From First Things, June/July 2005, No. 154, p. 68

The Public Square: A Survey of Religion and Public Life
• Rome Diary, etc., Richard John Neuhaus

• “Civic friendship.” What a beautiful idea, but in our rancorous political climate some might be excused for thinking it is a pipe dream. In an instructive little book published by the Acton Institute, Trial by Fury, by law professor (and FIRST THINGS contributor) Ronald Rychlak, applies the idea of civic friendship to tort reform. Here is how a tort system that encourages
accepting responsibility in the context of community relations ought to work: “Those who have been harmed know that the legal system will guarantee that they are compensated, and those who have committed the harm know that society ultimately will not let them avoid responsibility. Above all those without genuine claims will know that neither will the legal system permit their compensation nor will society condone their immorality. This knowledge encourages potential litigants to resolve disputes justly and privately. The perceived superiority of courtroom justice over personal interaction (civic friendship) is neither part of Christian social thought, nor historically corroborated, and it is very harmful to the community and to justice itself. As the tort law system evolved over the past several decades, however, it has moved away from practices that promote community relations. Courts lowered barriers to litigation, dismantled immunities, lessened causation requirements, and increased monetary awards. These developments have transformed the legal landscape and the message that the tort system carries.” Rychlak thinks tort reform is on the way and proposes some directions: “Effective tort reform, therefore, must return the system to one based on fault and causation, that holds responsible those who caused the damage, makes the injured whole, and does not impose upon the innocent. This will require careful examination of the current incentives that exist to the filing of lawsuits, especially class action lawsuits. Among the first matters to be considered would be the restoration of some form of immunities to entities that are today held responsible for actions that are outside of their scope of responsibilities. At the very least, the concept of awarding punitive damages against charities and governmental agencies must be revisited. Judges and juries also need to have more structured guidance regarding punitive damages in all cases. A loser pays system for attorney fees would also go a long way toward easing the fear currently felt by so many individuals and entities in the society.” Civic friendship. An idea that is not only beautiful but, if we have the will and the wit for it, maybe possible.

Read more on The Public Square: “Civic friendship”…

This Wired News article examines the European outrage at Google’s announced plans to digitize the holdings of all the world’s libraries.

“There is a growing awareness in continental Europe of the technology gap, even with some of the very good technologies they have had, of companies like Google, like Microsoft, like Apple … which are presented as almost technology imperialists at the forefront,” said Jonathan Fenby, a former Observer editor and author of France on the Brink. “There is this defensive reaction: ‘We have to defend what we’ve got. We mustn’t let the Americans and the British get into this.’”

The article goes on to share the lament the failed efforts of European national governments to invigorate the continental tech industry. For example,

Read more on Technology Imperialists at the Forefront…

Rev. Robert Sirico responded over the weekend in the Detroit News to a letter disputing one of his previous columns. In “Catholic social teaching embraces markets,” (May 21) Rev. Sirico writes that “the fact that the church has no economic models to propose is not the same as saying all economic models are the same. Some have greater moral potential than others.”

Read more on Capitalism and Catholic Social Teaching…

Almighty and everlasting God, by whose Spirit the whole body of thy faithful people is governed and sanctified: Receive our supplications and prayers, which we offer before thee for all members of thy holy Church, that in their vocation and ministry they may truly and devoutly serve thee; through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the same Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Read more on Prayer for All Chistians in Their Vocation…

Chicago’s Museum of Science and Industry is currently hosting the Body Worlds show, a display of plasticized cadavers and body parts. According to museum publicity, some 16 million people worldwide have seen the show, the creation of Gunther von Hagens, a German inventor who claims to have created the “plastination” technique. This, basically, is a modern-day form of mummification which allows museums to exhibit skinned and otherwise dismembered bodies in interesting and even entertaining postures.

Depending on your point of view, Body Worlds is either an assault on human dignity, or a marvelously educational exhibit designed to point attendees in the direction of healthier lifestyles (see the resinated lungs of smokers! Touch plastinated organs!). But curators at the Museum of Science and Industry knew they were treading into morally problematic territory. Their “parents resource kit” addresses the viscerally repelling nature of the show by equipping parents with a number of morally-neutral inanities such as “Answer your child’s questions honestly — it is okay not to know all the answers,” and “Be sensitive to your own reactions and your children’s reactions.” Presumably, the kids will want to know why the “embryos, fetuses and a pregnant woman who died with her fetus in her womb” are segregated into their own area. No doubt, the impertinent little ones will have embarrassing questions for mom and dad about the polymerized unborn. Suspecting this, curators have helpfully offered that “visitors may choose whether or not to view this area.”

Hagens and his Body World organization dismisses any reservatins we might have about the subjects of his entertainment by reminding us that “religion and ideology impeded the study of human anatomy for many centuries.” By the late Middle Ages, he notes, there was a “fundamental shift away from a mythical symbolic understanding of the human body (including corpses and internal organs) and towards a more realistic perspective.” Having kicked the blocks away from the wheels of progress — blocks placed there by religious sorts with “symbolic” views about human person — Hagens has now freed society to view his resinated freak show. He’s also emancipated museum curators to pursue box office success with “dry and odorless” specimens that will “remain unchanged for a virtually unlimited amount of time.” No word how the plastinated will fare at the parousia.
Read more on Museum of Plastic Cadavers…

Many may know that the season finale of The Apprentice was brodcast last night, with the conclusion being a victory for the “Book Smarts” team (college educated or higher) over the “Street Smarts” team (high school only).

Read more on Book Smarts vs. Street Smarts…

I recently watched a rerun of Seinfeld, in which Jerry becomes entangled with a movie bootlegger, and finds out that he has a gift for movie piracy. Jerry’s talent would be the cure for what this Slashdot poster complains about: “I’ve yet to find a blockbuster movie that isn’t readily available on the net after it opens, but somehow this is still news. It’s still usually worth shelling out the cash to see a version that isn’t fuzzy with garbled sound, though.”

Read more on The Art of Movie Piracy…

Dr. Andrew Yuengert, the John and Francis Duggan Professor of Economics at Seaver College, Pepperdine University, discussed the various economic and moral dimensions of the critically important immigration issues facing America today. In an interview on The Jerry Bowyer Show yesterday, Dr. Yuengert discussed “The Right to Migrate” (MP3).

Read more on The Right to Migrate…

From the “biting the hand that feeds you” department:

Coldplay lead singer Chris Martin today launched an attack on his record label EMI and the company’s shareholders.

It came after EMI, the world’s third-largest music company, warned that profits would be lower because the band took longer than expected to finish their first studio album in three years.

Read more on Coldplay Frontman: Buying Our New Album is Evil…

This article is a must-read for anyone interested in the recent history of American evangelicalism:

For a movement that began its modern life among the Calvinists, the sometimes strong critique evangelicalism has received in the past decade from its own Calvinist caucus cannot be dismissed lightly. While most of these Calvinist voices have not distanced themselves from the movement they helped create, their accusations of doctrinal declension, human-centered worship and idolatrous narcissism stand in sharp contrast to the more upbeat boosterism found in a movement that has witnessed a remarkable resurgence in the modern era.

From “Evangelicalism’s Insecure Calvinists: The Proliferation of the Evangelical Self-Critique Book at the End of the Twentieth Century,” by Gregory Johnson

Read more on ‘A Modern Revival of Confessional Reformation Protestantism’…