UNITED STATES
Bilgrimage
William D. Lindsey
A few short takes on yesterday’s report on American nuns by the Vatican Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life:
1. The report itself: I’ve read it, so you won’t have to (you’re welcome). As various media statements are saying, it’s generally positive, though the praise is interlarded with some critical statements that reflect the well-seeded rumors of wealthy, powerful U.S. Catholics who got the ball rolling on Vatican investigtion of American nuns, when the nuns dared to claim influence in the U.S. public square equal to that of the bishops, as the latter did everything but stand on their heads in the past several election cycles to convince Catholics that voting Democratic would be sinful.
As you assess the positive aspects of the report, keep in mind that the investigation of the Leadership Conference of Religious Women by the congregation on consecrated life is only half of a two-pronged investigation. The other is being carried out by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, headed by the arch-conservative Cardinal Müller, a crony of the emeritus pope Benedict. That investigation report is expected to be far less positive than the one released yesterday was.
On the carping side, here’s a statement that stood out for me as I read the report yesterday:
A review of the Constitutions and other directives of apostolic religious institutes generally revealed that institutes have written guidelines for the reception of the sacraments and sound spiritual practices. This Congregation asks the members of each institute to evaluate their actual practice of liturgical and common prayer. We ask them to discern what measures need to be taken to further foster the sisters’ intimate relationship with Christ and a healthy communal spirituality based on the Church’s sacramental life and sacred Scripture.
This statement stood out for a variety of reasons. In the first place, the report begins by acknowledging that religious women led the way after Vatican II in reflecting on the charisms of their various religious institutes, and in seeking to return to their founding charisms and live those charisms effectively in the church of the late 20th century. What the report didn’t say but might well have said is that religious women set a standard in this regard that male religious communities and male clerics might have done well to emulate — but which male communities and clerics often actively refused to emulate. Because they have imagined women have nothing to teach them, and that Catholic truth resides exclusively among them as Catholic men of God. . . .
2. David Gibson thinks, however, that at least one effect of this report is that it demonstrates the following:
The church’s conservative echo chamber is broken.
I hope he’s correct about that. But I have my doubts. Wealthy right-wing U.S. Catholics have had disproportionate influence in the Vatican for quite some time now. They’re the ones driving the investigation of American nuns, since they want to silence nuns’s voices as the U.S. bishops anoint the Republican party as God’s chosen party for Catholics. And I’m not entirely sure their influence is waning, though it does appear that Pope Francis is willing to listen to more voices than these voices — and if that’s the case, then it bodes well for the future of the church, it seems to me. If he chooses to act on some of what he hears from people outside the right-wing echo chamber, that is . . . .
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