Pacem in Terris by sam enderby

A few years after my grandfather died my mother had his copy of the "Tanach" rebound by a Moroccan Muslim from Queens (NY!). My mom thought that her father would have enjoyed such an ecumenical gesture for we were typical liberals after- all, who tried to always mind what zayde would do and say. He wasn't a railroad man for nothing. Anyway, upon its return the bookbinder made sure to mention that there was an old newspaper clipping still placed in my grandfather's book. He had left it where he found it. The article as I recall was an account of the funeral of Pope John XXIII and the lead or headline stated that the good Pope had requested a particular passage from "the Jewish Bible" to be read -the clipping is long vanished but I believe the passage was from the Book Of Isaiah and I wouldn't be surprised if it included the line about beating swords into plowshares. My grandfather was so taken by this that he saved the article and placed it in his Tanach in the pages where the verse was located ( so the next time you see a sign reading "Isaiah 2.4" being held up at a football game just think of my grandfather). Interestingly, for me only, on the reverse side of the article was a story that was filed by a "journalism 101" professor I once had ( its always a small world here at the jm). My grandfather came from a religious family but he himself was not a religious man tho' he was widely read in the "holy" books and he always maintained an inquisitiveness and a guarded posture toward the world. Wary, always. I would come to think of this later but I always thought he lived where he lived - and by extension my mom and my father and me- in a rather goyishe  (forgive my slanderous idiomatic usage) section of Queens, NY because he wanted to test (God). That and to be within walking

Sunnyside Yards around 1965-

distance of Sunnyside Yards, where the Pennsylvania Railroad- at one time- had its offices. At any rate he was rather moved by the Pope's request because- lets face it- Popes as a group weren't shall we say so nice to the Jews which pleased a lot of people living in certain parts of Queens at the time, but we can discuss this later. But this Pope-John XXIII- not only impressed my grandfather but succeeded in making a lot of Catholics angry when he convened what is called the Second Vatican Council and this convocation had the chutzpah to state as official church doctrine that All Jews or at least Most Jews were not and are not responsible for the death of Jesus (see: Nostra Aetate). After almost two thousand years this was some gantseh megilah. I can't help it but I always think of the old Lenny Bruce bit about the Jews being "christkillers" accusation and the note from his cousin (Morty?) found in the basement. Looking back with a squinting gaze it was a scary time - the big Vatican hoo-hah started around the time of that Cuban Missile Crisis and ended around the first large military escalation in Vietnam. By the time it ended Pope John XXIII had died. His death of complications from cancer came less than 6 months before the death of President John F. Kennedy of complications from some well-placed bullets along a busy Dallas intersection. Even though the Pope was 81 and the President 46 (!) at the time of their respective deaths a case could probably be made that something almost ethereally good went away from our world then not to return - at least not yet. Fifty years later with the Cold War behind us, with the advances in science and technology and medicine,  with a newly resolved civil and human rights agenda, with the U.S.A. still at the apex of its powers what, if anything, has changed - about us? About our world? What have we learned - if anything? Well, we've learned how to do a lot of stuff except what we should have been doing all along- how to be with one another. If this is starting to sound a little schmaltzy well it may have to do with this:

About two months before he died Pope John XXIII issued what is now a famous "papal encyclical", PACEM IN TERRIS (Peace On Earth). Famous, yes, but seldom read now and sadly- for these past 50 years, taken to heart. It was addressed not only to Catholics (in Queens and around the world) but to all men (and women, we assume) of goodwill. Among many things it stated: "conflicts should be resolved not by arms but by negotiation" -

Pope John XXIII

Its taken us a little while to grasp this; that "every man (and we're making a moral leap here-and woman) has the right to life, to bodily integrity, and to the means which are suitable for the proper development of life-these are primarily FOOD, CLOTHING, SHELTER, REST (!), MEDICAL CARE and finally the NECESSARY SOCIAL SERVICES. Therefore a human being also has the right to security in cases of sickness, inability to work, widowhood, old age, unemployment, or in any other case in which he is deprived of the means of subsistence through no fault of his own." - Or just the things left out of Paul Ryan's budget. But wait, there's more and then we'll dismiss. The Pope also said: " Furthermore- and this must be specially emphasized- the worker has a right to a wage determined according to criterions of justice, and sufficient, therefore, in proportion to the available resources, to give the worker and his family a standard of living in keeping with the dignity of the human person." So, uh, Pope XXIII was no Republican.

sam enderby | September 27, 2013 at 4:40 pm