How a Party Rooted in Authoritarianism Can Grow a Conscience

Cardinal Kim Soo-Hwan seems to have very little use for President Roh Moo-Hyun and Unifiction Minister Lee Jong-Seok, and he’ll get neither an argument nor any points for originality from me there. The most important words he spoke were for the Korean right, which has been much too busy boycotting the National Assembly to use its seats there to propose a better direction for Korea. I hope the GNP (and everyone else) heeds the Cardinal’s words:

Cardinal Kim also urged the conservative party to be “more active and vocal in inter-Korean relations, with love for the North Koreans.”

I’m one who believes that religion has a legitimate role in politics — injecting conscience into the national debate. Rather than restart that endless discussion of when the slope toward theocracy has become too steep or slippery, I would instead ask a question more firmly grounded in the reality of South Korea in 2006 — whether this guy deserves to be the face of Korea’s religious conscience.

Didn’t think so.