VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Among the various World War I-related anniversaries of this centennial year, the election of Pope Benedict XV, 100 years ago Sept. 3, is apt to be one of the less widely observed.

Pope Benedict XV is the most obscure of the nine men who have led the Catholic Church over the last century — the title of his biography by historian John F. Pollard is “The Unknown Pope” — and in some ways, this negative distinction seems justified. His seven-and-a-half-year pontificate was relatively short and, with respect to his most prominent undertaking, spectacularly unsuccessful.

Yet Pope Benedict left a legacy of lasting significance for the papacy and the church as a whole in the vital area of teaching and practice on war and peace.

Cardinal Giacomo della Chiesa of Bologna, Italy, was elected pope less than six weeks after the outbreak of the world war — and almost immediately started campaigning against it. His efforts reached their peak in his Peace Note of 1917, which urged all belligerents to stop fighting in favor of international arbitration of their disputes.[quote_box_right]

Pope’s apostolic exhortation to the peoples at war and their rulers

[/quote_box_right]
All of these efforts were for naught, largely because of the weakness of Vatican diplomacy, which had languished since the Holy See lost the Papal States half a century earlier.

“The Vatican by 1914 had relations with only two great powers; one was Austria-Hungary, the other was the Russian empire, and with the Russian empire, relations were pretty bad,” Pollard said.

U.S. President Woodrow Wilson, who took his nation into the war in 1917, was dismissive of Pope Benedict’s attempts to intervene. Even many Catholic bishops on both sides put patriotism ahead of loyalty to the pope and openly undercut his calls for peace.

After the war ended in November 1918, the victors kept the Vatican out of the peace conference in Paris. Pope Benedict presciently objected to the punitive treatment of Germany, which Adolf Hitler later exploited in his rise to power.

The pope was more successful in his efforts to organize prisoner exchanges and humanitarian relief for refugees and other noncombatants during the war.

He also left behind an enhanced Vatican diplomatic establishment.

“By the time Benedict died in 1922, the Vatican had relations with nearly all of the great powers, including Germany, except America and except the USSR,” Pollard said.

Today, the Holy See has full diplomatic relations with 180 countries.

Pope Benedict’s most significant contribution, however, was the new way he approached the age-old problem of war.

In condemning the world war as a whole without taking sides, the pope did not reason in terms of traditional church teaching about just and unjust wars. With Catholic nations on both sides of the conflict and the Vatican no longer a territorial power with a strategic stake in the outcome, the pope was free to reject the horror of war per se.

He was able to see that modern technology — especially the novelty of aerial bombardment — had made traditional moral calculations and distinctions between combatants and noncombatants increasingly meaningless.

Pope Benedict’s influence on his successors is clear in:

• Pope Pius XII’s attempts to use diplomacy to forestall World War II
• St. John XXIII’s call for a ban on nuclear weapons
• Pope Paul VI’s cry of “no more war, war never again” in a speech at the United Nations
• St. John Paul II’s interreligious prayers for peace at Assisi

After Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was elected pope in 2005, he said he chose the name Benedict in honor of his wartime predecessor, “that courageous prophet of peace, who guided the church through turbulent times of war. In his footsteps, I place my ministry in the service of reconciliation and harmony between peoples.”

Pope Francis — whose efforts to end or prevent war have included a vigil for peace in Syria that drew 100,000 people to St. Peter’s Square and a joint prayer for peace with the Israeli and Palestinian presidents in the Vatican Gardens — told an international gathering of diplomats earlier this year that it was Pope Benedict XV who had shown world leaders the “royal road” of “diplomacy of dialogue.”

That legacy is one example of how, even in the practicalities of international politics, the papacy measures its influence and success not in years but in centuries.

— By Francis X. Rocca, Catholic News Service. Contributing to this story was Robert Duncan.

PHILADELPHIA (CNS) — Although Philadelphia’s Taney Dragons didn’t walk away with the Little League World Series title, they captured the country’s attention by making it to the quarterfinals and have been honored as heroes in their home city.

At some point soon, the media blitz and celebrity status will come to an end.

But for now, the team has been managing interview and autograph requests, appearances on NBC’s “Today” show and waving to onlookers in a six-mile parade in Philadelphia.

One celebration that arguably overshadowed the others was Aug. 27, when the Phillies’ baseball team honored the Little League team with a pregame ceremony at Citizens Bank Park.

Before the Phillies-Nationals game, each Taney player and coach walked together on a makeshift red carpet from center field to the pitcher’s mound. They shook hands with area dignitaries, and every Phillies player and coach and were individually introduced to the crowd.

The Little League team members took a victory lap around the stadium before joining in unison to throw out the game’s traditional first pitch. Players and coaches were each presented with a game ball and an official Phillies jersey with their names and numbers on the back.

After the team’s big win against Texas Aug. 17 in the Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, Taney lost the next two games of the double-elimination tourney, bringing the season that had begun in April to an end.

Tai Shanahan, an outfielder for the Dragons, says he is ready to resume normal life.

Shanahan, a seventh grader from St. Francis de Sales School, said: “On one hand I think I will miss it, but then I think I’ll be really fine with it.”

He said he was disappointed the team didn’t get to the championship, “because we came so close.”

“But something like this hardly ever happens for people, especially our age. We have a lot to be thankful for,” he told CatholicPhilly.com, the online news site of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia.

Tai’s brother, Liam, who played for Taney’s 15-year-old team, said he wished he “could have played in something so amazing” and admitted living vicariously through his brother’s experience. The brothers have been longtime altar servers at St. Francis de Sales Parish.

Liam said he didn’t imagine the team would have advanced to the third round. For that matter, given the competition, he was surprised that Taney had even reached the prestigious tournament, which was eventually won by the South Korean team.

As the Taney Dragons continued to advance, Liam and his father, Pat, a 1980 graduate of St. John Neumann High School and a 25-year teacher at Roman Catholic High School, helped the Taney coaches by hitting batting practice.

“None of the players or their families will ever forget this, obviously,” Liam said. “This was a once-in-a-lifetime experience, and I think they did a really great job of handling the pressure.”

When Tai and his teammates watched the highlights of their victory match on ESPN’s “SportsCenter,” he had a difficult time believing they were on television.

“Never thought that would ever happen,” he said, “and I doubt it will ever happen again.”

The team, the first from Philadelphia to reach the Little League World Series, also included standout pitcher Mo’ne Davis, the first American female player in 10 years to compete in the World Series.

Taney blitzed through districts, sectionals, states and then regionals with few serious scares. Once the team got to the Little League World Series, it enjoyed, in many ways, a no-lose situation.

And as the wins mounted, the entire Philadelphia region took notice.

Tai’s father Pat pointed out that one thing the team experienced will always stick with them.

“It’s not just the memories, but it is the friendships that have developed,” he said. “These are moments that will last a lifetime.”

— By John Knebels, Catholic News Service. 

WASHINGTON (CNS) — Hundreds of protesters took part in a rally and march in Washington Aug. 28 chanting: “Not one more! Not one more!” to urge President Barack Obama to stop the deportation of immigrant families, workers and children.

The participants, including many young children, also got their message across holding aloft placards saying: “Don’t deport my dad” and wearing T-shirts with the words: “Keep families together.”

“We’re here because the president must act and he must act now,” one of the rally speakers said over a bullhorn to a cheering crowd erupting into shouts of “Si, se puede” (“Yes we can”) — a motto of United Farm Workers and a slogan of Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign.

The gathering started at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement headquarters, just a few blocks from the National Mall, while police officers stood watching and office workers looked out their windows. Participants then walked several blocks to the White House, chanting slogans in Spanish that translated to “Obama, listen, we’re in this together.”

“We’re here fighting to stop deportation,” said rally participant Rene Santos, originally from El Salvador. “We came here to work and feed our families. We are not criminals,” he told Catholic News Service through an interpreter.

A woman from Bolivia said she came to the rally because she has been waiting for six years for her mom to “get her papers” securing her legal immigration.

“My brother wants to come; it’s not easy,” she said.

Mercy Sister Anne Curtis, joined by a group of women religious, stressed the sisters’ long-term commitment in working with immigrant families and trying to secure a just immigration reform.

“We’re concerned about families that are separated and what happens to these women and children,” she told CNS on the sidewalk where crowds were forming alongside a row of food trucks.

“We need to stop the deportation of mothers and children and not warehouse them,” she added, noting that faith-based communities can find alternative ways to help.”

She also said she hoped Catholic members of Congress, no matter their political party, would respond to the needs of immigrants “out of tradition of their faith.”

The Rev. Paul Lee, a Lutheran minister who teaches at the Elliott School of International Affairs at George Washington University, said the need for immigration reform is a concern to the church as a whole.

He said he attended the rally because he was “frustrated at the lack of immigration reform” efforts by Congress.

Rev. Lee, who has worked with asylum seekers from Ethiopia, said he cannot understand why the United States does not offer similar refuge to people from Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras.

“I’ve worked in those countries,” he told CNS. “Fear of persecution is very much a reality.”

“We have to protect that right. This country has always been a refuge,” he added.

He also noted that he sees Pope Francis as a sign of unity in the church and believed that if he were in this country now, “he’d be right here” at the rally.

The White House has said that since Congress has failed to pass a comprehensive immigration reform bill or the supplemental funding Obama requested to handle the surge of unaccompanied minors and families crossing the border this year, the president would announce executive actions to address some aspects of the problems.

As summer draws to a close, immigration law experts have been weighing in on what some of those actions might include.

In an Aug. 26 teleconference, attorneys including the former general counsels of government immigration services laid out what they consider some of the likely actions Obama can take and how those square with the boundaries of presidential authority.

David Leopold, former president and former general counsel to the American Immigration Lawyers Association, said there’s a clear constitutional authority for the administration to set enforcement priorities.

The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, program is just one example of how presidents have opted to use prosecutorial discretion, he noted.

“Another way to look at it is the whole concept of the immigration code, as written by Congress, gives the executive branch pretty unfettered discretion in many areas,” Leopold said.

Stephen Legomsky, former chief counsel of USCIS, now a professor at Washington University School of Law, said the funding priorities of Congress give the president the necessary legal authority.

“When Congress knowingly only gives the Department of Homeland Security enough resources to go after a tiny percentage of the undocumented population, Congress gives the president authority to prioritize” how to spend those resources, he said.

Cristina Rodriguez, now a Yale Law School professor but formerly in the office of legal counsel at the Justice Department, said Obama might expand the program to include the spouses or parents of U.S. citizens or the spouses or parents of DACA recipients.

He also could expand how the administration uses its authority to grant humanitarian parole, now used sparingly, to wider populations, she said.

Rodriguez cautioned that “a decision to halt all deportations would likely extend beyond his authority,” because there are some financial resources to continue deportations.

— By Carol Zimmermann, Catholic News Service. Contributing to this story was Patricia Zapor.