James Lovelock and Mother Teresa

In his recent The Revenge of Gaia, James Lovelock refers to Mother Teresa’s assertion made in 1988, that we need “to take care of the poor, the sick and the hungry, and leave God to take care of the Earth”. To this, Lovelock seems to have replied: “If we as people do not respect and take care of the Earth, we can be sure that the Earth, in the role of Gaia, will take care of us, and if necessary, eliminate us”. The interchange of ideas is interesting and revealing, both for Lovelock’s understanding of Gaia as a living organism to which we belong, and for Mother Teresa’s immediate concern with the poor and destitute of this earth.

One of the challenges that Roman Catholic Church (RCC) theologians today face in their own church, concerns, precisely, the questions whether eco-concerns do not turn our attention away from the real and concrete poor and whether the emphasis on climate change is not a convenient cover-up allowing the rich countries not to address the development of the poorer countries up to the point of providing arguments against such development, as it would be costly to all of us. In other words, investing in eco-concerns moves us away from our commitments towards the poor. Or, more abstractly speaking, are climate change and ecological commitments not a way to forget about social justice. This is a critical question we will always have to ask ourselves. Indeed, it cannot be that ecological concerns and policies would result in worsening the fate of the poor or in legitimizing the globally unsustainable lifestyles of the rich.  RCC theologians, therefore, feel the need to address the social justice dimensions of climate change. This is, how paradoxically it may seem to some who feel that prioritizing the ecological issues is absolute, an urgent priority in the RCC. It does not mean that environmental challenges should not be taken seriously or minimized, but that they should also be viewed in the light of social justice and sustainable, dignified relationships between all of us on earth.

Therefore, the connection between environmental challenges (especially the urgency of climate changes) and the Millennium Goals should be emphasized and studied carefully. But, in my opinion, one should be careful also not to fall prey to the trap of not considering structural issues or global issues, out of an absolutization of the direct care for the poor and destitute. Dietrich Bonhoeffer had to overcome some of the prejudices of his Lutheran theology, when he emphasized that there comes a time when it is not sufficient to bandage the wounds of those who suffer at the hand of the state: a spoke has to be put into the wheel of the state structures that oppress people and cause poverty and suffering. Liberation theologians have over and over again stressed the fact that charity, although absolutely necessary, may not be sufficient in view of the structures that cause the poverty that calls for our charity. Therefore, Jon Sobrino stressed the “principle” of compassion (mercy = misericordia). Therefore also, a Latin American bishop, addressing audiences in the USA, said: “as long as I ask you for money, there is no problem and you are very generous … as soon as I beg you to change the policies of your country that cause so much poverty and suffering, you don’t invite me anymore”.

One has the impression that Mother Teresa, although a very saintly person, has not sufficiently perceived these structural dimensions, paradoxically out of a profound compassion with the concrete people who suffer. It would be wrong, I fear, not to see how the poor will be most hit by the environmental crises and the climate changes. They are also often trapped in not having the luxury to address the environmental challenges that are threatening them more than they often now. Rich peoples have a tremendous responsibility here, and that can only be addressed if they are willing to lower their lifestyles to sustainable levels that can be shared by all. This is certainly not going to be easy, and it will require careful political planning. But the claim that the poor should introduce costly environmental policies can only be seriously made, if the rich are willing to foot a great part of the bill by changing their ways of living.

As a RCC theologian, I am worried that Christian scientists, philosophers and theologians, as well as the RCC hierarchy, attempt to escape the structural complexities of environmental crises by focussing only on well intended charity that does not address the root causes of the issues. It would be like taking away the pain that for a patient signals a life threatening illness, without addressing the illness.

Council of Europe Report on Creationism

There is a very nice analysis of the Council of Europe Report on Creationism, in view of the discussion on June 26th, on a webblog of a fellow theologian:

http://tasmedes.web-log.nl/tasmedes/2007/06/council_of_euro.html .

Concerns about Eastern DRC

On June 11th, the Africa Europe Faith and Justice Network (AEFJN) circulated a letter warning for a possible new war in Eastern DRC (Democratic Republic of Congo = Congo Kinshasa). The first paragraph runs as follows:

Attached to this message, you will find a letter written by the Archbishop of Bukavu (DR Congo), describing the alarming situation in which the people of the Eastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo live in. Some cruel atrocities have been perpetrated that affect mostly the civilians of this region. It seems that very soon, in this Sub Region some atrocious killings are happening again, very sad repetition of the massacres affecting the people of Kivu that took place during the recent years.

François-Xavier Maroy’s message can be read on the AEFJN’s website (FX M is the archbishop of Bukavu). It horrifies one that hostilities may start over again in a region where in a series of brutal wars between 4,000,000 and 5,000,000 people are said to have died. It saddens one that the the democratisation process and the elections may turn out not to be powerful enough to stop the violence and the bad governance that leads to so much suffering in DRC.

I am a member of a group that is concerned with human rights abuses in Eastern DRC and in the African Great Lakes Region. The group itself is connected to the Jesuit Brussels office of OCIPE and to the K.U.Leuven Faculty of Theology’s Centre for Liberation Theologies. Lately, we have been focussing on (1) the causes of the human rights abuses in Eastern DRC, and (2) capacity building for an international qualified peace advocacy network.

(1) A key factor in the violence in Eastern DRC is the presence of lootable natural resources in the region and the fact that belonging to militia groups in the region is an advantageous economic option for the poor people. Moreover, the complexity of the situation in the region is such, that I am not sure whether the lack of good governance is a consequence of the wars or, rather, the result of the lack of will of politicians who profit from loot that is facilitated by bad governance. The economic-military-political complex (both nationally and internationally) gains by maintaining violence that allows for loot. Moreover, the loot of natural resources here is lucrative as these resources are in high demand by the long term unsustainable and greedy life styles of the rich of this world. Therefore, it is so difficult to tackle the legal issues involved (such as litigation against looting transnational corporations and corrupt politicians or military; development of a legal corpus in the UN, AU or EU). Some documents have been produced by the United Nations, by the Congolese authorities (e.g. the Lutundula Report), or by independent NGO’s (see for example the Fatal Transactions initiative, or the Oxford UK based Rights & Accountability in Development – RAID, on the website of which are also available several of the UN documents as well as other material) – but there is still a lot of hard work to be done. I think that, in many rich countries, we should learn to connect our craving for goodies that require lootable natural resources participates in the causes for wars and violence such as in the Eastern DRC.

(2) A Jesuit colleague of mine, member of JRS (Jesuit Refugee Service) and a specialist in conflict and peace research, Elías López, has developed ideas for the creation of international peace advocacy networks (RPAN = Relational Peace Advocacy Network) used in OCIPE to connect qualified advocacy work in Brussels (EU headquarters), in Washington (social justice department of the US Jesuit Conference), and in Africa (the Centre d’Etudes pour l’Action Sociale – CEPAS – in Kinshasa; the Hekima Institute of Peace Studies and International Relations and the Hakimani Centre in Nairobi). The challenge is how to allow to emerge a joint action out of the diversity that arises when one faces a challenge together. This is an issue of common discernment and of relational constructionism, in which the joint action and the building up of a community are tackled together, in a full mutual and collaborative approach, that overcomes (neo-)colonial and patriarchal affects. The challenges in Eastern DRC concern us all, they constitute a common project and not merely some local African troubled issue for which others will lobby in the centres of power.

As a a Christian theologian, I feel very much connected to these issues and challenges: they touch the core of the so-called “preferential option for the poor” amidst the injustices of our world and at the service of dignified and sustainable life together for us all. What happens in Eastern DRC is not only about some Congolese suffering the abuses of war and violence; it involves all of us, in various interconnected ways, both with regard to the causes and to future answers. Those who suffer the human rights abuses remind us of the fact that there is something rotten in the kingdom of our lives and that we should commit to what is our real being and our future, God’s Kingdom. The models of thought used by theologians – such as the preferential option for the poor, the holistic perspective on creation inspired by the social justice and life in common of the Kingdom, the importance given to the attempts to build ecclesial communities (inspired by God’s dream and promise of the Kingdom, as well as by the very concreteness of Jesus of Nazaret’s life), the deep trinitarian structure of our reality and of our encounters with others, the need for forgiveness and reconciliation, etc. – may be helpful in structuring our political visions and actions.

June 20th: World Refugee Day

June 20th is world refugee day. The UNHCR (United Nations High Commission for Refugees – the UN Refugee Agency) announces on its website that, for the first time since 2002, the number of refugees has gone up to reach almost 10,000,000 people – that is the population size of my home country Belgium. The total population of concern to UNHCR has increased to some 32,000,000 people. These are enormous figures, but they are still dwarfed by the 1,000,0000,000 displaced people that the NGO Christian Aid expects because of environmental reasons, as I pointed out in a previous post.

Such numbers represent statistics … we are not capable anymore to imagine what they mean. Therefore, we need to reconnect with our own experiences of encountering refugees and displaced persons, maybe of having been amongst them. My parents told me stories about how, at the beginning of the Second World War, when Nazi-Germany invaded Belgium, people had to flee to France. I learned that some of the people I greatly admired had been refugees: Sigmund Freud, Albert Einstein amongst those. But I was really struck by the fate of refugees and displaced persons when I spent some time with fellow Jesuits engaged in JRS (Jesuit Refugee Service) in refugee camps in Kenia, when I found myself at the faculty of theology of the K.U.Leuven teaching to people who have been refugees, when I was indirectly involved in the occupation of RCC churches by illegal immigrants in my home town of Leuven, when through JRS channels I attempted to contribute to the alleviation of war refugees in Central Africa and to publicizing the fate of those thousands of Africans who through the Mediterranean or the Canary Islands try to find their way into Europe, etc. I see concrete faces and know about concrete experiences. I will never forget the Rwandan university professor – a colleague of mine – in a refugee camp: all the dignity and the security provided with his job were gone, he had been stripped of many things that had provided him with estime and recognition. I will never forget those young refugees who, upon knowing that I was a university professor, asked me to provide them with the means to study in the refugee camps. I will never forget the young Congolese religious who had walked from war torn Eastern DRC to Africa’s Atlantic coast. Whatever success stories there may exist – and it is good to tell them and to remind people that migration, even forced migration, may be a source of enrichment through human contact -, it would be culpable negligence to forget about the terrible and horrifying existences of so many people forgotten in no-man’s land.

Refugees and migrants refer to some of the core religious experiences: “don’t you dare to forget that once upon a time you yourself have been refugees and migrants in a strange land” says God to God’s people in the First Testament. How could we ever forget that we are fragile, that we may end up in situations that turn us into waste (cf. Zygmunt Bauman’s Wasted Lives, published in 2003) or worthlessness, when we are cut off from life giving human solidarity? How can we continue to trust in God’s presence amidst this broken reality? How do people draw energy out of their experiences of migration, is the question asked by Dan Groody in his Border of Death, Valley of Life: An Immigrant Journey of Heart and Spirit, a work that closely relates to Virgilio Elizondo’s Mestizo theology. How does a dividing borderline become a frontierspace of encounter? How can hope and creativity arise out of these “camps” that already in some parts of our world span generations?

It is important to connect to individual life-experiences, as it may awaken us to harsh realities and solidarities. It is also important to see how some of these experiences are connected to structures of the world in which we live and that pattern our close or worldwide relationships. The people who risk their lives attempting to cross over from Africa to Fortress Europe are what in Europe we euphemistically call “economic refugees or migrants” to distinguish them from the “political refugees or migrants”. But are the economic imbalances in our world not the consequences of policies in which the rich attempt to safeguard their unproportionate wealth? Are such refugee flows not the result of unsustainable ways of living together on a world scale? We have become more aware of this since ecological sciences have taught us that some of us enjoy globally unsustainable ecological footprints. This will increasingly become a source of violent conflicts in our world.

Refugees and migrants remind us of challenges, problems and issues that concern all of us together: in a way they painfully connect us there where it hurts. The challenge will increase over the coming years: because of wars, because of global climatic changes, many more people will migrate … we may very well find ourselves to be amongst those.

On Jan 26th, 2007 the Council of Europe will discuss creationism

According to the information provided by several newspapers, the Council of Europe wil discuss on June 26th a document prepared by its “Committee on Culture, Science and Education”, entitled: The Dangers of Creationism in Education. The document itself is available on the website of the European Council. The summary of the text runs as follows:

The theory of evolution is being attacked by religious fundamentalists who call for creationist theories to be taught in European schools alongside or even in place of it. From a scientific view point there is absolutely no doubt that evolution is a central theory for our understanding of the Universe and of life on Earth.

Creationism in any of its forms, such as “intelligent design”, is not based on facts, does not use any scientific reasoning and its contents are pathetically inadequate for science classes.

The Assembly calls on education authorities in member States to promote scientific knowledge and the teaching of evolution and to oppose firmly any attempts at teaching creationism as a scientific discipline.

The tone of this summary is already very passionate: clearly, emotions run high and there is some fear that the debates that are raging in the USA, opposing creationists and supporters of “intelligent design” to staunch advocates of evolution theory, would move to Europe. This debate is complex, as religious convictions enter into it and as it entails a discussion on what science is as well as its impact on our lives. The document itself is divided in various parts:

A. Draft resolution.

In its #18.4 it suggests to “firmly oppose the teaching of creationism as a scientific discipline on an equal footing with the theory of evolution by natural selection and in general resist presentation of creationist theories in any discipline other than religion”. Such sentence seems confusing to me, as I am wondering what kind of view on religion is implied here. Moreover, does creation as taught within the framework of, say, RCC theology or religious studies, imply the consequences and positions to be found in creationism as it seems to be meant in the document? I personally share the opinion that creationism and “intelligent design” should not be taught as scientific subjects; but I would also like to claim that they do not reflect a sound theological interpretation of the meaning of “creation”, even if I can understand the fact that creationists react against views in which science claims to set aside religion (this is another issue that is worth being discussed, independently of the creationist reaction). Not only the relation between creationism and evolution (science) is at stake, also the tension between creationism and theology.

B. Explanatory memorandum by Mr Guy Lengagne, rapporteur.

This is the largest part of the document. I regret that in the first subheader, “Evolution: a genuine scientific theory”, a lot of attention is paid to the claim that the works of Darwin “mark the end of the agreement between natural history and the Christian tradition, as well as the birth of anti-evolutionist movements” (#6). Such claim seems to deny the possibility for Christianity to connect with evolution theories in a constructive way. This seems to equate all Christian theology and “religious obscurantism” (#7). There is a tone here that aggressively goes beyond what can be said about the relations and tensions between the science of evolution and the Christian religion and theologies. The second subheader is a presentation of the theory of “Evolution”, as it is corroborated by many facts. In the third subheader “Creationism” is analysed, with references to the situation in the USA. Follows a fourth subheader on “Creationism in Europe”, in which “The Atlas of Creation” by the Islam creationist Harun Yahya is severely criticised. In the fifth subheader “Creationism and Education: The main creationist initiatives in Europe, overviews and reactions of the scientific and religious communities”, the situation in various European countries is analyzed. In a following, sixth, subheader a look is taken at the “Positions adopted by the religious authorities”: the Vatican (is this an adequate representation of RCC?) and the Christian religious movements, as well as the Muslim organisations. The confusion surrounding the word “creationism” remains, as far as I can see, but at the same time it is made clear that both in the RCC and the Muslim traditions there is a much more refined and nuanced debate going on. (I will quote #76 at the end of this post, to illustrate how the authors of the document perceive the RCC position today.) The conclusion of the document points to the core concern of its authors: “the denial of evolution is particularly harmful to children’s education”, as it hinders them to become active players in the transformation of our societies. However, creationist theories “like any other theological position, could possibly be described in the context of giving more space to cultural and religious education” (#99).

For RCC theologians, the ##75-77 of the second part of the document are particularly important. There is awareness of the debates and discussions that are ongoing within the RCC and that concern the reasons for approaching science with a certain degree of suspicion, particularly when science itself risks to turn into an ideology and assume quasi-religious prerogatives. I quote the interesting #76:

In the tradition of his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI now welcomes the role of the sciences in the evolution of humanity: Science has opened up large dimensions of reason that have been closed up to now and thus brought us new insights. In early September 2006, he brought together a group of former students and colleagues at Castel Gandolfo for a seminar on the evolutionism versus creationism debate. He published the conclusions of this seminar in mid-April 2007 in German under the title “Schöpfung und Evolution” (Creation and Evolution). He does not support the theory of creationism: the creationist position is based on an interpretation of the Bible that the Catholic Church does not share. The Pope rejects both a creationism that categorically excludes science and the theory of evolution, which hides its own weaknesses and does not want to see the questions that arise beyond the methodological capacities of science. The theory of evolution is considered too pervasive by the Catholic Church, which seems above all to be woried about the influence of social Darwinism and the evolutionist theories concerning economic matters and medical ethics.

What do we keep from this? That, for theologians, there is at least also the issue of clarifying the concept of creation in general, and of analysing its understanding by creationists. Moreover, one should also pay close attention to the deep reasons creationists have to take on the combattive attitudes that are theirs. What is at stake for them? Another element to look at for theologians is the link of creationism – and of some theological understandings of creation and other theological concepts – to aggressive fundamentalisms. There should be a great concern here to deal with these theological issues on the public forum: theological approaches to creation may very well help to clarify the debates that are going on between creationists and scientists of evolution, at least as far as “in depth” concerns are concerned. These discussions are not without consequences for our societies as Lord May of Oxford has very well pointed out in his 2005 anniversary address to the British Royal Society, an address that remains one of the most worthwhile to read on the relationships between religion and science, the understanding of what science is, and todays environmental challenges.

Sensitive, sensuous, and sensual theological concepts

There was an interesting conversation today in which I participated. During a seminar yesterday, a discussion arose about the tension between the universality of the Roman Catholic Church and the particularlity of its local churches. The topic is a difficult one, particularly when some of us begin to use the word “autonomous” in this context. Personal and local backgrounds are so different – so contextual – that the meaning given to all these words becomes very loaded. For someone who lives in a place where Christians suffer persecutions making it difficult for them sometimes even to survive, the universality of the Church is crucial: it represents a life giving bloodline. For others, who do not suffer persecutions but the consequences of a faith that was brought to them through a history of colonization of which they feel the consequences in what they experience as the imposition of particular ecclesial or ecclesiastic cultures that do not correspond to their ways of living and doing, the situation is different. They feel the need to emphasize, not the universality of the Church (which they may view as the imposing of the ways of one particular, colonizing church) but the “autonomy” of their local church, which looks for its own ways and means to live and express its faith. That does not mean that they want to separate from the universal Church, but that they want to talk about the word “universal” when it takes shape in concrete contexts. Similarly, those who emphasize the universality of the Church will not want to deny that their own local church uses its own language, cultural expressions, historical references, and religious experiences, to faithfully articulate the universal faith and Church.

This indicates how sensitive such ecclesial concepts as “universality”, “local”, “particular”, and “autonomous”, are. Roman Catholics share a common faith and this “common” has embedded itself in ecclesial and ecclesiastical structures. This is a value in itself and in some contexts it becomes a necessity for survival, while in other contexts it remains in the background as a nearly unconscious dimension of our faith (we don’t really need to reflect about it). Some people live the experience that this “common” has sometimes expressed itself in forms of cultural oppression, so that the “common” has become an argument for power games and control. The question is, therefore, what the meaning and the content of this “common” is – an issue for fundamental theology and theologies of revelation. A supplementary aspect related to this is that, for Christians, the “common” has a universal dimension as it is meant “for all”, not only for the Christian. Here, the question arises how this sharing of what is common to some towards something that is common for all, should happen – one of the questions of mission. These are delicate questions, that deeply affect the lives of concrete people.

Such sensitive concepts sometimes divide us. We start quarreling about them, all the more so since they touch very personal and contextual experiences in which we experience close realities (persecution, cultural oppression, etc.). In that sense, these concepts could be called sensuous: they connect with our very concrete life conditions, they describe the material reality that is ours. This is where abstract theological concepts interact with our senses as their grip on concrete reality. It is important to understand this sensuous dimension of theological concepts: they are not floating above our lives, in a sphere that makes abstraction of our day to day material conditions. Nevertheless, they are not so close to reality that they cannot but target “this” or “that” reality, loosing their universal reference, as they indicate situations that pertain to experiences of every human being, be these rooted in very different context. Particular and universal connect here in a very creative way. For those who really like to go into the historical theological discussions: is this not what was at stake in Nominalism? Umbero Eco’s In the Name of the Rose, provides us a good insight in this.

Our most particular and sensuous experiences – where we connect concretely with reality through our senses that are not the senses of someone else – are, therefore, also very universal and we are invited to share them with others. There where we are most different from one another, we find the challenge to become close to one another precisely in discovering that “my” experiences are also “our” experiences, that “my” experiences are a gift to “us” all … as the experiences of someone else are also a gift to me. Our differences bring us together and allow us to discover, to descry, what is really at stake in the depths of our lives: the “common” arises when the sensitive concepts with their sensuous roots are shared, put in common, in a game of constructive difference … Paradoxically, the concepts of commonness in the human-divine Jesus-Christ or in the Trinity, may be of great help here – as also the deep human experiences of intimacy between human beings: friendship, marriage.

This is where I would like to use the word sensual: we allow our sensitive theological concepts, which reflect our sensuous reality, to connect sensually, bringing us to profound life together, to the “common”ness of the Kingdom of God. Part of the theologian’s task is, then, to allow the sensuous differences in sensitive theological concepts to arise as a sensual wealth, that helps us all to discern the depth of our faith, and in that the marvellous and unexpected ways in which God reveals Godself. Although we are vulnerable and may feel threatened by the way others (in other contexts) use our theological concepts and ideas, we are called to view and receive the experience of these others as a very dear gift in a very sensual process (in which we lovingly feel and reach out to the presence of God in one another), so as to discover the richness of God’s presence in our most sensitive theological concepts.

I hope and pray every day that we find the means to bring about this sensual and sensitive converations, in which we do not need to fear one another’s sensuous roots.

Goya’s Ghosts

This evening – as a counterpoint to the exams – I went to see the movie Goya’s Ghosts (Milos Forman). The main theme is violence, religious violence (the practices of the RCC inquisition) and war (the Napoleonic wars in the Iberic peninsula). As a painter, Francisco Goya (1746-1828) is known for his marvelous portrets, as well as for his very crude paintings of war and violence – a contrast that one experiences when visiting the Prado museum in Madrid. I think I somewhat better understand the mind of Goya after seeing this movie, how he must have been profoundly hurt by the violence around him while at the same time experiencing deep compassion, which moved him to record in his drawings and paintings what he saw.  The movie confronts us with the tragedy of those who suffer evil and violence, and it makes us more sensitive and compassionate in our own world: violence is still very much around us.

We are also brutally reminded of the fact that religion – in this case the Roman Catholic Church – sometimes brings about violence that it covers up by theological argument and church authority. Theologians have to learn the humility to always become aware of those who may suffer from their systematisations and theories.

Ecclesiology and a Theology of Ministries

Allow me first of all to apologize for not having written more frequently. My return from the workshop with the Little Sisters of Nazaret in Drongen, was immediately followed by exams in the faculty of theology in Leuven. There are several theological ideas that I would like to share with you, both on the workshop and as arising within the exams. I will have to limit myself to one idea. I’ll make sure more follow in the coming days.

Today, a Latin American friend and an African student whom I was examining reminded me of the fact that, certainly in Flanders, when we work on ecclesiology, we tend to forget a theology of ministries. The Roman Catholic Church in Flanders has been so powerful – in the number of vocations as well as in public influence – that Flemish people still find it difficult to conceive of the church outside of this power. A part of Flemish Christians – some of them clergy, but certainly not all – still have to learn that the times of a service church are over, and that they themselves have to take responsibility for the ecclesial communities – a sense of co-ownership, very practically, is needed. More than ever before, Flemish Catholics cannot count anymore with a powerfull and organising clergy on which they could rely for all church matters. It is not easy, not even for theologians, to make the jump from this clerical service church, to a church in which people take on various ministries (e.g. visiting the sick and the elderly, taking care of the material aspects of the church buildings, organising liturgies, etc.) for which they are also recognized and mandated, for which they are ecclesialy sent. I find it remarkable, indeed, that, while I have been teaching ecclesiology, very often my reflections on ministry have been focused on the clerical side of it, even when paying some tribute to a larger and more encompassing idea of ministry. Our setup of mind seems to be mainly the priestly and hierarchical perspectives – and although these perspectives remain very important, at the same time they may also represent a block for a creative mind that is looking for novel ways of organising and structuring our ecclesial communities. They also narrow down the tension between clergy and lay people, and do not allow for the creative approaches that could originate from this tension. I was touched by the fact that an African and a Latin American reminded me of this, and considered this to be a sign of a lack of vitality in the Flemish RCC.

René Descartes and Jan Ruusbroec

 A director for a home for mentaly impaired children and young adults, once told me passionately: “If it were for René Descartes with his view on the human being as ‘Je pense donc je suis’, there would be no need for my job, nor for a home for the young people entrusted to my care”. This has, indeed, been the consequence drawn by the Nazi’s in the years before the second world war. To me this poses a serious challenge to modern philosophy and anthropology. It contrasts with another view on the core of human existence, as expressed by the medieval mystical author Jan Ruusbroec: “Want compassie es ene quetsure der herten die minne maect ghemeyne tot allen menschen, ende niet ghenesen en mach also langhe als enighe doghet in den mense levet” (compassion is a wound of the heart that stretches out love to all human beings, and that should not be healed as long as there is any virtue alive in a human being). Here, the emphasis is not on the “I” and on intelligence, but rather on the vulnerable capacity to relate to others and, therefore, on the “We”. It may wel be very important to recover this “we” and the relational reality that constitutes it and in which the “i” arises. For those who have had of have the privilege to live with mentally impaired young people, their immediate capacity at relating – sometimes in a violent way, but often also in compassion and sympathy – is a grace. Is this not the revelation of graceful human beings?

Violence and Common Apostolic Discernment

I am sorry for not having been able over the past days to keep up posting messages. I am involved – in the Jesuit Retreat Centre of Drongen near Ghent – in a workshop with a group of Little Sisters of Nazareth. These remarkable women form a small religious congregations, inspired by the spirituality of Charles de Foucault and the social commitment of Cardinal Joseph Cardijn (“see, judge, act”). They are involved in poor areas in Ghent, Antwerpen, Paris and Barcelona, as well as in poor barrios in Venezuela and in refugee camps in Lebanon. They asked me to reflect with them on the theme of violence. We have organized the workshop along two main lines: inputs on conflict transformation and sustainable peace building, and a discernment process about how they as a religious congregations and in their fraternities (communities) experience their community building processes as a service to peace.

We touch our experiences of violence (as victims, as perpetrators, as witnesses, as bystanders) and share those, to discover how our experiences are to all of us and to our communities as well as to the people we serve, a gift of God. This requires in depth encounters, in which we humbly learn to be open to one another, because precisely that openness is part of our service to peace building. We also try to connect serious reflection and analysis to the experiences of compassion – both need to complement each other, as reflection without compassion looses its heart, while compassion without reflection risks to reduce one’s commitment to simply tending wounds (working on symptoms) without reaching out to the causes of violence. I feel how much I have been learning during my 7 years work in the now defunct MaCSP programme at the K.U.Leuven: Luc Reychler’s emphasis on Peace Architecture, René Bouwen’s insistence on Relational Constructionism, and Stephan Parmentier’s perspective of restorative justice, together with Elias Lopez’ work on political forgiveness and reconciliation, and on networking between the field, the academy and the decision-makers in a qualified relational peace advocacy network, have led us to the metaphors of peace building as community building along a line that goes from separating borderlines to connecting frontier spaces, and as inspired by the mestizo-theology developed by Virgilio Elizondo. I have had the honour to work with these inspiring people and they have deeply influenced my understanding of religious life as community building with the vows of poverty, obedience and chastity as the rules of the game of community building.

We have used to excellent movies during the workshop: Robert Redford’s The Motorcycle Diaries relating the compassionate experiences of the young Che Guevara in the face of suffering encountered during a motorcycle trip through Latin America (the metaphor of border and frontier is clearly present where the Amazone river separates in a leper colony the caretakers and the patients), and Robert Chelsom’s The Mighty an empowering movie about the friendship between two kids who, through the story of King Arthur’s knights of the round table, learn to creatively approach reality in the midst of their pains and sufferings and of the violence that is part of their lives.

President Bush and global warming

Last Thursday, the US president Bush called for action on global warming. This means that the US now officialy recognize that there is a serious problem that should be addressed by appropriate actions. However, some, particularly environmental activists and EU responsibles, wonder whether president Bush’s statement represents a real move forward from the traditional US policy which avoids urging immediate action, emphasizes economic global competition, and focusses on technological remedies to global warming. Moreover, what is the meaning of such statement a few days before the beginning of the G8 meeting in Heiligendamm, where global warming will be discussed.

I am left wondering whether this US approach really touches the heart of the matter and the real challenges in the face of global warming. Of course, all appropriate and sustainable technological means should be used. Of course, we will have to take into account the global socio-economic and political effects of measures taken, e.g. CO2 offset. Of course, consideration has to be given to the situation of these countries that are in a process of development and are in need of energy consumption.

But, one should also take into account the real injustices that are involved in global warming: the poorest countries will suffer most and already suffer, the non sustainable lifestyles of some have consequences for others, purely economic answers to global warming privilege those who have the means to pay, … Global warming, therefore, is about how we live together and how we organize our common life in a sustainable and dignified way for all of us. Therefore, a reflection on our global life together and on the motivations involved in our choices of life styles, should be persued and ethical, moral decisions are called for. This moves beyond technical and economic solutions, although these are undoubtedly necessary.

It reminds me of a remark a good friend of mine made, in response to an earlier posting: he suggests that theologians should not too easily and one-sidedly criticize capitalism, as there exists a risk then to move against people’s creativity and sense of initiative. Moreover, the science of economics contains, in the mechanism of interiorisation of externalities, a good means to bring into account the hidden costs of our actions on others – particularly in the case of environmental costs. It then is possible to hold those whose lifestyles cause environmental externalities accountable. I think such calculations are important and they help to reveal the real cost of our lifestyles. On the other side, these are extremely difficult calculations, and they do not initiate a common discernment process amongst all those involved; they merely set up rules for compensation. The rich can pay for such compensations, … not the poor. The question is: who will decide about how we live together? Will we come to such decision in a common discernment process? Or will some of us be bribed into it?

To bring about such levels of public debate and reflection, in line with J. Habermas’ Herrschaftsfreier Kommunikation, is a task for public theologians today. Their concern will be about the quality of our discernments, amidst a debate that also involves economic and political arguments.