Woodstock Report | Vagaries of Faith and Politics

By William Bole

"Religion and Politics: Like Oil and Vinegar?"

That was the title of remarks given by Father Thomas J. Reese, S.J., at the Woodstock Theological Center's annual Riggs Dinner on April 20. And Father Reese made it clear that the analogy he prefers is oil and vinegar, not "oil and water," because religion and politics do mix, but the right proportions are a matter of taste and require experimentation.

Father Reese is a newly appointed fellow of Woodstock, but hardly a new face or voice. He spent 13 years at the Center before he became editor of America magazine in 1998, and he is returning to Woodstock this summer after stepping down from his editorship last year and spending time as a visiting scholar at Santa Clara University.

Among other activities as a senior fellow, Father Reese will seek to nurture theological and ethical reflection at the crossways of religion and politics, which he negotiated during his Riggs talk attended by 60 Woodstock friends and supporters.

He began his remarks with a world-history sketch of the relationship between religion and politics - between the shamans and tribal chiefs of antiquity, between prophets and kings of Old Testament days, between pagan emperors and followers of Christ in the early church, and between Catholic monarchs and popes of less ancient times.

Father Reese pointed out that it was only fairly recently that the church left behind its teaching that when Catholics form a nation's majority, they should establish a Roman Catholic government. "This was the teaching until Vatican II. And it was John Courtney Murray and others who turned that around, so that the Catholic Church became committed to religious liberty," he related, referring to the late American Jesuit theologian who played an illustrious part in this reform adopted by the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965).

The speaker paralleled the pre-Vatican II teaching on religious freedom with Islamic fundamentalism today. "In a sense, Islam is a lot like pre-Vatican II Catholicism - 'we're going to have a religious state and it's going to be Islam.' And much of what's going on in the Middle East between Sunnis and Shiites reminds me of the religious wars between Protestants and Catholics in Europe. There are just a few centuries of difference in what we're talking about."

As Father Reese explained, the contemporary Catholic vision of religion and politics is projected through Catholic social thought, which extends from Scripture and principles of natural law (for example, human dignity and the common good). He characterized the American bishops as struggling with these questions: "I think the bishops want to be a nonpartisan prophetic voice, where they talk about principles, about values, about concern for the poor and the immigrants, about life issues - without identifying themselves with a particular party."

Some would argue the bishops muted this nonpartisan message in the 2004, when a furious handful of them stole the election-year stage by denying communion to Catholic politicians (especially liberal Democrats) who take a prochoice stand on abortion.

Although many at the time saw the U.S. hierarchy as stumping for the GOP, Father Reese pointed out that prelates are now making news for condemning the immigration bill recently passed by the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, with some even calling for civil disobedience if necessary. The Jesuit drew laughs from the audience when he asked, "Are these Republican bishops? What happened to the Republican bishops?"

Such are the vagaries - and sometimes the vinegary aftertastes - of religion and politics.

"It really is oil and vinegar," said Father Reese. "It mixes, but it doesn't mix perfectly. It adds a little spice to our lives. It's fun to experiment with and see what happens. And it'll be extremely important to both the Catholic Church and the United States of America."

Together with religion and politics, Father Reese will focus on ethics and public policy as well as contemporary Catholic Church issues. During the papal conclave of last year, he appeared on television news screens throughout the world, widely sought after as an expert commentator on Church affairs.

While at Woodstock from 1985 to 1998, he wrote three books about the Church's leadership at the local, national, and international levels. The last of that trilogy, Inside the Vatican: The Politics and Organization of the Catholic Church (Harvard University Press, 1997), has been translated into Dutch, German, Polish, Korean, and Portuguese.

"Woodstock provides an ideal setting for scholarly reflection on contemporary theological and ethical issues," he said in a press release announcing his return . He told the Riggs crowd, "It's good to be back with friends."