Bridges
by
Christopher Dodson
Executive Director, North Dakota Catholic Conference
May 2010
Sometimes God places seemingly unrelated observations in
your head that beg for reflection on whether they are
related. That happened to me with bridges.
A reference to a letter by Saint Basil the Great first
caught my attention. Basil was bishop of Ceasarea, in
modern day Turkey, from 370 to 379. Basil is known as great
defender against heresy, but he was also prolific letter
writer very involved in the life of his community. In one
of these letters Basil urges the provincial governor to
build a much needed bridge.
Even in the early years of the church, therefore, we have a
case of a member of the clergy, a bishop no less, urging a
representative of the state to engage in a task for the
common good. Saint Basil apparently recognized that the
duty of a Christian went beyond personal charity for the
poor. It also encompassed working for what the community or
government could do for the good of all.
Jump ahead 1600 years. I saw a story about a Catholic
priest in India beaten by police while peacefully
protesting delays in the construction of a bridge.
In 2007, Catholic diocesan officials in the Kerala area of
India expressed concern about repeated delays in the
construction of important bridge connecting two coastal
communities hit by the 2004 tsunami. Father Father Edward
Puthanpurackal and members of the Catholic Youth Movement
participated in a peaceful protest by lying on the road to
the bridge, a form of nonviolent action developed by
Mohandas Gandhi. Police then attacked and beat the
protestors. News stories reported that the Deputy
Superintendent of Police himself beat Father Edward. The
diocese and other Catholic leaders condemned the attacks
and renewed calls for completion of the bridge.
I then came across another unexpected reference to bridges
when reading about English Catholicism before the
Reformation. At that time, wills and testaments were
primarily religious acts. A person executed a will to set
himself right before God. It was common, therefore, for
people to leave bequests for prayers and acts of mercy to
be performed by executors or specified individuals. Many of
these wills also left money for the building and
maintaining of bridges. Historians point out that these
bequests were not secular gifts, like those of
today’s philanthropists, but were religious acts
motivated by God’s call to care for the community.
Government primarily funded the construction of bridges.
The church, however, was a supporter of bridge building as
a public good and essential to public safety. The famous
London Bridge, which provided safer passage to pilgrims
going to Canterbury, may never have been completed without
direct and indirect church support. In fact, even its main
architect was a priest.
The Christian symbolism of bridges is easily apparent.
Christ is a bridge to the Father. Bishops and the pope are
called “pontiffs,” which literally means
“bridge-builder.” What struck me about the
similarities between Saint Basil in fourth century Asia
Minor, a twenty-first century Indian priest, and Catholics
in medieval England was not symbolism. Rather, the striking
feature of these three events in church history is how they
reflect an understanding that our Christian obligation to
others is not just about private charity. Being Christian
also means having a commitment to the common good, which
the church defines as those social conditions that allow
people, either as groups or as individuals, to reach their
fulfillment more fully and more easily. These Christians
recognized that bridges, like a just economy, education,
security, and health care, are part of the common good to
which Christians are called to provide for all.
