Obama wins nobel peace prize, Vatican PR predictably disappoints

I'm not sure which has me scratching my head more, the fact that the Nobel committee granted President Obama the Nobel Peace Prize, or that Vatican spokesman Fr. Federico Lombardi says the Vatican received the news with "appreciation":

"The awarding of the Nobel Prize for Peace to President Obama is greeted with appreciation in the Vatican, in light of the commitment demonstrated by the President for the promotion of peace in the international arena, and in particular also recently in favor of nuclear disarmament. It's hoped that this very important recognition will further encourage that commitment, which is difficult but fundamental for the future of humanity, so that the desired results will be obtained."

Whispers makes the right point here, by quoting from former Nobel Peace Prize winner Mother Teresa:

"The greatest destroyer of peace today is abortion, because it is a direct war, a direct killing -- direct murder by the mother herself."

So, in the Vatican's view (as Lombardi claims), someone who has only promised in words to establish peace, but has acted in deed to destroy the peace between mother and child (abortion, even late-term abortion), between scientists and new life (embryonic stem cell research), and between fruitful love and selfish sexual gratification (government-sponsorship of contraception, especially to school-age children) ... deserves this prize?

Here is the reaction I posted to Facebook:

"Well, it's official, the Nobel Peace Prize is MEANINGLESS."

PS - this photo from AmP reader Tomasino was too good to pass up:

Politics: On the new US ambassador to the Vatican

Four persepctives on the new US ambassador to the United States (I blogged on his appointment when it was first announced):

Pro-Life: "Pope Tells New Obama Vatican Ambassador to Uphold Pro-Life Position on Abortion"

Catholic News Service: "Pope welcomes new US ambassador, prods on right to life issues"

John Allen: "Pope pushes Obama envoy on abortion, conscience protections"

Mainstream: "Pope meets new US envoy, praises Obama"

Tells ... prods ... pushes ... meets.

Note the spectrum of perspectives.

On the Motu Proprio "Ecclesiae Unitatem"

I've been remiss in reporting the motu proprio which Pope Benedict released yesterday, frankly because I don't quite understand yet what it is designed to do or how it will accomplish its goals.

A good place to start, though, would be to poke through the comments at Rorate Caeli.

One meme that is being circulated in the mainstream media is that this is Pope Benedict's way of "disciplining" the figures behind the embarrassing holocaust controversy from a few months back (embarrassing only in that the Vatican was not informed and prepared for it).

I'm not sure if I quite buy that because Cardinal Hoyos was at the mandatory age of retirement anyway, and the organizational restructuring that the motu proprio calls for seems common sensical in its own right.

So please, chime in and help me get this right in my head.

Confirmed: Pope to meet Obama July 10 during evening audience

Mark your calendars:

Pope Benedict XVI will welcome U.S. President Barack Obama to the Vatican July 10 for an audience scheduled to begin at 4 p.m. Obama will visit Italy July 8-10 to participate in the Group of Eight summit, a meeting of leaders of the world's wealthiest nations. (CNS)

Since I'm a credit-where-credit-is-due sort of guy (or sure try to be), I agree with CNS' prediction:

Discussions between popes and U.S. presidents usually focus on common concerns regarding world events and the church's concerns over issues or policies with special moral relevance. So in addition to discussing ongoing tensions in the Middle East, especially the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the situation in Iraq, Pope Benedict likely will bring up his concerns regarding abortion policy in the United States and renewed government permission for embryonic stem-cell research.

Ya know, because there *are* concerns he can have about what Obama has been doing.

Obama names theologian Miguel Diaz as ambassador to Holy See

From the AP:

A Hispanic Roman Catholic theologian who was an adviser to Barack Obama's presidential campaign will be nominated to serve as the next U.S. ambassador to the Vatican, the White House announced Wednesday.

Miguel H. Diaz, 45, an associate professor of theology at St. John's University and the College of Saint Benedict in Minnesota, would be the first Hispanic to serve as ambassador to the Vatican since the United States and the Holy See established full diplomatic ties in 1984. Diaz was born in Havana.

The CNS Blog has the press release from Diaz's university. Articles of Faith has his White House bio. Apparently he consults for Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good. With this sort of association, it comes as no surprise to learn he is an Obama supporter ... and a supporter of Kathleen Sebellius.

I thought Patrick Archibold had a good line: "President Obama continues to build his Vichy Catholic government that pretends to be against abortion while supporting those who support it." (Vichy? Ouch.)

Michael Sean Winters jumps in with a typo: "The immediate takeaway is this. Diaz is a pro-life Democrat so his mere presence at the Vatican will disprove the contention of some conservatives that there is no such thing as a pro-life Catholic."

I presume Winters meant "pro-life Democrat." And instead of stereotyping what he claims "some conservatives" think (none that I've met, by the way), how about sticking with the case at hand. In other words, Diaz, who thinks Kathleen Sebellius (a woman who never met an abortion she wouldn't suppor) is "a woman of deep faith." Claiming such a person as Diaz is "pro-life", well, gets me scratching my head.

Whispers has good coverage of this nomination as well.

It will be interesting to see if Mary Ann Glendon, the former US Ambassador to the Holy See, will make any comment about Diaz's appointment tomorrow. If she does, I'll be there blogging and twittering it.

Report: Vatican has rejected 3 Obama picks for ambassador

The Washington Times reports on Italian newspaper rumors (underlining mine):

The Vatican has quietly rejected at least three of President Obama's candidates to serve as U.S. ambassador to the Holy See because they support abortion, and the White House might be running out of time to find an acceptable envoy before Mr. Obama travels to Rome in July, when he hopes to meet Pope Benedict XVI.

Italian journalist Massimo Franco, who broke the story about the White House attempts to find a suitable ambassador to the Vatican, said papal advisers told Mr. Obama's aides privately that the candidates failed to meet the Vatican's most basic qualification on the abortion issue.

... He said the Vatican recognized that a foreign nation is free to appoint the ambassador of its choice but that the pope is free to reject a proposed envoy if he believes the candidate would "fail to improve relations" with the Catholic city-state.

Mr. Franco, who has close connections at the Vatican, added that the rejection of the Obama candidates "would suggest that, at least so far, none of the potential Democratic diplomats were considered fit to 'improve relations' with the Holy See."

In tandem, Headline Bistro adds (underlining mine):

A longtime John Kerry supporter is about to land the prized position of U.S. ambassador to Italy, and Caroline Kennedy may join him nearby as ambassador to the Vatican, an Italian news magazine has claimed.

In an April 2 article in Panorama, journalist Carlo Rossella predicted that 60-year-old David Thorne, a donor to the Obama campaign and brother-in-law of former presidential candidate John Kerry, will be given the post, per the request of Kerry himself.

And in a report that will drop like a bombshell among Vatican watchers, Rosella also asserted that Caroline Kennedy – her own hopes to rise to the U.S. Senate dashed for now – has been suggested as the Obama administration’s ambassador to the Holy See.

It’s an ironic tangle of State Department, campaign and even marriage connections that only adds fuel to speculation over who will represent the United States in two of the State Department’s most high-profile posts.

Photos: this is *not* how a Vatican spokesman should look!

Someone needs to get the message to Vatican spokesman Fr. Federico Lombardi that when you're in front of the cameras you don't touch your face this much! The Reuters photo journalist had a field day:

These still images make it appear that Fr. Lombardi is extremely uncomfortable with what he has to say, or the position he is in. I doubt this is the case - but he appears that way from these photos. And he could completely avoid this false appearance by simply folding his hands and staring into the cameras - like a spokesman.

[Photo credit: REUTERS/Alessia Pierdomenico]

Update: Holocaust-denier Bp. Williams apologizes for comments

Zenit:

Bishop Richard Williamson, formerly excommunicated member of the Society of St. Pius X, apologized today for statements in which he denied the extent of the Holocaust.

In a statement published on his return to London on Wednesday after being expelled by the government of Argentina, the prelate explained that "the Holy Father and my superior, Bishop Bernard Fellay, have requested that I reconsider the remarks I made on Swedish television four months ago, because their consequences have been so heavy."

... Bishop Williamson continued, "Observing these consequences I can truthfully say that I regret having made such remarks, and that if I had known beforehand the full harm and hurt to which they would give rise, especially to the Church, but also to survivors and relatives of victims of injustice under the Third Reich, I would not have made them."

The prelate said that on Swedish television he only gave the "opinion [...] of a non-historian," a perspective "formed 20 years ago on the basis of evidence then available, and rarely expressed in public since."

However, he recognized, "the events of recent weeks and the advice of senior members of the Society of St. Pius X have persuaded me of my responsibility for much distress caused."

He added, "To all souls that took honest scandal from what I said, before God I apologize."

AP video of a reporter trying to confront Bp. Williams as he left Buenos Aires:

Related links:

• Reuters: Holocaust-denying bishop makes apology
• CNS: Bishop Williamson says he regrets remarks denying Holocaust
• CNA: Bishop Williamson expresses ‘regret’ for Holocaust comments’ effects
• NYT: Bishop Apologizes for Statements on the Holocaust

Pope Benedict & the SSPX - a substantive contribution

Finally something more than the holocaust angle, discussed at the Ratzinger Fan Club blog.

Weighty reading.

Today: Pelosi meets the Pope

Associated Press photo, taken during Pope Benedict's visit to Washington DC last year:

I'm not prone to hyperbole, but when I see this photo, the first thing I think of is "Kiss of Judas."
Nancy Pelosi, in her record of public service, has continually worked against the common good of humanity as proclaimed and defended by the Catholic Church. She is a vigorous supporter of abortion on demand, and has even claimed that her activity in this regard is a defensible action in light of Church teaching. She touts her Catholic credentials (especially around election time), yet shows no desire to ever act on her Catholic convictions (presuming she has a clue what those are). If you need to read more, I've written scores of posts about her.

What does she want out of her meeting with Pope Benedict? Street credit. She wants the photo-op to wave in front of her conscientious Catholic questioners, to say "see, the pope doesn't have a problem with me - why do you?"And you know what? She'll probably get what she wants. Evil often does.

Deal Hudson makes two suggestions to salvage this:

• Benedict XVI should use the opportunity of the visit to make a strong public statement about the attack on unborn life being waged by the new Congress and the new administration.
• Pelosi's ordinary, Archbishop Niederhauer of San Francisco, should issue a public statement strongly critical of Pelosi as a Catholic politician. He should include a statement that if she presents herself for communion he will deny it to her.

The Anchoress says: "Truthfully, there is no down side to this meeting." But I have to disagree: clearly, while grace can make good things come of it, you can't get around the reality that for many Catholics who are unsure about these issues, they will take Pope Benedict's obligation to meet with a U.S. representative as a tacit support for her radical dissenting views on the protection due human life, etc. Again, if the pope doesn't think it's important (so they will falsely conclude), why should I? Even political writers are aware of what is at stake with this meeting.

Pewsitter.com has an online petition (~2,000 signatures, currently) asking for communion to be withheld from Pelosi which they explain here. Their goal is 1 million signatures. It's a bit of an 11th hour solution.

Let's pray for Pope Benedict today, and for Nancy Pelosi, and for the children in the balance.

update: full update on what happened today ... here.

Vatican to receive briefing on Pelosi record prior to papal meeting

Pelosi is not denying that she rushed to pass this massive stimulus bill because she had to catch a plane for her europian tour - a tour that includes a meeting with Pope Benedict XVI.

No doubt she's looking for a quick photo-op with her Pontiff to convince her voters back home that everything is "okay" with her "identity Catholicism".

Some people, however, have a different plan in mind (underlining mine):

Fr. Tom Euteneuer, president of Human Life International (HLI), told LifeSiteNews.com that HLI will be briefing the Vatican "so they are aware of her dismal record on life issues.

"It is our hope that the Holy Father will not grant the floundering Speaker of the House what she surely wants and expects, a quick and valuable photo-op, but will rather give her a stern lecture on contraception and abortion and let her know that her eternal salvation is in danger," said Fr. Euteneuer.

"Further, this would be the perfect opportunity to formally excommunicate the Speaker, as she has done everything a public official possibly can to declare her lack of communion with the Holy Father and the Roman Catholic Church on every conceivable issue." (Kathleen Gilbert of LifeSiteNews)

To be clear, I don't think Pelosi is going to get excommunicated. It is, however, the perfect time for the pope to sit down with her and have that chat she so obviously needs to have about the teachings of the Church. You know, that chat she promised her Archbishop she would have him with him 162 days ago. So, no time for her Archbishop, but plenty of time to tour Europe?

Talk about a woman with dysfunctional priorities.

Magister: "Bad News from China. A Rift Has Opened in Beijing"

Bad news abroad:

"Between obedience to the pope and to the communist party, some bishops are choosing the latter. The most stunning about-face has taken place in the capital. A secret letter from Cardinal Bertone. The alarm of Cardinal Zen." (Sandro Magister)

Disappointment at the Vatican press office

Today, in the first bulletin from the Vatican press office after the weekend (summarizing February 7-9th), the following news items were considered important enough to publish:

• the Pope made public his message for the seventeenth World Day of the Sick
• the Pope appeared at the window to pray the Angelus (as he does every week)
• the Pope launched an appeal for peace [in Madagascar]
• the Pope and German Chancellor Angela Merkel had a phone conversation
• Cardinal Bertone expressed appreciation of the attempts to save the life of Eluana (We are all presumed to know about this case since it is in Italian news. And this is an international news service?)
• the Pope received the Letters of the new ambassador of Brazil (a photo op, in other words)
• the usual announcement of recent papal audiences (this week it has been Nigerian bishops)
• the usual noting of recent papal acts (an interesting appointment to "director for telecommunications" - maybe someone got fired? I'll have to track that question down some other time.)

... anyway, my simple point is: no mention of the Legionary crisis. Not even a note of condolence from the Holy Father over the public admission of the scandalous life of Maciel, a revelation which is clearly shaking thousands of LC and RC members worldwide. And this situation does not merit a mention?

update: I should make myself clear, especially since I have many new readers who don't know where I am coming from: I'm not impugning the pope in this post, I'm simply saying that it strikes me, an independent observer, as odd that so many things are done by the pope and in the pope's name every day - so why a selective silence when it comes to an objectively grave situation like the one facing the Legionaries? I don't apprehend, immediately, the prudence of not even expressing sympathy for the victims and members of the movement.

You will recall that it was an "information vacuum" that exacerbated the SSPX-Holocaust situation. I would hate to see the Maciel meltdown follow the same general trajectory - because that can still be avoided.

The other story: Pope Benedict and the SSPX

My intensive coverage of the Maciel situation put all other stories on the back burner in the past 48 hours.

But there is something else important happening: the ongoing controversy surrounding Pope Benedict, the SSPX, and Bishop Richard Williamson.

It's another complicated situation, so I'll try to summarize and shed some lights on where things stand now:

Liberal Catholic theologian Hermann Haering's call for the pope to step down, I think, is preposterous.

Things got more serious when German Chancellor Angela Merkel rebuked Pope Benedict and asked him to "clarify unambiguously that there can be no denial and that there must be positive relations with the Jewish community overall."

The pope's brother, Fr. Georg Ratzinger, shot back: "[the pope] doesn’t need me to defend him. But it angers me how unjust and badly informed the people who are attacking him are."

I'd of course, agree with Fr. Ratzinger. Of course Pope Benedict supports positive relations with the Jews. He's been working for that his entire ecclesiastical and papal career!

So how did we get here? Two things: a) bias against the Church and b) admittedly poor handling by the Vatican. This is not the first time the Vatican has badly bungled the handling of a delicate situation, and it is frustrating - to say the least - that this still regularly happens.

Vatican expert Sandro Magister explains:

A few days after the events, the lifting of excommunication from the four Lefebvrist bishops is increasingly manifesting itself at the Vatican as a double disaster, of governance and of communication. In the disaster, Pope Benedict XVI found himself to be the one most exposed, and practically alone.

{Magister reviews Pope Benedict's deep theological understanding and teaching about the issue of SSPX reconciliation, etc.} But little or nothing of this {papal explanation} was stated in the decree issued on January 24 by the Holy See. In the "vulgata" diffused by the media, with this decree the Church of Rome was simply clasping the Lefebvrists to its bosom.

{Now the twist:} Then, to make the misunderstanding worse, there came the uproar over an interview with one of the four bishops granted clemency, Richard Williamson of England, in which he supported ideas denying the Holocaust.

In the media all over the world, the news read as follows: the pope clears a Holocaust denier bishop from excommunication, and welcomes him into the Church.

Magister's hypothesis (underlining mine):

The question comes naturally: was all of this really inevitable, once the pope had decided to lift the excommunication of the Lefebvrist bishops? Or was the disaster produced by the errors and omissions of the men who are supposed to implement the pope's decisions? The facts point to the second hypothesis.

The decree revoking the excommunication bears the signature of Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, prefect of the congregation for bishops. Another cardinal, Darío Castrillón Hoyos, is the president of the pontifical commission "Ecclesia Dei," which, ever since its creation in 1988, has dealt with the followers of Lefebvre. Both of these cardinals have said that they were taken by surprise, after the fact, by the interview with Bishop Williamson, and that they were never aware that he was a Holocaust denier.

At this point Magister goes on to describe one failing after another. Two main points:

• "The media release of the decision also seems to have been entirely negligent. The Vatican press office limited itself, on Saturday, January 24, to distributing the text of the decree, in spite of the fact that the news had already leaked out a few days earlier, and a fiery controversy was already growing around the statements denying the Holocaust made by Williamson.... And yet, if nothing of this was done, it was not the fault of the Vatican press office and its director, Jesuit Fr. Federico Lombardi, but of the offices of the curia from which they receive their orders. These offices of the curia converge in the secretariat of state."
• "So then, throughout the entire affair of the lifting of the excommunications for the Lefebvrist bishops, the secretary of state, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, despite his highly active and outspoken nature, distinguished himself by his absence. His first public comment on the question came on January 28, during a conference in Rome at which he was speaking. But more than words, what were lacking from him were actions equal to the gravity of the situation. Before, during, and after the issuing of the decree. Benedict XVI was left practically alone, and the curia was abandoned to disorder. The fact that Benedict XVI has given up on reforming the curia is now before the eyes of all. But it is conjectured that he compensated for this non-decision by entrusting the leadership of the offices to a tough, dynamic secretary of state, Bertone. Now this conjecture has also been shown to be lacking. "

Magister's final point:

"Bertone's personal devotion to Benedict XVI is beyond all doubt. Not so that of the other curia officials, who continue to have free rein. It is possible that some of them deliberately oppose this pontificate. It is certain that most of them simply do not understand it, do not measure up to it."

Wow, that's alot to take in. Given this state of affairs, it should not surprise us that there has been no official Vatican reaction to other current controversies - notably the Maciel meltdown. Quite simply: they have their hands more than full.

Magister's analysis jives with John Allen's Jan. 30th column: "The Lefebvrite case: What was the Vatican thinking?":

On the lecture circuit, I'm sometimes asked for my opinion about the Vatican's communications strategy. My glib answer generally is, "As soon as they have one, I'll be glad to tell you what I think of it."

The line usually draws a few chuckles. However, this week's furor over the lifting of the excommunication of four traditionalist bishops, including one who's a Holocaust denier, offers a reminder that the lack of PR savvy in Rome is actually no laughing matter. {Read his entire column.}

While the Vatican Information Service released a brief communique on the subject today, they are also taking more drastic measures, including, apparently, demanding that Bishop Williams recant.

It's pretty evident that Vatican officials from top to bottom really dropped the ball on this one, and gave the detractors of the Church a clear opportunity of working against her in the court of common opinion. I say this because it's nothing new for people to attack the Church in public, it is something out of the ordinary for Vatican officials to be so pell-mell in their response, up to and including pointing the figure at one another.

(I think it's worth noting, as Whispers does here, that the release of Bp. Williamson's Swedish TV interview might have been timed to embarrass the pope. Nonetheless, Williamson's record is far older than this interview and the situation could have been avoided altogether.)

I hope this is a serious reality check. And maybe it's time to hire a couple research assistants. I know how to use Google pretty well.

And because Pope Benedict is so very alone on this - and unjustly being attacked - I would ask readers to sign this petition to publicly support him.

Rumor: 400k Anglicans to be received back into the Church?

This is technically "blog fodder", but believable hear-say, and if true, incredibly significant:

The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith is reportedly recommending that the Traditional Anglican Communion (TAC) be offered the status of personal prelature. The Traditional Anglican Communion is a group of approximately 400,000 Anglican’s that have broken away from the Anglican Communion seeking to preserve their Anglo-Catholic traditions. They formerly requested entry into the Catholic Church in 2007. These reports are emanating from an Australian Catholic weekly called The Record. {American Catholic}

Catholic Online posts a qualification to its initial report:

Catholic Online promised to up date our readers on this extraordinary story. So, we now pass this on: The National Catholic Register cites a "Vatican Source" as saying that "nothing's been decided" by the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Reports abound that the Congregation has recommended the creation of a personal prelature as the vehicle through which to receive the members of the Traditional Anglican Communion into full communion with the Roman Catholic Church. The Register contends that an official at the Congregation spoke with their correspondent Edward Pentin today saying,“It’s something that has appeared on the blogosphere and then been reiterated, but the truth is nothing’s been decided.” We set forth our original story below believing that the sources reporting this exciting news and the history of the dialogue support its accuracy.

This move strikes me as entirely likely, and seems to fit within the general framework of what Pope Benedict has been doing to reach out to other communities who are "all-but-Catholic" (that "all-but" remaining an important destinction, of course). A revealing paragraph from the Register piece:

An announcement could be made soon after Easter this year. It is understood that Pope Benedict XVI, who has taken a personal interest in the matter, has linked the issue to the year of St Paul, the greatest missionary in the history of the Church. The Basilica of St Paul outside the Walls could feature prominently in such an announcement for its traditional and historical links to Anglicanism.

Excellent observations from American Catholic contributor Tito Edwards:

If this information is accurate, this is an incredible turn of events coming from the Vatican. First the motu proprio freeing the Tridentine Mass, the overtures to S.S.P.X., and now granting the Traditional Anglican Communion the status of a personal prelature, which only Opus Dei occupies thus far. With the Catholic Church change occurs over centuries, but with the Venerable Pope Benedict XVI he has dramatically altered the landscape of the Catholic Church within three short years.

What does this mean for traditionalists (High Anglicans) in the Canterbury based Anglican Communion? Possibly protection from heterodoxical bishops by entering the Catholic Church as a personal prelature or simply entering the Traditional Anglican Communion. This is going to create shockwaves all the way to Canterbury and the rest of the Anglican Communion throughout the world. It will definitely make the prelates of England and Wales cringe in fear to the thought of hundred’s of thousands of Anglicans entering their realm and bolstering the numbers of faithful and dedicated Catholics. It will also certainly create havoc for Katherine Jefferts Schori and her bishops in keeping The Episcopal Communion together here in the United States.

Regular AmP readers know that I tend to not quote at length unless I find everything being said valuable.

Breaking: Israel's chief rabbinate severs Vatican ties

This is a complicated story, but the latest development has become especially noteworthy:

Israel's chief rabbinate severed ties with the Vatican on Wednesday to protest a papal decision to reinstate a bishop who publicly denied 6 million Jews were killed during the Holocaust.

The Jewish state's highest religious authority sent a letter to the Holy See expressing "sorrow and pain" at the papal decision. "It will be very difficult for the chief rabbinate of Israel to continue its dialogue with the Vatican as before," the letter said. Chief rabbis of both the Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews were parties to the letter.

The rabbinate, which faxed a copy of the letter to The Associated Press, also canceled a meeting with the Vatican set for March. The rabbinate and the state of Israel have separate ties with the Vatican, and Wednesday's move does not affect state relations.
Pope Benedict XVI, faced with an uproar over the bishop, said Wednesday he feels "full and indisputable solidarity" with Jews and warned against any denial of the full horror of the Nazi genocide.

The remarks were his first public comments on the issue since the controversy erupted Saturday. (AP)

Obviously there are many layers here, many different things going on at once.

I tend to dislike jumping into stories in "real-time" when there is a significant chance that a little more time will clarify the situation. In the meantime, I've been reading a lot of coverage which I'll quickly summarize from memory:

• the disputed Swedish TV interview, it appears, was conducted without the knowledge of the Holy See, so there's very little chance the excommunication-lifting announcement went forward with a knowledge that such an incendiary episode had recently taken place
• the relationship between the Holy See and the four bishops in question is not directly a Jewish-Christian dispute, but the comments in question have overflowed into it
• Bp. Bernard Fellay, the Superior General of the SSPX, has attempted to gag the offending Bp. Richard Williamson after his anti-semitic comments were made public. The SSPX is now faced internally with a very important decision as to which side they take in the debate
• My gut reaction is to say that Israel's Rabbis are not handling this affair well, and that Pope Benedict is doing his very best to save a situation complicated by disadvantaged intel

Hopefully that sheds some light on the situation.

(oh, and for those who are interested in the original question regarding the ins-and-outs of the original lifting of the excommunications, see Ed Peters' comprehensive treatment of the variables.)

Papists - please populate the comment box with thoughtful comments and links to informed opinion.

I'll be watching this story as it develops.

{Full Text} Pope congratulates Obama on Inauguration Day

update ... the full text:

"On the occasion of your inauguration as the 44th President of the United States of America I offer cordial good wishes, together with the assurance of my prayers that almighty God will grant you unfailing wisdom and strength in the exercise of your high responsibilities.

Under your leadership may the American people continue to find in their religious and political heritage the spiritual values and ethical principles needed to cooperate in the building of a truly just and free society, marked by respect for the dignity, equality and rights of each of its members, especially the poor, the outcast, and those who have no voice.

At a time when so many of our brothers and sisters throughout the world yearn for liberation from the scourge of poverty, hunger, and violence I pray that you will be confirmed in your resolve to promote understanding, cooperation, and peace among the nations, so that all may share in the banquet of life which God wills to set for the whole human family (cf. Isaiah 25:6-7).

Upon you and your family, and upon all the American people, I willingly invoke the Lord’s blessings of joy and peace."

Pio Cardinal Laghi, US-Vatican diplomat, dies

The news:

In this March 5, 2003 file photo President Bush welcomes Cardinal Pio Laghi, Pope John Paul II's envoy, left, during a meeting on the looming war with Iraq, in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington. Cardinal Pio Laghi, a longtime Vatican diplomat who went to Washington in 2003 to personally try to dissuade President George Bush from launching the Iraq war, died in the evening of Saturday Jan. 10, 2009 in Rome, the Vatican said Sunday, Jan 11, 2009. He was 86. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

President Bush has released a statement of condolance. More from the AP:

The Italian-born Laghi had a long career in the Vatican diplomatic corps, serving first in Nicaragua in 1952. He was dispatched to India, Jerusalem and the Palestinian territories, Cyprus, Greece and Argentina before being named envoy to Washington in 1980.

At the time, there were no formal diplomatic relations between the United States and the Holy See; Laghi oversaw the establishment of ties in 1984 and remained as the Vatican's permanent diplomatic representative there until he was recalled to Rome to serve as prefect of the Vatican's Congregation for Catholic Education.

Prayers for the repose of his soul.

Kmiec for Vatican Ambassador?

A double dose of stupid this week from Michael Sean Winters.

Last Friday I took apart Winters' attempt to claim that Tom Daschle's appointment as Secretary of HHS was a "step in the right direction."

Now I find that Winters is arguing that Doug Kmiec would be a good choice (indeed, the "perfect candidate") for US ambassador to the Vatican.

Oh boy, here we go again. Luckily, we don't have to go far....

Longtime associates of Professor Kmiec denounced him, often in ways that lacked all charity, suggesting bad logic or bad motives or both. There is no better way to answer those who argued that no Catholic could vote for Obama in good conscience than to see the man who wrote the book (literally!) defending the proposition that Catholics can and should vote for Obama being received in the Sala Clementina by Pope Benedict XVI!

Winters implies that "longtime associates" turned on Kmiec. In fact, Kmiec turned on them. Kmiec turned himself around several times. For instance, after originally supporting the Republican Mitt Romney, Kmiec then supported Obama. After originally claiming "beyond life issues", Obama was a good choice for Catholics, Kmiec went on to claim the Obama was the natural choice, "upon even a moment's reflection." In other words, which side in this debate has been "longtime" in their position? That's right - not Kmiec.

As for the "lacking all charity" jab, Kmiec continually hides behind a smokescreen of holier-than-thouness, without ever engaging his opponents in substance. In fact, Kmiec's normal tactic is to claim that anyone criticizing him, de facto, must be speaking uncharitably. The reality that the criticism might be founded in reason and fact, seems to conveniently escape him. Having watched this debate closely, most interlocutors seemed to be trying their best to reach Kmiec, scratching their heads all the while. They've demonstrated an over-abundance of charity, considering they are dealing with someone who they genuinely believe is undermining the cause of defending unborn life in our country.

And it is so untrue for Winters to claim that the Kmiec-critique contained "bad logic, bad motives or both." In fact, Kmiec seemed to run from a debate with intellectual Catholics whenever he could. He refused to publicly dialogue with bishops, he continually turned down opportunities to debate his position with prominent pro-life Catholics, opting instead for a well-funded, whirlwind tour of Catholic campuses where he rallied for Obama. Controlled Q&A sessions with liberal undergraduates is not where you test the mettle of your position. And shilling for a candidate who raised the ire of an unprecedented number of American bishops is not good credentials for a diplomatic appointment to the Holy See.

Oh, and Winters last claim that Pope Benedict's meeting with Kmiec would somehow be an endorsement of Kmiec's position is simply ludicrous. The Pope takes what he gets, and I'd love to see Winters come out and say that the Pope's meeting with Mary Ann Glendon (the current Republican ambassador) is somehow an endorsement of her entire public career. For someone who claims so much knowledge of what the position of ambassador entails, it's amazing that he would have these sort of blindspots still.

... okay, that's just one short paragraph of Winter's post that I've decided to answer.

Winters similarly displays a certain unexplainable myopia in his presentation of the situation. Again:

Notwithstanding the sparring over abortion, Kmiec’s influence in the campaign grew from there – helping the campaign draft platform language supporting economic assistance that would encourage the decision of a pregnant woman to choose life, writing his book explaining why Obama might be voted for in good conscience (the book ranked #1 for a number of weeks in its category on Amazon), and then personally carrying the message to the battleground states of Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Michigan.

I have to wonder where Winters is getting his statistics. Currently Kmiec is ranked #31 in Political Reference and #59 in Government Elections. By contrast, Archbishop Charles Chaput's book, Render Unto Caesar, which I have talked about often and represents the most comprehensive, authoritative refutation of Kmiec's argument, is currently (still!) #1 in Catholic Inspirational, #1 in Roman Catholicism, and #1 in Church & State.

If Winters is really serious in claiming that Amazon rankings are a measure of the influence and level of acceptance an individual's arguments merit ... well, Catholics who are reading, read Chaput, not Kmiec.

A final observation:

Kmiec has shown no interest in an administration appointment.

What sort of interest should Kmiec show? When was the last time, when asked, anyone being considered for a post said "yes, I'd be thrilled to accept it, and eager"? Again, Winters says things he presumes are arguments, but upon reflection, turn out to actually be counter-arguments.

In other words, if Kmiec is uninterested in an appointment, he has a very funny way of showing it - because throwing oneself into the pro-Obama movement is an unlikely way to remain hidden from view in an Obama administration (which would make Winters wrong). And if Kmiec is interested in an appointment ... well, everything he has done makes sense, and, again, Winters is wrong.

Regardless of what happens to Kmiec, it's encouraging to see that Winters is already laying the groundwork for his canonization cause. In the meantime, Kmiec should focus on fixing his credentials.

update: I'm not surprised and pleased to see that a certain official of the Vatican's Secretary of State agrees with me.

[photo credit: ProLifeProObama]

Breaking: President-elect Obama phoned pope yesterday

CNS:

"U.S. President-elect Barack Obama telephoned Pope Benedict XVI to thank the pope for his message of congratulations on his election victory.

The Vatican spokesman, Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, confirmed to Catholic News Service Nov. 12 that the president-elect telephoned the pope Nov. 11 "to thank the pope for his telegram, his congratulations" on winning the U.S. presidential election.

Further details about the call were not known, Father Lombardi said."

[photo credit: U.S. President-elect Barack Obama on the phone Nov. 6, returning calls to world leaders. (CNS photo/Obama Campaign/handout via Reuters)]

John Allen on the future of U.S-Vatican relations

On the whole, I support John Allen's contribution:

"For the record, nobody from the Obama transition team has solicited my advice about relations with the Vatican, and I would frankly be surprised if the question were yet on their radar screen. Others, however, are already speculating about how things might shake out; on Wednesday, for example, Reuters moved a story predicting a “tricky” relationship between Rome and the Obama White House because of the abortion issue. As a thought exercise, I decided to pen an open letter to the president-elect about U.S.-Vatican ties over the next four years."

Allen also tells a story from the Clinton years I found worth repeating:

Finally, one last piece of unsolicited advice: Mr. President-Elect, whatever else you do, please try to avoid repeating the mistakes of the last Democratic administration with regard to the Vatican.

In his memoirs, former Vatican Ambassador Raymond Flynn tells a depressing story from 1994 illustrating what I mean. During the lead-up to the U.N. conference on population in Cairo in 1994, Pope John Paul II called Flynn to the Vatican on a Saturday morning to personally request a telephone conversation with President Clinton. Flynn relayed the request urgently to the White House that afternoon, and got no response. He called again on Sunday and on Monday, both times with no results. Frustrated, Flynn then got on a plane to Washington on Tuesday. He cooled his heels outside the president’s office that night and most of Wednesday. Finally, he was admitted to the White House’s pre-Cairo war room, where he was told by Assistant Secretary of State Timothy Wirth that “nobody is getting a chance to lobby the president on this one.” Dumbfounded, Flynn explained that the Bishop of Rome is not a lobbyist, and that it would be seen as a profound act of disrespect if the president wouldn’t even get on the phone. After almost a week, Clinton finally agreed to take the pope’s call.

The episode was symptomatic of a basic disinterest within the Clinton team about the Vatican, which at times shaded off into hostility. The result was that the U.S.-Vatican relationship during the Clinton years was more often defined by predictable differences than by imaginative areas of common purpose.

For what it’s worth, Mr. President-Elect, my advice is to get on the phone if the pope calls. Better yet, initiate the conversation yourself. You might be surprised about where it goes.

It's no secret that the Clintons were basically jerks to Pope John Paul II when they could get away with it.

Text: Excerpt of Vatican's communique to ex-bishop Lugo

Translated exclusviely for AmP by a Spanish-speaking friend:

The recent situation which has been created with the election of Mons. Fernando Lugo President of the Republic of Paraguay demands another consideration of, for the good of the country and so that the charge of President of the Republic and the Episcopal ministry can be clearly and definitively distinguished, the petition that he presented in his day that the loss of his clerical state be conceded. In effect, his acceptance of the charge of President of the Republic of Paraguay is not compatible with the obligations of Episcopal ministry and clerical state.

In this way, having carefully examined all the circumstances, His Holiness Benedict XVI has conceded for him the loss of clerical state, with the corresponding loss of those rights inherent to that state, dispensing him at the same time of his religious vows made in the Society of the Divine Word, of the obligation to celibacy (cf. CIC can. 291), and of the other obligations which make up the clerical state (cf. CIC can. 292).

The Pontiff exhorts to Mr. Fernando Armindo Lugo Mendez to be faithful to the Catholic faith in which he was baptized and to live a life coherent with the Gospel.

Note the use of "Mr." (as opposed to "Rev.") in the final address.

The original, full Spanish text is available here.

Confirmed: Vatican laicizes former bishop to become president of Paraguay

If it's true [update: it is true], this is the first time it's happened, and Cardinal Re was mistake in his prognosis (see below):

Pope Benedict granted Paraguay's president-elect a historic waiver to allow the former bishop to take office next month without violating church rules, a Vatican representative said on Wednesday.

The Pope gave Fernando Lugo a special dispensation, downgrading him to layman's status, said Orlando Antonini, the Vatican's ambassador to Asuncion.

Lugo was elected president in April, ending more than 60 years of one-party rule in the poor South American country notorious for corruption and contraband.

"It's the first time this is granted. It was accepted because the people have chosen him and ... because his clerical status is incompatible with serving as president," Antonini told a news conference.

"The Pope has granted him the loss of his clerical status ... he's a layman now," Antonini said after meeting with Lugo. (Reuters)

I'm surprised that this story is not being reported more widely. Reuters, however, can normally be trusted to get this sort of thing basically right [update: it did this time.]

Prensa Latina adds more details:

Papal Nuncio to Paraguay Orlando Antonini delivered Lugo the resolution in which the former San Pedro bishop requested on December 28, 2007 the loss of his clerical state to aspire to the presidency in the April 20 general elections.

"The Holy See after trying to dissuade Lugo not to present himself to the Republic's presidency has suspended him in the priestly exercise," said Antonini, who noted that the Pope granted him a definitive and perpetual dispensation.

This really is the final resolution, arriving earlier than expected.

Back in May, when I last covered this story, Cardinal Re said this solution was impossible:

Lugo was named a bishop in 1994. He had since asked Benedict XVI to be able to "renounce his ecclesial ministry […] to take up again the condition of a layperson in the Church."

The petition was not accepted because, as Cardinal Re noted, "the episcopacy is a service accepted freely forever."

Curious and Curiouser.

update: considering they held a press conference, I'd say it's official:



Orlando Antonini, Vatican's ambassador to Asuncion, speaks during a news conference, in Asuncion July 30, 2008, after a meeting with Paraguay's President-elect Fernando Lugo. Pope Benedict granted Paraguay's president-elect a historic waiver to allow the former bishop to take office next month without violating church rules, Antonini said on Wednesday. REUTERS/Jorge Adorno (PARAGUAY)



Paraguay's President-elect Fernando Lugo (L) meets with Orlando Antonini, Vatican's ambassador to Asuncion, in Asuncion July 30, 2008. REUTERS/Jorge Adorno (PARAGUAY)

update 2: The Associated Press reports.

update 3: Here is the text of the Vatican communique from Cardinal Re in Spanish, with excerpts of it here in English. update 4: Here is an English translation of the most important part of the communique.

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.

New U.S. Ambassador to Vatican has first day on the job

More than mere pleasantries:

• Address: U.S. Ambassador Glendon to Benedict XVI
• Response: Pope Benedict XVI to Ambassador Glendon

A little light on the Israel-Vatican diplomatic horizon

CWNews:

Israel has set a new policy expediting the process of granting visas to Catholic priests and religious, the country's embassy to the Holy See has announced.

The Israeli government has agreed to give high priority to visa requests from Catholic Church workers from Arabic countries. The new policy is intended to address the problems of priests and religious who travel frequently between Israel and Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and the Palestinian territories. Many of these clerics have been forced to apply for an entry visa to return after each trip outside Israel.

The visa restrictions were a major problem for the Latin-rite Catholic patriarchate of Jerusalem, which covers territory in Jordan and Cyprus. Many of the priests and seminarians of the patriarchate are natives of Arab countries, who have been subject to the strict visa requirements. A similar situation has handicapped the activities of Eastern Catholic churches in the Holy Land.

This has been causing Vatican/Israel friction for some time, so it's good to see progress being made.

There's still plenty to do.

"Outgoing U.S. ambassador to Vatican meets with pope"

From today's Vatican bulletino:

The Holy Father today received in [a] separate audience ... Francis Rooney, ambassador of the United States of America, accompanied by his wife, on his farewell visit.

CNS covered the meeting here. Learn more about the U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See here on Wikipedia, as well as at the official U.S. Government page.

The new ambassador to the Holy See is Mary Ann Glendon [wiki page] [in the news].

Sarkozy meets with Pope Benedict

From the Vatican bulletino:

The Holy See Press Office released the following communique at midday today:

"This morning the Holy Father Benedict XVI received in audience Nicolas Sarkozy, president of the French Republic.

"The president subsequently went on to meet Cardinal Secretary of State Tarcisio Bertone S.D.B., and Archbishop Dominique Mamberti, secretary for Relations with States.

"The cordial discussions provided an opportunity to examine a number of questions of mutual interest concerning the current situation of France. Mention was made of the good relations that exist between the Catholic Church and the French Republic, and of the role of religions, especially the Catholic Church, in the world.

"Particular attention was given to the international situation with reference to the future of Europe, the conflicts in the Middle East, the social and political problems of certain African countries, and the drama of hostages.

"At the end of the conversation, best wishes were exchanged for the forthcoming Feasts of Christmas and the New Year."

More on recent Sarkozy news from the Sydney Herald Sun.

Pope Benedict responds to Muslim letter, invites them to Vatican

From today's Vatican bulletino:

On October 13, for the occasion of the end of the Muslim month of Ramadan (Eid al-Fitr), a group of 138 Muslim religious leaders sent an open letter to the Holy Father Benedict XVI and to other Christian leaders. The letter was entitled: "A Common Word between Us and You."

The Holy Father has replied with a letter of his own, signed by the Cardinal Secretary of State and addressed to Prince Ghazi bin Muhammad bin Talal, president of the Aal al-Bayt Institute for Islamic Thought and one of the signatories of the original letter.

In expressing his thanks and appreciation for this significant initiative by the eminent group of Muslim figures, the Holy Father reaffirms the importance of dialogue based on effective respect for the dignity of the person, on objective knowledge of the other's religion, on the sharing of religious experience, and on joint commitment to promoting mutual respect and acceptance.

The Secretary of State's reply also mentions the Holy Father's willingness to receive Prince Ghazi and a delegation of the signatories of the letter, and also highlights the readiness of the Pontifical Council for Inter-religious Dialogue, in collaboration with other specialized pontifical institutes, to organize a working meeting.

Secular and Catholic coverage:

• AFP / Reuters
• CNS / AsiaNews / CNA / Vatican Radio

We'll see what comes of all this.

Update: Rocco covers this story and reproduces the full text of Cardinal Bertone's letter on behalf of the Pope.

Update 2: Christopher Blosser has been following this story for some time, and has analysis.

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?

Pope sends delegation to Annapolis Conference

Vatican Information Service:

The Holy See delegation to the International Middle East Conference which begins today in Annapolis, U.S.A., will be made up of Msgr. Pietro Parolin, under-secretary for Relations with States, and Msgr. Francesco Coppola, nunciature counsellor, according to a statement by Holy See Press Office Director Fr. Federico Lombardi S.J.

Last Sunday, after praying the Angelus, the Pope had encouraged faithful to join the Day of Prayer called by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops to ask for peace in the Holy Land and for "the gifts of wisdom and courage for all participants in this important meeting."

In Annapolis, the Holy Father said on Sunday, "Israelis and Palestinians, with the help of the international community, aim to relaunch the negotiating process in order to find a just and definitive solution to the conflict which, for the last 60 years, has bloodied the Holy Land and brought so many tears and so much suffering to the two peoples."

Related:

• CNA: "Delegation from Holy See sent to Annapolis, hope expressed by leaders"
• CNA: "Annapolis summit, an opportunity that can't be missed, Cardinal DiNardo says"

U.S. nuncio Abp. Sambi criticizes Israel promise-breaking to Christians

Oh boy, brace yourself....

In an interview published last Friday by Terra Santa (Italian), Archbishop Sambi, the current nuncio to the U.S. and former nuncio to Israel ('98-'05), pulled no punches when talking about Israel:

"If I must be frank, the relations between the Catholic Church and the state of Israel were better when there were not diplomatic relations."

"The Holy See decided to establish diplomatic relations with Israel as an act of faith," he said, "leaving for later the promises to handle the more concrete aspects of the life of Catholic communities and the Church to be addressed later."

The gist of the problems:

The economic agreement, Archbishop Sambi said, dealt with three issues: the status of Church property; equal compensation for services the Church provides to the Israeli population, whether Jewish or Palestinian; taxes.

Put in other terms: tax exemptions for Christian religious institutions have not been forthcoming, and there is a continued problem securing visas for Catholic religious.

The Archbishop's conclusion?

"The confidence that can be placed in Israel's promises is plain for all to see," he observed.

Ouch!

Terra Santa, it should be noted, is a publication of the Franciscan Custody of the Holy Land (source: CNS), so even the forum of dissemination is somewhat controversial and charged.

A notable reaction from at least one public official:

Oded Ben-Hur, Israel's ambassador to the Vatican, told Catholic News Service Nov. 16 that he was "really surprised" at the criticisms, "especially coming from our good friend, Archbishop Sambi."

"I know where he's coming from; there have been difficulties, but I see the situation much more positively," Ben-Hur said.

The Associated Press claims Sambi "lashed out at Israel" in his interview. I wonder if anyone has tried counting how many articles claim church officials have "lashed-out." It's almost like a public church official can't have an opinion contrary with or opposed to anyone else's without it becoming a "lashing out." I think Abp. Sambi stated some reasonable criticisms forthrightly. [See also: "Pope Benedict "lashes out" against laws that contradict Natural Law"]

One can, of course, question the prudence of making his comments public while negotions are still taking place.

Oded Ben-Hur, Itialan news papers reported, requested that the Holy See explain the meaning of Sambi's remarks. This is what the Vatican said:

"The interview with Monsignor Sambi published on the site www.terrasanta.net reflects his thinking and his personal experience garnered in the years he served as Nuncio to Israel and with the Apostolic delegation in Jerusalem..."

"... [The Holy See] reiterated its hope - already expressed during the recent visit by (Israeli) President (Shimon) Peres to the Holy Father - for a speedy conclusion of the ongoing important negotiations."

Ansa I think puts the situation in good context: "A respected Vatican diplomat has expressed his utter frustration over the lack of progress on bilateral issues in the 13 years since Israel and the Holy See established diplomatic relations."

Personally, I could understand being frustrated by a lack of progress after 13 years and then - once free of my official position - being ready to vent a little to a publication run by Franciscans who themselves daily deal with the fall-out of the poor relations.

Digging a little deeper, it might be possible that the Terra Santa interview - and the Archbishop's voiced frustration - could have been exacerbated by recent news that a delegation of Austrian bishops (led by no less than Cardinal Schonborn) were turned away from the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem when they refused to hide their crosses. CathNews and Jerusalem Post have more. I can find, however, no direct connection between the two events so leave it for what it's worth.

The Associated Press thinks it found another recent cause of strain: "Earlier this year, tensions developed between the Vatican and Israel when the Holy See's ambassador to Israel initially decided to boycott a Holocaust memorial service because of allegations that during World War II Pope Pius XII was silent about the mass killings of Jews." I can't see that in itself being too big a deal.

More coverage:

• Jerusalem Post (does not contest Sambi's claims)
• International Middle East Media Center
• AsiaNews.it (which leads-off with Sambi's quote about Israel's lack of promise-keeping)

Anyone have some personal experience of these allegations to contribute to the discussion?

Update: More from CNA.

Also, see: "Israel-Vatican Relations & The Fundamental Agreement" - Ratzinger Fan Club

Video: Pope Benedict and the Saudi King meet

Raw video from Reuters of Pope Benedict meeting with Saudi of Arabia King Abdullah:

Ph/t to Br. Christopher for the link.

And for the especially-dedicated, a 6+ minute video from an Arabian-language station:

You want papist video? We got papist video!

... and I'm always eager for submissions.

Reports: Pope to meet with Dalai Lama in December

... and in the same breath, China begins its protestations:

• CNA: Meeting between Pope, Dalai Lama "offensive" to China
• CWNews: Beijing warns against papal meeting with Dalai Lama
• AsiaNews.it: “Special and significant” the Pope’s meeting with the Dalai Lama
• Reuters: Dalai Lama diplomacy will not change Tibet: China

Keep your eye on tomorrow's Saudi King-Pope Benedict meeting

Update: VIS press release here. Not very informative, in my opinion.

More from CNA, AFP, AP, UPI & BBC.

People more in the international politics know than myself have alerted me that tomorrow's meeting between Pope Benedict and the King of Saudi Arabia Abdullah is both historically and presently very significant, for reasons explained below:

Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah will meet Pope Benedict XVI on Tuesday in the first encounter between a pope and a Saudi monarch, the Vatican said.

Abdullah is on a European tour and Benedict has been trying to increase dialogue between Catholics and Muslims.

...

The Vatican and Saudi Arabia do not have diplomatic relations, but the Holy See has ties with many other Islamic nations.

Saudi Arabia follows a strict interpretation of Islam that rejects the possibility of diplomatic relations with a Christian entity. This interpretation would prohibit a Vatican embassy in Saudi Arabia on the grounds it would be equivalent to raising the cross inside the site of Islam’s holiest places.

It is forbidden to practice Christianity inside Saudi Arabia, and it is illegal to bring symbols from religions other than Islam into the country. Bibles and crosses, for instance, are confiscated at the border.

The Vatican has repeatedly stressed its demands for “reciprocity” - meaning that countries such as Saudi Arabia should ease limits on worship by Christians and other non-Muslims. [source.]

More from Iran's Press TV (apparently King Abdullah met with John Paul II when he was the crown prince) and the AFP.

Progress?

Promoting condoms = early retirement for Netherlands bishop?

In a time when overserving is the norm for most bishops, an early retirement might be notable:

Pope Benedict XVI has accepted the resignation of Bishop Petrus Maria Martinus "Tiny" Muskens of the diocese of Breda in the Netherlands.

... Not yet 72, Bishop Muskens is over three years from the usual retirement age of 75, but has surrendered the pastoral governance of the diocese in conformance with can. 401 § 2 of the Code of Canon Law. The canon states, "A diocesan Bishop who, because of illness or some other grave reason, has become unsuited for the fulfilment of his office, is earnestly requested to offer his resignation from office."

Bishop Muskens gained notoriety in 2006 by advocating the use of condoms to stop AIDS. The bishop told Radio Netherlands that the use of condoms can be acceptable for AIDS prevention and cited the Catholic theological position of the “lesser evil” to defend his idea. Muskens was quoted saying, “It is permissible to opt for the lesser evil of condom use to prevent the greater evil of AIDS.”

Earlier this year he was quoted on Dutch television encouraging Catholic faithful to pray to God as "Allah" in order to promote a better relationship between Catholics and Muslims. [LSN has two related stories.]

72 is no spring chicken, and the see already had a coadjutor ready to step in (Mgr. Johannes Harmannes Jozefus van den Hende), but still, one wonders.

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!

“We shall certainly respond to the letter by the 138 Muslim scholars,” says Cardinal Tauran

AsiaNews.It:

The Vatican will “certainly” respond to the open letter to Christian leaders, foremost to Pope Benedict XVI, signed by 138 Muslim scholars, this according to Card Jean-Louis Tauran, President of the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for Inter-religious Dialogue.

“We shall certainly respond,” he said in an interview to Vatican Radio, “because it is a positive signal sent to Christians. As I have said before there are some new elements. For example, when they mention Jesus they quote the New Testament, not the Qur’an. The text itself is not polemical and contains many positive aspects.”

“There is a willingness to collaborate on peace through religion,” the prelate added. “The letter says that Muslims and Christians represent 55 per cent of the world’s population and this has great potential to contribute to peace in the world. The positive elements in this message must be taken up.”

Follow-up: Kidnapped Catholic priests freed in Iraq

Pope Benedict prayed for their release last Sunday.

And this Sunday, Deo gratias, they have been freed:

Two Catholic priests kidnapped in Iraq have been freed and are in good health, a cleric at the residence of Cardinal Emmanuel III Delly in Baghdad said on Sunday."I talked to the hostages. They are well.

They say they were treated like guests," said the cleric, who asked not to be identified.

He said the priests were celebrating their release with a service at a church in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, where they were taken hostage amid reports they were being held for a $1 million ransom.

A Vatican spokesman confirmed their release.

... and in the Vatican, much rejoicing.

Milingo gets grounded by the Vatican (so to speak)

They pulled his Vatican-issued passport which he was planning to use for an upcoming visit to Rome. Hehe.

New apostolic nuncio appointed to Iran

From this morning's Vatican Information Bulletin:

The Holy Father appointed Archbishop Jean-Paul Gobel, apostolic nuncio to Nicaragua, as apostolic nuncio to Iran.

As the name suggests, Abp. Gobel is French-born. He's been the nuncio to Nicaragua for almost six years.

Update: Iran's PressTV notes what I noted.

Vatican Sec. of State to visit Cuba?

CWNews notes some rumors to that effect.

Today's UN exhortation: a moral imperative without content?

From today's VIS. My comments paragraph-by-paragraph:

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION IS A MORAL IMPERATIVE

Made public today was the text of a speech delivered by Msgr. Pietro Parolin, under-secretary for Relations with States, before the 62nd session of the UN General Assembly which is meeting to deliberate on the theme of "the future is in our hands: addressing the leadership challenge of climate change."

"Climate change is a serious concern and an inescapable responsibility," said Msgr. Parolin in his English-language talk. "My delegation wishes to stress the underlying moral imperative that everyone, without exception, has a grave responsibility to protect the environment," he added.

Everyone has a responsibility to protect the environment. This statement is an imperative for human action. However, where is the actual content of this action? What must human beings do, in the modern world, to protect the environment? Again, in this vacuum of specificity the content will continued to be supplied by secular lobby groups.

"The best scientific assessments available have established a link between human activity and climate change," he continued. "However, the results of these scientific assessments, and the remaining uncertainties, should neither be exaggerated nor minimized in the name of politics, ideologies or self- interest. Rather they now need to be studied closely in order to give a sound basis for raising awareness and making effective policy decisions.

Of course there is a link between human activity and climate change. My contention is that it is so minimal as to be irrelevant on a global scale. I agree there should be objectivity in the debate. However, if the fundamental scientific claims still "need to be studied closely" in order to raise awareness, how can there already be moral imperatives involved? Or is the moral imperative to study the question? Finally, how can effective policy decisions be an imperative when further study is still required?

"In recent times," he added, "it has been unsettling to note how some commentators have said that we should actually exploit our world to the full, with little or no heed to the consequences, using a world view supposedly based on faith." This, said Msgr. Parolin "is a fundamentally reckless approach." However "there are those who hold up the earth as the only good, and would characterize humanity as an irredeemable threat to the earth, whose population and activity need to be controlled by various drastic means." They, he stressed, "would place human beings and their needs at the service of an inhuman ecology."

I'm not sure exactly who these people are who claim we should "exploit our world to the full, with little or no heed to the consequences." The position is so extreme as to not deserve attention in the first place. In other words, the phrasing ("exploit, to the full, no heed to consequences") precludes justifying it as a rational position. Of course it's a "fundamentally reckless choice." But abuse does not negate the use: just because some people abuse the environment doesn't mean the environment can't be used legitimately. The principle stated above that one must never "place human beings and their needs at the service of an inhuman ecology" pretty much sums up my reason for resisting countless innitiatives the environmentalists council.

"Since no country alone can solve the problems related to our common environment, we need to overcome self-interest through collective action. On the part of the international community, this presupposes the adoption of a coordinated, effective and prompt international political strategy" to "identify ways ... to enhance sustainable development and foster a healthy environment," while bearing in mind "that poor nations and sectors of society are particularly vulnerable to the adverse consequences of climate change, due to lesser resources and capacity to mitigate their effects and adapt to altered surroundings."

"The pace of achieving and codifying a new international consensus on climate change is not always matched by an equally expeditious and effective pace of implementation of such agreements. States are free to adopt international conventions and treaties, but unless our words are matched with effective action and accountability, we would do little to avert a bleak future and may find ourselves gathering again not too long from now to lament another collective failure."

This line about poor nations is problematic. If by saying "poor nations ... are particularly vulnerable to the adverse consequences of climate change" he means for instance, rising sea levels caused by man made global warming will drown citizens of coastal areas, I see a problem, which touches upon a more fundamental issue of prudence. Namely, I think it is more prudent to directly aid people who are the victims of natural disasters than to mandate worldwide, drastic changes in the very structures of international society and production because such actions *might* alleviate future natural disasters. This *might* is dependent upon recent, questionable scientific hypothesis. Remember, the UN is the same institution that said global overpopulation would destroy the earth (and now they're actually admitting that underpopulation is the chief problem in most the world). These are the same scientists who said we were risking the advent of another Ice Age back in the 1970's. Since when do these same bodies, so clearly susceptible to "group think" and politics, merit the support of Vatican delegates?

Is this prudence? I don't think so.

UK tabloid claim: "Pope to make climate action a moral obligation"

The UK Independent is making some big claims today and I'm going to attempt to give some clarification and context:

The Pope is expected to use his first address to the United Nations to deliver a powerful warning over climate change in a move to adopt protection of the environment as a "moral" cause for the Catholic Church and its billion-strong following.

The New York speech is likely to contain an appeal for sustainable development, and it will follow an unprecedented Encyclical (a message to the wider church) on the subject, senior diplomatic sources have told The Independent.

It will act as the centrepiece of a US visit scheduled for next April – the first by Benedict XVI, and the first Papal visit since 1999 – and round off an environmental blitz at the Vatican, in which the Pope has personally led moves to emphasise green issues based on the belief that climate change is affecting the poorest people on the planet, and the principle that believers have a duty to "protect creation".

While Pope Benedict may speak about stewardship of creation, I highly doubt such an appeal would constitute the "centerpiece" of his entire US tour. It is also imprecise to say that Pope Benedict has the authority to "invent" new moral causes, strictly speaking. The Pope can, however, emphasize to the Church that stewardship of creation is an important duty, in line with previously revealed truth. In other words, don't expect to see Pope Benedict adding an eleventh commandment: "Thou shalt use only hybrid cars." He'd be the last person to do that.

More interesting is the UK Independent claim about an "unprecedented Encyclical" on the same topic. This claim contradicts all previous reporting as to the subject matter of his next encyclical, with the dominant strain of rumor proposing a topic involved with economics. [related: What do we know for sure about the Pope's next Encylical?] I'm sure they'd like an encyclical on climate change, but I'd like to see them hold their breaths for that.

The next claim that this UN address will follow an "environmental blitz at the Vatican" is similarly biased. Pope Benedict has been very active on many issues (issues, incidentally, that don't make it into popular reporting), stewardship of creation being one of them. As for climate change "affecting the poorest people on the planet", all he actually said was that scarsity of water is a problem in some areas: it is, but the cause of that problem is not global warming. [related: What Pope Benedict said about Creation at Loreto]. It is true that the Catholic Church teaches we have a duty to "protect creation" - that's nothing new. What constitutes protecting creation in today's world is what Pope Benedict would be addressing. And so far, it's a very different message than what the global warming lobby want to hear. But that doesn't seem to bother them.

Back to the text of the UK Independent article:

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, head of the Catholic Church in the UK, said last night: "This is a crucial issue both today and for all future generations. We are the stewards of creation and we need to take that responsibility seriously and co-operate to care for the created world."

I wonder if the Cardinal knew he was being interviewed for an article that seeks to reveal Pope Benedict's plans for his UN speech, and for the universal church, months prior to its delivery. I hope not.

Much of the rest of the article operates upon the principle that Pope Benedict's topic and message is already a done deal, and works through the implications (as the author sees it) of Pope Benedict getting firmly on the climate change bandwagon. Some of the author's history, however, is similarly incomplete:

News of the speech comes as Vatican City has become the first fully carbon-neutral state in the world, after announcing it is offsetting its carbon footprint by planting a forest in Hungary and installing solar panels on the roof of St Peter's Basilica in Rome.

Once again, the Vatican's Hungarian forest initiative provides eager reporters the "evidence" they need to claim that the Vatican is going green the way reporters want to see that happen. To clarify, the Vatican accepted the offer of a 3rd party company to plant a forest in Hungary. It's good to plant forests, and that's about all you can claim about the decision. I've blogged extensively on this (in my view, imprudent for several reasons) collaboration: "The Vatican and Planktos: strange bedfellows or sign of the times?" and again here: "Wait a minute, wasn't the selling of indulgences a bad thing?."

As for installing solar panels on the roof. Sure, that's true. I'm sure the Vatican also has low-flush toilets now (or again, maybe not). Electricity isn't cheap, and I'm not sure what more you can really claim about the choice to incorporate some solar energy.

Oddly enough, I think the last paragraph is more revealing that it might desire:

UK diplomats have held a number of behind-the-scenes meetings with Vatican officials on the environment. A Whitehall source said last night: "Benedict is the spiritual head of 19 per cent of the world's population and a highly respected figure. If the Pope's words are taken on board by his community that is one big constituency for change and could well turn the tide on climate change and environmental degradation."

Exactly, of course the global warming lobby wants the Catholic Church on its side. Once they can make the claim that global warming initiatives - as they see them - are a moral obligation (with sinfulness and culpability attached to ignoring it) as opposed to a simple act of prudence with two valid outcomes, they'll have successfully increased the size of their adherents. And here's the rub: even if they don't get the Catholic Church to say what they want, they can publish articles like these to convince people that the Catholic Church in fact does endorse their views.

What the Vatican must decide, and soon, is if it will continue to allow articles and reports such as this one to put words in Pope Benedict's mouth. If the Vatican doesn't speak, they will continue to speak for him.

Moreover, when he does speak, proposing a parallel track to their message isn't as effective. Unless he makes the distinctions and shows where Christian stewardship of creation is different than secular environmentalism, his audience might not be able to make the distinction. In this vacuum, the press accounts carry the day.

Of course, in general, when he does make the distinctions, the media is very good at chopping up his comments into sound bytes digestible for their purposes. In these situations, the Vatican press agency needs to be as pro-active on correcting these (often times intentional) errors in transmission as they have been on such issues as, for instance, Pope Benedict's comments on the Mexican legislators and whether they were excommunicated.

Hope for China?

There are increasing signs.

Update: Pope 'refused meeting with Rice'

I don't think you can really make that much of it.

Update: Since the story is getting some traction (slow news day), I'll comment.

From the AFP:

Pope Benedict XVI refused to meet US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in August, saying he was on holiday, an Italian newspaper reported Wednesday.

Rice "made it known to the Vatican that she absolutely had to meet the pope" to boost her diplomatic "credit" ahead of a trip to the Middle East, the Corriere della Sera daily reported without citing its sources.

She was hoping to meet the pontiff at his summer residence of Castel Gandolfo at the beginning of August, it said.

"'The pope is on holiday' was the official response," the paper said....The newspaper said the pope had rejected all meetings with political representatives during August.

1) It was August, and the pope really does take a break from meetings during the entire month (as does most the Vatican). I do, however, seem to remember that he broke that general rule for some special situation last year, but at the moment I can't recall the details. (anyone?)

2) If Condi requested a meeting just to "boost her diplomatic credit" than it's not at all surprising the pope would decline. Asking for advice or offering support is one thing. Photoshoots are another.

"Pope may visit Holy Land next year"

Reuters:

Pope Benedict could visit the Holy Land next year, Israeli President Shimon Peres said on Thursday after a private audience with the Pontiff.

"His initial inclination is to do it next year," Peres told a news conference. "I believe he will try to do whatever he can to have his visit not postponed for any length of time."

The Pope told Peres's predecessor two years ago that he hoped to visit Israel in 2006, but that failed to happen and his spokesman said the timing of a visit was still not clear.

"As you know, the Pope is ready but the timetable still needs to be seen," Federico Lombardi told reporters after the audience.

The German-born Pope, who visited the former Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz last year, is due to pray at a memorial for Austrian victims of the Holocaust when he visits Vienna on Friday.

CWNews on the Pontiff's meeting with Peres.

"Pope Benedict sending Secretary of State to Peru" - CNA

CNA reports:

After reciting the Angelus prayer today, the Pope remembered those affected by the “devastating earthquake” in Peru and announced that he is sending the Vatican’s Secretary of State with help from the Church.

...

The Pope said that Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, the Vatican Secretary of State, will soon be travelling to the country where he will personally relay the Pope’s sympathies and “concrete help from the Holy See”.

The New Beijing bishop candidate

Don't have time to analyze, but here are the relevant links:

• Associated Press: New Beijing Bishop Praised by Vatican
• Reuters: China nominates bishop, threatening Vatican rift
• CWNews: New Beijing bishop named: test of Rome-China ties
• CNS: Beijing Catholics elect Dongtang priest as new bishop
• Update: CWNews: Vatican welcomes new bishop for Beijing

The Vatican and Planktos: strange bedfellows or sign of the times?

A news wire headline caught my attention this evening:

"Vatican to Become World's First Carbon Neutral Sovereign State"

Now what, I asked myself, does that headline exactly mean? So I read on:

"Planktos/KlimaFa's New Vatican Climate Forest Initiative to Fully Green the Holy See"

"By agreement with the Vatican, Planktos/KlimaFa is now pleased and honored to announce that the Holy See plans to become the first entirely carbon neutral sovereign state, and it has chosen KlimaFa ecorestoration offsets to achieve this historic goal. In a brief ceremony on July 5th the Vatican declared that it had gratefully accepted KlimaFa's offer to create a new Vatican Climate Forest in Europe that will initially offset all of the Holy See's CO2 emissions for this year."

I think there's a bit of smudging occurring in this first paragraph. Either the Vatican decided to become the "first entirely carbon neutral sovereign state" and chose Planktos/Klimafa as the means to that "historical goal" or Planktos/Klimafa approached the Vatican and the Vatican in turn signed-off on it. I think the latter is more probably the case, given that the paragraph mentions an offer proposed by Planktos/Klimafa which the Vatican later accepted.

Now, there's a whole bevy of questions that this decision raises for me, and since this story seems to tie-in many threads that I've been reading through recently, I'm going to give it an extended treatment.

Planktos/Klimafa's proposal is straightforward enough: plant as many trees as are needed to equalize the Vatican City State's yearly CO2 output. The site chosen for this reforestation (or "ecorestoration" as they call it) is Hungary's Bükk National Park, where they will plant "thousands of hectares of new native species, mixed forest growth...". This plan, in itself, seems unquestionably good to me. Planting trees is a great thing, and I'm happy when it happens.

What gets me thinking, however, is the whole context of this agreement, and especially the views of Planktos/Klimafa and how they are marketing their cooperation with the Vatican.

As a further quick clarification, Klimafa is the European subsidiary of Planktos, a for-profit organization that claims to be the "world's leading ecorestoration firm." On the Planktos main website, one can view a picture of Cardinal Poupard (president of the Pontifical Council of Culture) receiving a plaque from the president and chief executive of Planktos, Russ George with the caption "Vatican to Go Green with Planktos/Klimafa" (update: I've placed the same picture at the top of this blog post).

Clicking through that picture/caption, one can find the Planktos/Klimafa news release which includes a video of the Vatican acceptance ceremony and their full press release. Also included with the press release packet is the text of Cardinal Poupard's address to the leaders of Planktos (available here in PDF), which I've reproduced below (the italicized parts are not included in the Planktos/Klimafa press release text, as I'll make note of next):

As President of the Pontifical Council of Culture; I am honored to receive this donation from the leaders of Planktos-Klimafa. This donation means an entire section of a national park in central Europe will be reforested. In this way, the Vatican will do its small part in contributing to the elimination of polluting emissions from CO2 which is threatening the survival of this planet.

As the Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, had recently stated, the international community needs to respect and encourage a ‘Green Culture,’ characterized by ethical values. The Book of Genesis tells us of a beginning in which God placed man as guardian over the earth to make it fruitful. When man forgets that he is a faithful servant of this earth, it becomes a desert that threatens the survival of all creation. The earth itself turns against man.

Environmental protection is not, therefore, a political issue - it's not enough to have a simple commitment from a few people. Instead, it is necessary, as it is underlined by His Holiness, to have the dawn of a new culture, of new attitudes and of a new mode of living that makes man aware of his place as a caretaker of the earth.

The Pontifical Council of Culture pledges its complete collaboration and deeply thanks those responsible at Planktos-KlimaFa for this significant donation.

I realize, of course, that for considerations of space Planktos/Klimafa (hereafter "PK") had to limit itself to excerpts from Cardinal Poupard's text. I don't find it surprising, however, that PK decided to drop the somewhat enigmatic line "The earth itself turns against man" [update: Mark Shea contributes] as well as the paragraph that stresses how true environmentalism should not be inspired so much by political considerations as from much deeper and more thorough understandings of who man is and how he is to relate to God's creation.

PK goes on to claim that the planting of these trees will "offer many rewarding new eco-forestry jobs to struggling rural communities" (i.e., people will be given jobs planting the trees) and there will be "increasing eco-tourism employment opportunities as these beautiful woodlands mature" (i.e. people will be given jobs as park rangers).

More disturbing to me is this paragraph:

Planktos/KlimaFa has further committed to work with the Vatican and the Pontifical Council of Culture to develop methods to calculate the CO2 emissions of individual Catholic churches and offer ecorestoration options to turn their carbon footprints green.

The press release makes no mention about how the Vatican has received this offer, or even if the offer has been presented. But just think for a moment what a huge project this would be - steadily going individual church by individual church and reducing (or "equalizing") their carbon footprint?! Would PK, a for-profit, organization, also donate all the money that such a project would require?

When PK says it is a for-profit firm, they mean it. At the Planktos Store, you can, for instance, purchase a 100% Vehicle Emission Reduction for a Midsize Vehicle ... for $30:

The average mid-size or full-size car gets 19-28 mpg and is responsible for 6 tons of CO2 emissions per year. 6 tons of CO2 equivalents will be retired on your behalf to negate 100% of your automobile's annual carbon footprint.

Do you own a large home? Its yearly carbon footprint can be "erased" for $100. Don't worry, they also do event planning: "Meetings, conferences, weddings, or classrooms, you can green them all. Just fill out the form below and Planktos will contact you. Together we will calculate the carbon footprint for your event." For only $10, you can relieve Mother Nature of 2 tons of its excess, human-created C02 baggage. I'm not making any of this up.

PK's methods for this "erasing" or "replacing" of human-created carbon footprints is controversial. While they offered the Vatican the option of planting trees, PK's favorite technique for removing excess CO2 from the atmosphere is by artificially creating plankton colonies (because plankton colonies are consumers of Co2 and produce oxygen). Put very simply, the plan involves dumping large amounts of iron into the oceans for plankton to feed upon. This project has encountered fierce, widespread criticism from within environmentalist circles and beyond.

Indeed, even the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a "scientific body set up by the United Nations to assess the risk of human-induced climate change" calls the procedure "unproven." Now, I should note here that I disagree with many of the IPCC's conclusions, but the fact remains that they are considered by many environmentalists to be a benchmark for protocol and, in this case, even the IPCC has doubts.

The BBC reports:

In its [the IPCC's] Working Group Three report, released this year, it said: "Geo-engineering options, such as ocean fertilisation to remove CO2 directly from the atmosphere, or blocking sunlight by bringing material into the upper atmosphere, remain largely speculative and unproven, and with the risk of unknown side-effects.

According to documents passed by the US government to the International Maritime Organization (IMO), the company [Planktos] planned to deposit 100 tonnes of iron ore powder this month in a 100 sq km area of ocean hundreds of kilometres west of the Galapagos Islands. The Canada-based ETC environmental campaign group has asked the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to launch an immediate and full investigation into Planktos' activities.

Just take a pause and look at those numbers. 100 tonnes of iron ore powder this month? Now, read how Russ George (yes, that's the same guy seen above giving Cardinal Poupard his commendation plaque) responds to these concerns:

Russ George, president and chief executive of Planktos, countered that its work built on many years of study, and that the company would collaborate with "scores of scientists and engineers from international ocean science institutions both aboard ship and ashore to develop this form of ocean stewardship in a scientifically, environmentally, and economically viable form".

He added: "This is work that must be done if we are to reverse the apocalyptic collapse of the ocean ecosystem as well as the climate crisis it is helping to accelerate.
"We are the first responders to a planetary medical emergency."

And this kind of language ("apocalyptic," "medical emergency," etc) when he is on-record with the BBC!

The controversy that the BBC sites is the tip of the iceburg in terms of the questioning surrounding PK's techniques. Without at all attempting an exaustive coverage, here's one website that links to this website which has a very long story/interview on Russ George and his company:

Russ George is a California businessman with a big idea: you give him some money and he will seed the ocean with iron, causing phytoplankton to grow. The process is called Iron fertilization, and is designed to take carbon out of the atmosphere to help you mitigate your contribution to global warming. It is one of a number of business ideas that have grown out of the global demand for carbon trading schemes, and it’s becoming a big business. Russ George and his foundation Planktos is creating quite a stir: Nature, the BBC, and a host of major newspapers have reported on his business venture.

For the past year, through a grant from the Fund for Investigative Journalism, journalist Wendy Williams has been investigating global warming mitigation stories. What she found behind all the media hoopla about Russ George was surprising: A man and his carbon trading scheme sorely lacking in scientific credentials.

A very troubling quotation from him:

I asked to see his research papers. They weren’t done yet.

“It’s really more of a business experiment than a scientific experiment,” he [Russ George] said.

And finally:

"To say that George [Russ] has shocked and angered much of the scientific community is an understatement. Indeed I found many who were profoundly concerned by the increasingly popularized notion that scattering iron in the oceans could help solve global warming."

Now, granted, I can't vouch for the objectivity of these non-mainstream sources I'm citing. It is clear, however, from my research thus far, that there is significant and vocal opposition to some of PK's plans from within the environmentalist community.

Russ George has responded to these accusations, most notably submitting a letter to the Ottawa Citizen. That letter is available here, along with links to previous stories criticizing PK. Planktos also has a fact sheet published on their website that tries to answer the challenges being voiced. I can't say that I find their counter-arguments enough to totally assuage the criticisms noted and linked.

For those of you patient enough to have read all of the above - I'll finally come to my point (which, actually, I'll convert into three simple questions):

• Is Russ George the kind of person and Planktos/KlimaFa the kind of company that the Vatican should be collaborating with and promising future support?
• Should the Vatican allow its actions to be featured in the press releases of a website that sells ecologically-conscientious people peace-of-mind by seeding the oceans with iron?
• Did the Vatican do its research on this gentleman and his company's other operations?

If the answer to these three questions is yes, well then it might be time to purchase a share in Plankton, because their stock is still reasonably-priced and I just gave out one heck of a tip about their new Vatican deal.

If you are still undecided, go back to this page and re-watch the press release video and ask yourself what you see. Is this a beneficent philanthropist collaborating with the Vatican to plant some trees in Hungary, or is it a business-savy CEO gaining a valuable endorsement for his company and its activities?

I haven't come to a decision myself. But my unease about the association of the Vatican with a for-profit like Planktos/Klimafa has not been relieved by the research I have done thus far. I remain open to more evidence.

Update: CNA has brief coverage of this story today.

The Letter to China, and what it portends

At long last we have confirmation that Pope Benedict will be releasing his letter addressed to the "bishops, the priests, the religious, and the lay faithful" of China this Saturday.

It will be released to journalists at 9am (under embargo until noon) and then released to the public, as the VIS states.

CNA has the best coverage from a Catholic source currently, providing a bit of the backstory to this letter's release:

"The current situation of division began in 1951 when the officially atheist Communist Party took power and forced Catholics to cut ties with the Vatican. Presently, worship is allowed only in the government-controlled churches which are not allowed to acknowledge the leadership of the Pope. Millions of Chinese, however, belong to unofficial congregations loyal to Rome.

Benedict has been reaching out to Beijing in an effort to restore diplomatic ties and unite China's estimated 12 million faithful. The Chinese government and the Vatican have remained divided over the government’s refusal to allow the Pope to appoint bishops and to exercise his papal authority.

Benedict's decision to address Chinese Catholics in a letter came out of high-level talks on China at the Vatican in January.

The Vatican statement on the letter, issued yesterday, provided a general indication of the letter’s contents by speaking of the interest in pursuing "respectful and constructive dialogue" with the government while paying tribute to those Catholics who have suffered for their loyalty to the pope.

Vatican watchers have said they expect the pope will stress the unity of the Catholic Church in the document, which Italian news reports said would be about 28 pages long and read like a mini-encyclical.

...

Benedict made clear from the outset of his papacy two years ago that improving relations with China was a key priority.

He has sent envoys to Beijing to sound out the government on the possibility of restoring ties, and he invited four Chinese bishops — from the official and underground churches — to a meeting of the world's bishops in 2005. Beijing did not let any of the four attend.

The second part to this story is how it will be received by both the underground and "official", state-approved Church. CNA again reports:

The reaction of the Beijing government and the underground faithful will be vitally important. Some underground priests have already expressed resentment about the pope's outreach to the government and the official church, according to the “official” bishop of Shanghai, Bishop Aloysius Jin Luxian.

According to the International Herald Tribune’s source, Agostino Giovagnoli, a commentator on Vatican-China relations, "There will be two different reactions." The underground bishops may resent the pope's recognition of the fact that many "official" bishops who were consecrated without Rome's consent have since reconciled with the Holy See, he said.

"Maybe the reaction of the official bishops will be better," he said.

Ambrose-a-rama, who lives in China, is "nervous" about the letter's reception.

Reuters has rather bland coverage. The Associated Press coverage is closer to CNA's, and adds an interesting tidbit that "The Vatican has said it would concede to another key demand of Beijing to downgrade relations with Taiwan in exchange for restoring ties with Beijing."

That's news to me. What, exactly, could "downgrade relations" mean in this context?

The AFP coverage likewise prompts more questions than it answers, but does at least remind us that the underground church has more members than the official one. At least, if you can trust these sorts of statistics.

Update: R-C points to this interview with Cardinal Zen which says that the Chinese authorities received the letter a couple days ago and this would in turn explain reports that the Bishops under the Chinese government have been summoned to Beijing, and - in all likelihood - are being coached how to officially and publicly respond to it. Party line and all that.

Update 2: CNS fills us in on some details from the officially-sanctioned meeting of Chinese bishops:

Chinese government officials told about 80 Chinese Catholic bishops, priests and lay Catholics called to a late-June meeting to receive an imminent pastoral letter from Pope Benedict XVI "with calmness."

... UCA News learned that top officials from the Community Party's United Front Work Department and from the State Administration for Religious Affairs spoke for more than a half-hour June 28 regarding the papal letter. The Vatican announced June 29 that the letter would be made public June 30.

... Zhu Weiqun, United Front deputy director, and Ye Xiaowen, religious affairs administration director, did not reveal the letter's contents at the meeting. However, they did say that China's Catholics should remain calm, no matter what the content of the letter, sources said.

Update 3: The BBC appears to have some minimal knowledge of the letter's contents:

In his 28-page document, the Pope pointedly refrains from referring specifically either to the underground church, which is still in communion with Rome, or to the Patriotic Catholic Church, whose bishops have always been appointed from Beijing.

Pope to meet with Putin today

The Vatican newswire reminded me this morning:

"At 6 p.m. this evening, the Holy Father isscheduled to receive Vadimir Putin, president of the Russian Federation,accompanied by his entourage."

The Associated Press has a little coverage:

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Pope Benedict XVI are set to meet Tuesday in the highest-level Kremlin-Vatican talks in more than three years, a meeting expected to focus on ways of easing tensions between Catholics and Orthodox Christians and finding common ground on moral issues.

The meeting -- the first between Benedict and Putin -- is part of a visit that takes the Russian leader to Italy and Greece this week.

Tensions with the Russian Orthodox Church have stood in the way of a papal visit to Russia. [More...]

There's a slim chance that Putin might invite the Pope to Russia. CNA has more.

There's some disagreement about whether Putin's visit has explicit ecumenical dimensions or not. CWNews has more.