Posted in category "Bishops"
The last time Bishop Gaillot was feted in the United States was at the 1996 Call to Action Conference in Detroit. The title of his address was, “My Option for the Poor.” You can read it here.
After that, I haven’t heard about him. He is a man who deserves never to be forgotten, although that is what Pope John Paul II hoped, when Gaillot was removed from the Diocese of Evreux, France and appointed to an ancient and fictitious see, Partenia.
The See of Partenia, now located in the desert of Algeria, has not existed in reality since the 5th century when it was in Mauritania. But, thanks to the web, Gaillot managed to outwit the Vatican and continues to teach and pastor via the internet as a “virtual bishop.”
“As Partenia does not exist anymore” says Gaillot, “it becomes the symbol of all who feel like non-existing in society or in the Church. It is a huge diocese without borders where the sun never sets.” Travel to Partenia here.
Bishop Gaillot didn’t start off as a radical. Little by little, his contacts with people who came to see him and events to which he chose to respond led him to some unexpected places:
He called on all Catholics to persist in dialog without condemnation so that the church can, as Jesus did, embrace the dispossessed: those marginalized by poverty; those living with AIDS, those in prison, those ostracized for homosexuality; and ultimately, those struggling on the borderlands of their own Christian faith. 
“If we take as our starting point the poor, everything will be renewed – liturgy, catechism, the life of the church. It changes the way we think, pray, our very lifestyle. But if we take as our starting point the Status Quo, we will never be able to catch up with the Good News.”
Gaillot infuriated members of the French Bishops’ Conference and the Vatican with his outspokenness on a number of issues including clerical celibacy, the use of condoms for the prevention of AIDS, ordination of women and married men to the priesthood, and especially, homosexuality.
“The church must be where there is need, and homosexuals have suffered innumerable discriminations. If the church doesn’t free people from oppression, what purpose does it serve?” he asked.
In 1988 Gaillot took the unprecedented step for a Roman Catholic bishop of blessing a homosexual union after the couple requested it in view of their imminent death from AIDS.
He was the only French bishop to participate in the ceremony of the transfer of the ashes of the Abbe Henri-Baptiste Gregoire to the Pantheon, a burial place for “the great men of France.”
Gregoire (1750-1831), a Catholic priest and bishop, was a leading French abolitionist at the turn of the 18th century, a participant in the Revolution of 1789, and a member of its governing assembly.
Gregoire was among the most active deputies of the Assembly, advocated abolishing Negro slavery and granting citizenship to Jews. He objected to some provisions of the Civil Constitution of the Clergy, but agreed to swear the oath of allegiance and was the first member of the clergy to take it (1790). Because of this, the hierarchy of the church refused to give him the last sacraments. (Although he was given them by some sympathetic priests in defiance of the ban.)
After these and other “incidents,” Pope John Paul II relieved Bishop Gaillot of his responsibilities as bishop of Evreux on January 13, 1995. After being removed from his office Bishop Gaillot wrote the following statement:
“I had a dream: to be able to accompany the poor, the excluded, the ignored, without having to explain myself or justify myself to the rich, the secure, or the comfortable. To be able to go where distress calls me without having to give advance notice. To be able to show my indignation at destitution, injustice, violence, the sale of weapons, and managed famines without being considered a meddler in politics.”
“I dreamed of being able to live my faith within the church, but also in society, in my time and with my times. I dreamed of the freedom to think and express myself, to debate and criticise, without fear of the guillotine. I dreamed of the being different within the unity of faith, and remaining myself, alone and yet in solidarity with others. Ultimately, I hoped to be able to proclaim a Gospel of freedom without being marginalised.”
“He was one of the most gifted leaders in the post-Vatican II church in America,” said Rev. Jim Martin, a Jesuit priest and associate editor of America, a Catholic magazine, “and certainly beloved by the left, and sadly that gave his critics more ammunition.”
Archbishop Weakland was among those who publicly questioned the need for a male-only celibate priesthood. He also led American bishops in a two-year process of writing a pastoral letter on economic justice, holding hearings on the subject across the county.
He stepped down as Archbishop of Milwaukee in May 2002… one day after a former lover disclosed on the ABC network television show, “Good Morning America,” he had been paid $450,000 to keep quiet about an affair with Weakland in 1980.
But now, in interviews and in a memoir, A Pilgrim in a Pilgrim Church, Archbishop Emeritus Rembert Weakland is speaking out about how internal church politics affected his response to the fallout from his affair and why Catholic teaching on homosexuality is wrong. 
“If we say our God is an all-loving god,” he said, “how do you explain that at any given time probably 400 million living on the planet at one time would be gay? Are the religions of the world, as does Catholicism, saying to those hundreds of millions of people, you have to pass your whole life without any physical, genital expression of that love?”
He said he had been aware of his homosexual orientation since he was a teenager and suppressed it until he become archbishop, when he had relationships with several men because of “loneliness that became very strong.” 
Archbishop Weakland, 82, said he was probably the first bishop to come out of the closet voluntarily. He said he was doing so not to excuse his actions but to give an honest account of why it happened and to raise questions that the church’s teaching that homosexuality is “objectively disordered.”
“Those are bad words because they are so pejorative,” he said.
The archbishop said it was partly because of his strained relations with Pope John Paul II he did not tell Vatican officials in 1997 when he was threatened by a lawsuit by Paul J. Marcoux, the man with whom he had a relationship nearly 20 years before and who had appeared on “Good Morning America.”
Archbishop Weakland said he probably should have gone to Rome and explained he had had a relationship with Mr. Marcoux, that he had ended it by writing a lengthy and emotional letter that Mr. Marcoux still had and that the archbishop’s lawyers regarded Mr. Marcoux’s threats as blackmail.
But, the archbishop said, a highly placed friend in Rome advised him that church officials preferred that such things be hushed up, which is “the Roman way.”
“I suppose, also, being frank, I wouldn’t have wanted to be labeled in Rome at that point as gay,” Archbishop Weakland said. “Rome is a little village.”
In its report “Good Morning America” quoted from the 11-page handwritten letter dated August 25, 1980. The letter describes a planned vacation on Nantucket, a trip to Boston, and conflict over Marcoux’s involvement with a man named Don.
“I should not put down on paper what I would not want the whole world to read. But here goes anyway,” the letter said.
“I felt like the world’s worst hypocrite. So I gradually came back to the importance of celibacy in my life.” Weakland describes his decision to turn away from Marcoux and back to celibacy as “the greatest renunciations” in his life as a priest.
The letter also makes clear that even then, Marcoux was pressuring Weakland for money. “Paul, I really have given you all I personally possess. The $14,000 is my personal limit…Your anger was evident that I couldn’t play the great patron…”
He signed the letter, “I love you.” 
Seventeen years later, Marcoux resurfaced threatening to file a lawsuit. The archdiocese was prepared to counter with an extortion charge, but according to the signed settlement agreement, eventually Marcoux walked away with $450,000. Marcoux’s sister told reporters Marcoux had burned through all the money by 2002 – the time of the “Good Morning America” program.
Paul Marcoux told ABC News reporter Brian Ross he was just trying to get an apology. “That’s not blackmail?” Ross asked. “What do you call it?” Ross asked. “A settlement for a sexual assault case, and what I wanted to do was to have my day in court,” Marcoux said. And though the agreement bars Marcoux fom discussing it, he told Ross he couldn’t keep his silence any longer. “I’ve been involved in the cover-up. I accepted money to be silent about it, not to speak out against what was going on,” he said.
Marcoux linked his situation to the clerical sex abuse scandals: “He was sitting next to me and then started to try to kiss me and continued to force himself on me and pulled down my trousers, attempted to fondle me. Think of it in terms of date rape.” Marcoux was 32 at the time of the affair. A graduate student in theology at Marquette University, he met Archbishop Weakland at a reception.
His “date rape” example could apply to what most teenage girls get used to fending off with regularity.
Shortly after the “Good Morning America” program aired, Archbishop Weakland said he phoned the Apostolic Nuncio in Washington, DC–Archbishop Gabriel Montalvo–who, he said, told him, “Of course you are going to deny it.”
Archbishop Weakland said he told the Nuncio that while he could deny emphatically it was date rape, “I can’t deny that something happened between us.”
The book comes out on May 29th.
I welcome the return of Archbishop Weakland. We have missed him.
The Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR), an association that icludes the leadership of most U.S. women’s congregations, is under investigation by the Vatican.
Cardinal Levada said the assessment of the LCWR will be conducted by the Bishop of Toledo, Ohio, Leonard P. Blair. Bishop Blair is a member of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Doctrine. 
The Vatican assessment became necessary, according to Levada, because at the 2001 meeting between LCWR and the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which took place in Rome, the women were invited “to report on the initiatives taken or planned” to promote the reception of three areas of Vatican doctrinal concern: the 1994 apostolic letter Ordinatio sacerdotalis, the 2000 declaration Dominus Jesus from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, and “the problem of homosexuality.”
Cardinal Levada informed conference leaders: “Given both the tenor and the doctrinal content of various addresses given at the annual assemblies of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious in the intervening years, this Dicastery can only conclude that the problems which had motivated its request in 2001 continue to be present.”
The National Catholic Reporter, an independent newspaper, said the Vatican ordered the probe because the sisters had not addressed issues raised by the Vatican in 2001 about their promotion of church teaching on homosexuality, salvation and the priesthood, which the Vatican said is reserved for men.
The ripples from a keynote by Sinsinawa Dominican Sister Laurie Brink at the 2007 LCWR assembly roused the Vatican machinery into action. 
In that keynote address, titled A Marginal Life: Pursuing Holiness in the 21st Century,” Sr. Laurie Brink urged leaders of Catholic religious orders to make clear, if painful choices about the future of religious life. She began with this assumption: “Old concepts of how to live the life are no longer valid.” The rest of the speech outlined four possible options or outcomes as a starting point for discussion.
- ”Death with dignity and grace” as opposed to becoming a “zombie congregation” that staggers on with no purpose. This option must be taken seriously, since the average age of the 67,000 sisters and nuns in the United States is 69. Many retreat ministries are closing, and large “mother houses” are struggling with finances, while some congregations no longer invite or accept new candidates.
- Brink noted that some orders have chosen to turn back the clock – thus winning the favor of Rome. “They are putting on the habit, or continuing to wear the habit with zest…Some would critique that they are the nostalgic portrait of a time now passed. But they are flourishing. Young adults are finding in these communities a living image of their romantic vision of religious life.”
- During this era of crisis and decline, some Catholic religious orders have chosen to enter a time of “sojourning” that involves “moving beyond the church, even beyond Jesus.” “Religious titles, institutional limitations, ecclesiastical authorities no longer fit this congregation, which in most respects is post-Christian,” added Brink, a former journalist who is a biblical studies professor at Chicago’s Catholic Theological Union.
For these women, the “Jesus narrative is not the only or the most important narrative…They still hold up and reverence the values of the Gospel, but they also recognize that these same values are not solely the property of Christianity. Buddhism, Native American spirituality, Judaism, Islam and others hold similar tenets for right behavior within the community, right relationship with the Earth and right relationship with the divine.”
She described the Benedictine Women of Madison as having a commitment to “ecumenism” which led them “beyond the exclusivity of the Catholic Church into a new inclusivity, where all manner of God is welcomed. They are certainly religious women, but they are no longer women religious as it is defined by the Roman Catholic Church. They choose as a congregation to step outside the Church in order to step into a greater sense of holiness.”
- Finally, some women are fighting on, hoping to achieve reconciliation someday with a changed, egalitarian church hierarchy. “Theologians are denied academic freedom. Religious and laywomen feel scrutinized simply because of their biology. Gays and lesbians desire to participate as fully human, fully sexual Catholics within their parishes,” Brink said. Many Catholics also oppose the “ecclesial deafness that refuses to hear the call of the Spirit summoning not only celibate males, but married men and women to serve” as priests.
Read Brink’s 2007 address and the keynotes from the LCWR 2008, 2006, 2005, 2004, 2003 and 2003 assemblies here.
The blog, Journey to a New Pentecost, provided a very crisp and thorough assessment of the LCWR investigation. You can read it here.
Brink’s comment about being “post-Christian,” and the sentence: “They are certainly religious women, but they are no longer women religious as it is defined by the Roman Catholic Church,” may have been the spark that ignited the gas can.
Amy Welborn, a Catholic blogger who writes on Beliefnet said: “If you are going to be post-Christian, then be post-Christian. I don’t say that with snark. It’s just reality. If you’ve moved on – move on. Step out from the protective mantle of identity that gives you cachet, that of ‘Catholic nun.’”
Here was a comment on America Magazine’s blog that summed things up for this conservative reader: “The Vatican investigation is long overdue. If you want to be a social worker then be a social worker–not a nun. A nun’s first allegiance is to the Church. I am quite tired of running into nuns who: look like aged hippies, push for women’s ordination, push for abortion, push homosexuality as an ok lifestyle and do this, supposedly, in the name of Christ.”
Sr. Jeannine Gramick, former co-director of New Ways Ministry, commented on the probable political reasons for the investigation: “It is difficult for me to believe that the CDF (Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith) has not already made a predetermined conclusion. This seems to be the Vatican’s modus operandi. An “investigation” process puts a veneer of fairness to the result. Consider the investigations of theologians like Charles Curran, Leonardo Boff, Roger Haight, etc. etc. No matter what the investigating party does to please them (or not please them) the outcome will be the same. For example, in the Vatican investigation of Fr. Robert Nugent and me, Bob agreed to make some “profession of faith” about the church’s teaching on homosexuality while I refused. The sanction for each of us was identical.”
“In this case, I expect the predetermined outcome to be a change in the canonical relationship of LCWR to the Vatican. The Council of Major Superiors of Women Religious (CMSWR), the traditional group of nuns formed in 1192 by Cardinal Hickey, was not to be the official group representing women religious to the Vatican. By 1195, they not only had canonical status but also were favored over LCWR (e.g., CMSWR had more delegates than LCWR at the synod on Religious Life.) The Vatican would like CMSWR to be the official representative of the leaders of US women’s communities. I think the Vatican is using this investigation to usurp LCWR’s role and replace them with CMSWR.”
I agree with Amy Welborn. I also tend to agree with Jeannine on the politics of the situation. LCWR gave the Vatican the opening it needed by Sr. Laurie Brinks candid–but public–remarks about the choices facing the communities of the LCWR and the options a few members have chosen to pursue. They were imprudent, considering how many enemies LCWR has in the Church.
However, in addition to ideological purity, there is also the issue of property and endowments. These aging communities are sitting on a lot of very valuable real estate. I think the church definitely has an interest in what happens to it when communities begin to fold and the property is sold off. What happens to the money? That may be easier to influence or manage if a more traditionalist group of sisters is involved.
There is another investigation underway running parallel to the investigation of the LCWR.
On March 10, 2009, the Vatican ordered an apostolic visitation of the institutions of the Legionaries of Christ following disclosures of sexual impropriety by the order’s late founder, Father Marcial Maciel Degollado. The letter was signed by Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, Sectetary of State. It was addressed to Father Alvaro Corcuera, director general of the Legionaries and its lay association, Regnum Christi.
In 2006 Pope Benedict XVI disciplined Fr. Maciel. He was banned from exercising his ministry in public and told to retire to a life of prayer and penitence, following allegations that he sexually abused about 30 boys and young men over a period of 30 years. The Vatican initially stonewalled the sexual abuse investigation for well over a decade.
The Legionaires of Christ were much admired by the late Pope John Paul II for its conservative views, strict loyalty to Vatican teaching, fund raising ability and success in attracting seminarians.
But it was not until Fr. Maciel’s death in 2008 that his secret life was revealed. In February 2009 the Legionaries admitted he kept a mistress and fathered a daughter who is now in her 20s.
The leadership of the order recently admitted that Maciel, a cult figure among Legionaires, led a “double life” after the discovery of his liaison with the mother of his daughter.
Several prominent Catholic commentators said publicly–and some Vatican officials said privately–that the situation called for an outside investigation into the Legionaries of Christ, in order to ascertain the truth, determine whether officials of the order covered up Father Maciel’s misconduct and judge whether Father Maciel’s teachings could still inspire the order.
Also at stake in the investigation is the significant estate Maciel left behind–which his daughter could have a claim to…
The probe could also uncover more cases of sexual abuse similar to those committed by Fr. Maciel.
“We have testimonies that there have been other Legionaires who followed Maciel’s example,” said Jose Barba, the legal representative of eight former Legionaries who started court proceedings against Marciel in 1998. “The ramifications of the problem exist throughout the Legionaires of Christ,” he added.
It will be interesting to compare the end result of each investigation. It will also be interesting to see if Fr. Maciel’s daughter pursues gaining an inheritence or is offered a settlement by the order. Children of priests and bishops laying claim to church property is one of the reasons priestly celibacy became a requirement years ago.
“For whatever ways any representative of the church has hurt, offended, dismissed, ignored, any one of you — I ask you, the church asks you, for forgiveness,” Bishop David A. Zubik of Pittsburgh said in an April 8, 2009 reflection during a special “service of apology” at St. Paul Cathedral. 
Bishop Zubik apologized for sins, including sexual abuse, committed by clergy and any other representatives of the church and asked for forgiveness.
He noted that many of the several hundred people present had come to the service with “hurts that you hold, perhaps painfully so, in the inner recesses of your hearts.” He said, “You call me, as leader of the church of Pittsburgh, to not only not forget the sins of those who have hurt you, but you charge me with the need to continue the work to secure that the sins not happen again.”
Bishop Zubik said that “while the church is truly divine, fully given its mission as the body of Christ by Jesus himself, we are also a very human church, comprised of people who are human and sinful.”
Read Bishop Zubik’s entire Service of Apology reflection here.
He ended his reflection by quoting a statement Sister Thea Bowman made at a concert for people suffering from AIDS.
“Thea Bowman said: ‘I have come tonight seeking a blessing. I have come tonight seeking a healing. I don’t usually talk about myself, but tonight I want to tell you a little about me. I have cancer. More important, I have something in common with my brothers and sisters who have AIDS–weight loss, hair loss, loss of voice, weakness, fatigue, exhaustion. I’m here tonight to say, God is! God made me! God loves me. I want to live my best; I want to love my best; I want to do my best; I want to give my best.’” 
“Like Sister Thea, I stand before you tonight on behalf of the church seeking your blessing, seeking your forgiveness, seeking a healing so that we as church can live our best, love our best, do our best, give our best.”
On April 15, 2009 Archbishop Timothy Dolan became the 13th leader of the Catholic church in New York since the Vatican appointed the first bishop here in 1808. A vast territory, the archdiocese includes Manhattan, the Bronx, Staten Island and seven northern counties, stretching from the border of the city to the Catskill Mountains.
This stretch of territory is the home of the toughest, crankiest, most argumentative and nit-picky baseball fans in the country–Mets and Yankees fans. It’s a great place when you’re on the back page of the Daily News – it’s a tough town when you’ve blown the save. 
“You are what your record says you are,” said Bill Parcells, the revered former head coach of the New York Giants and Jets football teams and another Catholic sports guy.
There are a lot of Catholic players and piles of Catholic fans spread out among the different NY teams. One of the reasons I’m back at church today is that I spotted a man in a Mets jacket heading for the door of my neighborhood church. I followed him in. As it turned out, that person happened to be the pastor, Fr. Danny. Here was somebody, I thought, like me.
Archbishop Dolan, 59, appears to be a very genial, down-to-earth, outgoing kind of guy. He likes to be with people. He laughs and smiles a lot. He’s a big baseball fan. He has gone from rooting for his hometown St. Louis Cardinals and Milwaukee Brewers to wind up at a NY Mets game at Citi Field his first weekend in New York.
One of his first stops as the new Archbishop of New York was the West Bronx Community Center in Highbridge. The teams of workers there give out free nutritious meals across the borough each year through a partnership between Catholic Charities and the Rusty Staub Foundation, a “I’m happy, happy,” said a delighted Anna Rodriquez, 76, after she got to give the archbishop a big bear hug. “He is so friendly.”
Rusty Staub, a former Mets baseball star, was on hand with the archbishop at the food pantry. Staub said he was honored that that Dolan chose to spend his first morning of face-to-face duties with the organization. “He obviously has a tremendous amount of energy,” Staub said, “I think that’s going to be a blessing.” “(I want) to learn, to listen, to shake hands, to meet people, to hear them dream,” Dolan said. “That’s a greater lesson than reading briefing reports, or reading histories.”
“I aim to be a happy bishop, sharing joys and laughs with you. So you will see me at the St. Patrick’s parade, and at the new Yankee Stadium, and at processions and feast days and barbecues across our almost 400 parishes. Being Catholic is not a heavy burden, snuffing out the joy of life; rather our faith in Jesus and His Church gives meaning, purpose and a joy to life. I love being Catholic. I love being a priest, and I fully intend to love being archbishop of New York while loving all of you in the Church in New York.”
“Loving the Church here means supporting her indispensable work for caring for the poor, the immigrants, the sick and elderly, the lonely, the unborn and the abandoned. It means working hard for her Catholic schools, in many ways the pride of the archdiocese. It means ensuring that our parishes are places where people encounter the Lord Jesus in the Mass, the sacraments and in an authentically Catholic community.”
“It means speaking from America’s most famous pulpit for justice and peace, for religious liberty and the sanctity of all human life. It means teaching the Catholic faith in season and out of season, as a good shepard must.”
Archbishop Dolan chose as his motto “Ad Quem Ibimus,” which means ”To Whom Shall We Go?”
For Catholics who love their Church, this is the crux of the matter. When Jesus asked the disciples if they, too, would leave him, St. Peter replied, “Lord, to whom should we go? You have the words of everlasting life.”
Let’s start from there. Not polemics and threats about Communion.
One team.
Archbishop Raymond Burke, Prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura, issued an apology this week to “my brother bishops” for statements he made on a videotape by Randall Terry, the former head of Operation Rescue. In Burke’s statement of apology he said that Terry and some of his associates had visited him in Rome and asked to videotape an interview “to share with pro-life workers for the purpose of their encouragement.” The interview was conducted on March 2, 2009. 
Terry said he conducted the 12-minute interview as part of his campaign to persuade the church to oust American bishops who allow pro-choice backers to receive Communion.
But instead of private showings to supporters, Terry played the interview for reporters on March 25 at the National Press Club. He also put the tape on his website, A Humble Plea. You can see it here.
Terry traveled to Rome with a delegation of anti-abortion activists to ask Vatican officials to remove U.S. bishops they felt were not doing enough to stop abortions. “One of the reasons we are here is to specifically request the transfer of Bishop Loverde of Arlington, VA and Archbishop Wuerl of Washington, DC,” Terry was quoted as saying at the time. Archbishop Wuerl is currently head of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
Obviously, Terry would like to see these bishops removed, and have in their place bishops who would refuse Communion to any elected representative or government official involved in any capacity to allow legalized abortion.
Other U.S. prelates singled out by Randall for “rejecting church teachings” were Los Angeles Cardinal Roger Mahony and the former Archbishop of Washington, Cardinal Theodore McCarrick.
In the tape, Burke called on parishioners to pressure reluctant bishops to withhold Communion from Catholic politicians who back legalized abortion. Burke said the failure of some bishops to stand up by withholding Communion is “weakening the faith of everyone.” He said, “It’s giving the impression that it must be morally correct to support procured abortion.”
Burke also went one step further, agreeing with Terry that voting for Barak Obama for president was a “form of cooperation” with “evil” and the Catholics who did so need to bear the moral responsibility for their action. “Well, your vote is either a vote to put someone in office who will do what is right and just, or someone who won’t.” He went on to say “we can’t be content with the fact that some 55% (of Catholics) – or whatever it is – who for whatever reason, supported this anti-life program.” He urged Catholics in the United States to let the president know abortion ”is the number one issue.”
Archbishop Burke should know the dangers of taping someone to forward an agenda for church politics. After all, he used the sneaky, undercover taping of Sr. Louise Lears at a Roman Catholic Womenpriests ordination at a St. Louis synagogne to impose the penalty of interdict on Lears, forcing her out of her ministry at a local parish, and barring her from Communion.
Burke denied that he gave the interview as the Prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura, but only as “a Bishop from the United States to encourage those in the respect life apostolate.” He went on to add:” I was never informed that the videotape would be used as part of a campaign of severe criticism of certain fellow bishops regarding the application of Canon 915 of the Code of Canon Law.” 
After viewing the tape and reading the transcript, I’m not sure exactly what Archbishop Burke is sorry for, since he appears to genuinely believe in everything he said.
But ultimately, like any schoolyard bully, Archbishop Burke finds it easier to beat up a few religious and laity rather than go up against his “brother bishops.” They might be able to hit back.
He should be sorry he lost his nerve at the moment it counted, and backed down from a face-off on Canon 915. That would have taken some courage and conviction, since there is no guarantee Archbishop Burke would have prevailed.
Better to do things the sneaky way….with letter-writing campaigns, character assassinations, flyers left on the windshields of cars, and YouTube videos.
Hey, after all, what counts is that it is being done in the cause of the #1 moral concern.
In a March 10, 2009 interview on the Albany radio station Talk 1300, Edward Cardinal Egan, head of the Archdiocese of New York, suggested the Catholic Church would sooner or later have to consider whether to allow priests to marry.
“I think that it’s going to be discussed; it’s a perfectly legitimate discussion,” Cardinal Egan said, replying to a question from the host, Frederic Dicker, about whether the church’s shortage of priests might spur such a change. “I think it has to be looked at. And I’m not so sure it wouldn’t be a good idea to decide on the basis of geography and culture to make an across-the-board determination.” At another point he said: “Is it a closed issue? No. That’s not a dogmatic stand.”
Egan noted that priests in the Maronite and Melchite churches are allowed to be married with “no problem at all.”
Catholic news media, and conversative pundits especially, were in a spin over the cardinal’s remarks. What did he mean?
Were his words a parting gift to reformers? A matter-of-fact response by a canon lawyer–which the cardinal is–to a question involving church law? Or was it aimed at his successor – Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan - who in 2003 soundly rebuffed a discussion by priests in his diocese on the question of celibacy.
Some conservatives dismissed what the cardinal had to say as the comments of a man speaking, as one put it, “above his pay grade.” But many advocates of church reform, who have long considered Cardinal Egan a conservative, said his remarks were surprisingly encouraging, albeit a little late in the day. The cardinal, 76, officially retires on April 15th.
The Rev. Richard Vega, president of the National Federation of Priests Councils. which is affiliated with the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said such words from a top American prelate, whatever his intent, would “put an issue on the table that a lot of people thought was off the table.” He added: “I think he breathed new life into the hopes of a lot of people.”
One of those people is Sr. Christine Schenk, executive director of FutureChurch, a group promoting the ordination of women and an end to the celibacy rule. “It would have been nice if he had said this five years ago,” she said. “But coming from Egan, I think it is a sign that the conversation is ripening. He’s not the poster child for progressivism. I think it shows we are much closer to having this issue addressed by the Vatican than most people realize.” 
Many church experts said Cardinal Egan’s comments were surprising not so much in their content, but in his willingness to say them in publicly.
“In a sense, what he said was obvious,” said Rev. Thomas J. Reese, Jeusit author and former editor of the moderately liberal Catholic magazine America. “But not many cardinals do that. It was kind of brave of him to say what everybody’s been thinking. It’s interesting that he said it as he was leaving.”
Fr. Peter Kennedy, 71, was removed as pastor of St. Mary’s, South Brisbane, Australia, by Archbishop John A. Bathersby earlier this week. This action was a tremendous loss not only to the parishioners of St. Mary’s, but all Catholics around the world that look for points of light–parishes, groups, schools, retreat centers, religious people, theologians, authors, bloggers–to take hope and comfort in knowing light from an open door shines for us. 
Archbishop Bathersby accused Fr. Kennedy of being “out of communion” with the church by allowing women to preach the homily, giving Communion to gay and divorced people, baptizing babies using unorthodox wording, criticizing the pope and not wearing traditional vestments.
The archbishop’s decree said Fr. Kennedy had “caused harm to ecclesiastical communion in spite of frequent requests from me to do otherwise.”
“The question for me,” said Archbishop Bathersby, “is not so much whether St. Mary’s should be closed down, but whether St. Mary’s will close itself down by practices that separate it from communion with the Roman Catholic Church.”
“In reality St. Mary’s South Brisbane has taken a Roman Catholic parish and established its own brand of religion,” he said. “Undoubtedly it does good, it promotes a strong sense of community, opens its doors to all who wish to come, but its own style of worship and sacramental practice can hardly be described as Roman Catholic.”
The conflict between Archbishop Bathersby and the parish community of St. Mary’s stretches back at least six years.
In 2004 the Archbishop demanded that Fr. Kennedy comply with Redemptionis Sacramentum, follow the liturgical norms and stop baptizing people “in the Name of the Creator and the Liberator and of the Sustainer.” Fr. Kennedy countered that they were doing this to make the sacrament “more inclusive, less patriarchal.” 
The parish previously angered conservatives in the church by welcoming gay couples and allowing the Brisbane Gay and Lesbian Choir to perform there in June 2003 as part of Brisbane Pride Festival celebrations. Archbishop Bathersby opposed the performance and said it was “inappropriate.”
Tony Robertson, who belongs to St. Mary’s, said parishioners were rallying to save their parish. Robertson blogs on Out and About with Tony – A Queer Perspective on Life as a Gay Catholic.
“St. Mary’s is a church which takes seriously its identity as a Catholic community and practices the teachings of the Catholic Church which calls for homosexual persons be accepted with respect, compassion and sensitivity,” Robertson said.
“Such acceptance calls for practical action which welcomes gay and lesbian people to the life and worship of the community.”
Robertson noted that other Catholic churches also welcome sexual minorities, including one church that flies the rainbow flag among its public decorations.
“Those who have concerns about our support for sexual minorities need to remember that the Catholic Church also teaches that every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. In this spirit the Church has opened its doors to the Brisbane Lesbian and Gay Pride Choir who use the Church for weekly rehersals as well as supporting the musical and religious culture of St. Mary’s,” he said.
“Gay and lesbian Catholics who prefer a more traditional worship have always been a presence at the Cathedral of St. Stephen where one of the beautiful stained glass windows is dedicated to a gay member of the famous Mayne Family of Brisbane,” he added.
“Jesus Wept” at the loss of a relationship, not the interpretation of a rule.
Follow the St. Mary’s situation on St. Mary’s Discussion Forum.
Show your support for St. Mary’s on their MySpace page.
Interesting notes on gay history in the Mayne family can be found on page 229 in Colonialism and Homosexuality by Robert Aldrich.
The current book by my armchair is The Power and the Glory: Inside the Dark Heart of John Paul II’s Vatican by David Yallop. In the chapter, “The Marketplace” the author discusses the discreet, but powerful involvement of money in the popular Medjugorje pilgrimage site. A series of local bishops declared the apparitions a hoax and the visionaries liars, but so far the Vatican has declined to make a pronouncement.
On page 221 of the book the author quotes this gem from a member of the Secretariat of State about Medjugorje: “Of course its a fraud but the money is genuine.” 
On January 6, 2009, the conservative Italian Catholic website “Petrus” broke a story that Pope Benedict has instructed the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith to prepare a vademecum, or handbook, on how to deal with alleged Marian apparations and visions such as those at Medjugorje. It actually amounts to an update of a 1978 document on the same subject.
It would reportedly require individuals who said they have experienced appearances or visions of the Virgin Mary to remain silent while their claims are investigated carefully by Church authorities.
The document was also rumoured to specify that local bishops should set up commissions composed of psychiatrists, psychologists, theologians and priests to investigate the claimed apparitions.
The commission is supposed to establish whether the visionary seems psychologically unstable; whether trickery or economic interests may be involved; whether any alleged revelation is consistent with church teaching; and whether there are grounds to suspect demonic influence.
One interesting winkle: according to the Petrus report the alleged seers will be required to turn over their computers to investigators, who are supposed to determine if they’ve gone online researching miracles and wonders–suggesting that perhaps they wanted to minic other famed incidents.
In the background to these alleged new guidelines lurks the continuing controversy over Medjugorje, the Bosnian site where the Virgin Mary has been delivering revelation to a group of local seers since 1981. Medjugorje has become a pilgrimage destination for millions of devotees every year, despite the fact the church has never authenticated the visions. Pope John Paul II was a believer.
Vatican concern has also been shaped by ferment in Italy over the “Madonnina” or “little Madonna” of Civitavecchia–a small statute of the Virgin, originally purchased in Medjugorje, which has reportedly been shedding tears of blood since the mid-1990s. 
In May 2008, his excellency Andrea Gemma, 78, bishop emeritus of the Isernia-Venafro Diocese northeast of Rome and one of Italy’s best known exorcists, announced in Petrus that the Catholic Church had officially stated that the Blessed Mother had never appeared in Medjugorje and that the entire operation was the “work of the devil.” When asked to be more specific about the interests motivating involvement in Medjugorje, the bishop declared, “I’m referring to the devil’s shit, money.”
The fact that many priests from around the world continue to lead pilgrimages there is “a disgrace,” the bishop added. “The phony seers and their assistants make money hand over fist, while at the same time the devil creates dissension between the faithful and the Church.”
The well known theologian Rene Laurentin, after years of research, has recorded over 2,450 Marian documented events in the history of the church. But out of almost 300 requests for investigation initiated in the last 100 years, church authorities have officially certified as true only a dozen appearances. The most recent recognition is “Our Lady of Laus,” in France, which took place on May 8, 2008.
The local diocese declared the apparition as authentic in 1665. It only took the Vatican three and a half centuries to concur.
Former Papal Envoy to the U.S., Archbishop Jean Jadot of Belgium, died last week at the age of 99. Jadot’s predecessor and successor as papal delegates to the U.S. received the red hat of a cardinal. Jadot never received one in recognition of his work here. In fact, he is the only Vatican diplomat assigned to the United States that was never made a cardinal. Why not a red hat? 
In 1973, Pope Paul VI sent Archbishop Jadot to Washington, DC to serve as the apostolic delegate to the United States. The pope told him he was chosen partly because he was not part of the Vatican bureacracy, and thus might not be as pliable in the hands of powerful American bishops; who to Paul VI’s view were often more businessman than pastor. Jadot was sent to press the American church to carry out the reforms of Vatican II, and find candidates for future episcopal appointments who were willing to do so.
Although largely undone by the conservative appointments of Pope John Paul II, Jadot had a hand in over 100 nominations, including such well known names as Roger Cardinal Mahoney of Los Angeles, Joseph Cardinal Bernadin of Chicago, Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen of Seattle, Archbishop Rembert Weakland in Milwaukee, Archbishop Francis Hurley of Anchorage, and Bishop Walter Sullivan of Richmond, Virginia. All of these bishops have made an effort to outreach to Catholics on the margins, including gay people.
As a Washington Post article said in 1983, “Whatever their background, the new breed of bishops was less concerned with the ring-kissing and watered silk vestments that went with the office, and more with getting to know their people.”
Paul VI saw an evolving role for his nuncios after Vatican II. “Nuncios should travel,” Paul VI said, not so much as the representatives of Rome to secular governments, or even as legates between Rome and the world’s bishops. Instead, they should “show the Pope’s concern for the poor, the forgotten, the ignored.”
Although Archbishop Jadot strongly adhered to most of the church’s teachings, including its opposition to abortion, he was willing to leave some issues, like artificial contraception, to individual consciences. He also helped to lead a largely successful effort to push the American church to welcome minorities, widen the role of women, increase participation by the laity and relax some rules, like the automatic excommunication of divorced people.
In A Watchman for the House of Israel , his November 9, 1976 address to the general meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, Jadot called attention to the situation of minorities in the American church: “How are we to give pastoral care to those who do not feel at home with our white, Western European ways of public worship and community living, to those who have not adapted and do not want to adapt to what we call our American way of doing things?”
He added, “I wonder if the majority of our priests and people realize our shortcomings in these areas and even our arrogance toward our brothers and sisters in the faith who are in some ways different from ourselves. I wonder if we can ever fully understand the legitmate frustrations that they feel.”
He could have been speaking about how gay Catholics feel treated by their church.
In his concluding remarks, the apostolic delegate called brief attention to two other areas of concern that the bishops would have to follow up on: “There are other problems either near or far on the horizon. I could mention the question of the role of women in society and in the church or problems that will come from the rejection of the traditional standards of morality in society, political and business life.”
Jadot concluded his address to “my brother bishops” by saying: “Let us be confident, courageous and open to the Spirit. Let us build the church of God by our foresight.”
After this address the apostolic delegate became the target of bitter animosity from conservative bishops and laypeople. He received a steady flow of anonymous hate mail telling him to get out of the United States and go back to Belgium. He was also being denounced at the Vatican. At one point, Jadot offered his resignation to Paul VI, who responded immediately by saying, “No. You are doing just what I want you to do.”
The anti-Jadot campaign was allegedly spearheaded by Cardinals John Carberry of St. Louis, John Krol of Philadelphia and John Cody of Chicago. Polish-American Cardinal Krol had the ear of John Paul II and eventually convinced him Jadot was “destroying the Catholic church in the United States.” Cardinal Cody was opposed to Jadot because he knew personally that Jadot had asked Paul VI to remove him. 
When John Paul II became pope, Archbishop Jadot was relieved of his position and given a minor post. The fact he was not honored with the customary red hat was the subject of a September 7, 2002 article in the Tablet by veteran Vatican reporter Robert Blair Kaiser.
“The Jadot I found in Brussels,” Kaiser wrote, “did not strike me as a man who was nursing any grievences. He knew he had done a fine job – for Paul VI and for the Church. He refused to speculate about why he did or did not become a cardinal, and had good words, moreover, for some in the Roman Curia. He said he liked Cardinal Gianbattista Re. “I trust him very much. He’s in the category of honest people.”
“I asked him how many cardinals he in put in that category.”
“Jadot hesitated, then laughed. ‘I don’t know all the cardinals,’ he said.”
But Jadot may have expressed his private feelings to his good friend and biographer, theologian Dr. John (Jack) Dick, the day his successor, Archbishop Pio Laghi, who appointed conservative bishops, was named a cardinal on May 29, 1991. That day, after lunch, Jadot said, “It is a slap in my face.”
Dr. Dick, now retired from the University of Louvain in Belgium, is completing a book about Jadot titled Paul’s Man in Washington. Perhaps the book will reveal things Jadot was too much of a diplomat and a gentleman to ever mention directly.
On the other hand, when it came time to select a new archbishop in Vienna in 1986, John Paul II picked Hans Hermann Groer, a Benedictine abbot, because he had met the man at a Marian conference and was impressed for one reason alone: his obvious devotion to Our Lady. (Cardinal Franz Konig got the news about Groer’s appointment on television.) A few years later, Groer had to retire after allegations that he had been seducing the young men at his monastery.
