National Catholic Reporter
Subscribers only section
December 22, 2006
 

Letters

Follow the woman

I’m waiting to read Chapter Two of Tom Carney’s story about Fr. Ray McHenry (NCR, Nov. 24). It’s the woman who interests me -- the single mother with two children, the one who supported Fr. McHenry when he “was lonely and vulnerable.” She evidently gave up her own life in Iowa to share in his search for an alternative church. She must have believed that their relationship was forever -- that is, until he changed his mind. Did he ask her forgiveness as he did the bishop’s? Was their parting a mutual decision? Has she been able to pick up the threads of her own story, as so many other women who entered a relationship with a priest have had to do?

NANCY SULLIVAN MURRAY
Syracuse, N.Y.


An anti-science church

Regarding the documents approved at the recent bishops’ meeting on birth control and gays (NCR, Nov. 24): Those who cannot abide a world without the certitudes of faith or the dictates of some divinely inspired authority have been on the rise everywhere. We have even seen settled science, such as the geological age of the earth or evolution, routinely challenged by people who would have been identified as religious fanatics or cranks in the past. There are religious people who continue to strive for a balance between religion and faith, but the trend is clearly toward those who wish to subordinate reason to faith. From recent papal pronouncements on religious diversity, soteriology and liturgy to the inane “guidance” of the bishops’ conference, the trend is away from reasonable, compelling argumentation toward breathtaking assertions, some of which have been widely ignored or discredited for years (birth control, closeted gays and so on).

The reactionaries who revel in this trend are undeterred by the warning that the church may become irrelevant or that believers may simply walk away. Fewer unquestioning true believers are preferable to vast numbers of critically thinking adherents. This notion is a kind of idolatry. The church not as pilgrim servant, but as a depository of truth to be preserved and revered. The most telling and dangerous manifestation of this is the willingness to simply ignore science or experience that does not fit the party line. The church as irrelevant is a tragic yet benign development; the church as yet another promoter of anti-scientific “truth” is far more troubling.

DENNIS M. WOYTOWICH
Baltimore

* * *

Regarding the American bishops’ latest “Ministry to persons with a homosexual inclination: Guidelines for pastoral care,” the official church continues to equivocate about its teaching on gays -- that “objective disorder” thing. The bishops do “not [mean] to say that the person as a whole is disordered.” Could we be honest for once? In its first modern statement on homosexuality in 1975, the Vatican already used the terms “intrinsically disordered” and “pathological constitution,”” and in 1986, “objective disorder.” The 2005 document on gay seminarians clarified the meaning beyond doubt: Homosexuals lack “emotional maturity”; this debility “gravely hinders them from relating correctly to men and women.” I looked up the reference: It’s John Paul II’s 1992 Pastores Dabo Vobis, which holds that emotional maturity entails the ability to dialogue, love of the truth, a sense of justice, respect for others, balanced judgment and behavior, integrity, compassion.

The official Catholic position is that by their very makeup, homosexuals lack these qualities. Spin it as you like, this is not about sex; it’s about the very persons of lesbians and gays. Spurning all the evidence, this teaching is an abomination. How far will this fraud go? But prototypically Catholic, this teaching is “clear and consistent.” To the official church, homosexuals are sick and devious people. And the bishops feign welcome? Let them either own Roman Catholic teaching or finally reject it.

DANIEL A. HELMINIAK
Atlanta


No travel to Bethlehem

I spoke recently with Dr. Victor Batarseh, the Catholic mayor of Bethlehem. He explained the sorry state of affairs in his town. Israel is proceeding with constructing the “separation fence,” which is mostly a 26-foot solid concrete wall at the entrance of Bethlehem. Israel has already taken about 15 percent of the municipality by annexing Rachel’s Tomb and surrounding areas to Israel. Travel to and from Bethlehem is difficult and requires permits rarely given. The Bethlehem area has become a large open-air prison. Joseph and Mary would not have been able to travel from Nazareth to Bethlehem this year.

The U.S. and international boycott of aid to the Palestinians and Israel’s refusal to pay the Palestinians the tax and customs funds collected on their behalf has resulted in no funds available to pay teachers, public hospital and municipality workers. Salaries have not been paid in about 10 months. Some pastors in Bethlehem now pay for garbage collection, street cleaning and repair of streets through funds that are permitted to be transferred to the Bethlehem churches. The one saving grace is that Bethelehem University, a Catholic school run by the Christian Brothers, is the largest employer in town and thus helps some residents. Christians in Bethlehem need lots of help. Please pray for them. Urge evenhanded U.S. policies.

ALBERT HAZBUN
El Dorado Hills, Calif.

Albert Hazbun is chairman of the Holy Land Education Committee.



Back to the theologians

Your editorial “Not bad for melodrama” (NCR, Nov. 24) underlines well how grossly our bishops have mishandled their teaching office. When it comes to laying down doctrine, like St. Peter himself in Matthew (16:13-23), his successors seem to get it wrong about half the time. No wonder that informed laypeople increasingly turn away from the church’s branch managers and seek moral guidance from its professional theologians whose batting average is at least no worse.

This is actually a return to our original practice. As Leonard Swidler points out in Toward a Catholic Constitution (Crossroad, 1996), according to St. Thomas Aquinas, the magisterium of the teacher (professor of theology) and the pastoral authority of the bishop are separate and equal. “For well over nine centuries of Catholic history, it was the ‘teachers’ (the theologians) who were the supreme arbiters in deciding what was correct Catholic teaching.” This occurred in the first three centuries of the Christian era and again from the 13th through the 18th centuries.

Counting from the doctrinal disaster of Humanae Vitae in 1968, we are already some four decades along the road back to this norm. Maybe it’s time for our bishops to go back to running their dioceses and leave the teaching to the pros.

DARYL P. DOMNING
Silver Spring, Md.

* * *

The article “Bishops’ message: Get with program” and the editorial “Not bad for melodrama” (NCR, Nov. 24) clearly show that U.S. Catholics today belong to two distinct groups: one the “Roman Catholic church” and the other “the people of God.” “Roman Catholic church” members follow faithfully the tenets of Pope Paul VI’s encyclical Humanae Vitae in sexual matters, continue to “pray, pay and obey,” bemoan a general absence of “orthodoxy” and firmly believe that the pedophilia scandal is media driven; further, gays are “intrinsically disordered” and celibacy is essential to the priesthood while sexist language in the liturgy is appropriate.

“People of God” members on the other hand follow their consciences on the issue of contraception, require a bishop to earn respect and credibility, realize that church tenets (for example, limbo) are changeable and that the pedophilia criminal cover-up was of the bishops’ own making; further, that one of the greatest problems today is an unmarried clergy and that liturgy language is both male and female, just as God made us.

Issuing edicts won’t appreciably change this status quo. “Roman Catholic church” members don’t need them and “people of God” members will continue to worship God out of their well-informed consciences.

PAUL J. ACKERMAN
Columbus, Miss.


Images of torture

Connie Rutter is not alone. In her letter to the editor, “Different view of torture” (NCR, Oct. 27), she likened the photos from Abu Ghraib prison to images of the crucifixion. Recollection of the pictures and their images come easily to my mind also. “What the eye doesn’t see doesn’t move the heart” is a Haitian proverb. As I sat in church during the last days of Lent, staring at the purple-covered statues of Jesus, Mary and the saints, chills ran through my body. Was I looking again at the pictures of Abu Ghraib? Say it isn’t so: We don’t torture, do we, Lord? Condoning torture as Christians? Do our actions and attitudes belie the beliefs we profess? Are our insecurities so real we don’t really see what’s happening in our country? Is our faith so lacking in God’s all encompassing love for each creature we turn a blind eye to others’ tragedies?

Maybe the election results indicate that others saw too and felt that some of our country’s actions are totally wrong. We must ask for forgiveness and pray for healing.

LEONA R. WEILAND
Sioux Falls, S.D.


Different kind of sinner

I have searched my Bible to find the verses that would support the decision of the Vatican and Nebraska’s Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz to excommunicate all members of the Nebraska chapters of Call to Action, and for the life of me I can’t find any. I read where Jesus called all sinners to himself, and even where respected members of the Sanhedrin who plotted to kill him visited him under the cover of darkness. What could it be that makes these Call to Action members so much more sinful than, say, sinners holding Vatican positions or even that old cornhusker Bruskewitz himself? It appears that Bruskewitz and his Vatican backup team fancy themselves a cut above your general rank and file sinner, but, in fact, they act more like biblical pharisees.

MARGERY K. ENGLISH
Apple Valley, Minn.


A New Jersey guy

I was stunned and appalled as I read Colman McCarthy’s column regarding Charlie Weis, Notre Dame’s “boorish” head coach (NCR, Nov. 17). My late husband was an avid Notre Dame football fan. I shared his admiration of Notre Dame as an institution that challenges its students to excellence while treating them with respect and dignity. What has happened? It’s hard to believe that Notre Dame would tolerate such behavior as described in the column. It is downright verbal abuse, and it can inflict lasting damage on a person’s psyche. As a spiritual director with more than 20 years of experience, I am well aware of the effect of parent figures on a person’s concept of God. I have assumed that the very base of Notre Dame’s values would be a desire to consistently reflect a clear image of God as unconditionally always loving. I am no longer sure that this is true. This is an unanticipated detour that needs to get back on track. What kind of example does the coach’s verbally abusive behavior set? How will it affect the players’ concepts of God? How will it influence these same young men when they come to teach their own children? Is this an attitude that Notre Dame wants its students to pass on to the next generation?

This is serious and does not deserve to be passed over lightly. Apparently laughing it off, Notre Dame’s president, Fr. John Jenkins, is quoted as saying, “Charlie’s a New Jersey guy and he speaks very directly.” There is a huge difference between speaking directly and speaking abusively.

JEAN GILL
Cupertino, Calif.


Lack of compassion

Rosemary Ruether’s “Consistent life ethic is inconsistent” (NCR, Nov. 17) reflects the sensus fidelium of most thinking Catholics who recognize that in the real flesh-and-blood world there are and must be moral tradeoffs. Whether our male church leaders admit it or not, many women, married or otherwise, are victimized because they do not have control over their sex lives. Certainly the AIDS epidemic in Africa, which could be mitigated through the use of condoms, is a prime example of the Vatican’s lack of compassion for these women. Small wonder that some have characterized the church’s indefensible hard line on condoms in that desperate situation as criminal, if not genocide.

The unholy alliance of politicians and the local hierarchy in El Salvador, with the apparent blessing of the Vatican, has resulted in the criminalization of all abortions, actually providing for long-term imprisonment of mothers who abort, without regard for the welfare of the live children they are forced to leave behind. These harsh laws that are gaining momentum in Catholic Latin America are taking on aspects of the harsh Shariah law imposed in some Muslim theocracies and by fanatical imams on their hapless and largely uneducated people. One wonders how far the doctrinaire Christian right might go in punishing their fellow Christians if Roe v. Wade were to be repealed.

WILLIAM J. SCHUCH
Naples, Fla.


Letters to the editor should be limited to 250 words and preferably typed. If a letter refers to a previous issue of NCR, please give us that issue’s date. We reserve the right to edit all letters. Letters, National Catholic Reporter, PO Box 411009, Kansas City, MO 64141-1009. Fax: (816) 968-2280. E-mail: letters@ncronline.org (When sending a letter via e-mail, please indicate "NCR Letters" in the subject line. We've installed a new spam filter on our letters e-mail account. If it's not clear to us that yours is a letter, we might delete it.) Please be sure to include your street address, city, state, zip and daytime telephone number

National Catholic Reporter, December 22, 2006