Of Synods and Shepherds

Well, the two-year Synod on the Family closed yesterday with somewhat mixed results that should give us a hint that Pope Francis, his agenda more or less thwarted by the conservative block of bishops in the Synod, will take matters into his own hands.  I think it also gives a hint that all things being equal—and they never really are—Francis may not step down from the papacy as early as he has previously hinted. 

The final Synod document isn’t bad, it just isn’t good.  To get what he needed to justify taking the Church in some new directions, the document had to be more ambiguous than Francis and the liberal block would have liked.  For example, there could be no explicit mention of giving Holy Communion to those who had been divorced and remarried without a Church annulment.  Even with the vague ambiguities of the final document, some of the more controversial passages barely received the required two-thirds majority needed.  The two-thirds rule, while necessary for a measure of consensus, is a huge part of the problem.  A simple majority of bishops would probably have gone further along with the Holy Father’s desire to create a more open and welcoming Church. 

Francis could let the document stand as it is or he can use it as a basis for a document—perhaps an encyclical—he will write and give the more concrete norms on how the Synod statements should be interpreted.  Francis is probably going to go that route.  He also will probably delegate to the various Episcopal Conferences the task of providing the concrete guidelines for better pastoral care of those Catholics in irregular unions.  In such a case I would not expect the American bishops to be as open to changing pastoral practice as might be the Canadian or German Bishops, or even the English bishops.  The American hierarchy is still infested with John Paul and Benedict appointees who are strong on canon law but short on theology and pastoral experience.  And this is why I think Francis may hold on to the See of Peter for a few more years than the next two or three of which he has spoken.   He has made inroads in changing the College of Cardinal Electors but he still needs at least two more “classes” of his appointees to secure a succession that will continue his direction.  Even more important, he needs to fill key Sees with bishops who understand and are onboard with his agenda.  There are many archbishops and bishops who will, given normal lifespans, outlast Francis.  They days are ticking down for Myers of Newark who recently drew his line in the stand that there will be no change in policy as long as his caboose is parked on his marble throne in the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart, but Myers goes off to the Jacuzzi in his retirement home next summer and his successor is someone who at least cultivates the appearances of being in the Francis style.  Lori of Baltimore has ten more years as does Aquila of Denver and Gomez of Los Angeles.  Chaput of Philadelphia, on the other hand, has only four more years to go—Francis might be able to change that See if he holds on just a little longer than he had been thinking about.  Cordileone—a problematic prelate by any account—has sixteen more years before mandatory retirement.  Francis could move him to a desk job in Rome where he could be neutralized and he certainly would not be missed by the City on the Bay, but he will almost certainly be at Francis’ funeral and, along with his mentor Cardinal Raymond Burke, do a happy dance on Francis’ grave.  I suspect that Francis will have a “come to Jesus” talk with Dolan and DiNardo after the behavior at the Synod—behavior which frankly surprised me.  Most of the more obstinate bishops—Morlino, Slattery, Paprocki, Sheridan, Lennon, Olmstead, Dewane, O’Connell etc.—are non-entities beyond their respective Sees—or even within them—but collectively can do great damage as a sort of Episcopal Tea Party within the Conference.   Restructuring the American hierarchy in the Francis model would be an immense task and hard to do in even a ten-year period. 

I would like to look at two paragraphs from the homily at the Mass with which Pope Francis closed the Synod:

There are, however, some temptations for those who follow Jesus. Today’s Gospel shows at least two of them. None of the disciples stopped, as Jesus did. They continued to walk, going on as if nothing were happening. If Bartimaeus was blind, they were deaf: his problem was not their problem. This can be a danger for us: in the face of constant problems, it is better to move on, instead of letting ourselves be bothered. In this way, just like the disciples, we are with Jesus but we do not think like him. We are in his group, but our hearts are not open. We lose wonder, gratitude and enthusiasm, and risk becoming habitually unmoved by grace. We are able to speak about him and work for him, but we live far from his heart, which is reaching out to those who are wounded. This is the temptation: a “spirituality of illusion”: we can walk through the deserts of humanity without seeing what is really there; instead, we see what we want to see. We are capable of developing views of the world, but we do not accept what the Lord places before our eyes. A faith that does not know how to root itself in the life of people remains arid and, rather than oases, creates other deserts.

There is a second temptation, that of falling into a “scheduled faith”. We are able to walk with the People of God, but we already have our schedule for the journey, where everything is listed: we know where to go and how long it will take; everyone must respect our rhythm and every problem is a bother. We run the risk of becoming the “many” of the Gospel who lose patience and rebuke Bartimaeus. Just a short time before, they scolded the children (cf. 10:13), and now the blind beggar: whoever bothers us or is not of our stature is excluded. Jesus, on the other hand, wants to include, above all those kept on the fringes who are crying out to him. They, like Bartimaeus, have faith, because awareness of the need for salvation is the best way of encountering Jesus.

I think that Pope Francis was giving a less than subtle criticism of those bishops who are resisting a change in pastoral approach, pointing out that they are deaf to the people whom they are ordained to serve.  They live in an isolation in which the concrete pain and alienation of so many has become invisible to them.  They see the rules and laws and regulations but they do not see with compassion the realities of the lives of ordinary people who are struggling to be faithful to Jesus and his Gospel in a very complex world.  There are none so blind as those who will not see; none so deaf as those who will not hear.  To effectively change the Church and put it back on track with its mission to bring people to Christ, we need new leadership.  Let’s pray that Pope Francis will be able to give us bishops who have that Shepherd’s Heart that is on fire for going and searching out those who are lost rather than gathering as much wool as possible from the docile sheep in the pen.  

A Tea Party in the Catholic Church

Pope Francis celebrates Mass 

in Philadelphia 

Interesting article in the New York Times yesterday about the power of Tea Party Republicans and how through the gerrymandering of districts and the rise of a right-wing sophisticated media network they have been able not only to have achieved a powerful political machine disproportionate to their actual numbers but now actually be in a position to restructure the rules of the House of Representatives to crush opposition from both the moderate wing of their own party as well as from the Democrats.  In other words, a movement which represents the views of only between ten and fifteen percent of the American People will be able to set the course of Government for the entire nation.  History as seen this sort of thing before whether it was the coup that put the Jacobins in power during the French Revolution, the Leninist establishment of the Soviet Republic in 1917, or the rise of National Socialism in 1933 Germany.  It does not bode well for democracy when small factions can dis-integrate the balance of power.  

But this blog is not about political power struggles.  I only use this example to point out some disturbing glances behind the scenes of the visit of Pope Francis to the United States last month.  It was, in most respects, a great visit but there were some disturbing glimpses in the shadow Catholic world behind the official church.  The Liturgies, at least in New York and Philadelphia (I wasn’t able to see the Washington one) were more the sort of the liturgies with which Pope Benedict would have been comfortable.  They were beautifully done but there was a sense of pomp, even triumphalism, that seemed out of step with Francis’s style and a return to the semi-Tridentine preferences of Pope Benedict.  The music, though magnificent, was somewhat consistently “old school” without integrating so much of the contemporary music, and good contemporary music,  the Catholic Church in America is producing.  Dr. Jennifer Pascual who is the director of music at Saint Patrick’s Cathedral and Father Matthew Ernest who is Director of Liturgy for the New York Archdiocese are both deep into the Reform of the Reform model of liturgy that briefly flourished during Benedict’s reign but to which some still cling in hopes of a overturn of the more pastoral liturgical style that has emerged in most parishes in the years since Vatican II.  John Romeri, former Director of Music for the Archdiocese of Philadelphia actually resigned his post last summer because he and Archbishop Chaput simply could not come to a meeting of the minds about the public liturgies of the Archdiocese.  Archbishop Chaput, while a doctrinal conservative, prefers a more simple style of liturgical celebration over Romeri’s insistence on a very “high Church” approach to liturgy.  Dr. Romeri stayed on the planning committee for the Philadelphia Papal Mass and it showed.  It was beautiful but it didn’t speak Pope Francis and it didn’t speak the Catholic Church in the United States. 

There are many places where Reform of the Reform Directors of Music and/or Liturgy have installed themselves to create an opposition, and even an obstruction, to the simpler liturgical styles favored by the Vatican II and post-Conciliar generation of Catholic clergy and laity.  Now, I think a certain spectrum of High-Church/Broad-Church/Low-Church varieties in style is a good idea as it gives Catholics a choice of worship to fit their own spiritualities, but we have to be careful of tying legitimate variations to some sort of self-established orthodoxy or “authentic” Catholicism that sees other expressions as somehow less Catholic. 

I was happy to see the seminarians at Saint Charles give the pope such a welcome.  They sang a song of welcome that seemed to have been composed for the occasion as it mentioned Francis by name (Lord, grant health to our Holy Father, Francis…  I translate salvum fac as “grant health” though it could also be translated as “grant safety” or “grant salvation.”).  Now since the Pope is not particularly comfortable in English, maybe Latin makes some sense here, but again, I wonder.  I like Latin.  I like using some Latin music in the liturgy on occasion.  I particularly like the In Paradisium, the (Lloyd Weber)Pie Jesu, the Mozart Ave Verum Corpus.  I like the Missa de Angelis.  But if the Pope isn’t at home in English, why Latin?  Why not Spanish?  Small point, maybe I am attaching too much significance to it, but it just seemed a bit 1950’s.  And the cassocks.  The cassock, a bit like the biretta, is really a party-badge these days.  I am certainly not opposed to religious wearing their habits—in fact I would rather see religious in their habits than in clerical dress, but where secular priests used to wear cassocks nowadays, they wear black suits with a clerical collar.  Most priests I know don’t even own a cassock.  But I understand that in a variety of seminaries these days students are required to wear the cassock, at least for certain functions or on certain days.  And of course the inestimable Father Z was so generous as hit up his public to purchase birettas for the seminarians of his new diocese of Madison Wisconsin.  Talk about a loony bin of clericalism.  And far more serious, as I have mentioned in previous postings, large number of seminarians in such seminaries as Immaculate Conception at Seton Hall, Mount Saint Mary’s in Emmitsburg and even the North America College are openly contemptuous of Pope Francis and where he is leading the Church.  Feedback from Theological College at Catholic University, Saint Patrick’s Menlo Park, and the Dominican House of Studies in DC suggests an undercurrent of dissent in those seminaries as well.

All of this is just an indication that as in the Republican party, so also in the Catholic Church in the United States, there is a small faction preparing to steer the Church in a different direction than the majority of Catholics would choose.   There is no doubt that a restorationist vision is shared by a majority of younger priests and certainly of seminarians.  The clergy of 2030 will be significantly different in their ecclesiology and liturgical styles than the clergy of the past forty years.  This will only accelerate the number of America Catholics either falling away from the practice of the faith entirely or adding to the already swelling numbers going to other Christian denominations.  Groups such as the Latin Mass Society that favor a restoration of the preconciliar rites as the norm, or we might say making the extraordinary form the ordinary form, will be content as we slide away from the heady enthusiasms of the Second Vatican Council, but it bodes for a much smaller Church and not necessarily a “more faithful Church” but a Church that is closed in on itself and without mission except for self-preservation. 

While I think that overall the “Francis effect” is revitalizing the Church in the Southern hemisphere and even, to an extent, in Europe, unless there is some drastic changes in leadership now, the American Church of 2030 will find itself very idiosyncratic and isolated, a bit like some of the Orthodox Churches like the Church of Greece, that have closed in on themselves and pretty much even shoved the remainder of the Orthodox world away.  

Like Sharks In A Feeding Frenzy

The World Meeting
of Families Targeted

In my last posting I mentioned how the Krazies have turned on their one-time champion, Cardinal William Levada whom Pope Benedict had appointed to succeed him as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith when he (Benedict) was elected Pope.  Levada headed the failed witch-hunt against the American nuns who are member of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious.  The Cardinal was recently arrested for a DUI in Hawaii and it set the Krazy’s blogosphere alight with all sort of insinuations about a darker side to the Cardinal’s behavior.   Frankly it is a mess but the Krazies, far from having compassion for one of their own, have been feasting on Levada’s blood with an enthusiasm you would have thought they would have reserved for Cardinal Mahoney or Archbishop Cupich or even their arch-nemesis, Pope Frank.   

And now they are moving on to a second course in their ghoulish cannibalistic banquet going after none other than Archbishop Chaput of Philadelphia.  Led by media wolves Michael Hichborn of “The Lepanto Institute” and Michael Voris of “Church Militant TV,” the pack is turning to feed on Chaput and the upcoming World Meeting of Families held in Chaput’s See City of Philadelphia this September. 

Poor Charles Chaput doesn’t deserve this; His Excellency (an ironic title) is the personification of the Episcopal mediocrity with which the Catholic Church in the United States was blessed under the papacies of Saint John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI.  In his days as Archbishop of Denver, Chaput had a tendency to walk the same political line as Cardinal Raymond Burke though he eschews Burke’s love of buttons and bows when it comes to matters liturgical.  Back in 2004 Chaput was quoted in the New York Times as saying that it was a serious sin for Catholics to vote for John Kerry because of the pro-choice plank in the Democratic Party platform.  He supported Burke’s position that Catholic politicians who vote for pro-choice legislation should be denied Holy Communion.  He also said that Catholics themselves who vote for pro-choice politicians “need to go to confession” before receiving Holy Communion.  As Archbishop of Denver he also supported a Catholic school that refused to re-enroll the two children of a same-sex couple, though he had no problems with children of divorced and remarried couples attending Catholic Schools. He also does not believe that same-sex couples can love their children to the same degree that mixed-sex couples can. 

Archbishop Chaput also brought the Neo-Catechumenal Way to Denver while Archbishop there, and opened a newly reorganized seminary for the Neo-Catechumenal students as well as for vocations from his own Archdiocese.  It has a reputation for insularism, never a good sign in educational circles. 

Since moving to Philadelphia, Archbishop Chaput has taken a considerably less provocative stand in pastoral matters.  Most likely it doesn’t represent a conversion of heart as much as a change in the wind.  On the other hand, Philadelphia has a long tradition of being among the most conservative dioceses in the United States and seems to be a good match for Archbishop Chaput’s style.  He can just hold the course—he doesn’t have to make waves. 

The upcoming World Meeting of Families is providing a bit of a challenge however.  First of all, the highlight of the meeting is the visit of Pope Francis.  Francis’ understanding of the Family is somewhat more open than Archbishop Chaput’s, and this meeting really isn’t the Archbishop’s.  Secondly, a Papal Visit is a pastoral visit but it is also far more.  The Pope’s position not only as a world leader but also as a Head of State complicates things immensely. 

Protocol of the Papal Visit demands participation of civic officials.  Governor Wolfe (an Episcopalian) and Mayor Nutter (a Baptist—though Catholic school educated) are both Democrats.  Both are pro-Choice.  Both are pro LGBT rights and supported legal recognition of same-sex marriage.  Their appointment as “honorary co-chairs” of the event have infuriated Hichborn and Voris who have rallied the blogosphere’s torch-and-pitchfork gang in furious indignation against Archbishop Chaput.  What Hichborn and Voris have not pointed out is that there is a third co-chair, former Governor Tom Corbett, a Catholic and a Republican.  It would be unusual for a sitting governor and a sitting mayor not to be the “honorary” chairs of a civic welcome to the Pope.  The only thing unusual about this team is the inclusion of a person no longer in office and Mr. Corbett’s inclusion is undoubtedly to balance the team with at least one Catholic and one person who can witness to our core values.  Governor Corbett will do that but, as he is a gentleman, will probably do so without leaving a trail of blood.  That always disappoints the krazies. 

Hichborn and Co. have gone on to slam the rest of the welcoming team, the Executive Board, which—unlike the “Honorary” folk—actually do the work.   The co-chairs of the executive committee include David L Cohen and Brian Roberts.  What is their sin in the eyes of their eminent critics Voris and Hichborn?  Well, for one they’re Jews.  Imagine that.  What would Saint Peter say if some Jews came out to meet him?  “Shalom,” I would guess.  Jesus was a Jew—though, as one krazy in my parish keeps reminding me “He’s a good Catholic now.”   Moreover, Mr. Cohen is on the board of the “racist” Hispanic organization La Raza.  (Whenever non-whites get together we can be sure they’re up to racism.  There is a long history of People of Color skewing the system to disenfranchise the white folk.  You remember affirmative action.)  Oh, and he raised 1.2 million dollars for Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign; that disqualifies him for sure. And now he supports Hilary—and he gets to meet the Pope?  Not fair!!!  And he has a history of working well the LGBT community.  Mr. Roberts also has a history of creating Gay-friendly environments in the workplace.  Both men are married (to women, not to each other) and have children, but that is no qualification for being on the board of a World Meeting of Families.  I mean we aren’t talking about Jewish families.  We want good old fashioned Catholic families with one man married to one women and all the children you can squeeze into a house.  ‘Cause when we talk about families with two mommies or two daddies we say “families,” and this meeting is for families and not for “families.” Capiche?

And then there is Denise Morrison being on the Committee.  Ms. Morrison—also married and parent of adult children (and Boston College graduate with the Maiden Name of Sullivan, so probably “one of us”) is the CEO of Campbell Soups and Campbell Soups has run adds showing “families” when we all know that people who eat Campbell’s Soup only belong to families (without the “ “).  We don’t want that sort of publicity around of World Meeting of Families.  And there is Eric Foss who is President and CEO of Amarack.  You remember Amarack; they filed a Amicus Curiae brief favoring same-sex marriage in the recent Supreme Court case.  And, in his days at PepsiCo Foss also made it a nice place for gay people to work.   I don’t think it was just about gay people, but it did include them.

I had this all written and ready to go, when Michael Hichborn brought up a new problem.  The President of the organizing committee is Robert Ciaruffoli. From everything I had been able to find out, Ciaruffoli seemed to be Mr. Squeaky Clean by all public records.  But then Mr. Hichborn found that Mr. Ciaruffoli has contributed to a number of campaigns, including that of Vice President Biden, who have supported pro-Choice and LGBT agenda.  Ciaruffoli has also, Hichborn tucks away in a subordinate clause where he hopes it won’t be noticed, supported candidates who are pro-life and pro-Traditional Marriage.  It never dawns on ideologues—not that Mr. Hichborn is an ideologue but his financial base would be composed heavily of ideologues, that one contributes to campaigns for reasons beyond one’s own narrow views, in this case anti-abortion and anti-same-sex marriage.  Most of us good Catholics need to do some anguishing and even soul-twisting when it comes time to write a check or cast a ballot.   

To move down a level from the Committee President, in addition to Messers. Cohen and Roberts there are four other co-chairs for the event.  And the Executive Leadership Cabinet includes 13 other members beside Ms. Morrison and Mr. Foss.  Why didn’t Hichborn find the dirt on the others?  Or even tell us there are others who might possibly not have soiled hands.  Of course, since God would have spared Sodom for even ten righteous souls, we really don’t want to pay attention to those who might have clean hands and pure heart.  It is always embarrassing when we are hurling our fire and brimstone before God decides to show his displeasure. 

So what is the problem?  The problem is a weltanschauung.  That’s a fancy shmancy word for “worldview.”  Hichborn and company pander to an audience that buy into exclusivity. “If you don’t do it our way, you can’t be part of the club.”  They want this to be, not a World Meeting but a Catholic Meeting as if the Church’s mission is only to its own.  There is no concern for those who are not in the Church and, as they see it, in the Church are only those who fit in the cookie-cutter mold of their particular Catholicism.  When Archbishop Blase Cupich of Chicago says that we need to “show mercy to non-traditional families,” they go berserk.  Their vision of a World Meeting of Families would be for a convention center filled with mantillaed women and girls in long jumpers and men and boys in grey flannel slacks and white shirts and dark ties where all would spend hours on their knees adoring the Blessed Sacrament in between lectures by Cardinal Burke and Alice von Hildebrand and workshops about achieving holiness in your marriage by renouncing sexual intimacy once one had reached menopause.  While I certainly hope that prayer will play a central role in the upcoming Philadelphia meeting, we need to face the realities of life in the twenty-first century and figure out what the Gospel has to say to the Family-in-the-pew and the Family-not-in-the-pew today. 

I think what is really sad is that if you read their posts and watch their videos people like Hichborn and Voris are charlatans who have found their niches from which to prey on those who are overwhelmed by the collapse of a world and a culture which had all long taken for granted.  When I read the krazies I find—for the most part—older women who want desperately to pass on to their grandchildren a world where all is sure and safe and through which there is a clear, well-illumined and definable path to bring us from the milk and cookies of Grandma’s house today to all being together again forever in God’s house.  That path does exist, of course, but it is a path of faith and sometimes dark faith, that takes us through the tangled underbrush of our modern world trusting only in promises yet unseen.  It is frightening to many that we live in a world where some families have two daddies and where a child is not safe in the sacristy or in the womb and where “to death do us part” are only empty words, but that is the reality.  It doesn’t have to be frightening however if we remember that perfect love casts our fear.  For those who love God and love their neighbor this world can be a beautiful place rather than the ruins of a bygone Christendom.  

Francis, the Bridge Too Far, and the Threat of Schism, more to say

Need More Be Said To Explain
The Paranoia?

I came across a fascinating article in The New Republic by Elizabeth Stoker Bruenig in which she adopts a view of Pope Francis as one who synthesizes the often contrasting views of Tradition and Modernity.  She also identifies how much opposition to the Pope’s agenda comes from the American Right.  Let me recommend the article and then let me quote two paragraphs.  Check out the article for yourself at http://www.newrepublic.com/article/121168/pope-francis-conservatives-battle-us-catholic-churchs-future   For now, check out her observations in the following paragraphs

THE WORLD’S MOST RENOWNED CHRISTIAN THEOLOGICAL GUIDE IS, of course, the Pope. He is, in a sense, a steward of the Church’s religious past, a clerical leader who must mediate the institution’s traditions as a public figure and symbol, and in his writings and pronouncements, which bear a great deal more authority among the Catholic faithful than do papal visits or interviews. The Church views herself in terms of apostolic succession and papal primacy—terms that describe a continuous transmission of authority that can be traced to the original apostles of Christ. The Pope has a special relationship to the past, being the recipient of so much carefully preserved thought and practice. Each Pope, therefore, must make use of the richness of Church tradition, while also ministering effectively to a world of ever-evolving challenges and realities.

Pope Francis ascended to the papacy two years ago, becoming Catholicism’s first leader from South America. A curious narrative soon emerged with regards to his approach to the past and the traditions of the Church among cultural, political, and religious conservatives in the United States. He has made no substantial changes to Catholic doctrine, and yet has nonetheless earned opprobrium worthy of extreme tampering. It seems rather that Francis inspires uncomfortable feelings, and affronts particular dispositions rather than particular doctrines. A key moment for testing this hypothesis is on the horizon: This summer Francis is expected to publish an encyclical—an authoritative papal document indicating an issue’s pressing priority—on the environment. It will reportedly address matters of environmental stewardship and climate change. (No specifics of the document have been issued yet.) As its release draws near, American conservatives have begun protesting supposedly vast reforms that have not happened. Steve Moore, chief economist at The Heritage Foundation, has declared Francis an adherent of a “modern pagan green religion”; Maureen Mullarkey, a writer for the religious journal First Things, charged the Pope with “bending theology to premature, intemperate policy endorsements.” No one but Pope Francis and his closest advisers know what is contained within the encyclical. Conservatives troubled by the very suggestion of a theological approach to climate change have been forced to expose more id than argument, dragging in such temporal terms as modern and premature. Pope Francis will travel to Washington, D.C. in September to address Congress, a visit already hotly anticipated. To understand the responses of conservative Catholic politicians like Representatives Paul Ryan and Peter King to papal pronouncements on inequality and climate change requires untangling the Church’s other trinity: of the Pope, the past, and the right wing.

 CONSERVATIVES HAVE BEEN WARY OF FRANCIS since his ascension in March 2013. On the day he was named Pope, the far-right Catholic blog Rorate Caæli called Francis “a sworn enemy of the traditional Mass.” In the following summer, legendarily plainspoken Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput said that the right wing of the Church “generally have not been really happy” with Francis’s papacy. Francis had that week made his famous quip, “Who am I to judge?” when asked about homosexuality. He was referring specifically to gay people who follow Church teaching and seek a celibate life within the Church, and thus his statement was entirely in keeping with Catholic doctrine. The trouble seemed to stem largely from the fact that he had used the modern parlance gay. In May 2014, conservative Catholic writer Michael Brendan Dougherty published a provocative op-ed in The Week arguing that “Catholics must learn to resist their Popes—even Pope Francis.” Dougherty suggested that the legitimacy of papal teaching—and in a sense, the principle of papal infallibility—was subject to review by the greater body of Catholic faithful. The duty of the believer, he concluded, “is not just to rebuke and correct those in authority ... but to throw rotting cabbage at them, or make them miserable.”

There have always been grumblings about popes, but the differences in opinion between Francis and the movement collectively known as the “American right” appear especially numerous, and unusually bitter. In October 2014, New York Times columnist Ross Douthat, who is Catholic, wrote that in matters of marriage and family life, “[Francis] may be preserved from error only if the Church itself resists him.” The “error” he referred to was Francis’s leadership at the Synod on the Family, held in Rome in October. The Pope’s hand-picked prelates had drafted a working document for the synod, which contained early, and mildly positive, language regarding homosexual orientation and the possibility of communion for the divorced. “Homosexuals have gifts and qualities to offer to the Christian community,” the document originally read, adding, “For some [divorced and remarried persons], partaking of the sacraments might occur were it preceded by a penitential path.”

The final report issued from the synod was substantially revised, and most of this language was removed. Communion remains generally unavailable to the divorced and remarried, and Church attitudes toward homosexuality continue to be negative. Conservatives were nonetheless rattled by Francis’s willingness to flexibly address what appear to be “modern problems”: gay people in the Church and the ever-growing number of divorced and remarried persons. At the end of his column, Douthat wondered, with some anxiety, if Francis might “be stacking the next synod’s ranks with supporters of a sweeping change” that would leave traditionalists unfairly on the wrong side of history.

The Heritage Foundation, Maureen Mullarkey, Rorate Caeli blogsite, Archbishop Chaput, Ross Douthat, Michael Brendan Dougherty—with the possible exception of the bloggers at Rorate Caeli, these are not stupid people.   (Actually Rorate Caeli used to be a pretty reputable site but the last few years has become more polemical than substantive.)  What about Francis is triggering this backlash from the right and what does it mean?

Within my lifetime we have had seven popes.  Pius XII, the Pope of my childhood and the man who will ever epitomize the papacy for me—much as I might wish it different—was an intellectual progressive but faced with the real challenge that post-war Italy might go Communist, forged a close alliance with Eisenhower/Dulles America where, for us, to be Catholic was to be American.  We might be Republican, were more likely Democrat, but never questioned American policies—at home or abroad—and so we stood for political and social conservatism.  Our local gauleiter  Cardinal Francis Spellman of New York, assured us that we, as a nation, were on God’s chosen path.  The face of Catholicism in America was Fulton Sheen whose weekly television show reinforced the collective naiveté that all was well in heaven and its earthly colony from sea to shining sea.  You didn’t see Catholics marching with Dr. King—at least at first—Archbishop Thomas Toolen of Mobile rallied his fellow bishops to keep the Catholics home in Ohio and Boston and let the Episcopalians and the Presbyterians do the Christian thing in standing up for human rights.   That is why we were shocked and appalled when a young priest by the name of Father James Groppi began leading marches for fair housing polices in Milwaukee.  Catholics didn’t do that sort of thing.  And you didn’t see Catholics marching against the War in Viet Nam, Spelly saw to that.  And that is why were were shocked at the Berrigan brothers and their friends.  Of course by that time Pius was entombed beneath the High Altar of the Vatican Basilica and we had been blessed with the human face of John XXIII and the genteel visage of Paul VI.  And there had been the Council.  John and Paul and their Council had done a lot to change the tenor but not the practice.  We had Pacem in Terris and  Mater et Magistra and Gaudium et Spes and Popolorum Progressio—each of which was pretty radical in terms of its social vision but very little of which trickled down to the folk in the pews.  This has been the major problem with the implementation of Vatican II: we were shown the trees but never saw the forest.  Or, in the minds of most of our priests and practically all of our bishops, there was no forest.  Changes yes—but a changed perspective?  They never got it and so could never pass it on.   Yeah, yeah, yeah—our altars were changed to “face the people” and the “sign of peace” was introduced at Mass, but we never got the basic change in emphasis from Church as religion, institution, rules and rituals, something you do on Sunday to a community of disciples committed to carrying on the work of Jesus in proclaiming the Good News to this broken world in which we live.  We thought that one could have charity for the poor and unfortunate without a passion for the justice that would break the shackles that weighed them down.  We never understood that without a passionate commitment to justice, charity was no more than an empty, even cynical, sentiment. 

John Paul’s encyclicals, Sollicitudo Rei Socialis,  Dives in Misericordia, Laborem Exercens, and Centesimus Annus, were the most radical papal statements yet, but like those of his predecessors they remained largely unread by American Catholics.  Moreover, John Paul’s interest in forging a political alliance with the Reagan administration in order to weaken the Soviet Bloc meant he chose bishops in this country who would not rock the Reagan/Republican boat.  Those prelates who took the social teaching of the Church seriously—men like Archbishops Raymond Hunthausen, John Quinn, or William Borders or Bishops like Ken Untener—found themselves beyond the good graces of Rome. Even Cardinal Bernardin of Chicago found himself isolated from fellow American Cardinals and pretty much without any influence in the Papal Apartments or the Secretariat of State.  So along comes Francis and the idea that he is writing an encyclical on the environment has sent the climate-change deniers on the American Right into a total panic. Why?  Well, because Francis, despite his Jesuit roots, doesn’t hide behind pontifical ambiguities.  He is plain spoken, makes the rubber hit the road, and says what he means and means what he says.  He is, in a way, validating Father Groppi and the Fathers/brothers Berrigan.  Ms Bruenig is right—no doctrine has been changed, but far more threatening we have a Pope who is taking the teachings of the Gospel and the Church seriously and threatening to point out to us that we too should take them seriously.