Along with a couple thousand others, I spent the weekend in Milwaukee attending the annual convention of Call to Action (CTA), a beleaguered group of progressive Roman Catholics. The conservative retrenchment of the Vatican and the American bishops marches on, and one wonders what the future holds for Catholic progressives. I met hundreds of interesting persons with fascinating stories: former priests and nuns who are now married, many gays or parents of gays, and numerous women who have recently been ordained to the priesthood or who are anticipating ordination in the near future.
“What,” you ask, “women ordained as Catholic priests?”
Roman Catholic Womenpriests is a movement less than a decade old that began with the 2002 ordination of seven women (six Europeans and one American). Since then, the movement is growing rapidly (despite excommunications), and I can attest to a sense of vibrancy at the Womenpriests’ booth that attracted an earnest crowd. One of the priests at the exhibit told me that their booth at the 2008 CTA Convention attracted a few curiosity seekers, but overall the mood was “don’t get too close to these excommunicated dissidents”. Last year, at the 2009 CTA convention, she reported that the fear of contagion had dissipated and the curiosity level had increased dramatically. This year, the Womenpriests booth was filled with visitors who had moved beyond curiosity to genuine interest. Their US map with red and green dots signifying locations of ordained womenpriests and pending ordinations was a hit with many asking for more specifics so they could attend a nearby Eucharist celebrated by female clergy.
Are progressive Catholics coming to the realization that their future lies outside the patriarchal hierarchy and beyond the control of the Vatican? If so, where? If not, how can progressive Catholics effect reform within the existing conservative power structures?
Enter the American Catholic Council. The Council also had an energetic presence at the CTA conference, passing out brochures inviting all to a Pentecost gathering next June. CTA is one of the member organizations of the Council, which also includes other Catholic reform organizations.
American Catholic Council is a movement bringing together a network of individuals, organizations, and communities to consider the state and future of our Church. We believe our Church is at a turning point in its history. We recall the promise of the Second Vatican Council for a renaissance of the roles and responsibilities of all the Baptized through a radically inclusive and engaged relationship between the Church and the World. We respond to the Spirit of Vatican II by summoning the Baptized together to demonstrate our re-commitment. We seek personal conversion to renew our Church to conform to the authentic Gospel message, the teachings of our Church, and our lived context in the United States. Our reading of the “signs of the times”, as we experience them in the US, our plan and our agenda are set out in our Declaration. We educate; we listen; we facilitate discussions and encounters; and, we build toward an American Catholic Council that will convene in Detroit over Pentecost weekend in June of 2011. At this Council we hope to proclaim our belief in the Rights and Responsibilities of US Catholics.
June 10, 2011. Mark the date.
On a personal note, I had the opportunity to visit with keynote speaker, retired Episcopal Bishop and noted author John Shelby Spong, and we discussed our mutual suspicion that the Apostle Paul may have been a conflicted gay man (which is developed in my novel, A Wretched Man). Bishop Spong said he first encountered that theory in a 1930’s book by theologian Arthur Darby Nock. We also discussed our mutual admiration for recently deceased British theologian Michael Goulder, who rekindled interest in the theory of Christian origins that posits a fundamental opposition between Paul the Apostle on one side and the Jerusalem Christians Peter and James, Jesus’ brother, on the other. This dispute provides the main plot line of A Wretched Man.
I also visited with Linda Pinto of CORPUS who favored me with an early report on her reading of the novel:
It was indeed a delight to meet you at CTA. I am, however, a little annoyed. I packed your book (a present to my husband) and at the last moment thought….you might browse through it at the airport. As the hotel forgot to change their clocks, they woke me up at 3:45 am rather than 4:45 am. So, with that much time to kill, I started to read A Wretched Man. WOW!!!! I am addicted. My annoyance comes from the fact that I had to return to work today and my husband insisted that I keep the book at home for his consumption!
I love your attention to detail and description. I love the interplay between the story of Paul and Jesus. And I love your description of Jesus’ family.
That is to say, get me a book review and I will publish it in CORPUS REPORTS.
Anyone interested in writing a book review for CORPUS? Contact me.
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Hi!… As an open minded, or progressive Roman Catholic, let me describe the situation of my Church.
Unfortunatly, since Pope JP2 was ill, more or less in 1996, the Church has been governed by a group of radical conservatives more or less linked to the Opus Dei, a radical group that won a “Personal Prelature” or an Ordinariate after their help to pay the bills of the Ambrosian Bank in 1982. Other radical groups have grown since that.
Things went more or less well in Pope JP2 Lifetime… But since Pope B16 was elected radicalism has swollen in the Church direction… Liberal Theologians were banned, Latin Mass was restored (with some popularity in the US, as I suppose to know, but les here in Europe). Radicalism against other Christians improved, and lots of people are becoming really unhappy with the Church. The pedophilia scandal was the cherry on the top of the cake.
Here the majority of the Churcher are empty, or at least with some old remaining people. No youngsters at all…
But, unfortunatly, these progressive groups don’t encourage lots of people, and they only atract unhappy Theologians, ex-priests or some quite old Academics. Here in Portugal, we have “We Are Church”, but it is so small that nobody know anyone who stay there…
Unfortunatly conservatives have now all the things to control the Chuch: Money, hierarchy prefearence and some laity supporters including some youth and young adults, younger than the people in the progressive groups.
I don’t know how it will be the future, but it seems that progressive Catholics will have to live their Catholicism out of the Mother Church. How? Creating a new denomination or society or joining another progressive Church that could accomodate their tradition. Anglicanism would be the natural place… But things aren’t very well among them, except if PECUSA/TEC would be expelled from the Anglican Communion and form another new thing… Lutherans should be, but Catholics are acostumied to another kind of a bit more sophisticated Church, things like Chasubles, Eucharist Reservation and Adoration, to be real part of the Universal Church and so on that I don’t know if Lutherans would be confortable to accomodate among them, except, perharps, Church of Sweden which would certainly be confortable with it, apart some Theological differences… And Utrecht is a place to avoid because there are lots of independent Old Catholic groups in the US (and anywhere else) and Utrecht or their representants in the US, PECUSA/TEC (or others anywhere else) seem to be quite impotent to control the situation.
Excuse me to be so long! And for my few mistakes. I am not a native English speaker!…
For those of us who follow such things such as the diffusion of teachings following the major Councils of the Western (and Eastern) Church – it is exciting to see the people in the pews in the Roman church in the USA begin to take a deep seated ownership in THEIR church! Exciting and gratifying too. But … also very scary for some folks.
I have a long time friend, a woman, who now lives on the East coast who has finally called it quits as a Roman Catholic. I’m not sure what the trigger event was, but she’s now going to be received into a United Methodist church. Since she writes about the wonderful singing of the UMC – and never mentions her local RC parishes – I’ll take a guess that the impending imposition of retro changes to the Roman liturgy are the straw that broke her back.
She grew up during Vatican II and loves the current liturgy – which the UMC comes very close to – and to have a non American and non English speaking group in Rome unilaterally decide that the current English liturgy is going to revert to 1950’s style Latin translated into schoolboy wooden “English”, is simply unacceptable. Her children and spouse long preceded her in departing.
All of this is to say, that the council called by the ACC to assemble in Detroit this coming summer is going to be heard around the world. However, I’m not holding my breath that anyone in Rome will be listening. Too bad!
If you look around and you see you are talking to a group of retirees (aka Call To Action) you might realize that your message is out of sync with the youth of the Church. Call to Action and the likes take sacred symbols and turn them into odd and slightly erotic “mythic actions and symbols.” Felt banners looked good in the 60’s, but we have moved on. Seeing “priests” circled around a table clinking wine glasses looks like it belongs to a 60’s movie like Valley of the Dolls. Young people want identity, as our culture destroys it for a vague consumerist individualism. Young people want dedication. Young people want community. That is why you see groups that foster these things growing, and groups that threw these things out dwindling. Pray that we can follow the lead of the youth!