Finalmente!
Posted by Rebecca Teti in News on Tuesday, April 27, 2010 1:00 PM
Last Saturday, the pro-life movement lost one of its most cogent Jewish thinkers.
Prof. Hadley Arkes was received into the Church.
He writes a little bit about it here.
I am only kidding about losing a Jewish thinker. In remarks he made at the celebration dinner following his initiation as a Catholic, Hadley made it clear he doesn’t consider himself to be leaving Judaism behind, but only following it to its fulfillment.
But he himself joked that in becoming Catholic he is undermining his rhetorical value for the pro-life movement: “Even Hadley Arkes thinks so, and he’s not Catholic.”
More seriously, that he should choose this moment to enter strikes me as proof of the truth of Bishop Slattery’s observation that the truth whispers louder than a hundred thousand shouted lies. He writes:
One friend, who converted at Oxford, told me that the resonating line for him came from our friend Dermot Quinn. Dermot said that you can believe everything the Church tells you and not be a good Catholic. The question is, “Do you believe in the Church as a truth-telling institution?” And I thought: I do, I really do. When the Church stands contra mundum¸ against the currents of relativism in the world, my inclination is to think that the Church has it right.
He writes too of how his many Catholic friends had an impact on him, how
each revealed to me, in their own character, what it meant to lead a Catholic life. Each in his own way, taught me something of the teachings of this Church, and each showed me the welcoming face of the Church.
His conversion has in a sense been an intellectual one. The truth drew him and the example of his friends drew him, and that led him to ask himself what the source of this goodness could be.
I’ve come to this matter then through the Church. But the Church cannot be understood apart from the one who planted the Mustard Seed from which it grew and took its shape and character. Nor can it be detached from the Spirit that managed to preserve the discipline of its moral teachings even through times of trouble and disarray.
For those of us gathered in the chapel to watch this lovely man and beloved friend receive Jesus for the first time, it was an occasion of immense gladness on his behalf. But it was also a tremendous shot in the arm for all of us personally, I think: one of those counter-signs sent by providence to strengthen us in a low moment. Hadley thanked his friends for being signs to him; and now he is a sign for all of us.
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