Notre-Dame and What We Owe Our Children

The inferno in Paris looked worse than was feared by the thousands of onlookers stationed on either side of the River Seine and by the hundreds of millions watching live-streamed and time-stamped images on their screens.

The April 15 fire ravaged the great Cathedral of Notre-Dame, the heart of the City of Lights, where we romanticize French culture in a blend of love, sex, food, faith and art. Tears were shed and prayers were said as Parisians watched Our Lady burn and mourned the loss.

But as church and government officials assess the extent of the destruction, the 850-year-old church appears to have another 850 years ahead of it, barring any unforeseen damage the intense heat may have done to undermine the massive structure’s stone construction. 

The attic “forest,” which fueled the fire, is, relatively speaking, easily replaceable. With modern technological advances in building materials, the reconstruction debate won’t be about the cost – more than $1 billion raised so far and counting – but what material to use in the rebuilding. 

Purists will want to replace the attic forest with wood, but the oak that burned came from primeval forests that no longer exist. Will they agree to sprinklers, firewalls and electric wiring for smoke detectors, of which the cathedral had none to preserve its historic nature?

The French government owns Notre-Dame, but permits the Catholic Church to preside and worship there in perpetuity. How politically skillful church and state leaders are in negotiating and executing the rebuilding will determine how long the effort takes, hopefully not the nearly two centuries it took to build the cathedral. 

While the world took a moment to lament the French Gothic structure’s loss, it’s interesting to ask what we hold dear in a medieval building that comparably few people in the world will ever visit. It’s the loss of familiarity, perhaps, of the comforting permanence such an iconic structure has in our subconscious. Notre-Dame has withstood wars, plagues as well as social, political and religious upheavals, not to mention degradations other than fire. 

Historically (and why lack of wiring and sprinklers is understandable but no longer practical), the cathedral is a connection to the past. Touching its stone walls and floors, peering up at its soaring stone vaulted ceilings, and marveling at its massive rose windows of stained glass assure us of the past and reassure us of the future.

Yet, in 2019, when scientists have warned the dangers of climate change are closing in unless we address the issue immediately, the future is uncertain. This is especially so for the children of the world who want the same chance to become productive adults as their parents, grandparents and great grandparents.

If a burning church built nine centuries ago can immediately move humanity to collectively help preserve it, then can we also move with the same urgency to address the man-made pollution that is threatening the existence of the cathedral known as earth? 

We owe it to our children.   

The Big Con: Everyone is in on It

Other than perhaps the red MAGA-hat wearing folks that show up at President Donald Trump’s it’s-all-about-me rallies, the recent congressional testimony by Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, that his former boss is “a con man” was of little revelation to most of the world.

Even those who believe he’s “not a politician,” “not beholden to special interests,” “is a businessman,” “telling it like it is,” “conservative,” and other hard-felt reasons know he’s conning them.

But then, they think that about every politician. However, there is a difference between a politician persuadingyou, and a politician conningyou. 

For a voter to know the difference is a matter of being truly honest; it isn’t enough to just say, “yeah, I know he’s a jerk, but so was Obama,” or as some evangelical conservatives like Jerry Falwell Jr. reason, “We’re never going to have a perfect candidate unless Jesus Christ is on the ballot.” That reasoning means your fine with things, no matter how bad, just as long as your self-interests are protected.

More illustrative is Robert Jeffress, pastor at the First Baptist Church in Dallas and a member of Trump’s Faith Advisory Group. In August 2018, after Cohen confirmed that in 2016 candidate Trump directed him to pay hush money to keep porn start Stormy Daniels quiet about her 2006 affair with Trump, Jeffress said this to Fox News:

“I know a lot of people are still perplexed — why are Christians so supportive of Donald Trump? Well, it’s really not that hard to figure out when you realize he is the most pro-life, pro-religious liberty, pro-conservative judiciary [president] in history and that includes either Bush or Ronald Reagan. I think that is why evangelicals remain committed to this president and they are not going to turn away from him soon.”

Evangelical opportunists like Lynch and Jeffress don’t buy Trump’s con, they just factor it into the calculus for moving their agenda. That’s why they supported Trump in 2016. In a way, they have become the very devil they’ve made a pact with.

For Trump, as long as he gains from championing the evangelical Christian interest, he’ll do their bidding, and they, at least most of them, will support him.

But evangelicals are not alone in cold-hearted calculating to have their myopic self-interest served, regardless of whether it damages society and the nation.

U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell, Republican majority leader, is unapologetic about it. A few weeks before Election Day in 2016, Democratic President Barrack Obama convened the legislative leaders from both parties to tell them about Russian interference in the elections. McConnell refused to sign a bipartisan statement condemning Vladimir Putin’s government. 

Former Vice President Joe Biden told the Council on Foreign Relations in January 2018 that McConnell "wanted no part of having a bipartisan commitment saying, essentially, 'Russia's doing this. Stop.' " Biden realized then that “the die had been cast … this was all about the political play.”

For conservative Republicans, who rejected Trump until he vanquished their candidates in the GOP primary, the political play is partisan self-interest—stacking the appellate courts and the U.S. Supreme Court with conservative judges. 

Unable to sway voters against typically Democratic-authored, legislation, i.e. affordable care act, common-sense gun regulations such as universal background checks and voting reforms that ensure every voter can cast a vote, Republicans want Trump-appointed judges to strike down moderate legislative initiatives not based on conservative interpretations of the Constitution—exactly what McConnell and Republicans falsely accuse Democratic-appointed judges of doing.

Certainly, McConnell and Republicans know Trump is a con artist, but until he stops serving their purpose – tax cuts for the wealthy, conservative judge appointments, abolishing consumer and environmental protections – they are content. For McConnell, it’s also personal: Trump appointed the senator’s wife, Elaine Chao, U.S. Transportation Secretary.

What helped the Big Con most, and where Russia contributed spectacularly, is social media—the gateway for disinformation (more so than even Fox News), misinformation, lies, falsehoods and the herding of voters into partisan corrals where many users of Facebook, Twitter, et al undiscerningly grab at whatever piece of information confirms their biased world views. 

Trump is a con artist, but most everyone is in on his con. Tens of millions of voters pulled the lever for someone they, in the not too distant past, would have otherwise rejected—an unprincipled, authoritarian, real estate developer who thinks not terms of serving the people or of meaningful programs to help people; not even in terms of actual negotiation, but in simple transaction: what can you do for me?

As Danish writer Hans Christen Andersen warned in the 19^thcentury, nearly half of American voters today choose to believe the naked Emperor wears fine new clothes rather than admit the Emperor wears no clothes. 

A Regretful President

During the midterm elections recently past, President Trump befriended a former political enemy whose father Trump accused of killing John F. Kennedy and whose wife Trump once made offensive, disparaging remarks. Politics breeds strange bedfellows. 

Trump, desperate for the Republicans to keep control of the Congress and advance his agenda, was in Texas stumping for GOP Sen. Ted Cruz, himself feeling desperate. He narrowly defeated Democrat Beto O’Rourke in a race he should have won easily.

            Smiling and praising his new friend, who he called “Texas Ted” to a gaggle of reporters, Trump was asked whether he regretted his claim during the 2016 election about Cruz’s father killing Kennedy. Trump waved the question off: “I never have any regrets.”

            Trump is not a man to have regrets, but this is something that even some of those who ardently oppose him doubt. Everyone has regrets. Why would Trump not have any regrets? Yet, we should believe him. When Trump speaks, for anyone who listens, he reveals himself. 

            A friend and an astute observer of people who is appalled by Trump asked me recently how the president, at age 71, could have learned so few life lessons at his age. That’s a question I’ve heard many people ask, as if Trump missed class those days life lessons were taught.

            Truth is, Trump did learn the lessons humanity lives by and cherishes – honesty, integrity, fairness, empathy, sacrifice, generosity, selflessness, kindness and sympathy. But Trump could not see how virtue would get him ahead in life, how it would make him wealthy beyond measure, how it would earn his father’s approval. 

            So, he chose dishonesty, deceit, deception, cruelty, hate, unfairness and pain to make his way in the world. Democracy doesn’t work for him because it doesn’t give him unfettered political power to reward his loyalists and punish his opponents, to rule with an iron fist in order to smash any obstacles or constituencies he perceives as threatening his wealth and power.

            Trump is the man in the high tower. He’s unreachable through interaction because that requires meeting someone at a common level; he’s transactional – what can someone do for him; what can he get from someone at minimal cost to him. Trump is just about power and money, as much power and as much money as he can get.

            The anger Trump’s opponents feel is born from frustration that an individual could deny empathetic traits such as regret. In life’s interactions, people expect honest, integrity, empathy, selflessness and fairness. However, Trump is a blank screen. He reserves those character traits for the transaction to ensure he gets what he wants.

In October, when CBS reporter Lesley Stahl in a “60 Minutes” interview asked Trump whether he had any regrets looking back at his first two years in office, Trump said, “I regret that the press treats me so badly.” A few weeks later, Trump shared what Sinclair Broadcasting characterized as a regret: "I would like to have a much softer tone. I feel to a certain extent I have no choice, but maybe I do," 

            As former New York Times editor and longtime journalist Howell Raines recently said of Trump, “To have regrets in life or in politics means you have principles.” 

The Senate Judicial Confirmation Process Works; It’s Some of the Nominees that Don’t

This headline and subhead to Brett Kavanaugh’s op-ed appeared in the Wall Street Journal on the eve of the Senate Judiciary Committee’s vote to move his U.S. Supreme Court nomination to a Senate confirmation vote. They say much about the man:

“I am an Independent, Impartial Judge: Yes, I was emotional last Thursday. I hope everyone can understand I was there as a son, husband and dad.”

Yet, he wasn’t there in those roles nor in his role as nominee. He was there as victim of a process that in his view was out to get him. 

He honed this point in this paragraph about his partial, anger-filled testimony that followed that of the woman who accused him of sexual assault when they were teenagers, Christine Blasey Ford: 

“I was very emotional last Thursday, more so than I have ever been. I might have been too emotional at times. I know that my tone was sharp, and I said a few things I should not have said. I hope everyone can understand that I was there as a son, husband and dad. I testified with five people foremost in my mind: my mom, my dad, my wife, and most of all my daughters.”

During his testimony, Kavanaugh lashed out at the process, made baseless accusations against Democrats as to the reason Ford stepped forward with her story, and dismissed the confirmation process as essentially broken: 

“This is a circus. The consequences will extend long past my nomination. The consequences will be with us for decades. This grotesque and coordinated character assassination will dissuade competent and good people of all political persuasions, from serving our country.”

He’s right, the consequences will be with us, and not just for decades.

They will be with us because the process worked, despite Kavanuagh’s emotional ouburst or Sen. Lindsey Graham’s rant in which he joined the nominee in blaming Democrats – “You’re looking for a fair process?” Graham said to Kavanaugh. “You came to the wrong town at the wrong time, my friend.” 

The process was fair, as fair as it has always been and always will be in the politically charged environment under which it’s conducted. Plenty of “good people” from all political persuasions have not been dissuaded in the past, and they won’t in the future. 

It’s not the process that’s broken, it’s the people in the process that are broken. Kavanaugh is a flawed nominee. As his outburst revealed, he’s not the best person to sit on the nation’s highest court. While partisans are fine with justices who evaluate the law solely through their particular partisan prism, most Americans are not.

The process, as difficult and perhaps distasteful as it may seem, revealed Kavanaugh as someone who is neither an independent nor impartial jurist, regardless of his insistence. Through his emotional testimony, and at times inappropriate behavior toward the senators, this 53-year-old man showed he could not handle a job interview for a lifetime appointment.

More importantly, the hearing process revealed a person born, raised and living in the ranks of privilege – white man privilege – where boys are not questioned about their actions nor required as men to accept responsibility for their actions, past or present. Instead, they are encouraged to pursue their dreams; dreams that lead some of them to position of power in this country.

The process also revealed Kavanaugh’s lack of maturity as well as his abiding sense of privilege.

His emotional outburst sounded not like a man defending his good name and his family, but like a man angry that he would have to submit to questions about past behaviors that he didn’t think relevant. He should have known as someone who has long been immersed in Washington politics that it didn’t matter what he thought was relevant, what mattered was what the senators, who represent the voters, thought was relevant. This alone raises questions about his jurisprudence.

If Kavanaugh was honest with himself – and he demonstrates that he lacks that capacity – he would have readied himself for the accusations levied against him and prepared an appropriate response that could have shown his empathy, his temperament and his humanity. We all makes mistakes, at any age. 

Instead, he wanted everyone to focus on his performance on the appellate bench, but the hearing process is not just to determine a nominee’s ability to write a legal opinion – computer programs can do that, if we let them – but also the humanity that goes into the thinking and analysis when deciding how to rule on an issue that affects people.

Christine Blasey Ford sounded more than just believable, she sounded credible because she came forward out of her “civic duty.” Kavanaugh could not understand her humanity or the desire of at least half the committee to understand his humanity. Instead, he became “emotional” because something he felt was owed him seemed to be slipping away. 

The American people don’t want a self-centered justice to get a lifetime appointment on the court; they want someone with experience, maturity and humanity.  

The Triumph of Trumpism: He's on Our Minds. Every Day.

In 2002, Mark Bowden, journalist and the author of “Black Hawk Down,” wrote this passage in the May issue of The Atlantic: “The sheer scale of the tyrant's deeds mocks psychoanalysis. What begins with ego and ambition becomes a political movement. [He] embodies first the party and then the nation.”

The three sentences, published in the roiling wake of the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, were part of a large piece, “Tales of the Tyrant,” about Saddam Hussein, whose country, Iraq, the United States invaded in March 2003 to oust the tyrant from power.

After nearly 24 years. Hussein achieved absolute control over the country, not just politically, but culturally; he insinuated himself into the daily lives of Iraqis. They thought about him, talked about him, and feared him. Every day.

As president of the United States, Donald Trump has accomplished this feat, thanks to the technology of mass communication, his bullying personality, his demagoguery, and a Republican Party willing to accept the disembowelment of our democratic institutions and presidential actions and declarations that challenge our Constitutional rights and principles and undermines American democracy’s foundation. 

Is Trump like Saddam Hussein? They share the same authoritarian tendencies that are abetted by the political party in power. For Saddam, it was the Baathist Party, who tolerated and abetted their autocratic leader’s behaviors for their own quest for power and wealth. Confident they could control him, they lost control, and Saddam led their country to near destruction. 

We witness the same with the Republican Party. They chose to abet his behavior once they realized they could not control Trump who enjoys overwhelming support among Republican voters. The GOP is Machiavellian because Trump fulfills their agenda. He redistributes the wealth with a massive tax cut to ensure the wealthy are wealthier and the poor are poorer; hollows out government with that same tax cut so services for helping people in need are no longer available; and marches GOP conservatives to absolute control over the American judiciary to ensure their agenda is upheld for a generation. 

An iron-clad conservative majority on the U.S. Supreme, with the confirmation of nominee Brett Kavanaugh, could be the GOP’s crowning achievement. For Republicans, the ends have justified the means. Trumpism has triumphed, but not because the GOP achieved its agenda. 

From his Tweets to his rousing political rallies, Trump’s demagoguery is masterful. He finds something to announce or do every day that is inappropriate to most people. He threatens to use the awesome power of the presidency to punish enemies. He is outlandish for the sake of outlandishness. He lies with the bravado of a strongman. He admires strongmen not because he aspires to be one of them, but because he is one of them; he never apologizes, never cares. 

Trump has accomplished what authoritarian figures like Saddam Hussein accomplished. He has Americans thinking about him, talking about him, and worrying (if not fearing) him. Every day.  

Where Does the Catholic Church Go from Here?

The grand jury report on Pennsylvania Catholic clergy stuns us not just for the excruciating details of sexual and physical abuse against more than 1,000 children by 300 priests over seven decades, but for a greater significance it holds. This is the beginning of the end of the Catholic Church.

The report signals that sexual abuse by clergy occurred, and occurs still, everywhere in the world; and church leaders, from the Vatican to the parish house, knew and have always known. How could they have not known?

“We believe that the real number – of children whose records were lost, or who were afraid ever to come forward – is in the thousands,” the grand jury states in the report’s introduction. “As a consequence of the coverup, almost every instance of abuse we found is too old to be prosecuted. But that is not to say there are no more predators. This grand jury has issued presentments against a priest in the Greensburg diocese and a priest in the Erie Diocese, who has been sexually assaulting children within the last decade. We learned of these abusers directly from their dioceses – which we hope is a sign that the [C]hurch is finally changing its ways.”

This is a crushing reality for the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics not blinded by the unquestioning obedience that allowed the Church to control the faithful for centuries. Catholics are torn about a faith most were born into, live and love. The allegations, the accusations and, in very few cases, convictions, have divided the Church. 

Vatican City in 2017

Some conservative Catholics are unable to accept that once trusted men with immense power over their ordinary parishioners chose to abuse that power. They seek comfort in the belief that the devil is at work, but evil is solely the work of men, and in this case, the men of the Church. 

Some moderate and liberal Catholics are in search of ways to correct the abject failures of the institution; some have decided to simply leave the Church, their sense of community shattered. 

The years of sexual abuse, and the victims’ accompanying emotional and mental anguish, have taken their toll. The years of Church leader denials that followed nearly every accusation; the years of cover-up, of moving abusing priests from one parish to another, letting them damage lives from one parish to another; the years of quietly paying off victims for their silence using hard-earned money dropped in the Sunday collections plates by unwitting parishioners. The years of struggle for victims tortured by guilt and shame, unable to reconcile their faith and their abuser. The years, the years … 

The latest revelations in the grand jury report come after years of revelations from Boston to Ireland to Chile and so many, many more dioceses. The revelations have exposed the corrosive acid that long ago seeped into the Catholic Church’s now crumbling pillars. The Catholic Church today is in the throes of death, corrupted thoroughly. I do not speak carelessly here. As a lifelong Catholic, I’ve watched for nearly 40 years the degradation of the Church that began many decades, if not centuries, earlier. The Church became too powerful; Church leaders deluded in the belief that the Church, and thus they, are infallible – they can do anything, God willing, and, indeed, when it came to children, anything is what they did, claiming God’s will, no matter who it hurt. 

Since the release of the grand jury report, more abusive priests have surfaced; more victims have come forward; more states have started their own grand jury investigations into clerical sexual abuse, which means more horrors to come. Despite the grand jurors’ optimism, “that the Church is finally changing its ways,” the Church, with its wealth and power, is not changing. 

Yet, despite that wealth and power, the Church, as it is currently organized, cannot withstand what is coming. A sign of the future is what occurred last week in deeply Catholic Ireland, where not too long ago the Church ruled with an iron fist. A mass protest greeted Pope Francis’ visit, where he apologized and asked forgiveness for the horrific years of sexual and physical abuse by clergy. Many were unconvinced. Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Ireland’s protests, and its recent landslide vote to legalize abortion, means the Church’s grip is no more.

The same has long been occurring in the United States. The archdioceses in Boston,Philadelphia,Pittsburgh,New York, Chicago,Washington D.C., Los Angeles and elsewhere are closing parishes and schools because the faithful no longer trust them, no longer believe the dogma and doctrine behind which individual priests, the leadership, and the institution abused children, abetted the abusers, and covered it up – evil in the name of God.  

Turmoil now reigns in the Church. The Church’s princes are turning on each other, driven by ideology and opportunity instead of Christ-like spirituality. Rather than address the problem of clerical sexual abuse, they exploit the problem in a struggle for political power. Conservative Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano accused liberal Pope Francis and senior Church officials of knowing about the abuse and the cover up. 

In pure political terms, this is an opportunity to remove an opponent. If Pope Francis knew of the abuse – again, how could he not? – then Archbishop Vigano did, too. There’s just no question. 

Can the Catholic Church survive? Yes, with fundamental reforms. While priests should marry and women should serve as priests, the real reform requires the Church to relinquish control; to re-examine Church dogma and doctrine, particularly infallibility, sin and the sacrament of matrimony; and to accept and embrace the faithful long shunned – those who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, transsexual and transgender.  

To be relative in the 21^stcentury, the Church should drop its 16^thcentury thinking; minister to the faithful’s spirituality rather than to their sexuality. The Church was never in a position to lecture anyone about sex. Unless it changes, the Church will not survive before century ends. 

Resorting to the Tyranny of the Minority

From the June 16, 2018 Tweet of U.S. President Donald Trump:

“My supporters are the smartest, strongest, most hard working and most loyal that we have seen in our countries [sic] history. It is a beautiful thing to watch as we win elections and gather support from all over the country. As we get stronger, so does our country. Best numbers ever!”

Not, “my fellow Americans” or “Americans,” as other presidents have referred to the nation of people they serve, but “my supporters.” 

Stunning, but not surprising from a man who is comfortable with authoritarian impulses and uncomfortable with the democratic principle that no one, not even the president or the makers of laws, is above the law. 

As one of American democracy’s Founding Fathers, James Madison, explained in article 51 of the Federalist Papers: 

“If men were angels, no government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.”

What makes Trump’s remark telling is that, a year-and-a-half into his presidency, having failed to get a majority of Americans to support his agenda, he is trying to use the tyranny of the minority to assume greater powers.

Trump uses them as a bulwark; to try and stop federal investigations into allegations that his 2016 campaign colluded with the Russians to get an electoral advantage over Democrat Hilary Clinton; state and federal investigations into his questionable New York charity and his international business dealings; his alleged violations of the Constitution’s Emoluments Clause (an anti-bribery rule against foreign power influence); the allegations against him for sexual assault; the lawsuits for defamation and for violation of federal campaign finance laws to pay an adult film star money to hush about a liaison. 

American suffragist Elizabeth Cady Stanton said in 1860: “To make laws that man cannot and will not obey, serves to bring all law into contempt. It is very important in a republic, that the people should respect the laws, for if we throw them to the winds, what becomes of civil government?”

Trump’s devoted supporters, and the Republican leaders who control Congress and who once thought they could control Trump but now fear him, prove helpful in his endeavours to stymie the ongoing investigations of the Justice Department’s Special Prosecutor Robert Mueller. They provide a wall of white noise to defend theirpresident and in the process, endorse the erosion of civil government and national unity.

National Republican Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel recently Tweeted what sounded like an authoritarian’s threat: “Complacency is our enemy. Anyone that does not embrace the @realDonaldTrumpagenda of making America great again will be making a mistake.”

GOP Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, a lawyer who understands criminal and civil investigations are not started or finished at behest of politicians, told the Washington Examiner last week, “What I think about the Mueller investigation is, they ought to wrap it up. It’s gone on seemingly forever and I don’t know how much more they think they can find out.”

As president, Trump possesses immense powers. He made McConnell’s wife, Elaine Chao, head of the U.S. Department of Transportation. Is it reasonable to assume McConnell has an ulterior motive to making such comments? 

McConnell and McDaniel (niece of Mitt Romney who is running for U.S. Senate in Utah and wants Trump’s help to win) are just two in a Republican Party that erstwhile or expatriate Republicans now consider the “Trump Party”. 

Trump accurately assessed the undying loyalty in the core of his supporters during a campaign rally in 2016: “I could stand in the middle of 5^thAvenue and shoot somebody and wouldn’t lose any votes, ok? It’s like incredible.” 

He’s used their loyalty to effectively diminish the government’s investigations into the allegations against him. An Economist/YouGov survey in early May showed 61 percent of Republicans believe Trump’s claim that Mueller’s investigation is a “witch hunt.”

Trump likes to characterize his base as "the forgotten." They are not. They are angry and afraid of the demographic changes, technological advances, and economic challenges transforming society today. They embrace Trump because he promises to reverse all that, to “make America great again.” 

Perhaps they are better characterized as “the unprepared”; they failed, for whatever reason, good or bad, to prepare themselves for the 21^stcentury. What they, and the nation, need is a leader, and leaders, with policies that guide them through the transformations.  

The president’s appeal to only his “supporters” who join him to tear down the Mueller investigation is dangerous to a democracy where the rule of law is paramount to a just and free society. 

As U.S. Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter wrote in 1947: “There can be no free society without law administered through an independent judiciary. If one man can be allowed to determine for himself what is law, every man can. That means first chaos, then tyranny.”

Ironically, the nation’s founders worried the “tyranny of the majority” would elect a demagogue who would harm the minority. They never figured on what happened in the 2016 election. Now it looks like the 2018 mid-term elections could either break or save American democracy.