By Mark Henry
On this Memorial Day, we are called to honor and remember those who have served our country. We must never forget that the freedom we take for granted is not free and comes with a heavy price. It is also a time to remember that we are one nation under God and we honor those in the military who sacrificed to keep it that way.
While all Americans need to be thankful for the service of our military veterans, there are those among us who owe a particular debt of gratitude to family members who served in the armed forces.
This Memorial Day is particularly significant for my family since my father, a veteran of WWII and the Korean War, was interred this week at Punchbowl National Cemetery in Hawaii. My father was one of a whole generation of young men who were pressed into military service when WWII broke out. Since Dad was not keen to fight in the trenches, he opted to enroll in flight training school to become a Marine aviator. Barely meeting the pilot minimum age requirement of 18, he went on to flight training school and was rushed into air combat in the Pacific.
By military standards, Dad had a successful tour of duty as he was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross among other wartime citations and awards. However, Dad never liked to talk much about his experiences in the war. In fact, the Catholic chaplain at my father’s memorial service this week nailed it when he said that if my father were here he would say he did nothing special, nothing but his duty.
My father’s memorial service last week was with "military honors" and was a deeply moving experience. Since I never served in the military, I had no idea what I was in for. Seeing an honor guard of seven Marine soldiers firing their rifles into the air three times was awe-inspiring. The ceremonial playing of taps by a lone bugler, followed by eight additional Marine honor guards presenting the American flag to me as the next of kin was an unforgettable experience.
Many Americans do not realize or appreciate the deep Christian symbolism which is reflected in the flag presentation ceremony at a military funeral. The honoring of God in the presentation of the American flag was personally comforting and surprising in this age where our federal government seems so determined to remove any semblance of Christian faith from the public square.
Each individual fold of the flag has symbolic significance, with a number of folds honoring God and traditional Christian values. At my father’s service, the flag was folded thirteen times by eight Marine honor guards, standing in two rows of four honor guards each.
The first fold of the flag is a symbol of life. The second fold of the flag is a symbol of a belief in eternal life. The fourth fold of the flag represents man’s fallibility, man’s need to trust in God and the importance of turning to God for His divine guidance in times of war and peace.
The twelfth fold of the flag symbolizes eternity and glorifies God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The thirteenth and last fold of the flag reveals the stars on the flag and symbolizes the United States' national motto, “In God We Trust.”
My father’s military memorial service, especially the flag presentation ceremony, was an experience that will live with me all my days. However, what made Dad’s memorial service not just moving but spiritually significant was realizing how different events in my father’s life, like the ceremonial folding of the American flag, manifested God’s providence and led my father inexorably closer to God.
Earlier in his life, my father never seemed to have too much of an interest in his faith. While he occasionally joined the family for services on holidays and other occasions, it seemed more in his character, as the battle hardened Marine combat pilot, to be the breadwinner, disciplinarian and sports coach rather than spiritual leader of the family. While the Lord may have called Dad, he was not yet willing to listen and the Lord's call fell, for the moment, on deaf ears.
However, during his final years my father’s worsening physical condition provided him a timely opportunity to reflect on his life, his accomplishments, his regrets and also his gradually awakening desire to come closer to Christ.
During this stage of Dad’s life, his numerous hospitalizations required that we, his family, “stand guard” at his bedside and literally defend his life. I believed it was the least we could do in return for all Dad did for us and his country. The need for this was clear as each time Dad was hospitalized the hospital staff tried to convince us that Dad was dying and it was futile and pointless to insist that he received life-sustaining care like food and water intravenously. According to the hospital staff, the better thing to do was to medicate him, not provide him nutrition and hydration and let him die.
Essentially, the hospital staff wanted us to agree that Dad could be euthanized. Fortunately, we resisted the unrelenting pressure of the hospital staff to terminally sedate Dad and each time Dad walked out of the hospital on his own.
While I did not realize it at the time, I eventually came to appreciate the eternal spiritual significance of the battle that we were waging for Dad. He needed just a little more time for God’s loving arms to embrace him. Had the hospital had its way and been able to euthanize Dad, he may not have come back to Christ and his soul could have been lost forever.
After Dad was discharged from the hospital for the last time, he sat down with me and the final and most joyous chapter of his life unfolded. I remember it well, after having lunch with my father and returning to his apartment we sat down and he asked me to tell him about my faith in Christ! Hearing his request brought a lump to my throat and tears to my eyes. Dad had now unfolded the first and second folds in the flag, he was acknowledging the importance of life and eternity.
This conversation with my father was the first in a sequence of memorable events that ended with Dad accepting Christ as his Lord and Savior. Soon enough, Dad began attending church services with us. He also started a daily prayer life, sometimes on his own and sometimes with friends of his who also had been encouraging him to renew his Catholic faith.
The Lord’s plan for my father was finally unfolding before my very eyes. By now, my father’s failing health made it apparent that he may not have long to live. He was now at the fourth fold in the flag and had recognized his own fallibility and his need to turn to God in this most difficult of times.
All to soon, Dad was admitted to the hospital for the last time and he took his final step of spiritual reconciliation - he confessed his sins to the hospital Chaplain and received the last rites. Dad was now unfolding the final folds in the flag where he recognized the need to reconcile with God, to glorify Him and to trust in His saving grace. Within twenty-four hours, the Lord tenderly reached out and took Dad home.
My father’s memorial service at Punchbowl last week was a tribute to a man, his service to country and his Catholic faith. Like the faith inspired folding of the American flag, Dad’s life journey was a testimony to the values of life, honor and God’s providence. My father, the prodigal soldier, finished faithful which was God’s plan for him all along. Semper Fidelis, Dad.
Monday, May 31, 2010
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Lessons Learned From Greece: Dominos and Subsidiarity
by Mark Henry
The recent economic chaos in Greece has generated shockwaves felt all the way to America with many financial commentators opining that last weeks dramatic stock market losses were due to Wall Street anxiety about the economic problems in Greece and what it portends for other countries which have adopted economic policies similar to those adopted in Greece.
The recently announced bailout of Greece by the E.U. Union and IMF are stop gap measures that fail to address structural weaknesses that are firmly entrenched in most European economies. These stress fractures of the welfare state are now spreading to the U.S. economy and the economic policies of America’s current political leaders threatens to exacerbate the economic hardship that may be in America’s future.
Political leaders in Europe and America would do well to adopt economic policies guided by pertinent Catholic social doctrine, including the principle of subsidiarity. If policymakers reject these Catholic teachings they will do so at their own peril and jeopardize the well being of the countries they have been entrusted to protect.
Essentially, Greece’s financial meltdown is due to the government’s socialistic leaning policies which, inter alia, promote government entitlements and discourage private enterprise. The Greek government policies favors government employees who receive higher wages, better benefits and more generous retirement than private sector employees. These policies require increasing levels of taxation and result in significant redistribution of wealth.
Greece’s policies favoring public employees are seen as a quid pro quo for the political support of these well provided for public employees. However, a recession weakened economy in Greece, combined with costly government entitlements has pushed the country to the brink of financial collapse. The European Union and the IMF have agreed to a monetary bailout of Greece in exchange for austerity measures which Greece’s ruling socialist leaders have been compelled to implement. These austerity measures include deep pay cuts to the salaries and pensions of government workers.
What the Greeks are learning – and what other developed countries in Europe are having to cope with – is that socialist economies doesn’t work very well and are not sustainable over the long-term. That’s why the E.U. and IMF have to bail out Greece.
The bigger problem is that other European countries like England, Spain, Portugal and Ireland also have “Greek” economic problems of their own with unsustainable overspending on government entitlement programs. Like Greece, these countries have also overpromised entitlements which they can no longer afford give to their citizens. The fear is that Greece is just the first domino to fall and if other countries follow the E.U. and IMF are going to be unwilling or unable to bail these other countries out. This could result in sovereign defaults with disastrous effects on the worldwide economy.
How can we understand the causes of this growing economic problem and discern the direction our political leaders should take to deal with it? As is usually the case, Catholic teachings provide helpful guidance on how the faithful should analyze this pressing problem.
Pope John Paul II harshly criticized the welfare state in his 1991 encyclical Centesimus Annus wherein he stated that the welfare state undermined this core principle of subsidiarity. This Catholic teaching states that when something can be done locally by a smaller simpler organization this is better than central planning type action by a larger and more complex organization. This tenet safeguards the ideals of limited government and personal freedom and stands squarely opposed to the welfare state’s goals of centralization and bureaucracy.
John Paul II warned us that the welfare state discourages human initiative and results in an excessive increase of public bureaucracies. This results in an enormous increase in spending by a government whose goal is to achieve its own statist agenda rather than to serve the public.
What we are seeing in Europe are the disastrous financial consequences that come to countries that reject subsidiarity and embrace the failed economic model of socialism. Recent images of Greek government workers rioting in the streets in response to limited austerity measures announced by Greece’s socialist ruling party is an omen of economic chaos that can spread throughout Europe and to America if unsustainable government entitlements are not brought under control.
However, the “fix” to these serious national economic problems is not a knee-jerk return to unfettered capitalism. The seeds of the serious recession we have been going through in the U.S. were planted during the Bush administration which was roundly criticized for excessive government spending and ineffectual regulation of the financial industry. And this occurred with an administration that professed support for free market policies instead of socialism.
While socialism’s economic failures are obvious and historically documented, improperly regulated capitalism has had its fair share of train wrecks as well. The 2008 stock market crash, recent banking and insurance industry failures and the collapse in real estate values were the handiwork of capitalism gone wild.
It is true that misguided government intervention into the free market arena was at least partially responsible for some of these economic collapses.
However, regardless of whether these economic failures were caused by free wheeling capitalists, wrong-headed statist minded politicians or all of the above, Catholic social teachings in the economic realm can be a light on the path to improving the economic well being of all of us.
In his recent Encyclical Letter Caritas in Veritate, Pope Benedict reveals his keen insight on some of the financial abuses which caused the recent meltdown on Wall Street. Pope Benedict writes “Economy and finance, as instruments, can be used badly when those at the helm are motivated by purely selfish ends. Instruments that are good in themselves can thereby be transformed into harmful one… The Church's social doctrine holds that authentically human social relationships of friendship, solidarity and reciprocity can also be conducted within economic activity.” (CV 36) Benedict goes on to say that “Financiers must rediscover the genuinely ethical foundation of their activity, so as not to abuse the sophisticated instruments which can serve to betray the interests of savers” (CV 65).
In light of these pressing economic problems how can Catholic’s chart a path which avoid the abject failures of socialism while avoiding the excesses of unbridled capitalism?
Steering clear of socialism’s bureaucratic welfare state is clearly called for. America needs to learn from and not embrace the failed social welfare system currently wreaking economic havoc in Europe. These failed ideologies have jumped the pond and are taking hold in America under the statist policies of the Obama administration and the majority party leaders.
The most recent example of European modeled statist policies being implemented here at home is the federal takeover of health care insurance, destined to be a huge public entitlement that will raise taxes but is not likely to measurably improve health care.
Another example of the recent drift towards the European style social welfare state is the accelerated growth of both the numbers of government employees and the benefits paid in the public sector. According to leading economic historian John Steele Gordon, federal workers currently earn almost twice what their private-sector counterparts earn. Further, Obama's new spending programs will result in a 14.5 percent increase in the number of federal employees in just two years.
A variety of other policies the America’s political leaders are pushing will, if unchecked, take us down the path of unsustainable government spending which is creating economic chaos in Europe.
On the other hand, an unconditional embrace of purely economic driven capitalism, bereft of any ethical parameters, is not the answer either. We have recently seen that this economic philosophy generally works but is accompanied by periodic upheaval that leaves far too many suffering in its wake. Pope Benedict’s Caritas In Veritate highlights the need for economic practices which are not just efficient and productive but are also based on ethical principles which promote positive human development.
Pope Benedict’s refreshing economic philosophy manifested itself recently in a recent study by the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences. This study was issued by the Pontifical Academy during its recent April 30 - May 4 session, just as the economic chaos in Greece was coming to a head.
Pontifical Academy Chair Mary Ann Glendon called for financial reform to promote “the essentially ethical nature of economics as an activity of and for human beings.” The study also attributed part of the current economic instabilities to an overreliance on speculative financial activities that are separated from productive activity in the real economy.
While this recent study shied away from detailed economic policy directives, it is sensible to conclude that we are called by Catholic social doctrine to take a middle path somewhere in between the two extremes of socialism and laissez faire capitalism.
To the extent that these recent teachings call for increased government oversight of the economy, it would be mistaken to interpret this as support for the type of top down centralized government control of major economic sectors like the recent federal government takeover of the health insurance industry.
While Catholic social doctrine acknowledges a proper role for government to play that role is purposely limited. Government is called to regulate but not to dominate or unduly control commerce. A country’s government and economic system need to coexist and have a complimentary relationship in order to advance the overall well being of a country’s citizens.
Fundamental Catholic teachings on both subsidiarity and the proper but limited regulatory role of government are a critical light on the path to guide socio-economic policies to maintain the delicate balance between government and economics. Political leaders who disregard these important Catholic social teachings jeopardize their own political futures and imperil the well being of the citizens they are entrusted to lead.
The recent economic chaos in Greece has generated shockwaves felt all the way to America with many financial commentators opining that last weeks dramatic stock market losses were due to Wall Street anxiety about the economic problems in Greece and what it portends for other countries which have adopted economic policies similar to those adopted in Greece.
The recently announced bailout of Greece by the E.U. Union and IMF are stop gap measures that fail to address structural weaknesses that are firmly entrenched in most European economies. These stress fractures of the welfare state are now spreading to the U.S. economy and the economic policies of America’s current political leaders threatens to exacerbate the economic hardship that may be in America’s future.
Political leaders in Europe and America would do well to adopt economic policies guided by pertinent Catholic social doctrine, including the principle of subsidiarity. If policymakers reject these Catholic teachings they will do so at their own peril and jeopardize the well being of the countries they have been entrusted to protect.
Essentially, Greece’s financial meltdown is due to the government’s socialistic leaning policies which, inter alia, promote government entitlements and discourage private enterprise. The Greek government policies favors government employees who receive higher wages, better benefits and more generous retirement than private sector employees. These policies require increasing levels of taxation and result in significant redistribution of wealth.
Greece’s policies favoring public employees are seen as a quid pro quo for the political support of these well provided for public employees. However, a recession weakened economy in Greece, combined with costly government entitlements has pushed the country to the brink of financial collapse. The European Union and the IMF have agreed to a monetary bailout of Greece in exchange for austerity measures which Greece’s ruling socialist leaders have been compelled to implement. These austerity measures include deep pay cuts to the salaries and pensions of government workers.
What the Greeks are learning – and what other developed countries in Europe are having to cope with – is that socialist economies doesn’t work very well and are not sustainable over the long-term. That’s why the E.U. and IMF have to bail out Greece.
The bigger problem is that other European countries like England, Spain, Portugal and Ireland also have “Greek” economic problems of their own with unsustainable overspending on government entitlement programs. Like Greece, these countries have also overpromised entitlements which they can no longer afford give to their citizens. The fear is that Greece is just the first domino to fall and if other countries follow the E.U. and IMF are going to be unwilling or unable to bail these other countries out. This could result in sovereign defaults with disastrous effects on the worldwide economy.
How can we understand the causes of this growing economic problem and discern the direction our political leaders should take to deal with it? As is usually the case, Catholic teachings provide helpful guidance on how the faithful should analyze this pressing problem.
Pope John Paul II harshly criticized the welfare state in his 1991 encyclical Centesimus Annus wherein he stated that the welfare state undermined this core principle of subsidiarity. This Catholic teaching states that when something can be done locally by a smaller simpler organization this is better than central planning type action by a larger and more complex organization. This tenet safeguards the ideals of limited government and personal freedom and stands squarely opposed to the welfare state’s goals of centralization and bureaucracy.
John Paul II warned us that the welfare state discourages human initiative and results in an excessive increase of public bureaucracies. This results in an enormous increase in spending by a government whose goal is to achieve its own statist agenda rather than to serve the public.
What we are seeing in Europe are the disastrous financial consequences that come to countries that reject subsidiarity and embrace the failed economic model of socialism. Recent images of Greek government workers rioting in the streets in response to limited austerity measures announced by Greece’s socialist ruling party is an omen of economic chaos that can spread throughout Europe and to America if unsustainable government entitlements are not brought under control.
However, the “fix” to these serious national economic problems is not a knee-jerk return to unfettered capitalism. The seeds of the serious recession we have been going through in the U.S. were planted during the Bush administration which was roundly criticized for excessive government spending and ineffectual regulation of the financial industry. And this occurred with an administration that professed support for free market policies instead of socialism.
While socialism’s economic failures are obvious and historically documented, improperly regulated capitalism has had its fair share of train wrecks as well. The 2008 stock market crash, recent banking and insurance industry failures and the collapse in real estate values were the handiwork of capitalism gone wild.
It is true that misguided government intervention into the free market arena was at least partially responsible for some of these economic collapses.
However, regardless of whether these economic failures were caused by free wheeling capitalists, wrong-headed statist minded politicians or all of the above, Catholic social teachings in the economic realm can be a light on the path to improving the economic well being of all of us.
In his recent Encyclical Letter Caritas in Veritate, Pope Benedict reveals his keen insight on some of the financial abuses which caused the recent meltdown on Wall Street. Pope Benedict writes “Economy and finance, as instruments, can be used badly when those at the helm are motivated by purely selfish ends. Instruments that are good in themselves can thereby be transformed into harmful one… The Church's social doctrine holds that authentically human social relationships of friendship, solidarity and reciprocity can also be conducted within economic activity.” (CV 36) Benedict goes on to say that “Financiers must rediscover the genuinely ethical foundation of their activity, so as not to abuse the sophisticated instruments which can serve to betray the interests of savers” (CV 65).
In light of these pressing economic problems how can Catholic’s chart a path which avoid the abject failures of socialism while avoiding the excesses of unbridled capitalism?
Steering clear of socialism’s bureaucratic welfare state is clearly called for. America needs to learn from and not embrace the failed social welfare system currently wreaking economic havoc in Europe. These failed ideologies have jumped the pond and are taking hold in America under the statist policies of the Obama administration and the majority party leaders.
The most recent example of European modeled statist policies being implemented here at home is the federal takeover of health care insurance, destined to be a huge public entitlement that will raise taxes but is not likely to measurably improve health care.
Another example of the recent drift towards the European style social welfare state is the accelerated growth of both the numbers of government employees and the benefits paid in the public sector. According to leading economic historian John Steele Gordon, federal workers currently earn almost twice what their private-sector counterparts earn. Further, Obama's new spending programs will result in a 14.5 percent increase in the number of federal employees in just two years.
A variety of other policies the America’s political leaders are pushing will, if unchecked, take us down the path of unsustainable government spending which is creating economic chaos in Europe.
On the other hand, an unconditional embrace of purely economic driven capitalism, bereft of any ethical parameters, is not the answer either. We have recently seen that this economic philosophy generally works but is accompanied by periodic upheaval that leaves far too many suffering in its wake. Pope Benedict’s Caritas In Veritate highlights the need for economic practices which are not just efficient and productive but are also based on ethical principles which promote positive human development.
Pope Benedict’s refreshing economic philosophy manifested itself recently in a recent study by the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences. This study was issued by the Pontifical Academy during its recent April 30 - May 4 session, just as the economic chaos in Greece was coming to a head.
Pontifical Academy Chair Mary Ann Glendon called for financial reform to promote “the essentially ethical nature of economics as an activity of and for human beings.” The study also attributed part of the current economic instabilities to an overreliance on speculative financial activities that are separated from productive activity in the real economy.
While this recent study shied away from detailed economic policy directives, it is sensible to conclude that we are called by Catholic social doctrine to take a middle path somewhere in between the two extremes of socialism and laissez faire capitalism.
To the extent that these recent teachings call for increased government oversight of the economy, it would be mistaken to interpret this as support for the type of top down centralized government control of major economic sectors like the recent federal government takeover of the health insurance industry.
While Catholic social doctrine acknowledges a proper role for government to play that role is purposely limited. Government is called to regulate but not to dominate or unduly control commerce. A country’s government and economic system need to coexist and have a complimentary relationship in order to advance the overall well being of a country’s citizens.
Fundamental Catholic teachings on both subsidiarity and the proper but limited regulatory role of government are a critical light on the path to guide socio-economic policies to maintain the delicate balance between government and economics. Political leaders who disregard these important Catholic social teachings jeopardize their own political futures and imperil the well being of the citizens they are entrusted to lead.
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