D
diggerdomer
Guest
Thank you for all your (as usual) thoughtful, informative, and charitable posts on this topic.I agree that female religious life in the USA is in need of renewal, in certain quarters. I will not say that this is true of every congregation. There are some historical points that we must also understand, besides the fact that these congregations are of Pontifical Right.
Until John XXIII, the Church had very little use for the Americans. It was John XXIII who lifted the veil of suspision that the Vatican had of American Catholics. The one thing that really bothered the Vatican is that Amercian Catholics often demonstrated a greater fidelity to their country than to the Church. Patriotism seemed to be a priority over Catholicism in the USA. The Vatican often referred to it as the American heresy, because so many Americans had an attitude of “my country right or wrong.” Today that is no longer the feeling of the Vatican. There is an American in every commission, department and sacred congregation and there are even some American Cardinals who are papbili. That would have been anathema before John XXIII.
The atttention that the Church in Rome paid to the American Catholic was minimal. She did not trust us. We were too patriotic and too ingrained in our ideals of self-determination and independence. Unfortunately, many of the sisters confirmed this suspicion when they affirmed that they did not need the supervision of religious superiors, but could govern themselves, because they were more mature and more independent than their counterparts in other countries. Talk about a setback in Vatican-USA relations.
The other historical fact is that the average American bishop resented intervention from the Vatican. This was long before Vatican II. The Vatican had to walk gingerly around them or risk an American schism. The modern solution that John Paul II adopted was to consecrate more bishops from religious orders. This helps, because religious orders do not have national ties. Orders like the Jesuits, OMI, Franciscans, Dominicans, Carmelites and Benedictines are used to dealing with an international perspective, since they are international communities and most of their leadership is foreign. These men are more used to thinking beyond the USA and their fidelity is to their order, not to the USA. John Paul wanted to separate the bishops from their “Americanism” and find more bishops that were Catholic first. There have been a number of other consecrations of secular priests who also have a broader pespective, not just religious. But these issues did have to be addressed before you could address the reform of the Catholic Church in America. We needed bishops who were more faithful to the Vatican than to the local culture to gain their support. The task is far from complete, but it’s getting there. In fact, two of the bishops that they placed on the Congregation for Religious are both Capuchin Franciscan friars: Cardinal O’Malley and Archbishop Chaput. There is also a Jesuit and a Dominican friar who are also bishops. These men understand religious life in the broader sense, because they belong to international communities and they understand the Vatican.
The process is very complex and has taken a long time to set up the infrastructure needed to deal with the issues of women religious in the USA. It is also interesting that the women religious who are in “trouble” are those who belong to American congregations, not those who belong to international congregations. I’m not sure what the phenomenon is, but I find it interesting.
Fraternally,
Br. JR, OSF
I think part of what annoyed me from the article is the statement that initially the USCCB was told they would not have to pay, now they’re basically being asked to pay. Your point about the cost compared to the Catholic population in the U.S. has some merit, but I don’t think it’s ultimately a key point.
I think this is yet another huge perception gaffe.
I still think it’s questionable about why the Vatican is sponsoring not one but TWO investigations. And why does the LCWR seem to be the focus, yet not the CMSWR?
There seems to be more “behind the scenes” info than was released to the public. This can only fuel speculation and division, imho (you can see what I mean by some of the outrageous and provocative responses on this thread). You seem to have a very good insight into some of the background of an issue like this, I appreciate your sharing it. I’m frustrated, though, why more candor and honesty isn’t available to the public from the Vatican and Church authorities involved.
I mean, what is the public going to think? The whole world knows about the scandal of the sexual abuse crisis, and how in so many ways the institutional Church’s response to this was often slow and inadequate (and still may be). And that’s an issue that no one I know of says is not a problem. Now, apparently (and I emphasize that, apparently…there may be good reasons but they have not been made public) the Vatican has initiated two distinct investigations of women religious in the U.S. So many were hurt by the sexual abuse scandal, and have been left without redress or closure. I am sure there are some women religious who are conducting themselves outside the norms of the Catholic faith, but I don’t see that any such cases could be anywhere near the significance and scandal that the sexual abuse crisis has caused. The Vatican initiated no such investigation of sexually abusive clerics and religious (yes, the visited Seminaries, but that’s certainly not addressing those who perpetrated such acts).
Again, thank you for your contributions, I appreciate them.
But it is what it is: “Americanism” at its fullest. I think that in order to solve the problem of unorthodoxy at hand (at least in the U.S.), there must be at least one component of emphasizing God over country. Of course, there are many other causes of this lack of faith among American Catholics, but no one seems to be doing anything about this part of the monster. (Unless anyone would like to tell me of such a book/group/anything else that is doing so. . . .)