Guam Group Warns Other Islands about the Neocatechumenal Way
By Haidee V Eugenio
A group of Catholics on Guam reached out to other islands about the Neocatechumenal Way. The Neocatechumenal Way is a movement within the Catholic church whose practices sometimes are at odds with those of Guam's traditional Catholic community. David Sablan, president of Concerned Catholics of Guam, wrote separate letters and made phone calls to leaders of the Catholic church on Saipan, Chuuk, Palau and other islands after learning that the Neocatechumenal Way wants to establish communities there too. “At the root of all our problems within our church on Guam is an itinerant organization called the Neocatechumenal Way,” Sablan said in his letters, dated between Feb. 13 and March 16. Sablan cited as examples the Neocatechumenal Way’s alleged lack of valid mandate from the pope, its Mass celebration that does not conform to the general instruction of the Roman missal and its alleged use of Catholic church and parish resources while it does not conform to Catholic laws. “We strongly suggest that you do not allow this heretical sect to enter your diocese. They have caused so much division within our Archdiocese of Agana, pitting family members against each other, when some members of a family join the NCW, while other members continue to practice their Catholic faith in the way their parents and grandparents have raised them,” Sablan said in his Feb. 13 letter to Bishop Amando Samo of the Diocese of Caroline Islands in Chuuk and five other church officials, three of them pastors in different parishes. Palau and the Federated States of Micronesia's Pohnpei, Chuuk, Yap and Kosrae are under the Diocese of Caroline Islands, Sablan said. Sablan sent a similar letter on February to church officials on Palau. One of those officials, in an initial Feb. 14 response to Sablan, said a couple and a priest from the Neocatechumenal Way were on Palau in late December 2016. Sablan also wrote to Bishop Ryan Jimenez of the Diocese of Chalan Kanoa on Saipan in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands. Prior to sending a formal letter, Sablan said he also had conversations with the bishop. “We learned that they are also trying to establish a community on Rota,” Sablan said in an interview. Another church official in Chuuk confirmed in an initial Feb. 20 response letter to Sablan that he met four members of the Neocatechumenal Way in Chuuk in 2016 “as they sought for place in Chuuk to do any ministry.” The church official, in his letter to Sablan, also was concerned about Archbishop Anthony S. Apuron, a part of the Neocatechumenal Way on Guam. Pope Francis suspended Apuron in June, after former altar boys publicly accused the archbishop of raping or sexually abusing them in the 1970s. Apuron faces a Vatican canonical penal trial and lawsuits over childhood sexual abuses. Sablan also said the Neocatechumenal Way was able to convince Apuron to give them, free of charge, a property worth more than $40 million, to establish their seminary and headquarters on Guam. Sablan said the secret transfer of church property was done in violation of canon law. Concerned Catholics started writing to other island churches about a month before Archbishop Michael Jude Byrnes issued a March 15 pastoral letter asking the Neocatechumenal Way to put a one-year pause on the formation of its new communities on Guam, and to celebrate Mass in accordance with the Catholic Church’s general instructions and norms. That means celebrating Mass at a consecrated altar and consuming the Eucharist as soon as the person receives it, among other things, Byrnes’ pastoral letter states. Byrnes said he intends to appoint a priest delegate to review the Neocatechumenal Way’s basic pastoral theology principles or teachings, ensure the group's catechists are sufficiently formed and certified and help the archbishop discern the effects of these efforts. Sablan, in his letters, said Pope Benedict XVI issued a directive stating that some of the Neocatechumenal Way’s practices must conform to the liturgical books in how the Mass is conducted. He said Pope Benedict gave them a two-year transition period to conform, which expired in 2009. “They have not conformed. Instead, they have defied the pope. They will say that they are discussing these issues with the Vatican and they will soon have approval to continue. Well, anyone can say that. And in this lies, no pun intended, their method of deceit,” Sablan told island church officials. He said Apuron, back in the 1990s, allowed the Neocatechumenal Way to enter the Archdiocese of Agana and “evangelize supposedly to Catholics who have strayed from the church.” “Instead, they have infiltrated several of our parishes and are literally destroying parish life because of their belief that small clusters of 30-40 people within the villages here in Guam is the way one could deepen their faith — rather than as a total parish community. There are reports of parish funds that are unaccounted for and missing,” Sablan added. Concerned Catholics, the Laity Forward Movement and several people have been advocating for Apuron’s removal and laicization. The same groups and people have also helped former altar boys come forward to share their stories of childhood sexual abuse in the hands of Apuron and other priests. Thus far, 30 clergy sexual abuse lawsuits have been filed on Guam. Sablan said seminarians from American Samoa and Samoa were also pulled by their bishops and archbishop from a Neocatechumenal Way-controlled seminary on Guam in the summer of 2016. Contact: heugenio@guampdn.com
|
.
Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.