TO THE EDITORS.

The reviewer's task

As a fellow reviewer of George Weigel's Witness to Hope (for L'Osservatore Romano), I couldn't but wonder whether Eamon Duffy and I read the same book ["Wojtyla Writ Large, and Long," October 22]. It is, of course, tempting to use the book review format to air one's own views, but how much more helpful to the reader it would have been if a distinguished historian like Duffy had taken Weigel's interpretations of events seriously and told us why he disagrees with them.

Mary Ann Glendon 

Cambridge, Mass.

The writer is Learned Hand Professor of Law at Harvard Law School.

A beautiful book

After reading Eamon Duffy's ungenerous review of Witness to Hope, George Weigel's biography of Pope John Paul II, I went back to Duffy's own account of this pontificate in his history of the popes, Saints and Sinners, published two years ago. I found that the points covered in the review-for example, the suspension of the constitution of the Jesuit order in 1981, the defense of liberation theology, or the pope's garrulity (Duffy says that Wojtyla saw his role as pope to be an "oracle")-had already been set forth there, often in the same words.

Duffy much preferred the style and policies (except for Humanae vitae) of Paul VI to those of John Paul II, whom he considers harshly pessimistic, confrontational, authoritarian, and the like. Hence he sprinkles his review with phrases such as "doomed enterprise," "erodes the reader's trust," "sacrifices credibility," and "conservative" to suggest that the book is partisan and untrustworthy.

But any fair-minded reader will see at once that Weigel has not only gone more deeply into the life and work of this pope than anyone before him, he also tells the story with insight, understanding, learning, literary grace, and, let it be said, sympathy. Few readers will come away unmoved from the sections on Wojtyla's youth, the harsh years under Nazi occupation, his life as a young priest and bishop, or the gripping account of Wojtyla's spiritual turmoil during the month between the death of John Paul I and his own election.

Weigel gives the reader story after story, detail after detail, text after text to support his view that Karol Wojtyla is an extraordinary man, a priest of uncommon depth, a great pope, perhaps one of the greatest, and a historic figure on the world stage. Shouldn't his life be written so that readers can also appreciate his greatness? Let Professor Duffy continue to hold his views. My guess is that most readers will discover that Witness to Hope is a beautiful book, thoughtful, informed, carefully researched (and well-indexed), a pleasure to read.

Robert Louis Wilken

Charlottesville, Va.

The writer is William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor of the History of Christianity at the University of Virginia.

Bright lights, plus shadows

Eamon Duffy's review of George Weigel's biography of Pope John Paul II is masterly. Duffy's generous and well-merited praise of Weigel's major achievement lends credibility to the review's critique.

This long pontificate manifests wonderfully bright lights for which one can only be grateful. Duffy calls attention to the shadows. Especially interesting is his criticism of Weigel's "virtual silence about the pope's coolness toward figures like Oscar Romero." Following a lecture by George Weigel several years ago, I drew attention to the pope's "very muted reaction" to the assassination of Romero, and asked whether the same response was even remotely conceivable had an archbishop been shot at the altar in Poland or elsewhere in Eastern Europe. I added that "one of John Paul's cardinals" had personally confided to me his conviction of a "double standard" in this regard. The only response was a denial of any double standard. Earlier this year Father Avery Dulles, questioned about the same matter, admitted that he, too, had no answer. He was more candid than Weigel, however, in admitting this. (rev.) john jay hughes

Saint Louis, Mo.

The writer is a church historian.

A missing Picasso

In her review of Richard Viladesau's Theological Aesthetics [September 24], Daria Donnelly refers to the "church decorations at Assy by Leger, Rouault, Matisse, Picasso, and Braque."

In fact, Picasso initially was consulted about joining the project at Assy, but later these negotiations were terminated; Picasso did not contribute any art to the chapel.

For the record, in addition to Braque, Leger, Matisse, and Rouault, the complete list of contributing artists includes Bazaine, Bercot, Bonnard, Bony, Crianchon, Chagall, Couturier, Demaison, Herbert-Stevens, Hure, Lipchitz, Lurcat, and Richier.

(Rev.) Harry M. Culkin

Douglaston, N.Y.

A dangerous Jesus

Though I have not read Roger Haight's Christology [Jesus Symbol of God, reviewed October 8], I have enough acquaintance with the postmodern categories of "experience" and "symbol" to concur with John Cavadini's insightful critique of the deconstruction of the central Christian symbol, Jesus Christ. Cavadini hints at another problem implicit in this postmodern Christology, namely that it renders Jesus incomprehensible to the experience of the Christian community, present and past.

Traditionally, the faithful have interpreted the Jesus of history-this Jesus of "dangerous memory" (and rightly so!)-through an intimate relationship with the risen Lord who comes to each of us with wounds in hands, feet, and side, inviting us to take up our cross and follow him. As so many people of God have witnessed, we mysteriously enter into his very life and death through our baptism, and are nourished by the very gift of his body-broken and shared-in the Eucharist. Should not this experience of Jesus Christ, the God of love, stand as the primary hermeneutical lens through which the theologian and biblical scholar view the Jesus of history and all of Christian experience? I suggest von Balthasar as a helpful guide in exploring these questions.

Peter V. Shaughnessy

Chicago, Ill.

A misreading of Haight

I was rather dismayed by John Cavadini's review of Roger Haight's Jesus Symbol of God. While I have some disagreements with Haight's text, I find that the reviewer seriously misreads Haight on "symbol."

Cavadini thinks that Haight construes Jesus as merely a symbol of God that merely mediates God. This is misleading. When I read Haight I wondered why he did not title his book Jesus: Sacrament of God, or Jesus: Revelation of God, despite his writing a Christology "from below," which he thinks precludes using these terms.

Haight basically adopts Rahner's concept of the symbol. In a similar vein, in Models of Revelation, Avery Dulles says that all revelation and faith are symbolic. Dulles makes explicit that some symbols are "sacramental," in that they do not merely "represent" another reality but do so by participation in it and mediation of it. Dulles says such symbols "contain and mediate the reality they signify."

While Haight's comments on symbolism are not as explicit as Dulles's on "participation," Cavadini is wrong to say that a symbol "by definition mediates something else." Haight writes that the Christian experience "is that it is truly God who is encountered in Jesus." Only symbolic language can represent (not describe) the mystery of "how God is present in Jesus." Haight has a principle of distinction (not separation, as Cavadini writes) between Jesus and God coded into his theology. Without such a distinction, a Christology would likely be Docetic. Without symbolic language, the mystery would be lost. Like Cavadini, I would see little or no reason to remain a Christian if Jesus were "merely a symbol." But he is not, even in Haight's account.

Terrence W. Tilley

Dayton, Ohio

Sign & symbol & Jesus

In her most recent book, Sandra M. Schneiders, I.H.M., writes: "There is growing consensus among scholars in the semantic disciplines that 'sign' and 'symbol' are very different realities and that using the terms interchangeably leads to substantial confusion" (Written that You May Believe: Encountering Jesus in the Fourth Gospel). I think that in his review of Roger Haight's Jesus Symbol of God, John Cavadini really treats symbol as basically synonymous with sign, and this allows him to dismiss Haight's work so summarily. For him, if Jesus is "merely a symbol" he cannot be divine, the implication being that Haight has given us a merely human Jesus.

Cavadini's trouble seems to be with "the adequacy of the postmodern category 'symbol' itself to render an account of God's love in Christ." Sandra Schneiders again lends some help: "Although there is much theoretical diversity among those working in several disciplines with symbolism, there is today broad consensus at least on the nature and function of the symbol, and the following definition would...be generally acceptable: Symbol can be defined as (1) a sensible reality (2) which renders present to and (3) involves a person objectively in (4) a transforming experience (5) of transcendent mystery. Of the five elements of this definition, only the first is common to both sign and symbol."

I submit that Haight's work is a real contribution to "postmodern Christology" and a vital step toward true dialogue with our non-Christian sisters and brothers, and as such deserves a review from someone more in agreement with what Schneiders tells us regarding the nature and function of symbol.

Peter A. Fitzpatrick

Chicago, Ill.

The reviewer replies:

With all due respect, the question is not whether in absolute terms Haight has an adequate theory of symbol, but whether his theory is adequate to a tradition which claims that Jesus not only mediates God but also is God. It is not misleading to say that for Haight a symbol by definition "mediates something other than itself." These are his own words, emphatically repeated three times on page 197; then, on page 198: "A concrete symbol...mediates a real presence within itself of something other than itself"; see also, page 201.

I do not hide the possibility that for Haight "it is truly God that is encountered in Jesus"; my review even concedes the possibility that for Haight, Jesus the symbol "makes God absolutely and fully present." But do we have sufficient grounds for concluding, therefore, that Jesus is God? There are other concrete religious symbols, according to Haight, both Christian and non-Christian, in which God is truly encountered; are we entitled to say that they in any way are God?

There is a crucial distinction here which Haight's theory of symbol cannot negotiate. Jesus in Catholic tradition mediates to us the presence, not of another, but of none other than himself. If he mediates the presence of someone other than himself, we have indeed what is classically called "separation." Haight says that "Jesus is worshiped insofar as Jesus embodies God and makes God present"-not insofar as he is God. Does Haight recommend the worship of other true symbols insofar as they "embody God and make God present"? Presumably not, but I submit that Haight has no way of securing the distinction between these symbols and Jesus.

The ideas Tilley cites from Dulles would indeed be reassuring if they were in Haight's book; Haight seems actually to depart from Dulles, who says: "Symbols do not necessarily point to things strictly other than themselves."

John Cavadini

Coping with Darwin

In his article, "The Darwinian Struggle" [September 24], John Haught asks Catholics to "pay attention" to the debate over evolution, and concludes that "it is now time for a more rigorous and publicly accessible renewal of post-Darwinian theology."

I had the privilege of collaborating with the late Karl Schmitz-Moorman while he wrote his Theology of Creation in an Evolutionary World [Pilgrim Press, 1997] at the Center of Theological Inquiry at Princeton. He applies a philosophy of becoming to the meaning of tradition, and of union to the evolution of consciousness, information, and freedom. New insights into the inner life of the Holy Trinity and into evil and predestination create fertile ground for future systematic theological reflection.

Unfortunately, Schmitz-Moorman's work is relatively unknown among his fellow Roman Catholics. Because of its perceived significance, however, the influential quarterly Zygon, Journal of Religion and Science [June 1999] devoted a symposium to the book. One of the two essayists, a theoretical physicist now a dean at Purdue, says the author "has given us a wonderful legacy on which to ponder." The other, a professor at the Lutheran Theological Seminary, writes that the book "should be regarded as a programmatic proposal and a trenchant one at that." Neither author is Catholic; both commend Schmitz-Moorman's Catholic approach as ground-breaking. A German translation has received the same kind of praise in European publications.

I commend Haught for raising concern about a lack of interest in American Catholic circles on the need to investigate the serious implications of the "Darwinian struggle."

(Rev.) James F. Salmon, S.J.

Baltimore, Md.

'Tu es sacerdos in aeternum'*

Though I agree with Ken Lovasik's view of the canonical status I share with him as a "resigned priest" ["Not for Hire," June 4], and while I, too, have chosen not to engage in a non-canonical ministry (that is, without authorization by a bishop), I do not believe there is nothing more to be said. For one thing, I disagree with the view expressed in John Hawes's letter [Correspondence, July 16] that "the issue of celibacy should not be part of this discussion; it is an issue separate from that of resignation." To the contrary, the only reason I became a "resigned priest" was that I chose no longer to be celibate and to marry.

I respected the canonical forms and filled out the corresponding papers, but I did not accept their scriptural, theological, or historical justification, not to mention their insinuation that I must be some kind of degenerate, or was dubiously ordained. I made it clear that the only barrier to my continuing as a priest was that I wished to marry. I haven't heard back from the "competent ecclesiastical authorities" in more than twenty years. Yet today we have the farce of the law requiring celibacy being dispensed with for the benefit of married former Anglican/Episcopal priests (many of whom transferred from their former denomination because it ordained women, to the delight of the "no women priests" party in ours), while"cradle" Catholic priests are treated as pariahs for marrying. The problem is compounded, in the same way as the issue of contraception, by the papal monarch reserving decision-making power to himself, in contravention of the spirit if not the letter of episcopal collegiality, and with no consultation of the "pious faithful" in favor of the hierarchical idolatry of the celibacy law.

Like Ken Lovasik, "I would not hesitate to minister as a priest if there were a true emergency where no canonical priest is available," but have no wish to function as a "free-lance" priest administering the sacraments. As an assistant public defender and member of Pax Christi, I find plenty of scope to minister in other ways. My experience has been that, at least in Florida, there are more "noncanonical" than "canonical" priests involved in justice and peace ministry, described by the 1971 Synod of Bishops as that "constitutive dimension of the preaching of the gospel." Still, I respect the alternative choice of married priests who continue to preside over the Eucharist.

Having done my studies at the Gregorian and having been ordained in Rome, I am as steeped in Romanita as any Vatican functionary, but I am also aware of the historical need to conclude the era of absolute papal monarchy. It seems to me that the bishops are enabling our present pope to play a modern-day Innocent III or even Boniface VIII. I know of no evidence that the pope is even aware of such dangerous historical precedents.

Michael L. O'neill

De Land, Fla.

*Editors' note: For the benefit of all 257 subscribers who've forgotten the Latin they learned at their Mother's knee, as well as the 859 who never learned it, the headline is a line from Psalm 110; it says, "Thou art a priest forever."

Thanks for a plug

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Roanoke, Va.