A gulag Christmas:
Giving thanks for their witness

		The Catholic  Difference  George Weigel

"Vorkuta" has not become a universal metaphor for unmitigated evil, like "Auschwitz."

Indeed, one of the striking things about the collapse of European communism in the late 1980s and early 1990s was that, in its aftermath, there was no real reckoning with the industrial-strength slaughters committed in the name of the Soviet god who failed.

The lethal wickedness of German National Socialism has been measured with considerable precision; the lethal wickedness wrought by Lenin, Stalin, and their henchmen has not been measured, much less seriously addressed.

Siberian camps

Cardinal Kazimierz Swiatek of Belarus knows all about the Vorkuta camps of the Soviet gulag, built in northern Siberia so that prisoners could mine coal and other minerals for the glory of the Soviet state while being starved or frozen to death.

Ordained in April 1939, Swiatek was immediately arrested by the NKVD, predecessor to the KGB, and thrown into a death row prison cell in the city of Brest.

He remained on death row until the chaos caused by the German invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941 gave him the opportunity to escape. After three years of wartime ministry, Father Swiatek was arrested again by the secret police in December 1944. In July 1945, after the war, he was sentenced to 10 years of hard labor and shipped to Vorkuta.

Chilling account

Something of the atmosphere of the place is conveyed in these chilling sentences from Anne Applebaum's epic book, Gulag - A History:

During the winter of 1937-38, "no hot food was given to the prisoners at all; the daily ration consisted of 400 grams of half-dried bread. [In March 1938], a new group of NKVD officers arrived from Moscow. The officers formed a 'special commission' and called out the prisoners in groups of forty.

"They were told they were going off on a transport. Each was given a piece of bread. The prisoners in the tent heard them being marched away - and then [heard] the sounds of shooting."

Vorkuta Christmas

Those were the circumstances in which Father Kazimierz Swiatek tried to carry on his priestly ministry. He recently told the Italian newspaper Avvenire about one Christmas in Vorkuta:

"Once, in the Vorkuta gulag, I organized a Christmas vigil Mass. I brought with me two daily rations of bread, which I had put aside the days beforehand . . . As I was speaking to those in attendance, the door flew open. With riot-stick in hand a government official rushed in with a soldier bearing a rifle and bayonet. 'What are you doing?" he asked. I stood up and explained that we were celebrating Christmas Mass.

Then, while holding the host, I asked if he wanted to receive it, too, so as to exchange Christmas greetings with us. It was a very unusual and tense situation: both our hands were held tight - his clutching a riot-stick while mine held firmly onto the host.

The officer put down his club, excused himself for not being able to receive the host while on duty, and allowed us to continue our vigil service. He left the room with the soldier. The next morning, however, I was . . . sent to the far-off tundra region to the north."

Fire from Holy Spirit

Now almost 90 years old, Cardinal Swiatek is archbishop of Minsk-Mohilev in Belarus and one of the great martyr-confessors of contemporary Catholicism. There were hundreds of thousands, even millions, like him - lights that could not be extinguished by the surrounding darkness, because their fire came from the Holy Spirit.

We should give thanks for their witness throughout the Christmas octave, which reminds us, in the feasts of St. Stephen and the Holy Innocents, that, from the very beginning, the darkness has sought to extinguish the light that shown over Bethlehem.

The darkness has receded in the last 20 years. But there are Christians who will celebrate Christmas 2003 in circumstances not unlike those Father Swiatek endured in Vorkuta, a half-century ago.

Today, they are in prisons in China and Vietnam and Cuba and North Korea; today, they must celebrate the birth of the Christ Child clandestinely in Saudi Arabia and in parts of the Sudan and Pakistan.

We are linked to them in the bonds of faith. Let's not forget them as we celebrate Christmas in freedom.

George Weigel is a senior fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C.

Share Christmas gift of peace

	Guest  columnist  Fr. Donald Lange

On Christmas Day in 1864, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow listened to Christmas bells ring out the good news of peace on earth.

But he lacked the Christmas spirit of peace. For he still suffered from the tragic loss of his wife Fanny in 1861. And his son Charles had been recently severely wounded in the bloody Civil War, which he knew would kill or wound many more Americans.

Doubts about peace

As he listened to the bells, he expressed his painful doubts about Christmas peace in a poem. Later this poem became a Christmas carol entitled "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day!" One bleak stanza read:

And in despair I bowed my head

"There is no peace on earth," I said

"For hate is strong and mocks the song

Of peace on earth and good will to men!"

Hope rising

After writing this verse, hope unexpectedly rose from his tomb-like heart and Longfellow wrote:

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep

"God is not dead nor doth he sleep

The wrong shall fail, the right prevail

With peace on earth, good will to men."

Model of Jesus

Like Longfellow there may be times when we need to make the journey from discouragement or near despair to Christmas peace. The Christmas bells bring us hope as they ring out the Good News that Jesus entered human history to offer us eternal life. He became like us in all ways but sin to compassionately identify with us in our suffering and setbacks.

Jesus also modeled for us how to live in peace as brothers and sisters. He sent the Holy Spirit to show us that most if not all wars are civil wars between brothers and sisters and sisters and sisters and other variations.

Conversion of heart

Human history seems to indicate that to achieve this goal will be a long journey. And we know that a massive conversion of the human heart will be needed to even approach this idea. But human survival may depend upon it.

To do our part in bringing peace, we must ask the Holy Spirit to help us to disarm our hearts of violence and transform us into God's instruments of peace. Then Jesus' peace, which is beyond human understanding, can flow through us into our relationships with others at work, in our family, and in our recreation.

The Spirit can also motivate us to let our elected representatives know of our wishes for peace. These are some of the reasons why one of the best presents that we can give to ourselves and others is the Christmas gift of peace.

May the Christmas bells toll peace on earth and good will for all of you as they ultimately did for Henry Wadsworth Longfellow! May you have a peaceful Christmas and New Year.

Fr. Don Lange is pastor of St. Bridget Parish, Ridgeway, linked with Immaculate Conception Parish, Barneveld.

GMOs: Shown to be destructive

	Guest commentary  John E. Peck

I was surprised by the "Frankenfood" article by George Weigel in the Catholic Herald (12/4/03), especially since it contradicted so many of the concerns I have heard from farmers and consumers about genetically modified organisms (GMOs).

Having done a lot of work with family farmers in Africa myself, I must also say that the description of the situation and motivation behind the continent's recent rejection of U.S. offered GMO "food aid" is not all correct.

Unresolved problems

Contrary to Mr. Weigel's assertions, there is much research to show that GMOs are destructive. Fatal allergic reactions among consumers, genetic drift and offsite field contamination, adverse impact on non-target species like butterflies, honey bees, and songbirds are just a few of the unresolved problems.

People have also already died due to GMOs. In 1989 a Japanese chemical corporation, Showa Denko, used genetically engineered bacteria for the first time to produce L-trytophan - a common over-the-counter dietary supplement. A "bad batch" killed 39 people in the U.S. and permanently disabled another 1,500 with a blood disorder, eosinophiia myalgia syndrome (EMS). Showa Denko paid a $2 billion settlement to its GMO victims.

Purely mercenary

The agribusiness corporations behind GMOs are not altruistic - their interest is purely mercenary. According to the USDA, 98 percent of biotech research in agriculture today is done to make food production and processing easier and more profitable - not to improve nutrition or quality.

Numerous field studies have shown that GMO crops suffer depressed yields and may even require as much - if not more - chemical inputs than conventional varieties. In Wisconsin farmers lost $5.5 million between 1996 and 2001 planting Bt corn, because the premium cost for the patented seed was not covered by the very slight yield increase in a depressed commodity market.

Phil Angell, Monsanto's director of corporate communications, asserted in the New York Times (10/25/1998), "(we) should not have to vouchsafe the safety of biotech food. Our interest is in selling as much as possible."

African farmers

In Africa, where family farmers cannot afford conventional hybrids of the synthetic chemicals and rely upon low input methods and open pollinated varieties, the threat of importing GMOs as "food aid" is obvious.

Maize reserves were available regionally to meet local needs, but the U.S. refused to purchase food relief within Africa, insisting instead that the countries accept surplus Bt corn from the U.S.

This was nothing more than a crude form of taxpayer subsidized dumping. It would have triggered widespread contamination as has occurred in Mexico.

Ethical concerns

Protecting the biological integrity of plants and animals is a valid ethical concern. So, too, is respecting food sovereignty. It is the right of ALL farmers to choose what they grow and ALL consumers to choose what they eat. Just because someone is hungry does not mean they must swallow unwanted unhealthy handouts.

It is both moral compassion and common sense that leads many people of faith to question the corporate promotion of a reckless technology that caters more to private profit than social welfare.

John E. Peck, Madison, is executive director of the Family Farm Defenders.