Ordo Praedicatorum

 Fr. Dominic Langevin wrote an opinion column saluting the Pope, which was picked up by a number of newspapers. Scranton, PA’s The Times Tribune and Fargo, North Dakota’s The Forum. The Freelance Star , Fredericksburg, VA, and The Times Dispatch, Richmond, VA. 

I love baseball. Hearing numerous baseball illustrations in my homilies, my parishioners have been ever so gracious in my sports interests being transferred to the pulpit. But my attraction to baseball and its position as the American sports pastime are not driven by pure rationality; the emotions are involved. All the more ironic that, when Pope Benedict is in America, his largest events will be Masses at baseball stadiums. These settings of sweating and swearing will be transformed into outdoor halls of elevated discourse and prayer. If only he could lift up a prayer for my Chicago Cubs!

This intersection of fandom and faith underscores the paradox that the papal presence causes exuberance but, more deeply, sobriety. We see this especially in Pope Benedict. He is both a pastor and a professor at heart. He is a man of reason. While all Americans may not agree with his theology, Benedict will challenge each of us to think with intelligence.

Concerns of the intellectual life and the demands of rational discussion are essential to the message of the Pope—not just as a man of faith, but as a man period. Famously speaking as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger before being elected Pope, he observed that the modern world is imperiled by the “dictatorship of relativism.” The life of reason is being threatened under the guise of reason.

Continuing this thread of thought as Pope, he has argued that the nature of reality is intelligible to human beings. Furthermore, in nature and human experience, we can discern objective truths relevant to our cultural, political, and economic lives. While an Augustinian in his thought pattern—a pattern often linked with a pessimistic view of humanity—Pope Benedict actually is more optimistic and confident in reason than many academic and cultural leaders.

In his observations regarding the dignity of human intelligence, the Pope draws upon a long Catholic philosophical tradition. As my Dominican forebear Saint Thomas Aquinas observed, what distinguishes human beings from other animals and plants is the ability to use rational deliberation to choose a goal. The final end sought by human beings is happiness—true fulfillment, in Aquinas’ mind, that can only be found in God—but a happiness toward which human beings strive by acting in accordance with reason. The natural law tradition explores how the possibilities for collective and personal happiness are available to those who discern the rational use of our gifts and talents.

A dose of this rationality and happiness would be of great benefit to the United States being visited by the Pope. We find ourselves in a malaise on multiple levels. A New York Times/CBS News poll reported earlier this month that Americans have reached a relatively high level of doom and gloom in their outlook: 81% think “things have pretty seriously gotten off on the wrong track.” The result of fire and brimstone preachers? Not unless one counts the economy, national defense, and politics as agents of God.

Our collective economic ills are telling. The problems in the subprime mortgage industry—the apparent starting point of our tribulations—find their root in a credit situation that can stretch the standards of rationality. Some consumers have willingly and happily borrowed and borrowed into heavy debt. A number of lenders have made credit easily available, but at high rates of interest that can be profitably injurious and profligately unjust. Both sides feed and are fed by a mentality of instant satisfaction. The solutions being discussed by our politicians fall into the same trap—quick fixes without addressing the underlying personal and social issues.

In contrast, Pope Benedict could draw upon the Catholic—and indeed Christian and classical—understanding of temperance to encourage persons towards economic discipline and true self-satisfaction over the long term. For those creditors who have been reckless and irresponsible, is it unthinkable for us to revive biblical and classical notions of sinful usury? I think not. After all, usury in its first usages within barter societies meant lending at any interest. Later medieval and early modern thinkers came to understand that commercial exchange and monetary instruments can involve creative and productive development. The principle remains that the poor should not be overly burdened by the rich.

Should the Pope be our next financial guru? No. But a papal call to economic reason and sobriety—one that has been voiced by Popes Benedict and John Paul II and their predecessors—is certainly within his purview. He can do so simply and with great effect by appealing to the natural virtues knowable to reason.

It is a poignant note that the Catholic Pope—a man whose primary focus is on proclaiming faith in Jesus Christ beyond the limitations of reason—has to reiterate the importance and implications of reason, even for the sake of civil society and mores in a country founded upon Enlightenment principles.

I am reminded of this powerfully from my vantage point as a chaplain to the Catholic community of the University of Virginia. Thomas Jefferson founded the University intentionally to be a secular institution, the first with no acknowledged public role for faith or religion. And yet, over the years, the University has been challenged to coexist with religion. It can be done. Our Catholic campus ministry is evidence, thriving despite or due to being part of an overall University atmosphere with vestiges of the notion that faith is antithetical to reason and the academic life.

Pope Benedict demonstrates how the Christian life of faith supports the religiously-indifferent life of reason. Benedict as a Catholic believer confidently finds his foundation in faith. And yet the resources of naked reason are ever available, leading to the possibilities of faith, but also leaving a religiously pluralistic society with a full spectrum of standards by which to discern the common good.

Therefore, the papal presence is a powerful invitation to think, to use reason for the common good, such as our economic situation. His is a message of hope and reconciliation for humanity. For the Pope and myself, this hope and reconciliation possible through reason are fulfilled only beyond the limitations of man, namely in Jesus Christ. But the country can use all the hope and reconciliation she can get!

The Pope’s pitch is just the one needed by an America tired of chasing curveballs of irrationality and irresponsibility. It is the fastball that gives hope for a home run.

Father Dominic Langevin, O.P., is a priest at St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church in Charlottesville, VA., the parish that serves Catholics at the University of Virginia.

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