Debates among bishops increasingly go
public
By PAMELA SCHAEFFER
NCR Staff
Increasingly, tensions among U.S. Catholic bishops over issues
that divide them are reflected in highly public ways.
Jesuit Fr. Thomas J. Reese, an expert on the U.S. hierarchy,
regards the open disagreements -- unusual among bishops in modern times -- to
be a healthy sign.
Recently, for example, at least four bishops have written columns
in diocesan newspapers to criticize or support a recent negative assessment by
Archbishop John R. Quinn of the leadership style of Pope John Paul II and the
power of the Roman curia.
In a second round of disagreement, two prominent cardinals
publicly denounced the Catholic Common Ground Project announced this week by
Cardinal Joseph Bernardin of Chicago. Such a show of disunity is
uncharacteristic of the U.S. hierarchy. It is also illustrative of the very
tensions the project aims to address.
"Bishops have tended to avoid discussing their differences in
public lest they they scandalize the faithful" -- a failure, Reese said, "to
recognize that we now have a literate laity well-aware of the issues facing the
church."
Reese is author of Archbishop: Inside the Power Structure of the
American Catholic Church, published in 1989, and Inside the Vatican: the
Politics and Organization of the Catholic Church, to be published in December
by Harvard University Press.
Quinn, retired archbishop of San Francisco, called for reform in
the way authority is exercised in the church in a major address at Oxford
University June 29. His nuanced attack on curial power, an unusual breach of
ecclesial protocol in itself, brought praise and disagreement from his
peers.
Archbishop Rembert Weakland of Milwaukee described Quinn's address
as "a profound and wise analysis of the church today."
"Archbishop Quinn has opened the needed discussion on the right
issues, issues that will not go away and are very much at the heart of the
ecumenical dialogue," Weakland wrote in a July 11 column in his archdiocesan
newspaper, The Catholic Herald. "What he said openly can often be heard in the
dialogue with the Orthodox, especially in the corridors," Weakland said.
High praise also came from Bishop Frank J. Rodimer of Paterson,
N.J., who wrote in his column in The Beacon, "The church has always had bishops
who excel as scholars, theologians, teachers and prophets. There are even some
who are all these at the same time. On the premise that you don't have to be
one to know one, I would say that the archbishop emeritus of San Francisco,
John R. Quinn, is worthy of this distinction."
O'Connor of New York, on the other hand, said in a three-page
dismissal in the July 11 issue of Catholic New York that Quinn's observations
were based on facts he doubts and perceptions he does not share.
O'Connor said he "respectfully questions" whether many of the
issues raised by Quinn in his speech "are the impediments to unity that the
archbishop perceives them to be."
Bishop James T. McHugh of Camden, N.J., said he found, contrary to
Quinn's observation, that officials at the Roman curia generally "go to great
lengths to consult with theologians and other scholars," as well as with
laypersons and bishops.
Reese believes Catholics should welcome the open debate. "As long
as we de facto have the disagreements within the church, for the bishops to
face them honestly and discuss them with respect for various points of view is
much better than trying to pretend that the problems aren't there. It's a silly
myth to think the bishops are of one mind.
"I think it's much better," he said, "for the bishops to show the
world how Christians can disagree and still love and respect one another.
That's the more important witness than a witness of a uniformity that's created
by sweeping problems under the rug.
"If you look at the history of the church, bishops have always
disagreed with one another. The question is how to deal with these
disagreements within the Christian community. Peter, Paul and James had
disagreements about how to deal with the gentiles. They came together at the
Council of Jerusalem (A.D. 50), they talked and compromised. It's a good model
for how we in the church should deal with these things."
National Catholic Reporter, August 23,
1996
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