Reponse to NCR article of 2 May 2012 on the abuse of authority by the Vatican and the bishops

All good plans begin with fantasy about what if...? So, here goes! What if the North American, Northern European, Southeast Asian, Australian and New Zealand Roman Catholic Churches together with other Roman Catholic Churches simply told the Vatican that from now on they would decide their own issues locally through elected bishops, priests and laypeople; and that they would begin by lifting the rule of clerical celibacy; they would ordain women; they would admit divorced and remarried people to Communion; they would use liturgies approved by local commissions; they would approve the use of contraceptives; all this for starters; and they would keep the Vatican apprised of their decisions without granting Rome a veto? That would return the church to something like what it was for the first thousand years of its existence and allow continuous reform as needed. Far out? Indeed--like the Second Vatican Council! Still binding as promulgated by the then reigning pontiff, Paul VI. By the way, how come the Vatican is silent about those who dissent from and work against the official teaching of the church as contained in the Council's pronouncements. Cafeteria catholicism on the part of the Vatican? Listen to the overwhelming voices of the catholic faithful throughout the world--the sensus fidelium.

Contraception and the Roman Catholic Church

18 Feb 2012

Response to an NCR article on the discussion of ‘freedom of religion’ and ‘government mandated access to birth control’

What a sorry state Catholic moral theology has come to. The idea that the moment of conception brings into being an individual human being is not found in the works of even the most conservative moral theologians. The fertilized ovum develops into a pre-embryonic blastocyte that cannot be confused with being an individual human being because it is still capable of becoming more than one such being. According to the official teaching of the RC church, the 'ensoulment' of the embryo is the moment at which an individual human being is present. Thomas Aquinas--whose theology is considered the 'model' to be followed --wasn't sure when 'ensoulment' took place. He 'knew' that it was some time after conception and that boys got their 'souls' earlier than girls. Of course, no? The current science of human reproduction does not support--and is not compatible with--the 13th century's view of such things.

If we want to know what the moral status of birth control methods is within the RC church, we should ask the practicing Roman Catholics whose lives are affected rather than a minority group of supposedly celibate men, i.e., women and men who are engaged in making decisions about when and how many children to have. The overwhelming majority [+/- 98%] do not have problems of 'conscience' about using birth control methods condemned by the church. They regularly receive Holy Communion without visiting the confessional; their informed consciences do not accuse them of bad faith. After all, Humanae Vitae is an encyclical containing the opinion of a 1960's pope. It should certainly be considered, but it is hardly the final word.

The Vatican's Role in Abuses

One of the comments on John Allen’s article, “A Blessing for the Vatican ….” In the September 23 issue of  “The National Catholic Reporter” refers to an article in Der Spiegel interviewing the Swiss-German theologian Hans Kueng  <http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,787325,00.html>. In his interview Professor Kueng refers to the—so far, successful—attempt on the part of Pope John Paul II, his successor Pope Benedict XVI, and the papal curia at the Vatican to reverse the reforms approved by the Second Vatican Council. The reversal of those reforms has been vividly demonstrated in the Vatican- directed, international attempt to cover up and minimize the world-wide sex abuse of victims in the Roman Catholic Church. Although this abuse has caught the attention of the non-Roman Catholic world, other—strictly—internal abuses of Vatican II reforms have had a significant impact on the integrity and credulity of the dominant culture of the Church’s leadership.

   

Freedom of Religion?

NCR   15 Nov 2011 Bishop says freedom of religion is under attack in the USA

I was naive enough to believe that the bishops were actually talking about freedom of religion. Complaints about the 'secularization' of our society misunderstand that democracy implies separation of 'church--including synagogue and mosque, etc.--and state'. Freedom of religion implies freedom to believe--or not believe--in any particular religion. True freedom of religion requires a secular state in order that no one be coerced in matters of religion. The attempt by the RCC to impose its set of official beliefs about sexual morality and reproduction on all citizens is a violation of freedom of religion not a support for it. The overwhelming majority of Roman Catholics in the USA reject the RCC teaching on artificial contraception; a good percentage also refuse to follow The RCC teaching on freedom of choice for women regarding abortion. No law of the USA requires anyone--pregnant woman or physician--to agree to an abortion. If a RC hospital does not want to provide all of the medical services for people that are part of legally and professionally approved procedures, then it should declare that and forego any taxpayer derived funds. The constant reference to 'unborn babies', 'murder of children', and the like are ignorant (willfully?) of the fact that in Western civilization an embryo or fetus only acquires the status of person upon birth; until then the pregnant woman has control over her own body. What does the RCC believe? Ask the Vatican if you will; or ask the overwhelming majority of practicing Roman Catholics. The answers will not be the same!

NCR 14 October On the Distribution of Communion

NCR 14 ctober, 2011

It is with great sadness that I see this kind of response to the distribution of Holy Communion by "Extraordinary" Eucharistic Ministers. It strikes yet another blow to the Vatican II concept of a Eucharistic community celebrating together with the ordained ministers. The Roman 'model' of receiving on the tongue accentuates the 'unclean' nature of the hands of the faithful to receive Holy Communion. The insistence of the laity kneeling during the Eucharistic Prayer--at least one of which declares that we all have been made worthy to stand before God--is yet another instance of that inconsistency. When I preside at the Eucharistic am I actually the only person--a priest--who has been made worthy to 'stand' before God? The gradual, intentional destruction of the norms and clear intentions of Vatican II by the Vatican, the Curia, and many bishops raise deep questions about the authority of a Roman Catholic Ecumenical Council, promulgated by the then Pope Paul VI,  the decrees of which are being systematically abrogated by the present Pope, his predecessor and bishops appointed by those Popes. Was Joyce really right when he wrote that "the center will not hold"?

The "new" English Roman Missal: Whose translation?

The idea that the translation of the Latin Rite Mass into English should be done by a handful of non-native speakers of English in Rome rather than the overwhelming majority of native-English speaking bishops and scholars in the entire Roman Catholic Church is so absurd that one wonders about the motives behind it. Whether intended or not, it discredits not only those bishops and scholars but the intention of Vatican II for the use of the vernacular in liturgy. The English-speaking RC Church throughout the world should simply decline to use a translation of its liturgy not made by itself; I doubt that the Vatican would be ready to excommunicate the majority of the world's English-speaking Roman Catholics for the sake of such an absurdity.

How to begin the Revolution

When Prof. Kueng [As quoted in The National Catholic Reporter, June 11, 2011] suggests a 'peaceful revolution' many people behave as though they have never heard of such a thing in the church. Several contributors to these pages have raised the question, 'How do we begin that peaceful revolution?'. Perhaps recalling some historical examples may help us to understand what a peaceful revolution would look like. The 15th century Council of Constance accepted the resignation of one anti-pope, dethroned two others, and elected the next pope. Likewise, when John XXIII convened Vatican II, the papal curia tried to take over the council by preparing the proposals for the college of bishops to adopt. They refused and gave the church one of the most fruitful councils that it had ever had. The curia and subsequent popes have tirelessly worked since then to overturn Vatican II's results.

Revolutions--peaceful or otherwise--do not begin with those who are in power, but with those who use the power they have to challenge the status quo. A group of Episcopalians, when asked by several Roman Catholic monks how the Episcopal Church managed to achieve approval of the ordination of women to the priesthood, replied, "Three retired bishops ordained a group of women to the priesthood and then turned to the wider church and asked, 'Now what?'" The moment was ripe in 1976 and now almost every Church in the Anglican Communion has accepted the ordination of women. The Roman Catholic bishops who have ordained women priests in Europe and the United States have not acted in vain despite their excommunication by an increasingly weaker Vatican. Maryknoll priest Fr. Bourgeois has not acted in vain by assisting at the ordination of women priests despite his excommunication. Every act of civil disobedience, based on the church's own teachings of justice and human dignity, weakens the power exercised unjustly by a papacy, curia and hierarchy determined to use that power as a violent means to oppress and control others. The church, like a nation, cannot continue to exist divided against it self, half slave and half free.

On the condemnation of a prominent Catholic theologian’s book by the US bishops’ committee on doctrine

Most Bishops don't have advanced degrees in theology; they often write and say things that are theologically incorrect and that do not clearly express the official teaching of the church. Many of them think that simply by being bishops they have been endowed with a level of learning that they had not had before their consecration. The wiser bishops tend to have competent theologians to whom they look for help when they need it. Cardinal Wuerl does not seem to be in that group nor do his colleagues. They don't even seem to observe their own procedures. My sense is that they ignored the proper procedures in this case because it never occurred to them that women can be theologians--just like they can't be priests. Unfortunately for them, many laypeople--men and women--have become increasingly knowledgeable about theology. It is arrogant of the bishops to believe that their theological knowledge is greater, by virtue of their office, than that of lay and ordained theologians.

Response to a comment in NCR concerning Australian Bp. Morris’s removal

"Most bishops legally own their own dioceses and can establish a true Catholic Church at any time, free of Roman monarchical tyranny and corruption." "Magari" as one says in Italian, "--If only it were so!" The legacy of the First Vatican Council [1870's] comes back with a vengeance.

A bit of conciliar history helps us to understand what led up to Vatican I [1869-1870]. The last general council of the Western Catholic Church before the Reformation was the Council of Constance  [1414-1418] that was attended by a representative number of bishops from the Western Church and—even—the Byzantine emperor and a number Eastern Church bishops. It accepted the abdication of one anti-pope and removed two others, electing a new pope. The Council of Trent  [1545-1563] only included what was left of the papal church; those bishops who disagreed with the papal party were systematically excluded and—eventually—alienated from the papal church. It, as well as the two subsequent councils [Vatican I and Vatican II] cannot, therefore, be called a general council of the Western Church. 

Two dogmatic conclusions of Vatican Council I, i.e., the ordinary universal jurisdiction of the pope, and the infallibility of the pope placed the papal church outside traditional Catholic teaching. The adoption of these two doctrines as dogmas for the papal church radically affected the possibility of restoring unity in the Western Church, and between the papal church and with the Eastern Church. The effect of universal jurisdiction for the papal church has been the reduction of the local bishop to being no more than the vicar of the pope; the effect of infallibility has been an increasingly expanding and unique final authority of the pope exercised in a way that is secretive and beyond appeal.

When we examine the removal of Bishop Morris of Toowoomba, Australia in this context, we discover the application of infallibility leading to the removal of the bishop. In 1975, Pope Paul VI had sent a letter to the then Archbishop of Canterbury arguing that women were not valid subjects for ordination and warning that it would make the attainment of unity more difficult if the Church of England went ahead with the ordination of women. The Pope instructed the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith to issue a statement that it did in 1976. The concluding paragraph of it reads as below:

Inter Insigniores

October 15, 1976

Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith

For these reasons, in execution of a mandate received from the Holy Father [Editor: Paul VI] and echoing the declaration which he himself made in his letter of 30 November 1975,⁶ the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith judges it necessary to recall that the Church, in fidelity to the example of the Lord, does not consider herself authorized to admit women to priestly ordination. The Sacred Congregation deems it opportune at the present juncture to explain this position of the Church.

There was nothing in the Pope’s letter or the Congregation’s Statement claiming that this is an infallible declaration. On 22 May 1994, Pope John Paul II issued an Apostolic Letter concerning the ordination of women containing the following conclusion:

Apostolic Letter 
ordinatio sacerdotalis
of John Paul II to the Bishops 


of the Catholic Church 
on Reserving Priestly Ordination 
to Men Alone

Wherefore, in order that all doubt may be removed regarding a matter of great importance, a matter which pertains to the Church's divine constitution itself, in virtue of my ministry of confirming the brethren (cf. Lk 22:32) I declare that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church's faithful.

(Edtor’s note) Lk 22:32 is Jesus’s admonition to Peter to is to “strengthen” his brethren. Once again, no reference to papal infallibility.

Back to Bishop Morris: Pope Benedict accused Bishop Morris of disagreeing with an infallible statement of the pope when he said in a letter to his diocese in 1976  that the desperate shortage of priests could lead to discussion of the ordination of women. Benedict has raised these statements to the level of infallible statements by the pope and the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. The statements heretofore only declared that there was to be no further discussion of the subject. The pope, raising them to the level of infallible statements, has used his authority of ‘universal ordinary jurisdiction’ to remove Bishop Morris from jurisdiction over his diocese.

One sees here the fruit of Vatican I’s ‘dogmas’. We can easily understand the promulgation of the two ‘dogmas’ as a reaction to the pope’s loss of temporal power with the defeat of the Vatican’s military forces at the  hands of the forces of the new Republic.  The present application of these two ‘dogmas’ in prohibiting further discussion of the ordination of women [or the elimination of celibacy for Latin Rite priests] Benedict XVI has—once again—taken a position that is contrary to the spirit of Vatican II’s ecclesiology. The support for the ordination of women by most European and English-speaking Roman Catholics—as well as others—will eventually prevail not just as a response to the shortage of celibate male priests, but as a matter of justice.    

A response to the controversy between a Roman Catholic bishop And a Roman Catholic professional organization

The conflict between Bishop Olmstead and the Catholic Health Association is a symptom of a serious problem for the heretofore unquestionable authority of the hierarchy: a group of lay and religious experts have challenged the opinion expressed by a bishop on a critical moral theological issue. The CHA and the particular ethics commission at the hospital in question have provided an argument for their decision based on present Roman Catholic moral theology; the bishop does not enter into the discussion, but --in effect--says, "They are wrong, because I am a bishop and I say so." Increasingly, clergy, religious, and lay people are standing up and saying, "The hierarchy is wrong; the hierarchy has lied to us; the hierarchy has placed itself above the accepted principles on the basis of which we decide what is acceptable and what is not."

This is a situation that transcends simple interpretations of what the authentic opinion of the Church is. The 'sensus fidelium' and the 'sensus magisterium' of theological experts have asserted a critical right to be consulted in what the authentic Catholic faith is. The Pope, the papal curia, and the bishops are being held responsible for their opinions according to established norms by an educated laity and the authoritative opinions of theologians. It is no longer possible for the curia to declare that a particular theologian is no longer a recognized Catholic theologian for his or her opinions to be ignored.

We have entered into an era in which "moral authority' transcends other kinds of authority. One must engage the other in dialogue and argue honestly and openly for one's point of view in order to persuade other-minded people. It is no longer acceptable simply to declare conclusions without the support of rational discourse: the Pope, the Curia, the bishops [either individually or in union with one another] are no longer able to impose their opinions on the rest of the Church by fiat. Their positions must stand the test of rational discourse in order to obtain the agreement of the Church.

The exercise of such a new authority on the part of the Patriarch of the West, the Pope is set forth in the Anglican Roman Catholic International Commission's “Report: Authority in the Church III". It needs to be adopted by both churches and implemented in order for us to be obedient to Christ's prayer for the unity of the Church.

Legalism and Teaching Authority

The disagreement between Bp. Olmstead of Phoenix, AZ, and Catholic Health West is an excellent example of a profound systemic problem within the Roman Catholic Church worldwide: Does the magisterial authority of a bishop override the magisterial authority of the sensus fidelium of the general Catholic community and/or the magisterial authority of the theologians--in this case moral theologians? Bp. Olmstead--no theologian in his own right--has depended almost exclusively on the advice of canon lawyers--no theologians in their own right--to arrive at a conclusion that differs from the way in which the Roman Catholic professional health community interprets the Church's teaching.

The Council of Constance in the 1400's--the last regular council of the western part of the church--reached the peak of limiting papal and episcopal authority, subjecting it to conciliar authority--and electing a new pope! Beginning with the Council of Trent--which systematically excluded any northern European bishops who had expressed sympathy with the reform element of the church--canon lawyers began to dominate the interpretation of the church's teachings in practically every area. This development intensified and reached its highest expression at the First Vatican Council: the pope's authority was--successfully for the first time--defined as 'universal ordinary jurisdiction' over what was left of the papal church. Canon lawyers moved into a definitive role as the interpreters of the church's faith in every area.

Vatican Council II--Pope John XXIII's 'fresh air' council--attempted to restore some balance in its decrees and recommendations. One need only read the writings of official theologians like Hans Kueng and the then Josef Ratzinger to discover the scope of the reforms intended by the Council. Theologians regained their rightful magisterium as did the faithful in 'Lumen Gentium'. Despite the binding nature of conciliar decrees on all Roman Catholics, the intense campaign to discredit and reverse the decisions of the Council began almost immediately on the election of Papa Woytyla and has continued under Papa Ratzinger. Support and encouragement for politically right-wing, ultra-consevative movements like Opus Dei, Communion and Liberation, as well as Maciel's profoundly corrupt and corrupting religious order came from the highest papal circles in the Vatican. This anti-conciliar movement has concentrated itself on discrediting theologians as interpreters of the Church's teachings and on preventing the active participation of lay Roman Catholics in the life of the Church. The attack on women's religious orders in the United States must be seen in this larger arena.

The Fathers of Vatican Council II rejected what the inner circle of the Vatican had prepared for them to rubber stamp, and moved the Church into the modern world. The Council laid the foundation for a new 'Proclamation of the Good News of God in Jesus Christ'. Almost all of those bishops are gone now, the towering brilliance of the leadership of the Council is remembered by increasingly fewer and almost all of the present bishops and cardinals in the church are appointees of the anti-conciliar popes Woytyla and Ratzinger.

Thus, the tension between the papal hierarchy and its bishops and the theological and lay communities continues to prevent the Church from being what Vatican II intended it to be: the continuously reforming, vibrant, forward moving Body of Christ proclaiming the good news of justice, peace, and love. Despite the best efforts of the anti-conciliar forces, the genie cannot be put back in the bottle; the Holy Spirit will prevail!

NCR, Daniel Burke, 10-04-2010 “Catholics Face ‘Mutiny’  over Teachings on Gay Marriage’

Catholics face 'mutiny' over teachings on gay marriage

By Daniel Burke, Religion News Service

WASHINGTON -- For 13 years, Fr. Joseph Palacios lived, prayed, and studied with the Jesuits. But he left the Roman Catholic order in 2005 because he would not profess a vow of obedience to the pope. Now, the 59-year-old priest and adjunct professor at Georgetown University is again at odds with the church’s hierarchy, this time on one of its signature issues: the definition of marriage.

Ray Bronk’s Observations

The Luddite tendencies of official RC teaching never cease to amaze me. That homosexuality--naturally occurring in the human species forever--should be declared "unnatural", despite the findings of medical science, is an example of the intellectual gymnastics required by the church's teachings on sexuality. The vehemence with which the "official" church teaches that contraception; remarriage after divorce; married priests and bishops; ordination of women and GLBT persons; true equality for GLBT people; and abortion are all seriously sinful and lead potentially to eternal damnation make one wonder what the "Good News of God in Jesus Christ" is. The radical obsession with and prominence of sexuality in the official teaching of the church make one wonder if the Incarnation took place in order to control people's sex lives. Surely the "Good News" is more about justice, peace and love than it is about exclusion and damnation. Fortunately for the church, the majority of practicing Catholics in the US reject most of this teaching in the expression of their opinions and in their daily lives.

Welcoming former Roman Catholics into the Episcopal Church

18. X. 2010

From the desk of the Rev. Prof. Harold R. Bronk, Jr.:

I believe that it is time for the Anglican Communion and, most especially, the Episcopal Church in the US, to welcome into this branch of ‘Christ’s holy catholic church’ those disaffected former Roman Catholics who are no longer able in good conscience to remain in the Roman Communion.

Pope Benedict XVI, by offering disaffected ex-Anglicans a place in the Roman Catholic Communion, has raised the issue—indirectly—of what we Anglicans can do about disaffected former Roman Catholics without proselytizing.

In an article in the National Catholic Reporter, January 11, 2010, Fr. Richard McBrien, Professor of Theology at Notre Dame University, wrote: “In late February 2008, the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life released a major survey that found that nearly a third of U.S. Catholics have left the Catholic church. Some have joined other churches, but most have simply slipped from active membership in the Catholic church to become part of a group once described as "lapsed Catholics." This means that about 10 percent of all Americans today are former Catholics. “ It also means that most of the some 20,000,000 former Roman Catholics have not yet found a spiritual home.

In the Episcopal Church they will find a reformed Catholic church (the third largest Christian church in the world) that already exemplifies many of the characteristics that they had hoped to see in the Roman Catholic Church as a result of the Second Vatican Council:

·      A democratic church in which every office holder—lay or clergy—is elected by the people. From the parish priest to the diocesan bishop to the national presiding bishop, all are elected by the chosen representatives of the clergy and laity.

·      The Eucharistic liturgy with the Sacrament of Holy Communion as the principal act of worship on Sundays and major saints’ days. All baptized Christians are welcome to receive Holy Communion. The Sacrament of Reconciliation is available on an ‘all may; some should; no one must’ basis.

·      The freedom of clergy to marry.

·      Admission to Holy Communion of divorced and remarried people without annulment of the previous marriage.

·      Full equality of women including their admission to all of the ordained ministries of the Church: diaconate; priesthood; and episcopate.

·      Full equality of all people regardless of their sexual orientation.

·      Artificial contraception is not considered to be sinful; the freedom of women to follow their own informed consciences in regard to the termination of an unwanted pregnancy is approved by a majority of Episcopalians and is not censured by the church. Children and adults are taught the Christian faith in order to apply it to their own lives; priests and trained spiritual directors are available to assist them in their decision-making.

The suggestion that I make above is also based on my own personal experience of both Communions. I was ordained an Episcopal priest in 1954. I left the ministry of the Episcopal Church in 1959, became a Roman Catholic, and—after four and a half years of postgraduate study at the Catholic Theological Faculty of the University of Tuebingen, Germany—was ordained as a married Roman Catholic priest in Germany. I subsequently returned to the Episcopal Church and was restored to the Episcopal priesthood in 1992. In Tuebingen, I studied with a number of prominent Roman Catholic theologians, including Prof. Hans Kueng and then Prof. Josef Ratzinger; I attended a session of the Second Vatican Council and followed its deliberations closely; and I have continued to have many Roman Catholic priest friends and acquaintances, theologians among them. I share with many of my Roman Catholic friends—both practicing and no longer practicing—a concern for the spiritual welfare of those who have left the Roman Communion but who have not found a church within which to continue their Catholic faith and practice. I believe that ignorance of the reformed Catholic nature of our church prevents many former Roman Catholics from finding a new spiritual home among us. I believe that we have an obligation to address their plight and that the Pope’s offer to former Anglicans allows us to reciprocate in the same spirit of concern—on our part—for the welfare of former Roman Catholics.

I propose that the Episcopal Church engage in a campaign at the national, diocesan, and parish level to inform former Roman Catholics that “we recognize [them] as [members] of the one holy catholic and apostolic Church, and we receive [them] into the fellowship of this Communion”. Former Roman Catholics already in our church, including clergy, could be enlisted to help others understand the needs of former Roman Catholics as they seek further information about our church. I—and, I am sure, others—have conducted workshops and seminars to explain the similarities and differences between our church and the Roman Catholic Church. Most of us, I am sure, would be willing to do that at the diocesan and parochial level as we welcome former Roman Catholics to become part of our church.

Using the figures provided by Fr. McBrien, there are c. 800,000 disaffected Roman Catholics in eastern Massachusetts [i.e., within the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts] most of whom have not found a spiritual home.  

There is no need to create separate ‘ordinariates’ [as the Roman Church has done for former Anglicans] for our former Roman Catholic sisters and brothers—they will feel at home with the liturgy of the Episcopal Church: it is practically identical to the liturgy that they have become accustomed to in the last three generations since Vatican II.

  

Response to an article by Daniel Burke, National Catholic Reporter, 10-04-2010 on RC bishops attempt to prevent legal marriages for LGBT people

The Luddite tendencies of official RC teaching never cease to amaze me. That homosexuality--naturally occurring in the human species forever--should be declared "unnatural", despite the findings of medical science, is an example of the intellectual gymnastics required by the church's teachings on sexuality. The vehemence with which the "official" church teaches that contraception; remarriage after divorce; married priests and bishops; ordination of women and GLBT persons; true equality for GLBT people; and abortion are all seriously sinful and lead potentially to eternal damnation make one wonder what the "Good News of God in Jesus Christ" is. The radical obsession with and prominence of sexuality in the official teaching of the church make one wonder if the Incarnation took place in order to control people's sex lives. Surely the "Good News" is more about justice, peace and love than it is about exclusion and damnation. Fortunately for the church, the majority of practicing Catholics in the US reject most of this teaching in the expression of their opinions and in their daily lives.

Response to John Allen’s article in NCR, April 2, 2010

John, I don't know if you read these comments; I hope you do. 'Is there room for a middle ground?' you ask. Let us continue to hope so because if there isn't then rational discourse will have disappeared along with a respectful listening to those with whom one disagrees. True knowledge depends on speaking what we believe to be the truth, listening to others' arguments, revising our opinions, and articulating the next level. In rational discourse, there is no 'final' truth; only increasingly accurate approximations of truth. But, then, there is also no final act of justice, no final loving.
After the Second Vatican Council, the Pope and the papal curia could have moved forward toward decentralization and greater democratization of the church. None of the post conciliar popes have chosen to do that. The present crisis around the pope's possible involvement in the covering up of priestly sex abuse when he was the archbishop of Munich and prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has to do, in part, with the separation of the figure of the pope from the life of the person who becomes pope. The donning of the white apparel from the moment of his election (a 16th century custom); the changing of the name of the person elected (not an ancient custom); the seclusion of the pope as the 'prisoner of the Vatican' up until Woytyla; and the radical separation of the pope from the ordinary life of people all contribute to the mystification of the papacy. Josef Ratzinger, like his predecessors from the middle of the 19th century, has disappeared, has been obliterated by His Holiness, the Holy Father. The demythologization of the papacy would help us to accept the mistakes in judgment made by the person before his election to the papal office as well as mistakes made in office. 'Papal infallibility' is so carefully proscribed as to be almost non-existent; it certainly does not apply to either ordinary, every day utterances of the pope or even ordinary official statements on faith and morals. Admission of errors made during his administration of the archdiocese of Munich and his prefecture at the CDF would go a long way toward helping us to understand better the man who has been called to the highest office in the largest Christian Church in the world—and to support him with our prayers.

Response to Fr. Michael Crosby NCR Mar 30, 2010

Reading Fr. Crosby’s response to Sr. Sandra Schneider’s article on ‘ministerial religious life’ was one of those ‘grace-filled’ moments that we enjoy all too rarely. As a secular priest who has no vocation for celibacy, poverty, or obedience in the ‘religious order’ sense of those terms, whose ministry has been mostly teaching at a university, I read Sr. Sandra’s articles [devoured them, I guess] at the level of spiritual reading. She caused me to reflect upon my own ‘ministerial’ life as priest and professor. Is my life less ‘ministerial’, less ‘religious’ than the lives of my sisters and brothers in ‘religious orders’? I hope not. And now, Fr. Michael’s article in response to Sr. Sandra’s. What I find is a ministerial religious continuum along which we all find ourselves—and that our lives together form a messy kind of ‘community’ along Fr. Michael’s fourth model.

There is a tension between the universal call for all followers of Jesus to minister to others according to their needs, and the institutionalization and control of those ministries by a hierarchical, authoritarian, patriarchal sector of the church. At least since post-Constantinian times, the church seems to consist of at least two ‘types’ of Christians: ‘conventional’ Christians who uninterestedly and minimally do what they are required to do in order to maintain their ‘membership’; and ‘intentional’ Christians who see themselves as engaged in their ministries because they are religious. Francis of Assisi is a good example of the latter. As a layman, he did not seek official recognition by the institutional church but was persuaded to receive tonsure thereby coming under the jurisdiction of the church. This can be seen as the church using its power to dominate and control a religious movement that challenged the institutional church’s authority.

I agree with Fr. Michael’s criticism of the anachronistical ‘proof-text’ approach to justifying later developments. Whatever ‘leaving one’s possessions and not marrying’ may have meant among the early followers of Jesus, it is difficult to trace a direct connection between that and the development of the lives of the ’desert fathers [mothers?]’ and other forms of ascetic life, largely in the eastern church. Despite pre-Benedictine ‘religious’ examples [e.g., pre-Benedictine Farfa in Italy], the Benedictine model dominated the development of ‘religious’ life in the western church; and it was not focused on ministry to the world outside the monastery. Women’s religious orders followed the same model. Not until the thirteenth century do we find Francis and Dominic founding orders designed to ‘minister’ to the world outside the cloister. And women were not permitted to follow their brothers in that vocation: Franciscan and Dominican nuns were required to live the same cloistered lives as their Benedictine sisters. The establishment of women’s religious communities to serve ‘ministerial’ needs in the world outside the convent is a relatively new development [18^th century?] and certainly one that finds inspiration in the women of the original community gathered around Jesus.

The desire [even need] that we have to ground all that we do in reference to the original ‘Jesus community’ is understandable. If we see the New Testament as being the Word of God, then we want it’s authority for what we do. But, like the early Christians who wrote the ‘New Testament’, perhaps we need to look to our experience of the living ‘Word of God’, Jesus himself, in our midst, for the inspiration of the ways in which we live out our Christian lives. As the ‘proof of the pudding is in the eating’, so the ‘proof of our Christian lives is in their living’.

Whether as ‘religious’ or just ‘intentional’ Christians, we are to live our faith daily, always seeking, being challenged, never absolutely certain about tomorrow’s Christian life, but certain that we walk ‘surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses’ and accompanied by the living ‘Word of God’, Jesus himself.

    

Response to article on excommunications in Phoenix abortion case-NCR 18 May 2010

This case is an example of how incorrect language leads to incorrect actions. The phrase "unborn child" was--apparently--used by the religious authorities to justify the excommunication of Sr. McBride and others who concurred with the termination of the pregnancy. There is no such being In either canon law or civil law as an "unborn child". An embryo or fetus only becomes a "child" upon birth; until then it is human tissue and does not qualify--either in church or civil law--for the status of being a "person". Only "persons" are subject to the law and its protections. Bishops, priests, lawyers, judges, and others involved in making critical decisions such as the one at issue in this case have a moral obligation to make "informed" recommendations in such cases. The use of the term "unborn child" reveals a level of ignorance--at best--or deliberate obfuscation that serves no one except ideologues.

The circumstances in Roman Catholic moral theology in which the death of an embryo or fetus is morally acceptable as a result of an allowable medical intervention are arcane at best and certainly beyond the expertise of most of the people engaged in the kind of emergency decision making required in most such cases. The excommunication of Sr. McBride and all others who participated in advising or performing the termination of pregnancy in this case--including the pregnant woman!--is a prime example of the kind of second guessing and uncharitable arrogance and lack of basic Christian concern for the welfare of others that characterizes many of those who are in leadership positions in the church.

Would it really have been a better expression of the Christian message to allow the pregnant woman to die along with the 11-week old embryo?

Response to an article by Fr. R. McBrien in the National Catholic Reporter c. 02-24-2010

Some interesting comments--someone seems to have hit a nerve! But, getting back to what Fr. McBrien was writing about: internal divisions within the Roman Catholic Church and the Anglican Communion--or the Roman Catholic Communion and the Anglican Catholic Church. I admire and have always benefited from Fr. McBrien's writings: theologically acute; readable; appealing to the only authority really worth having--moral authority. I agree that the Anglican Communion (the third largest Christian body in the world after the Roman Catholic and the Orthodox churches and which also considers itself to be an authentically Catholic Church) must deal with the problem of the status of gay and lesbian people in the Church and in the world. There are questions which, once raised, must be addressed without hesitation: slavery, civil rights, the equality of women are all examples; one could go on to hunger, disease, housing, education, medical care. The point is that the place and role--the radical equality--of gay and lesbian people in the Church and in the world was raised and continues to be raised. Martin Luther King's "Why We Can't Wait" is an eloquent response to those who would rather postpone or simply not deal with the question. Scientific knowledge and medical opinion based upon it provide no foundation for the opinion that gay and lesbian (as well as bi-sexual and transgendered) people are aberrant or perverse: they occur in nature just as heterosexual people do. The incidence of their occurrence may be less than that of heterosexual people, but they are just as "normal". Once we accept the arguments of science and medicine--and those who do not offer no convincing opposing  views--the consequences of that acceptance seem reasonably clear: discriminating against gay and lesbian people is contrary to our Christian commitment as well as their rights in a just society--or just church, for that matter. And, so, Anglicans have no choice but to insist on addressing the "homosexuality" question and responding to it out of convictions based on rational discourse as well as faith.

As to "bad" or "lapsed" Roman Catholics. My experience, admittedly anecdotal, is supported by the studies that have been done: there is little homogeneity. Some have left because of individual and personal experiences of priests or ecclesiastical authorities that angered or offended them in some way. Others have left because they could no longer in good conscience accept what was offered to them as the "church's teaching". Others have simply found the Church to be irrelevant to their lives. In my experience, most of the former Roman Catholics (or about-to-become-former Roman Catholics) with whom I have some relationship have left or considered leaving around disagreements with the church having to do with sexuality: artificial contraception; marriage of the clergy; ordination of women; admission to communion of divorced and remarried people; women's freedom of choice about abortion; and the place of lesbian and gay people in the church. According to almost all of reliable studies, the majority of practicing Roman Catholics in the US disagree with the Roman Catholic Church's teaching on all of these issues (except, perhaps, on the question of freedom to choose to terminate a pregnancy); and, yet, they remain in the church and do not consider their rejection of the church's teaching to be an obstacle to being faithful Catholics. As one of them said to me recently, "Did the Incarnation really take place in order to control people's sex lives?" Many who have left the Roman Catholic Church, however, found themselves unable to be members of a church that teaches what the Roman Catholic Church teaches.

Perhaps, in the Anglican Communion/Roman Catholic desire to find a middle ground that may increase our participation in our Lord's desire that the Church be one, we should encourage (as Pope Benedict XVI has done) Anglican dissidents to join the Roman Catholic Church and Roman Catholic dissidents to join the Anglican Communion. I have not heard the Archbishop of Canterbury explicitly welcome dissident Roman Catholics to become part of the Anglican Communion, but I am certain that he would not be displeased if that were to take place. Maybe then we would experience a cross fertilization that would eventually lead to a renewed ecumenical desire.

Health Reform

Many of us are disappointed in the health reform law because it does not go far enough, goes too far, or contains provisions that we disagree with. An Italian proverb says, “Perfection is the enemy of the good.” Are we willing to sacrifice the good achieved for the unachievable goal of universal agreement? Abortion and less radical means of controlling pregnancy have become the litmus test for all discussion having to do with the morality of “interfering” with nature. There is a sharp difference between anti- and pro-choice advocates. The official position of the Roman Catholic Church and its magisterium is that no women should ever have the choice of having an abortion regardless of the circumstances. Some Roman Catholics do not believe that the church has the right to impose its moral views on non-Roman Catholic women; other Roman Catholics disagree with the institutional church’s position altogether. Most non-Roman Catholic Christians disagree to one extent or another with the Roman Catholic position.

The argument of anti-choice moral theologians is based on the opinion that an embryo/fetus is an appropriate subject, i.e., a “person”, under both canon and civil law.  However, both church canon law and civil law have traditionally held the view that an embryo/fetus achieves personhood upon birth and not before. Of course, as human tissue, like a human organ or limb, the product of a spontaneous abortion is to be treated with the appropriate respect. There is provision in canon law for the baptism of an aborted fetus if it is alive. A fetus that has been separated from the womb and is still alive is, by definition, no longer a fetus but a “child”, i.e., a “person’ and, as such, a suitable candidate for baptism. Liturgically, we celebrate the Feast of the Incarnation not on March 25 [the Feast of the Annunciation], but on December 25, when Jesus’ human birth is celebrated.

That an embryo/fetus has no rights under either canon or civil law because it is not a “person”, i.e., not an appropriate subject in law, prevents a pregnant woman from being criminally prosecuted in the event that harm or death should come to the embryo/fetus through some action or inaction on her part (e.g., smoking, the abuse of alcohol or other drugs, etc.). If the argument that an embryo/fetus is—under law—a “person” were to be accepted by the courts, a pregnant woman could face criminal charges ranging from assault and battery to first degree murder in the event of harm to or death of the embryo/fetus in her uterus provoked by some action on her part. That is a position that has never been taken either by the church or the civil courts.

Perhaps our discussion and energy would better serve our common interests if we confined it to the embryo in the third trimester, i.e., when it is potentially capable of extra-uterine survival. Roe v. Wade already treats third trimester abortions differently from earlier abortions. At that point in pregnancy, the extrauterine survivability of the embryo already creates circumstances that require special care.  Focusing on the increased potentiality of the fetus to become a legal “person” through birth or surgical removal from the womb may help us—Roman Catholics, other Christians and non-Christians—to come to a consensus in both church and civil law.

Name calling and punishing faithful Roman Catholics for differing with what is, after all, a patriarchal, authoritarian, hierarchical position held by a group of celibate men who are in no danger of being pregnant does not further the enterprise of rational discourse about moral theology within the Christian theological community or about ethics in the larger society. When one examines the obsessive concern with matters of sexuality within the Roman Catholic Church—celibacy of the clergy; ordination of women; equality within the Church of gay and lesbian people; teaching on contraception and abortion; the exclusion of remarried divorced people from communion; the legitimacy of scientific techniques (e.g., in vitro fertilization) to assist infertile couples to have children—give one the impression that the Incarnation took place in order to control people’s exercise of their sexuality or regulate gender issues.

One of the central questions has to do with natural law arguments and religious arguments. The conclusions of the former are “binding” on all by virtue of their reasonableness, whereas the conclusions of the latter are binding only on the “faithful”.

In response to Richard McBrien, NCR, 10 May 2010

Fr. McBrien's assessment of Papa Ratzinger's pontificate over the years and now has been both fair and forbearing. Many of us who knew Josef Ratzinger as a young and progressive theologian in Tuebingen and as a peritus to Cardinal Frings, one of the large group of northern European progressive bishops, and as an astute commentator and supporter of the decrees of Vatican II wondered what had happened to turn him into the perfect foil for Papa Woytyla in his tireless campaign against the reforms of Vatican II. He had become the sworn enemy of the progressive theologians and bishops with whom he had been closely allied. At Woytyla's death and during the conclave that followed, it seemed to many observers that Ratzinger and Cardinal Martini had become "stalking horses": Ratzinger for the anti-Vatican II forces and Martini of Milan for those cardinals who wanted to carry the conciliar reforms forward. It was not to be. The preponderance of Woytyla-appointed cardinals became clear in the almost immediate election of Ratzinger as pope. Even at the beginning of his pontificate, despite gestures such as the fraternal supper with Hans Kueng, he surrounded himself with supporters and protagonists of the anti-Vatican II movement already ensconced in the papal curia; his first encyclicals were theologically interesting but had little bearing on the plight of the post-Woytyla church. And, like George Bush with September 11 and Barack Obama with the recession, he was confronted almost immediately with the pedophile epidemic that many--erroneously--had thought to be confined to America. Suddenly, his beloved "Christian Europe" was deluged with the most sordid stories of children victims and the attempts of the institutional church to deny and sweep under the carpet one of the most vile episodes in the Church's history. Somewhere between an innocent bystander and an active participant in his own episcopate in Munich and his early years as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, he was totally unprepared to find himself at the center of the present uproar.

Perhaps, if he had been able to clean out the corrupt upper levels of the curia and the equally corrupt bureaucracy that served that corrupt elite, he would now have people around him who could have given him better advice than that which he appears to be following. But, after all, they are the people who put him in power in first place.

Let us all continue to hold Papa Ratzinger in our prayers and to leave some room for God the Holy Spirit to work in the Church--She doesn't need all that much room to do her work. Maybe that once courageous and hopeful young Vatican II reformer-theologian is still in there somewhere and will come to the aid of God's church.