CORRESPONDENCE.

A photo wrongly read

I salute Christopher Young's October 22 cover. I've seen hundreds of pictures of Pope John Paul II, but this photo seems so intensely personal- as if the Holy Father is turning with a blessing for all us Commonweal readers.

Edward F. Hayes

Orlando, Fla.

From the editors: Sorry to disappoint you, but he said at the time that it was only for the staff.

Thanks, but no thanks

Eamon Duffy's review [October 22] of George Weigel's biography of John Paul II is something of a left-handed blessing, like your cover of the pope for the same issue. Duffy acknowledges that "Wojtyla is by any standards a titanic human being." Such personalities are simply too good to be true, and any good journalist will try to cut them down to size.

Duffy's main criticism is that "Weigel's lack of distance from his hero undermines his credibility as an apologist." All this means is that Duffy has not understood a key element of Weigel's biographical methodology: that is, John Paul II's insistence that he be "understood from the inside."

Here Wojtyla, the phenomenologist, is stating the key principle not only for understanding his true self and the substance of his humanistic philosophy, but also Vatican II's projection of Christ as God's solution to what it means to be a human being in the modern world. Weigel's methodology in this book can be a first step for us to discern this whole series of interlinked meanings.

(Rev.) John F. Kobler, C.P.

Chicago, Ill.

No built-in bias

In his review [November 5] of John Cornwell's book Hitler's Pope, the Rev. John F. Morley makes a statement about myself which I feel obliged to correct. He writes that "Peter Gumpel, S.J., is the postulator for the beatification of Pius XII" and that "Gumpel's task...is to do all in his power to promote the cause," and that, in consequence, he is "biased."

The two statements are not true, and the conclusion drawn from them is not only false but objectively offensive. In fact I am not the postulator, but the relator of the cause of Pius XII; that is, by papal appointment the autonomous and independent judge of investigation, whose task is to examine in a completely impartial manner everything concerning this cause; to supervise the drafting of the "Position on Life and Heroic Virtues," which in due time will be presented to the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, and to make sure also that possible objections have been presented and treated in an objective and fair manner.

I am confident that if Father Morley had been aware of the essential difference between the offices of postulator and relator, he would have refrained from stating that I am "biased." Obviously, however, his unintentional but objectively serious mistake needs to be corrected.

To this I may add that I refuse to be put in the same category with John Cornwell, a rank amateur in the fields of history, law, and theology, and whose untruthful statements regarding his consultation of the archives of the Secretary of State have been publicly refuted by an official Vatican statement (see, L'Osservatore Romano, daily edition and weekly English edition, both dated October 13, 1999).

Peter Gumpel, S.J.

Vatican City

Back to the roots 

Thanks for publishing David Goldweber's fine article ["Home at Last: The Pilgrimage of Claude McKay," September 10]. The review wonderfully chronicled McKay's career and his journey to Catholicism.

It is difficult in a few short pages to reveal the complexity of the environment of the Catholic interracial Friendship House of the 1930s and '40s. Mr. Goldweber focused for a bit on Bishop Bernard Sheil, who would still be considered a social liberal today, and who played a key role in bringing Catherine de Hueck and her Friendship House to Chicago. Catherine de Hueck Doherty, absent in the review, defies description.

The movements of radical Catholic "founders" of the 1930s, Dorothy Day and Catherine de Hueck, are today considered "liberal" more by adoption than actual practice. These two-more properly "radical" Catholic women-drew around themselves very complex and varied networks of friendship and association. Their complexity addressed the complexity of the church and world around them, and did great things for persons seeking God and art and justice, like Claude McKay.

Current efforts to define liberal or neoconservative Catholicism tend to limit us to politicized "How we're better-than-Catholic" discussions. Probing the complex movements of radical Catholicism can humble us into continuing our search for becoming Catholic. I thank Mr. Goldweber for his enlightening contribution.

Albert Schorsch, III

Chicago, Ill.

The writer is president of the board of Friendship House.

Maurice & his friends

A. W. Godfrey's piece on Maurice Lavanoux ["Mr. Quilisma," September 10} shot me back into my childhood. I thought no one remembered that New York had a lively Catholic lay intelligentsia in the thirties and early forties. There was a network, if not quite a community, joining the liturgical movement, Commonweal, Friendship House, Corpus Christi Church, the Catholic Worker, America, and Liturgical Arts.

And the Quilisma! I remember those men in their overcoats and Homburgs. Though, as they admitted, there was not one good singer in the group, Dr. Becket Gibbs bullied them into a credible rendition of the chant; they sang a public Vespers (I think) once a year. And they talked, over their weekly spaghetti dinners, for hours.

Harry Binsse (an editor of Commonweal), Harold Rambusch of church decoration, Joseph Shanley, Ambrose Leonard, William O'Meara (the Duns Scotus scholar), and Barry Byrne, architect of contemporary churches, and my father, were among the Quilismites.

No curmudgeon to my parents, who referred to him as "Dear Maurice," nor to us children, Maurice Lavanoux got me my first teen-age summer job, adding those new zip codes to Sheed and Ward's mailing list. Thanks for the time- travel moment.

Ann Byrne

Providence, R.I.

On a par with C. S. Lewis

Thank you, thank you! for Anita Mathias ["I Was a Teen-age Atheist," October 8]. The world has not heard a turn of phrase like hers since C. S. Lewis's apologetics (as in "Paul, a bullet of hatred, galloping to Damascus to kill and destroy, he is struck off his horse and glimpses divinity").

Can we hear more from her? Bless her for showing the world (or at least our enclave of Christian intellectuals) that even deeply faithful Christians can shred language with their wit.

(Rev.) Molly Phinney

Beverly, Mass.

Score one for Alleva

Richard Alleva's take on The Sixth Sense [September 24] is on the mark. With its ghost-like connections to everlasting love, the child as redeeming figure who suffers and loves, its deft use of the color red to move and deepen it, The Sixth Sense is memorable. Bruce Willis, by taking the more subtle approach in playing his role, demonstrated his willingness to "present" the superb acting of Haley Joel Osment. This was generous and a real contribution to film as art.

Rose Pacatte, F.S.P.

Boston, Mass.

The writer is director of the Pauline Center for Media Studies in Boston.

Score two for CMWL

In your issue of September 10, Lyn Burr Brignoli's "Broken Body to Broken Body" is extraordinary-the finest short piece about faith I have read in a long time.

Second, I read Annie Dillard's difficult and brilliant For the Time Being, and have had an awful time explaining to friends why I think it is a work of genius and not really a book at all, in a sense. Peggy Rosenthal's review ["A God's-Eye View"] is perfect.

Brian Doyle

Portland, Oreg.