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NCR Making the world fit for our children
Every time a child is born, the
initial promise of creation is renewed. The child is slapped on the backside
amid ooing and cooing and general elation and even silliness because humans are
overwhelmed by a mystery come to earth, a life, something we cant yet
find anywhere in the universe beyond our own small planet. No wonder were
beside ourselves.
All too often the initial euphoria blows over. While parents
love of their children is one of the most magnificent forces on earth, it is
often no match for other, gloomier aspects of the human condition. Our best
efforts have always failed to keep children pristine as they were born. In
short, they become adults, with all the loss of innocence that implies. Or in
other words, they become like us. They cant escape it.
Two great champions of children are featured in our pages this
week. Marian Wright Edelman has spent her working lifetime fighting for the
young on any number of fronts. Having done so in all the conventional ways,
especially through the Childrens Defense Fund she founded, she now tells
NCRs Arthur Jones in an exclusive interview that her next effort
may be a movement of parents, grandparents and young activists aimed at
convincing this nation to put its children first.
Jonathan Kozol has written another book on children. A substantial
excerpt shows what magic and grace they are born with, and consequently how
urgent it is to cherish their uniqueness.
In our education supplement several other contributors likewise
take the young to heart.
In Quest for the Grail, Fr. Richard Rohr tells what he
claims is a true story. A family with a 4-year-old son had another baby. They
brought the new baby home and put it in its crib. The older boy at that point
said to his parents, I want to talk to my little brother. The
amused parents encouraged him, but the boy insisted he wanted to do it alone.
So the parents left the room, but cheated by eavesdropping at the door.
The little boy approached the crib and said to the baby:
Quick, tell me who made you, and where you came from. Quick -- Im
beginning to forget.
Last week we brought you the story
of a womens spirituality series in the Arlington, Va., diocese that was
cancelled because Bishop Paul Loverede concluded its presenters hold
positions contrary to the formal teachings of the church. One of those
presenters is Arlington-based artist Mary Lou Sleevi, a lifetime Catholic whose
work, among its other manifestations, has been exhibited at meetings of the
U.S. bishops. She acknowledges a feminist dimension in her paintings, but
insists that this does not constitute an attack on the church. The
image of the biblical woman at the well on this page, nicknamed by Sleevi
Some Mary From Samaria, is an example of her style. If this is
subversive, perhaps the church in Arlington is in bigger trouble than even
Loverede realizes.
-- Michael Farrell
National Catholic Reporter, March 24,
2000
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