Civility in the church, in the culture

Following up on my previous post regarding the attacks on Fr James Martin, SJ, I think we can view these as a microcosm of the ugly social media driven fracturing of our civil polis.  And it's not just in the US.

Writing in La Croix, an international Catholic daily, Massimo Faggioli comments

The cancellation does not only concern Fr Martin and the Church’s LGBT community. Actually, it should worry all Catholics. That is not only because this was the third time that the Jesuit was disinvited from giving a previously arranged lecture. More seriously, it was linked to a campaign of hatred and personal attacks against the priest. 

This sort of vitriol is profoundly changing the communion of the Catholic Church. And not just in its ethos, but also in the way it functions. It signals a new kind of censorship that uses verbal violence to intimidate individual Catholics, as well as institutions within the Church – institutions that exist (also) to protect the rights of Catholics.
...
These cyber militants are not alone. Rather, they are part of the “age of anger” from which the Catholic Church is not immune. 

I don't know if you venture into Twitter very often, but it's a hells cape of over reaction, lies, and on line attacks.  The recent "Memo" nothing-burger was driven by social media, and now those reacting are doxing the FISA judge (doxing means to post personal information of a target such as their address, as an attempt to threaten them).  The Catholic "cyber militants" at least don't seem to be driven by Russian bots.  It's perhaps more concerning that they are real people.

The Most Dangerous Catholic Priest

I don't know if you follow Roman Catholic news much these days, but it is fascinating to see the same kinds of cultural divisions and battles occur in the American RC church as in our culture at large, particularly the vehemence of the hard right.  They are united in loathing the more merciful style of Pope Francis, after the hard culture warrior years of JPII and Benedict.

But their current bugbear is a thoughtful Jesuit named Fr James Martin.

And every time he is invited to speak somewhere, the hard right Catholics roll out the hate calls and hate mail, to try to silence him. Sadly it works, more often than not.  (Interesting irony that these people are probably the same ones complaining that conservatives are silenced on college campuses.)

Frank Bruni tells us more:

What’s Father Martin’s unconscionable sin? In his most recent book, “Building a Bridge,” which was published in June, he calls on Catholics to show L.G.B.T. people more respect and compassion than many of them have demonstrated in the past. 

That’s all. That’s it. He doesn’t say that the church should bless gay marriage or gay adoption. He doesn’t explicitly reject church teaching, which prescribes chastity for gay men and lesbians, though he questions the language — “intrinsically disordered” — with which it describes homosexuality.

Think about it. Simply asking people to be kinder is enough for this guy to be attacked and accused.

San Diego's RC Bishop Robert McElroy isn't having it.  Writing in  America, he says

[A]longside .... legitimate and substantive criticism of Father Martin’s book, there has arisen both in Catholic journals and on social media a campaign to vilify Father Martin, to distort his work, to label him heterodox, to assassinate his personal character and to annihilate both the ideas and the dialogue that he has initiated.

This campaign of distortion must be challenged and exposed for what it is—not primarily for Father Martin’s sake but because this cancer of vilification is seeping into the institutional life of the church....The coordinated attack on Building a Bridge must be a wake-up call for the Catholic community to look inward and purge itself of bigotry against the L.G.B.T. community. If we do not, we will build a gulf between the church and L.G.B.T. men and women and their families. Even more important, we will build an increasing gulf between the church and our God.

McElroy, like Cardinal Cupich in Chicago, is decidedly a "Francis Bishop": open to voices and relationship.  Since being appointed, he has made a point of reaching out to many communities, which is wonderfully ironic, given that the evils of proposition 8 (the anti-marriage equality campaign in California in 2008) was largely driven by a previous San Diego Bishop, now Archbishop of San Francisco Salvatore Cordileone.  I suspect Abp Cordileone won't be getting a red cardinal's hat from Pope Francis.  Wouldn't it be delicious if McElroy did?

But the sad fact is that the hard right Catholics, like their Evangelical brethren, think that any kindness to LGBT people is evil.  They truly hate us.

Another purge: one sin above all others.

Well, another teacher has been purged from a Roman Catholic school for daring to have married her same sex partner, this time in New Jersey.

Drumgoole “was not terminated because of her sexual orientation,” the motion says. “Instead, she was terminated for violating the Ministerial Policies and the Code of Ethics – in failing to abide by the tenets of the Roman Catholic faith, i.e. by entering into a same sex marriage.

And, you know, they are entitled to do so.  The courts have found that religious schools have broad rights in this regard.  But it's strange that they are so selective about which violation gets one axed.

Drumgoole also says that several Paramus Catholic faculty members are divorced, at least one has a child out of wedlock, various employees cohabitate with members of the opposite sex, at least one other teacher is gay, and nude photographs of another teacher have been circulated online. 

She says she feels as though she was singled out. “There are people who are living lives that go against the tenets of the church and they’re still employed there,” Drumgoole said in an interview.

One sin above all others.

See here for our other posts on the purges.

The Life of the Mother

In 2012, people were horrified when a woman named Savita Halappanavar died in an Irish hospital from infection as a consequence of miscarriage at 17 weeks.  There was no question that the fetus would not survive, but Irish law was adamant that until the fetus was actually dead, or the mother nearly dead, they could not terminate the pregnancy.  Mark you, there was no chance of survival for the fetus at this point. But still they waited, until the infection from the dying fetus became sepsis and killed the mother.

In court, this was ruled "medical misadventure".  One specialist said that if they had terminated the pregnancy a day or two earlier, it would have saved the mother's life.  This disdain for a woman's life sparked calls for reform of Irish abortion laws.

Turns out that Roman Catholic hospitals in this country  do the same thng.  This report from Michigan details 5 women in similar condition to Savita.  It's just lucky none of them died. My emphasis:

All five women, the report says, had symptoms indicating that it would be safest for them to deliver immediately. But instead of informing the women of their options, the report says, or offering to transfer them to a different hospital, doctors – apparently out of deference to the Mercy Health Partners’ strict ban on abortion – unilaterally decided to subject the women to prolonged miscarriages.  

As a result, the report claims, several of the women suffered infection or emotional trauma, or had to undergo unnecessary surgery. None of the women were pregnant beyond 24 weeks, when an infant can survive outside the womb. 

The report has not previously been made public. And it offers a disturbing look at how religious restrictions may interfere with emergency care. Catholic control of US hospitals has ballooned in the last 15 years, and with it, patient advocates warn, the risk that the US Bishops’ bans on abortion, contraception and sterilization will prevent thousands of women from receiving critical healthcare.

What these tragic cases all have in common is a Roman Catholic mandated disdain for the lives of women over a dead or dying infant--and in all cases, this a wanted child.  It ultimately treats women as a container and if she dies along the way (along with her fetus, we might add, because the baby's death is inevitable in these cases), oh so sad too bad.  Better that, than a woman survives a tragic loss and perhaps has another child.  Better that, than she survives to take care of her other children.  And it's this disdain that is so frightening.

Now, people of good will can reasonably disagree about limits on abortion (vilifying one another is not helpful so behave yourselves in the comments).  The majority of Americans agrees that abortion should be legal, at least under some circumstances, even if they personally do not think it's moral. Generally, people are more comfortable with abortion in the first trimester,  as early as possible, or in case of rape or incest.  (Aside: The rape-incest exception is logically inconsistent if you are a pro-lifer, however:  a baby is a baby, right?  However, the majority is very clear that abortion in this case is okay). Most are comfortable with increasing restrictions later on.  And, Americans strongly believe that it should be legal if the woman's physical life is endangered. So then, I guess the question is, how endangered does endangered have to be?  And the answer is, ask Savita's husband.

I don't think women get abortions on a whim.  Some of the most heartbreaking abortion stories were collected by Andrew Sullivan about women whose most wanted child turned out to have life-ending defects, or who had severe medical challenges to the mother, that made abortion a necessary and very painful medical choice. These should be read.  I would never, ever want the government to interfere with a woman's right to that choice and her own bodily integrity.   (Aside:  Of course, if you want to reduce women choosing abortions for other than health reasons, then reduce unwanted pregnancy by providing decent sex education and contraceptive access, and provide educational and economic opportunities for women and their families.  Family leave and day care,  decent jobs and education for example.  Otherwise, as Sr Joan Chittister writes, you are pro-birth, not pro-life.)  

Meanwhile, there's another tragedy blooming in South and Central America, where Zika virus is linked to increased microcephaly:  children born with abnormally small heads. (BTW, it is not caused by a pesticide; so don't go there.)  This may have little effect on the child, or lead to profound developmental defects-- impossible to tell.  Countries like El Salvador have recommended that women not get pregnant till 2018, which is not realistic in a poor predominantly Roman Catholic country with poor contraceptive access, and criminalization of abortion.  You really think the men of El Salvador are going to forgo sex for 2 years? And impoverished women with poor healthcare access, just how will they raise a disabled child? And so terrified women who are already pregnant are seeking chemical abortions. 

You know, here's the challenge for the pro-birth side to prove that they're really pro life.  Don't want to see abortion?  Get boots on the ground in Central and South America to provide contraception. (Even the Pope agrees.)  And provide care for pregnant women and support for raising potentially severely disabled children.

Otherwise, both of these examples simply show religiously-justified disdain for the rights, health and lives of women.

Angry Catholics

Recently, the Roman Catholic Church completed a Synod on the Family, which was full of Bishops, politics and manipulation.  At one point, a scathing letter was written by 13 of the Bishops and then denied by some of them.  Columnists like Rob Dreher and Ross Douthat wring their hands about schism.  Not surprisingly, much of the fear and loathing is over the possibility of a more merciful approach to divorced-remarried Catholics (who are denied Communion), or LGBT people.  Conservatives are openly opposing Pope Francis, with a vehemence and anger that Vatican watchers consider unprecedented.  And all these, even though nothing has really changed.

Fr James Martin looks at the hysteria.  He is shocked at the spite, and identifies four reasons.

First,  Catholics today often conflate dogma, doctrine and practice.

....In the past few decades, we have seen these three categories collapsed together, at least in the popular Catholic imagination. It is as if every teaching is seen as dogma. And this has had disastrous effects. Because a change in one is seen as an attack on everything....

Second, change itself may be difficult for some Catholics because it threaten one's idea of a stable church. Yet the church has always changed. Not in its essentials, but in some important practices, as it responds to what Jesus called the "signs of the times."

.....Third, a darker reason for the anger: a crushing sense of legalism of the kind that Jesus warned against. Sadly, I see this evident in our church, and it is ironic to find this in those who hew to the Gospels because this is one of the clearest things that Jesus opposed....

Fourth, even darker reasons for the anger: a hatred of LGBT Catholics that masks itself as a concern for their souls, a desire to shut out divorced and remarried because they are "sinful" and should be excluded from the church's communion, and a self-righteousness and arrogance that closes one off to the need for mercy. ]

He concludes,

Fear of change holds the church back. And it does something worse. It removes love from the equation. In the past few weeks I have seen this fear lead to suspicion, mistrust and hate. And at the heart of this, I believe, is fear.

As St. Paul said, perfect love drives out fear. But perfect fear drives out love.

In another article, in America Magazine (the Jesuit Magazine), Fr Martin has more to say about these angry Catholics:

I’m disgusted with malicious slandering that passes itself off as thoughtful theology. I’m disgusted with mean-spirited personal attacks that pass themselves off as Christian discourse. I’m disgusted with the facile use of words like “heresy” and “schism” and “apostate,” passing itself off as defenses of the faith. Basically, I’m disgusted with hate being passed off as charity. ....

That is not theology, and it does not flow from the love of Jesus Christ. It is a malicious desire to wound people and to score points. And if you think it’s amusing, then you’re missing Jesus’s point about not calling people names, and always praying for our “enemies.” And by the way, if you take Jesus should be your model, and feel the need to judge people, and call them names, like “hypocrite,” feel free to do so when you are the sinless Son of God. We risk being so Catholic that we forget to be Christian.
 

Time for the Catholic ban on contraception to go?

Writing in the Washington Post,  Peter Steinfels  argues that the Catholic church needs to get rid of its ban on contraception to make any progress on issue of sexual morality.

The church’s unwillingness to grapple with a deep and highly visible gap between official teaching and actual practice undermines Catholic vigor and unity at every level. It encourages Catholics to disregard all manner of other teachings, including those on marriage and abortion. If the church wants to restore its moral authority, it must address this gnawing question..... 

Sociologists, theologians, pastors and bishops have dated a sapping of Catholic confidence in other church teachings about sexuality, and indeed in church authority in general, to the 1968 encyclical. Some researchers have linked frustration over the measure with declines in church attendance, financial contributions and parental support for sons to enter the priesthood. The prominent Catholic theologian Bernard Haring went so far as to write that “no papal teaching document has ever caused such an earthquake in the Church as the encyclical ‘Humanae Vitae.’ ” 

Many Catholics now disregard the church’s teachings on premarital sex, same-sex unions and divorce. According to a recent Pew poll, 70 percent of American Catholics believe it’s acceptable for same-sex couples to live together, and 86 percent say premarital cohabitation among heterosexual couples is fine. Fewer than half say homosexual behavior or remarriage without annulment is a sin. 

Meanwhile, an outspoken conservative minority insists on making opposition to contraception a litmus test for separating “faithful Catholics” from “dissenters,” and the past two popes seemed to count it far more than many other qualifications in naming new bishops. In short, the contraception issue has injected paralyzing doses of tension, suspicion, dissemblance and dysfunction throughout Catholic life.

  If the Catholics relaxed their strictures against contraception (which they ALMOST DID in the 60s), what else would change?

A twist in the latest Catholic school purges

Well, another month, more purges of Roman Catholic school teachers.  There was the married lesbian in Philadelphia who had worked for 8 years (married the whole time, to the knowledge of her school) but fired when a disgruntled parent reported her to the Archbishop.   The usual outcome;  the teacher was fired, there is bad press for the school, some parents and children are angry, the principal wrings her hands and says "we had no choice".

The in Portland, Oregon, St Mary's Academy found out that their new hire is lesbian and although not married, might some day like to marry as we often do.  They rescinded her contract and offered her six month's salary as hush money which she did not take.  It hits the press. Predictable outrage ensues.  Except, Portland being Portland, a lot of the students, alumni, and particularly big donors are pro-LGBT rights.

Interestingly the school reversed itself, and its Board unanimously put sexual orientation into its non-discrimination policy.   The position in question has been filled but they have reached out to the would-be employee.

"Conversations" with the Archdiocese are ongoing, but both the school and the Archdiocese warn that the school may lose its Catholic association over this.

Well well well.  This is one of the first Catholic schools to stand up to the purge of married LGBT people (and note, this would-be employee wasn't even married yet!)  although some of the colleges have accepted same sex marrieds (e.g., Fordham, Notre Dame).   We'll have to see what happens to St Mary's Academy.  And all this in the context of an impending visit from Pope Francis to the US.

Purge,denunciation, witch hunt

We have long noted the purges of gay teachers,  musicians, and others who work in Catholic schools or in lay positions, for breaking the Roman Catholic "Don't Ask Don't Tell" and getting married or otherwise coming out.  While it is the right of the church to do this, it is extremely distasteful.

But now it has moved from purge to witch hunt. New Ways Ministry, a pro-gay Catholic ministry, reports:

A Catholic Relief Services (CRS) employee has resigned amid controversy over his same-gender marriage.

Estridge is not a Catholic, and his job did not involve decisions which affected mission, so church affiliation and faith were not a requirement for his employment.

....Estridge’s resignation comes as the result of a vicious witch hunt launched by an anti-LGBT Catholic individual. The release of Estridge’s marriage license, including personal information like his home address, was [an]  intentional act .... he admits he targeted Estridge because he believes only Catholics in conformity with a strict interpretation of the faith should be working for the church. 

...Because this case was resolved by a gay employee losing his job, this type of resolution may ultimately encourage right wing activists’ targeting of LGBT church workers — a dangerous precedent as marriage equality could very well become national law later this month because of the anticipated U.S. Supreme Court ruling.

Indeed, many of the other cases have come become someone has  denounced the employees, but this is even beyond that. Extremist anti-gay conservative Catholics are relentless in their attacks.  (Indeed if you read the comments of online Catholic media, the anti-gay remarks will curl your hair).   But then, the vehemence is not surprising, given  the like of Archbishop Cordileone of San Francisco hysterically calling Caitlyn Jenner's transition "a reversion to the paganism of old, but with unique, postmodern variations on its themes, such as the practice of child sacrifice, the worship of feminine deities or the cult of priestesses."

The  goal of the extremists is to attack and harm LGBT people, driving them from their jobs and community. These  actions are hardly Christ-like, are they?

On Cardinal Burke

Recently, Raymond Cardinal Burke, the arch-conservative prelate has been in the news for an interview that basically blamed women for everything wrong in the Roman Catholic church.

Alexandra Petri in the WaPo takes him down:

Burke observed: “The Church becomes very feminized. Women are wonderful, of course. They respond very naturally to the invitation to be active in the Church. Apart from the priest, the sanctuary has become full of women. The activities in the parish and even the liturgy have been influenced by women and have become so feminine in many places that men do not want to get involved.”

Well, sure. Women are wonderful. Only, if they’re involved, everything is RUINED. Other than that, they are great and it is wonderful that they are participating.

But  this one takes the cake; it's those feminists that made those priests assault those children!

“We can also see that our seminaries are beginning to attract many strong young men who desire to serve God as priests. The new crop of young men are manly and confident about their identity. This is a welcome development, for there was a period of time when men who were feminized and confused about their own sexual identity had entered the priesthood; sadly some of these disordered men sexually abused minors; a terrible tragedy for which the Church mourns.”

I’m sorry, I’m a little dazed from striking my head repeatedly and mightily on my desk. That’s what it was. It was the feminists who were behind this whole thing. We should have known. They were the puppetmasters (puppetmistresses?) all along. The worst part of radical feminism was when the feminists all rose in a single body and insisted that the Catholic Church become embroiled in pedophilia. It is a wonder that we still listened to feminists after that.

And this:

If you think that once women come into places and do things, there won’t be room for men to come into those places and do things any more, you are scared that the power you have is undeserved. Or you would not be so desperate to keep the door closed.

 Amen sister.

Pope Francis is no friend

I admit to being bemused at the response of LGBT people to Pope Francis.  Yes, he has attempted to reduce the focus on "pelvic issues" in the Roman Catholic church, with a renewed and welcome focus on the poor.  He has challenged the deeply political Vatican culture.  But he has NOT changed, nor is he likely to change, anything about how the Church views women or LGBT people.

There was a brief moment in the recent Synod on the Family where we all thought there might be at least a smidgeon of recognition that LGBT people are not unremittingly evil.  But that was hastily walked back in the final documents, amidst a conservative uproar.

And now, as if to polish his anti-equality bona fides, the Vatican is sponsoring an ecumenical conference on men and women, where the invitation list is straight out of the US culture wars, with a seasoning of African advocates for criminalizing LGBT people.

And rather than being about men and women, it's all about Teh Gayz. Jeremy Hooper (a married gay man) tells us that the Pope's full-throated speech about straight marriage uber alles thrilled the anti-gay activists. They also loved the speech of the Nigerian Archbishop (Anglican) who advocates for criminalization.

He concludes,

All will tell you that the aim is to "strengthen" marriage and families, yet every speaker pushes an ideal, from softer-toned to Archbishop Okoh, that tells the world my marriage and my family are a threat. There is no room for discussion. There is no consideration that perhaps my own monogamous union of twelve-years-going on-life, with one beloved child for whom and I my husband would instinctively lay down our own lives, is actually part of the strength that they seek. The preconceived thesis is that my marriage, no matter how productively and peacefully lived, is at war with what they are trying to do. And by inviting the types of activists that they have invited, it's clear that the Vatican is eager to disseminate this view into the public policy arena

As Fr Geoff Farrow warns, this is well-choreographed theatre.

The long term goal is to reverse gains made by LGBT people and subordinate them once again. It is to reestablish the Catholic Church as the final authority in morality, with power to translate those morals into legislation in civil governments.

And they slowly, inexorably move to that goal.  See, for example, a recent lawsuit with the claim that religious freedom means that Roman Catholics are exempt from even being sued in court. No court has jurisdiction.  Because religious freedom  means they make their own law.

No, the Catholic church has not changed.    Pope Francis is just a kinder, gentler face on the same views and doctrine that consider us "objectively disordered", and oriented toward "intrinsic moral evil".   They are playing a very long game.  And their goal is to disenfranchise, even criminalize LGBT people, eliminate our legal rights, and destroy our relationships.

Fortunately, the institutional Roman Catholic Church does not speak for the Catholic laity, who remain strongly supportive. Maybe because they know and love their gay children, parents, family, and co-workers well enough to ignore the hot air from the culture warriors.

The polarizing effects of Pope Francis

In the aftermath of the recent Roman Catholic Synod on the Family, a fault line has been exposed between traditionalists who favor discipline, no matter the suffering, and pastoralists who favor mercy, no matter the sin.  In particular, the questions are whether the divorced/remarried can be more gently treated (or even welcomed back to Communion), and the proper response to LGBT people.  The traditionalists narrowly "won", but there is clearly concern.

Conservative columnist Ross Douthat wrote a piece in the NY Times that threatened schism if Pope Francis doesn't hold the line against the divorced.

The Catholic Church was willing to lose the kingdom of England, and by extension the entire English-speaking world, over the principle that when a first marriage is valid a second is adulterous, a position rooted in the specific words of Jesus of Nazareth. To change on that issue, no matter how it was couched, would not be development; it would be contradiction andreversal. 

SUCH a reversal would put the church on the brink of a precipice. Of course it would be welcomed by some progressive Catholics and hailed by the secular press. But it would leave many of the church’s bishops and theologians in an untenable position, and it would sow confusion among the church’s orthodox adherents — encouraging doubt and defections, apocalypticism and paranoia (remember there is another pope still living!) and eventually even a real schism. 

Interestingly, he claims that even if a minority, the pure minded traditionalists somehow count more than everyone else.

Those adherents are, yes, a minority — sometimes a small minority — among self-identified Catholics in the West. But they are the people who have done the most to keep the church vital in an age of institutional decline: who have given their energy and time and money in an era when the church is stained by scandal, who have struggled to raise families and live up to demanding teachings, who have joined the priesthood and religious life in an age when those vocations are not honored as they once were. They have kept the faith amid moral betrayals by their leaders; they do not deserve a theological betrayal.

Fr John O'Malley writing in America Magazine scolds Douthat.

What is being said here? I think we can assume that change, if it comes, would come from the synod, a body of duly ordained bishops at a meeting duly convoked by a duly elected pope. It is a body, moreover, that has at its disposal the full range of Catholic theologians and theological opinion on a world-wide basis. I think we can assume that, influential though the reigning pope always is in such situations, Francis neither wants to nor is able to force his agenda (whatever that might be!) on the members of the synod. I say that in the face of Mr. Douthat’s insinuations to the contrary about Francis. 

While the synod is in session as a body of bishops working collegially with the pope to take measures for the good of the church, it is a binding and authoritative teaching organ in the church. Do not all orthodox Catholics believe that that authority is to be accepted over their own personal fears, expectations and hopes? 

Do not all orthodox Catholics believe that that authority is most certainly to be accepted over the objections of “a minority—sometimes a small minority,” as Mr. Douthat describes himself and his fellow-travelers? This minority self-identifies as orthodox and, it seems, potentially more orthodox than the synod. But it is a self-identification without credentials to validate the claim. 

Finally, what are we to make of this: “Remember there is another pope still living!”? “Another pope still living!” This sounds like a threat. Are Mr. Douthat and the like-minded Catholics for whom he speaks appealing to a pope more to their liking over a pope less to their liking? If so, the statement has a regrettable sinister ring. Or what? Let’s hope that Ross Douthat does not mean his reminder to be as schism-suggesting and radically un-Catholic as it sounds to my conservative ears.

Meanwhile, Fr Geoff Farrow, a priest who came out during the Prop 8 campaign, warns us against reading too much into Pope Francis.  Doctrine, he says, isn't changing--it is just wearing a kindlier mask.

The current Synod in Rome is part of the well-choreographed theater intended to bolster Francis’ popular image as a champion for a more tolerant acceptance of LGBT people and to give Catholicism a much needed pass on this issue. The long term goal is to reverse gains made by LGBT people and subordinate them once again. It is to reestablish the Catholic Church as the final authority in morality, with power to translate those morals into legislation in civil governments.

So what's a Catholic family with a gay child to do?  Fr Farrow makes a recommendation:

Join an Episcopal USA Church. Your child will be formed with the positive Christian values that you cherish, you will enjoy a far superior liturgy and more beautiful music. You will also be a member of a community that welcomes and esteems your child and does not merely tolerate him/her or impose impossible conditions (life long celibacy) on your child.

C'mon in, there's always room for another!

Hot Air

I've had little to say for the last few days, because it all seems same-old same old.  I've been feeling burdened and burned out by work and by politics.

Marriage equality has had a booming month so far, with 32 states now having equal marriage rights.  Appeals are flying but the Supreme Court seems content to stay out of it unless and until there is a conflict between circuits.  Fundamentalists are throwing hissy fits and demanding the right to discriminate against LGBT people on the grounds of religious freedom. To which the answer is, if an adherent of a white-supremicist church (and there are such) demanding the "right" to discriminate against a black person in the civil realm, would we allow it?  How about a refusal to serve a Muslim woman in a head scarf?  But I've gone on about this at length elsewhere and I haven't the energy to do it again.

The Republicans (or the right-wing fanatics who have taken over the Republican party) scarcely even pretend any more to support democracy, but admit that they want to prevent Democratic constituencies from voting.  They  continue providing money and power to the Koch brothers, the fossil fuel industry, the military-industrial complex, and the big banks.  And the climate is continuing its dangerous change. It's hard to conclude anything than that we are screwed.

The Roman Catholic Synod on the family backtracked on making overtures to respect LGBT people, let alone welcome them. The conservatives are smirking at their slap-back of Pope Francis.  And yet, the transparency in the final document and the votes on each paragraph are such that it appears there is a more closely divided church, between conservatives by-the-book happy to lay crosses on other people's shoulders, and progressives of more pastoral instincts.  Polls show a surging majority of young American Catholics support gay rights and marriage equality.  At least arch-conservative Raymond Cardinal Burke, known for his love of garments liturgical, has suffered another demotion.

In the Episcopal Church, there's been the agonizing slow-motion crash at General Theological Seminary in New York.  I don't know much about seminaries, but I know a lot about secular academe, where the faculty have been demoted to a minor managerial role as the institutions become increasingly corporatized.   At GTS, it  bears all the hallmarks of heavy-handed institutional leadership, a hot-house atmosphere with a weakened faculty making dramatic ultimatums, and a board digging in its heels.  One would somehow have hoped that a seminary would do better,  both the faculty and the board.

And the Northern White Rhino species is down to 6 individuals, guaranteeing they will go extinct.

Stupid humans.

Something seismic from the Roman Catholic Synod

Writing in America Magazine, Jesuit Fr James Martin describes a "stunning change" from the Synod on the Family:

The Synod said that gay people have "gifts and talents to offer the Christian community." This is something that even a few years ago would have been unthinkable, from even the most open-minded of prelates--that is, a statement of outright praise for the contribution of gays and lesbians, with no caveat and no reflexive mention of sin. And, regarding same-sex partners, the Synod document declared, remarkably, "Without denying the moral problems connected to homosexual unions it has to be noted that there are cases in which mutual aid to the point of sacrifice constitutes a precious support in the life of the partners." That any church document would praise same-sex "partners" in any way (and even use the word "partners") is astonishing.

The Synod also asks questions, challenging dioceses and parishes: "Homosexuals have gifts and qualities to offer to the Christian community: are we capable of welcoming these people, guaranteeing to them a fraternal space in our communities? Often they wish to encounter a Church that offers them a welcoming home. Are our communities capable of providing that, accepting and valuing their sexual orientation, without compromising Catholic doctrine on the family and matrimony?"

This represents a revolutionary change in how the church addresses the LGBT community. Nowhere in the document are such terms as "intrinsically disordered," "objectively disordered," or even the idea of "disinterested friendships" among gays and lesbians, which was used just recently. The veteran Vaticanologist John Thavis rightly called the document an "earthquake."

Now, no LGBT couple is going to get married in the Roman Catholic church any time soon (and probably never). But it could be that the Synod is expressing some dismay at the effects of the culture war in rejecting civilly married gay Catholics from the pews, purging them from service roles, or rejecting the children of gay parents for Baptism and schooling. We can but hope.

Are gays part of the Catholic family? A question for the synod....

There's a big  Roman Catholic synod on the family in Rome, which has ranged from a married couple  discussing the need to include gay children, to a Cardinal saying that teaching boys to clean up after themselves , rather than wait for girls to do it, confuses them as to their appropriate gender role.

At the same time, independent of Synod, out gay priest Fr James Alison is there at a conference, and speaking about LBGT people in Catholicism.  And he has quite a lot to say.

What we have .... is the somewhat amazing realisation that, exactly in the degree to which it has become clear that we are simply the bearers of a not particularly remarkable non-pathological minority variant in the human condition, in that moment, as we find ourselves seeking the Lord, we are found to be bearers of Catholicity on terms of equality with everyone else. .... 

And that all our understanding of good and bad, insider and outsider is going to change because of this. The process is obviously much more painful and difficult, at least initially, for those who had a strong stake in promoting a form of public goodness in which we were bit-players, as necessary examples of what was wrong. And much more joyful for those of us who are finding that after all we have been telling the truth. It is not the case, as we were so often told, that we are simply being particularly self-indulgent, or that our love is harmful to others, or that we are crazy to think that we are normal, or that we have been misled by hedonism and relativism into purely subjective, unrealistic desires that are part of some dehumanising trap.

....No, truthfulness does not wait for the convenience of those wedded to untruth before peeking out. It breaks out, as if from captivity, bearing witness to the One who sent it to run wild among us, and takes us on a giddy, and ultimately joyful ride. The Spirit does bring the peace that comes with truth, but not by following the schedule of those whose fear would hold it back.  

Go read the whole thing!

Why Catholics leave

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield, IL did a survey of active and inactive Catholics.  Why do people leave the church?  The answers aren't a surprise, but suggest that Catholics who stay Catholic are more likely to be older, less educated, and socially conservative.  

Many individuals gave a variety of reasons for why they stopped attending Mass; however, Church doctrine appears to be a major reason... Of the eight specific Church doctrines given, six (homosexuality, birth control, fertility treatments, divorce/remarriage, women as priests, and the marital status of priests) were selected by more than half of respondents as reasons for distancing themselves or leaving the Catholic Church ...

Birth control, women' priests, divorce issues, and gays are the big areas of concern.

The demographics of those leaving and their reasons is interesting too.

Issues with Church doctrine were especially problematic for those with a graduate degree or graduate school experience, as these individuals had significantly higher agreement that doctrine on homosexuality, abortion, birth control, fertility treatments, divorce, and women as priests were reasons for distancing themselves or leaving the Church

...Women were also found to have significantly higher agreement on Church doctrine issues as reasons for distancing themselves or leaving the Church, although these differences were only among two separate issues: homosexuality and women as priests ..... As for age, those 35 years old or younger had significantly higher levels of agreement that homosexuality doctrine and abortion doctrine were reasons why they distanced themselves or left the Church whereas those 50 years old or older had significantly higher agreement regarding doctrine on divorce/remarriage as reasons for why they distanced themselves or left the Church....

 The individual comments are interesting too... with hypocrisy and exclusion being major issues for people.  And of course the pedophilia coverup.

Examples::

• “The key words are compassion and tolerane e. Society teaches us to improve in these areas. The Church does not and does not exhibit or model these traits.” 

• “I found the Church to be teaching hate, not love. I felt like intolerance, not tolerance was being preached. I found that I disagreed with most of what was being preached. I left the Church, and am still very spiritual, but I am simply not Catholic.”....

and

• ENOUGH with the politics, especially the conservative Republican politics! I am beyond sick of the implication that Catholics need to vote Republican to be good Catholics, and that being anti-abortion and anti-gay marriage are the only ‘morality’ issues that should matter to Catholics - what happened to social justice, poverty, or God's  love for all?”

The study authors conclude, with evident regret,

This study suggests Church doctrine plays a key role in individuals separating from the Catholic Church and it may be difficult to prevent current parishioners from leaving or to bring lapsed or drifting parishioners back to this faith community.

Ya think?

Just remember, inactive Catholics, the Episcopal Church welcomes you. It's a pleasant swim across the Thames and you will find many formerly-Catholic friends there to greet you.   ;-)

Update from Montana

Here's an update with more information from the case in Montana, where the married gay Catholics were told to divorce and split up before they could have communion.

[Bishop] Warfel, in a telephone interview on Thursday from Great Falls, said he thought opinions on the matter ran about 50-50, but Wojtowick, Huff and Shupe all say they believe it was more like 80-20 speaking on behalf of the couple.

One of the gay men is a former Roman Catholic priest.

A number of people have left.

The choir director resigned and is now attending the Episcopal church.

Sounds like a success for the new priest, eh?

Other churches in the community are reaching out to the men.  Including the Episcopal church, St James.

The Rev. Jean Collins of St. James Episcopal Church in Lewistown described the current controversy as a good opening for discussion and education about same-gender relationships and LGBT inclusion within the broader community. 

"Almost everybody knows somebody or loves somebody who is LGBT," Collins said, "but it's not something that's always talked about a lot, particularly perhaps in Lewistown. So it may be a good opening for that to happen in that community, and in individual churches and other civic organizations.".... 

Collins said she has already welcomed Huff and Wojtowick to worship and receive communion at St. James if they choose to do so. ... 

Asked if she were approached by a member of her own congregation who expressed concern about the inclusion of openly gay parishioners, Collins responded, "I would remind that person that we are all children of God and we should be treated that way." 

"And that's the bottom line," she added.

The purges go on: to US Roman Catholic Bishops, nothing is worse than being gay and married.

New purges in Roman Catholicism this week. 

 Item 1: two elderly MOntana men, active in their parish, and partners for 30 years, got married in Washington state. They didn't make a deal out of it, but someone told the new young priest in their parish and....

the two parishioners were told that they would no longer be allowed to participate in fundamental Catholic religious observances or ministry programs.

To restore their position within the Catholic Church, Huff and Wojtowick must obtain a divorce, discontinue living together, and write a restoration statement defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman. Wojtowick and Huff have thus far declined to do so.

Note that this is a Roman Catholic church not only demanding that they divorce (!) but also that they part. Leaving my wife would rip my heart out of me. I can't imagine the brutal fanaticism that would demand such cruelty. The Bishop met with the community about this but did not change his mind.

Bishop Michael Warfel of the Diocese of Great Falls-Billings met Saturday with about 300 parishioners of St. Leo the Great Catholic Church in Lewistown, where he also led a Mass. About half the parishioners supported the Rev. Samuel Spiering’s decision, while the other half were very angry.

“There obviously is polarization, and certainly what I want to do is try to effect some healing,” Warfel said Saturday. “At the same time, as a Catholic bishop, I uphold our Catholic teachings.”

Yeah, good luck with that, Bishop. Not sure how you can heal anything when you have bitterly divided a community.

Item 2: another church organist fired, this time by reliably anti-gay campaigner Archbishop John Nienstedt of Minnesota.

"Our beloved Director of Music, Jamie Moore, married his long-time partner Garrett this past weekend," the Rev. Bob White, of St. Victoria Catholic Church, wrote in a letter to parishioners posted on the parish website this week. "Since Jamie's marriage conflicts with official Church teaching, Archbishop Nienstedt asked for Jamie's resignation." (MPR)

As a nice touch, they fired Jamie while he was on his honeymoon. Stay classy, Archbishop.

Nienstedt is rather embattled, not only having failed to stop marriage equality from reaching MN, but also because he has been accused of inappropriate sexual contact with priests and seminarians.  A law firm hired by the archdiocese is examining the claims but no reports have been made.

Andrew Sullivan (a gay Catholic) writes,

If the church upholds this kind of decision, it is endorsing cruelty, discrimination and exclusion. Pope Francis’ view is that this is exactly the kind of thing that requires the church to exercise mercy not rigidity. But allowing a married gay couple to sing in the choir as an act of “mercy” would merely further expose the fragility of the church’s thirteenth century views of human sexuality. It would put the lie to the otherness of gay people; to the notion that it is essential or even possible for a tiny minority to live entirely without intimacy or love or commitment. It also reveals that gay men have long been a part of the church – and tolerated, as long as they lied about their lives and gave others plausible deniability with respect to their sexual orientation. It is an endorsement of dishonesty. 

None of this is compatible with the core moral teachings of the church – about fairness, truth, compassion, forgiveness, mercy and inclusion. And this is clear to large numbers of Catholics – especially the younger generation who will rightly view this kind of decision as barbaric and inhuman. There is only so much inhumanity that a church can be seen to represent before its own members lose faith in it...... When a church responds to an act of love and commitment not by celebration but by ostracism, it is not just attacking a couple’s human dignity; it is also attacking itself.  

MOre coverage of purges here. 

The Catholic roots of Hobby Lobby

From Salon, a history of the Hobby Lobby decision and a description of how its roots lie not in the purported Evangelicals who brought the case, but in the fierce rear-guard actions of the Roman Catholic conference of bishops.

 [The Bishops called] for a broad conscience clause that would allow any employer who had a moral objection to contraception to refuse to provide it. Increasingly it looked as if the fight wasn’t about finding a reasonable compromise that would allow Catholic employers to distance themselves sufficiently from the provision of contraception to satisfy at least the letter of the widely ignored Catholic teaching on contraception. It was an attempt to block the federal enshrinement of contraception as a basic women’s health care right.

Let's be clear about that.  "Religious Freedom" is a canard intended to cover the real effort to make contraception expensive and difficult to get.  Having failed to get their laity to adhere to RC teaching on birth control, they want to get the government to help them.

Women’s health advocates and political pundits expressed amazement that contraception could be so controversial in 2012. But they shouldn’t have been surprised. That’s because the forty-year fight over reproductive rights had never really been about abortion; it had always been about women and sex—specifically, the ability of women to have sex without the consequence of pregnancy. That’s why it was the shot heard ’round the world when in the midst of the flap over the all-male birth control panel radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh called Fluke a “slut” for wanting her insurance to treat birth control like any other prescription medication. Limbaugh had revealed what the right really believed about women and sex: Women who wanted to have sex—especially outside of marriage— and control their fertility were doing something fundamentally illicit and shouldn’t expect anyone else to pay for it. To them, birth control was just a lesser form of abortion.

My emphasis.  That's what it's about: controlling women's sexuality.  This is the old Roman Catholic binary of woman as slut or virgin. It continues to frustrate me that we women are letting them do this.  

Another purge

Here we go again.  This time, two teachers in St Louis, who kept their relationship private, married and applied for a mortgage.  Their employer, the Cor Jesu high school, was sent the mortgage application and now the two teachers are jobless.  So much for buying a house together. 

Reichert said she and Gambaro were asked to resign after the school said in late July it received a copy of a mortgage application with the couple’s names. The couple had married in New York over the summer and the school said they had violated the moral contract faculty are required to sign as part of employment.....

In a Facebook post, Gambaro wrote that although alumnae support for her and her wife had been overwhelming, “the law is not on our side, nor is the church, so we have no ground to stand on.”

So do we conclude that none of the other teachers at Cor Jesu use birth control, or have sex out of marriage, or have remarried following divorce?  My, they are a pure bunch.

According to a recent poll by Quinnipiac University, a growing number of Catholics support same-sex marriage. The 2013 poll, which surveyed close to 500 Catholics, found that 54 percent of Catholic voters support same-sex marriage, while 38 percent oppose it. 

Gambaro and Reichert, for their part, said they hoped their terminations would “guide the Catholic school system towards greater tolerance and acknowledgment of LGBTQ issues.” 

“We are both grateful for the time we had at Cor Jesu Academy,” Gambaro and Reichert wrote to the Post-Dispatch. We “will cherish the memories and experiences created with students, athletes, and colleagues over the years.” 

Our previous coverage of Roman Catholic purges of gay employees here.

The Vatican still doesn't get it

The Roman Catholic Papal Nuncio in the Dominican Republic, basically the Vatican's Ambassador, was discovered to be a child abuser. He was whisked back to Vatican City and laicized. From the NY Times:

But far from settling the matter, the Vatican has stirred an outcry because it helped Mr. Wesolowski avoid criminal prosecution and a possible jail sentence in the Dominican Republic. Acting against its own guidelines for handling abuse cases, the church failed to inform the local authorities of the evidence against him, secretly recalled him to Rome last year before he could be investigated, and then invoked diplomatic immunity for Mr. Wesolowski so that he could not face trial in the Dominican Republic.

The Vatican’s handling of the case shows both the changes the church has made in dealing with sexual abuse, and what many critics call its failures. When it comes to removing pedophiles from the priesthood, the Vatican is moving more assertively and swiftly than before. But as Mr. Wesolowski’s case suggests, the church continues to be reluctant to report people suspected of abuse to the local authorities and allow them to face justice in secular courts.

Meanwhile,  the Bishop in Kansas City remains in office, despite being convicted of a crime of failing to report child abuse.