Tag Archives: Tablet

Africa

This exchange between Ray Towey and (Prof) Tina Beattie began on 07 December 2023, in The TABLET, a Catholic publication in London.

Topic of the week – the scourge the Church ignores

Professor Vimal Tirimanna (Letters, 2 December) makes the debatable claim that some topics omitted from the Synod report (LGBTQ, women’s ordination, priestly celibacy) are “hot-button issues” from the “developed world”. This cannot go unchallenged. In Uganda, gays and lesbians face the death penalty. Priestly celibacy is so alien to most African cultures that it has to be asked how often it is observed. Stories abound of priests with children, and of African and Asian priests sexually abusing religious sisters.

There is strong support for women’s ordination across many countries in Latin America and elsewhere. But the elephant in the room remains the total silence on women’s reproductive health. Nearly 300,000 of the world’s poorest women and girls die every year in causes relating to pregnancy and childbirth, and thousands more suffer debilitating fistulas and other injuries. The vast majority of these are in sub-Saharan Africa and Asia. This is indeed a hot-button issue. Why, when the Synod involved so many women participants and so many bishops from the Global South, does this scourge on the lives of poor women remain unacknowledged and unaddressed? One can search church teaching documents in vain for any mention of the suffering caused to individuals, families and communities by maternal mortality, which is one of the most avoidable causes of death. It is vanishingly rare in countries with good obstetric care, though rates are rising in the UK and are shamefully high in the US.

As long as the Church’s teaching ignores this reality with its glossy romanticism about maternal life and its eloquent but selective rhetoric about poverty, it cannot claim to be a poor Church of the poor. Why don’t the African and Asian bishops speak up? Did any of the women at the Synod raise these issues? And given the much-vaunted inclusivity of the synodal process, is it not right that we, the laity, should be able to ask such questions of those who were there, and expect honest answers?

(Prof) Tina Beattie Rye,

East Sussex.

Catholic Heroism

I read with dismay Prof Tina Beattie’s letter (9 December) accusing the Catholic Church of ignoring the plight of health care for the poorest women in Africa.

Over the last 40 years I have travelled extensively as an academic and as a lay missionary and worked with the Catholic Church in some of the remotest parts of sub-Saharan Africa, and I can assure her and your readers that you will find entire religious orders of nuns and priests and brothers who have given their entire lives to the care of the poorest women in the world.

It has been my privilege to work alongside these heroic individuals who at significant personal cost show a living witness to the Church’s special option for the poor. You will see the Catholic Church at its most inspiring. The faithful in Africa remain a significant pro-life community in every meaning of the word because of the service of these generations of missionaries. 

(Dr) Raymond Towey London SE5.

Church in Africa

Dr Raymond Towey (Letters, 16 December) read my letter (9 December) as an accusation that the Catholic Church ignores maternal mortality and other obstetric risks among the poorest women in Africa, so I’d like to clarify. My letter referred to the silence of the Church’s leaders and official teaching documents on these issues, including the Synod report. It did not refer to the Church at the grassroots.

I’ve lived in sub-Saharan Africa for much of my life. I know that Catholic religious orders work tirelessly to provide education and healthcare for poor women and girls, including care during pregnancy and childbirth, and for thousands of young women suffering from life-threatening infections and injuries after abortions. Dr Towey’s claim that “the faithful in Africa remain a significant pro-life community” risks glossing a more complex and often tragic reality, but I suspect we are on the same side.

(Prof.) Tina Beattie

Rye, East Sussex

Cecilia Hatt letter in Tablet

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1984-04-07-Cecilia-Hatt-letter-in-Tablet

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THE TABLET 21/28 April 1984

Letters A question for disarmament

Sir: Cecilia Hatt in Viewpoint asks a question and I hasten to answer. The point I made at the London meeting on 20 March and at other times as well was quite a simple one.

If Catholics and others concerned for peace do not agree with the policies of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, then why do they not instead become active members of one of the many organisations with more general aims?

From the Freeze Coalition to the Campaign against the Arms Trade, from Pax Christi to the United Nations Association, such movements exist in quite large numbers and they ought to have solid Catholic support. That they do not is simply a matter of observation.

I am still almost the only British priest with concern for the entirely non-controversial World Conference of Religions for Peace. It is good news that Cecilia Hatt and I can at least agree on the excellence of the American bishops’ pastoral letter, so well prepared and presented.

If we were to apply its conclusions to government policy here, we would very soon be in collision with government policy. It calls for a halt on further nuclear weapons deployment, an end to nuclear war-fighting doctrines, and opposes deterrent policies resting on a willingness to target cities.

Julian Critchley MP, by no means a enthusiast for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, has recently agreed that our present policies in this area can be summed up as “population extermination”

Of course, we can all do things sometimes, which others will judge to be silly, extreme or over-judgmental, though Catholic Peace Action must answer for itself.

I can only speak for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament which has clearly made mistakes in its time. But no one ought to expect perfection from an organisation before getting involved. Or even afterwards, as the failings of the Vatican Bank may serve to remind us….

(Mgr) Bruce Kent

General Secretary Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament

11 Goodwin Street

London

N4 3HQ  

28 April 1984

Sir:

Cecilia Hatt has given the wrong impression of Catholic Peace Action and also reveals a lack of understanding of Christian civil disobedience (Viewpoint, 7 April). Her charge against CPA of “self- righteousness” and “uncharitable language” is based on two quotes. The first quote does not support her in the least and the second is not only taken out of context but is a misquote.

To mention three examples: After our second act of civil disobedience on 11 October 1983, CPA supporters and many of the police exchanged handshakes of peace. Our twice-monthly leafleting of the Ministry of Defence workers now elicits friendly greetings, smiles, written responses and often a civil dialogue or two. And when the magistrate sentenced two of us to prison over the Christmas period last year, we did not feel any ill-will toward him; indeed, he acted with more patience and understanding during this, our second trial, than he did during our first one.

Mrs Hatt goes on to take out of context and misquote a statement of ours which explained our Ash Wednesday act of civil disobedience. The full quote, in the proper context, is: “Today we pray for the conversion of this nation and for all those involved with nuclear war preparations. We pray in the place where planning for genocide continues day after day, the Ministry of Defence building in Whitehall. In sorrow and love, we bring a message of repentance to the Ministry of Defence workers and through them the government and nation: ‘Repent; in the name of God and life stop preparing for death and destruction.’ “

As the actual sentence reads, we did not single out the Ministry of Defence workers as the only ones in need of repentance. During the action, the four members of Catholic Peace Action who wrote on the pillars the word “Repent” also daubed their own foreheads, along with the 40 people praying with us. Our statement further read: “We sin by omission if we fail to do what we can to stop this nuclear madness.” Sins of omission and commission cover, I presume, everyone, including ourselves.

Mrs Hatt seems to think that the word “genocide” cannot correctly be applied to nuclear weapons or nuclear war preparations. She and others can believe what they like, but perhaps an even more appropriate word is “omnicide”. What other consequences would follow the use of nuclear weapons? How else could their use be described?

Let us not delude ourselves. Nuclear weapons are here to be used. During the last elections, Mrs Thatcher was quite clear that she would, under certain circum- stances, “Of course” push the button. So thousands of military personnel and many civil servants are involved in maintaining a certain level of readiness so that the button can be pushed (even if they personally do not have the intention to use nuclear weapons themselves).  And these people, of course, are not acting alone — they do their job as servants of the people; the Government sincerely threatens to use nuclear weapons in our name.

Even if every person in this country agreed with such a position it would not, in our opinion, make it right. One of our responses to this situation is non-violent resistance and civil disobedience. We would sin by omission if we did not say “no” as clearly and as powerfully as we could. And we believe that there is nothing more powerful than actions based on love and non-violence. On a point of agreement with Mrs Hatt, I also “take heart” from the American bishops’ pastoral letter The Challenge of Peace. In the section “The Value of Non-violence”, they mention Dorothy Day and Martin Luther King, as having a “profound impact on the life of the Church in the United States”. It may not be well known, but Dorothy Day, co-founder of the Catholic Worker Movement, engaged in civil disobedience over many issues. It was during the fifties that she went to jail for resistance to nuclear “defence” preparations.

My heart was most taken, however, when one of the principal authors of the pastoral letter, Bishop Thomas Gumbleton, met two members of Catholic Peace Action and thanked them for what we were doing and wished that he could do it also. He was very supportive. We are encouraged also by the statements and actions of Bishop Matthiesen of Amarillo and Archbishop Hunthausen of Seattle. These bishops are active in a campaign to stop the shipment by rail of Trident warheads from Amarillo, where they are assembled, to Seattle, home of the Trident submarine.

In a recent joint statement they encouraged people to “monitor and offer non-violent resistance to each successive violation of our pastoral letter. Our stand in the pastoral letter is that no further deployment of nuclear weapons can possibly be justified. Every missile and nuclear weapons shipment is both a significant step toward a first-strike holocaust and a violation of the moral stand we have taken.  What we can all do along the tracks when these shipments come through is stand in prayerful witness to the alternative power of divine love and non-violent action. “

Non-violent civil disobedience may be “unintelligent” to Mrs Hatt, but it has a long Christian tradition and a growing number of Christian practitioners, both in this country and in the United States.

Dan Martin

Catholic Peace Action

7 Putney Bridge Road

London

SW18 IHX

Dan Martin letter in Tablet

Dan Martin letter in TabletDownload
1984-04-28-Dan-Martin-letter-in-Tablet

28 April 1984

Sir:

Cecilia Hatt has given the wrong impression of Catholic Peace Action and also reveals a lack of understanding of Christian civil disobedience (Viewpoint, 7 April). Her charge against CPA of “self- righteousness” and “uncharitable language” is based on two quotes. The first quote does not support her in the least and the second is not only taken out of context but is a misquote.

To mention three examples: After our second act of civil disobedience on 11 October 1983, CPA supporters and many of the police exchanged handshakes of peace. Our twice-monthly leafleting of the Ministry of Defence workers now elicits friendly greetings, smiles, written responses and often a civil dialogue or two. And when the magistrate sentenced two of us to prison over the Christmas period last year, we did not feel any ill-will toward him; indeed, he acted with more patience and understanding during this, our second trial, than he did during our first one.

Mrs Hatt goes on to take out of context and misquote a statement of ours which explained our Ash Wednesday act of civil disobedience. The full quote, in the proper context, is: “Today we pray for the conversion of this nation and for all those involved with nuclear war preparations. We pray in the place where planning for genocide continues day after day, the Ministry of Defence building in Whitehall. In sorrow and love, we bring a message of repentance to the Ministry of Defence workers and through them the government and nation: ‘Repent; in the name of God and life stop preparing for death and destruction.’ “

As the actual sentence reads, we did not single out the Ministry of Defence workers as the only ones in need of repentance. During the action, the four members of Catholic Peace Action who wrote on the pillars the word “Repent” also daubed their own foreheads, along with the 40 people praying with us. Our statement further read: “We sin by omission if we fail to do what we can to stop this nuclear madness.” Sins of omission and commission cover, I presume, everyone, including ourselves.

Mrs Hatt seems to think that the word “genocide” cannot correctly be applied to nuclear weapons or nuclear war preparations. She and others can believe what they like, but perhaps an even more appropriate word is “omnicide”. What other consequences would follow the use of nuclear weapons? How else could their use be described?

Let us not delude ourselves. Nuclear weapons are here to be used. During the last elections, Mrs Thatcher was quite clear that she would, under certain circum- stances, “Of course” push the button. So thousands of military personnel and many civil servants are involved in maintaining a certain level of readiness so that the button can be pushed (even if they personally do not have the intention to use nuclear weapons themselves).  And these people, of course, are not acting alone — they do their job as servants of the people; the Government sincerely threatens to use nuclear weapons in our name.

Even if every person in this country agreed with such a position it would not, in our opinion, make it right. One of our responses to this situation is non-violent resistance and civil disobedience. We would sin by omission if we did not say “no” as clearly and as powerfully as we could. And we believe that there is nothing more powerful than actions based on love and non-violence. On a point of agreement with Mrs Hatt, I also “take heart” from the American bishops’ pastoral letter The Challenge of Peace. In the section “The Value of Non-violence”, they mention Dorothy Day and Martin Luther King, as having a “profound impact on the life of the Church in the United States”. It may not be well known, but Dorothy Day, co-founder of the Catholic Worker Movement, engaged in civil disobedience over many issues. It was during the fifties that she went to jail for resistance to nuclear “defence” preparations.

My heart was most taken, however, when one of the principal authors of the pastoral letter, Bishop Thomas Gumbleton, met two members of Catholic Peace Action and thanked them for what we were doing and wished that he could do it also. He was very supportive. We are encouraged also by the statements and actions of Bishop Matthiesen of Amarillo and Archbishop Hunthausen of Seattle. These bishops are active in a campaign to stop the shipment by rail of Trident warheads from Amarillo, where they are assembled, to Seattle, home of the Trident submarine.

In a recent joint statement they encouraged people to “monitor and offer non-violent resistance to each successive violation of our pastoral letter. Our stand in the pastoral letter is that no further deployment of nuclear weapons can possibly be justified. Every missile and nuclear weapons shipment is both a significant step toward a first-strike holocaust and a violation of the moral stand we have taken.  What we can all do along the tracks when these shipments come through is stand in prayerful witness to the alternative power of divine love and non-violent action. “

Non-violent civil disobedience may be “unintelligent” to Mrs Hatt, but it has a long Christian tradition and a growing number of Christian practitioners, both in this country and in the United States.

Dan Martin

Catholic Peace Action

7 Putney Bridge Road

London

SW18 IHX

Cecilia Hatt letter in Tablet

Cecilia Hatt letter in TabletDownload
1984-04-07-Cecilia-Hatt-letter-in-Tablet

Add title

THE TABLET 21/28 April 1984

Letters A question for disarmament

Sir: Cecilia Hatt in Viewpoint asks a question and I hasten to answer. The point I made at the London meeting on 20 March and at other times as well was quite a simple one.

If Catholics and others concerned for peace do not agree with the policies of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, then why do they not instead become active members of one of the many organisations with more general aims?

From the Freeze Coalition to the Campaign against the Arms Trade, from Pax Christi to the United Nations Association, such movements exist in quite large numbers and they ought to have solid Catholic support. That they do not is simply a matter of observation.

I am still almost the only British priest with concern for the entirely non-controversial World Conference of Religions for Peace. It is good news that Cecilia Hatt and I can at least agree on the excellence of the American bishops’ pastoral letter, so well prepared and presented.

If we were to apply its conclusions to government policy here, we would very soon be in collision with government policy. It calls for a halt on further nuclear weapons deployment, an end to nuclear war-fighting doctrines, and opposes deterrent policies resting on a willingness to target cities.

Julian Critchley MP, by no means a enthusiast for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, has recently agreed that our present policies in this area can be summed up as “population extermination”

Of course, we can all do things sometimes, which others will judge to be silly, extreme or over-judgmental, though Catholic Peace Action must answer for itself.

I can only speak for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament which has clearly made mistakes in its time. But no one ought to expect perfection from an organisation before getting involved. Or even afterwards, as the failings of the Vatican Bank may serve to remind us….

(Mgr) Bruce Kent

General Secretary Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament

11 Goodwin Street

London

N4 3HQ  

28 April 1984

Sir:

Cecilia Hatt has given the wrong impression of Catholic Peace Action and also reveals a lack of understanding of Christian civil disobedience (Viewpoint, 7 April). Her charge against CPA of “self- righteousness” and “uncharitable language” is based on two quotes. The first quote does not support her in the least and the second is not only taken out of context but is a misquote.

To mention three examples: After our second act of civil disobedience on 11 October 1983, CPA supporters and many of the police exchanged handshakes of peace. Our twice-monthly leafleting of the Ministry of Defence workers now elicits friendly greetings, smiles, written responses and often a civil dialogue or two. And when the magistrate sentenced two of us to prison over the Christmas period last year, we did not feel any ill-will toward him; indeed, he acted with more patience and understanding during this, our second trial, than he did during our first one.

Mrs Hatt goes on to take out of context and misquote a statement of ours which explained our Ash Wednesday act of civil disobedience. The full quote, in the proper context, is: “Today we pray for the conversion of this nation and for all those involved with nuclear war preparations. We pray in the place where planning for genocide continues day after day, the Ministry of Defence building in Whitehall. In sorrow and love, we bring a message of repentance to the Ministry of Defence workers and through them the government and nation: ‘Repent; in the name of God and life stop preparing for death and destruction.’ “

As the actual sentence reads, we did not single out the Ministry of Defence workers as the only ones in need of repentance. During the action, the four members of Catholic Peace Action who wrote on the pillars the word “Repent” also daubed their own foreheads, along with the 40 people praying with us. Our statement further read: “We sin by omission if we fail to do what we can to stop this nuclear madness.” Sins of omission and commission cover, I presume, everyone, including ourselves.

Mrs Hatt seems to think that the word “genocide” cannot correctly be applied to nuclear weapons or nuclear war preparations. She and others can believe what they like, but perhaps an even more appropriate word is “omnicide”. What other consequences would follow the use of nuclear weapons? How else could their use be described?

Let us not delude ourselves. Nuclear weapons are here to be used. During the last elections, Mrs Thatcher was quite clear that she would, under certain circum- stances, “Of course” push the button. So thousands of military personnel and many civil servants are involved in maintaining a certain level of readiness so that the button can be pushed (even if they personally do not have the intention to use nuclear weapons themselves).  And these people, of course, are not acting alone — they do their job as servants of the people; the Government sincerely threatens to use nuclear weapons in our name.

Even if every person in this country agreed with such a position it would not, in our opinion, make it right. One of our responses to this situation is non-violent resistance and civil disobedience. We would sin by omission if we did not say “no” as clearly and as powerfully as we could. And we believe that there is nothing more powerful than actions based on love and non-violence. On a point of agreement with Mrs Hatt, I also “take heart” from the American bishops’ pastoral letter The Challenge of Peace. In the section “The Value of Non-violence”, they mention Dorothy Day and Martin Luther King, as having a “profound impact on the life of the Church in the United States”. It may not be well known, but Dorothy Day, co-founder of the Catholic Worker Movement, engaged in civil disobedience over many issues. It was during the fifties that she went to jail for resistance to nuclear “defence” preparations.

My heart was most taken, however, when one of the principal authors of the pastoral letter, Bishop Thomas Gumbleton, met two members of Catholic Peace Action and thanked them for what we were doing and wished that he could do it also. He was very supportive. We are encouraged also by the statements and actions of Bishop Matthiesen of Amarillo and Archbishop Hunthausen of Seattle. These bishops are active in a campaign to stop the shipment by rail of Trident warheads from Amarillo, where they are assembled, to Seattle, home of the Trident submarine.

In a recent joint statement they encouraged people to “monitor and offer non-violent resistance to each successive violation of our pastoral letter. Our stand in the pastoral letter is that no further deployment of nuclear weapons can possibly be justified. Every missile and nuclear weapons shipment is both a significant step toward a first-strike holocaust and a violation of the moral stand we have taken.  What we can all do along the tracks when these shipments come through is stand in prayerful witness to the alternative power of divine love and non-violent action. “

Non-violent civil disobedience may be “unintelligent” to Mrs Hatt, but it has a long Christian tradition and a growing number of Christian practitioners, both in this country and in the United States.

Dan Martin

Catholic Peace Action

7 Putney Bridge Road

London

SW18 IHX