Let's Hear It For the Ladies --Yet Again

good nuns

Sister Dorothy Vidulich of the Sisters of Saint Joseph of Peace, attributes the following words to their foundress, Mother Margaret Anna Cusack. 

The prophet does not compel;
She invites each person to see herself,
her world, her God,
in a fresh way.

bad nuns

I find it all but impossible that a woman in the nineteenth century could express herself this way—or even formulate such ideas in her own mind—not because a woman’s mind differs from the male mind in any capacity but simply because the ideas expressed are far ahead of 19^th century categories.  Indeed, the creativity to birth this insight and the courage to give it speech is far more likely to come from a woman than a man, especially a man trained in the stodgy Neo-Scholastic thought canonized in the papacy of Leo XIII.  Perhaps I have misunderstood Sister Dorothy and she is writing about the impact that Cusack has had over the years rather than quoting the foundress directly.  But even so, this is a remarkable statement and it captures the reason that I think  today’s American Religious Sisters have triggered the alarm bells in the Vatican. 

      Margaret Anna Cusack was a remarkable woman.  I first read about her over thirty years ago while staying in a retreat house run by her Sisters.  She had been a convert to the Catholic Church from the Church of Ireland (Anglican).  Immediately after becoming a Catholic, she entered the Poor Clares at Kenmare in Ireland as a nun.  In those days, the Irish Poor Clares, for a variety of historical reasons, were not strictly cloistered and Cusack brought her education to bear in writing articles supporting the Irish Land League in its attempts to break the Landlord system in Ireland by which English gentry lived off the labor of impoverished Irish tenant farmers.  She developed a huge name for herself as an author and she left the Poor Clares to establish a new community free of the burden of monastic customs that regulated day to day life among the Poor Clares.  The new community, founded in England, was called the Sisters of Saint Joseph of Peace and they were founded to do what we would today call Social Work among the poor immigrants to England from Ireland.  Cusack soon established a second foundation of her Order in the United States.  Here, as I said yesterday, she fell afoul of Archbishop Corrigan who demanded control over Cusack’s new Congregation.  The conflict escalated and Cusack realized that Corrigan would persecute the Sisters as long as she was associated with them.  Discouraged and disgusted by it all, Cusack left the Sisters of Saint Joseph of Peace and returned to the Anglican Communion.  She kept up contact with the Sisters throughout her remaining years but the Sisters were forced to rewrite their history and make no mention of their original foundress.  Such is the fear that independent minds can raise in moribund institutions. 

     The Catholic Church today is in a crisis of leadership.  The largest religious denomination in the United States today is the Catholic Church.  The second largest denomination is former Catholics.  Note: I said former Catholics, not non-practicing Catholics (they are in the first group regardless of their inactivity.)  Even as huge numbers of converts are received into the Church every Easter and as its ranks are swelled by immigrants from Latin America, the Philippines, Vietnam, Korea, Haiti and other nations with large Catholic populations,   American Catholicism is also hemorrhaging members out the back door.  There are various reasons for this and one of them—and not the least—is that as the tectonic plates of culture have shifted and people have much more confidence in their religious experience and less needy of—and less inclined to trust in—being fed their experiences of God by others, even (and perhaps especially) religious “authorities.”     This is particularly true when the God delivered by religious authorities does not match the God people experience.  The fact that the Catholic hierarchy has lost its moral credibility doesn’t help the situation. 

     This is where a huge part of the problem relates to Humanae Vitae, the encyclical of Paul VI that condemns contraception.  The Magisterium has told us that artificial contraception is a moral evil and that its use separates one from direct communion with God—such separation being one of the consequences of what we Catholics call mortal sin.  In fact, despite magisterial teaching, millions of Catholics have opted to ignore the Church’s proscription of artificial contraception and have found no disruption in their relationship with God.  This isn’t to say that artificial contraception isn’t gravely wrong—I don’t do theology, only history—but it has weakened the credibility of the Church to claim an absolute authority over access to God when Grace seems to flow in abundance regardless of magisterial proscriptions. Along the same lines but even more dramatically, hundreds of thousands of gay Catholics have learned to maintain a strong relationship with God while also maintaining a committed and loving (and sexual) relationship with another human person.  Moreover, gay people, like those using contraceptives, are all over the Church—educators, theologians, musicians, hospital chaplains, spiritual directors, canon lawyers, pastoral associates, extraordinary ministers of the Eucharist, fund-raisers, institutional administrators—and again, their experience is a disconnect with magisterial authority.        

       At the same time, of course—and tragically—the magisterial authority has been grossly undermined by the inept handling of the sexual abuse crisis and now more and more with financial scandals.  Most of our bishops seem unaware that they are ludicrous emperors marching naked down the aisle with only their miters for ornament and while their (moral) nudity might be repulsive to the rank and file Catholic, the real problem is that they have been so isolated from reality as, like Adam, not to know they are naked.  They honestly believe they are still in a position to offer moral guidance.  I am all for people believing but God’s people should never be naive.  It is beneath the dignity of those who are baptized and sealed with the Holy Spirit to be credulous.   And here is why the nuns are in trouble: they’re prophetic in an Institution that distrusts prophecy.

The prophet does not compel;
She invites each person to see herself,
her world, her God,
in a fresh way.

Notice, I said in an Institution that distrusts prophecy.  I did not say a Church that distrusts prophecy.  The Church includes the hierarchy but is much broader than its leadership.  People today are seeing themselves, their world, and God (God is never “my” God, “your God” or “their God”—God is just God. )  in fresh ways and this takes control of the God experience away from the boys and let’s everyone in the game.  And that is precisely what the boys in Rome—and the local chancery offices—are afraid of, a level playing field of grace where they can’t control the game.  Go nuns!!!