal John Henry Newman. I think Pope Benedict will be welcomed as Head of the Catholic Church and as Head of Vatican State. Pope Benedict may give an address to both Houses of Parliament in Westminster Hall.

Longnecker on the Brits and Entrepreneurship

Fr. Dwight Longnecker of 'Standing on my Head' has a to the point post about entrepreneurship and the Brits, amongst other things.

Here's a snippet:

" It is amazing to me how entrepreneurial about religion Americans are. When I lived in Britain people regarded it as some sort of childish faux pas to have an idea, and enthusiasm about religion was considered to be a grave social error. "Good heavens Nigel, He's had an IDEA!"

I partly agree, but there are plenty of examples to the contrary, and I've posted on them already. It's worth having a read of the post.

Something in the water...

Robert, at Love Undefiled, has provided the link to a recent document summary of the International Federation of Catholic Doctors, titled Forty Years of Humanae Vitae from a Medical Perspective.

The summary lists several consequences of the contraceptive pill:


1. As a basic statement, the contraceptive pill must be described as a cortisone derivative. This necessarily generates some side-effects, such as propensity to infection. Most notable in this case is Chlamydia, the most widespread sexually transmitted disease(STD), which is promoted by the contraceptive hormone. Sterility is a common result of inflammation of the fallopian tubes.


2. The second major factor is the carcinogenic effects of the pill, which in 2005 led the WHO to declare the pill to be a cause of cervical, breast and liver cancer. HPV infection is a key factor in the development of cervical cancer, which is also promoted by contraceptive hormones.


3. The third group of side-effects concerns the risk of thrombosis and cardiovascular illness, which the pill greatly exacerbates.


4. In addition to this, the pill also causes metabolic changes, psychiatric disturbances and disturbances in sexual behaviour. The possibility of malformations in children during or after use of the pill should also be taken into consideration.


5. Another essential issue that is becoming increasingly urgent is the presence of hormones in drinking water, mainly caused by the pill. We have to take notice of the fact that over the last fifty years spermatozoa levels in men have dropped by 50%.


1-4 would be more concerned with women who are taking the contraceptive pill. Number 5 is something everyone could be exposed to.

Further to point 5 the document has made, Dr. Leonard Sax has researched and written a book called Boys Adrift. Dr. Sax points to 5 factors in society that are having adverse effects upon boys and men. One of these factors is Endocrine Disruptors, which can be found in plastic containers and packaging. Endocrine disruptors can lower a Male's testosterone level.

Some blogs

Sacramentum Vitae and Pontifications

Theological, interesting, in depth, worth a read.

Doctrine: Verbal Icon of Christ.

Here are a few excepts from an Orthodox blog:
From the Desert Fathers:

Malicious sceptics visited Abba Agathon to see if they could annoy him. They had heard that Agathon possessed great discretion and self-control. They spoke directly to him, “Agathon, we heard that you are an adulterer and full of pride.”
He answered, “Yes, that’s true.”
“Are you the same Agathom who gossips and slanders?”
“I am.”
“Are you Agathon the heretic?”
“No, I am not a heretic.”
“Why did you patiently endure it when we slandered you, but refuse to be called a heretic?”
Agathon answered, “Your first accusations were good for my soul, but to be a heretic is to be separated from God. I do not want to be apart from God.”

" Fr. Georges Florovsky, of blessed memory, once wrote that doctrine is “a verbal icon of Christ.” That statement may not carry much weight with the non-Orthodox – but should come as a profound revelation for contemporary Orthodox believers. What we find in the teaching of the Church is not a collection of “right opinions” but a verbal representation of Christ, similar to the representation found in the holy icons. Again, the non-Orthodox may not perceive the power in this statement – but it is an important way for Orthodox Christians to remove themselves from the position of valuing opinions and restore them to the position of holding doctrine in its proper veneration."

" The role of doctrine and dogma (officially stated teaching of the Church) is not a morbid concern with correct phraseology or ancient metaphysics: all doctrine is taught for the sake of our salvation. This does not mean that, in the end, God will reward those who get an ‘A’ on their doctrine report card. Rather, doctrine is for our salvation because it teaches us the true path to union with God, Who alone is our salvation."

These paragraphs remind me of something I read recently. It's a book called Faith & Theology, by M. D. Chenu. Here's what Chenu wrote about doctrine and dogma:

"There is a dual aspect to the object of Faith. On the one hand, the act of the believer terminates not in a dogmatic proposition but in the divine reality itself which it expresses in a human manner. This realism of the Faith is the basis of its mystical value...it follows that our faith's appetite for satisfaction has a dual capacity for progress: realist perception and assent to propositons. The duality is in the manner of knowing: it is not a case of two separate or dissociated realms of truth."

"What is unveiled to our trust is not just some intelligible object but the very reality of our beatitude. God himself, subsisting Truth, the satisifying end of all our desires, substantia rerum sperandum. This is not a concept, not a proposition, not a system of thought, but he in whom I now recognise the purpose of my life, my ultimate happiness. Faith is, of course, an assent to propostions. But this is because my mind, unfortunately, knows truth- even divine truth- only in propostions. But through these propositions faith is an adherence to that which satifies all desires, to that which is the only desire of my soul: happiness in the possession of God."

Contraception cheapest way to combat climate change?

This is the title of an article I read today in The Telegraph. It presents a recent report by the London School of Economics, entitled Fewer Emitter, Lower Emissions, Less Cost. The conclusion is that contraception is the cheapest way to reduce climate change, because if more contraception is used, there will be fewer people, hence reduced harmful emissions.

There are a few things to consider:

1. The are a considerable number of experts in all fields of scientific endeavour who hold reasonably sceptical and critical opinions about the cause and effect of climate change.

2. More contraception will mean more abortion. Contraception is not 100% full-proof and reliable.

3. Consider the amount of money that will be spent educating children and adults in the use of contraception. The Teenage Pregnancy Strategy has cost taxpayers more than £150 million, and this is just in the UK.

4. Reproduction in the West is below replacement rate-people are not haivng enough children to maintain population. 12 percent of the world’s population lives in North America and Western Europe and accounts for 60 percent of private consumption spending, but a third of humanity that lives in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa accounts for only 3.2 percent. Industrialized nations, representing only 20% of the world's population, consume 87 percent of the world’s printing and writing papers and global production in the pulp, paper and publishing sector is expected to increase by 77% from 1995 to 2020. The pulp and paper industry is the single largest consumer of water used in industrial activities in OECD countries and is the third greatest industrial greenhouse gas emitter, after the chemical and steel industries. Contraception will be more aggresivly imposed upon African and Asian countries as they have larger populations, yet they consume and emmit much less.

5. What about encouraging the West to consume less?