Page contents:
1. Introduction to this page
2. Recent actions of the Vatican: links to pages elsewhere
3. Comment about the Church: links to pages elsewhere
1 - Introduction to this page
The blog began life to explore issues around the Mass and has now inevitably led me to need to explore those around being Church also. The problems many people experience with the new Mass text and its imposition arise in part from different understandings of Church, and of the role of the Vatican, Cardinals and Bishops. (That in turn might arise from different understanding of Christ and the New Testament, but that is not explored on this page.)
Vatican II asserted the notion of hierarchy being for listening, so listening to lay experience is one of the sources of the Pope's teaching. That experience was to be brought into dialogue with Scripture and Tradition, but now the servants of the servants of the servants of the servants of the people of God are telling us what to think, talk about and how to pray in the Mass. (The servant chain goes: Curia (civil servants)- Pope collegiate with Cardinals - Bishops - priests - people).
I know we shouldn't talk about women priests - but can we talk about talking about women priests? Or talk about talking about talking about women priests? Some would think that I ought to check before I say what I want, but instead I choose to recall my experience of married clergy, women and men, in other denominations. They have enhanced my Christianity for 20 years, and, lest you think otherwise have given me stronger roots in my own faith community where I have also recently appreciated the RC priesthood of a married former Anglican. Married and women clergy is evidently an idea that works - why ban it on the basis of disputed interpretations of parts of our tradition and of the Scriptures? Admittedly, re-imagining priesthood and ministry feels hugely more important to me. Yet as with the use of Scripture in the Mass, I think it can be argued that Scripture is invoked to support pre-judged positions - in the case of the Mass there is the general tone and details like the centurion, who did not pray that his servant's soul only be healed! Here the means, being closer to the Latin, is used to justify the ends - rather than the end condemning the means.
Despite my anger, or more accurately with my anger and despite the text, the Eucharist remains source and summit of my life as a Catholic. I explored this reaction here and in more recent posts to this blog.
A few links follow on recent actions by the Vatican and to some of the commentaries about the Church. This page was set up in Spring of 2012; it is impossible to keep up with the torrent of good information and writing but these are among the ones that struck me, at a time when I could update these links.
2. The actions of the Vatican
I'll add to this list as chance permits, but although this week I became aware of the total of Irish priests silenced rising, I'm way behind the state of play:
- on the We Are Church UK page, Courage under Silence I am appalled at the number of names I recognise from books that have helped my faith and its integration with my life.
- To transcribe the list of such articles from this week's Catholic press (ending 19 April 2012) would take too long - look at the Tablet.
about the Austrian Church issues
Silencing of Fr Sean Fagan
- see here for a chapter of his writing on sexuality I thought it superb and life-enhancing.
silencing by the Vatican of Redemptorist priests Fr Tony Flannery and Fr Gerard Moloney
About criticism of US nuns
3. About the Church
A Call to Action - ACTA is a UK response initiated in the summer of 2012 with an emphasis on seeking fear-free dialogue . It has an excellent website with forums that enable sharing of plans, insight and experience; associated google email groups (UK-wide and for each diocese), and a selection of excellent links including a talk by Riobert Mickens on the imploding Vatican.
We Are Church, in a similar space to ACTA, aims to assist in the articulation of issues that affect many Catholics in order to bring about productive dialogue.
Catholics for a Changing Church
EXCERPTS FROM VATICAN II DOCUMENTS - from "Voice of the Faithful - keep the Faith, Change the Church"
Detroit: Catholics4Change
Detroit: Catholics4Change
Enlightened Catholicism
Abusive ecclesialauthority puts our bishops on the spot
Austrian parish listens to priest, none receive the host
“Towards an Assembly of the Irish Catholic Church”. 20th April We are Church Ireland announces a silent vigil in support of those silenced priests , Sean Fagan, Tony Flannery, Gerry Moloney , Owen OSullivan and others who wish to remain anonymous.
Pope has consistently come down on dissent within the church like a hammer
My Church Right or Wrong? Don FauselPATSY McGARRYOPINION: TOMORROW is the seventh anniversary of the election of Pope Benedict XVI on April 19th, 2005. The scenes on St Peter’s Square that afternoon illustrated what this divisive figure has meant for his church.
Middle-aged and older people were crestfallen. A man sat at one of the great fountains in the square and wept openly. Around him danced seminarians from the North American College.
Well-scrubbed and in cassocks, they could not contain their glee. “Benedicto, Benedicto, Benedicto,” they shouted. “It’s a regular party,” a seminarian from Pittsburg told this reporter.
For them, the election of John Paul II’s enforcer as pope represented the final defeat of that liberal Catholicism ushered in following Vatican II which they and their mentors see as at the root of all that is wrong in the church today. The rigid certainties enforced by the new pope had so much more appeal for them than the porous, inclusive Catholicism of the previous generation.
James Carroll: The Catholic Church Has To Be Rescued From Catholic Fundamentalism
Theologian claims there is 'ominous divide' in church
2 May 2011, NCR: Why let bishops drive us from church we love?
.... As we pray, we might appreciate that those of us who resist the “hard-liners” are as imperfect and broken as they appear to be.......
And we can speak out. .......
We are the people of God. We are called to be prophetic voices.
.... The congregation, however, misconstrues its role when it becomes the arbiter of what constitutes Catholic theology, managing and even squelching discussions within the theological magisterium. Doctrine and theology should have separate places in the Catholic lexicon......
Yes, the papacy should be the final authority in the church, but it has now become the only authority. Yes, theologians will always be prone to mistakes. Theologians must be true to their role and criticize one another, and at times the hierarchical magisterium must step in. However the magisterium cannot just tie itself to one school of theology and condemn all others....Open letter from Hans Kung to the Bishops, April 16, 2010
