Linda P. Campbell: Driving doctrine teaches the high road

Bless me, Father, for I have sinned: I ran a red light while in a hurry, I procrastinated on getting the muffler fixed, and I took your name in vain when that slowpoke refused to vacate the passing lane.

The Vatican’s joking, right, with its “Drivers’ Ten Commandments”?

Notwithstanding their priceless comic value, the “Guidelines for the Pastoral Care of the Road” are presented as a serious contemplation of “a modern phenomenon, full of consequences.” The guidelines discuss such aspects as the psychology of driving to achieve domination, the obligation of good car maintenance and the spirituality of appreciating the scenery.

“Good drivers courteously give way to pedestrians, are not offended when overtaken, allow someone who wishes to drive faster to pass and do not seek revenge,” the guidelines advise.

“Obviously, someone who allows their attention to be diverted whilst driving by a mobile phone or television is not behaving in accordance with prudence,” they warn.

And then there’s this rap of the knuckles:

“It is quite common when accidents occur to blame the state of the road surface, a mechanical problem or environmental conditions. However, it should be underlined that the vast majority of car accidents are the result of serious and unwarranted carelessness — if not downright stupid and arrogant behavior by drivers or pedestrians — and are therefore due to the human factor.”

(Read a translation of the full document at www.zenit.org/ article-19915?l=english.)

It’s hard to remember sometimes — say, on a late-afternoon rush-hour crawl — but you’d think that the commandment about loving your neighbor as yourself encompassed all you need to know about driving friendly.

But the Vatican felt compelled to remind us, “You shall not kill.”

Also that “courtesy, uprightness and prudence will help you deal with unforeseen events,” cars should not be “an occasion of sin,” and we should “charitably convince the young and not so young not to drive when they are not in a fitting condition to do so.”

If you thought, as I did, that this was a wacky excursion by intrusive Roman Catholic hierarchy, well, shame on our ignorance of church teaching.

Apparently Pope Pius XII was delivering rules for the road in 1956: “Do not forget to respect other road users, be courteous and fair with other drivers and pedestrians and show them your obliging nature. Pride yourselves in being able to master an often natural impatience, in sometimes sacrificing a little of your sense of honor so that the courteousness that is a sign of true charity may prevail.”

Now, I’m convinced that God has a wicked sense of humor. And it’s tempting to chuckle at the quaint notion of substituting rosary chants for an AC-DC CD on a long drive.

But stop guffawing a moment. Get past being dumbfounded that amid the world’s vexing moral dilemmas, the church zooms in on rude drivers. Then you’ll find in these guidelines sober reflection about serious threats to human dignity.

A section on “the liberation of street women” talks about sexual exploitation and human trafficking as “acts of violence,” men’s role in working toward sexual equality, and combating “humiliating portrayals of women in advertising.”

A section on street children calls their increase a “real social emergency, as well as a pastoral one” requiring a systematic commitment toward solutions.

A section on homelessness recognizes that “living on the street is not always a choice” but is a daily struggle for survival, at the same time acknowledging that “the plight of the poor no longer moves people” and they’ve become a law-and-order problem.

“The Word of God censures any form of irritation or indifference towards poor people (poverty fatigue), reminding us that the Lord will judge our lives by assessing how and how much we have loved the poor,” the guidelines say.

That bears reminding, maybe even more than how to love that reckless driver up the highway.