The essay written by the greatest editor of The Guardian newspaper over a century ago, “Comment is free, but facts are sacred” has endured as the ultimate statement of values for a free press and continues to under-pin the traditions of good newspapers throughout the western world. As Malta gears up for an election, where it looks as though facts will be sacrificed liberally on the altar of tribal political expedience, it is as well to be reminded of this maxim.
I recently found myself writing about, and debating publicly, the issue which came to the fore following the death of the great Cardinal Martini of Milan, whether the Catholic Church was “200 years behind the times”. Like Maltese politics, religion here has a habit of being discussed only in black and white terms: either you are with us and believe implicitly, or you ask questions about facets of the Church and are therefore, by definition, deemed to be against us.
I have no problem when people disagree with my views. But I do draw a line when something I have written or said is deliberately misconstrued or is factually misinterpreted. I have recently had direct experience of this in correspondence in another newspaper.
The first occurred in the wake of The Times Debate on 2 October. Monsignor Joseph Farrugia, a Gozitan monsignor who had been present, levelled a number of criticisms at various people he had disagreed with. Our exchange of correspondence started because I accused him of not speaking up at the debate when he had had every opportunity to do so, preferring instead to lob his criticisms in an article written from the safety of Gozo. I implied that he had bottled out of expressing his views in a public forum in the presence of the people he later chose to criticise. I still stand by that judgement.
Scrabbling about for cover, his next letter then took me to task for not attributing the phrase “Speaking Truth to Power” to Archbishop Desmond Tutu. I explained carefully to Monsignor Farrugia that, first, there was no plagiarism on my part of anything Archbishop Tutu had said because he had never actually said it and, secondly, that the phrase had pre-dated his eminence by several decades – having in fact been coined in the 1950s.
He then shifted the argument yet again to whether or not I was permitted, presumably as a mere layman, to use the phrase (Speaking Truth to Power) as, what he termed “a missile against the magisterium of the Catholic Church”. But why should I, or any other Catholic layman, not speak truth to power – in this case the Church? When I give my views on the state of the modern Church, I do so because I sincerely believe it needs to be helped. Many at The Times Debate felt the same. He may disagree with my analysis of what's wrong, but I surely have every right, as well as due encouragement from an enlightened Church, to do so. Far better people than me have done this – Cardinal Martini so effectively, for a start.
Finally, in a Jesuitical attempt to take the high ground, he shifted the argument again. He quoted the “fourth” gospel at me and “Pontius Pilate” to claim that “the phrase got coined some 2000 years before then.” Fact. No, it did not. Although Monsignor Farrugia quoted a historically good example of somebody actually speaking truth to power, history is of course littered with similar such actions, many of which pre-date even that pivotal event – for example, at random, by Socrates, Cicero and, in legend, Haemon in “Antigone.” The fact remains that the catch-phrase only got coined fifty-seven years ago by a Quaker, a religion which probably sounds outlandish to a Gozitan monsignor.
He then shifted his ground yet again in his final sally saying that Cardinal Martini “has suffered enough indignity to continue to be thrashed about [sic, my italics] as happened in the debate organised by The Times and as Martin Scicluna is still doing”. On the contrary, Cardinal Martini was highly extolled by us all at the debate, not “thrashed about.” These are very strong words.
I have rarely known a person to duck and weave as often as this Gozitan monsignor. He should go into politics. But ultimately the question still remains: if he felt so strongly, why did he not speak out at the debate? The answer can only be that he lacked the moral courage, and the wit, to do so.
Leaving aside Henry Pace from Sliema, who persists in interpreting my declaration that I am a “disinterested” observer of the Maltese Church as being an “uninterested” member – a very different proposition indeed (look it up) - my second recent occasion to find words used by me had been deliberately misconstrued occurred in a letter in another paper by Professor Joseph A. Muscat of Ta' Xbiex commenting on my article “The Church: Basic Principles and the Need for Change”.
It saddens me when a superannuated professor, who should know better, seeks to interpret what I wrote in such an inaccurate and partial manner.. What I wrote was this: “To take some random examples: contraception (can anyone truly believe that if you intend not to have a baby it matters whether you use a thermometer, a calendar or a pill? As Cardinal Martini said the encyclical humanae vitae was a grievous mistake); women priests; married priests and priestly celibacy (the Church had married priests a thousand years ago, why not today?); gay relationships; IVF treatment; the right to die, what constitutes a family in the twenty-first century.”
I added “These are doctrinal rules on which Catholics all over the world are seeking enlightenment and change and which many of us thought were going to be addressed. In Cardinal Martini's words, these are “the doctrinal and disciplinary knots” which need to be unravelled because these are turning people away.”
I challenge Professor Muscat to show where I wrote that I “want (sic) a married priesthood, gay families, unregulated artificial human fertilisation, euthanasia, etc ...” I only asked, like Cardinal Martini, that these doctrinal and disciplinary knots should be addressed. “Addressed,” (looked into, examined) is the key word.
If Professor Muscat in his dotage is unable to read and comprehend, he should stay out of the dialogue for change in the Churc which I, and others like me, are trying to encourage.
As to “the Maltese way of life,” of which he spoke so nostalgically, he should get out of his 1950s and 1960s comfort zone. For better or for worse, the unquestioning, malleable and gullible Maltese faithful flock of that era is long gone and the Universal Church, and more so, the Maltese Church must adapt if it is not, like elderly professors, to become redundant.
The voice of opponents of my point of view, no less than that of friends who support it, has a right to be heard. But while such comment is free, facts are sacred.