HerbEly

Politicization of Intelligence, Part V

Since July 13, 2004 , this blog has been reporting the story of an Iraqi intelligence source code named “Curveball.” You can follow this story by reading a WaPo review of  On the Brink: An Insider's Account of How the White House Compromised American Intelligence  by Tyler Drumheller.

This book is one more manifestation of “Herb’s Law.” Any former intelligence officer or analyst who gets into the press will say: "If the administration had heeded my warning they wouldn’t have these problems." (This blog is no exception. In May, 2004 I was contending that the intelligence community was in denial about Iraqi WMD programs.)

Based on the review, Drumheller is angry, feeling that had his warnings been heeded the war against Iraq might have been avoided. As far as I can tell, his anger is justified.

Note: This post linked to Beltway Traffic Jam for 12/13/2006

Relearning and Old Lesson with the Help of Santana Moss

This morning's WaPo has a story about the Washington Redskins pass reciever Santana Moss:

Santana Moss, dogged by a series of hamstring problems, will come nowhere close to the franchise record he set for receiving yards in 2005, but in a league filled with wide receivers who whine about their roles or production, Moss has been a mature and incident-free presence with the Redskins.

In both tough and successful times, Moss has endeared himself to teammates and coaches. The former Miami star said that hasn't always been the case with him -- he had an occasional flare-up when he was with the New York Jets -- but he has learned to control his emotions as well as his tongue. Moss, 27, has maintained a perspective on his ups and downs that does not go unnoticed, especially when teammate Brandon Lloyd is throwing helmets -- and tantrums.

"I used to pout and [complain] and moan and worry about this and worry about that, but what it all boils down to is you're hurting something else," Moss said. "All we can do is get better. We can't sit around here and dwell on what happened. We have to move on."

While he may not realize it, Moss has given us one more concrete application of the Serenity Prayer. We only harm someone else - or ourselves - when we worry about things over which we have no control. In case you haven't seen it, click here for the complete version.

I'm sure coach Joe Gibbs is happy with Moss's newfound maturity. Every employer could wish that all of us would "go forth and do likewise."

Should The “Widow’s Mite” Story Make Us Feel Guilty?

    In Sunday’s gospel reading (Mk 12:38-44 ) we hear three contrasting positions on the use of money:

• The scribes – glory seeking religious leaders of the day – rapaciously consume the savings of poverty stricken widows.
• Rich people who put large sums in the temple treasury
• A widow who gave the last of her meager savings to the temple – “all she had, her whole livelihood.

Through the years, I’ve heard this gospel interpreted as a criticism of the rich for failing to contribute even larger sums. The meaning is different and in many ways more challenging than a surface appeal for more funds. To get to the meaning, it helps to compare this story with the advice of St. Paul, in his Second Letter to the Corinthians, (Chapters 8 and 9.)

Sexual Harassment at the Air Force Academy, the Archdiocese of Boston and the US Congress

As I think about these recent scandals:

• Representative Mark Foley (R-FL) resigns after his harassment of a young male page is exposed
• Cardinal Bernard Law is transferred to Rome and placed in a Basilica after numerous news stories and investigations of priests sexually harassing young boys

I’m reminded of this statement concerning a series of rapes at the Air Force Academy:

DENVER, March 26, 2003
(AP) The top two leaders at the Air Force Academy are not responsible for the sexual assault scandal at the school, but they should be held accountable for the culture that allowed the problem to continue, Air Force Secretary James Roche said Wednesday.

"Still, change must occur, and a new leadership team to implement these changes is in the best interest of the academy and the Air Force," Roche said in a statement.

The top two academy officers - Lt. Gen. John D. Dallager and Brig. Gen. S. Taco Gilbert III - are among five officers involved in the shake up. Dallager is expected to remain as superintendent and the top official at the 4,100-cadet institution until his scheduled retirement in June.

The Air Force announced Wednesday that it will replace the other four, at least two of them by women, and it will implement a series of directives aimed at making the school safer for cadets.

Air Force officials declined additional comment until a news conference scheduled later Wednesday.

Roche said he and Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. John Jumper would monitor the academy closely.

"You can't just fire a couple of generals and think the problem is solved because you've missed the point," Roche said. "The culture at the academy absolutely must change. We're going right at the culture, but you don't change the culture with one memorandum."

Based on these examples, which of the three institutions holds its leaders to a higher ethical and moral standard? Where would you rather have your son, or daughter, serve?

Class: The Practice Of Spirituality In The Workplace

Starting on January 9, 2007 I will part of a team offering an 8 week class/workshop on the proper practice of spirituality in the workplace. The class will take place on Tuesday evenings at  Richmond Hill

an ecumenical Christian fellowship and residential community who serve as stewards of an urban retreat center within the setting of a historic monastery. Our mission is to advance God's healing of metropolitan Richmond through prayer, hospitality, racial reconciliation, and spiritual development.

We are a diverse group from many Christian traditions, with a variety of occupations and interests, but all touched with the need for a spirituality which addresses the issues of modern urban life. The residential community lives by a modern Benedictine rule which is based around three common prayer times each day.

The class will be based on Gregory Pierce’s Spirituality at Work: 10 Ways to Balance Your Life on the Job

    The religious blogosphere is filled with debates over the role of the church in the political arena, along with stories about the IRS and voter guides published by the religious right and left. 

    Most of us, it seems to me, will influence more people through our work than we ever will as campaign workers or in the voting booth. Given this, it seems that the institutional church’s primary effort should be focused on helping its members to insure that their work is a service to God’s kingdom and a sharing it God’s creative effort.

    To see how this might be done, please read my review review of Gregory Pierce’s book.

Cut It Off – but What is It?

    Last Sunday's gospel gives us a startling and challenging image:

If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter into life maimed than with two hands to go into Gehenna, into the unquenchable fire.
And if your foot causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter into life crippled than with two feet to be thrown into Gehenna.Mark 9: 43-45

    What is there, in our lives, that so strongly holds us that it will cause us to sin – either by omission or commission? If you want to know, try rephrasing the saying, substituting some other parts of ourselves that might cause us to sin and the nature of that sin.

If your dedication to your job causes you to work 24/7 ignoring your family and your own health, cut it off.

If your desire for power and prestige causes you to fail to tell your boss the truth when the public safety is on the line cut it off. (I suspect that there a large number of Enron employees and Presidential aides who wish that they had heeded this verse.)

If your need for possessions causes you to encumber your own life and home, cut it off.

If your need for esteem and affection causes you sacrifice your legitimate needs in order to gain someone else’s approval, cut it off.

If your need for safety and security causes you to avoid taking up a new profession or changing your lifestyle, cut it off.

The immediate objection is that dedication to job, power and prestige, and “worldly goods” can all be positive goods that help us to care for ourselves, and others, in this world. It is through our jobs that we provide service, care for our families and find ways to be creative.

In order to see past this objection one must discern whether dedication to job, etc. are “causing one to sin.” The best way of discerning this comes from the first principle first principle of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius.

The human person is created to praise, reverence, and serve God Our Lord, and by doing so, to save his or her soul.

All other things on the face of the earth are created for human beings in order to help them pursue the end for which they are created.

It follows from this that one must use other created things, in so far as they help towards one's end, and free oneself from them, in so far as they are obstacles to one's end.

To do this, we need to make ourselves indifferent to all created things, provided the matter is subject to our free choice and there is no other prohibition.

Thus, as far as we are concerned, we should not want health more than illness, wealth more than poverty, fame more than disgrace, a long life more than a short one, and similarly for all the rest, but we should desire and choose only what helps us more towards the end for which we are created.

If we are indifferent to goods, power and prestige, or health and security, we are surely ready to “cut it off.”

    The challenge of the gospel is for us to learn what it is that causes us to sin by omission or commission. Given the power of the human soul to fool itself, we need to understand that it is only with time, prayer and perhaps the help of a spiritual director, coach or trusted friend.

    Cutting it off is a daunting prospect. Gerald May’s Addiction and Grace: Love and Spirituality in the Healing of Addictions is an excellent source of advice, both for distinguishing legitimate needs from disordered attachments and for meeting the demands of Mark 9:43-44 in "cutting it off."

 

Did You Hear a Labor Day Sermon?

I didn’t. If you did, was it about the value of work or social justice for working people. Here are some thoughts from Mike McLoughlin on Why are Churches So Silent When It Comes to Labour Day?

I think the main reason Church ministers don’t mention work is simply because they live in an entirely different world than most of their congregations. For them the only important work is that which builds the Kingdom of God which is by their definition religious work such as evangelism.

So, although this is the day that our society honors work, very likely you did not hear a sermon or message this past Sunday on work. If this past weekend we had celebrated Father’s Day or Mother’s day you would be pondering the importance of such a role as exhorted by your pastor, but despite the fact there are far more workers in congregations than fathers or mothers, you probably did not hear a peep about work. Too bad!

On Holy Thursday we heard a homily on the washing of the feet as a symbol of service. Then we prayed for all those who serve in their capacities as lectors, Eucharistic ministers, catechists, etc. For every one of us who got up on Friday and went about our lives of service, one of us served within the confines of the parish. The other 99 served as teachers, construction workers, lawyers, taxi drivers etc. None of the 99 had a prayer offered for them the previous night. Call it the parable of the 99 overlooked servants.

I think Mike gives a good explanation as to why this happens.

Katrina, the Big Dig & Workplace Spirtuality

Brian Feil, writing in Government Executive has this to say about Katrina and the tunnel collapse in Boston:

The Big Dig highway cost $14 billion and took well over a decade to build. It was complex, involving many federal, state and local agencies and numerous contractors. The New Orleans levee system was similarly complex, involving many agencies and many contractors. These two projects have been the subject of numerous oversight reviews by inspectors general and other watchdogs.

In both cases, the engineering problems that contributed to the deaths were identified by overseers in the past, though the significance of the problems was not understood before it was too late.

Because both projects were messy, complicated affairs with multiple masters over many years, it's hard to pin the engineering failures on any particular player or any particular decision. Perhaps there are lessons to be learned about the need for clear lines of authority, centralized control and oversight methods that not only identify problems but make sure they are solved. Continuity of leadership was missing in both cases.

Once again - and this is a lesson that bears frequent repetition - workplace spirituality is not just, or even first, matter of witnessing one's faith. It is first a matter of rendering service to one's employer and to the public. This requires the practice of ten basic disciplines including attention to quality and challenging one's employer when serious mistakes are being made.

Norman Augustine on Business Ethics

In 1992 Norman Augustine gave a talk on Business ethics. He started with this disclaimer, having been praised for his achievements and his character:

Thank you. It is indeed a pleasure to be here. I hope that I can live up to the expectations that have been created by that generous introduction. It makes me feel a little like my friend David Roderick, the former chairman of US Steel, who was once introduced to an audience as the most gifted businessman in the country evidenced by the fact that he "had made a million dollars in California oil."

When Dave came to the podium, he was a bit embarrassed. Those facts, he said, were essentially accurate, but it wasn’t oil, it was coal…and it wasn’t California, it was Pennsylvania…and it wasn’t a million…it was a hundred thousand…and it wasn’t he, it was his brother. And he didn’t make it, he lost it!

You can read his talk here. You can read more in Len Marella's In Search of Ethics: Conversations with Men and Women of Character

Silence vs. Noise

    Thomas Keating quotes John of the Cross: “Silence is God’s first language. Every thing else is a translation." From this premise, one might conclude than to find God, one must retreat into a hermitage, Once there, one can be silent 24/7. This attitude is easily reinforced by the 2nd reading for Sunday, Sept. 3, 2006. The last sentance - James 1:27 reads:

Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.

If pure religion requires being unstained by the world, perhaps the best course of action is to avoid the world entirely. This leads to the spiritual practice known as contemptus mundi – contempt for the world.

On his audio CD publisher Gregory Pierce replies that a spirituality of silence alone won’t help him. With a publishing company, a family, and little leaguers in his care, he needs a spirituality that helps him find God in the midst of noise.

   A look at Sunday's gospel shows that the conflict is only an apparant one. From Mark 7:15-23  we read:

"..there is nothing outside the man which can defile him if it goes into him; but the things which proceed out of the man are what defile the man.
…
"For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed the evil thoughts, fornications, thefts, murders, adulteries, deeds of coveting and wickedness, as well as deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride and foolishness. All these evil things proceed from within and defile the man."

The context of this passage has to do with ancient Jewish dietary laws. However, a moment's reflection leads us to the recognition that there are many things in the outside world what can “go into us” through our senses and perceptions. It is not the outside world that is that is a problem. It is our reaction to the outside world that is the problem. When we react from any of the list of evil thoughts listed, we will be “ .. stained by the world.”

The question then becomes; how do we move from a state in which we react out “evil thoughts” to one in which we can respond to the world out of grace?