Power moves, warms and threatens all of us, and it is disturbing that power has become visibly problemmaJic and unpredictable. It expands with a relentless logic as men wrestle nature into strange shapes, vault into space and race to create new forms of wealth, persuasion and terror. It destroys the earth, menacing air arid water; even when it seems benign, as in medicine, it helps conjure the possibility of an over-populated planet. Yet it also seems curiously ineffective; ragged guerrillas defy great powers, students show contempt for wealth and for the state, black militants face force with defiance.

I have never been convinced of the Marxian belief that thought is the outcome of social conditions, particularly the modes of production and exchange. It seems to me that the opposite is more nearly true, that the social substance in any given age is primarily defined by its climate of ideas, its philosophical worldview, if you will. The structures of society derive their being as well as their significance from the prevailing philosophy; truth is always a function of a state of consciousness, of the way we view things.

While in Florence recently, I came across an essay, “'Spiritucl'—'Spiritualité'” (Chriatus, October, 1969) by my colleague, the French Jesuit Charles Bernard. These terms have a long and intricate history, yet, as Bernard suggested, there are many types of spirituality in the Christian world that are present by right and by necessity within the overarching structure of the same faith. On my return to Rome, 1 remarked to Bernard, a propos his essay, that I had the impression that spirituality was becoming an ever more important subject in the contemporary world. That is correct, he told me. for our current problems are at bottom spiritual ones out of which our public difficulties arise.

The military utility of the limited Cambodian campaign should be clear to those capable of assessing the facts. It will help protect the withdrawal of American troops, and reduce the Communist capability to launch attacks in the southern half of South Vietnam. It will, in short, help the process of Vietnamization. On the other hand, the fate of the I.on Nol regime in Pnompenh remains in doubt. Should South Vietnam, and perhaps other countries in Southeast Asia, help the new Cambodian government after American withdrawal, it could withstand the efforts of Sihanouk. Hanoi et. al. The venture gained time at least to shore up the Lon Nol regime, while not assuring its survival. Nixon's expressed hope that the venture might prod Hanoi into serious negotiations can be dismissed in the light of North Vietnamese patience and determination.