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by Jim Holman.
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Skewed to the Center-Left
Background of Religious Ed Congress Speakers
BY JOHN ECK
National Catholic Reporter's Rome correspondent, John L. Allen, Jr., has this "small suggestion" for the Roman Curia: "at some point during your tenure, come to this Congress." Allen, writing in the February 25 Reporter, was speaking of the Los Angeles archdiocese's Religious Education Congress, a yearly gathering primarily for religious educators, held February 18-20 at the Anaheim Convention Center. Allen himself had flown out from Rome to speak at this "beehive of ecclesiastical life," as he calls it. Being that this year's congress was his third, Allen might know whereof he speaks when he said the congress "provides a unique, and encouraging, perspective on Catholicism in the United States."
While few would challenge the epithet "unique" as applied to the congress, some might object to the modifier "encouraging." To the promoters of the Religious Education Congress, attendance at the event was certainly encouraging. According to a post-conference update sent out by the archdiocese on March 8, the 2005 congress "gathered together a record 38,577 for our four-day event. We had 20,649 pre-registered attendees, 214 companies represented in the Exhibit Hall, and 210 speakers presenting 276 sessions."
Impressive, yes. But encouraging? Well, perhaps to those like the attendees who, in Allen's words, "tend[ed] to skew a bit to the center-left — reflecting, in that sense, the personality of the Los Angeles archdiocese under Cardinal Roger Mahony." But to Catholics concerned for orthodox teaching, such a number at such a congress can only be discouraging.
For while many of the 210 speakers at the congress were doubtless fine or at least harmless, many of the speakers are noted dissenters from Church teaching and/or progressive mavericks against Church authority. This year's keynote speaker, Bishop Donald Trautman of Erie, Pennsylvania, certainly falls into the second category. Bishop Trautman has long been a champion of inclusive, or gender-neutral, language translations of the lectionary and liturgical prayers. In 1997 Trautman urged the American bishops to reject limits placed by the Holy See on the use of inclusive language in the lectionary. More recently, he has criticized the Vatican's attempts to correct liturgical abuses (most notably in the 2004 document, Redemptionis sacramentum.)
In his October 10, 2003 address before the Federation of Diocesan Liturgical Commissions, Bishop Trautman bemoaned those "people who hearken back to rigidity in rubrics." To these, he said, "we must say, 'Do not quench the Spirit.' When inculturation is denied," he continued, "and one liturgical form is forced on all, we must say, 'Do not quench the Spirit.'" It is likely the bishop (who has warmly praised Cardinal Mahony's liturgical reforms) was pleased by the congress' liturgical offerings, which included liturgical dance, contemporary music, and a good deal of lay participation.
At least one of the congress' presenters, though, would have preferred that the liturgies have female presiders. This was Diana Hayes, a Georgetown University theology professor and long opponent of the all-male priesthood. This was certainly not Hayes' first time as a Religious Education Congress speaker; she also has frequented the conferences hosted by Call to Action (a dissident Catholic group) and the Women's Ordination Conference.
Though opposed to the male-only priesthood, Hayes, it seems, does not want ordained women but a deconstruction of the Catholic priesthood. According to an April 25, 2003 National Catholic Reporter story, Hayes, speaking at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, charged that the Church has subjugated women and other groups. "Natural law and scripture, especially Paul, has been used to support sexism, racism, classism and homophobia," she said. "Women, persons of color and all others outside the norm have been relegated to the roles of passivity, even non-humanity." The Reporter said "Hayes cautioned against women merely stepping into already corrupted leadership roles, urging them instead to transform the whole idea of leadership. 'For reform in the church, we who are women need to speak another language than the masculinized one that exists,' she said. 'We must look at how exclusive we are being even in our efforts to be inclusive.'" In an article published in the April 6, 2002 Reporter, Hayes wrote that the priest molestation scandal calls for "honest, open discussions within the church on homosexuality, optional celibacy and married priesthood as well as women's ordination." Such discussions, she said, "are desperately needed, especially in light of the continuing decline in the numbers of priest and religious."
Another speaker who seems to express his thoughts more subtly is Richard Gaillardetz, a lay theologian at the University of Toledo in Ohio. Gaillardetz gave a talk, "Unity in Essentials, Liberty in Doubtful Matters, and in All Things Charity," which was, according to the conference blurb, to "explore the application of this axiom as a way of addressing divisive Church issues. Perhaps some of the divisions that beset our Church can be overcome by a clearer distinction between essentials and non-essentials in Church life."
Among the non-essentials, according to Gaillardetz, is the male-only clergy. In a 1996 article published in Louvain Studies, Gaillardetz disputes the conclusion of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith that the pope's 1995 declaration in Ordinatio sacerdotalis that the Church has no authority to ordain women belongs to the deposit of the Faith. The pope approved the congregation's conclusion. Cardinal Josef Ratzinger's commentary on the Congregation's conclusion noted that though Ordinatio sacerdotalis is not ex cathedra, it expresses the universal and ordinary magisterium and so its teaching is infallible. But this cannot be, Gaillardetz argues, since, in his view, the pope in the document is not teaching in union with the bishops of the world — a situation in which Vatican II envisions such infallibility. Besides, says Gaillardetz, one can never be sure in disputed points what the universal mind of the bishops is and, therefore, "appeals to the infallibility of the ordinary universal magisterium are ill-suited for resolving controversial matters related to the Christian faith." So, in short, though the pope says otherwise, Gaillardetz says women's ordination is still an open question.
According to Allen, Gaillardetz "is among the most popular speakers at the Congress." Allen attended his talk, where the theologian "offered a 'report card on the church' 40 years after the Second Vatican Council." Gaillardetz evaluated four areas: "understanding of church" (for which the Church received an A minus), "Church's mission in the world" (also an A minus), "liturgical and sacramental life" (C plus), and "structures and exercise of leadership" (D). While praising the Church's "sense of active lay participation and legitimate diversity," Gaillardetz, wrote Allen, was "at the same time ... troubled by a return to 'rubricism and formalism,' citing recent Vatican documents such as the revised General Instruction on the Roman Missal and Redemptionis sacramentum, plus suspicions in the Vatican about liturgical decision-making in Rome. Ten years ago, he said, he would have given the liturgy a 'B,' but things are different today." When, using a Power Point presentation, Gaillardetz "flashed" the D grade, "the crowd cheered," according to Allen.
Hayes and Gaillardetz were not the only questioners of the all-male priesthood at the congress. R. Scott Appleby, professor of history at the University of Notre Dame and director of its Joan B. Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, is another. In an interview that appeared in the July 2002 U.S. Catholic, Appleby noted how "particularly powerful" it is "when a person not only takes the vows seriously but is on a quest for holiness. A priest, religious, or a layperson who has really submitted himself or herself to the authority of the gospel and of the church is a powerful model of sanctity — this we desperately need." But, presumably, such submission does not extend to Ordinatio sacerdotalis. Said Appleby: "it seems to me, however, that we are on the brink of sacrificing the Eucharist to the insistence on an all-male, celibate clergy. I wish we had a sufficient number of priests, but we clearly do not."
One of Appleby's talks at the Religious Education Congress was "A Catholic Reformation?" in which he asked, "what are the limits and possibilities of a Catholic reformation in the 21st century? What are the historical precedents?"
Capuchin priest Michael Crosby has in the past expressed himself more vehemently on the subject of women's ordination than the scholarly Gaillardetz or Appleby. In 1997 he gave the keynote address to a Call to Action national meeting in Detroit. He noted that in another talk he had said "our God could care less whether women are priests" — a position, he said, he still held. But, he said, "God does care (and a lot!), when our church leaders purport to speak in the name of the Author of the universe and undermine their authority when they insist it's God's will that only men be priests." The "right to life" said Crosby, "will find us insisting that women have equal rights with men from the womb to the tomb, that the disabled and able-bodied among us can't be denied their reproductive rights, that gays and straights have the same rights from conception to death, that the South and the North have mutual rights and responsibilities to help each other in face of need, and that, in our God and in any reality identified with this God, there can be absolutely no systemic discrimination, only truth, justice, love and peace." At this year's Religious Education Congress, Crosby's talk was "A People 'Perishing' for Want of Prophecy."
At the congress, Paulist priest Richard Sparks, pastor of Newman Hall/Holy Spirit parish at the University of California, Berkeley, addressed Christian morality in the 21st century which, says the congress blurb, "promises to be a synthesis and overview of Catholic morality for this new century." Father Sparks, who travels the Call to Action circuit, presents, it is said, a relativistic view of morality. His treatment often has a coldly clinical air, unexpected in a priest who, one would presume, would want to justify Catholic teaching. Thus, in presenting Church teaching on homosexuality, he writes (in the journal Catholic Update): "While many homosexual couples embrace one another sexually and intimately as an expression of their love, it can be argued that such intimate genital embraces are fundamentally created to be heterosexual acts, reserved to those couples pledged to each other for life in the bond of marriage."
The theme of sexuality at this year's congress was taken up by Sister Fran Ferder, a clinical psychologist and co-director of TARA (Therapy and Renewal Associates) in Seattle. For her workshop, "How Can We Become Sexually Liberated? Reclaiming the Bond Between Christian Love and Justice," Sister Fran was joined by the other co-director of TARA, Father John Heagle — her frequent conference partner. A common theme sounded by the sister-priest team is that the Church hasn't gotten it when it comes to sexuality. In an interview appearing on The Social Edge.com, Father Heagle says that his and Sister Fran's hope "is that the institutional Church will only come to this deeper and richer understanding of human sexuality if it listens to the love stories of all the people ... to people for whom loving is their life." And who are these people? "All of us," said Heagle. "But people who've been moral theologians in the past were primarily those who were celibates. They weren't necessarily listening to the voices of married persons, single people, or the gay and lesbian community as well. We not only need to expand our vision of sexuality, but we also need to expand the inclusivity with which we listen to their stories."
On the theme of chastity, Sister Fran told the National Catholic Reporter (August 30, 2002), that "our tradition often uses the two terms chastity and celibacy interchangeably, equating the two. It shows up in teen chastity programs." In these programs, instead of telling "teens to be reverent toward themselves and one another in their relationships," we tell them "to just say no right at the time when their sexual urgency is at its peak." And what is wrong with this, according to Sister Fran? "Chastity," she said, "we think, has less to do with what we do or don't do with our genitals but what we do with our hearts. It has to do with how we treat people in relationships, how much reverence we show ourselves and others. I can be chaste while sexually active or celibate." The "ultimate meaning of chastity," according to Sister Fran, is "sustainable sexuality."
And, of course, Sister Fran sounds the seemingly obligatory call for women priests. Writing in the May 10, 2002 National Catholic Reporter, she says, "central to a more inclusive, open system, is, of course, the need to welcome sacramental ministers from all lifestyles and both genders. It cannot be denied that the Vatican effort to maintain maleness and mandatory celibacy among its clergy has profoundly affected both the number and quality of Catholic priests. In practice, if not by intention, this papacy and its leaders have in effect chosen to keep sexually abusive priests as sacramental ministers rather than open up the priesthood to married men or women."
One is left wondering if the archdiocese knows the character of the speakers it invites to its yearly Religious Education Congress. Except for Gaillardetz and Bishop Trautman, every speaker mentioned in this article has been featured at previous congresses. During the 2002 congress' internet chat, one John Anderegg asked Los Angeles auxiliary bishop Edward Clark this question. "In the past years," said Anderegg, "the Religious Education Congress has had speakers (Fathers Michael Crosby and Patrick Brennan, and Diana Hayes) associated with Call to Action, a group that dissents from Church teaching. Diana Hayes is associated with Women's Ordination Conference. Why does the archdiocese invite such speakers?"
To which, Bishop Clark: "John, I'm not so well informed as to presume to answer this question, being only a neophyte bishop. However, I do know that every speaker must have the endorsement of his or her local bishop and we rely [o]n that endorsement. I know that this is common policy throughout the United States because I have filled out forms this past year for endorsing speakers from Los Angeles to speak in other dioceses. I cannot really give you a better answer than this."