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I must admit that I don't
think this canonization is
appropriate
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Pope Francis is canonizing
two popes this weekend and in all likelihood he will be joined by his
predecessor, Benedict XVI, for the ceremony.
Two popes honoring two popes. It
is historic moment. It is also, I
believe, a mistake of historic proportions.
I am not saying that the two honorees were not good men—though I do
wonder if they possessed sanctity to the heroic degree that sainthood
requires—but the canonization is at best the right thing for the wrong
reason. I say at best, because I am not
convinced that it is even the right thing.
I am not the only one who has
reservations about this canonization.
The wing-nuts on the left have raised objections to John Paul’s being
declared a saint because of how the sex-abuse crisis was handled during his reign,
including his own support for the late Marcial Maciel, the disgraced founder of
the Legionaries of Christ. The wing-nuts
on the right object to John XXIII because he called the Second Vatican Council
which is responsible for the dramatic changes in Catholicism over the last
fifty years. Personally, neither of
those arguments hold much water for me; my objection is that this canonization
has nothing to do with the heroic holiness of either man but is a political
ploy to try to put together again the Humpty-Dumpty of First-World
Catholicism. I say “First-World
Catholicism” as the Church in Africa, Asia, and Latin America is still intact
while in Western Europe and North America there are two Churches, both claiming
to be Catholic. John Paul is the mythic
hero of the one; John XXIII the mythic hero of the second. The irony of this canonization is that
neither myth is well-founded in history and the tragedy of this canonization is
that it is too late for such a symbolic act to effectively restore the unity of
the Church.
In future entries we will
look more closely at these two to-be-sainted pontiffs, but first: what do I
mean by saying that in the developed world there are two distinct Churches,
each claiming to be Catholic? We can sometimes
see this by looking at two adjacent parishes that each manifest a different
face of Catholicism. I will give you an
example, though I am blocking the name and town of the parishes other than to
say that they are in Fairfax County, Virginia.
A friend of mine is preparing an article for a major journal and while
she has given me access to some of her research, I cannot use it until the
article is published. She has cleared
this draft, however, and has agreed to let me give some of her conclusions as
long as I don’t identify the places.
Parish A is a parish of 2500
families and comprises two communities: one English speaking and the other
Hispanic. While there are a variety of
joint activities—including Holy Week Liturgies—and while there are a number of
families that participate in both communities, there are for all practical
purposes two parishes meeting under the same roof. The Hispanic community is exceptionally
active with two vibrant weekend liturgies in Spanish, one Saturday evening and
the other Sunday afternoon with an average attendance of about a thousand
between the two masses. The English speaking community has six liturgies: one
on Saturday, four on Sunday morning, and one Sunday evening with an average
attendance of about two thousand between the six masses. The music at the English liturgies is all
contemporary music with piano, guitars, sometimes flute, violin, or bass. The Sunday evening liturgy has a contemporary
music ensemble that is particularly good.
There is no Catholic school but an extensive CCD program for about 1500
kids. There were 35 catechumens or
candidates in the RCIA this past year, disproportionately from the Hispanic
Community. There is only one priest
assigned to the parish but he has an extensive staff of over a dozen qualified laypersons
for religious education, adult faith formation, social justice, youth ministry,
liturgy and music. There is also a full-time priest for the Hispanic
community. There is a lay administrator
for finances, facilities, etc. The
parish has a particular emphasis on social ministry with outreach to the large
immigrant population in the area and to senior citizens. Cursillo, Just Faith, Little Rock Bible Study
and other activities are building blocks of a strong parish community as well
as are “work camps” both for older teens and for adults that take parishioners
to Appalachia to build homes for the poor.
A ministry to the bereaved includes funeral planners, a “Resurrection
Choir” and a team of parishioners who will prepare the luncheon after the funeral
if the family wishes. There is an
extensive Adult Faith Formation program with nationally known speakers as well
as speakers from Catholic U and Georgetown.
The parish rolls show that parishioners come from 72 different
zip-codes, some coming over thirty miles on Sunday and even crossing state
lines.
The parish directly north of
parish A, we will call it parish B, has three priests and four lay staff,
including the principal of the Catholic School.
The school is noted for a good education and is a draw to the
parish. The pastor handles
administration and leaves the bulk of pastoral work to his two associates. Parishioners participate in a local Catholic
food pantry but other than that activities tend to be the more traditional:
Legion of Mary, Catholic Daughters, Secular Franciscans, and the Nocturnal
Adoration Society. There is an RCIA
program but I was unable to find out how many catechumens or candidates they
had this Easter. About 1500 people
attend Mass there each weekend. There
are seven Masses each weekend and three each day. There is a weekly Sunday Latin Mass but all
the liturgies tend to more traditional music and worship style. There is no Spanish Mass despite a
significant Hispanic population in the area.
Funerals are celebrated in purple or black vestments with the
traditional Requiem Mass format, though (mostly) in English. While 80+% of Sunday Mass goers tend to live
within a five mile radius of the Church, the Latin Mass does draw some from
Washington DC and other nearby towns.
Parish A respondents said
that they see the parish as a community that supports each other in a life of
discipleship: service, faith formation, and community all of which came
together in Sunday Eucharist. Parish B
respondents said that the primary role of the Church is the Worship of God and
that their focus is Sunday Mass attendance (or, for some, daily Mass). They saw outreach, social ministry, adult
education, participation beyond Sunday Mass, etc. as “elective.” When asked what they expected from a homily,
parish B respondents wanted clear teaching on issues of faith and morals;
parish A wanted something that was “spiritually uplifting” or “awareness of the
presence of the least of Christ’s brothers and sisters.”
When my colleague polled
people at each parish she asked—among other things—had they ever attended Mass
at the opposite parish, that is had parishioners of parish A ever attended Mass
at parish B and had people from parish B ever attended Mass at Parish A. About twenty respondents at parish A said
that they had once been parishioners at parish B, but had drifted over to
parish A because it offered a more stimulating Catholicism. An additional five respondents at parish A
said that they were actually parishioners at parish B to have their children in
the Catholic school, but preferred to come to Mass at parish A. Most of the respondents at parish A said that
they would not go to Mass at parish B as it was too “pre-Vatican II.”
At parish B, a common
response was “Parish A is not a Catholic Church.” when pressed for what they meant, many said
that the liturgies at parish A were “too wild,” or that the priests who came in
to weekend Masses or the speakers for the adult ed programs were
“heretical.” Six respondents said that
they lived in the boundaries of parish A but preferred parish B as it was “more
faithful to the magisterium” or because parish A was “too political.” Despite these two churches being only about
seven miles distant from one another, and each having regular parishioners
living in the territorial bounds of the other, there is very little flow back
and forth between the two parishes.
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