Tag Archives: Catholic

Church of England General Synod 2010 convenes

Today marks the start of the 2010 General Synod of the Church of England. As a non-Anglican, I may misunderstand the polity of the worldwide Anglican Communion; with that disclaimer, this is what I think I know, but I stand open to correction.

The Church of England, headed by the Archbishop of Canterbury, is the mother church for Anglican bodies around the world. While Archbishop Rowan Williams exercises the authority of persuasion and prestige, those Anglican bodies in communion with the Church of England are essentially self-governing. Thus, Archbishop Rowan unsuccessfully lobbied the Episcopal Church of America last year to refrain from allowing LGBT persons to be ordained as bishops.

Unrelated to the General Synod, Archbishop Williams hosted ELCA presiding bishop Mark Hanson and an ELCA delegation on Friday last. Lutherans and Anglicans already have close relationships (in the US, the Episcopal Church and the ELCA have full communion agreements and in Europe, the Anglicans and the Lutherans of the Baltic states have a similar arrangement in the Porvoo Communion), and the meeting stressed strengthening those relationships:

The Rev. Mark S. Hanson met with Dr. Rowan D. Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury, in a private hour-long meeting Feb. 4 at Lambeth Palace here. After the meeting Hanson said the two discussed strengthening Anglican-Lutheran relationships, challenges each leader faces within his own communions, the proposed “Anglican Covenant” to deepen internal church relationships, global environmental issues, Christian-Muslim relationships, and mutual concern for conflicts in places such as Sudan and the Middle East.

Hanson told the ELCA News Service that the discussion of strengthening Anglican Communion relationships focused on existing full communion agreements — in Canada, Europe and the United States. “We talked not only about how this time of ‘reception’ can strengthen the ministries and mission we share, but provide new opportunities for us to be engaged in ways we haven’t even imagined,” Hanson said.

The two world church leaders discussed how both communions can focus on “the pressing issues of the world in which God has placed us,” said Hanson. He said the two agreed there is an urgent need for the United Nations and the U.S. and British governments to find a solution to the conflict in Sudan. The two also discussed commitment and concern for Palestinian Christians, and support for the Council for Religious Institutions in the Holy Land, for Lutheran and Anglican churches in the region and for dialogue with religious leaders in Israel.

In an official written statement to the archbishop, Hanson noted a series of priorities that Lutherans and Anglicans share, including care for the environment, working to end poverty and disease, and seeking peace and justice through greater interfaith understanding. He also noted that Lutherans and Anglicans have faced their share of “challenges in our communions.”

This latter statement about “challenges in our communions” is a bit of tongue in cheek understatement. The two clerics share a commonality as leaders of church bodies embroiled in controversy over LGBT issues, especially gay clergy. Yet, each has taken a different public posture. Bishop Hanson has attempted to remain neutral although the opponents of the ELCA’s pro-LGBT resolutions last summer would claim otherwise; to Lutheran CORE and the WordAlone Network, Bishop Hanson was a primary culprit and behind the scenes force that manipulated the church wide assembly actions, but this merely reflects a conspiracy theorist mentality, in my view. Archbishop Williams, on the other hand, has been outspokenly against the Episcopalian’s 2009 pro-LGBT actions.

The 2009 US Episcopal decision to allow gay bishops provides the dramatic undercurrent to the 2010 Church of England General Synod. The issue arises over the effort by conservatives to recognize the American dissident group of Episcopalians, the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA). The Telegraph UK reports:

Leading conservative clergy have declared their support for a motion at this week’s General Synod which would ally the Church with the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA).

This was formed in opposition to the consecration of Gene Robinson, the first openly homosexual bishop, and the actions of liberals in the Episcopal Church of the US, which is the official Anglican body.

However, the House of Bishops has tabled an amendment to the Synod motion which would seek to defuse the issue by postponing a decision until next year.

The Rt Rev Nicholas Reade, Bishop of Blackburn, is opposed to the stance taken by his colleagues. He said: “I am hoping for a sign of early support for ACNA, not a report coming back to Synod by the end of 2011.”

The Rt Rev Wallace Benn, Bishop of Lewes, a fundamentalist on the Church’s evangelical wing, said: “It seems to me that the House of Bishops’ motion is just needlessly undermining, delaying and prevaricating.”

The original motion, put down by Lorna Ashworth, an evangelical from the Chichester diocese, comes after the Episcopal Church elected a homosexual priest, Mary Glasspool, to be a suffragan bishop in the Los Angeles diocese.

Christian Today offers more background and insight into the debate over the tabled resolution.

American Episcopal priest and blogger Scott Gunn has several posts about ACNA, and his latest is a warning for the Anglicans of the home country that countenancing the schismatics from America will only invite internal turmoil.

Like dealing with a child who is throwing a tantrum, you cannot reward bad behavior. Recognizing secessionists in America ensures they’ll be in England sooner rather than later. Making it clear that they will not be recognized by the Anglican Communion because they chose to walk apart will at least slow them down.

America Magazine, the Catholic Weekly, discusses a different issue which is of greater concern to Roman Catholics, and that is the recent papal invitation for disaffected Anglican priests to be accepted into Roman Catholicism.

The Church of England’s Parliament, known as the General Synod, meets this week, beginning today with an announcement on women bishops which is certain to have an impact on the numbers of Anglican traditionalists choosing to take up the Pope’s ordinariate offer.

Synod voted two years ago to move towards consecrating women bishops, but is yet to come up with a formula for doing so which doesn’t at the same time alienate traditionalists who oppose the move.

Does this make it more likely that C of E traditionalists will accept the Pope’s ordinariate offer? Yes and no. For those that have already decided, in principle, to accept the offer and are waiting on the details, it will confirm their decision. But the view among most traditionalists I have spoken to is that an early exodus would weaken their attempts to safeguard the ‘Catholic’ place in the Church of England. Supporters of women bishops be able to say, in effect, “they’re going anyway. Why agree to what they want?” As long as traditionalists remain in the C of E, the threat of their departure is likely to make supporters of women bishops more likely to negotiate.

You may follow the General Synod proceedings on the website of the Church of England.

Calendar of events: Lutherans and progressive Catholic

Lutherans Concerned North America Let Justice Roll Assembly 2010

“Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream” —Amos 5:24

You are invited to participate in Let Justice Roll, the biennial assembly of Lutherans Concerned / North America and Reconciling in Christ conference. Let Justice Roll will be held at Augsburg College in Minneapolis, MN July 7–11, 2010.

Let Justice Roll is more than a conference. It is an opportunity to explore and live out the work of reconciliation that we are called to do. Justice requires reconciliation, and reconciliation takes effort. Throughout our time together, we will work on justice issues from the intersection of oppressions (racism, sexism, ablism, etc.) and through the lens of full participation of people of all sexual orientations and gender identities in the life of the Lutheran Church.

Call to Action Shatter the Stained Glass Ceiling Tour

This link will take you to the calendar of events sponsored by Call to Action that promote female ordination within the Roman Catholic Church. Call to Action is a major progressive Catholic organization. The following is a short list of the soon to occur events, but click through for the full calendar and a map.

Santa Fe, NM
February 4, 7pm
St. Bede’s Episcopal Church
1601 St. Francis Drive

Albuquerque, NM
February 5, 7pm
Albuquerque Mennonite Church
1300 Girard Blvd. NE

Sarasota, FL, 2pm
February 20
St. Andrew’s UCC Church
6908 Beneva Rd. S.

Dallas, TX
February 27

Chicago, IL
March 2nd

WordAlone Network Annual Convention

April 18 & 19 at Calvary Lutheran, Golden Valley, Minnesota. Rescheduled to avoid a conflict with the LCMC convention a week later in Omaha.

Exegetical Theology and The Lutheran Confessions

I missed this one which occurred on Jan 19th, but I mention this Lutheran Church Missouri Synod conference because of one noteworthy speaker on the agenda: Mark Chavez, a director of Lutheran CORE and recently vice president of the WordAlone Network. It is fascinating that Chavez is warmly received as a speaker at an LCMS theological conference. I doubt whether any CORE or WordAlone speakers will be invited to a United Methodist, Presbyterian, UCC, Episcopal, Moravian, or Reformed Church in America theological conference. These denominations are the full communion partners of the ELCA and are considerably more “middle of the road” than the conservative LCMS, and Chavez’ participation at the LCMS conference is a clear indication of the veer to the right that CORE chooses to travel.

ELCA Lutherans: Can we learn from conservative, Catholic retrenchment?

Open Tabernacle, the newly spawned progressive Catholic blog to which I occasionally offer ELCA tidbits, keeps spinning out one exceptional article after another. Today, Bill Lindsey critiques the conservative retreat of the last two popes from the progressive reforms of Vatican II. His post is directed at Catholics and Catholicism, but it occurs to me that there are parallels with the current Lutheran CORE / Wordalone conservative retreat from the progressive ELCA.

There is a fundamental difference, of course, in that progressive Catholics such as Lindsey are the outsiders critiquing the Catholic establishment, but in Lutheranism, it is the conservatives who are the outsiders opposing the progressive ELCA. There is also a difference between the hierarchy of the Vatican and the democratic polity of the ELCA. Putting aside those obvious differences, is there wisdom in Lindsey’s post for Lutherans to apply to our own internecine struggles?

The focus of Lindsey’s post, inspired by fellow blogger Colleen Kochivar-Baker, is the shift away from the Vatican II emphasis on “internalizing theological insights and ethical values, as well as on the role of conscience and discernment in the Christian life” toward “rote memorization of dogmatic and moral formulas”. Lindsey expands on the idea:

This shift moved Catholic intellectual life away from a post-Vatican II engagement with contemporary society in which Catholic thinkers listen to and learn from secular disciplines as they offer Catholic insights, values, and teachings in a process of dialogic give and take. Now the model for Catholic intellectual life—and for theologians in particular—became one of receiving “truths” from on high and handing these down to anyone who cared to listen.

Kochivar-Baker provided a personal illustration. When she was an undergraduate at a Catholic University a generation ago, “she took courses in the documents of Vatican II that were intellectually demanding and required real thought and engagement.”

Then down the road, her daughter took courses—same Catholic university, same professor—in moral theology in the period in which the restorationist agenda of Pope John Paul II and Cardinal Ratzinger (now Benedict XVI) began to roll through American Catholic theology departments.

She was able to pass these courses, Colleen notes, while hardly attending class. The syllabus spelled out in detail what the professor would teach. When Colleen asked about the shift in his pedagogical style—from challenging students to think, respond, and critique, to spoon-feeding them “truth”—he told her he was being monitored in class and lived in fear of being reported to the authorities for saying anything that transgressed the restorationist canon of truths.

Disturbing for Catholics and Catholicism, to be sure, but does this not sound a warning bell for the ELCA?

Consider the following words of Lutheran CORE / WordAlone spokesmen. Listen for a rejection of hard thinking–spirit led thinking, conscience bound thinking, reflection in dialogue with scientific disciplines–in exchange for a clear set of rules, a cookbook of moral recipes, handed down from on high. Hear the Lutheran CORE call, if not for an infallible pope, then for infallible (and unambiguous) canon, creeds, and confessions. Listen for the CORE promotion of their assumptions, their interpretations, their fossilized traditionalism–unquestioned and unchallenged by science or reason or conscience. Certainty instead of ambiguity. Learn the rules and don’t worry about moral discernment.

Therefore, the office of the papacy acts as a check, controlling the range of interpretation. The bishops share in this authority.

So the congregation, the elders, pastors and theologians are linked together in a system of mutual watchfulness. The lay people, elders, pastors and theologians all look both ways, watching over each of the other layers of authority. Interpretation requires constant scrutiny, lest the interpreters be led astray.

[T]he idea that the Holy Spirit in the heart supersedes Scripture and sets aside all the normal standards. Having floated away into such a never-never land beyond the ordinary, in reality the August churchwide assembly has stranded the ELCA ecumenically.

Benedict XVI, the orthodox patriarchs and commonly the Protestant leaders as well, know both Scripture and the church’s tradition intimately—well enough to recognize the difference between the historically certain and the ambiguity of convenience.

James Nestingen

How ironic that a 21st century Roman Catholic pope and an archbishop can better articulate confessional Lutheran teaching than the ELCA churchwide organization.

Mark Chavez

When the first Lutherans lost the magisterial authority of the Roman Catholic Church, it had no sure authority to put in its place.

Modern Protestantism is an amalgamation of historic Christianity and the principles of the Enlightenment, its rationalism, subjectivism, and anthropocentrism. The underlying assumption is the neo-gnostic belief in the innerdwelling of God, such that everyone is endowed with the inner light that only needs to be uncovered. The light of truth does not shine through the Scriptures and the Christian tradition as much as through scientific reason and individual experience. This is what happened in Minneapolis: appeals to reason and experience trumped Scripture and tradition, punctuated with pious injunctions of Lutheran slogans and clichés. The majority won. And they said it was the work of the Spirit, forgetting that the Holy Spirit had already spoken volumes through the millennia of Scriptural interpretation, the councils of the church, and its creeds and confessions.

Carl Braaten

And, I might add, the Spirit having spoken in those long ago councils and creeds, better damn well keep her mouth shut these days.

The radicals so decisive in the defining moments of the ELCA intended to smash the authority of the influential theologians and bishops who had informally kept both the American Lutheran Church and the Lutheran Church in America on course. The radicals wanted many voices and perspectives, especially those of the “marginalized,” put forward in the ongoing deliberations of the ELCA. They were so successful that now, after 20 years, there is no authoritative biblical or theological guidance in the church. There are only many voices. The 2009 Assembly legitimated those many voices by adapting a “bound-conscience” principle, according to which anyone claiming a sincerely-held conviction about any doctrine must be respected. The truth of the Bible has been reduced to sincerely-held opinion.

Robert Benne

Allow me to conclude by paraphrasing the words of my fellow blogger, Bill Lindsey, to graft Lutherans into his post.

The move against Vatican II—the move to the right, the deliberate dumbing down of Catholic intellectual life and the punishment of critical thinkers that have been part and parcel of the restorationist agenda—is not merely a Catholic phenomenon. Restorationism is tied to a similar thrust within [Lutheran] life and culture to stop critical reflection from progressive standpoints, and to force progressive theological [Lutheran] thinkers into a right-leaning ideological conformity.

Open Tabernacle: First week

The collaborative progressive catholic blog, Open Tabernacle, has now completed its first full week with resounding readership success. Since each of the contributing bloggers brought their own following, there was a built in readership for this new blog of Catholic (catholic with a small “c”?) themes.

Here are the top five most popular progressive catholic postings from the first week.

SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests) Needs Our Help.

For the last 21 years SNAP has been a voice for Catholics seeking answers and reform from the hierarchy on pedophilia. In that time it has bravely demanded an end to the shell game of moving predatory priests as well as the seemingly endless series of cover-ups of incidents of sexual abuse.

Frank Cocozzelli and Maggie Gallagher: The Voice(s) of American Catholicism.

On 20 April last year, Frank Cocozzelli published an interesting essay entitled “Who Speaks for American Catholics?” at Talk to Action’s website (here). Cocozzelli notes the wide diversity of viewpoints of American Catholics on social and political issues, including issues with connections to Catholic moral teaching. As he notes, American Catholics frequently disagree with each other (and with official church teaching) on issues such as stem-cell research, abortion, and gay and lesbian rights.

Many of us find the political and moral positions of our brothers and sisters of the Catholic right morally repugnant precisely because of our commitment to Catholic moral teaching about economic and social justice and war and peace. As Cocozzelli rightly notes, “A strong case can be made that these icons of the Catholic Right are using abortion and LGBT rights as wedge issues primarily to elect laissez-faire economic conservatives.”

The Canonization of Pope John Paul II: I Dissent

Vatican journalist Andrea Torniello has recently reported that the cause for the beatification of John Paul II has advanced. The Congregation for the Causes of Saints has cleared the way for the previous pope to be declared “blessed,” the initial step on the path to sainthood.

Since reading this announcement, I’ve been giving thought to my reaction, which is, on the whole, strongly negative. As I think about it, I’m opposed to the canonization of John Paul II, and I’d like to think out loud here about my reasons for this opposition.

First, some provisos. I take it that Catholics may validly criticize popes. In fact, I take it that Catholics may have a strong obligation at certain points in history to stand against the actions, example, or even teachings of a given pope at a given time. Those of us who believe that this is the case have historical warrant for such actions: exemplary Catholics, including Catherine of Siena, a saint, have spoken out to call the pope to fidelity to the gospel, and to express concern when a pope seemed to be leading the church in a direction contrary to the gospel. And Paul stood in opposition to Peter when Peter wanted to make the gospel hinge on the purity laws of Judaism.

“Why the Church Must Change “

At the Belfast Telegraph, the columnist Sharon Owens has a heartfelt piece in which she describes all the things that she thinks are wrong with the Catholic Church, ranging from the insistence on Catholicism as the only valid route to salvation, through the incomprehensible difference in response to matters of abortion as compared to other offences, to the appalling record of the Irish church, on clerical abuse and on the treatment of women in the Magdelene laundries.

Catholic Remonstrance Now!

Lately, the Catholic Right has unabashedly sought to impose its will on society. From its recent advocacy against marriage equality in Maine; to the inquisition of American nuns who challenge Vatican hard-liners; and now the U.S Bishops who have threatened to sabotage health care reform unless they got their way on abortion policy in the House version of the legislation.

As a Catholic, I am beyond frustration with Church leaders and lay persons who seek to replace American pluralism with an ultra-orthodox form of Catholic morality. I say it is time for remonstrance from mainstream Catholics.

Progressive #catholic blog launched: The Open Tabernacle

I am pleased and highly honored to have been invited to participate on a new collaborative blog entitled THE OPEN TABERNACLE, HERE COMES EVERYBODY. The blog is live as of New Year’s Day, and I’m sure there will a bit of sorting out at the beginning. The blog will reflect a progressive catholic (note the small “c”) point of view, and the original coterie of bloggers hopes to expand.

For now, here’s a taste of the first contributions that serve as an introduction to the blog:

Colleen Kochivar-Baker is a US based counseling psychologist. She explains the OPEN TABERNACLE name:

When I was a little girl I was always pretty confused when the priest would lock the ciborium in the tabernacle after communion. It seemed to me like Jesus was being locked in His kennel. It was a pretty kennel, but I didn’t grasp why Jesus had to be locked away. I couldn’t quite believe Jesus would run away the way my dog had run away. But having had the experience of losing my dog that way, it was nice to know that Jesus couldn’t go the route of my first dog.

Then I grew up, but to my horror, I realized that symbol of locking Jesus away in a tabernacle was still really important for some people, and for very specific theological reasons. On the practical level this locking up the ciborium would seem to be about theft, but I began to realize it was also about theft on the theological level. Leave the metaphorical theological tabernacle open, and horror of horrors, anyone could come in and take Jesus. Which is after all, what He Himself said. Take this all of you…..

The locked Tabernacle for me became a very potent symbol about access to the Catholic Jesus. There would be a lot of hoops to jump through before that door would be unlocked and there would be insurmountable intrinsic barriers which meant I would never be allowed access to the keys. It didn’t matter how much I loved Jesus or how I advanced spiritually, the closed tabernacle was a fact of Catholic life I would have to accept.

And then I grew up some more and realized the locked tabernacle has nothing to do with Jesus and everything to do with the clerical key keepers. Once I realized that, I knew if there was a tabernacle, it was always open and always meant to be that way. The only keys were faith and love, and those can’t be put in a pocket. Those have to be lived.

Terence Weldon, presently of the UK but formerly of South Africa, has been the primary impetus behind the creation of this collaborative effort, and he explains the second part of the name, HERE COMES EVERYBODY:

This phrase, which is now being used quite widely in a range of contexts, is best known for its use by James Joyce in his extraordinary novel, finnegans wake. Read literally, it has obvious relevance for a progressive catholic blog such as this one, which sees inclusion at the heart of the Gospels, and interprets “catholic” as meaning universal.

William D. Lindsey, a theologian from Little Rock, offers his perception of what the blog is all about:

Progressive Catholicism: you’re kidding, right? Catholics have made clear what they stand for, and it would be a big stretch to call their stands progressive in just about any area you can name.

Opposition to women’s ordination (and women’s rights); opposition to same-sex marriage (and gay rights); support for the Republican party in the U.S. and right-leaning political movements all across the globe; opposition to liberation theology and its preaching of a preferential option for the poor: the Catholic church has made clear where it stands.

And the place where the church stands is definitely not progressive.

So why do we, a group of catholic-minded bloggers announce with confidence that we think it’s worthwhile to explore the progressive side of Catholicism/catholicism, at this period of such strong, entrenched reaction (at the very center of the Catholic church) to progressive movements around the world? Read more …

Check out the blog and add it to your RSS reader or whatever you use to follow blogs. Join the conversation with comments or a guest post.

Post Christmas catchup #Catholic

After a Christmas blizzard that prevented our son and his girlfriend from travelling to our house, then pooped out, after an NFL weekend that identified the six NFC teams that will be playoff bound with seeding yet to be determined and an AFC with five 8-7 teams contending for two wildcard spots, after Christmas eve Senate passage of health care reform, after a failed attempt at terrorism over the Detroit skies, it’s Monday morning and time to return to the routine.

My novel publisher is busy designing a robust website to promote the novel, due for release in February, but I have to write the text that will appear on the various web pages. That has been my task for the past several weeks, but I should finish today or tomorrow. Yesterday, at a Christmas gathering of my siblings, 86 year old Dad, and numerous nieces and nephews, I received lots of kudos about the early novel reviews—tinged with hues of surprise.

I follow lots of blogs through my RSS reader, and this morning I sifted through the headlines of over 250 posts that had accumulated over the weekend. It will take a few days and a few blogposts to sort it all out, but let me start the week by noting the passing of a great Catholic reformer.

I mentioned Edward Schillebeeckx in a recent blogpost about a Vatican II reformer whose path I had crossed, Godfrey Diekmann. Here is a link to the press release from the Schillebeeckx foundation announcing the death of the 96 year old Catholic reformer; another to a Vox Nova blog post, which has an interesting string of comments, pro and con, that speak to the current retrenchment of Roman Catholicism to pre-Vatican II conservatism; and to the National Catholic Reporter, which contains a lengthy and well spoken obituary that concludes:

[T]hough he was keenly aware of the hierarchical church today and had no misapprehensions about the direction in which it seemed to be heading. This is what he said in 1990:

“My concern is that the further we move away in history from Vatican II, the more some people begin to interpret unity as uniformity. They seem to want to go back to the monolithic church which must form a bulwark on the one hand against communism and on the other hand against the Western liberal consumer society. I think that above all in the West, with its pluralist society such an ideal of a monolith church is out of date and runs into a blind alley. And there is the danger that in that case, people with that ideal before their eyes will begin to force the church in the direction of a ghetto church, a church of the little flock, the holy remnant. But though the church is not of this world, it is of men and women. Men and women who are believing subjects of the church.”

America, the National Catholic Weekly, also contains an excellent article that speaks of the “Dominican priest who advised the Dutch bishops at Vatican II and became a major figure in the Church’s efforts to implement the reforms of that Council in the decades that followed.”

In a related note, blogger Terence Weldon of the UK notes a movement in his country to “stand up for Vatican II”. Indeed, that is precisely what US based Catholic reform movements such as Call to Action, Voice of the Faithful, and a host of others seek as well. The next 5-10 years will be fascinating to follow progressive Catholics in opposition to an increasingly conservative, patriarchal, and hierarchal institutional church.

Godfrey Diekmann and Hans Kung: voices unstilled

About fifteen years ago while studying with the Benedictines of St John’s School of Theology in Collegeville, Minnesota, I was privileged to be in the last Patristics (early church history) class taught by Father Godfrey Diekmann. Although his infectious good spirits made his class a real treat, Father Godfrey’s reputation was due to his role in twentieth century progressive Catholic history more so than as a professor.

As a young priest spending four years in Europe while studying for his doctorate in Rome, he heard Hitler speak to a youth rally.

He had a demogogic power to influence people. Within two minutes the entire crowd was ready to give their life for him. Of course, I was caught up in it, in spite of myself, and leaving the stadium I had to shake myself to get rid of the evil miasma. He had a terrible, terrible gift.

Later, as a worker in the civil rights movement, he was on the grandstand in Washington, not far from the podium, as Martin Luther King Jr. gave his “I have a dream” speech. Godfrey characterized the experience as “one of the great moments of truth in my life.”

But Godfrey’s greatest contribution was as a progressive reformer in the liturgical movement of Roman Catholicism that resulted in the reforms of Vatican II. It was here that Godfrey crossed paths with a young professor from the University of Tübingen, Germany, named Hans Kung. In fact, they were two of the four blacklisted by Catholic University of Washington for their progressive Catholic views in the days leading up to the Council. The backlash from the blacklisting probably kept Godfrey from receiving an invitation to the Council, but it also helped sway public attitude away from the conservatives towards the reformers. From his base in Collegeville, Godfrey was a force behind the scenes of Vatican II, drafting many of the important documents.

Father Godfrey passed away in 2002 at the age of 93, but professor Kung carries on, even though the Vatican has long prevented him from teaching at Catholic institutions. In fact, December 18th is the thirtieth anniversary:

of the day when Pope John Paul II revoked the ecclesiastical right to teach (missio canonica) of Prof. Dr. Hans Kueng because of his proposals for reform in the Catholic church. In his book ‘Infallible? An inquiry’ published in 1970 after the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965) and equally prompted by the encyclical ‘Humanae Vitae’ from 25 July 1968 Kueng raised the question if the papal ministry is indeed infallible. With this Kueng, like nobody else in our time, raised the question of truth in Christianity and kept it alive ever since.

In 2005, Kung published a scathing criticism of Pope John Paul II.

This Papacy has repeatedly declared its fidelity to Vatican II, in order to then betray it for reasons of political expediency. Council terms such as modernization, dialogue, and ecumenicalism have been replaced by emphasis on restoration, mastery, and obedience. The criteria for the nomination of Bishops is not at all in the spirit of the Gospel … Pastoral politics has allowed the moral and intellectual level of the episcopate to slip to dangerous levels. A mediocre, rigid, and more conservative episcopate will be the lasting legacy of this papacy.

Kung continues to be a progressive Catholic voice crying in the wilderness about obligatory celibacy, the role of women in the church, papal infallibility, and ecumenism. Carry on, Herr Doktor.

NJ Poll reports religious attitudes toward marriage equality

Four decades ago, the gay rights movement burst onto the scene in the Stonewall riots of Greenwich Village. As we near year’s end in 2009, we close the fourth decade of gay rights activism and the first decade of the twenty-first century. You’ve come a long way, baby.

A handful of states now offer marriage equality, either through court decree or legislative fiat. A handful more allow civil unions. The Matthew Shepherd bill extended hate crimes protection to sexual orientation. “Don’t ask, don’t tell,” in the military is likely to be phased out soon.

Several branches of Judaism and several of Christianity allow gay clergy and blessings of same-gender unions. This summer, the Episcopal church opened the episcopate to gays, and a lesbian bishop was elected in California just a week ago. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) became the largest religious denomination anywhere in the world to allow gay clergy in committed relationships and to allow blessing of same-gender unions. Their Swedish counterpart, the Lutheran Church of Sweden, also elected a lesbian bishop this year.

But the battles rage on. The worldwide Anglican communion and its leader, the Archbishop of Canterbury, are harshly critical of their American communion partner, the Episcopal church. A dissident group of Lutherans called Lutheran Core is making a lot of noise and siphoning off members, congregations and especially funds from the ELCA. Gay rights is both a secular and a religious issue, and religious organizations have played major roles in the outcomes of public ballot initiatives in California in 2008 (Mormon) and Maine in 2009 (Catholic), which narrowly rejected marriage equality.

As the year comes to a close, the focus shifts to New Jersey where a marriage equality bill is moving through the legislature. A new public opinion poll in that state offers fascinating insight into the overlap of the religious and the secular (hat tip to Irish blogger Terence Weldon for first posting about this poll overnight). The poll was conducted by Rutgers University, and is posted on the University’s media relations site.

Despite opposition from the Catholic Church, New Jersey Catholics generally support legalizing gay marriage, according to a Rutgers-Eagleton Poll released today. Among Catholics, 48 percent support gay marriage, while 40 percent oppose and 12 percent are undecided. Protestants hold the opposite view, with only 34 percent supporting and 55 percent opposing gay marriage; 11 percent are undecided. Jewish respondents support gay marriage, 56 percent to 40 percent, with 4 percent undecided, while those with no religion preference are the most supportive, at 85 percent to only 10 percent opposed (5 percent undecided).

The Protestant numbers are skewed a bit by lumping evangelicals and non-evangelicals together. The evangelicals are strongly negative, but the main line Protestant numbers approximate the favorable figures for both Catholics and Jews (47% favorable, 37% unfavorable). Equally interesting is the finding that none of the religious groups, including the evangelicals, consider this issue to be of major importance.

“While the issue matters to a very small but passionate group on both sides, by far, most New Jerseyans of all stripes think there are more critical issues that need to be addressed,” Redlawsk said. “This suggests that regardless how a legislator votes, at the next election, this vote will be far less important to potential re-election than most other issues the Legislature will deal with.

Will health care be skewered by Catholics? UPDATED

Word out of Washington this morning is that progressive and moderate Democrats have fashioned a compromise on health care reform acceptable to both camps. The odds for passage of a health care reform bill just went up. Yet, a formidable hurdle remains, and that is the Stupak amendment in the House version and the whole issue of abortion politics. A day earlier, the Senate voted to kill a similar amendment, but the 54-45 vote is considerably less than the 60 votes the Dems may need for ultimate passage of health care reform.

Should abortion politics factor into the debate at all? Majority leader Harry Reid apparently gave an impassioned floor speech, suggesting this bill is about health care access and is not, and should not be, about abortion rights or restrictions. It appears those crafting the legislation are bending over to ensure the bill will be abortion neutral: access to abortion is neither expanded nor restricted relative to the status quo, which begs the question: Is this the time and place for the pro-life movement to attempt inroads against Roe v Wade?

Front and center is the American Conference of Roman Catholic Bishops, who have historically been for health care reform but against abortion rights. Here is where the rubber meets the road. Will the bishops sacrifice universal health care on the altar of pro-life?

In a hard hitting post in National Catholic Weekly, Joe Ferullo blasts single-issue Bishops.

U.S. Catholic bishops are in danger of finding themselves on the sidelines of history, regarded as a single-issue constituency with no view toward the greater good … the bishops have the influence to help push through a change in public policy they have sought for decades: universal health care coverage. Instead, they have become enmeshed in abortion politics, threatening to undermine a bill that would help ten of millions.

The blog post refers to an column in the Los Angeles Times, which quotes Kathleen Kennedy Townsend:

“As Catholics, are we so laser-focused on the issue of abortion that we are willing to join the ‘tea-partyers’ and the like to bring down the healthcare reform bill? And at the enormous expense of million of Americans who suffer every day” without healthcare?

Thomas Rutten, the LA Times columnist, offers this summation:

[If the bishops] abandon their church’s historic support for universal healthcare, rather than accept an abortion compromise that preserves a 33-year-old status quo, they’ll have done more than turn themselves into a single-issue constituency. They’ll have broken with a long tradition of not disdaining what is inarguably good in pursuit of unattainable perfection, which has been a hallmark of modern Catholicism’s contribution to American politics.

The tea party rabble can be dismissed as unthinking know-nothings (“Father forgive them, for they know not what they do.”) We expect more reasoned pragmatism from an esteemed body such as the Conference of Bishops.

UPDATE:

Congresswoman Lois Capps is right in the middle of the efforts to keep the health care reform bill “abortion neutral”. Today she offered an op-ed piece to suggest the bill (read Stupak amendment) has been hijacked by those with a pro-life agenda to add restrictions to abortion access beyond what exists in the current status quo. Here is a portion, but I commend her entire piece.

I didn’t believe that health reform legislation was the place to promote either a pro-choice or anti-choice agenda. The focus needs to be on getting insurance to the nearly 50 million Americans without it and ensuring stability of coverage for the rest of us.

Unfortunately, the Stupak-Pitts amendment that replaced my amendment during House Floor consideration goes well beyond the status quo and is in no way the simple extension of the Hyde amendment its proponents claim. It would result in a major step backwards for women’s control over their reproductive lives.

We need to strike a balance on this issue so health reform isn’t a casualty of divisive abortion politics. That’s what my amendment did and that’s what the Senate bill proposes. Congress would be wise to send the President a bill reflecting this common ground approach and I will work hard to see that happens.

Voice of the Faithful calls for heads to roll in Irish sex abuse scandal

Voice of the Faithful (VOTF) is an American group of progressive Catholics that advocates for clergy reform in light of clergy sexual abuse scandals. With the recent release of the Dublin report that not only details a history of clergy abuse in Ireland but also a pattern of cover up by the Catholic hierarchy, call for reform rages anew.

See my recent post about Catholics and sex, which discussed the recent report from Ireland.

The online Irish Times reported on the story of the VOTF (Ireland) representatives who delivered a letter to the papal nuncio demanding that Pope Benedict remove certain bishops complicit in the cover up.

The open letter to Pope Benedict also called on him to remove the bishops who “enabled abuse” and urged him to bring in a culture of accountability.

During a protest at the apostolic nunciature in Dublin, the 10 protesters also called on papal nuncio Archbishop Giuseppe Leanza to apologise for the failure of his predecessor to co-operate with the Murphy commission. They also asked for him to fully co-operate with the commission from now on.

They were part of Voice of the Faithful Ireland, a group of Catholics that wants to see structural change in the church and a more active role for lay members.

The following is from a VOTF press release announcing that the Pope will hold a summit:

On Monday we learned that Pope Benedict will hold a summit with top Irish bishops on Friday to discuss the findings of the Murphy Report on the Dublin Archdiocese.
Over the weekend, a small group from Voice of the Faithful Ireland delivered a letter to the Papal Nuncio there asking the pope to remove the bishops who enabled the abuse and bring an end to the culture of secrecy in the church.

We are joining our Irish affiliate in calling for accountability as Pope Benedict prepares to meet with Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of Dublin, Cardinal Sean Brady of Armagh, President of the Irish Bishop’s conference, and Archbishop Giuseppe Leanza, the papal nuncio in Ireland. We have highlighted our call with a video that briefly recounts what we face in light of the Church’s refusal to hold accountable those bishops who covered up initial sex abuse and still refuse to open all the records pertaining to such abuse.