Jeffrey Miller

Lets play a game of guess the charism.
 Pick the religious order by using the following clues of what
they offer.

• Therapeutic Massage
• La Stone Therapy
• Craniosacral Therapy
• Maya Abdominal Self-Care Workshops
• Australian Bush Flower Essence Practitioner
• Healing the Light Body Shamanic Practices
• Maya Abdominal Massage
• Introduction To Raw Food
• Native American Ceremonies
• Energy Medicine Sessions
• Reiki Sessions
• Lymphatic Drainage
• An Indepth Look At The Chakras
• Therapeutic massage with emphasis on trigger point,
  chiropractic modalities, medical massage and relaxation techniques
  enhancing circulation and the immune system 
• Dances of Universal Peace
• Animal Spirits/Animal Guides
• Reflecting On Reconciliation in a Quantum Universe

What you can’t easily pick what
religious order this is by a listing of what they are teaching and
practicing? Of course with new agey Dominicans and Franciscans it is
harder to determine which one has gone further around the bend.

Catholicism is sometimes associated
with rosary beads, statues, Latin Masses and novenas.

But this brand of Catholicism centers on meditation, dream work, global
spirituality and inner peace.

Under the umbrella term Collaborative Ministries, the Wheaton
Franciscans offer an ongoing series of programs and classes at Maura
Hall on the campus of Marianjoy Rehabilitation Hospital in Wheaton. The
program focuses on spiritual development and the healing arts.

“We were involved with ministries across the United States, and we
thought it was time to reach out to our immediate community,” said
Sister Gabriele Uhlein, who helped launch Collaborative Ministries in
2005. “It was our dream to provide a venue for spirituality to the
public.”

The name originated from the collaboration of the Wheaton Franciscan
Sisters and their covenant members, a group of laypeople who have a
special relationship with the sisters in their desire to follow the
traditions of St. Francis of Assisi and St. Clare.

“Collaborative Ministries is grounded in the Franciscan dimension,”
Uhlein said. “St. Francis had a tremendous respect for God’s creation,
and we wanted Collaborative Ministries to reflect that.”

Some Franciscans seem to over-emphasize one aspect of Francis’
spirituality to the detriment of the rest of it.  Too much
Brother Sun, Sister Moon and not enough Mother Church and God the Father.
 Francis’ love of creation was due to his love of the creator.
Going through the Wheaton Franciscan’s site the most
you hear about Jesus and Mary is in there name Province of the
International Congregation of the Franciscan Sisters, Daughters of the
Sacred Heart of Jesus and Mary.

Though maybe I am being a little hard on them.  After
all when you want to hear about animal spirit guides surely the first
place you would go is the Catechism, or maybe not.  I say
Shaman on them for such as travesty.

They also prove my rule about Progressive Catholic Religious
web sites – that you will always find a link to the United Nations and
never to the Vatican. Something that Fr. Powell has also recently discovered
concerning the United Nations Millennium Development Goals and
Dominican sites and publications.

Two Catholic women are being ordained
by
Roman Catholic Womenpriests here Nov. 11, prompting outrage from Catholic officials — outrage
that, surprisingly, is directed less at the women aspiring to the
Catholic priesthood, or at the movement ordaining them, than toward a
rabbi who agreed to host the event.

The women to be ordained are Elsie Hainz McGrath, a retired writer and
editor for a Catholic publishing house, and Rose Marie Dunn Hudson, a
former teacher. Bishop Patricia Fresen, who was for many years a
Dominican nun, ordained the women as deacons Aug. 12 and will perform
the ceremony here. The women are among a growing number of deacons,
priests and bishops ordained in the Roman Catholic Womenpriests
movement. Based on responses to formal invitations, Hudson said
organizers are expecting 300 to 400 to attend.

Noting that ordaining women is forbidden by Catholic canon law, St.
Louis Archbishop Raymond Burke wrote to Rabbi Susan Talve, senior rabbi
at Central Reform Congregation — the synagogue host — urging her to
revoke her offer of hospitality. Meanwhile, the director of the
archdiocesan Office of Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs, Fr.
Vincent A. Heier, has excoriated Talve for her role, likening it to a
Catholic pastor inviting a Holocaust denier to speak, and describing
Talve�s action as a major setback to the area�s strong, hard-won
Jewish-Catholic relations.

The president of the St. Louis Rabbinical Association, Rabbi Mark
Fasman finds it inappropriate for a synagogue to host an event no
Catholic parish would allow and, though stressing that he speaks only
for himself, acknowledged that among rabbis he is not alone. He is
worried that what should be a Catholic issue — whether women can be
ordained — will provoke a backlash against Jews.

I doubt there will be any such
backlash, but I am glad for the statement.



But in some ways this is quite
appropriate.  After all they are only imitating the women
priests that they had in in Levitical priesthood.  Oh wait –
that didn’t happen.  Funny how God can be so consistent.

Hudson, a longtime teacher, was
certified by the St. Louis archdiocese
as a lay pastoral minister in 1998, after completing a two-year
formation program, and received a master�s degree in pastoral studies
in an extension program offered by Loyola University, New Orleans. She
was the first woman to serve as parish council president at her former
parish, St. Joseph Catholic Church in Farmington, Mo.

McGrath worked with the St. Louis archdiocese to develop a family life
commission, earned an undergraduate degree in theology at St. Louis
University while working as a secretary in the theology department in
the 1980s. Invited to join the editorial staff at Liguori, the Catholic
publishing house, she stayed for 12 years, while earning a master�s
degree from Aquinas Institute of Theology in 2002. Her late husband was
an ordained deacon in the St. Louis archdiocese, and she attended
courses with him throughout a rigorous formation program.