A correspondent has just sent me a link to the text of three talks given by Bishop O'Donoghue last month to the clergy of Northampton Diocese on retreat at Ars. (See: Rich in Christ, rich in loveSome of what Bishop O'Donoghue says is quite controversial so I think it is important to say first of all that the talks cover a wide range of topics related to the priesthood and are balanced and sensible - though quite hard-hitting at times. I did like this comment on the Curé of Ars:
He didn’t court popularity, he didn’t engage in person-centred, non-judgemental, positive regard, instead he was afire with the imperative that each person was struggling with a fundamental split in their nature – called to beatitude but wounded by sin.The saintly Curé obviously hadn't read "I'm OK, You're OK." ;-)
The second talk is a thoughtful and prayerful analysis of what it means for the priest to make Christ present in the Church, looking at the power of grace working through human limitations, the priest's commitment to the confessional and meditating on the various ways in which Christ was stripped of his dignity as God and as man, and how we must imitate him in our priestly life. The third talks focusses especially on the missionary dimension of the priesthood, and the fourth ponders the different ways in which the priest is called to be immersed in Christ.
In the first talk, His Lordship looks at the positive and negative developments for the priesthood since Vatican II. One of the negative developments:
Dissent and disobedience. We are living in an unprecedented period in the life of the Church when countless individual priests, and laity, even bishops, believe they are free to decide what it means to be Catholic for themselves. For example, we have witnessed a wholesale rejection of the Church’s perennial teaching against contraception. This is the litmus test of the acceptance of obedience in the Church. How many priests support Gaudium et Spes’ crystal clear rejection of contraception, upheld by successive Popes – Paul VI, John Paul II, Benedict XVI? If we reject their teaching on this matter we are saying, as priests, that we know better than the successor to Peter! Is this tenable in a priest?And then this passage which made me nearly fall off my chair:
Conspiracy of silence. This cocktail of dissent, disobedience and disloyalty has resulted in what I call a ‘conspiracy of silence’ amongst groups in the Church. There is no real dialogue or willingness to talk openly and honestly about our differences. For example, I don’t know why my Fit for Mission? documents hit a wall of silence among the bishops in this country. All I did was re-iterate the teaching of the Church, but this has been treated as unacceptable and unspeakable. Why?Good question.
15 comments:
Controversial perhaps, but then why call a spade anything but a spade.
Bishop O'Donoghue calls for us all to look critically at ourselves which is never easy and is never going to sit easy with everyone.
It is a pity that O Donoghue did little when Bishop of Lancaster but close beautiful churches and manage decline like the rest of them.The "crusade" started at the end of his tenure.
Actually though, we water down infallible positions like the one on abortion when we group them with non infallible or questionably infallible positions and call all such issues the object of a dissenter. Evil dissent (and at that materially/only God knows of formal guilt) can only certainly happen as to the infallible issues. We needed the dissent of Archbishop Las Casas on slavery after a series of late 15th century Popes made slavery in the new world legitimate which Pope Paul III tried to undo in 1537 after he listened to Las Casas.
Abortion is infallibly condemned (Pope plus all Bishops polled worldwide) with such clarity in section 62 of Evangelium Vitae that it would pass muster actually as to a charge of heresy under canon 749-3 (which requires that an infallible designation only be used where that infallibility is manifestly clear) in an ecclesiastical court. It's (EV sect. 62) wording on abortion is a shortened version of the infallible language we see in the IC and in the Assumption encyclicals. Sections 57 and 65 of the same Evangelium Vitae infallibly condemn euthanasia and killing the innocent.
Birth control has no such clarity as being infallibly solved with opposing theologians (e.g. Grisez/Ford versus Rahner/Haring/Fuchs) not being punished by Rome in disputing as to whether it is solved in the universal ordinary magisterium infallibly or is not so solved.
Why drag its lack of clarity into the field of abortion protest by equating dissent on one with dissent on the clearly infallible.
I would love to hear the Vatican at the top of its lungs announce that abortion and euthanasia are infallibly settled in those sections of Evangelium Vitae and have Sunday homilists read the wording which follows:
" Therefore, by the authority which Christ conferred upon Peter and his Successors, in communion with the Bishops-who on various occasions have condemned abortion and who in the aforementioned consultation, albeit dispersed throughout the world, have shown unanimous agreement concerning this doctrine-I declare that direct abortion, that is, abortion willed as an end or as a means, always constitutes a grave moral disorder, since it is the deliberate killing of an innocent human being. This doctrine is based upon the natural law and upon the written Word of God, is transmitted by the Church's Tradition and taught by the ordinary and universal Magisterium. 73"
When Leo X in 1520 denounced Luther's condemnation of burning heretics at the stake as against the Holy Spirit, Leo said it was "against the Catholic Faith"...
http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Leo10/l10exdom.htm
see article 33
That seemed infallible to many and yet section 80 of Splendor of the Truth now condemns torture as intrinsically evil which seems closer to Luther than to Leo X. That is why the infallible should have the clarity that canon 749-3(c) talks about.
But when it does as in the abortion case and in the euthanasia case, Rome should shout it from the rooftops and have Sunday homilists shout it from there which is actually more effective.
I tried to find "Fit for Mission - Schools" both online and at Lancaster Cathedral and have as yet failed to do so. Before I go down the conspiracy theorist route, can anyone tell me where I might get hold of this document (I have no doubt of its value)? Thank you.
Someone writing in that scurrilous rag the Tablet a few years ago commenting on why he thought people didn't go to Mass any more said 'Is there a deeper reason, that no one has dare to ask. Are they not coming simply because they don't believe its true?'
Bishop O'Donoghue's Fit For Mission may have been 'hit by a wall of silence among the bishops of this country for the same reason.
Dear Father, thank you for posting this link. There is a lot of good stuff in there.
His frequent quoting of the Catechism is a rare thing, and to be praised!
Author - Fit for Mission Schools is available from the CTS
Bilbannon - I don't agree that it amounts to "watering down". There is an established opinion that the teaching of Humanae Vitae is infallibly taught by the ordinary magisterium. We are not entitled to dissent from it.
His second document, Fit For Mission? Church, received high praises from none other than the Prefect for the CDF.
Author - Fr.Tim is right that the documents are available as the extended versions from CTS... However the copy sent to schools and parishes in the Lancaster Diocese is available free on the Lancaster website by selecting 'Diocese' (in the side menu) then 'Useful documents'
I'm not trying to bypass the CTS... they publish excellent material and we need to support them.
Fr. Tim
Humanae Vitae was twice introduced at its own press conference as non infallible by Monseignor Lambrushini, the papal spokesman, who was not corrected in that statement by the Pope and may have been directly told by the Pope to phrase it that way since one cannot imagine him doing it on his own.
Odd behaviour for him and the Pope at the time if the matter is settled in the ordinary magisterium infallibly so as to be part of the universal ordinary magisterium. I'm aware that Germain Grisez, John C Ford, Brian Harrison, Janet Smith etc believe that it is infallible in the ordinary magisterium. I'm also aware that weightier names seems to be on the other side and say it is not infallible in the ordinary magisterium...Rahner, Fuchs and Haring...none of whom were punished by a series of conservative Popes who knew them personally. Oddly Hans Kung agreed with the first group for nefarious reasoning in that he wanted to undermine the concept of infallibility.
What next happened that year of HV was that a number of theologians who dissented in Washington DC were at first punished severely by the local Bishop but his decision was mollified by Rome which only required them to sign that the teaching was "authentic Church teaching" which is below the infallible level.
The death penalty's approval was in Trent's catechism and in every major Catholic spokesman from Augustine to Pius XII and there was a papal executioner while we had the papal states....and the death penalty is now vanishing from the ordinary magisterium under a single prudential judgement that life sentences make it unnecessary (but they had life sentences under the Avignon papacy) with no note about its tradition....and it had more cache than this issue.
one cannot imagine him doing it on his own.
No? People were doing all sorts of things like that during the reign of Pope Paul VI. As for dissident theologians, it was part of the depressing era that they could say what they liked and get away with it. (Although in fact, Kung eventually did have his licence taken away.)
The teaching of recent Popes on the death penalty is that it ought not to be necessary in an advanced society. They haven't denied its legitimacy and they have indeed noted past practice.
But the important issue here is the one you raise about theologians not being disciplined by their bishops. It is documented well in "The Worlock Archive" which details how the "conspiracy of silence" over Humanae Vitae was established. Longley says "it was a silence difficult to break". He was right and all credit to Bishop O'Donoghue for breaking the silence at last.
Fr.Tim
So Pope Paul VI was too weak to correct Msgr. Lambrushini and correct Rahner, Haring and Fuchs? And John Paul was too weak also?
Or could it be that both knew the matter is not yet settled in the ordinary as to be universal ordinary since Tuas Libenter said to look for universal agreement of theologians as to issues in the ordinary that are really universal ordinary.
peace....you have the last word...and ps...Kung's offences and Curran's stretch far beyond the issue of birth control and hence both were de-certified but Rahner, Haring and Fuchs are leagues above them and at times were looked into along with many good minds in the Church's history like John of the Cross. Heck with both Benedict and John Paul following Balthasar down the "maybe Judas is in heaven" road, maybe they should be looked into also....and both Popes saw no danger in Fr. Raymond Brown who was on the PBC under both men...a man who thought Mary never said the Magnificat (see Birth of the Messiah p.349...lol.
Enough...I need a smokey shiraz and a funny TV show.
Well yes, I'd agree with most of that (though you have to factor in the tradition on contraception which is pretty solid).
Interesting footnote on Fuchs. I did his morals course in Rome (i.e. read the notes the day before the exam) yeck! But his course on confessional practice was unimpeachable (I actually went to those lectures) he was rigorous and exact on all the questions over the seal and the use of knowledge etc. I found it extraordinary and still do.
Enjoy the Shiraz. For the TV, I suggest "Not the 9 o'clock news" but that probably dates me rather ;-)
Based on your strong memory of him, I've just ordered his "Natural Law; a Theological Investigation" for $15 from Alibris rare books on line. Heck I would have wasted that on the Nacho entree at El Charittos in Hoboken. Maybe he'll explain how Alphonse Di Lihouri's comment in the Theologia Moralis as to how many saints differed on the less clear issues within natural law...usury being paramount despite our apologetics marketing people and their theory that in those times, money was infecund. That would have been news to Calvin who had our eventual common sense position of the 19th century but had it in 1545 AD while Luther stayed with us on interest and raised us pokerlike by then forbidding extrinsic titles on business ventures which we and Aquinas always allowed. "That you may be one as I and the Father are one." What a headache He must have in Heaven. Peace and shiraz.
A priest I studied with in Rome writes:
"There is not such a clear cut difference between abortion and contraception as some people think.
Many methods of artificial contraception do not in fact prevent conception but actually are abortifacients."
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