$50,000 Euphemism
James Kidd says we should call prenatal murder advocates “pro-choice” because that’s what they ask to be called (Letters, October 2004). No we shouldn’t, any more than we should call Adolf Hitler “pro-choice” in his treatment of Jews just because neo-Nazis would prefer that term to “pro-mass murder.”
That Kidd uses the cynically deceptive term pro-choice proves the maxim that he who controls the vocabulary controls the debate. Planned Parenthood, operator of the world’s largest chain of abortuaries, understood that well when they hired publicist Ruth Lieberman in 1973 to come up with a euphemism for their grisly business. She coined the term pro-choice, for which she was paid $50,000.
They got more than their money’s worth. Here we are thirty-one years later, and even Catholics are still using Planned Parenthood’s term, thus unwittingly helping to sanitize the reality that more than 40 million innocent unborn children have been murdered in their mothers’ wombs in the name of “choice.”
These dead babies’ Creator cannot be pleased when Christians use the abortionists’ whitewash terminology.
—Garvan F. Kuskey
Santa Barbara, California
James Kidd replies: I agree with Kuskey that we should challenge our opponents on the term pro-choice, but if you insist on referring to them as “pro-abortion” or “anti-life” while in a discussion with them, you will have opened the door to being called “anti-choice” and have no right to complain about it. Thus, it’s usually best to focus on destroying their arguments and leave the “pro-choice” discussion for another time.
Take It Down a Notch
Some articles in This Rock I find difficult to understand, or they seem too tedious. Perhaps if articles were simpler, then more people would get the point. I have a college degree, but when I try to understand topics presented in your magazine, some go over my head, or I lose interest quickly as it takes too long to make a point. The magazine seems more interested in philosophical and theological discourse than in giving simple answers for simple people such as me. Is it just me or do others have this problem?
—Roger Akers
Via e-mail
Creed Confusion
Thanks for publishing Carl Olson’s review of Luke Timothy Johnson’s The Creed (“From Creed to Screed,” September 2004). It was a great article. I am a fan of some of Johnson’s books and quite unhappy with others, and Olson did a great job of focusing on Johnson’s odd inconsistencies.
One minor correction, though: Olson repeats Johnson’s assertion that the phrase “He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary” is a faulty translation from the original creed. This is not the case.
At the Council of Nicaea in 325, this sentence indeed read: “For us men and for our salvation he came down and became incarnate”—no mention of the Holy Spirit or Mary. (See Norman Tanner, ed., Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, Georgetown University Press, 5). But this is not the creed we recite at Mass. The creed of Nicaea is only about three-fourths of our current creed; it defines the divinity of God the Son but not of the Holy Spirit.
The creed we recite at Mass is the creed from the Council of Constantinople (381), often called the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed. This creed reads: “For us men and for our salvation he came down from the heavens and became incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary.”
The Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed is usually abbreviated to just “the Nicene Creed,” but that term is not completely accurate.
On page 24 of Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, you can find the Latin and the original Greek:
Propter nos homines et nostram salutem descendit et incarnatus est de Spiritu Sancto et Maria virgine.
Dia ten emeteran soterian katelthonta ek ton ouranon kai sarkothenta ek Pneumatos Hagiou kai Marias tes Parthenou.
—Lawrence King
Seattle, Washington
Carl Olson replies: King’s criticism puzzles me. I do “repeat Johnson’s assertion” but only to refute it. I appreciate, though, King’s exposition on the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed.
Truth about Fiction
Todd Aglialoro of Sophia Institute Press sounds a bit frustrated and puzzled over why millions are reading The Da Vinci Code and comparatively few are reading excellent Catholic books (“Catholic Publishing: A Game for Suckers,” December 2004).
Between family commitments and church and community activities, not to mention a full- or part-time job, most people don’t have a chance to read much of anything until later in the evenings. After a chapter or two, exhausted eyes start to close, heads nod, and that’s the end of any good intentions for the night. That stack of wonderful Catholic books on the end table grows ever higher but remains mostly unread, and soon there’s no point in buying any more. About the only thing that keeps tired people motivated to read for more than a few minutes is a compelling story. That’s one reason many Catholics are buying theologically unsound works of fiction, but what is their alternative?
Last year, after I wrote a Catholic novel, I pitched it to dozens of Catholic publishers, and the answer was invariably the same: “We don’t do fiction.” I then contacted a “Christian” publishing house, but they weren’t interested in Catholic books. I eventually published it myself—and it’s selling like crazy.
The Holy Father has called on us to redeem the culture, and presumably that includes contemporary fiction. Jesus taught his doctrines by means of stories. Maybe it’s time we do likewise.
—Carol Tardiff
Troy, Michigan