Mahony Blesses Cathedral’s Cross

When Cardinal Roger M. Mahony of Los Angeles called national church authorities about his special Christmas wish this year--to celebrate Mass with U.S. troops in Afghanistan--the response was not exactly what he had anticipated.

“They said, ‘You’ve got to be kidding,’ ” Mahony recalled Wednesday, after blessing a mammoth cross for the bell tower of the Roman Catholic cathedral his archdiocese is building in downtown Los Angeles.

The national office that runs Catholic military services gently nixed Mahony’s request after explaining that protecting VIPs from fighting in Kandahar was not quite the most pressing mission of the moment. After all, as Bishop John Caising of the military archdiocese put it in an interview, this was not some lowly “Father Smith” who might be accommodated with a humble cot.

This was a cardinal, whose lofty status second only to the pope would require Army officials to treat him as a prince of the church, Caising said. An around-the-clock escort of colonel or captain rank would be required. Even if the cardinal didn’t want anything fancy, military protocol would try to offer him top-notch living conditions. Unfortunately, “there are no Marriott hotels in Afghanistan,” Caising said.

“To pop into Kandahar by helicopter would have made a good photo opportunity, but he could have got himself shot,” said Caising, a retired Army colonel with 28 years of service under his collar, including a year of combat duty in Vietnam.

So they’re sending Mahony instead to Okinawa, Japan. There, the cardinal will celebrate several Christmas Eve and Christmas Masses with troops at Kadena Air Force Base, Futenma Marine Corps Air Station and other facilities at camps Kinser, Hanson and Lester. On Dec. 26, the cardinal is scheduled to visit the Yokosuka region near Tokyo to celebrate Mass with troops aboard several ships, including the Kitty Hawk, which recently returned to Japan after several weeks in the Persian Gulf.

All of which suits Mahony just fine. “I want to assure [the troops] of their support of people back home--that they are deeply loved,” said Mahony, who has not conducted services overseas at Christmas. The archdiocese said it is very rare for an archbishop to be away from home during big holidays.

Mahony said he hatched the idea to visit the troops after realizing this year would be the last chance for it. From next year on, Mahony said, he feels committed to celebrating Christmas at the new Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, which is scheduled to be completed in September. His usual Christmas services at the Los Angeles County Jail will be conducted by another priest this year.

In his first detailed remarks on the war in Afghanistan, the cardinal spoke out forcefully in support of the U.S. effort. Mahony said the war fell “well within the parameters of just war,” referring to a Christian doctrine on how to gauge the morality of war. The criteria for a “just war” include a just cause, a probability of success and the avoidance of innocent bloodshed.

Mahony said the U.S. military operations have been focused, with care taken to avoid civilian casualties and ennobled by the goal to “defeat terrorism.”

“I think we’ve been very restrained in trying to stop terrorism and its perpetrators,” Mahony said. “Unfortunately, there is always some type of collateral damage, but this has been minimal.”

The cardinal also gave his blessings to government efforts to apprehend perpetrators of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, which have resulted in the detention of more than 1,000 people and prompted some criticism of civil rights violations.

“I think every effort is being made to protect individual rights,” he said.

Coincidentally, 67 American Catholic leaders on Wednesday issued a paper criticizing the war on terrorism as “morally unjustifiable” and expressing concern that it was jeopardizing constitutional rights at home. The group said the war’s cause was just, but the execution of it was immoral because of the improbability of stopping terrorism through war alone and the civilian casualties--more than 3,700, according to the Catholic peace group Pax Christi.

The group included such prominent Catholics as Benedictine Sister Joan Chittister, Marie Dennis of Pax Christi International, Kathleen Pruitt of the 76,000-member Leadership Conference of Women Religious and Stan De Boe of the 25,000-member Conference of Major Superiors of Men. They advocated the use of international police and courts. They also called for a government commission to study the “grievances and roots of injustice that can be manipulated by perpetrators to justify terrorist actions.”

At the cross-raising, Mahony donned a red hard hat and a red and cream stole as he offered a prayer and splashed the 3,000-pound stainless steel cross with holy water. Then, it was hoisted more than 150 feet to top the adobe-hued concrete bell tower, which sits just to the north of the main cathedral building. He was flanked by members of the Von Der Ahe family of supermarket fame, who donated $3 million for the bell tower.

Calling it a “milestone moment,” Mahony said that placing a cross atop a bell tower signified the transformation of a building into a holy place.

“We hope people will see it for centuries to come and feel a sense of hope, comfort and healing,” Mahony said.