Divine disobedience: profiles in Catholic Radicalism

328 Pages·1970·3.619 MB·English

by  Francine du Plessix Gray

Profilesi n Catholic
Radicalism
DISOBEDIENCE
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Francme du PIeSSIx Gray
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Their commitment to Catholicism is total. Their
conscientious rebellion sends tremors through
the hierarchy of the Church, to which they are
devoted. Their revolutionary action in the ser-
vice of God confounds the secular establish-
ment. Their voices speak directly to the young
and the disinherited. The dissenting priests here
brilliantly portrayed embody the radical thrust
within the Roman Catholic Church today.
Davip Kirgk of Emmaus House. The “early
Christian community’ > he founded in East
Harlem—with its swinging liturgies, its work
with addicts, its sanctuary for draft resisters, its
ties with other “cells” in the Underground
Church—was in 1967 considered the vanguard
of the New Left. ..
THE BERRIGAN BROTHERs: DANIEL, poet-priest
and Pied Piper to the young; PuiLip, worker-
priest, pouring blood on draft files; both broth-
ers, together, leading the Catonsville Nine,
invading a Maryland Selective Service head-
quarters, putting its records to fire, standing
trial, going joyously to prison. ..
Ivax ILLich, aristocrat, intellectual, shepherd of
the dispossessed. The inquisition to which he
was subjected in the cellars of the Vatican in
1968, purportedly manipulated by a cabal of
(continued on back flap)
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THIS IS A BORZOI BOOK
PUBLISHED BY ALFRED A. KNOPF, INC,
Copyright © 1969, 1970 by Francine du Plessix Gray
All rights reserved
under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions.
Published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., New York,
and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada
Limited, Toronto.
Distributed by Random House, Inc., New York.
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 78-106627
These articles first appeared in a slightly different form
in The New Yorker magazine.
Lines from “A Masque of Reason” from
The Poetry of Robert Frost,
edited by Edward Connery Lathem, are reprinted by
permission of Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc.
Copyright 1945 by Robert Frost.
Lines from Poems 1923-1954, by e. e. cummings, are reprinted
by permission of Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc.
MANUFACTURED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
FIRST EDITION
Introduction
This is a book about the conscience of dissent and about
the role it has played in shaping the destinies of several ex-
traordinary men. Of all the forces that have forged the up-
heaval within the Roman Catholic Church in the past
decade—the revolutionary vision of Pope John XXIII, the
liberation brought about by the Second Vatican Council,
the crisis of authority which ensued from it—one phe-
nomenon has interested me the most: the character of those
Catholics who have remained deeply dedicated to their
faith while rebelling against the Church’s traditional struc-
ture and who, in the course of their rebellion, have also
become some of the most militant critics and reformers of
secular society. I have tried to explore the character of the
new Catholic radical; to examine the tension in his con-
science between his understanding of the Gospel and the
rigidities of the institutional Church; and to consider his
impact upon the secular world.
The phenomenon of the new Catholic radicalism has
been particularly ironic in the United States, where the
Catholic community has always been the most chauvinistic
and conservative segment of the nation. Its most succinct
explanation, if one dare put it in a single sentence, is that
repression breeds radicalism. Thus, in a time of profound
social and political crisis such as we have lived through
in the past decade, it is the men bred in the strongest climate
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Introduction
of repression and of moral absolutism, the men brought up
in that most rigorously authoritarian of all families—the
Catholic Church—who may become some of the most com-
mitted leaders of that dissident minority which is the leaven
of reform.
I wish to make it clear, however, that my understanding
of radicalism, both in its semantic and historical senses, 1m-
plies a return to roots. The non-violent revolutionaries such
as the men I write about wish to return to ancient ideologi-
cal principles—be they principles of the Gospel or of the
Constitution—which they feel have been sullied by time
and by the blind obedience of docile majorities. In this
sense the rebel heroes of this book are deeply traditional,
deeply conservative men.
Before all else I want to thank my mother and father,
Tatiana and Alexander Liberman, for the love and sup-
port they have offered me over the years. Anything I do
will always be bettered by their trust in me, and by the
standards which they have set in their own work and in
their lives.
My interest in the Roman Catholic Church was rekin-
dled by an Episcopalian minister, Reverend Otis Charles,
of Washington, Connecticut, who inspired me to start this
book. I thank Father Charles for his friendship and advice,
and for the warmth and wisdom which he offers to all who
seek his help.
I am indebted to my husband, Cleve Gray, for this book
getting written and finished. It could not have been done
without his love and his enthusiasm, and his patient pen-
ciling of drafts.
I am deeply grateful to the four editors—William Max-
well, William Shawn, Judith Jones, and Robert Silvers—
who have given me the confidence to be a writer.
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Introduction
Among the many persons who have helped me in the
execution of this book I particularly thank Fathers Daniel
and Philip Berrigan, whose vision has transformed my view
of the world beyond recognition, and whose friendships
I treasure; His Excellency Sergio Mendez Arceo, Bishop
of Cuernavaca, Mexico, who I believe senses and conveys
what the Holy Spirit is about more clearly than any other
bishop in the Church; Ivan Illich, who has helped me to
understand the complex simplicity of the Christian faith;
and David Kirk, Richard Mann, and Lyle Young of Em-
maus House, whose style of ministry is symbolic of the
change in character of the American Church in the past
decade. All have been patient and kind sitters for a very
Inquisitive portraitist.
I am also indebted to Jerome Berrigan and his wife,
Carol, for their warm friendship and their generous help
in researching the Berrigan family’s biography; to William
O’Connor and Brendan Walsh for their assistance in
documenting the history of the Baltimore Peace Mission;
to all of the Catonsville Nine, particularly Tom Lewis and
George Mische, for helping me to document the back-
ground of their trial; to the Catonsville Nine’s lawyers,
William Kunstler and Harold Buchman, for elucidating
many legal points; to Tom Cornell and John Grady for their
aid in studying the background of the Catholic Resistance;
to Vincent McGee, Jr., for a perceptive job of copy
editing. And I am particularly indebted to James Forest
of the Catholic Peace Fellowship, whose generous loan of
clippings, letters, and other documents made the writing
of the Berrigan profile possible, and whose committedness
and sacrifices remain a source of inspiration to many of us.
Others whom I wish to thank for giving me their time
to discuss some of the issues touched upon in this book are:
Martin Corbin, David Eberhardt, Dr. Harvey Cox, Betty
Bartelme, Reverend William Sloane Coffin, Jr., Pastor
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While there is a lower class,
Laminit...while there is a soul
in prison, l am not free.
—Eugene Debs
“Welcome to Emmaus House!” Father Mann said. “Shall
we begin? Let’s gather around.”
Father Richard Mann was a dapper young man with
angelically blond hair, dressed in gray trousers, a striped
shirt, and a fastidious paisley tie. He set a bottle of Chianti
and a loaf of Italian bread on the table. Waving small sheets
of typewritten paper, he walked among the forty people
who sat chatting in the living room of an East Harlem
brownstone.
“Who wants to help with the Agape?” he asked. I
need three people to read parts of the service.”
Several hands were raised. Father Mann distributed the
papers to three members of his congregation. He clapped
his hands and the Sunday service at Emmaus House began.
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Divine Disobedience
The crowd rose cheerfully and carried their teacups
and cigarettes into the adjoining room, where several dozen
folding chairs had been placed around the table on which
the bread and wine were set. It was a neat, brightly lit
room whose furnishings had clearly been assembled out of
charity. One wall was plastered with photographs of Teil-
hard de Chardin, Bertrand Russell, the Beatles, and Pope
John receiving African pilgrims. A mural had been recently
painted on the opposite wall, under the motto, “Fly the
Friendly Skies of United,” in that post-Matisse floral style
which characterizes the art of progressive nuns. The con-
gregation was of varied ages, scholarly in appearance, neatly
and modestly dressed. A bearded young man seated under
an enormous photograph of Gandhi strummed on a guitar.
Father Mann lit a2 narrow cigar and said: “Our kappell-
meister has to fill us in on the tunes. What’s on the pro-
gram?”’
“We'll sing ‘A Little Help from My Friends’ at the
Offertory,” the guitarist said softly. “And as a recessional
we'll sing ‘Pack Up Your Sorrows.” ”
“That fills me with Christmas cheer,” Father Mann
said. “As usual on Sundays, we’ll start with announce-
ments. I want to say that the new issue of our Emmaus
House magazine—The Bread is Rising—is out. It’s swing-
ing. Help yourself to a copy. Also, I hear that there’s a
peace vigil at the UN Plaza on Tuesday from five to nine.
I£'ll be bloody cold, but let’s all try to get there and pray or
picket or something. Any other announcements?”
“Over here on the bulletin board,” said a young girl
with long black hair, “I've posted up a list of names of
boys who are in prison for refusing to fight in Vietnam.”
She pointed to a leaflet titled, “Send a Christmas Card to
Jail.”” “Please let’s all try to give them our sympathy by
Writing them a note.”
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Emmaus House
The congregation clapped enthusiastically. Another
girl of student age stood up and said, “At four o’clock
every day this week, at Marymount Manhattan College,
Father Roman Verosko, from Saint Vincent’s Abbey, a
way-out Benedictine poet, painter, musician, et cetera, will
put on a performance of mult-media art. I recommend
it to all.”
“Wild,” Father Mann said, flicking a bit of ash from
his cigar. “I guess that’s all the announcements, so let’s get
on with the Agape. Joyce, will you take over?”
Every few weeks at Emmaus House, a radical Catholic com-
munity in East Harlem that includes many non-Catholics,
a different member of the congregation prepares the Agape,
an ecumenical celebration which includes prayers, songs,
readings, and the breaking of bread. This Sunday, Joyce
Richardson, a pretty black social worker, had been asked
by Father Mann to prepare the readings. She spoke in a
low, gentle voice, holding a sheaf of notes on her lap.
“Christmas 1s just a week away,” she said, “so I want to
talk about how hard birth is, how hard it 1s for all of us to
get out of the womb. By that I mean that once we are
born we re-create wombs for ourselves—we limit our
identities by our race, our religious denominations, our
homes, the street we live on, the social class we belong to.
True Christian rebirth would mean to break through these
definitions.”
She waved impatiently at a reproduction of a Raphael
Nativity scene that had been tacked up on the wall and
went on, “We're all fed up with that conception of Christ-
mas, as we're fed up with the impersonal traditional liturgy
that’s been imposed on us since we were children—the
coldness, the separatism of it all. Christmas and rebirth
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Divine Disobedience
really mean being with people who help us get out of our
own 1dentities, who help us create a sense of true com-
munity. Well, I’ve chosen a set of readings about this
theme of rebirth. Our first reading i1s from Henry Miller’s
Tropic of Capricorn.”
She nodded to a middle-aged, schoolteacherish woman,
who read:
Everything that bappened to me bappened too late to
mean much to me. It was even so with my birth. Slated
for Christmas 1 was born balf an hour too late. It always
seemed to me that I was meant to be the sort of individual
that one is destined to be by wvirtue of being born on the
25th day of December. Admiral Dewey was born on that
day and so was Jesus Christ . . . perbaps Krishnamurti too,
for all 1 know. Anyway, that’s the sort of guy I was meant
to be. But due to the fact that my mother bad a clutching
womb, that she held me in bher grip like an octopus, I
came out under another configuration—uwith a bad set-up,
in other words. They say—the astrologers, 1 mean—that
it will get better and better for me as I go on: the future,
in fact, is supposed to be quite glorious. But what do 1
care about the future? It would have been better if my
mother bad tripped on the stairs on the morning of the 25th
of December and broken bher neck . ..
The worshippers laughed uneasily. Without prompting,
the guitarist said that he was going to read an excerpt from
a book called The Politics of Experience, by R. D. Laing.
Most people most of the time experience themselves and
others in a way that 1 shall call egoic. That is, centrally
or peripherally, they experience the world and themselves
in terms of a comsistent identity, a me-over-bere against a
you-over-there
. . .
The guitarist cleared his throat.
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