Do the National Bishop Conferences Serve the Greater Good?

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"The Pope will be with us in less than 24 hours, and to a worrying extent the success of his visit depends on how he portrays himself during his four-day visit. A great man is arriving here, but his representatives in Britain are only dimly aware of his intellectual stature and so the groundwork has simply not been done.

The media have paid lots of attention to the bungling of the “papal visit team” over the past few months. But it’s worth putting that incompetence in the broader context of the failure of the bishops of England, Wales and Scotland to come to terms with the figure of Joseph Ratzinger. Most of them didn’t want him to become Pope. Their chief source of information about him was the Tablet, which spent 20 years misrepresenting his activities at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Even now, I doubt that many bishops are familiar with the theology of Pope Benedict, who is an important Christian intellectual quite irrespective of the position he holds.

Benedict has devoted more time to exploring the relationship of Christianity to Western civilisation than any of his predecessors. His vision of the magisterium is blindingly intense compared to the muddled, dumbed-down apologetics we associate with the Catholic Church in England and Wales, in episcopal terms one of the most intellectually impoverished in the world. The following quotation from the Ratzinger scholar Fr Aidan Nichols hints at the richness of Benedict’s thought:"

more: blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/damianthompson/100053705/this-pope-is-a-great-man-badly-served-by-bishops-unfamiliar-with-his-writings/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter
 
The suffering Church, what else is knew? it is not just in england it is everywhere. the bishops after VII decided to go their own way, and took many with them also. does that sound like a revolt like that one of ML? yes, it does.
 
I second the “NO”. The Bishops conferences diffuse the authority of the magesterium and the Holy Father. When a sitting Pope has to tip-toe around a group of Bishops to “encourage” them to adhere to Papal Encyclicals and directions, there is a problem. This created layer of bureaurcracy clouds the faithful as to whom we should listen to: The Chair of Peter or a ego driven group of Bishops with their own agenda.

these quotes from:
romancatholicblog.typepad.com/roman_catholic_blog/2007/03/index.html

“When there is an imminent danger for the Faith, Prelates must be questioned, even publicly, by their subjects.” ~ **St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica II, II, q. 33, a. 4 **
“It is better that scandals arise than the truth be suppressed.” ~ Pope St. Gregory the Great
“When circumstances make it necessary, it is not prelates alone who have to watch over the integrity of the faith.” ~ Pope Leo XIII

“The road to hell is paved with the skulls of erring priests, with bishops as their signposts.” ~ St. John Chrysostom (347-407), Doctor of the Church, generally considered the most prominent doctor of the Greek Church and the greatest preacher ever heard in a Christian pulpit.
“The floor of hell is paved with the skulls of bishops.” ~ St. Athanasius
“The road to hell is paved with the skulls of bishops.” ~ Saint John Eudes

“But how, I ask, does it happen that the saints, who live only for God, resist their ordination through a sense of their unworthiness, and that some run blindly to the priesthood, and rest not until they attain it by lawful or unlawful means? Ah. Unhappy men! Says St. Bernard, to be registered among the priests of God shall be for them the same as to be enrolled on the catalogue of the damned. And why? Because such persons are generally called to the priesthood, not by God, but by relatives, by interest, or ambition. Thus they enter the house of God, not through the motive a priest should have, but through worldly motives. Behold why the faithful are abandoned, the Church dishonored, so many souls perish, and with them such priests are also damned.” ~ St. Alphonsus de Liguori (1696-1787), Doctor of the Church (Moral Theology), Founder of the Redemptorist congregation

many of these quotes were believed to be leveled at the arian bishops for leading many faithful into heresy. Times may change, but the problems do not.
 
dmorgan said:
I second the “NO”. The Bishops conferences diffuse the authority of the magesterium and the Holy Father. When a sitting Pope has to tip-toe around a group of Bishops to “encourage” them to adhere to Papal Encyclicals and directions, there is a problem. This created layer of bureaurcracy clouds the faithful as to whom we should listen to: The Chair of Peter or a ego driven group of Bishops with their own agenda.

these quotes from:
romancatholicblog.typepad.com/roman_catholic_blog/2007/03/index.html

“When there is an imminent danger for the Faith, Prelates must be questioned, even publicly, by their subjects.” ~ **St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica II, II, q. 33, a. 4 **
“It is better that scandals arise than the truth be suppressed.” ~ Pope St. Gregory the Great
“When circumstances make it necessary, it is not prelates alone who have to watch over the integrity of the faith.” ~ Pope Leo XIII

“The road to hell is paved with the skulls of erring priests, with bishops as their signposts.” ~ St. John Chrysostom (347-407), Doctor of the Church, generally considered the most prominent doctor of the Greek Church and the greatest preacher ever heard in a Christian pulpit.
“The floor of hell is paved with the skulls of bishops.” ~ St. Athanasius
“The road to hell is paved with the skulls of bishops.” ~ Saint John Eudes

“But how, I ask, does it happen that the saints, who live only for God, resist their ordination through a sense of their unworthiness, and that some run blindly to the priesthood, and rest not until they attain it by lawful or unlawful means? Ah. Unhappy men! Says St. Bernard, to be registered among the priests of God shall be for them the same as to be enrolled on the catalogue of the damned. And why? Because such persons are generally called to the priesthood, not by God, but by relatives, by interest, or ambition. Thus they enter the house of God, not through the motive a priest should have, but through worldly motives. Behold why the faithful are abandoned, the Church dishonored, so many souls perish, and with them such priests are also damned.” ~ St. Alphonsus de Liguori (1696-1787), Doctor of the Church (Moral Theology), Founder of the Redemptorist congregation

many of these quotes were believed to be leveled at the arian bishops for leading many faithful into heresy. Times may change, but the problems do not.
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Very nice quotes, wish we could send these out to some of the Bishops who instead worrying about the state of their flock, they worry more about politics and “social justice”.

I agree on the no response, I feel these organizations get in the way on the road to salvation. My mom once asked her very traditional priest when she was a young girl, “but father how do I know if I am doing what the Church wants me to do, and not being lied to by another priest?” the priest responded, “daughter, when in doubt always look towards the Pope, and put your life in the hands of God.”
 
I never understood the point of them, to be honest. It always seemed to me like the bishops had eroded their own power within their particular diocese by banding together like that. What was the particular reason behind their creation?
 
FrancisB said:
I never understood the point of them, to be honest. It always seemed to me like the bishops had eroded their own power within their particular diocese by banding together like that. What was the particular reason behind their creation?
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That’s sort of the point. The point is to promote unity within national regions on issues that are within the bishops’ competence to determine. These are questions that Rome has not taken control of, but on which it’s good that there aren’t big differences from one state or province in a country to the next. So Canada, for instance, can have a national hymnal, which, as I understand it, isn’t mandatory, but is widely used and is the same from Newfoundland to the Yukon.

Bishops’ conferences also allow the bishops to combine their resources. It would be very difficult for every individual diocese to develop and publish a quality hymnal, and it might be very complex to coordinate such things as national variations to the Missal (saints’ days and propers, a national calendar, etc.), if there were not a nationwide bureaucratic structure to deal with it. It is also more effective for the bishops to coordinate and consolidate functions like lobbying the national legislature for desired change.

I really don’t know what the possible objection could be to bishops’ conferences, but I’m guessing it is born out of (1) the mistaken theory that they have usurped too much power that should “rightly” be centralized in Rome, or conversely (2) the mistaken belief that they have more power than they do, with resultant disappointment that their do not use their “great” power to accomplish the goals the objectors think are important.
 
We had hymnals before we had bishops’ conferences, did we not? In fact, I have several old hymnals from those days. They had in the front of them imprimantur (or imprimaturs, if you prefer) that said they were fit to be printed. I have looked at the hymnals at our church and at other churches I’ve attended. They no longer seem to carry such a mark or soundness.

It’s not that I object to them so much as I don’t see the point. Collegiality doesn’t know national borders and I don’t know what issues could possibly affect one country and not another, save those that are purely political. I could understand conferences established to standardise the use of particular vernacular languages, but not those based on political borders.

And it is still ultimately the job a bishop to tend to his flock, so ultimately I don’t see how a conference could bind a member bishop to anything. That, to me, seems like something only the pope could do.
 
FrancisB said:
We had hymnals before we had bishops’ conferences, did we not? In fact, I have several old hymnals from those days. They had in the front of them imprimantur (or imprimaturs, if you prefer) that said they were fit to be printed. I have looked at the hymnals at our church and at other churches I’ve attended. They no longer seem to carry such a mark or soundness.

It’s not that I object to them so much as I don’t see the point. Collegiality doesn’t know national borders and I don’t know what issues could possibly affect one country and not another, save those that are purely political. I could understand conferences established to standardise the use of particular vernacular languages, but not those based on political borders.

And it is still ultimately the job a bishop to tend to his flock, so ultimately I don’t see how a conference could bind a member bishop to anything. That, to me, seems like something only the pope could do.
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Good points. It has been argued that collegiality carried to its extreme could cause schisms or threaten to. We saw where that possibilty existed just before the release of Summorum Pontificum of 2007.
 
FrancisB said:
We had hymnals before we had bishops’ conferences, did we not? In fact, I have several old hymnals from those days. They had in the front of them imprimantur (or imprimaturs, if you prefer) that said they were fit to be printed. I have looked at the hymnals at our church and at other churches I’ve attended. They no longer seem to carry such a mark or soundness.
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As far as I know, all the major hymnals in the United States carry an imprimatur. That said, it’s not a mark of approval of the music; it’s a bare-minimum guarantee that nothing in the book constitutes heresy. Anyway, I’m talking about what they have in Canada, which is a national hymnal developed by the bishops’ conference, and not what we have in the U.S., which is a variety of hymnals published by whatever companies think they can make a profit by doing it.
It’s not that I object to them so much as I don’t see the point. Collegiality doesn’t know national borders and I don’t know what issues could possibly affect one country and not another, save those that are purely political. I could understand conferences established to standardise the use of particular vernacular languages, but not those based on political borders.
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As one example, you don’t think it’s important for the bishops in a nation to coordinate their lobbying of state and federal legislatures on issues that affect the Church? Clearly our bishops think it’s worth the effort; what are they missing here? And your point about languages has little to do with national saints’ days, patronal days, propers, etc., which concern the nation, not the language.

I find it strange that people who are not in charge of running dioceses and collaborating with other bishops will sit here and say, “Gee, I just don’t see the point” – intended to convey “I think there isn’t a point” – when the church itself, and all our bishops, and all the bishops in other countries, who deal with these issues on an everyday basis, clearly do see the point.
 
I can tell you for certain that I have not seen a hymnal printed in the last 20 years that had the imprimatur printed in it. I can’t tell you that there are none, or if they have been given an imprimatur but not printed them. All I can say is that I look every time I open a hymnal I’ve not seen before, and I haven’t seen one in a long time. Judging from some of the heretical texts that I’ve found in said hymnals, I somehow doubt that they have been granted any guarantee of doctrinal correctness, but again, I am not sure.

And your point about the usefulness of the conferences is well made. But I am genuinely still confused as to the need for them. I’m not trying to suggest that we don’t need them. I just don’t understand it. We got by for centuries without them in times when communication was much more difficult than it is now. Still, the bishops then managed to address all of these needs. Of course I would not on any grounds suggest they should not exist; if for no other reason then the bishops, each the head of their particular diocese, have decided to gather together and standardise things. I would not object to a bishop’s conference that was comprised of a bishop from Haiti, two bishops from Russia, a bishop from Tanzania, and three Canadian bishops either, but I do not see what help it could be.
 
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