Pope avoiding or not avoiding Iranian President Ahmadinejad?

So the Vatican claims:

Benedict XVI isn't hiding behind a full schedule to avoid meeting with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, reports the Vatican.

For several days media reports have speculated on whether the Pope would meet with Iran's president this week, who arrived in Rome today to attend the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) summit on food security.

An announcement by the Vatican that the Pontiff wouldn't meet privately with any of the world leaders attending the conference led some to suggest the Holy Father denied all requests in order to be able to also deny Ahmadinejad's.

The Vatican press office released a statement today clarifying that the Holy Father simply couldn't accept all the requests, and that this practice is one the Vatican has been following since 2006.Sources from the Vatican told ZENIT that the audience with Ahmadinejad was never considered due to the sheer number of requests made.

... In this context, the Cardinal Secretary of State has written personally to each of the leaders concerned, informing them of the Holy Father's disappointment at the impossibility, on this occasion, of meeting them personally, and reaffirming his willingness to receive them on a future occasion.

CNA I think is justified in saying it was avoiding:

Pope Benedict XVI has reportedly canceled meetings with seven world leaders to avoid encountering Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Forty heads of state, including Ahmadinejad, will arrive in Rome on Tuesday for a United Nations summit on the global food crisis. The meeting comes as soaring food prices have pushed at least 22 countries to the brink of catastrophe.

The Telegraph reports that Pope Benedict wished to avoid the publicity that would have accompanied a one-on-one meeting with the Iranian president.

Of course, the solution chosen by the Vatican is probably preferable to stating in public the reasons why such a meeting was undesirable.

Another annoying head of state in attendance? Mugabe:

Another controversy-causing person who will reportedly be in attendance is Robert Mugabe. The leader of Zimbabwe has presided over the devastation of the economy that was once known as the “bread basket of Africa.” The embattled president is able to attend the summit because it is being held under the auspices of the U.N., which makes his status as a persona non grata in the EU not applicable.

Now why is that name familiar? Oh that's right.

See also: Iran President Ahmadinejad demands meeting with pope (5/28).

Report: Iran President Ahmadinejad demands meeting with pope

To wit:

Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad hopes to meet Pope Benedict XVI during a visit to Rome next week, according to the Italian daily La Repubblica.
The Vatican has not disclosed any plan for a meeting between the Pontiff and the controversial Iranian leader.

Citing an unidentified diplomatic source, La Repubblica said that Ahmadinejad wanted to brief the Pope on his government's position in current international disputes. The Iranian regime has made several efforts to enlist the help of the Holy See in its conflicts with the US and other Western powers.

The Italian paper said that Iran's ambassador to the Holy See has put in a request "repeatedly" for a papal meeting with Ahmadinejad. The Iranian leader will be in Rome to attend a meeting of the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization.

Should the pope accept or reject such a request? It seems he is rejecting it thus far.

Time Mag. on "Iran's Secret Weapon: The Pope"

Published yesterday, posted online today:

The diplomatic chess game around Iran's nuclear program includes an unlikely bishop. According to several well-placed Rome sources, Iranian officials are quietly laying the groundwork necessary to turn to Pope Benedict XVI and top Vatican diplomats for mediation if the showdown with the United States should escalate toward a military intervention. The 80-year-old Pope has thus far steered clear of any strong public comments about either Iran's failure to fully comply with U.N. nuclear weapons inspectors or the drumbeat of war coming from some corners in Washington. But Iran, which has had diplomatic relations with the Holy See for 53 years, may be trying to line up Benedict as an ace in the hole for staving off a potential attack in the coming months. "The Vatican seems to be part of their strategy," a senior Western diplomat in Rome said of the Iranian leadership. "They'll have an idea of when the 11th hour is coming. And they know an intervention of the Vatican is the most open and amenable route to Western public opinion. It could buy them time." [Read the full article.]

I don't agree with the tone of the final sentence in this paragraph. It seems to imply that Iran is using the Vatican for its purposes in an attempt to "buy time." Neither should the Vatican be criticized for acting non-interestedly and for favoring peace. The Vatican has a unique capacity to act as a go-between in these sorts of high-level conflicts and is very careful not to risk its stated neutrality.

The unstated problem with this article involves the nature of the current Iran regime. If the current Iranian regime is in actuality committing grave crimes against its people (of which, I think, there is evidence), and if the Iranian regime is in fact building up his military infrastructure to further destabalize the region (of which, I also think, there is evidence), then casting the Vatican and Iran as "good buddies", so to speak, is highly problematic.

Frankly, I'd like to see more evidence of all this supposed "good will" between the two countries.
There's plenty more to take issue with in this article. If I had to mention one item, it would be this:

Religious experts say that Catholicism and Shi'a Islam have a surprisingly similar structure and approach to their different faiths. "What you have in Iran is a strong academic tradition, with both philosophical and mystical aspects — in many ways like Catholicism," says Father Daniel Madigan, a Jesuit scholar of islam, and a member of the Vatican's commission for religious relations with Islam who helped arrange for Khatami's visit. There is also a clerical hierarchy in Shi'ism that is absent in other forms of Islam.

Sure, and a British teacher who named a classroom teddy bear after a student named Muhammed is in a Sudanese Jail today on charges of blasphemy (the penalty for which, if she is found guilty, would be a public lashing or six months in jail) .... you know, because that sort of thing happens in the Vatican all the time.

[update: I agree with some commentators that my example of the jailed British teacher is somewhat "reckless", one might say. I would submit, however, that it is really no more reckless than the comparison made in the article between Islam in Iran and Catholicism. That was my point, however poorly it was made. The article consistently attempts to put the Vatican and Iran in the same boat in ways that I think are ultimately untenable.]

Update 2: Hot Air (a popular blog with huge comment threads) picked up on the story here. I have to say I'm surprised at the generally-favorable (albeit rather ignorant) treatment of this and related issues. Maybe there's hope?

But is a nuclear Iran really just a man with a knife?

Martino comments on the prospects of a nuclear Iran:

A leading Vatican official expressed support for the development of a nuclear energy program in Iran, as long as it serves peaceful purposes.

"Nuclear energy is something that can do good for humanity" -- a principle that "is certainly valid for Iran, too," said Cardinal Renato Martino, president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace.

Cardinal Martino spoke Oct. 23 at an interreligious gathering in Naples, Italy. His remarks, reported by the Italian news agency ANSA, came as Iranian and European officials met in Rome to try and resolve growing tensions over Iran's nuclear capability.

Cardinal Martino defended the right to develop a peaceful nuclear energy program, and said any risks of improper use of nuclear technology "depend on the intentions of those who manage the program."

"Anything is possible, in the sense that I can use a knife to cut bread but also to kill someone," he said. (underlining mine)

In dealing with such questions at a global level, the cardinal said, the international community must balance the need for peace and security with the necessary development of populations. (CNS)

I am in agreement with the Cardinal that nuclear energy can be a good for humanity. I further agree that it can be a good for the people of Iran, because they, too, are a part of humanity. Similarly, it is of course reasonable to note that the risks associated with nuclear energy depend on the intentions of those running the program.

No one is disputing any of these premises. The entire debate is actually focused on the prudential question as to whether or not the Iranian program is purely for peaceful purposes.

Martino's example of the man with a knife is useful for demonstrating that a neutral object can be used for good or evil purposes, even though I would argue that nuclear energy has a far greater moral weight about it than a knife. But every analogy limps.

More to the point in this debate is the character of the man holding the knife. And in this case, the man with the knife runs an organization that has been known to covertly kill people with knives in the past and despite all requests to the contrary, he insists on hiding his knives underneath his coat while simultaneously claiming that he needs those thousands of knives to ... cut bread.

It's not hard to see why I don't think this kind of man needs any more knives.

A little support for my opinion:

• The UN has offered a tremendous incentives package to Iran to suspend its nuclear enrichment program for considerations of transparency. These incentives would directly and immediately improve the quality of life for Iranians - and yet the President of Iran vehemently refuses. [AFP]
• Iran's new best friend is Russia, who is building a nuclear power plant for Iran. Putin met with Ahmadinejad recently and gave the impression that Iran had every right to go nuclear - without transparency to the international community. [CNN]
• Wikipedia has a great deal of information on the Iranian nuclear program.

Now, I'm not absolutely ruling out (yet) the possibility that the Iranian nuclear program could be peaceful. But I find that extremely unlikely based on everything I've or come across so far.

Further, even if their intentions were only peaceful, the fact remains that the inherent instability of the region and the Iranian government in particular would seem to make the case prudentially that there should not be any extra nuclear material lying around for the taking.

Finally, in what I find the most convincing argument I've come across, is the fact that Iran is obstinately trying to produce weapons-grade uranium (which requires a far greater percentage of refinement) as opposed to industrial-strength uranium. Alternately, over time a nuclear power plant produces Plutonium which is automatically suitable for weapons. In short, you can't have a peaceful nuclear power program without also having the ability to produce weapons, and at any rate, Iran seems to be taking the fast-route for immediate weapons-grade uranium production.

Add to all of these fears the fact that Iran appears less-than-ready to be reasonable, and I worry.

I think this is an important debate to have, especially with the real possibility of a U.S. strike on Iranian nuclear-production facilities in the future. If anyone has helpful links or good evidence one way or the other, please post it below. Thanks!

Video: Chris Matthews surprisingly fair to Ron Paul

Topics treated include Iran, fearmongering, and declaring war:

I was surprised to see CM so open to hear what RP had to say.

Oh, and Ron Paul has moved to 5th in the National Journal ranking.

CNS covers Aussie bishops' opposition to preemptive war

Catholic News Service:

The Australian Catholic Bishops' Conference said it did not believe the war in Iraq is justified and warned against participating in another pre-emptive strike with the United States.

While admitting that Australia's alliance with the U.S. is an "important element of Australia's international security arrangements," the bishops questioned whether the doctrine of pre-emption was consistent with Catholic teaching on just war.

The bishops stressed that war cannot be judged only by its consequences.They said Australians "would fail in our duty ... if we were again to take military action without our own thorough assessment of its morality and prospects, and without broad international approval."

"Obligations to an ally cannot include an obligation to engage in war that is not justified," the bishops said.

From what I've read, the possibility of a preemptive strike against Iran by the end of the current administration or during a Hillary Clinton administration is significant. I'm trying to keep track of what local bishop conferences are saying both about the legitimacy of the current war in Iraq and about the application of just war principles to the future of U.S. relations with Iran.

Related: Jeff Miller covers CNS's recent woeful coverage of Dutch dominican liturgical abuses.

Ahmadinejad and the limits of free speech in academe

The president of Columbia University Lee Bollinger has invited Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to speak today [AP report]. Ahmadinejad had also planned to visit Ground Zero during this trip until his request was denied using the excuse of security concerns [Reuters].

Surveying the situation, it's ironic how categorical the condemnation of this invitation has been, while the (I would argue, parallel) situation of inviting pro-choice politicians to speak at Catholic universities is considered legitimate.

Columbia President Bollinger didn't help matters any when he stated publically that he wouldn't have a problem inviting Adolf Hiltler to speak (video).

Of course, when secular society is faced with this kind of attitude, it's quick to threaten financial penalties: and sure enough, state and city lawmakers are contemplating witholding public funds in protest of Columbia's invitation.

I haven't had the chance yet to really think through this whole question, but in these events I'm trying to imagine, for a second, what the world would look like if it universally admitted that pro-choice politicians are proponents of infanticide and treated them as such when they were given pulpits by universities.

I think it would look much like the resistance we are seeing to Ahmadinejad's invitation at Columbia.

Update: Diogenes, with his characteristic brevity and wit, co-posts on this topic.

Update 2: To give credit where credit is due, President Bollinger evidently excoriated Ahmadinejad (and rightly so) on his human rights track record, as the AFP and Reuters reports. And 25,000 people protested Ahmadinejad's UN appearance. I'm happy to see that America still has enough moral integrity to call some forms of evil, well, evil.

Also, via commentor John V, via the Dawn Patrol, a clip from an upcoming documentary that looks at "tolerance, Columbia-style":