South Bend, February 4, 1979
The Door Flung Wide Open
The state visit of Vice Premier Teng Hsiao-p’ing to Washington has flung the door to China wide open. The guest from Peking was given a great and cordial reception. Teng also left behind the best of impressions. He had come to America in an obliging, most friendly attitude so that the 30-year long hostile separation of the two countries appeared to have been overcome. Teng’s desire for modernization and his suspicion of Russia brought him closer to America. But will this good relationship endure?
There could inasmuch be a danger in the present euphoria of American-Chinese relations as too much too fast of America comes to China. For, once the first curiosity is being satisfied and a certain saturation point has been reached, the enthusiasm for America could have the contrary effect. Then the damage would be greater than what is gained at the moment.
South Bend, February 5, 1979
Pope John Paul II in Mexico
The visit of the Holy Father to Mexico in the last week of January was a great success. Millions of people gave him a jubilant welcome. The visit of the Pope underscored the importance, which the more than 300 million Catholics in Latin America have for the Church throughout the world. It also highlighted the responsibility the Church has assumed for the people of Latin America.
Note
[Pope John Paul II followed an invitation by the Council of Latin American Bishops’ Conferences, which assembled in Puebla, Mexico, in the last week of January, 1979. As Mexico had no diplomatic relations with the Vatican, John Paul entered the country on a visitor’s visa. But the reception by the Mexican people was spontaneously overwhelming. The motorcade of the Holy Father from the airport to Mexico City and then along the 80 miles to Puebla became a triumphal procession with over a million people cheering on the roadside. John Paul II dealt with the theological and social problems of Latin America. Mexico was the first, and as George Weigel points out, also one of the most significant pastoral pilgrimages of the Pope. It was the beginning of a growing commitment to the Western Hemisphere, where about half of the Catholic Christians live. Cf. George Weigel, Witness of Hope: The Biography of Pope John Paul II (New York: HarperCollins, 1999), pp. 282-87.]
South Bend, February 6, 1979
Senate Hearing on Taiwan
While Teng Hsiao-p’ing was still on his state visit in Washington, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee began its hearing on Taiwan. The U.S. District Court had already ruled that President Carter, in his decision on China, acted within his constitutional authority. The hearing is concentrating on the question which is now the legitimate government of Taiwan. Is Taiwan only a province of the People’s Republic without its own sovereignty? Who, in the future, can responsibly sign for Taiwan treaties with foreign governments? As much as Deputy Secretary of State Warren Christopher is trying to extenuate the Taiwanese situation, the fact remains that in foreign affairs Taipei is not in its own right anymore. The circumvention of letting private organizations handle all relations with Taiwan appears more like a dubious makeshift design.
South Bend, February 11, 1979
The Revolution in Iran
Prime Minister Shapour Bakhtian who had been appointed by the Shah resigned today, after a civil war had been raging on the streets of Tehran, and after it had become obvious that the loyalty of the military was divided. Thereby, the way is now open for Ayatollah Khomeini to put into effect the Islamic republic he has been striving for. Will there be a functioning government in place, or is this just the beginning of the Iranian Revolution?
February 12, 1979
Iran is demonstrating a regressive, backward looking revolution, which abolishes Western lifestyles by force and goes back to archaic customs. Without a doubt, the West has underestimated the impassionate zeal of Islamic fundamentalism. What is happening in Iran is a revolution carried out by religious fanaticism, national pride, and Marxist splinter groups.
[Toward the end of February, 1979, my wife and I participated in a conference on comparative literature and art forms at the University of Indiana in Bloomington. That gave me an opportunity to get acquainted, though only cursory, with a big state university. The campus town of Bloomington is located about 50 miles southwest of Indianapolis, the capital of Indiana.]
Bloomington, Indiana, February 25, 1979
The State University
In 1820 the University of Indiana in Bloomington began its teaching with one professor and ten students. Today, 32,000 students are enrolled at the University of Indiana in Bloomington and 20,000 at its Medical School in Indianapolis. The intentions of its founders to make, in the spirit of democracy, higher education accessible to all the people of the state have been fulfilled. At present, the University is facing the problem of how to administer its huge institutional complex and how to take care of the large number of students. How to preserve the spirit of the humanities, which seems to get lost in the masses of people it has to handle? The 14-story building of the humanities, where 10,000 students are being taught, looks more like a beehive. Instruction can only be mastered with the help of electronic equipment.
But despite the automation, a European cultural atmosphere has been created by the highly motivated eagerness to learn and the desire for representation. Bloomington has one of the best known Schools of Music in America; affiliated with it is a large opera house. The representative halls of the University maintain an artificial ambience in the Tudor style. Thus, in the dining hall of the conference center, the Indiana Memorial Union, guests are greeted with the words: “We invite you to visit the Sixteenth Century where the Lord of the Manor and his family enjoyed a very special dining pleasure.” These and similar inscriptions in the dark paneled rooms are evidence of a hidden longing for Old World culture. They are typical examples of the ambivalence, which one may come across in America, between a representative aristocratic trend of taste and the common democratic lifestyle. It also comes to my attention that, in contrast to a European university of similar size, there are no glaring Marxist slogans or graffiti scrawled on walls. Bloomington gives the impression of a study oriented campus. It is like numerous American colleges and universities an idyll in the midst of a plain industrial environment.