Punditry

From a proposed resolution for VOTF via Matt Abbott.

Whereas, our Church is the entire People of God; and

Whereas, VOTF affirms our mission statement (to provide a prayerful voice, attentive to the Spirit, through which the Faithful can actively participate in the governance and guidance of the Catholic Church) and third goal (to support structural change within the Catholic Church); and

Whereas, the future of the Faith we are called to sustain is dependent upon a supporting structure inclusive of the voices and talents of all the People of God, and

Whereas, the Gospel message of inclusion is diminished by discrimination against more than half of its total membership; and

Whereas, women are excluded not only from governing positions within the Church’s hierarchical structure, but also from many ministerial leadership roles; and

Whereas, the deterrence of future abuses by the hierarchy is dependent on the entire People of God,

THEREFORE, IT IS RESOLVED THAT:

Voice of the Faithful calls for Church-wide discussion on advancing equal access for women to all positions of leadership and ministry within the Catholic Church.

I think I would have more respect with VOTF if they were honest in any way instead of just coming out and demanding women’s ordination they instead hide behind phrases like "leadership and ministry." There was already a discussion and the answer was no. Just what part of no don’t they understand? They blather on and on about priests of integrity, but when it comes to a real priest of integrity like Pope John Paul II they offer zero obedience. Their mask of orthodoxy was never firmly attached so it is no surprise to see it slipping even more.

MONTREAL — A Montreal priest faces a $150 fine after city officials ruled an electronic billboard flashing biblical messages outside his church was a form of advertising.

The Rev. Charles-Eugene Apesteguy said the purpose of the sign is to "bring good news." He said the sign’s messages are not advertising.

Apesteguy’s Roman Catholic parish paid $5,000 for the second-hand electronic billboard. It was installed over the front door in hopes of grabbing the attention of passers-by.

Apesteguy said many people have thanked the church for the messages of hope.

Go out into the whole world and spread the good news, oops is that considered advertising? I wonder if you follow the quote attributed to St. Francis "and if necessary use words" could land you with a fine for spreading the Gospel by your actions? Though many of us might have to worry about false advertising charges when we don’t fully live the Gospel.

Dominican University President Donna M. Carroll has been appointed to serve as a consultant to the Bishops and Presidents Committee of the US Catholic Conference for a three-year term beginning in June 2006.

The mission of the Bishops and Presidents Committee is to advance the Catholic character of Catholic colleges and universities and to recommend strategies that presidents and bishops can employ to develop a positive and collaborative relationship for the good of the church. The committee is made up of five bishops, five presidents and a provost.

So is Dominican University (of Illinois) any kind of template for Catholic identity? Their site seems to be have just the normal boilerplate language used in nominally Catholic universities such as the following from the President’s message.

Dominican is a Catholic university committed to independent thought and respect for divergent opinions. Whatever your personal beliefs, you’ll appreciate our value-centered approach to education that embraces the whole person.

Does anybody know if this school has implemented Ex Corde Ecclesiae? Though maybe I am just too skeptical, but it would have been better if they had appointed somebody from one of the schools that are authentically Catholic and does not shy away from the fact.

Finally, we suspect that the way forward will also include accommodating those who simply refuse to go along and will stand in place and continue to use the same language they’ve been using for decades. Our suspicion is that God will not be terribly upset by a little show of resistance.

So says a National Catholic Reporter editorial. Though I bet if somebody said all there responses in Latin while attending Mass that they would give them quite a look. But hey they would be just using the same language they had been using for decades if they grew up before the council. Tradition is really really important especially if it only goes back 30 years or so. Yes God really wants us not to change to a translation that is more theologically accurate or one that gives him more glory considering that the current translation had gone on a diet from adjectives when it came to referring to our Lord. That they would suggest resistance just goes to show that once again they have no idea what obedience means. The same article laments the liturgical wars and how gracious they say Bishop Trautman is and then they suggest that people just go on using the old translation. Sure that’s one really good suggestion for liturgical unity and ending the liturgical wars.

But what I find so fun with NCR articles is that they are so cliche ridden with venom dripping when the Vatican is mentioned.

"crowd of powerful actors in the Vatican", "managed to overthrow that process", "Short-circuiting a six-year debate", "Of the group that met in secret,", Powers in Rome handpicked a small group of men who in two weeks undid work that had taken dozens of years,” "that was the beginning of the final phase of a coup that upended all of the processes that had been in place since Vatican II"

Being a editorial it is unsigned, but you have to wonder if Dan Brown is now on their editorial board? Though I think he would fit right in with no problem.

Update: Amy Welborn also comments to good effect on this article.

Hillary Clinton and her feminist allies are denouncing what they call a "war on contraception” being waged by the Bush administration.

"There’s a quiet war going on in America against the most basic rights of Americans to make their own personal decisions about family planning,” Clinton wrote in a mass e-mail.

"This war against contraception endangers basic American values.”
[Via The World … IMHO]

Well I guess if selfishness and an avoidance of children has become an "American value" then maybe she is right. Though considering that they keep attacking the President for not being unable to win the war in Iraq they should subsequently have no problem with a "war on contraception" by what they see as his track record. Though I guess the war in Iraq and contraception are both related. A form of contraception is pulling out early.

If only the Bush administration really had a war on contraception, instead of only some minor skirmishes. The so-called war is suppose to be evidenced by the Bush administration’s abstinence program and the FDA and not approving plan B. So I guess their policy is that everybody not only must have sex, but that it also must be contraceptive. More accurate would be to say that Sen. Hillary and many like her are engaging in a war on chastity. The idea of no sex before marriage has become more than just quaint, but something that needs to be vigorously attacked. Dawn Eden’s book The Thrill of the Chaste garnered many attacks across the blogosphere when she printed parts from one of the chapters of her book. This unfortunately is not surprising and is to be expected in our sex-obsessed culture that demands pleasure without consequences.

CALGARY, Alberta, June 26, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Canada’s most out-spoken Catholic Bishop, Bishop Fred Henry of Calgary, is once again making headlines, this time as he comes head to head with the Calgary Catholic School Board.

The dispute between Bishop Henry and the Board is ostensibly over what the bishop says is the immoral practice of using monies raised by means of gambling. On a more fundamental level, however, it is a battle over what right a person or institution has to call themselves Catholic if they will not accede to the Church’s ecclesiastical powers when those powers are acting within the proper bounds of their authority.

In a pastoral letter on the matter, Bishop Henry explains that on December 9th, 2005 he renewed a request that he had made seven years previously—that the Calgary Catholic schools desist from fundraising monies by means of gambling, which, he says “exploits the weak and vulnerable.” On May 31st of this year the board formally refused to acquiesce to the bishop’s request, instead accepting a Task Force’s recommendation that Calgary schools remain free to determine what means to use to fundraise, including gambling.

“The acceptance of the Task Force’s recommendations constitutes a failure in Catholic leadership, pays lip-service to the pillar of ‘Catholicity,’ and is equivalent to Esau selling his birthright for a mess of pottage (cf. Gen. 25:29-34),” writes the bishop in the scathing pastoral letter that leaves little room for loose interpretation.

Ward 2 trustee, Janice Sarich, however, defended the Board’s decision, saying, “The feedback I’ve received from parents…is strongly against any motion that would restrict the flow of money generated by casinos,” according to the Edmonton Sun.

But in the Bishop’s opinion there is no room for negotiation; his request, he makes abundantly clear in the letter, is not a suggestion, but an order, and an order that he has the authority to enforce.

“Morality is not determined by a straw-vote,” he writes. “The School Board, the individual schools, and related parent councils and societies must get out of bingo and casino gambling fundraising activities. There is no question as to ‘what’ has to be done but there is room to negotiate ‘how’ and ‘when.’”

The School Board, and its trustees, says the bishop, must do more than merely “understand where the bishop is coming from.” He goes on to quote the Code of Canon Law—the code of law that governs matters in the Catholic Church—which states, “Even if it really be Catholic no school may bear the title Catholic school without the consent of the competent ecclesiastical authority,” suggesting that as Calgary’s “competent ecclesiastical authority” he would remove his consent for the schools to call themselves Catholic if the Board did not change its mind.

Well the good bishop’s argument is not about the "immoral practice of using monies raised by means of gambling", but instead that "gambling attracts a disproportionate number of welfare recipients, pensioners, and working poor" and that it is "morally wrong for a Catholic institution to formally cooperate in an industry that exploits the weak and vulnerable."

Bishop Henry always writes great pastoral letters.

The Trustees are not a parallel magisterium but accountable to the magisterium. They are not an official teaching body within the Catholic community on faith and morals. As Catholic Trustees, they have to do more than merely “understand where the bishop is coming from.”

The Code of Canon Law in 803 #3 states: “Even if it really be Catholic no school may bear the title Catholic school without the consent of the competent ecclesiastical authority.” A Catholic school is an instrument of the Church and is one in which Catholic education is established, directed, recognized or consented to, by the local bishop, who is competent to issue prescriptions dealing with the general regulation of Catholic schools (Cf. Canon 806#1).

A Catholic school is one in which all instruction and education is grounded in the principles of Catholic doctrine, subject to the authority of the Catholic Church. This dimension of accountability has not been adequately acknowledged by Administration and Trustees.

Their methodology featuring “the round-table” was also wrong. Morality is not determined by a straw-vote, participation was not inclusive of the whole Catholic community, and given the so-called “neutrality” of the trustees, the outcome was predetermined. My objections to the methodology were not considered significant.

Applying Andrew Sullivan’s proposal to the highly charged abortion issue, we might consider referring henceforth to the self-described pro-life contingent within the U.S. Christian community as "pro-birth" rather than as "pro-life."

I first heard this idea raised, in a far different form and context, by Benedictine Sister Joan Chittister, a prolific author and lecturer, on the Easter Sunday installment of NBC’s "Meet the Press."

Many, but surely not all, in the so-called pro-life movement are politically and socially conservative on issues affecting the quality of human life after birth: child care, health insurance, education, housing, safety standards in employment, a clean environment, immigration, non-discrimination based on race, religion, ethnicity and sexual orientation, the right to unionize, equitable tax policies, capital punishment, war and peace.

Indeed, Catholics identified with the self-described pro-life movement have been quick to criticize their own bishops for pressing a consistent-ethic-of-life approach over against one that focuses almost exclusively on abortion, with embryonic stem-cell research, homosexuality, and the continuation of life-sustaining measures (as in the Terri Schiavo case) running not far behind.

Clearly, such Catholics are pro-birth. Whether they are also pro-life in the comprehensive sense that the U.S. Catholic bishops are pro-life is another matter entirely.

It seems that Fr. McBrien becomes even more morally incoherent with each passing column. Now he is spreading the pro-abortion talking point about how pro-lifers only care about pregnant women. Even dumber is that he uses the Terri Schiavo case to buttress his argument that these Catholics are pro-birth and not pro-life. Last I checked Terri Schiavo was already born before they decided to starve her to death. He then goes on to equate support for life with what are quality of life issues. As if abortion and child care are moral equivalents. And of course what he means by child care is a right to demand government funded child care. The other issues brought up are also silly. What was the last time you heard someone who is pro-life demand that the environment get dirtier, that we should discriminate based on race, or that we should have unsafe working environments? These issues are non-sequitors and are thrown out as some kind of proof when it is really evidence of somebody drowned in Democratic party verbiage and who has abandoned reason.

If he is so worried about discrimination based on religion then whey did we never see a column on Massachusetts religious discrimination of Catholic Charities? What about the issue of euthanasia? Why are so-called pro-birth Catholics also against euthanasia? Or is this just a inconvenient fact that didn’t fit in with his column? What about the "pro-birth" Catholics who spend their time volunteering to help the needy? Another inconvenient fact? I don’t know what the actual statistics are, but I would also not be surprised to find that a majority of pro-life Catholics also see the death penalty as something that should be restricted and that it should only be used in very limited circumstances. Looking around just St. Blogs and articles I have read in Catholic periodicals this seems to be the majority opinion on the subject and mostly falls behind the thinking layed out in John Paul II’s encyclical The Gospel of Life.

Fr. McBrien has not offered any analysis but a caricature instead and that in no way advances the culture of life. It is no surprise that he uses the term sexual orientation and then goes on to disparage Catholics because they actually believe what the Church teaches. By his argument Catholics who are pro-abortion can I guess be described as anti-birth but pro-life if they support government-funded child care and OSHA. Again last I checked you have to be born first to experience job safety, clean environments, equitable tax policies, etc.

Gerald also has some good commentary on this article.

A theologian has become the first Swiss woman to be ordained a Roman Catholic priest, despite Church laws decreeing only men can enter the priesthood.

Monika Wyss, a divorced mother of four, feels she has the right to become a priest even though she will probably be excommunicated.

The ceremony, organised by the West European Roman Catholic Womenpriests organisation, took place on Saturday on board a passenger ship on Lake Constance between Switzerland and Germany.

In addition to Wyss, two other women joined the priesthood: Regina Nicolosi, a German living in the United States, and Jane Via, an American. Another woman from the US, who wishes to remain anonymous, was ordained a deacon, a rank below a priest.

For Wyss, currently a deacon, becoming a priest has been a lifelong ambition.

"It was an idea that came to me at the age of 12," she told swissinfo. "At the time, my brothers could be Mass servants but I couldn’t, so I played the priest at home and they were my servants."

Well I guess some things don’t change, she is still play-acting being a priest as a grownup. Though I can see how this attitude has been growing since so many people never get past the idea that fairness means being openly available to both sexes. I guess men can really be equal to women if they can’t get pregnant. In an age that sees the fact that Jesus was a man as unfortunate or a detail that holds no significance the rise of these stories is predictable. The fact that from the Old Testament to the New Testament that it was only men who were ordained to the priesthood is seen as just an cultural artifact despite the fact that the Israelites were surrounded by religions that pretty much all had priestesses. Again I can understand this view since this teaching is one of the more difficult ones to easily understand as to why God choose that only men should be ordained. But the fact is that this is the case and the Church has no ability to change this.

Once again though these mock ceremonies have been on a ship. I guess this has become a tradition for those who have jettisoned tradition or maybe they think by doing this they come under the authority of the Holy Sea. Possibly it is a Freudian slip and and unconscious acknowledgment that there theology is all wet. Though I once parodied this inclination in my Sea Priestess post.

Here is the part of the ceremony where they undergo a lice inspection.

The thing that most annoys me about these articles is that they are usually so gushy with enthusiasm with no critical eye to the facts. Sure sometimes they will quote somebody that the Church just doesn’t have the authority to ordain women, but it is usually just an afterthought sentence. I am sure that if I showed up for work at one of these newspapers and said my lifelong ambition was to be a reporter and I decided I was called to be one at this particular newspaper that they would soon throw me out. They would understandably argue that I had no authority to do this. If I subsequently went around town claiming that I was a reporter working for their paper I am sure that I would be sued or that a court order would be issued to prevent me from such a claim. But if a women decides that she should be a priest and a Catholic priest at that then the paper sees no problem with this situation.

Here is a story via Gerald about how one cause trumps protecting children.

The Roman Catholic dioceses of Los Angeles and Orange have backed away from pledges to prevent pedophiles from working with children by subjecting volunteers to fingerprint background checks, the Los Angeles Times reported Thursday.

Church leaders said they didn’t want to lose illegal immigrant volunteers, who lack the legitimate government-issued photo IDs that are required for the checks.

Volunteer candidates without photo IDs in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles can give a sworn affidavit stating that they have not been convicted of any crime, officials said. In Orange, they can provide a sworn affidavit and two character reference letters.

Because I guess criminals and sex offenders don’t lie.

They’ll be supervised whenever they’re working with children, officials said.

Will the supervisors be fingerprinted or is this a case of who will guard the guards.

Our mother Jesus gives birth to a new creation — and you and I are His children. If we’re going to keep on growing into Christ-images for the world around us, we’re going to have to give up fear. —Bishop-elect Katharine Jefferts Schori

Talk about confusion with referring to Jesus as both mother and being his children. I wonder if she refers to Father Mary?