For Pepperdine law professor Douglas Kmiec, a constitutional lawyer who often writes on religion in the public square, the situation had uncomfortable echoes of the last presidential election cycle –a priest refusing to give Communion to someone based on their political views.
This time, though, the stunned Massgoer turned away by a priest was Kmiec himself.
The former dean of Catholic University Law School was an architect of the Reagan administration’s stance against abortion. His pro-life credentials include serving as a keynote speaker at March for Life’s annual Rose Dinner a few years ago.
The story begins with Kmiec’s March 2008 endorsement of Barak Obama for president in an article published in Slate magazine.
“I take him at his word that he wants to move the nation from beyond its religious and racial divides and that he wants to return the United States to that company of nations committed to human rights,” Kmiec wrote. He noted that he and Obama disagree on “important fundamentals” including legislation about traditional marriage and that life begins at conception.
He followed up that piece by writing May 15 for Catholic Online. There Kmiec said his Obama endorsement “baffled my political pals; it infuriated some of my fellow Catholics.” Some bloggers declared he was “self-excommunicated,” he wrote, and Kmiec went on to describe being denied Communion at a meeting of a Catholic business group.
At the event, Kmiec wrote, the priest “excoriated my Obama-heresy from the pulpit at length and then denied my receipt of Communion.”
He said he was pleased to hear that Los Angeles Cardinal Roger M. Mahony had weighed in on the matter, in comments by his spokesman, Tod Tamberg, first included in a National Public Radio report.
Tamburg told Catholic News Service that the priest’s action in refusing Communion to Kmiec “was absolutely indefensible” both as a matter of canon law and the policies and practices of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. “The archbishop’s office is well aware of the situation and will be responding in an appropriate manner,” he added.
Kmiec has drawn attention as one of the nation’s leading “Obamacons”-conservatives who find Obama’s call for a new approach to politics appealing.
Kmiec started life as a Democrat, but like many Catholic Democrats, he said he was profoundly attracted to Ronald Reagan. For Kmiec, five words in Reagan’s 1980 acceptance speech summarized the essence of a Catholic view of politics: “family, work, neighborhood, peace and freedom.”
But Kmiec has expanded that original view: “To think you have done a generous thing for your neighbor or that you have built up a culture of life just because you have voted for a candidate who says in his brochure that he wants to overturn Roe vs. Wade is far too thin an understanding of the Catholic faith,” he said.
A critic of the Bush Administration’s Iraq policy, Kmiec added that Catholics should heed “the broad social teaching of the church,” including its views on war.
Kmiec said his pastor convinced him not to let the Communion incident go unanswered.
“He told me, ‘You may be resilient, but another person to whom this happens, it may destroy their entire faith,’” Kmiec said.
By a vast majority, he said, most U.S. bishops and church leaders are consistently good teachers on the range of political responsibilities expected of Catholics. However, he added, “if we continue to use religion as a political weapon than we’ve failed.”
It seems that one day, in a private conversation with a visiting archbishop in his office in the Vatican, the Pope shared his own great sadness that so many people of good will all over the world had come to believe that the Church rejected and condemned them.
It’s easy to understand the Pope’s emotion here. Indeed, sometimes the Church does seem to hold certain people at a greater distance than others. It does seem to open its doors only partly, leaving outside the gates certain ones who do not measure up.
Then the Pope turned to the crucifix which stood on the little table in his office as said with deep emotion: “But I must be like Christ. I open wide my arms to embrace them. I love them and I am their father. I am always ready to welcome them.” Then turning to his visitor, the Pope said: “Monsignor, all that the gospel requires of us has not yet been understood.”
(As related by Bill Huebsch . The story is from the book The Transitional Pope by Ernesto Balducci, McGraw-Hill, NY, 1964.)
Progressive Catholics may think Belgian Cardinal Godfried Dannueels is concerned about the Church moving away from the reforms and ideals of Vatican II. What really concerns him, he tells Robert Mickens in an interview in The Tablet, is the scarcity of intellectuals among bishops. “When I look at the synod assembly, so many good people are there with really pastoral hearts. They are good shepherds. But from time to time I think it would be good if five percent of them were also thinkers, that don’t lack hearts. We need among the bishops and cardinals some really intelligent people.”
He has publicly questioned the Vatican’s intransigence on certain issues, such as denying the sacraments to divorced and remarried Catholics or speaking against the use of condoms as a means of preventing AIDS.
There is also the infamous 1968 encyclical, Humanae Vitae. “It’s a problem,” Cardinal Dannueels says. “We have concentrated the whole problem on the pill.” He points out that the encyclical has deflected people’s attention from the other good things the Church has to say about marriage.
Dannueels accuses not only the Church as an institution, but also himself, for not having done enough for families. When asked what more he could have done, the cardinal says withoutout hesitation that he could have “been more positive to support and encourage” strong families rather than mostly focusing on broken families.
When Cardinal Dannueels became Bishop of Antwerp in 1977 (he’s now Archbishop of Brussels-Mechelen), he wrote the first of more than 50 pastoral letters, which are issued at Christmas and Easter. He speaks proudly of these pamphlets, which he says are widely read “outside the Church.” He has covered a huge range of issues; one of the latest focused on stress. His first letter sums up the ideal he has tried to live. It was about the “ministry of encouragement.”
It was encouraging for me to read that Cardinal Dannueels was considered by some as a possible candidate to become pope of the death of John Paul II. Can you imagine–a man aware of modern life and culture, a thinker, a moderate on most issues–as our Pope. But alas, his candidancy could not be seriously considered because of the lack of priestly vocations from his diocese. Or so it was said.
What a missed opportunity, to have him as Pope. The Holy Spirit dropped the ball on that one.
The charismatic Rev. James Lisante, a religion commentator for Fox News Network and pastor of St. Thomas the Apostle Church in West Hempstead, Long Island, came under fire for endorsing presidential candidate John McCain during his invocation at a Republican fund raiser. “One final thing, Lord, I promise,” said Lisante, dressed in his clerical collar, “this November could you keep an eye on all of us and see that the change that we embrace comes from Arizona and not Illinois?
He also made disparaging comments about Barack Obama, including him for criticizing him for failing to distance himself from his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Jr.
Lisante acknowledged that while he supports McCain, his endorsement came at the wrong moment. “In hindsight I would have separated out the invocation, the prayer, from my commentary.”
“I do not as a priest forfit my right as a citizen to a point of view, even when it comes to standing by a particular candidate,” he said.
Some church experts and fellow priests said Lisante went over the line with his endorsement. They said church tradition and practice prohibits priests from endorsing candidates and parties, although the church can be and is active in pursuing causes that align with Gospel values.
“U.S. bishops have been pretty strong in saying their clergy should stay away from partisan politics,” said the Rev. Thomas Reese, former editor of the Jesuit weekly magazine, America. “It’s OK to talk about issues. But to get into endorsing candidates crosses the line in terms of church practice.”
I am not a member of St. Thomas the Apostle, so I can’t say if the Democractic parishioners are uncomfortable with Msgr. Lisante. I hope he’s warm and kind and evenhanded with everyone, regardless of their point of view on U.S. politics and candidates for office. If not, then there’s a pastoral problem.
I agree with him 100% that he has a right to express his own point of view. But a media-savvy priest like Msgr. Lisante should know better to be careful when praying for Republican candidates (only) at a podium, pulpit, or anyplace where it can be recorded and splashed all over the internet.
I have signed up to participate in St. Francis’ summer session of courses. The Gospel of Luke runs six-weeks from mid-June to the end of July. Located in midtown Manhattan, it’s an easy walk from work to the classroom.
I like the idea of taking a break from work to sit down with others to study, discuss and discover new meaning in my life through the words in sacred scripture.
Past courses have brought together a great mix of people in the classroom: retirees, college students, office workers and professionals, housewives, unemployed, and even a few lost-looking people who just drifted in, sat down and contributed to the class.
The Gospel of St. Luke is a good choice for city filled with oppressed groups of people.
The consensus is that Luke was written by a Greek or Syrian for gentile or non-Jewish Christians. Luke’s gospel is concerned with groups on the margins of society: tax collectors, sinners, prostitutes, the poor, women and gentiles. St. Luke, said to be a physician, is the patron saint of doctors, surgeons and all health care workers.
Certain popular stories, such as the prodical son and the good Samaritan, are found only in this gospel. The Gospel of Luke also has a special emphasis on prayer, the activity of the Holy Spirit, and joyfulness. The word “joy” is mentioned more times in Luke than in any of the other gospels.
And, more than other gospels, Luke focuses on women as playing important roles among Jesus’ followers, such as Mary Magdalene, Martha and Mary of Bethany.
Who is Jesus? Why did he come? What does it mean for us, for me? These are the questions we’ll examine together in the study of this gospel.
To prepare for the course I picked up three books - The Gospel of Luke (Sacra Pagina Series) by Timonthy Luke Johnson; The Navarre Bible - St. Luke Texts and Commentaries, was initiated by St. Josemaria Escrinva, better known as the founder of Opus Dei; and New Collegeville Bible Commentary - The Gospel According to Luke by Michael F. Patella.
I plan to follow and participate in the class discussions, and read and compare the three books. Who knows…maybe all three will receive the coveted “Nihil Obstat” by yours truly!
On Friday Chicago Archbishop Francis Cardinal George sharply critized the Rev. Michael Pfleger of St. Sabrina’s Church for launching a “personal attack” on Hillary Clinton from the pulpit of Barack Obama’s former Chicago church.
“While a priest must speak to political issues that are also moral, he may not endorse candidates nor engage in partisan campaigning,” Cardinal George said. “Racial isues are both political and moral and are also highly charged. Words can be differently interpreted, but Father Pfleger’s remarks about Sen. Clinton are both partisan and amount to a personal attack. I regret that deeply.” George concluded: “To avoid months of turmoil inthe church, Father Pfleger has promised me that he will not enter into campaigning, will not publicly mention any candidate by name and will abide by the discipline common to all Catholic priests.”
Cardinal George is quite right that the church should stay out of politics. But we don’t. Some bishops deny the sacrament of communion to Catholic politicians because they support same-sex marriage or women’s reproductive rights. Why do some bishops and priests lend their pulpit in support of Republican candidates and administration by focusing on abortion and gay marriage, instead forcefully demanding good health care and education for working people and the poor, economic justice for immigrants, and an end to the thousands of lives and billions of dollars lost in a failed Middle East foreign policy?
The Cardinal’s rebuke comes after Pfleger’s ridicule of Clinton was captured on video and circulated on You Tube. Pfleger made the remarks as a guest preacher at Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, the home of Rev. Jeremiah Wright.
In his Sunday sermon, Pfleger mocked Clinton for shedding tears on the campaign trail before her win in the New Hampshire primary. “I really believe that she just always thought, ‘This is mine! I’m Bill’s wife, I’m white, and this is mine! I just gotta get up and step into the plate.’ And then out of nowhere came Barack Obama, and she said, ‘Oh, I’m white! I’m entitled! There’s a black man stealing my show!’”he said.
Yeah, he is pretty blunt and fiery. He spoke with language, gestures and a preaching style the folks in the pews at Trinity and St. Sabrina’s may expect and appreciate, but other Christians would find outrageous or upsetting. Liberation theology in America would have that effect on most wealthy, middle class and upper middle class white Christians.
Pfleger had some pretty tough things to say about “white privilege” and economics. Poking fun at Hillary Clinton’s frustration was simply an example of when entitlement didn’t win out.
I don’t agree with every word he says but I think Fr. Pfleger is a stand up guy.
All the women that have been ordained as priests in the Roman Catholic Church were excommunicated this week, along with the bishops who ordained them. The general decree “On the Delict of Attempted Sacred Ordination of a Woman” was published on May 30, 2008 on the front page of L’Osservatore Romano, the Vatican newspaper. It states that the decree “comes into force immediately.”
The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, headed by an American, Cardinal William Levada, 71, has decisively decreed the ordination of women is invalid, and affirms that “he who shall have attempted to confirm holy orders on a woman, as well as the woman who may have attempted to receive Holy Orders, incurs a ‘latae sententiae’ excommunication,’ that is, an automatic excommunication.
In an interview with Vatican Radio, Archbishop Angelo Amato said the reason for the text is the existence of instances of the ordination of women in some regions of the world. The decree underlines that the ordination of women to the priesthood is invalid or null, and that “only baptized men can be ordained validly.”
The Church reaffirms this exclusively for a “unique fundamental reason,” the archbishop explained. “The Church does not feel authorized to change the will of its founder, Jesus Christ.”
In 1994, Pope John Paul II issued the apostolic letter, On Reserving Priestly Ordination to Men Alone,” in which he stated that the priesthood “has in the Catholic Church from the beginning always been reserved to men alone.” He added, “I declare that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgement is to be definitively held by all the Church’s faithful.”
“I think the reason they’re doing this,” said Rev. Tom Reese of the Woodstock Theological Center of Georgetown University, “is that they’ve realized there is more and more support among Catholics for ordaining women.”
The news just depresses me. The Church can change its stance on slavery, the environment, Jews, the position of the earth and the sun, indigenous people, the welfare of working people and other issues, but won’t budge on priesthood. I’m not sure how they can argue the same rationale, and change some things but not others.
When I hear news like that, faith has to sustain my relationship with my church since logic and emotion cannot.
The week brought more bad news on excommunications with the decision by the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith confirming a December 15, 2005 declaration from the St. Louis archbishop that the board of directors of the St. Stanislaus Kostka Corporation and the priest they hired are excommunicated. The priest involved is Father Marek Bozek.
However it evolved and ended up, the dispute began with the issues of accountability of money and property. The laity wanted a voice in decision-making. The priest stood up for his parishioners and supported them in their concerns with the Archdiocese.
It doesn’t appear to me the Archdiocese of St. Louis made a good faith attempt to sit down with the parish leadership and try to work things out. Instead, there was a leaden response, then emotions and rhetoric got out of control, the Archdiocese responded with threats, and the worst happened - a separation, a “schism.”
I feel for all my fellow Catholics who were excommunicated this week. I will remember them every week by receiving communion for them.
I also feel for whatever pain was in the hearts of Cardinal Levada and Archbishop Burke. I hope that pain stays with them, to eventually inspire some future reflection and compassion. I will remember them in my prayers as well.
Two best-selling authors have accused the Vatican of blacklisting them in Italy after they discovered secret documents that suggest a 17th century pope had funded the Protestant hero William III (William of Orange).
Rita Monaldi and her husband, Francesco Sorti, have sold more than a million copies of their historical novel Imprimatur. The novel tells the story of Atto Melani, an Italian castrato, probable lover of nobleman Mattias de’Medici, and spy at the court of King Louis XIV of France.
Imprimatur was dropped by its Italian publisher, Mondadori, despite reaching No. 4 on the bestseller list on its release in 2002. Mondadori decided not to reprint the book because of pressure from the Vatican, Sorti said.
Mondadori, which is owned by media magnate and Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, refused to comment.
The authors said they found documents from a papal envoy discussing the “large sums” that William III owed Pope Innocent XI. Documents from Innocent’s family records show the Holy See sent 150,000 scudi (about $7.5 million today) to William via an intermediary.
“When we found the documents we had already started to write the book, but we decided to include the discovery as part of the storyline,” Monaldi said.
The documents appear to indicate that Pope Innocent XI bankrolled William of Orange in order to help him defeat the French under Louis XIV, whom he hated. Innocent stood by as Catholic king, James II of England as overthrown. He did nothing to aid him because of James’ support of Louis XIV in matters of collecting revenues from church properties.
With James II gone, England was firmly established as a protestant nation; and the Catholics in Ireland were dispossessed and eventually descimated by protestant overlords.
The revelation by the book that Innocent XI supported a heretic and enemy of the church to carry out a personal vendetta–and to collect the debt of his family’s money–embarassed the Vatican and derailed his case for canonization once again.
Pope Benedict sent a message of freedom to participants at the 97th “Deutscher Katholikentag.” This event, organized by German laity, gathered some 500,000 people in Osnabruck, Germany this past week.
Commenting on the theme chosen for the meeting - “He brought me out into a broad place,” a line from Psalm 18 - Benedict wrote that “no small number of people today…are afraid the faith may limit their lives, that they may be constrained in the web of the Church’s commitments and teachings, and that they will no longer be free to move in the ‘broad space’ of modern life and thought.” He went on to add: “…only when our lives have reached the heart of God will they have found that ‘broad space’ for which we were created. A life without God does not become freer and broader. Human beings are destined for the infinite.”
There is an echo of his words in Dorothy Day’s spiritual autobiography, The Long Loneliness. We get an immediate impression of the peace and happiness that preceded her conversion to Catholicism:
“I have been passing through some years of fret and strife, beauty and ugliness, days and even weeks of sadness and despair, but seldom has there been the quiet beauty and happiness I have now. I thought all those years I had freedom, but now I feel that I had neither real freedom nor even a sense of freedom.”
I think Benedict and Day are both right: we will find true freedom in scripture, within the sacraments and in God. But how do you find a way to freedom–that is, discerning the will of God for you and living it every day? What “broad place” are we being welcomed into?
Thomas Merton’s prayer - “Don’t Know Where I’m Going” comforts and strengthens me in that discernment:
“My Lord, God, I have no idea where I am going
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
Nor do I really know myself,
and the fact that I think that I am following your will
does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But, I believe that the desire to please you
does in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.
And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road,
though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore will I trust you always,
though I may seem to be lost in the shadow of death.
I will not fear, for you are ever with me,
and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.”
My pastor said something very wise and comforting about God’s will in one of his sermons. He said: if God wants us to do something other than what we’re doing, He’ll let us know, like He did to St. Paul.
John O’Donohue was an Irish poet, author and Catholic scholar who lived in the solitude of a cottage in the west of Ireland and spoke Gaelic as his daily language. His acclaimed writings reveal an original thinker rooted in a blend of Irish heritage, German philosophy, western theology, and an intimate relationship with the ancient, luminous landscape of his home.
He spoke of mystery, wildness, our human yearning for “home,” and our sense of exile from the denuded, soulless, and empty landscapes of our time. He often returned to the scouring experience of loss, which he believed paradoxically opened us to growth.
For 19 years he served as a parish priest in the west of Ireland, but always felt the urge to write, as well as a mounting tension between Irish Catholicism’s traditional stance and his own liberal position. In a radio interview long after leaving the priesthood, he spoke of ministering to people in the parish: “I was trying to refine their fingers…so that they could undo so much of the false netting crippling their own spirits.”
With degrees in philosophy and English literature, and a Ph.D. in philosophical theology from the University of Tubingen in Germany, O’Donohue was one of the most articulate voices of living Celtic Christianity and wisdom, and the beauty of Christian mysticism.
He is the author of two collections of poetry, Echoes of Memory and Conamara Blues; and several books, including the international bestsellers Anam Cara (Soul Friend) and Eternal Echoes: Exploring Our Yearning to Belong.
“This hunger to belong is the echo and reverberation of your invisible and eternal heritage. You are from somewhere else, where you were known, embraced and sheltered. This is also the secret root from which all longing grows. Something in you knows, perhaps remembers, that eternal belonging liberates longing into its surest and most potent creativity.”
