Discussion of "high-profile public apologies" reminds me of a species of non-apology particularly common of late among big-name politicians and other prominent people. It goes like this: "If anyone was offended," the big-name says, "then I apologize to them."

Leaving aside the offense to basic grammar, the key word to note here is "if." Its implication is clear: the speaker really can't imagine how anyone could be so idiotic/petty/politically correct as to misunderstand the humor/earthiness/wonderful honesty of whatever it was that the speaker said. That "if" throws the burden of proving the ill-intent of the statement in question right back onto whomever it was who complain in the first place. There's certainly no repentence here, and not even an actual apology.

So what gives?

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Are we talking here about faith in God, in fellow human beings, or in one's self? Perhaps it's unavoidable that we think about all three in times of war.

Despite the old adage about a supposed lack of atheists in foxholes, I do think personal claims to religion can suffer terribly in wartime. How could they not?

Some years back, an Anglican bishop told me that he believed a part of the Church of England's decline was directly related to British soldiers' experience of World War I--living months, even years, in trenches while continually subjected to random sniper shots, raking machine gun fire and high-intensity artillery bombardments.

You get a flavor of this in (if I remember right) Sebastian Faulks' novel, "Birdsong," which paints a vivid scene of the Battle of the Somme on July 1, 1916, when British troops were ordered to make a direct assault on heavily fortified German positions. Twenty thousand men in this assault--60 percent of all officers and 40 percent of those in the ranks--died on a single day. Faulks has a chaplain witness the opening minutes of this madness; overcome, the character tears a cross from his uniform. (And, think about it, if humans are made in God's image, as Christians and Jews are taught, then such murder runs perilously close to blasphemy.)

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The libertarian in me wants to say, Let the patient's judgment rule. (Martin Marty puts this with considerably more elegance when he speaks of the "covenant" between patient and physician.) Problem is, medical decision-making is often not so neatly simple as to be a clear, two-party affair. The primary players may be the doctor and patient, but the patients' family is as likely to be involved, particularly in critical medical issues. And guess what? The family may not always agree among themselves (including with the patient), particularly when there are religious, ethical and moral issues involved.

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The answer to the question is both. Children's health care is a parental responsibility and a moral imperative for society. Why should adults bother to have children if they do not take care of them? Why should a nation bother to imagine a future if it does not make basic investments in its coming generation? Taken together, that means a collaboration between parents and government to make sure children are healthy, well-fed, educated and not burdened by onerous financial debts that they will inherit as adults.

That's the ideal. Now, what's the real? Reality is that we live in a country ever torn torn between the cult of individuality and the ideal of a generous communitarianism. In that division, we typically lean toward individualism, which at its best does wonderful things for our creativity in all fields.

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Can the use of torture ever be justified? Nope.

Three reasons: a.) It's against international law, to which the United States is (we thought) party; b.) it's morally wrong, as it utterly degrades and devalues human dignity; and c.) it's impractical as a law enforcement tool, as often enough the tortured will say absolutely anything and give up anybody to stop the pain.

One might add that a lot of Americans don't want their government to do it--69 percent, according to a CNN poll released Tuesday.

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Sure, like several other panelists, I well remember Michael Douglas's impassioned speech as corporate predator Gordon Gecko in "Wall Street." Greed, he said then, "is right," it "works" and it "has marked the upward surge of mankind." Creepy stuff--no one's supposed to say that, right?

Among the Seven Deadly Sins, greed gets its particularly bad rep because its results are often so visible, grotesque in their benefits for some and their destruction for others. The tiny band of crooked corporate chiefs get their hundreds of millions, while the thousands of men and women who answer the phones, run the machines and work the loading dock get left without jobs, health insurance or pensions.

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