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The Pope's
Division
By Willliam J. Hamblin and Daniel C. Peterson
When an advisor
warned him against conflict with the Catholic Church, Josef Stalin
contemptuously demanded, “How many divisions does the pope
have?” It was a rhetorical question. It presumed the obvious:
With no army at all, what threat could the pope pose to Soviet tyranny?
Stalin's presumption
was wrong. Less than three decades after his death, the Catholic
Church elected a Polish pope. This was a vital factor in the collapse
of communism, not only in Poland but throughout Eastern Europe.
The triumphant homecoming of John Paul II soon after his election
in 1978 demonstrated that the pope has many powerful "divisions."
Blindness to
the continuing power of religion is not limited to Kremlin atheists.
In the mid- to late 1970s, as discontent with the rule of the Shah
in Iran began to boil, both government and academic experts on the
Middle East routinely downplayed it. After all, who were the Shah's
opponents? A ragtag alliance of bazaar merchants, led by Islamic
clergy who, it seemed, had scarcely emerged from the Middle Ages.
The Shah, by contrast, had a large and well-trained army. He had
tanks. He had jet fighter aircraft. In a struggle between the twentieth
century and the seventh, who could doubt the outcome?
For more than
two decades now, the West has struggled to cope with the Islamic
Republic of Iran. We have faced militant Islam in Algeria, in the
Sudanese civil war, in Afghanistan, in Beirut and south Lebanon,
in the Philippines, at the World Trade Center. Islamic fundamentalism
will challenge us for years to come, abroad and at home.
The notion
that the world is growing more secular -- that, as technology and
prosperity increase, religion inevitably loses its influence --
is simply wrong. Stalin and his successors are gone; the pope remains.
Even in the State Department, an awareness of religion as a forgotten
dimension of diplomacy and political analysis begins to dawn.
The realization
has hardly come too soon. Around the world, religions and religious
people exercise not a diminishing, but an increasing influence
on public affairs. India and Pakistan exist as separate countries
because of divisions between Hindus and Muslims. Now Sikh activism
complicates the scene. Extremist Catholics and Protestants in northern
Ireland have kept their bloody conflict going for years. Ultra-orthodox
Jews in Israel confront an ever more militant Palestinian Islamic
movement. U.S. politicians court the Christian Right. Sportswear
giant Nike recently capitulated to a coalition of unhappy American
Muslims who threatened it with a boycott. Even the prosperous and
largely secular Japanese have suffered from the deadly fantasies
of a conspiratorial religious group armed with poison gas.
Of course,
not all manifestations of religion in contemporary society are negative.
While violent, frightening or bizarre elements of religion grab
headlines, it's most powerful effects are surely found in the private
lives of ordinary people, in their work and families, in what they
choose to value or reject, and how they respond to stress and sorrow.
The surge of evangelical Christianity gives meaning and discipline
to millions of Americans. Prison officials across the nation report
that the spread of Islam and conservative Protestantism assists
in rehabilitating inmates and lowering their rate of recidivism.
Recent studies seem to confirm the power of religious belief to
promote mental health, and even to aid recovery from illness and
injury.
Religion is
hardly dead. Fundamentalist Christianity flourishes in Brazil. In
rural Guatemala, it may already have supplanted Catholicism. Mormonism,
some say, is poised to become the first new global faith since Islam
emerged from Arabia in the seventh century. U.S. Muslims now outnumber
adherents of some of the so-called "mainline" churches.
There will soon be more regular worshipers in the mosques of the
United Kingdom than in Anglican churches. The Islamic prayer call
echoes through Balkan cities where, not long ago, atheism was imposed
by law and the practice of any faith at all was a criminal offense.
Religion is
vibrantly, fascinatingly, alive.
Our essays
will examine it around the world -- Christian and non-Christian,
ancient, medieval, and modern -- from many perspectives. Religion
is of virtually infinite interest and human significance (not to
mention its importance in eternity). We hope that you share our
enthusiasm for this richly varied and instructive subject.
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© 2003Meridian
Magazine. All Rights Reserved.
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