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In 1948, in the shadow of that monstrous world war, the French author/philosopher Albert Camus accepted an invitation from the Dominican Monastery of Latour-Maubourg.
To their credit, the Dominicans wanted to know what an "unbeliever" thought about Christians in the light of their behavior during the '30s and '40s. Camus' words seem so terribly relevant today that it is difficult to trim them:
"For a long time during those frightful years, I waited for a great voice to speak up in Rome. I, an unbeliever? Precisely. For I knew that the spirit would be lost if it did not utter a cry of condemnation ...
"It has been explained to me since, that the condemnation was indeed voiced. But that it was in the style of the encyclicals, which is not all that clear. The condemnation was voiced and it was not understood. Who could fail to feel where the true condemnation lies in this case?
"What the world expects of Christians is that Christians should speak out, loud and clear, and that they should voice their condemnation in such a way that never a doubt, never the slightest doubt, could rise in the heart of the simplest man.
"That they should get away from abstraction and confront the blood-stained face history has taken on today.
"It may be ... that Christianity will insist on maintaining a compromise, or else on giving its condemnations the obscure form of the encyclical. Possibly it will insist on losing once and for all the virtue of revolt and indignation that belonged to it long ago.
"What I know -- and what sometimes creates a deep longing in me -- is that if Christians made up their mind to it, millions of voices -- millions, I say -- throughout the world would be added to the appeal of a handful of isolated individuals, who, without any sort of affiliation, today intercede almost everywhere and ceaselessly for children and other people." (Excerpted from Resistance, Rebellion, and Death: Essays)
