Much Sadder Sentence

My friend Sam almost died last week. That was the first sentence of my article Growing Old in Prison, published in America last Nov. 10. Today I must write a new, much sadder sentence: my friend Sam died yesterday afternoon.

Five days ago, during a spell of unusually cold weather, Sam began to feel congested and weak, andquite sensibly for a 63-year-oldhe reported to the prison infirmary. In my earlier article I compared penitentiary medical care to penitentiary food: the operative motto is as little as possible, as cheap as possible. True to this guiding principle, the nurses told Sam that he had the flu and that he should simply ride it out in his cell. No one thought it strange that he had to be taken back to the cellblock in a wheelchair.

The following day Sam was too weak to report to pill call or to walk to the chow hall. Thanks to a kindhearted fellow inmate, however, he was at least brought a tray with food. The guards on duty told this prisoner, Wilbur T., to keep an eye on Sam, in lieu of proper medical care.

The next morning, a Sunday, he had trouble breathing, so two other inmatesSylvester F. and Meredith S.persuaded the watch commander, Lieutenant M., to move Sam to the infirmary. Unexpectedly, this watch commander followed up on Sam’s progress so resolutely that the nurses called an ambulance and had him moved to the prison ward at a major hospital in Richmond, Va. I heard that at this stage the official diagnosis was still influenza, but I do not know this for certain.

Two days later, Sam passed away because of kidney failure. Because he, unlike most prisoners, still had contact with his family, civilian hospital staff were able to call his two daughters to his bedside at the end. His son is a military officer on active duty. Sam is survived by his children and a large passel of beautiful grandchildren.

Many of his fellow convicts also mourn his loss. On our side of the razor-wire fence, there are few men like him: generous, patient, funny, intelligent and stoical. Sam was always ready to give a roll-up cigarette or two to the crazies from this penitentiary’s mental health unit, and he taught other inmates how to read and write in a remedial literacy class organized by two Presbyterian teachers. Certainly his line-by-line edits and detailed critique of the manuscript of my first book helped significantly to make it publishable.

Even in Sam’s last months, he always maintained his sense of humor, arguing fiercely at the breakfast table that Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction would eventually be found, even if the United States had to invade Syria to track them down. But those days were very difficult for him. After the two mini-strokes I described in Growing Old in Prison, Sam experienced another mini-stroke, as a result of which he broke his wrist. No doubt those episodes contributed to the kidney failure that eventually took his life.

And the usual stresses of prison life surely played a role in Sam’s death as well. At the end of 2003, the Department of Corrections ordered all inmates to cut their visiting lists so drastically that he had to choose which of his many relatives would still be allowed to visit him in the future. What a decision to make: do I give up the right to see my grandchildren by my eldest daughter? Or do I give up the right to see my youngest grandson, by my son? And how do I explain all this to my family?

Supposedly, Sam told another prisoner three days before his passing that he was ready and prepared to die. Perhaps that is true, perhaps not. Many of us have spent so much time behind bars that we envy Sam his final release. At least he got out; we are still here.

Of course, all of us earned our trips to the penitentiary even Sam, even me. Sam, you may recall from my first article, shot an intruder twice inside his townhouse, a death that might have been prevented by firing a warning into the ceiling. So he deserved to go to jail; but did he deserve to lose his own life in a hospital’s prison ward?

Jens Soering

Resurrection Faith

Many thanks for the fine article by John W. O’Malley, S.J., on Anna Katherine Emmerich and the Mel Gibson film (3/15). His historical sketch of the Passion tradition prompts two thoughts regarding the relationship between that tradition and the post-Vatican lI emphasis on the Resurrection. That emphasis makes sense theologically, of course, but liturgically it has generated zingy church songs (I hesitate to call them hymns) in which we Catholics now celebrate ourselves as the finger-snapping people of God who, it seems, are so lucky to know that God loves us, thanks to our Resurrection faith. Fortunately, that is hard to do during Passion Week, one of the few times a Catholic is likely to hear a classic hymn in Latin. It also occurs to me that unlike Good Friday, or for that matter the Jewish Day of Atonement, Easter, which (as we might say) celebrates the fact that the last words of Jesus on the cross were not God’s last word, must compete with chocolate bunnies, egg-rolls, pagan sunrise services and other insipid rites of spring. Without the somberness of Passiontide, Easter these days would be unbearable, just as Good Friday without Easter would be meaningless.

Kenneth L. Woodward

Something Great

Of Many Things (2/23) honoring the life and the work of Jim Santora was one of the nicest tributes I have ever read. I hope and pray that you said all these same things to him not only on his deathbed but also 10 and 20 and 30 years ago during the middle of his tenure at America.

By way of background: I, like Jim, am a C.P.A., and like many others I have heard for years that I must remember my Christian values and live them in my professional life. I was lucky. During my years at LeMoyne College I took courses in corporate responsibility, religion and philosophy, so I actually had an idea what it meant to be true to my Christian values while running a business and trying to make money. You cannot believe how many businessmen there are out there, good people, who just don’t understand that Christian values and acceptable business conduct can be reconciled and demonstrated.

I am one of the leaders of a youth group at our church, 8th, 9th and 10th graders. I have been talking to the kids for two years about leading their lives with Christian values, being idealistic, trying to do something great. I knew I was not getting through to them. I handed out your article last Sunday night, and we all read it as a group. The lights went on! They finally understood what I have been talking to them about. Jim may not have been a saint; he wasn’t even a Jesuit. He was not the president of the United States, nor was he C.E.O. of I.B.M. Jim was a working guy, a father and a husband, and he touched everyone’s lives and made the world a better place as a result of his work.

I loved your closeyou asked Jim to pray for us. Thanks from my kids. I am hopeful that because of your article at least one of them will grow up to be another Jim Santora.

David W. Morris

Alternatives to Abortion

Your editorial The Abortion Debate Today (2/16) offered some excellent insights. However, we suggest that there is an additional and very relevant consequence of a consistent ethic of life: Pro-life faith communities must be prepared to offer expectant mothers realistic and effective alternatives to abortion. This may take various forms, like financial assistance, counseling, shelter and medical care.

As long as women feel that they have no choice but to abort, the culture of death will prevail. When life-affirming alternatives are as easily available as abortion, the culture of death will lose its appeal.

Mary Anne and Pete Gummere

Compassionate Critic

Thanks to Richard R. Gaillardetz for the kind things he said about me and others in Do We Need a New(er) Apologetics? (2/2). I am pleased that he can appreciate the love and passion of someone’s work, even as he disagrees with that person’s methods. I would find few things so valuable as the insights of such a compassionate criticif only he would support his criticism with evidence that corresponds to something I have actually done.

I understand the problem of space limitations. But Professor Gaillardetz should not make assertions, like placing me at the far right of the contemporary Catholic theological continuum, without providing some example of the work that would situate me so far to starboard. (I honestly cannot figure out what that might be.)

Mr. Gaillardetz does mention two titles of my works, both of which were published well over a decade ago. Since then I have published four books with Doubleday, three more in the Catholic press and six volumes of the Ignatius Study Bible. He shows no awareness of these. My most recent book bears a warm endorsement by the former vice-rector of the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Romehardly an immoderate man, a Jesuit who has taught there for some 40 years.

Finally, I would like to respond to Mr. Gaillardetz’s only specific criticism. On the basis of listening to one tape series, he accuses me of having avoided studying the textual history of Dei Verbum and of focusing exclusively on the final text. One might respond that only the final text is binding. But I need not do that. In the very series Mr. Gaillardetz mentioned, I was arguing, in fact, not from the final text but from the textual history, which I discussed in great detail, based on the accounts of Cardinal Augustin Bea, S.J., and others. The textual history made my case far better than any ahistorical reading could have done.

Scott Hahn

Long Trail

Your editorial in the Jan. 19 issue, like your other editorials, is biased and not balanced. The Kyoto Protocols did not require multinational controls on pollution. Only the United States was required to submit to tighter environmental guidelines. China, one of the worst environmental offenders, was let off the hook.

The Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty was not signed by China, North Korea or Pakistan. Would you have those countries in control of nuclear weapons while the United States, France and England are forced to relinquish theirs?

I always heard that journalism should be fair and balanced. Obviously you never went to journalism school. If I practiced medicine the way you practice journalism, I’d have a trail of dead bodies a mile long.

William J. Somers. M.D.

Catholics, Abortion and Politics

A task force of seven was established at the U.S. bishops’ meeting Nov. 10-12, 2003, to prepare policy for dealing with Catholic politicians on the subject of abortion. As one bishop stated, the question is most complicated and delicate. The guidelines could possibly promote harmony between the hierarchy and politicians or could pit Catholic against Catholic in unseemly public recrimination of little fruit. Ancient though they be, words of St. Thomas Aquinas can apply and, while they do not define a solution, they can provide a basis for dialogue: Human government is derived from the divine and should imitate it. God, although he is omnipotent and perfectly good, permits some evils to occur in the universe, evils which he could prohibit. He does this because if these evils were removed, greater evils would ensue. Therefore, thus also in human governance, those who rule properly should tolerate certain evils lest other good things are lost and even worse evils come about (Summa Theologiae, Secunda Secundae, q. 10, art. 11c).

There is consensus that some moral evils are best left to instructed individual conscience rather than government enforcement. Agreement comes easily on such actions as wayward consensual sex, dishonoring of parents and unofficial lies. Most Catholics, certainly all bishops, oppose extending the tolerance St. Thomas mentions to abortion and hold to the opinion that government should make laws to protect the unborn. We are appalled by the cloud of insensitivity toward human life that covers our land. This, even though a different sensitivity has a history going back to Hippocrates and beyond. Something is terribly amiss in wholesale, on-demand abortion, uninhibited by moral scruple. Semantics and euphemism can alter the face of reality. Is it not true that if a student were to define abortion flat-out as the killing of a developing human child, a fair-minded professor would not mark him wrong?

Sooner or later the subject of abortion comes up in conversation among acquaintances. People with whom I have spoken, Christian and Jewish, who choose to be called pro-choice admit that abortion is not good but feel that it is a private matter. In essence, they extend St. Thomas’s words to abortion. They point to evils that would occur if Roe v. Wade were ever overturned. In this age, abortion would merely be driven underground, as whiskey was during prohibition. There would be no proper medical supervision of abortion procedures, which could be harmful. Also when a law does not have widespread support, it is unobserved, and disrespect for law in general is produced. If abortion is allowed openly and controlled by law, excesses like partial-birth abortion, recently outlawed, and infanticide of a viable child can be prevented. This control would be absent in underground activity. They also claim that the right of privacy permits abortion, although privacy does not protect many acts committed in private, such as spousal abuse, from government jurisdiction. There are other varieties of pro-choice opinion. But I believe that the above is a fair outline of where the majority of Americans stand at this time. Patently there are exceptions.

If evils associated with suppressing abortion by law are considered sufficient grounds by a Catholic politician for opposing such laws, if he is concerned that abortion should be opposed as a moral, not a legal issue, can his reasoning be dismissed out of hand by the hierarchy? This is the end point at which the outlook of the bishops and that of practicing Catholics in politics can lead to contention. As dialogue proceeds, may we be spared unrestrained words and actions.

A major contribution to a calm relationship now is that abortion is substantially a non-issue in this election year. Roe v. Wade, as even this administration concedes, is here to stay for the foreseeable future. Nothing is going to happen to Roe v. Wade, no matter who gets elected. Politicians and judges are not going to overturn it until the majority of Americans want it overturned. In the meantime, of course, politicians may find it easy to garner votes by taking positions on abortion and making promises that cost nothing and deliver nothing. This practice has misled voters in the past and had them vote for an empty package, wasting votes needed by other urgent causes.

It now behooves us all to proclaim, to the utmost of our ability, the sacredness and beauty of life and to put our faith in instructing, in grace and good will rather than in politics.

(Rev.) Connell J. Maguire

Judging Miguel Estrada

The support expressed by John W. Donohue, S.J. , for Miguel Estrada’s nomination to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit is misguided, and his equation of the threatened filibuster to the actions of Bully Brooks is irresponsible rhetorical excess (Of Many Things, 1/5). Mr. Estrada holds pro-life views, and the Senate Democrats uniformly oppose such views, to their shame. But over 160 Bush nominees with similar views have been confirmed.

What sets Estrada apart is his history as an ideological operative, well known to people on Capitol Hill. Estrada has long cast common cause with Solicitor General Ted Olson, perhaps the most bellicose and divisive figure in today’s coarse political climate. Again and again he has proven himself to serve the cause by doing what is necessary, including being placed on Justice Kennedy’s staff to ensure ideological orthodoxy by all means necessary.

We can debate the morality of such political operatives; certainly they are not unknown in history, and they can be found on both sides of the aisle. But their place is in the political arena, not the judiciary. Estrada has too much political blood on his hands to merit the honor and responsibility of being a judge on the District of Columbia Circuit.

Moreover, this place on the court was preserved from being filled by Clinton appointees by underhanded tactics that have not been forgotten, nor should they be. Forgiveness is a Christian virtue, but it is rarely observed in politics; and the responsibility to practice it should not be placed upon only one of the combatants. Mr. Olson was confirmed as solicitor general despite his sordid past at the direction of Senator Tom Daschle, the Senate minority leader, as a show of good faith. That olive branch has been returned as a club, repeatedly. The confirmation of Mr. Estrada would be just another victory for such tactics, to the detriment of our republic.

Rick Fueyo

Opposing Estrada

It appears obvious that John W. Donohue, S.J., (Of Many Things, 1/5) missed the fundamental reason for the refusal of Senate Democrats to allow the confirmation of Miguel A. Estrada to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. The D.C. court is one of the most important courts in the country and is often a stepping stone for Supreme Court appointments. Estrada’s slim record shows him to be an extreme conservative, some say an ideologue. Yet the White House refused to release information on Estrada that would provide the Senate with adequate information necessary for its advice-and-consent responsibility.

His appointment was opposed by the Congressional Black Caucus, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, as well as the Puerto Rican Legal Defense Fund, and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund. President George W. Bush was catering to Hispanic voters in much the same way as his father, former President Bush, did when he sought to replace Justice Thurgood Marshall with Justice Clarence Thomas.

Leo J. Jordan, Esq.

Sustaining Life

The commentary by John F. Kavanaugh, S.J., Food for Terri Schiavo (11/24), was right on the mark. As a permanent deacon, a medical oncologist and a father of four, I applaud his clear and cogent discussion of the issues involved.

Why must our society confront this issue over and over and over? Despite previous debates about Karen Ann Quinlan, Nancy Crouzon, Hugh Finn and now Mrs. Schiavo, we continue to argue over the lengths to which medical and social science must go to maintain life. And it seems that each of these discussions becomes more fractious, difficult and painful for all parties involved. In the most recent debate, a grieving, suffering husband is even being accused of ulterior motives when he merely tries to honor his wife’s final wishes.

It seems to me there are two basic issues involved in these discussions.

First, with recent advances in medical care, miraculous things are possible and almost commonplace. Septuplets who could have never survived in an earlier age, now do. Heart and lung transplants are commonplace. We remove half the brain of children with uncontrollable seizures and they develop normally. Over half of all Americans with cancer are cured of their disease, and we even replace people’s livers destroyed by alcohol. So one could fairly ask, why can’t we cure Karen and Nancy and Terri?

Second, the Right to Life movement has had a tremendous impact on our society, and more and more Americans are rightfully asking if abortion for any reason, at any time is acceptable or justifiable. As Americans, we increasingly accept the need to protect the lives of the unborn, the retarded, the innocent and those incapable of speaking for themselves.

As a result of these advances, it has become more difficult to determine when any medical intervention is excessive or extraordinary. However, just as we are called to respect life; so too, are we called to respect death. The two are a continuum and cannot be separated.

(Deacon) P. Gregory Rausch, M.D.