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The Blessings of Goutweed: A Seasonal Reflection Goutweed, Bishop’s Weed, Ground Elder, CPF members sing in praise of Bishop Tom Gumbleton, whose solo peace-pulpit “lyrics” are always on key. The Jesuit historian, James Hennesey, hits the high and low notes of American Catholic history in his American Catholics, and writes that Bishop John Lancaster Spalding of Peoria, Illinois, sang also a solo song of dissent against war—the Spanish-American war— while the American Catholic community marched in step with the drum-beat for national expansion. Bishop Spalding’s theme song was: “Real service of country demands putting love of truth first.” He pleaded for independence of thought and a return to the principles on which the country had been founded. Spalding dreaded the inevitable military and naval buildup which would lead the country “gradually to drift into a militarism which must threaten our most cherished institutions.” So, at the ending of the 19th century, Bishop Spalding registered a “no” to the beginning of American Empire, and at the beginning of the 21st century Bishop Gumbleton’s “no” aims at ending that empire. Honored, but lonely voices, neither then nor now loud enough alone to silence the shouting for global Manifest Destiny. Choir, stand up, sing out. Frank McGinty |