The John Paul Papacy, A Mixed Legacy III

I recently had a friend who reads this blog ask me about something that I had written in my first entry about the legacy of John Paul II and that is what is the connection between the more conservative bishops that were appointed to American sees during his pontificate and the establishment of diplomatic relations between Washington and the Holy See by the Reagan administration in 1984, so I want to revisit this topic in case I have not been clear.

There had been a long tradition of socially progressive bishops in the United States going back into the nineteenth century with such prelates as Cardinal James Gibbons, Archbishop John Ireland, and Bishop Dennis J. O’Connell.  They were succeeded in turn by other progressive leaders as Archbishop John T. McNicholas, O.P., Archbishop Bernard Sheil, and Bishop Francis Haas.  These were all men whose outlook had been shaped by Pope Leo XIII’s Encyclical Letter Rerum Novarum  and later by Pius XI’s Quadrigesimo Anno.   Furthermore, when Cardinal Alfredo Ottaviani, the head of the ‘Holy Office’—today’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith—came down heavy on American Jesuit John Courtney Murray, even conservative prelates, and especially Cardinal Francis Spellman of New York, came to the defense of Murray’s harmonization of Catholic tradition with the American socio-economic-political outlook.  Spellman went so far as to defy Ottaviani and bring Murray (whom Ottaviani had formally “silenced”) to the Second Vatican Council as his personal theological advisor.  In the years before and during the second Vatican Council we saw a blooming of a theologically and socially progressive hierarchy with men like Cardinal Albert Meyer, Cardinal Joseph Ritter, Cardinal John Carberry, Cardinal Lawrence Sheehan, and Cardinal John Dearden, to name only the top ranking.  And then there was the eccentric and indomitable Richard Cardinal Cushing of Boston who was willing to overthrow just about everything and break any rule to make the world spin along more happily. Blessed be his memory!   Even men who could be quite authoritarian in the governance of their dioceses—Cardinal Patrick O’Boyle of Washington or Cardinal John Cody of Chicago—championed the cause of minorities, of the poor, and of labor.  It was not entirely a happy situation as men like Cardinal James Francis McIntyre of Los Angeles and Archbishop Thomas Toolen resisted the Civil Rights Movement in particular, but the tide was against them.  In the years after Vatican II positions in the American hierarchy were increasingly filled with talented men of vision—Bishops Howard Hubbard of Albany, Matthew Clark of Rochester, John L. May of Saint Louis, Paul John Hallinan of Atlanta, William Borders of Baltimore, Raymond Hunthausen of Seattle, John R. Quinn of Oklahoma City and then San Francisco, and Roger Mahoney who would end up as Cardinal Archbishop of Los Angeles.  Many of these men—though not all—owed their advancement in part to Archbishop Jean Jadot, Apostolic Delegate to the United States from 1973-1980.   Jadot, a protégé of Cardinal Leo Suenens who had been a principal architect of the Second Vatican Council,  came from an aristocratic Belgian family and had exceptionally progressive views;  he significantly marked the American hierarchy by his choice of intelligent and articulate prelates who were committed to the social agenda laid out by Popes Leo XIII, Benedict XV, Pius XI, John XXIII, and Paul VI as well as by the Second Vatican Council.  Well, Suenens sowed the winds of change but it was Ronald Reagan who reaped the whirlwind.  In 1983 the American bishops—at that point a body heavily influenced, if not controlled, by Jadot protégés, published the Peace Pastoral: The Challenge of Peace: God’s Promise and Our Response.  It was a dramatic counter-voice to the ost-politik of President Reagan and virtually was a Catholic vote of no-confidence in Reagan foreign policy.  And that was only the one shoe.  The bishops were preparing a second pastoral letter that they would in fact issue in 1986: Economic Justice for All.   It would prove to be a critique of Republican economic theory that would clearly show that Reaganonmics is not compatible with Catholic magisterial teaching on distributive justice.   Meanwhile, Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen of Seattle publicly declared that he would withhold half his taxes rather than allow money to go to the nuclear arms race.  This was a direct challenge to the Reagan administration. 

This split between the Catholic Church in the United States and Reagan policy—both regarding the Arms Race and Economics—threatened to undermine the joint efforts of John Paul and Ronald Reagan to destroy the hegemony of the Soviet Union in Eastern Europe.  To keep abreast in the Arms Race, the Soviet Union had to pour its resources unstintingly into military expenditures with no room for developing a consumer economy.  Reagan and his advisors counted on this “breaking the bank” and on it fomenting unrest among the unhappy citizenries of Eastern Europe.  Meanwhile, for his part, the Pope was brandishing the sword of Polish nationalism and egging the population of his homeland on to demand a better life than the Polish government or its Soviet overseers could provide.  Marxisim in Eastern Europe was fighting a war on two fronts.  And it worked.  Poland fell and the dominoes followed.  But that was not until 1989.  In 1984 Ronald Reagan still had to figure out how to hold it together.  He did not want to fight a war on two fronts also—Communism in Eastern Europe and Catholics at home. 

The Holy See had long wanted full diplomatic relations with the Holy See.  When the Popes lost their temporal power in 1870, several predominately Catholic nations maintained ambassadorial ties.  The United States did not. In fact, Congress by law prohibited such diplomatic relations.  In the years between the loss of the Papal States and the restoration of Sovereignty with the Lateran Treaty, more nations gradually began to exchange ambassadors with the Holy See.  Each ambassador gave the Holy See more prestige and credibility in international affairs.  During World War II, President Roosevelt, unable to name an ambassador, sent Myron Taylor as a “personal representative” to the Vatican.  The Vatican proved to be a very important diplomatic post during World War II as representatives from various sides were posted there and it was one of the best—if not the best—channels of communication.  Nevertheless, the outcry from America Protestant groups about any sort of American governmental presences—no matter how unofficial—was so strong that it would not be possible for many years yet to have official ties at the ambassador level.  Periodically Presidents sent “personal representatives” but there was no standing mission.   By 1980 most world powers had established full diplomatic relations with the Papacy, but the Holy See always wanted the prestige of American recognition.  Ronald Reagan gave this in 1984.  As a Protestant himself, and as a not particularly religious man, he was in a good position to do so, but there was still a considerable public outcry and several legal challenges.  Nevertheless, President Reagan appointed William A. Wilson first ambassador to the Holy See.  He served until 1986 when he was succeeded by Frank Shakespeare. 

 “Nothing gets you  nothing” as Monsieur Thénardier likes to sing and while there is no public record of a deal, there is a definite change in the type of priest appointed to the episcopacy during and after the Reagan years.  The concerns moved from issues of social justice, peace, the economy, and the environment to more “in house” matters.  A nominee for the miter—or having a miter, for advancement—had to be explicitly opposed to the ordination of women.  He had to have not blotted his copybook on contraception.  He had to be clear on the Church’s teaching about abortion and same-sex relationships.  There is nothing wrong with making sure that a candidate for bishop adheres to Church teaching, but what was curious is that there were no such litmus tests when it came to the Church teaching on war, on capital punishment, on economic justice.  There was lots of wiggle room there.   The ‘80’ and ‘90’s saw the American hierarchy change drastically in its outlook.  They became far more establishment, some not bothering to conceal their open and uncritical preference for the Republican Party and its policies.  Meanwhile, priests, religious, and laity who were involved in the areas of maintaining Church teaching on social justice—labor relations, health issues, immigration and migrants, against the death-penalty, civil rights—found themselves unsupported by many of their bishops and priests.

The Pope Francis sort of bishop whose priority is the poor was becoming virtually unknown in the United States.  Prelates like Raymond Burke, Robert Morlino, Robert Finn, Edward Slattery, Michael Sheridan, Thomas Olmstead, Frank Dewane became more and more the face of the American Church.  Decked out in pre-conciliar finery and extending their beringed episcopal paw to be slobbered over by the faithful as they proceeded to the altar for a retro-Mass,  they were the epitome of the Tea Party at prayer. 

A few years ago I had a chance to sit and visit with Thomas Gumbleton, retired auxiliary of Detroit.  Bishop Gumbleton is the “last of the lefties”—named a bishop in the heady days after Vatican II and always an outspoken voice crying for Peace and for Justice, he was a thorn in the side of Presidents and Popes alike.  That is what prophets do.  I asked Bishop Gumbleton why there had been such a shift in the way the hierarchy saw things.  He didn’t follow my suspicions of a symbiotic relationship between John Paul’s papacy and Ronald Reagan’s administration.  His explanation was more simple.  He said “In my day, we bishops came from families where our fathers were bricklayers, or worked in a factory, or carried the mail.  Today, my brother bishops’ fathers were Doctors or Lawyers, or Businessmen.  They were raised to think that way.  That is the way their fathers thought.”  Ockham’s razor says that we should accept the simpler explanation and that would be Bishop Gumbleton’s.  Who am I to argue with Ockham, I am—after all—a medievalist.  But I still say, that we got the John Paul Bishops as part of an understanding between the Reagan White House and the Holy See to reach their mutual goal of bringing down the “Evil Empire.”   There are too many fingerprints to think the demise of American Catholic Progressivism was a natural death.  The Good News is, of course, that our whole Christian Faith is based on Resurrection and it does seem that we might be in store for a better cut of Episcopal Leadership.  As they like to say at those Tridentine Masses, Oremus.  

I Was Sick and Imprisoned and You Ministered to Me

I recently switch insurance companies.  It had nothing to do with Obama Care.  I have had a change of employment and that means a change of coverage.  I had a great policy before.  I never had a deductible or a co-pay.  My new policy is good—but not that good.  And so last Saturday I went to the drugstore to pick up my medications.  I had a co-pay of 157.00.  It came as a shock after my years of just saying “thank-you” and moving on.  I have no idea what those same meds would have been had I not had insurance but this bring us the necessity—the absolute necessity—of having universal health care.  And it brings up my puzzlement at why our bishops are so opposed to universal health care.

Yes, I understand that from a Catholic perspective there are problems with the Affordable Care Act, but those problems are fixable—or would be fixable if our bishops had not lost their credibility over opposing universal health care per se. I can’t help but wonder if their opposition to the Affordable Care Act is not because of the moral murkiness of coverage for contraceptives and other procedures that are contrary to Church doctrine, or if their objection isn’t that as employers they don’t want to be saddled with having to provide good health coverage to all Church employees. 

And while we are on the subject of objection to providing coverage for contraception, I am amazed at the hypocrisy of employers in the private sector who are arguing that it is against their conscience to provide health care that includes contraceptives.   How many of these men practiced contraception in their own marriages?  Not all, I am sure, but more than didn’t if the national polls are any indication.  Moreover, I really don’t see it as the moral high-ground that an employer determines the conscience-choices for his employees.   I may be cynical but this isn’t about conscience—it is about indifference to the needs of the least of Christ’s brothers and sisters.  Minimize expense, maximize profits—regardless of the human cost 

No, I have good insurance.  I can see my doctor when I need to.  He has me doing many preventative therapies to forestall serious health issues from which I could suffer.  I think the least of Christ’s brothers and sisters deserve good health coverage too.  If we had been honest from the beginning and embraced the idea of universal health coverage we would have had the political leverage to come to honest resolve on this issue of contraceptive coverage.  But having sold out to forces political and medical establishment—the bishops’ credibility is in huge disarray.  And to try to peddle this off as a crisis in “religious liberty” is about the most cynical move one could make. 

Several years ago I found myself sitting across a lunch table from Bishop Thomas Gumbleton, retired auxiliary of Detroit.  Gumbleton was named a bishop in 1968 and was one of the great Paul VI bishops—an outspoken advocate for the poor and the disadvantaged.  I asked Bishop Gumbleton what had happened that so many bishops today lacked this social conscience.  His response was interesting.  “The bishops at the time came from families where the father was a bricklayer, an electrician, a garbage-collector.  They understood the centrality of the Church’s social teaching because it gave their families hope.  Today most of the bishops—their fathers were doctors or lawyers.  They come from the rising middle class and they see the world through the lenses of privilege.” 

Last week Pope Francis sent a message to the American bishops about the type of man he was recommended for the episcopacy.  Let’s hope this will make the difference that we as a Church need.   

On Consulting the Faithful on Matters of Doctrine

Bishop Michael Botean

Romanian Catholic Eparch

of Canton OH

We will take a short break from our “Rethinking God” series in which we are looking at how our basic understanding of God has not been unchanging but has evolved over the course of time and look at an indirectly related issue.  I saw the following statement from Jason Miller of Catholics United on the internet.   

“Members of Catholics United delivered petitions with more than 20,000 signatures which said the church's public stands against contraception and same sex marriage distract from what should be the Church's main mission of helping the poor.”
We wouldn't be able to have this type of success without the support of each and every one of our members. This is our victory, and we will continue to be speakers for the poor and marginalized who do not have a voice, just as Jesus commanded us to do in the Gospels.
Well, I am glad that Mr. Miller and Catholic United were able to deliver their petition to the Bishops during their annual meeting in Baltimore.  But who from the Episcopal Conference was sent to meet Catholics United and receive the petition: Bishop Michael Botean of the Romanian Catholic Eparchy (Diocese) of Canton OH.  All due respect to Eparch Botean and to the Romanian Catholic Church but his Excellency is of sufficiently low stature in the hierarchy as for it to be a sign of contempt for Catholics United and the 20,000 members of the faithful that he would be delegated to meet with their representatives and receive the petition.  A bishop is a bishop, and those of the Eastern Churches in communion with the Holy See are of the same dignity as those of the Roman Rite but I sincerely doubt that there was a single Romanian Catholic signature among the 20,000.  I realize that 20,000 signatures can hardly claim to represent 70 million American Catholics but if our bishops were to take our laity with respect and accord the faithful their proper role in holding the faith which they, the bishops, are supposed to teach, they would have sent an Archbishop or a bishop of a major see to meet the delegation.  But their Lordships obviously see that the role of the laity is no more than to pay, pray, and obey.

In the nineteenth century when Blessed John Henry Newman wrote his famous essay “On Consulting the Faithful on Matters of Doctrine,” Newman’s “perennial nemesis” responded with his own description of the role of the laity: “To hunt, to shoot, and to entertain.”  Monsignor Talbot obviously hung out with a rather select class of English gentry, but then too our bishops are for the most part out of touch with the average Catholic in the pew.  They say that when a priest becomes a bishop he “has had his last bad meal and will never hear the truth again.”  Alas too true.  Our bishops are, I am afraid, out of touch with the average Catholic.  And as such they see the faithful as those who are to be instructed with their Episcopal wisdom.  But the faithful are the core of the Church (The Church, of course, is the whole body of the baptized, including the bishops.) The faith of the Church which the bishops are required to teach is the faith held by the faithful.  The bishops cannot teach authentically if they are out of touch with the lived faith of the People of God. 
I have heard it said of Cardinal George, the Archbishop of Chicago, that he “lives in his head.”  His priests and people—or many of them—say that he is a man of very low affect.  This means that his Eminence, admittedly a distinguished theologian, lives in a world of ideas and ideals, unaffected by the emotional, or better, the “wholistic” self that integrates the intellectual with the emotional, spiritual, and physical elements of personality.  The Cardinal suffered from polio as a child and has some severe physical limitations and the opinion has been offered that he “lives in his head” because experience has shown him not to trust his body—his body lets him down.  To whatever degree this analysis is true, I feel sorry for his Eminence because such a sorrow about one’s physical limitations is a heavy burden to carry.  But I think our collective hierarchy is of much the same malady—they see themselves as the (visible) head of the Church and they don’t trust the Body.  They and they alone hold the truth.  But the Truth resides in the entire Body and if the Church is reflect that truth our bishops need to become more intuitive and less dogmatic.
Several years back I had a chance to sit down over coffee with Bishop Thomas Gumbleton, retired auxiliary of Detroit.  Bishop Gumbleton is one of the old Vatican II war horses who has always been light-years ahead of his brother bishops in apprehending the Mysterium of the Church.  I asked Bishop Gumbleton what had happened that the great bishops of the American Church were no more—the Gibbons and the Irelands, the Mooneys and the Topels, the Sheils and the McNicholases, the Cushings and the Deardens, the Bernardins and the Haases.  (Of course you also had your share of mitered horses’ asses –the Corrigans, the William O’Connells, the Glennons and the Francis McIntyres.)  Bishop Gumbleton explained the insensitivity of so many of his current brother bishops as that they no longer come from families that were immigrant, working class and labor union, but now come from families that are in the professions and who have been to the “best schools” and belong to the “best clubs.”  Like Newman’s antagonist, Monsignor Talbot, they are simply out of touch with ordinary people.  But those who are charged with teaching the faith of the Church cannot afford to be out of touch with the ordinary people who hold that faith.  The great bishops who are the “Fathers of the Church” –Augustine, Chrysostom, Isidore, Gregory—these were pastors who knew their flocks and cherished the faith as held in the hearts of their people.   Let us pray that God’s flock will be given good shepherds.     

New Day Dawning

Cardinal Avery Dulles SJ 
1918-2008

  I  am sorry of this most recent hiatus—some unexpected travel came up and I am behind in my lecture preps for class and….well, to be honest I am just not as organized as I would like to be and you know, it takes a big chunk of time to prepare these posts.

To pick up where we left off—and I am anxious to get over this topic and on to some things that have happened lately—I had most recently posted that there are two distinct traditions in the Catholic Church in the United States.  The one tradition, dating back to the Maryland colony and English Recusant Catholicism was a plainer, more Spartan Catholicism with a strong tradition of devotional reading, intellectual emphasis, and centered on devotion to Jesus Christ.  The other tradition, arriving later in mid 19^th century America with the waves of immigration, was given to more public displays of pomp and colorful devotion, less intellectual and more emotional, and centered more on devotion to the saints.  That is an over simplification, of course, but I also recently posted references to some previous postings on this blog that elaborate more on the theme and give examples of what I am talking about should you be interested. And I suspect that it is a theme that I will return to time and again as it particularly interests me.  In the very last posting earlier this week, I mentioned that Catholics whose spiritual life followed that old Maryland/Recusant tradition were more prepared for the changes of the Second Vatican Council while those who found comfort in the immigrant Catholicism found that the conciliar changes really ripped away much of that in which they found their Catholic identity.  Most of those who want a full or partial restoration of the pre-conciliar Church come out of that immigrant Catholic heritage. 

Now that we seen the Maryland tradition vs the Immigrant tradition, and the pro-Vatican II and contra Vatican II factions, I want to “slice the cake” of American Catholicism along another axis.  Cardinal Avery Dulles writing in his book on the Catholicity of the Church, The Catholicity of the Church (Oxford University Press, 1987), stated that while the 1000 years of the Church were about evangelization (he actually says “witness”) and the second thousand years were about power, that the third millennium will be about service.  I think—as regular readers can attest—that Dulles is among the best modern writers on the Church and that he is dead on with this statement.  But that means, of course, that as a Church we are precisely at that place where the Church’s tectonic plates are shifting as the old millennium of power gives way to the new millennium of service.  The ground beneath our Catholic feet is shaking and trembling and this causes fear and anxiety.  Some of us, of course, are looking forward to this period of service; others are frightened by the loss of power as the old order passes away.  I think this “ecclesiastical earthquake” is very much at the heart of the strife and struggles within the Church of today.  I admit that I make fun of Cardinal Burke and Archbishop Cordileone and others for parading around swathed in their furs and yards of silk—but precisely because I see this as a ridiculous holding on to the symbols of a dying Catholicism, a moribund Church of power while the Church that is rising up is that Church of service.  I think that Burke and company are buffoons, however, while the Cardinal Law and Archbishop Lori types are far more dangerous because it is not the silken rags of faded glory that they are clinging to but real manipulative power that seeks to control—and bind—the hearts and minds of Christ’s faithful people.   But again—for those who cannot conceive a Church of service and know only the past any loss of power seems to be a weakening of faith itself.  On the other hand, for those of us who were raised in the old American Catholicism of the Maryland strain—Christocentric, intellectual, and devoid of the European trappings of princedom, the switch to the servant model of Catholicism is something that we welcome.  The heroes to us are not the buckled-shoe and caped wonders, but bishops with their feet on the ground like the late Dom Helder Camara, or Tom Gumbleton, or Matt Clark. or Howard Hubbard—or even Avery Dulles, and certainly Carlo Maria Martini.  We remember Paul Émile Léger who resigned his See of Montreal to work in a Leper Colony in Africa.  To us the nuns of the LCWR are the heroes and American Church women who were killed in El Salvador in 1980 or Sister Dorothy Stang who was killed in Brazil in 2005 for defending the peasants there.  We like Richard Rohr and Joan Chittester and Ronald Rohlheiser because they articulate a vision of the future that we recognize as truly Evangelical—witnessing the Good News of God’s Victory.  I did a posting not long ago (August 18) on Monsignor Ralph Beiting, a remarkable servant of God who spent 60 years serving the people of Appalachia.  I have known scores of priests and sisters—and hundreds of lay people—over the years who model this Church of the Servant Christ and I see this model of the Church slowly rising as the earth beneath the slipper clad prelates sinks into irrelevance—but that is history. History is about  change.  To live is to change and to be perfect is to have changed often.  Keep moving forward!!!   To look back is to risk the Church becoming a pillar of salt. 

Reformation Today! 1

The Son of Man came not to

be served but to serve

(Matt 20: 28)

I think that when we bring up the subject of Reform in the Church what we most need today is a movement to restore the Church to its role as Servant in imitation of its Master who came not to be served but to serve.  All this commotion about the Affordable Care Act and what it purportedly does to our “rights” as Catholic Americans is centered about the idea that we, as Church, should be able to dictate the norms of behavior to the larger society in which we live.  That premise needs to be seriously questioned, but even more we need to take stock of the reality of the declining influence of the Church on our society.  It is unrealistic to think that the Catholic Church can have the political influence on American life that it had through most of the 20^th century.   While some may either grieve or be angry that we can’t shape public policy as we once did, I believe it presents us with the opportunity to be once again the Church that Christ established and not the Church built by human power. 

Years ago I was struck by a passage in William Willimon and Stanley Hauerwas’ Resident Aliens: Life in the Christian Colony, (Nashville:Abingdon, 1989) in which they critiqued mainline Protestantism in the United States  for its delusions about a lost ability to determine societal norms.  Hauerwas and Willimon wrote:
Everything needed to be reexamined, and the failure of the old answers, seen now more clearly by the glow of the furnaces at Dachau and the fires of Hiroshima, demanded new questions.  The world had shifted.  Mainline American Protestantism as is often the case, plodded wearily along as if nothing had changed.  Like an aging dowager, living in a decaying mansion on the edge of town, bankrupt and penniless,  house decaying around her but acting as if her family still controlled the city, our theologians and church leaders continued to think and act as if we were in charge, as if the old arrangements were still valid.

Well, we could rewrite this today to say

Everything needs to be reexamined and the failure of the old answers, seen now more clearly in the glare of the clergy sex-abuse trials and the investigative lights of numerous financial crimes and ‘irregularities,” demands radical reform.  The world has shifted.  Catholicism in the Developed World—and in particular in the United States—can no longer plod along as if everything has not changed.  Like an aging dowager, living in a decaying mansion on the edge of town, bankrupt and penniless, house falling into ruins around her, but acting as if her family still controlled the city, the Holy See and our own American bishops, continue to act as if they were still in charge, as if the old arrangements were still valid.     

If I am critical of Cardinal Burke for his antiquated pomp and Archbishop Lori for his high-handed ways and the Institute of Christ the Sovereign Priest for their living in a world of make believe baroque revivalism, and Carl Anderson for his shabby influence pedaling at the Roman Curia, and Bishop Olmstead for his ill-informed autocracy, and Cardinal Law for his unrepentant lack of shame, it is because they are holding our Church hostage to a world that exists any longer only in their own fantasies of power.  Gentlemen, the ancien regime is over and it ain’t coming back.  The toothpaste ain’t  goin’ back in the tube.   You—we—simply have no power anymore to chart the course of American society.  Get over it.  Wake up and smell the coffee.  Move on!

And if I am behind the good women of the LCWR and I tend to canonize people like Dom Helder Camara and Archbishop Romero and Bishop Tom Gumbleton, and Sister Joan Chittester,  and Dorothy Day and Social Justice and L’Arche and the Jesuit inner-city schools it is because I believe these are the first fruits of a new age for the Church, an age that will be characterized by service to society rather than exercising power over it.  And as one who looks to the Gospels for guidance, I say “gratias tibi, Domine.”  

Thank You Ignatius Loyola For the Loyal Service of Two Sons

I am a great admirer of the Society of Jesus.  I owe a lot to them for the education they gave me—especially teaching me my Latin which in turn has given me a necessary tool to be a historian.  Two Jesuits I particularly admire are the late Cardinal Avery Dulles and the very much alive Father James Martin.
     One of my colleagues who is a theologian, or at least a professor theology—I really don’t think he does the original work that would qualify him a a theologian though, like most academics, he has sufficient ego to claim a designation he hasn’t earned—dismisses Dulles as a “conservative” or even “reactionary.”  I think the gentleman is simply jealous of Dulles’ record of publications as well as his being honored by a red hat late in life.  I was always surprised that Dulles was so honored as I find his ecclesiology nothing less than subversive of the current Church order.  That, by the way, is to me a positive thing. While his book Models of the Church is his classic work—and I think prophetic for calling us to move beyond the institutional model to see the Church in its fullness—it is his book, Catholicity of the Church, that I have really enjoyed.  In Catholicity of the Church Dulles tells us that the predominant characteristic of the papacy’s first millennium was witness; the second millennium was characterized by power; the third millennium will be a time of service.  As a historian I think Dulles is spot on but while he speaks of the papacy, I think this is true of the Church at large.  The first millennium with the great evangelization of the then-known world was a time of witness to the Gospel.  In its second millennium the Church became entangled in the web of earthly power as it joined throne and altar to extend its authority into law.  And we are now entering a time when some—those prophetic souls who chart the course—see that we must give ourselves to service of humankind. 
      I think it is this shift of the Church’s tectonic plates that is at the source of so much of the tension in the church today.  It is very hard for many people to walk away from the power model.  Power is addictive.  Many people cannot imagine a Church that is not based on power—heavenly or earthly.  Ironically Jesus instructed his disciples to eschew power—“you know how it is among the Gentiles; how their great ones made their power felt over them; it must not be that way with you.”  The gospels tell us that Jesus “spoke with authority” but they do not ascribe power to him. Indeed, while he said that he could call upon legions of angels to come to his aid, he never did.  It is the conversion of the heart, not compulsion or a conversion by force, which characterizes the teachings of Jesus.
      In the Church’s second millennium power proved to be too tempting for churchmen (and notice, I mean churchmen)  to avoid.  Some—like Peter Damian or Gregory VII or Innocent III—for the most part used power well.  Others like the Medici Popes Leo X and Clement VII or Cardinal Wolsey, abused their trust. 
       When I see nuns—whether habited ones like the Little Sisters of the Poor or out-of-habit ones like the Daughters of Charity and Sisters of Mercy—running nursing homes or day-care centers or infant-homes or shelters for women and children, I see the sort of service to which we are all called as Christians.  I see some prelates who fall in that category too.  I knew—only slightly—Cardinal Dulles in his final years and found him a humble man, more professor than prelate, devoted to getting his students to think both critically and profoundly.  I remember the late Bishop Bernard Topel of Spokane.  I never knew, except by reputation, Dom Helder Camara of Recife, Brazil.  His famous quote is: When I feed the poor,  you call me a saint; why I question why they are poor, you call me a communist.  I see Cardinal Sean O’Malley of Boston who moved out of the mansion and is normally seen in his simple Capuchin robes and who, at least used to, work in soup-kitchens.  Bishop Hubbard of Albany has a good reputation for not taking himself too seriously and keeping his feet on the ground and his heart with his people.  I have had the privilege of sitting down with Bishop Tom Gumbleton—a man who has suffered terribly at the hands of other prelates for his witness to the Gospel.  But for the Cardinals Burke and Law, for Bishops like William Lori and Thomas Olmsted, for Grand Poobah Knight of Columbus Carl Anderson and laity like George Weigel or Russell Shaw the model of power is just too hard to walk away from.  Che peccato as we say in Rome—what a pity! (Literally, “what a sin” which might be more accurate.)  The future lies in the models of service, not of power.   When we say we are afraid of losing our religious liberties, what we really mean is that we are afraid of losing out ability to dictate to the larger society how people should live and reproduce and express love.  We think that we should be able to dictate to the world what we perceive to be God’s law.  Jesus never told us to do that.  He told us to win people’s hearts not control their lives.  Win their hearts and their behaviors will follow but simply try to force your ways on them and they will never surrender their hearts.  Service is the way to win hearts for Christ   
      And then there is Father James Martin—a Jesuit and associate editor at America Magazine.  Boy does he get the religious crazies upset and why—well, most of all because he makes a rational case for rational Christianity.  Father Martin is not some way-out radical—though their fields  (journalism and theology) are different and so a direct comparison is impossible, I find him more reserved in his opinions than the late Cardinal Dulles.  Father Martin only writes (or says) what most thinking Catholics are saying at their dinner tables, their book-clubs, their faith-sharing groups, their Adult Ed classes etc.  He has come out solidly behind the American nuns and now he has written an interesting article about DeLaSalle Christian brother Louis DeThomasis, president of Saint Mary’s University in Minnesota, which is a thoughtful critique of Catholic faith and practice in our contemporary world.  Of course Father Martin is in a long tradition of America editors who speak up in a Church culture where the leadership wants you to pay, pray, and obey.  But the reason that the boys in red don’t want you to think for yourself and ask the tough questions is that, frankly, they don’t have answers nearly as rational as your questions.  When reason fails, they appeal to “Tradition.”  There is nothing wrong with Tradition, of course, but Aquinas would be the first to say that when reason and tradition diverge, reason trumps the commonly held perceptions of the Faith.  This is not to say that appeals to Tradition can be discarded when irrational but rather that the understanding of the Tradition, when it is against reason, is a distortion of the authentic deposit of faith.  In other words, a religious doctrine which deviates from reason, does not correctly apprehend the Tradition handed down from the Apostles.  There are many such “doctrines” circulating today that would require a Catholic to reject scientific knowledge and reason if he or she were to hold them.  It is time that such “doctrines” were seriously studied and redefined for our current age.  Faith, of course, transcends intellect but it does not repudiate intellect as some would have it.   God blesses simple hearts, but not stupidity. 

Lions 2: Christians 0

The L'Arche communities of Jean Vanier are examples
of Catholicism at it's best--an example of the teaching
of John Paul II on solidarity as interdependent
communities of the developmentally challenged and
those of us who have been able to achieve to full
potential learn from one another how to live the
Gospel

Well, I am not sure exactly how he managed to do it, but President Obama has slipped the trap on the contraceptive-for-Catholics issue and regained his political footing to move on.  I am not happy about how it has worked out, but I have to admire his political acumen.  His “compromise” is anything but—it doesn’t address the problem—but while the bishops are still out looking for a fight, the people in the pews, or at least those who were with the President before the kerfuffle, are pretty much back in the Obama camp.  And not just the battle, but the war, has been won and not by the Church.

First—why it is not a “compromise:” 

     It is not a compromise because the bishops were never involved in the solution.  A compromise requires that both sides sit down at the table and work out a solution that both sides can live with but with which usually neither side is completely happy.  Granted, the bishops are certainly not happy with this “solution” but not because it required them to give in in any way but because they were not involved in the process and their key principle was not addressed.  Granted Catholic institutions do not have to pay (directly) for services that are contrary to Catholic moral teaching, but the principle has not been resolved that Churches or religious groups should not have to conform to legislation that directly violates their moral code—that to force them to act contrary to their beliefs would, limit the practice of their religion in ways contrary to the First Amendment.  That is an important principle and they want to get it established as there are other battles yet to come. (See Below.)  Of course there are those among the purpled mitered majesties that want far more than is reasonable—those who do not want anyone to have coverage that includes sterilization or abortifacients and they would not be happy with anything less, but that is not realistic.  Moreover it is part of the much bigger problem for Catholics and that is that Church leadership has totally blown the Defense of Human Life mission right from day one.  (But more about that later.)

My second point:  

      Almost certainly the bishops have never had anything really to worry about.  The recent Supreme Court Hosanna-Tabor case bodes well for the Bishops’ plea that Church institutions should not be required to conform to federal law that violates their religious principles.  The case is not an exact parallel, of course, but in the dispute between a Missouri Synod Lutheran Church in Michigan and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission the Court decided unanimously that religious institutions have a certain immunity from federal legislation.  Given that it was a unanimous decision that federal guidelines did not apply in a dispute between a Church and an employee, it seems unlikely that the same court would side against a religious body when that body was striving to protect its moral or doctrinal integrity from government interference.  Nevertheless, the bishops were wise to sound the alarm before the matter even went to the courts as there is a very key principle of religious freedom here.  On the other hand, wise as they may have been to clarify the issue as one of freedom to be true to one’s religious principles, they have lost in the Court of Public Opinion as most Americans think that the President’s accommodation—it really isn’t a compromise for reasons stated above—is fair.  Pursuing this in the courts—which the bishops are bound to do to preserve the principle of religious autonomy—will only make them look obdurate and pigheaded.  A mitered pig is not a pretty sight; a herd of them (in this case, a Conference) is absolutely appalling.  So even if they win in the Supreme Court—and they probably will—the Church loses and President Obama has still won.  (Not that the President wanted a pissing contest with the Church for the sake of winning a pissing contest with the bishops.)    

And to be honest—while the bishops have already lost, the war is far from over. 

This brings me to the third point we need to consider: 

     This battle over insurance covering contraceptives is only prelude to the battle that will soon emerge over rights of partners in same-sex marriages.  What will happen when employees of Catholic institutions want coverage for their same-sex spouses?  There have already been a few minor skirmishes.  In 1997 then Archbishop William Levada (now Cardinal and head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in Rome) ended up finding an “accommodation” with the City of San Francisco on the City’s requirement that domestic partners be given the same benefits as married spouses.  It saved face, and indeed provided a generous solution, but surrendered the principle that the Church should not have to comply with legislation that runs counter to its moral teachings. This is the issue that the bishops are now fighting the Obama administration on.  Various Catholic prelates, including Cardinal Dolan of New York, have led spirited but unsuccessful campaigns against legalizing same-sex marriages in their various states.  Some critics have claimed that the efforts were less than ardent and even have wanted the bishops to excommunicate or to deny sacraments to politicians who voted for or signed into law bills legalizing same-sex marriage.   Frankly, the bishops do their duty in upholding Catholic moral doctrine but they don’t seem very anxious to block the legality in civil law of same-sex marriages.  What will they do when they have to start providing spousal benefits? 

      I will tell you what they will have to do—they will have to ante up.  They will whine and complain but they lost this battle decades ago before gay marriage was even a question.  The Church in the United States treats civil marriage as a legal reality despite what the Church thinks of any particular union.  A Church employee who is divorced and remarried without a Church annulment is granted all the benefits and privileges of a married person.  A Catholic employee of the Church who is married outside the Church—and thus who, in the eyes of the Church, is not married at all—is still given the legal benefits and recognition owed to the legal status of the marriage in civil law.  It will have to be the same with same-sex marriages as they are legalized in state after state.  But wait and see:  the bishops will lead a fight—especially after they are bolstered by a Supreme Court decision upholding their right to refuse coverage for contraceptives, sterilizations, and abortifacients—to refuse benefits to same sex partners.  And here their hypocrisy will be exposed.  It will clearly be refusing benefits because the beneficiaries are gay and not because they are in what the Church believes to be an “invalid marriage.”  What a debacle that promises to become. 

This leads me to my final point for today: 

     We need to change our strategy as a Church on how we encounter the world in which we live if we hope to change it according to what we believe to be the values of the Gospel.  Today everyone knows what the Catholic Church is against but only a few know what it stands for.  We have become, at least in the perception of our society, a cantankerous old scold and cantankerous old scolds are not in a position to evangelize.  I am not saying that we have to bless everything that comes along, but we do need to stress what we—as a Church—believe in and not what we are against.  We would have much more credibility in our campaign to protect the unborn if we were to be known to be anxious to protect all human life against attack.  We would have more credibility in our campaign to end abortion if we were in respectful and honest dialogue with those who are concerned about the plight of women in today’s society.  We would have more credibility in our campaign to change the law if we made it our priority to change hearts first. 

      We can support marriage and sound family life without being anti-gay.  We don’t have to denigrate human relationships, gay or straight, to affirm our belief in heterosexual marriage.  We can accord each and every individual in our society respect and dignity—and equal access to social benefits and legal status—without giving our personal approval to the various relationships they may be in.   We might actually witness to the Gospel if we, like the Lord of the Gospels, encountered individuals in their particular circumstances rather than try to reduce people to categories and stereotypes. 

       The Catholic Church earned a moral reputation through the nineteenth and early twentieth century by building hospitals to care for the sick of any and all denominations, by opening schools and colleges that were as good as any in the land, by being the welcoming home for immigrants to our shores, by being the voice for the poor, by endorsing the corporate strength of the working classes against those who exploited them.  Today we are squandering that moral strength left and right and not even so much by the moral failures witnessed to in the sex-abuse crisis as much as by the pompous high-handedness of our prelates and the pharisaical hard-hearted self-righteousness of those who have allied themselves with the religious right in a political cause that hides behind the skirts of a pseudo-Christianity.  In a Dom Helder Camara, a Dorothy Day, a Mother Teresa, a Thomas Gumbleton, an Oscar Romero, a Daniel Berrigan, a Geno Baroni, a Horace McKenna, a Bernard Topel, I can see the apostles.  In a Catholic Worker House, a Jesuit Volunteer Corps, a Saint Luke’s Mission of Mercy, a Catholic Charities center, a Missionaries of Charity shelter for AIDS patients, a (Jesuit) Cristo Rey Prep School, a Little Sisters of the Poor home for the aged, an Jean Vanier L'Arche community, S.O.M.E. (So Others May Eat), a Saint Francis Breadline I see the Gospel becoming visible.  As a community of faith, our Catholic Church in the United States still has it—we only need to put our best food forward.  And it ain’t wearing a red stocking and a silver-buckled shoe.