George Weigel

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George Weigel (Baltimore, 1951 - ) is an American conservative author, Roman Catholic theologian and political and social activist. He currently serves as a Senior Fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center and as an Adjunct Fellow of the Discovery Institute's Religion, Liberty & Public Life Program. Weigel was also Founding President of the James Madison Foundation. He is the author of the biography of Pope John Paul II, Witness to Hope.

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[edit] Career and personal life

Weigel grew up in Baltimore, Maryland, where he attended St. Mary's Seminary and University, and he later received his masters degree from the University of St. Michael's College in Toronto. Weigel has received eight honorary doctorate degrees, in addition to the papal cross Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice.

Weigel lived in Seattle, serving as Assistant Professor of Theology and Assistant Dean of Studies at the St. Thomas Seminary School of Theology in Kenmore, Scholar-in-Residence at the World Without War Council of Greater Seattle, before returning to Washington, D.C., as a fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.

In 1986 Weigel founded the James Madison Foundation.

Weigel and his wife Joan live in North Bethesda, Maryland with their three children.

[edit] Views

In his political writings, Weigel argues for a foreign policy of "moralism without illusions." His position is that the threat of evil in the world cannot always be escaped, negotiated with, reformed, or constrained by international norms. Facing a world where "evildoers" still roam free, Weigel advocates a U.S. foreign policy guided not by moral notions about how nations should behave, but by moral reasoning.[1] In some cases, he adds, moral reasoning may require that the United States support authoritarian regimes to fend off the greater evils of moral decay and threats to the security of the United States, which in his view is "the champion of all that is good and right."

Weigel tends to strongly support the teachings of the recent popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI, although he has differed with specifics of their opposition to war and capital punishment.

Weigel achieved some fame for a 2004 article he wrote in Commentary Magazine, entitled "The Cathedral and the Cube", in which he used the contrast between the modernist Grande Arche, and the Notre Dame de Paris cathedral, both located in Paris, France, to illustrate what he called a loss of "civilizational morality" in Western Europe, which he tied to the tyrannies of the 20th century, along with, more recently, declining birthrates and what he called Europe's inability "to make hard domestic political decisions". [1] In 2005, he expanded the article into a book, The Cube and the Cathedral: Europe, America, and Politics Without God.

[edit] Contra connection allegations

Critics allege that while Weigel was president of the James Madison Foundation during the Reagan administration it received funding from the federal government's U.S. Institute for Peace to monitor what it called "peace groups." Weigel was also a principal at the Puebla Institute[citation needed]. The Puebla Institute received U.S. government funding channeled through Weigel's National Endowment for Democracy to the contra front group Prodemca. Along with Carl R. Channell's National Endowment for the Preservation of Liberty (NEPL), both the Puebla Institute and Weigel's National Endowment for Democracy were important conduits for funds from the contra supply network coordinated by Oliver North. Also alleged is that the Puebla institute's investigation of purported Sandinista government religious persecution was conducted in close coordination with the CIA and its Contra directorate, and that Weigel worked closely with the institute's director, Nina Shea, on the investigation.[2] Critics note the World Without War Council advocated U.S. military action to secure a Pax Americana, as has Weigel.

[edit] Publications

[edit] Books

  • God's Choice: Pope Benedict XVI and the Future of the Catholic Church, Harper Collins, 2005, ISBN 0-06-621331-2.
  • The Cube and the Cathedral: Europe, America, and Politics Without God, Basic Books, 2005, ISBN 0-465-09266-7.
  • Letters to a Young Catholic, Basic Books, 2004, ISBN 0-465-09262-4.
  • The Courage To Be Catholic: Crisis, Reform, and the Future of the Church, Basic Books, 2002, ISBN 0-465-09260-8.
  • The Truth of Catholicism: Ten Controversies Explored, Harper Collins, 2001, ISBN 0-06-621330-4.
  • Witness to Hope: The Biography of Pope John Paul II, Harper Collins, 1999, ISBN 0-06-018793-X.
  • Soul of the World: Notes on the Future of Public Catholicism, Eerdmans, 1996, ISB 0802842070.
  • The Final Revolution: The Resistance Church and the Collapse of Communism, Oxford University Press, 1992, ISBN 0-19-507160-3.
  • Just War and the Gulf War, Ethics and Public Policy Center, 1991, ISBN 0-89633-166-0.
  • Freedom and Its Discontents: Catholicism Confronts Modernity, Ethics and Public Policy Center, 1991, ISBN 0-89633-158-X.
  • American Interests, American Purpose: Moral Reasoning and U.S. Foreign Policy, Praeger Publishers, 1989, ISBN 0-275-93335-0.
  • Catholicism and the Renewal of American Democracy, Paulist Press, 1989, ISBN 0-8091-3043-2.
  • Tranquillitas Ordinis: The Present Failure and Future Promise of American Catholic Thought on War and Peace, Oxford University Press, 1987, ISBN 0-19-504193-3.

[edit] Reference notes

  1. ^ George Weigel, American Interests, American Purpose: Moral Reasoning and U.S. Foreign Policy (Center for Strategic and International Studies, 1989).
  2. ^ The product of the investigation published by the institute was Christians Under Fire.

[edit] External links

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