And Now I Know Why They Are Afraid of the Nuns!

Sister Nora Nash OSF and Spiritual Advisor

Recently while having lunch with some friends during a conference, we were joined at our table by a petite older nun who happened to know several of the others in our group. Sister had just the slightest trace of an Irish brogue and initially was quite deferential to the other guests at the table, but as the conversation proceeded onto the topic of Pope Francis and his teachings on economic justice in Evangelii Gaudium, she became more and more opinionated—and knowledgeable of what she was saying. 
I have to admit that while historians are supposed to be able to discuss economics intelligibly, it has never been my strength—and contemporary global economics are far too complex for my understanding and analysis.  But not Sister Nora Nash.   She had a grasp on issues from C.E.O. compensation to the complexities of Tax-free industrial zones in developing nations where children, women, and men are held in virtual slavery producing everything from the screen on my computer on which I am writing this entry to the sneakers I am wearing. 
Sister is one of the driving forces of the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility. The ICCR is a coalition of 275 faith-based institutional investors that advocates for corporate responsibility and files shareholder resolutions while leveraging corporate management on a variety of issues from human rights and corporate governance to global warming and consumer protection.  While there are dozens of organizations pursuing socially responsible investing, ICCR is the one that is seen as having the most moral integrity and social credibility.  Among the faith-based organizations comprising ICCR are the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the Unitarian Universalist Association, Quakers, and dozens of Religious communities of Roman Catholic Sisters.  Catholic dioceses and their bishops have been more reluctant to get on the moral bandwagon.  ICCR has taken on issues with Coca-Cola, Pfizer, the Gap, and Wal-Mart. 
Sister Nora is very much the heart and soul—and face—of ICCR.  Jack Welch, former CEO of General Electric, once flew his helicopter to Nora’s convent in Aston PA to meet with her in an effort to defuse a conflict that would have embarrassed GE before its investors.  No one wants an old nun to show up at a stock-holders’ meeting with her proxy vote and moral high-ground.  Nora has taken on Nestlé over labor policies, McDonald’s over childhood obesity, several grocery chains about farm-worker exploitation,  and Wells-Fargo over lending policies.  She has exposed child labor in the chocolate industry and gone after big-oil on environmental issues. 
Sister Nora, of course, does not wear a floor length robe tied with the white Franciscan cord—nor does she wear a wimple and veil.  I have always liked nun-drag.  I had a great aunt in Sister Nora’s community and I have great memories of the Sisters in their traditional garb bringing us milk and cookies when we would visit her.  On the other hand, not only were those clothes uncomfortable, they were psychologically dis-empowering.  One of the Franciscan priest-chaplains at Sister Nora’s convent explained: “When you dress everyone the same, 18 hours a day, seven days a week, every week of the year, a person loses his or her sense of individuality—and thus both creativity and personal power.  It is different for us men (he was in his brown Franciscan robes), we put the habit on and take it off—and beneath it we wear what shirt and slacks we choose.  And we don’t have to wear it all if we so choose.  But for the women it was a means of control—whether consciously done so or not—and as long as the women were in their habits they stayed in their traditional roles of third-grade teachers or nurses or cooks or seamstresses.  Now that they dress as they choose they are lawyers, journalists, physicians, social workers, potters, artists, or Nora Nash.  They dress simply and economically—and you will notice that these sisters all wear a San-Damiano Cross around their necks or pinned to their jackets as a sign of their Consecration and their Franciscan Commitment.” 
Now I see more clearly what is really behind this persecution of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious.  Too many Nora Nashes will bring down the house upon the bishops and their powerful friends.  The women need to be put  back, if not into their veils at least into their cookie-mold roles, and told to keep their eyes lowered and their mouths shut.  Of course, maybe if we took bishops out of their uniforms and let them dress like men we might get some bishops who would take on the prophetic roles and speak the Truth in this world of lies.  But then Pope Francis seems to be able to do that regardless of wearing his pope clothes so maybe at least in this situation it is not the clothes that make the man.  In the meantime most of us are looking to the nuns, not the bishops, for moral guidance.  You go girls!!!   

Today's Rebellious Catholics

 You want more about rebellious Catholics?  Look at this video about those damn trouble making nuns that keep poor Archbishop Lori and feather-headed Knights of Columbus Grand Poobah Carl Anderson and Cardinals Burke and Law from getting restful nights’ sleep.  Fortunately with the new prefect, Archbishop Gerhard Ludwig Müller, the “problem” has gone to a Vatican back burner, but I think this trailer makes it clear that the only problem with the nuns is that they take the Gospel seriously.  Hmmm—maybe we do need to think about turning over Church leadership to women.     

http://www.bandofsistersmovie.com/

 

The Rockets' Red Glare; The Bombs Bursting in Air

One of my regulars sent this to me

A bit strong, even “edgy,” but pay attention because it does capture the problem—the Church is losing the war because the bishops are picking the wrong battles.  C'mon guys, we need a change of strategy--or maybe a change of leadership.

http://www.sfgate.com/columnists/fiore/item/Fiore-Smackdown-10259.php

Magisterium and Prophecy

Amaziah, priest of Bethel, said to Amos,

"Off with you, visionary, flee to the land of Judah!
There earn your bread by prophesying,
but never again prophesy in Bethel;
for it is the king's sanctuary and a royal temple."
Amos answered Amaziah, "I was no prophet,
nor have I belonged to a company of prophets;
I was a shepherd and a dresser of sycamores.
The LORD took me from following the flock, and said to me,
Go, prophesy to my people Israel."

Amos 7: 12-15

Interesting first reading for Mass today.  The homilist explained that Amos was expelled from the sanctuary at Bethel by the priests of that temple because he was such an ardent defender of the poor.  They challenged him: What right did he have to prophesy?  This was a royal temple and he was not appointed to the sanctuary.  He was not a priest.—he was only a shepherd with a few fig trees.  Who was he to presume to speak on God’’s behalf?  What really upset them and caused them to expel Amos was that Amos spoke on behalf of the poor and called out the rich for their wealth.  He compared the wealthy women to fat cows and said that they lie around all day in luxury, getting drunk by lunchtime while the poor were being sold into slavery for the price of a pair of sandals.  And the priests could not have this—the sanctuary depended on the generosity of the rich and the powerful—the very people Amos was prophesying against. 

Then the homilist mentioned other people who were not priests but whom God raised up as prophets in the Church—Saint Francis, Saint Catherine of Siena, Saint Bridgette of Sweden and how they had spoken for the poor or had called the Church to reform.  He mentioned Mother Teresa who stood before presidents and kings and the United Nations calling for Life—the unborn, the elderly, the terminally ill, and even those on Death Row.  These were all prophetic voices yet none of them was a bishop or a priest.

Finally the homilist mentioned “THE NUNS” and those who wished to silence them.  “Maybe,” he said, “there are problems.  I don’t know.  I don’t see it.  But one of the charges against them is that they speak too much for the poor, they are too involved in ‘Social Justice’.  How can one speak 'too much' on behalf of the least of Christ’s brothers and sisters?  Is this not like Amaziah and the priests of Bethel?  Are prophets squelched when they point out the injustices against the poor because our friends and benefactors are among the rich?”   It was thought-provoking. 

Are Archbishop Lori and his buddy KofC Grand Poobah (and former Reagan Ade) Carl Anderson upset at the nuns for being spokespersons for the poor?  Are Cardinal Law and Cardinal Burke upset at the nuns because the nuns are making their benefactors who support their luxury in Rome look bad?  I don’t know but the tone of things suggests that the days of preaching Justice may be drawing to a close in our Catholic world.  I am the first to admit that there is a Magisterium and it needs to be listened to.  But God raises up prophetic voices outside that Magisterium.  Has since the days of Amos.  And will until Justice pours down off the mountainsides and Charity rules the land. 

Religious Liberty--For What Purpose?



Frederidk Douglass

 Well, back from retreat and travels and ready to settle in again.  Today’s entry is a long one but I hope thought provoking.  I think it has implications for all sorts of issues today—the Fortnight for Freedom, LCWR and the Nuns on the Bus, Social Justice and the Church’s Mission.  If you have the patience to read the entire entry and mull it over, I will just let you draw your own conclusions as you may.  I don’t think I have any answers really—not that I ever do—but I think there is a lot to think about regarding the role of religion in society, authentic freedom of religion, what our priorities as Christians should be.  Anyway here is the background:

In 1850 the Congress of the United States passed the Fugitive Slave Act requiring the return of runaway slaves in the “free states” to their owners in “slave states.”  By mid-nineteenth century hundreds of slaves were escaping to the free states each year.  Although a 1793 federal law had required the same, it was often circumvented and indeed state and local laws often forbad police under their jurisdiction to interfere with runaway slaves.  The 1850 law made it a criminal offense punishable by fine for any federal marshal or other official to fail to arrest any runaway slave or any person of color alleged to be a runaway slave.  Hmmm, sounds like some laws today.  

For the greater part the Christian Churches in the United States supported the enforcement of this law.  There was a perceived good—it was an effort to cool tempers that were leading to civil war.  That effort, of course, would prove to be unsuccessful.  Escaped slave and abolitionist leader, Frederick Douglass gave a long address on July 4, 1852.  Among other things, he took a long and critical look at the response—or failure to respond—of the Churches in the United States to this law.  Here is what he had to say       

RELIGIOUS LIBERTY.

I take this law to be one of the grossest infringements of Christian Liberty, and, if the churches and ministers of our country were not stupidly blind, or most wickedly indifferent, they, too, would so regard it.

At the very moment that they are thanking God for the enjoyment of civil and religious liberty, and for the right to worship God according to the dictates of their own consciences, they are utterly silent in respect to a law which robs religion of its chief significance, and makes it utterly worthless to a world lying in wickedness. Did this law concern the "mint, anise and cummin"—abridge the fight to sing psalms, to partake of the sacrament, or to engage in any of the ceremonies of religion, it would be smitten by the thunder of a thousand pulpits. A general shout would go up from the church, demanding repeal, repeal, instant repeal! And it would go hard with that politician who presumed to solicit the votes of the people without inscribing this motto on his banner. Further, if this demand were not complied with, another Scotland would be added to the history of religious liberty, and the stern old Covenanters would be thrown into the shade. A John Knox would be seen at every church door, and heard from every pulpit, and Fillmore would have no more quarter than was shown by Knox, to the beautiful, but treacherous queen Mary of Scotland. The fact that the church of our country, (with fractional exceptions), does not esteem "the Fugitive Slave Law" as a declaration of war against religious liberty, implies that that church regards religion simply as a form of worship, an empty ceremony, and not a vital principle, requiring active benevolence, justice, love and good will towards man. It esteems sacrifice above mercy; psalm-singing above right doing; solemn meetings above practical righteousness. A worship that can be conducted by persons who refuse to give shelter to the houseless, to give bread to the hungry, clothing to the naked, and who enjoin obedience to a law forbidding these acts of mercy, is a curse, not a blessing to mankind. The Bible addresses all such persons as "scribes, Pharisees, hypocrites, who pay tithe of mint, anise, and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy and faith."

THE CHURCH RESPONSIBLE.

But the church of this country is not only indifferent to the wrongs of the slave, it actually takes sides with the oppressors. It has made itself the bulwark of American slavery, and the shield of American slave-hunters. Many of its most eloquent Divines. who stand as the very lights of the church, have shamelessly given the sanction of religion and the Bible to the whole slave system. They have taught that man may, properly, be a slave; that the relation of master and slave is ordained of God; that to send back an escaped bondman to his master is clearly the duty of all the followers of the Lord Jesus Christ; and this horrible blasphemy is palmed off upon the world for Christianity.

For my part, I would say, welcome infidelity! welcome atheism! welcome anything! in preference to the gospel, as preached by those Divines! They convert the very name of religion into an engine of tyranny, and barbarous cruelty, and serve to confirm more infidels, in this age, than all the infidel writings of Thomas Paine, Voltaire, and Bolingbroke, put together, have done! These ministers make religion a cold and flinty-hearted thing, having neither principles of right action, nor bowels of compassion. They strip the love of God of its beauty, and leave the throng of religion a huge, horrible, repulsive form. It is a religion for oppressors, tyrants, man-stealers, and thugs. It is not that "pure and undefiled religion" which is from above, and which is "first pure, then peaceable, easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy." But a religion which favors the rich against the poor; which exalts the proud above the humble; which divides mankind into two classes, tyrants and slaves; which says to the man in chains, stay there; and to the oppressor, oppress on; it is a religion which may be professed and enjoyed by all the robbers and enslavers of mankind; it makes God a respecter of persons, denies his fatherhood of the race, and tramples in the dust the great truth of the brotherhood of man. All this we affirm to be true of the popular church, and the popular worship of our land and nation - a religion, a church, and a worship which, on the authority of inspired wisdom, we pronounce to be an abomination in the sight of God. In the language of Isaiah, the American church might be well addressed, "Bring no more vain ablations; incense is an abomination unto me: the new moons and Sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot away with; it is iniquity even the solemn meeting. Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth. They are a trouble to me; I am weary to bear them; and when ye spread forth your hands I will hide mine eyes from you. Yea! when ye make many prayers, I will not hear. YOUR HANDS ARE FULL OF BLOOD; cease to do evil, learn to do well; seek judgment; relieve the oppressed; judge for the fatherless; plead for the widow."

The American church is guilty, when viewed in connection with what it is doing to uphold slavery; but it is superlatively guilty when viewed in connection with its ability to abolish slavery. The sin of which it is guilty is one of omission as well as of commission. Albert Barnes but uttered what the common sense of every man at all observant of the actual state of the case will receive as truth, when he declared that "There is no power out of the church that could sustain slavery an hour, if it were not sustained in it."

Let the religious press, the pulpit, the Sunday school, the conference meeting, the great ecclesiastical, missionary, Bible and tract associations of the land array their immense powers against slavery and slave-holding; and the whole system of crime and blood would be scattered to the winds; and that they do not do this involves them in the most awful responsibility of which the mind can conceive.

In prosecuting the anti-slavery enterprise, we have been asked to spare the church, to spare the ministry; but how, we ask, could such a thing be done? We are met on the threshold of our efforts for the redemption of the slave, by the church and ministry of the country, in battle arrayed against us; and we are compelled to fight or flee. From what quarter, I beg to know, has proceeded a fire so deadly upon our ranks, during the last two years, as from the Northern pulpit? As the champions of oppressors, the chosen men of American theology have appeared-men, honored for their so-called piety, and their real learning. The LORDS of Buffalo, the SPRINGS of New York, the LATHROPS of Auburn, the COXES and SPENCERS of Brooklyn, the GANNETS and SHARPS of Boston, the DEWEYS of Washington, and other great religious lights of the land, have, in utter denial of the authority of Him, by whom the professed to he called to the ministry, deliberately taught us, against the example or the Hebrews and against the remonstrance of the Apostles, they teach "that we ought to obey man’s law before the law of God."

My spirit wearies of such blasphemy; and how such men can be supported, as the "standing types and representatives of Jesus Christ," is a mystery which I leave others to penetrate. In speaking of the American church, however, let it be distinctly understood that I mean the great mass of the religious organizations of our land. There are exceptions, and I thank God that there are. Noble men may be found, scattered all over these Northern States, of whom Henry Ward Beecher of Brooklyn, Samuel J. May of Syracuse, and my esteemed friend on the platform, are shining examples; and let me say further, that upon these men lies the duty to inspire our ranks with high religious faith and zeal, and to cheer us on in the great mission of the slave’s redemption from his chains.

RELIGION IN ENGLAND AND RELIGION IN AMERICA.

One is struck with the difference between the attitude of the American church towards the anti-slavery movement, and that occupied by the churches in England towards a similar movement in that country. There, the church, true to its mission of ameliorating, elevating, and improving the condition of mankind, came forward promptly, bound up the wounds of the West Indian slave, and restored him to his liberty. There, the question of emancipation was a high[ly] religious question. It was demanded, in the name of humanity, and according to the law of the living God. The Sharps, the Clarksons, the Wilberforces, the Buxtons, and Burchells and the Knibbs, were alike famous for their piety, and for their philanthropy. The anti-slavery movement there was not an anti-church movement, for the reason that the church took its full share in prosecuting that movement: and the anti-slavery movement in this country will cease to be an anti-church movement, when the church of this country shall assume a favorable, instead or a hostile position towards that movement. Americans! your republican politics, not less than your republican religion, are flagrantly inconsistent. You boast of your love of liberty, your superior civilization, and your pure Christianity, while the whole political power of the nation (as embodied in the two great political parties), is solemnly pledged to support and perpetuate the enslavement of three millions of your countrymen. You hurl your anathemas at the crowned headed tyrants of Russia and Austria, and pride yourselves on your Democratic institutions, while you yourselves consent to be the mere tools and bodyguards of the tyrants of Virginia and Carolina. You invite to your shores fugitives of oppression from abroad, honor them with banquets, greet them with ovations, cheer them, toast them, salute them, protect them, and pour out your money to them like water; but the fugitives from your own land you advertise, hunt, arrest, shoot and kill. You glory in your refinement and your universal education yet you maintain a system as barbarous and dreadful as ever stained the character of a nation—a system begun in avarice, supported in pride, and perpetuated in cruelty. You shed tears over fallen Hungary, and make the sad story of her wrongs the theme of your poets, statesmen and orators, till your gallant sons are ready to fly to arms to vindicate her cause against her oppressors; but, in regard to the ten thousand wrongs of the American slave, you would enforce the strictest silence, and would hail him as an enemy of the nation who dares to make those wrongs the subject of public discourse! You are all on fire at the mention of liberty for France or for Ireland; but are as cold as an iceberg at the thought of liberty for the enslaved of America. You discourse eloquently on the dignity of labor; yet, you sustain a system which, in its very essence, casts a stigma upon labor. You can bare your bosom to the storm of British artillery to throw off a threepenny tax on tea; and yet wring the last hard-earned farthing from the grasp of the black laborers of your country. You profess to believe "that, of one blood, God made all nations of men to dwell on the face of all the earth," and hath commanded all men, everywhere to love one another; yet you notoriously hate, (and glory in your hatred), all men whose skins are not colored like your own. You declare, before the world, and are understood by the world to declare, that you "hotel these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal; and are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; and that, among these are, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness;" and yet, you hold securely, in a bondage which, according to your own Thomas Jefferson, "is worse than ages of that which your fathers rose in rebellion to oppose," a seventh part of the inhabitants of your country.

Fellow-citizens! I will not enlarge further on your national inconsistencies. The existence of slavery in this country brands your republicanism as a sham, your humanity as a base pretence, and your Christianity as a lie. It destroys your moral power abroad; it corrupts your politicians at home. It saps the foundation of religion; it makes your name a hissing, and a by word to a mocking earth. It is the antagonistic force in your government, the only thing that seriously disturbs and endangers your Union. It fetters your progress; it is the enemy of improvement, the deadly foe of education; it fosters pride; it breeds insolence; it promotes vice; it shelters crime; it is a curse to the earth that supports it; and yet, you cling to it, as if it were the sheet anchor of all your hopes. Oh! be warned! be warned! a horrible reptile is coiled up in your nation’s bosom; the venomous creature is nursing at the tender breast of your youthful republic; for the love of God, tear away, and fling from you the hideous monster, and let the weight of twenty millions crush and destroy it forever!

Just a final ingredient in your thoughtful stew.  This was the reading at Mass this morning.  When I heard it, I thought it was particular to Independence Day but in fact it conincidentally happens to be the assigned reading for Wednesday of the 13^th week of the Year.  It comes from the fifth chapter of the prophet Amos.

Seek good and not evil,
that you may live;
Then truly will the LORD, the God of hosts,
be with you as you claim!
Hate evil and love good,
and let justice prevail at the gate;
Then it may be that the LORD, the God of hosts,
will have pity on the remnant of Joseph.

I hate, I spurn your feasts, says the LORD,
I take no pleasure in your solemnities;
Your cereal offerings I will not accept,
nor consider your stall-fed peace offerings.
Away with your noisy songs!
I will not listen to the melodies of your harps.
But if you would offer me burnt offerings,
then let justice surge like water,
and goodness like an unfailing stream.

Hmmm  our feasts and our solemnities   our cereal offerings and our sacrifices   our Masses and our Fortnights   What are they without justice?  Without goodness? 

Fortnight for Romney

I was amused and surprised the other evening when a friend of mine referred to the “Fortnight for Freedom” as the “Fortnight for Romney.”  Amused because he said what any number of us have been thinking; surprised because he is a committed and pretty main-line Catholic.  But then I think a lot of main line Catholics are wondering in what direction our leadership is going. 

     Another friend, a convert and very devout, called me today and brought up the subject of the Fortnight for Freedom and then the LCWR.  He too was uncomfortable with the message as it is coming from the pulpit in his parish and sensed that the “party line” is somehow out of step with the values of the Gospel.

       And I have been uncomfortable all along with what has been going on under the current “leadership” of our bishops.  To begin with, I never understood the opposition to Health Care.  Ok, Ok, I get the part about abortion and concern about health care covering abortions, but ever since the 2008 campaign the bishops were opposed to the idea of health care itself.  They weren’t just saying that we need to make sure that the package doesn’t promote abortion or euthanasia; they were going after the very idea that our society should provide health coverage for every individual.  You know, I went through eight years of Catholic Grade School, four years of Catholic (ok, Jesuit) High School, a BA from a Catholic (ok, Jesuit) university, and a Master’s degree in Theology—I always thought that it was one of the goals of our Catholic faith to make sure that everyone had access to good health care—as well as education, shelter, and food.  I mean, I read Mater et Magistra, Gaudium et Spes, Popolorum Progressio and a bunch of other magisterial documents about the kind of world that is consistent with our Catholic Faith.  Duh, what was the problem with health care?  I never got that back in 2008.  The goals, if not all the particulars, of Obamacare seemed consistent with our Catholic values—at least more consistent than leaving people without access to health care.  I am still confused on this.  Somewhere the “Church” took a turn in the road that I must have missed.  I mean the Obama project was flawed—but not essentially.  It seemed to me that it was a goal we could have worked with. 

         And I understand that regardless of the provisions of Affordable Care Act, the Church cannot in conscience provide contraception and sterilization to its employees.  And it doesn’t have to.  I am not happy, as I have written elsewhere, that President Obama got into this morass with the Church, but I think his solution solves the problem.  The Church does not have to provide objectionable services.  Period. And while I agree the Church should not have to provide the services, if the bishops don’t want people to have access to these services no-how, no-way, well, that is not reasonable.  Yes we Catholics believe that these procedures contradict the moral law—but there is no moral consensus in our society about contraception and we have no right to impose our view on others, especially when we are a minority.  (Though I do not believe that, other than in egregious circumstances, even a majority has a right to impose a doctrine or moral precept on society until the society comes to a consensus on the matter.  For example, I do not want to the Christian minority in Egypt or Iraq subject to sharia law even though the majority of citizenry in those societies hold to sharia law.)  So when we Catholics scream that our “freedoms” are threatened because we cannot block access to health-care covered contraceptives for employees in our institutions, I say: “get over it.”     
        Let’s be honest, for once, your Excellencies—the bottom line of this “Fortnight for Freedom” is nothing less than a rally against the Black Guy in the White House.  It is the leadership of the Church in the United States allying itself with the worst right-wing elements of our society in a Tea Party Frenzy to make the face of America look more…more…more…well, like “us.”  I know that sounds harsh, but our bishops went merrily down Karl Rove’s road of manipulating conservative religious groups to defeat John Kerry in 2004.  In the hopes of making headway against abortion, many of the bishops discarded any other moral concern.  And it was no better four years ago.  And this is just another reason why the leadership has lost its ability to genuinely lead.  There was a day when the Catholic Bishops were heard on moral issues.  Reagan s*** in his drawers when the Bishops published their 1983 pastoral letter condemning the Arms Race and the 1986 letter on economic justice required a change of under-clothing as well.  People listened to the bishops then but their moral voice has since been squandered due to the sex abuse and financial scandals as well as their pandering to the political right.  Maybe it is just as well that the Bishops are speaking up against social justice; it might actually help the cause.  But meanwhile, the voice of the Church today, at least the voice we are listening to, are the “nuns on the bus.”    Here I am fifty-some years later and once again I am say: “Yes, Sister.”

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. 

Blessed Are You When Men Persecute You...

The Lay Hermits on Mount Carmel--

forerunners of today's Carmelites--

by 15th century artist, fra Lippo Lippi

Innocent III harnessed the power of the laity for Reform in the Church at the beginning of the 13^th century.  There were many groups of lay hermits in Italy, up through France and the Rhineland, and elsewhere in the Catholic world.  These were independent groups of men who had renounced the materialistic culture of the urban expansion that characterized the 12^th century.  Due to various circumstances such as huge population growth, a revival of trade, more efficient agricultural techniques, an implosion of the feudal-agrarian system, the cities of Western Europe grew rapidly after the year 1100.  And with the rise of the cities, there was a revival of manufacturing and of trade that initiated a period of rapid economic expansion in Europe.  There were many positive features to this expansion with the building of the medieval cathedrals, the rise first of the urban cathedral schools and later the universities, advances in philosophy, theology, the arts, mathematics, medicine and the sciences, engineering, and other disciplines.  Many industrious families rose in just two or three generations from rural peasants who had come to the cities looking for opportunity to being rich merchant families.   But, at the same time, there were those among the new middle class who found the materialism of the new civic cultures repugnant and turned from their families’ wealth to lead simple lives of Christian prayer, pious works, and evangelical poverty.  Wanting to imitate Christ and his disciples they gathered into small communities that strove to live off their own manual labor and whatever alms they could collect to assist them in their work of tending to the sick, the elderly, widows, orphans, the handicapped, and the poor.  

There were those in the Church who saw danger in these hermits.  First, while there might occasionally be a converted priest among their numbers, they were almost entirely laymen without formal education in theology or bible.  Secondly, they exalted the poverty of Christ which made the bishops and many of the priests of their day look flawed for their wealth and comfortable ways.  Furthermore, they concentrated their efforts not on the movers and shakers of the day, but on those whom society had left behind, helpless in their poverty and consequently they were held in great esteem not only by the poor but by many of the middle classes who admired their humble service.  Some bishops and prelates feared that these radicals would become like the Waldensians or the Cathars and offer religious alternatives to the faithful, alternatives that would leave them—the prelates—with fewer sheep to fleece.  Other prelates just felt that these lay hermits made them, the bishops, look bad for their neglect of the poor and for the extravagance of their own lifestyles.  Defenders of the Status Quo accused these poor men of Gnosticism and other heresies when in fact they were only faithful to the Gospel.  Perhaps the reader can see the subtext here and how this period of history speaks to the current situation and the harassment of the American nuns by certain prelates in our time and place, but lest you think that I am making this up, let me suggest a book that treats well of the religious reforms of the 12^th and 13^th centuries in their social context.  Religious Poverty and the Profit Economy in Medieval Europe, was written by Smith College Professor of European History, Lester Little, in 1983—long before the current group of prelatial ne’er-do-wells  began hatching their plots against the good ladies. 

      Up until the accession of Innocent III to the papal throne in 1198 many voices for genuine reform in the Church were having difficulty but Innocent wasn’t afraid of the Gospel and the impact it had on peoples’ lives.  He recognized the integrity of many people who were trying to lead Christ-like lives in the midst of a society—political and ecclesial—that was obsessed with power and wealth.  Innocent himself, despite his great power as Pope, was a man of frugal, even austere, life and habits.  He had great personal integrity and was amazingly open to correction even from the most humble of his subjects.  He took the gospel seriously and he recognized that these voices for reform needed to be heard.  Even though most of these hermits were not priests, he encouraged their street-corner preaching and calls to repentance. 

     The most important of these lay hermits during Innocents’ reign as pope was a humble man from Assisi, a town about a three days walk north of Rome.  Francis—his father’s nickname for him (his actual name was John but his father—a wealthy cloth merchant—had always referred to him as his “Frenchie”)—came from a nouveau-riche merchant family, but had broken with his father and walked away from the family’s wealth for a life of prayer and voluntary poverty in imitation of Christ.  There is a spiritual axiom going back to Saint Jerome—“Naked Follow the Naked Christ”—and Francis valued the poverty of Christ who had emptied himself of all his divine power for our sake. 

      Innocent greatly admired the poor man from Assisi and empowered him and his brotherhood to preach the gospel.  The impact was huge.  Francis’ brotherhood grew and expanded across the Christian world in just a few years’ time and in his own short lifetime thousands of men chose to follow Francis following Christ.  A corresponding sisterhood was established by a disciple, Clare, who like Francis came from a well to do family but left behind the wealth to establish the Order of Poor Ladies (usually called Poor Clares in English-speaking countries.). 
      Other hermit groups of the time developed into the Servite, Augustinian, and Carmelite Orders.  A society of preaching priests, the Order of Preachers or Dominicans, while not having begun as lay hermits, adopted this model of mendicant friars as well. 
      I have to admit that when I see these School Sisters of Notre Dame and Sisters of Saint Francis, and Sisters of Mercy, and Sisters of Saint Joseph, and Daughters of Charity today wearing what clothes that are given them or they can buy cheaply, and living in apartments or simple homes, and reaching out to the elderly, to the poor, to abused women and children, I am impressed by their generous service and humble witness.  I am old enough to remember the Ladies of Loretto and the Madames of the Sacred Heart and Sisters of the Holy Cross of yesteryear with their starched habits and elegant manners and I appreciate the work they did educating women for leadership but am even more impressed by these same women who have in their senior years left behind the trappings of gentility for service of the poor.  Archbishop Lori lives comfortably in his Baltimore mansion looking forward to his red hat, and Cardinal Burke drags around wherever he goes a nine-yard train of scarlet silk, and Cardinal Law—well we all know what he has done—these are the persecutors of these good women of the gospel.  I can see why these prelates are afraid of the nuns.  I would be afraid of the nuns too if I were in their buskins.  Sinners always try to hide from the light of saints.  These women are showing the way for the reform the Church needs today.  Now we need a pope like Innocent III who can see that.         

The Prophetic Mission of the Religious Sisters

this doesn't quite speak to me, or if it does,

I don't think the message is orthodox and

it should be looked into by the Congregation

for the Doctrine of the Faith

I was preparing a lecture on monasticism this past weekend and I came upon this quote from Thomas Merton

Special Emphasis is put on the mystique of martyrdom—the consummation of the Christian’s consecration of himself to Christ in baptism   Tertulian writes: “A prison provides a Christian with the same advantages that a desert gives to a prophet.”  This is interesting,  Not only are the Desert Fathers heirs to the vocation of the martyrs, but the martyrs are heirs of those pre-desert Fathers, the prophets   

  Thomas Merton, Cassian and the Fathers: Initiation into the Monastic Tradtion, edited by Patrick F. O’Connell, Cistercian Publications, Kalamazoo  2005.  p. 11.

OK, this I recognize

seems to me to be what

our faith is about.

Merton demonstrates, citing Tertullian, a connection here between monasticism (and by extension, religious life) and prophetic charism.  Monasticism had its origins, in part, in the desire of men and women to give their lives totally to God in the age where the option of martyrdom was fast closing because the persecution of the Roman Empire was drawing to a close.  The word “martyr” comes from the Greek μάρτυς, a witness.  Prophet comes from the Greek προφήτης—which means someone who speaks up on behalf of, testifies for, another.  Tertullian makes a link between prophets and martyrs.  That link passed to the desert monks.  Men and women whose passion of faith led them to want to surrender their lives totally to God, turned to the ascetical life in the desert as hermits or monks.  Origen draws the connections between the martyrs and the desert ascetics when he interprets the parable of the sower and the seed (Matthew 13:1-23).  Origen says that those who bear increase a hundred fold are the martyrs.  Those who bear increase sixty-fold are the ascetics (those men and women who have opted for lives of celibacy and prayer), and those who bear witnesses thirty-fold are the widows—who give themselves to prayer and good works. 

     The monastic life began as a witness by those committed Christians who understood that the society around them with all its distractions and pleasures was no place for the heart that seeks God and his kingdom.   They desired a purity of heart that would empower them to focus on God and God alone.  Their function within the larger Church was to witness, to keep alive the testimony, that God demands our all.   It was not, as it was with the gnostics, a rejection of the world as evil, but rather a witness to the Christian that there is a Reality beyond this world and that our hearts, whatever our particular vocation is, must be set on that reality. The witness was a powerful one and this prophetic role within the community highly values, so much so that by the fifth century and afterwards, bishops were increasingly chosen from among the monks.  And the preaching of those monk bishops is remarkable.  Many of those readings from Chrysostom, Augustine, Jerome (who was not a bishop but very prominent, none the less), and other “Fathers” of the Church are still read today in the Office of Readings in the Liturgy of the Hours.  The monks, despite their withdrawal from society, were keenly aware of the concrete demands of the Gospel in the world.  They understood the fundamental connection between the Eucharist and an advocacy for the poor,  they realized the responsibilities that came with financial prosperity.  They understood that true religion demanded a distributive justice—that true faith demanded good stewardship of one’s material goods.  One of these Fathers, Saint Basil wrote:

The bread in your cupboard belongs to the hungry; the coat hanging unused in your closet belongs to the person who needs it; the shoes rotting in your closet belong to the person who has none; the money which you hoard in the bank belongs to the poor. You do wrong to everyone you could help, but fail to help."     

Chrysostom wrote

Do you wish to honour the body of Christ? Do not ignore him when he is naked. Do not pay him homage in the temple clad in silk, only then to neglect him outside where he is cold and ill-clad. He who said: "This is my body" is the same who said: "You saw me hungry and you gave me no food", and "Whatever you did to the least of my brothers you did also to me"... What good is it if the  Eucharistic table is overloaded with golden chalices when your brother is dying of hunger?  Start by satisfying his hunger nd then with what is left you may adorn the altar as well

     And there are people today in the Church that think that the Sisters are too involved in social justice? 
        Over a period of time, and especially with the Rule of Saint Benedict, monasticism became more formalized and new forms of religious life emerged—Canons Regular in the 11^th and 12^th centuries, mendicant friars in the 13^th,  The  Brothers and Sisters of the Common Life in the 15^th, the Apostolic Congregations such as the Society of Jesus, the Theatines, the Vincentians in the 16^th and 17^th centuries.  Similarly monastic institutions of women evolved as women affiliated themselves to the canons regular, the mendicants, and apostolic congregations. Charismatic women such as Mary Ward and Angela Merici established autonomous women’s communities not affiliated to men’s communities and with—for the time—the radical vision of educating women.  Vincent de Paul made a radical leap with his daughters of Charity who were very untraditional.  He instructed them
…for a monastery, only the houses of the sick, for cell, a rented room, for chapel, the parish church, for cloister, the streets of the city, for enclosure, obedience, for grill, the fear of God, for veil, holy modesty.  

Perhaps among all the congregations of religious, the Daughters of Charity have been the most prophetic because of the heroic service they have given to the poor. 

      It is the role of religious in the Church to be prophetic—to speak up against the institutionalism, whether in the worlds of business, government, society, or even the world of the Church, that is contrary to the Gospel.  To do this authentically, religious need to reexamine the monastic roots which may not lay at the foundation of their particular institute but which do comprise the underpinning of religious life itself.  Religious must be contemplatives.  That does not mean they must be cloistered but it does mean that their hearts have to be set on God and on his Word. They must strive for that singular focus of the Kingdom of God. 
         And this is the irony of the present moment.  When Cardinal Burke parades around in his nine yards of scarlet silk topped by a fur wrap it is not God’s Kingdom that is being witnessed to.  When Cardinal Law, fleeing accountability in Boston for his role in cover-ups of criminal activity, enjoys the luxurious quarters that were his as Archpriest of Saint Mary Major, it is not God’s kingdom to which he was witnessing.  The rank and vicious ambition for which Archbishop Lori became known as aide-de-camp to the late Cardinal James Hickey of Washington is not witness to God’s Kingdom.  When Carl Anderson draws a million + a year from the Knights of Columbus while using Knights funds to accomplish political agendas both at home in the States and in the rats’ nest of the Roman Curia, it is not God’s kingdom he is witnessing to. 
         But the good Sisters.  I go to homeless shelters, soup kitchens, shelters for abused women and children, inner-city schools, day-care for the elderly, and I find the nuns, not the prelates.  Sadly, I don’t even find the priests, at least those with pontiff collars and silver cufflinks under their cassocks.  No, the religious are the prophetic voice—and that is their vocation.  There are those who want to silence that voice but the ladies have the credibility of living what they bear witness to.  Moreover it is their right, their responsibility, and their vocation to give witness. You go girls!

Preparing the Ground for a New Luther?

Are we facing in the wrong

direction?  not only at the

altar but for God's Work in

the world?

I was at Mass Saturday evening and heard the Gospel:

"All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me.  Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you."

What concerns me most about the nonsense right  now with the Vatican’s complaints about the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, the “scandal” with the Pope’s butler leaking confidential documents,  the Vatican Bank and its inability to meet transparency standards set by international conventions, Cardinal Bertone’s alleged coup to consolidate all power in his Secretariat of State, the issues about Caritas Internationalis needing more hierarchical  supervision, Cardinal  Burke parading around thinking he is Louis XIV—and then the nonsense here with the alternative magisterium of Michael Voris and “Real Catholic T.V.,”  Carl Anderson and the mismanagement of the Knights of Columbus, and everything else going on is that—wait a minute: we have a mission and we have taken our eyes off that mission. 

     “Go and make disciples of all nations”—where is that in this current mess? 

     Somewhere in the reign of John Paul II the steersman took his eye off the course of proclaiming the Kingdom of God and the bark of Peter has been foundering in waves of turmoil ever since.  The Second Vatican Council is about more than putting the liturgy into everyday language, turning altars to face the people, (neither of which things the Council itself actually did, mind you); what the Council did do was to set a course for the Church to proclaim the Gospel in the Modern World.  What is going on today is nothing more than a free for all as those with power jockey for more power whether on the level of the Vatican bureaucracy or the American hierarchy.  The political connivance, led by Cardinal Francis George of Chicago in 2010, that kept Vice President of the conference, Bishop Gerald Kicanas of Tucson from becoming president of the conference—the first time that a sitting Vice President did not become President of the USCCB—is only one example of the misdirected energy that is going to infighting rather than carrying out a vision for the Church here in the United States.  The connivance of Archbishop Lori (who owes his Baltimore See to the generosity of Carl Anderson and the Knights of Columbus money which Anderson uses freely for some very  biased agenda items), with Cardinals Burke, Law, and Levada to go after the American Sisters  is yet another.  The transformation of a personal vendetta of an American bishop into a scathing attack on Sister Elizabeth Johnson—a more sound scholar and better theologian than any of the bishops—for her book Quest for the Living God is a third example of wasted energy that should be devoted to bringing Christ to people with profound spiritual hungers.  Richard Rohr has written

      Much of the Western world has given up on the church and is going other places for wisdom.  Unfortunately, in these other places they are sometimes “willingly filling their belly with the husks the pigs are eating” (Luke 15:16) But we in the church must ask ourselves if we have not been the parent who sent them away because there was nothing trustworthy or life-giving at home."  (Richard Rohr, Near Occasions of Grace, Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1993, p. 26)
      This is precisely the situation in which we are finding ourselves as Church—we have a tremendous storehouse of spiritual nourishment to share with a world that suffering in immense distress and hunger of every sort but instead of bringing the Gospel and its life-giving hope, we are squabbling over who holds the keys to the pantry.  And when the internecine squabbling stops long enough for the Church to speak something to the world beyond its doors—it is always a message of negativity.  As I have written before: today everyone can tell you what the Catholic Church is against but very few can tell you what we stand for.  
       From a historical viewpoint this situation is fraught with signs of danger for the Church.  The loss of reputation for moral integrity, the concern with power and wealth by many prelates, the ignoring of advances in scientific knowledge and learning, the alienation of an educated and competent laity, the defense of antique social and political structures in a rapidly evolving society—these are all reminiscent of situation that led up to the Protestant Reformations of the 16^th century.  Vatican II was called to heal the divisions in Christianity but the betrayal of the Council over the last thirty plus years is threatening us with further discord and schism.  We need to refocus on mission and be willing to surrender our personal ambitions for the sake of advancing the Kingdom of God.