The hermeneutic of dysfunction

strategy does a disservice to serious consideration of the council
....

Not as big a disservice as liturgical dancers. Or polka masses. Or pantomimed readings. Or banal music. Or mistranslations. Or...you get the idea.

I fear no man. My guidance comes from no man. My faith is in no man, and any human who assumes otherwise is convinced that he/she can replace my God.

NCR--Thanks for this and thanks for mentioning the sex abuse crisis. Many conservative bishops see this crisis as something that happened in the past, something we've come through. But as long as we have a closed church, as long as decisions are made behind closed doors this crisis will occur over and over. Whether they realize it or not priests are sexual humans. In the open world we know sexual abuse has not gone away; it happens all the time; it is not called a crisis. But in the hidden church, where the bedroom doors remain closed, where all decisions are made beyond the view of lay persons these priests and their victims remain hidden until there's the explosion, usually years later and then it is a crisis. Modernity has many faults but one good thing is a healthy openness. Our church has not learned this, our clerical church remains closed. What remains to be done is a hermeneutic of clerical secrecy.

Michael Crosby analyzed the problem with great insight over twenty years ago in “The Dysfunctional Church”. It is still a very good aid to understanding the dynamics of dysfunction we Catholics have to question and challenge.

We, are in the Dark Night of the Church, where transformation at a gut level can take place...for this we must pray.

It's more than transparency and accountability. The attempt at explaining the problems of the Roman Catholic church in terms of the hermeneutics of discontinuity and continuity doesn't speak at all to what is happening globally in the church. It's the last hurrah from a German Pope and Vatican hierarchy stuck in the Eurocentric remnants of a midevil institutional church. The German theologian, Johannes Baptist Metz was able to see that he had to come a long way from his midievil southern German theological belief. The present Pope from almost the identical theological perspective can't move beyond it. And yet the Church will continue to evolve under the Holy Spirit as it always does. It just takes the institutional, clerical, hierarchical, monarchical church a bit longer, sometimes 500 years as in the case of Galileo, to see what has happened. It is the reactionary forces that set in when a paradigm shift is taking place. Embracing the past out of fear of what is ever evolving.

When I read the comment section of NCR articles, it is clear to me that the hermeneutic that NCR has used for "how many years now" have formed the most obnoxiously, disrespectful Catholics ever. Is this the fruit by which ye shall be judged? It's time to change and form God's people in a more authentic way. I guess though that the hermeneutic that Jesus uses of separating the sheep from the goats is to easy of a "sound bite solution" for you. Christ's hermeneutic is too rigid for dealing with the complexities of life, you're either for Him or against Him, either a goat or a sheep. Is it going to be "modernity and secularism" or "the historic faith and faithfulness." These categories are really quite understandable and good in their simplicity, what the Second Vatican Council called the Church to experience.

The problem of dualistic thinking continues to plague all followers of the teachings of Jesus. "We are right and you are wrong." This has been the cause of wars, and continues to cause dissent in all arenas of human interaction. Jesus said, "Love one another as I have loved you." He did not say to be only on the "right" side, condemning all who disagree with what I believe to be truth.

The eternal human mess forever advances to cause more and more harm to the body of Christ. How did we build this kind of dual thinking and behavior on the back of Jesus? It is an awful weight to place on the shoulders of the one we claim to follow, our teacher in all things.

"While bishops’ suspicions of the wider culture certainly carry weight, placing all the blame on outside forces misses what many priests and laypeople assess as a more pressing matter inside the Catholic community."

Is it really proper critical thinking to place blame on outside forces at all?

Probably if our time frame for evaluation only goes back to the late 1940s and 1950s.

Definitely not if we extend our timeframe of evaluation to a few hundred years; which is more difficult to do because we are not trained to look at really long term trends nor are we conditioned to existentially accept it. Yet we readily accept that time moves slowly in the Vatican.

We need to remember that at one time all Europe was Catholic and in theory, if not practice, ruled from Rome. This was true for hundreds of years until the mid 1800's when the Pope lost all his land except for the Vatican.

Perhaps, the 'outside forces' have been at work for centuries instead of a mere 45 to 50 years since Vatican II?

Somehow we also must account for the fact that in the 20th Century there were two world wars in which the same 'God' was on both sides (it is almost as though society learned nothing from WWI). Add in the many years of war in previous centuries and I conclude that the 'reform of the reform' or the 'liturgy wars' are simply today's non-violent expression and extension of the physical wars that have long been present in the RCC. New chapter; same book.

So when we argue over V2 we really must try to put it in a much more broad historical context to understand not only our arguments, pro or con, but also the oppossing arguments.

In fact, I would argue that it is most important for us to understand the other side in order to understand our side because V2 is much like The Bible. The Old and New Testament go togther (which is why The Bible is printed with both) and to understand one; you must understand the other.

It is not a case of for me to be right; the other side must be wrong. Or vice versa. Unfortunately Rome all too often gives the impression that this is exactly what the changes are about.

My major point is that for Rome to blame secularism or modernity is for Rome to forget its major and predominant historical role over centuries in making today's society what it is. Thus, Rome loses more credibility which causes more loss of authority which causes more irrelevance.

I wonder if anyone has compared the decline of the Roman Church to the Decline of Rome itself? I ask because the management and structure of the Roman Church is based upon that of Rome which ceased to be centuries ago. .

Dividing Catholics does not do anything to solve the problems within the Church's structure, but for those in the heirarchy, it is certainly easier. We cannot go backward because the world has changed. The Church is failing to keep pace. God created each of us as unique, beloved individuals. Why then does the Church think that God isn't creative enough to have unique ways of allowing each of us to experience the Divine? One size fits all just doesn't work. The modern "pharisees" in the heirarchy have forgotten that Jesus put love over the law. They've also forgotten that Jesus never sought the trappings of power.

In my diocese in England there is blog called 'The hermeneutics of continuity' which is doing exactly what you are talking about - pretending that Vat 2 was merely a blip. Sadly many are taken in by this and the combination of nostalgia (for those old enough to even rember the so-called 'good old days'(ha ha) this includes myself b.1954) and the neo-mysticism of wafting incense and mumbled Latin that has clouded the waters somewhat.
The real issue is that of power (clerical, abuse thereof) and the nature of Church / image of God etc. An interestying aspect has been the return (has it ever really gone away?) to the dualistic thinking and fear behind so much of what I see and hear today. This is so sad.
Can we truly be free from these shackles?
I would like to at least to give it a try!

May I thank you for a really excellent publication here in NCR - I only recently started to read this on line and love so much that you write on spirituality (Joyce Rupp - wow!) and the theology articles.etc I am an avid Tablet subscriber but you seem to be able to reach a wider public - well done and God bless you all.

Jim (from rather lonely 'fortress Church' aka England (or at least my bit!)

One of the problems that I see with the appeal to continuity is that it enshrines as a golden era, one particular time. It traps the growth and expression of the Church in a worldview and understanding of humanity which is inconsistant with where the world is and what it knows about itself. We risk becoming the new pharisees focusing more on the rubrics of the liturgy than on the people that the liturgy is meant to serve and inspire. This traps and stifles a present day expression of our identity as God's beloved, and in forcing us into outdated (the pre-Vatican prayer texts are not some golden age of liturgy, nor theology, nor the highest expression of what it means to be human) articulations of faith, humanity, etc, it becomes totally irrelevant to my life. It no longer speaks who I am, but rather, who the Church once saw us to be. The world has changed. We have changed. Our theology has grown and developed. The Church must catch up, stay current or perish by her own misguided fear of growing up.

“The so-called ‘spirit’ of the council has no authoritative interpretation. It is a ghost or demon that must be exorcised if we are to proceed with the Lord’s work.”

The Sioux City, Iowa bishop's comment is so sad and absolute. Will he be fanning the fires of ignorance and hatred around those who embrace the Spirit of the Council...that gentle wind that John XXIII opened the windows for? Exorcism...what's next...excommunication?

"Hermeneutic" - A method or principle of interpretation.

"Spin" - A special point of view, emphasis, or interpretation presented for the purpose of influencing opinion.

You are entirely correct about Benedict XVI spinning the "reform of the liturgy" to deflect attention from the real root of dysfunction within the hierarchy and the church.

Now that we know...and see...what's next?
A new hermeneutic/spin/investigation/deflection?

Or will some brave soul in the Vatican attempt to deal with introspection and renewal in the hierarchical culture? Perhaps even some accountability?

I think the folks at NCR and their readers, ought to take a back seat now. Forty years of dissent, clown liturgy, and sex abuse is the fruit they've got to show. Enough said. Get thee to confession and live a holy and chaste life as a lay person, not your own little pope! I'm a young 20-something Catholic, tired of dissent and auto-destruction of the Holy Church. The asylum is slowly being grappled from the hands of lunatics.

Amen, Amen.

The term "heinous crime" was used by the Vatican in its meetinfg with the Irish bishops. And yet it seems that there are no "heinous criminals".

Sorrow, apology but no punishment.

It is too bad that impeachment is not allowed by the Church.

In his Dec. 2005 address to the Roman curia Benedict XVI rejected the continuity-discontinuity way of interpreting Vatican II and opted instead of a hermeneutic of REFORM.

a hierarchy implosion is imminent...the tsunami sirens of the people of God are sounding far and wide...

"Dysfunctional" is a most charitable word to describe delusional. Benedict and the Roman Curia have placed themselves directly in the path of a very powerful oncoming train. From their world viewpoint there are not two competing camps of Catholics; there is only one camp and it is theirs. In their pre-Vatican II world, which they continue to live in today, all Catholics [true Catholics] will do what they are told to do WITHOUT thinking and certainly without questioning. What they [the hierarchy] fail to grasp is that those days are gone! In that sort of dysfunctional/delusional scenario, they are sitting ducks; and they wonder why the People of God are shooting at them!

Hello

"those who want to diminish the effect of the Second Vatican Council"

"those who hold that the council was merely an affirmation of what went before"

"'you’re for us or against us' strategy of dealing with the complexities and messiness of church reform"

"attempting to send the faithful on a forced march back to some ill-defined simpler and purer period of the past"

I would expect better from NCR than these crude, hackneyed and ill-informed stereotypes of those who agree with the hermeneutic of continuity AND reform. I guess the authors must be really scared if their pushing such rubbish.

Don't forget, it's First Friday today!

So, I thought that the Holy Sprit was at work during Vatican Council 2!!!!!! The problem in the church starts at the top but the "Patriarchal Church" does not want to hear that. I for one was and still am awed by the results of Vatican Council 2 and the documents that came from it. Truly, the Sprit was at work. And, oh, by the way, let's forget about canonizing John Paul, and Canonize John 23rd! He deserves it!!
Sandra Slater

Well put! It certainly seems as though this whole "liturgy wars" is just "smoke and mirrors" to take the focus AWAY from the sex abuse scandal in the Church.
They can't fix or control that, so they are looking at the one thing they do have control over.
It will just continue to drive people away from the Catholic Church.

The reasons for the present crisis of leadership and confidence . . . are not to be found merely in connection with certain individuals or officeholders and certainly not in their lack of good will. It is the ecclesiastical system itself which has failed to keep abreast of the times and still displays numerous features of an outdated absolutism. Pope and bishops continue to behave largely as sole rulers over the Church, combining in their hands legislative, executive and judicial functions. Despite the councils set up in the meantime, they exercise their power in many places free from any effective control; conformity is the criterion for the choice of their successors.

Widespread complaints in different regions of the Church include: the appointment of bishops by a secret procedure without the co-operation of the clergy and people concerned; lack of openness in the process of decision-making; continual appeals by the leaders to their own authority and to the obedience of others; insufficient explanations of the reasons for demands and directives; monocratic official style and disregard of genuine collegiality; reduction of the laity and “lower clergy” to a state of tutelage, unable to appeal effectively against the decisions of the authorities. Freedom is demanded for the Church in its dealing with the outside world, but is not assured to its own members. Justice and peace are preached when this costs nothing to the Church and its leaders. There is a struggle for things of secondary importance, but there is no evidence either of great conceptions for the future or of clear priorities for the present. Even timid attempts on the part of theology to help the Church in this situation are met with distrust and rejection. The results can be seen in a passivity of many members of the Church and the increasing apathy of the public at large toward those who speak for the Church.

Today it is not only a question of what might be called “democratization” of the Church. If we get down to the reasons for the lack of leadership and ideas in the Church, we constantly find that the Church is not only far behind the times, but has also and more importantly fallen short of its own mission. In so many things – in the opinion of friends and enemies – it has not followed the example of him whom it constantly invokes. That is why we see today a strange contrast between the interest of Jesus himself and the lack of interest in the Church. Whenever the Church wields power over men instead of performing a service to men, whenever its institutions, doctrines and laws become ends in themselves, whenever its spokesmen hand out personal opinions and requests as divine precepts and directives: whenever these things happen, the Church’s mission is betrayed, the Church dissociates itself from both God and men, it reaches a crisis.

“On Being a Christian” (Pp. 520-521), Hans Kung

One gets the impression that the Bishops, and the Church in general, act only when the horse has bolted. Would it not be possible to have professional practicing psychologists work with the hierarchy to understand the problems that exist, to propose solutions, or to show that certain problems can be rephrased to be better understood, and then to be seen in clearer light? After all, the Church and the Bishops are at the service of the people of God, and so should use the means which modernity and secularisation provide so as to better function as leaders of communities. It is no excuse to say that the Church and its leaders are chary of modern psychology, that is merely trying to imitate the ostrich,isn't it?

The whole argument of the "hermeneutics of rupture" vs. the "hermeneutics of continuity" is a bogus argument. It implies that Vatican II made core doctrinal changes, which of course it didn't. It then argues that these doctrinal changes never happened. At the same time it argues that the important operational changes the Council actually did make ALSO didn't happen, which is basically crazy talk.

The hermeneutics argument is a red herring to keep hierarchy from making the changes it sorely needs to keep the church from further unraveling.

Well said: "a leadership layer in the Catholic church that keeps unraveling but refuses to see itself as any part of the problem."

Right on! This dysfunction, in the same, but different ways, seems to be effecting other Christian churches. To me, the Episcopal churches, with some parishes/priests/bishops vying to be pure (that is Anglican/16th C as they can be) vs the more progressive ends of the spectrum.

The US political scene has split from more moderate parties with discussion possible from a variety of people and opinions to extremes in both parties trying to shut out the other.

Such ways of doing things can lead to disgust on the part of the members, and inaction - or something else appearing for good or ill.

I pray for both the religious institutions and the people in our country - that wise leadership can prevail and sanity prevail. This is a tough scene.

Thank you. You speak clearly. I stutter.

"Dividing Catholics into competing camps and trying to short-circuit the reforms of Vatican II deflect attention from the troubles of the hierarchical culture. But the deeper problems of accountability and transparency won’t disappear" and neither will modern culture. Jesus didn't say his culture was bad and so remove yourself from it. He was living fully in his culture to the point of being perceived as a partier, drunkard and socially irresponsible person but he changed the entire world that way. What good does it do to buttress ourselves inside a closed church and claim the world will see how great our truth is from there? Nope, it will only happen as we stay in the modern world and deal with it from where ever people are in their journey as Jesus did. Going back to some hocus pocus language like Latin to say that's how respect and awe is attained is ludicrous. Going back to women not counting, nor any laity really is raw power and won't teach people Jesus' message of Abba, Father.

Jesus did bring division that is sure. What was the division he caused? Oh, that we are ALL worth God's whole love and we should treat each other that way too and the division came in when those in power or who thought they were better than the uneducated riffraff didn't want to hear that message. Well, that speaks of the division we feel today in the hierarchy versus the common person.

I support Pope Benedict XVI and his stewardship of the Catholic Church. It is useful to the Catholic identity to know that the Church today is the same Church that Christ founded. The hermeneutic of continuity ensures that what St. Peter taught is the same as what Pope Benedict XVI teaches today. I'm not opposed to the development of doctrine as a feature of Vatican II, but I am opposed to the view that Vatican II represents a radical departure from the teachings that preceded it.

I applaud that the National Catholic Reporter is taking a stand against sexual sins. I look forward to a series by the NCR attacking fornication, adultery, sodomy and contraception as other sexual sins deserving condemnation. That would be real progress.

What an utter waste of time!

I will not bother to refute this but to the author(s):
Actually read the Vatican II articles. No, really. Don't say you read them just please, read them. Especially sacrosanctum concillium.

For those of you who want an actual rebuttal to NCR here you go:

http://wdtprs.com/blog/2010/03/ncr-has-another-little-nutty/#comments

Fr Z does another great job debunking some of this stuff.

I love this part: "Dividing Catholics into competing camps and trying to short-circuit the reforms of Vatican II.” This is something the NCR has been doing for a long time.

It’s time for a rational, open-minded approach to the “hermeneutics of continuity.” Let's accept that the hermeneutics of continuity means to bridge the controversies between the proponents of Vatican I and Vatican II. The discontinuity between the Councils is a perceived schism between the theologies/ ecclesiologies of the two Councils.

Conflicts center on the roles of laity, on attitudes toward Modernity, and on the codependency of faith and reason. Vatican I endorsed what was the traditional top-down hierarchical model, while Vatican II allowed more participatory ownership of authority, of collegial relationship of popes and bishops, and need for Church-updating and inclusion of truths scientifically discerned. Fresh air from the “open windows” of Vatican II inspired the Liberation Theology movement, which provoked a retaliatory response by Pope John Paul II, namely, his appointment of replacement bishops who held to the Vatican I model against Liberation Theology.

In brief, the conflict between the Councils reduces to this: Vatican I proponents say nothing changed after Vatican II, Vatican II proponents say everything changed. What is proposed here is to establish that both are right, but not for the same reasons, and that what developed in the Church between the Councils was development toward a continuity process of reconciling scriptural hermeneutics and faith orthodoxy to norms of scientific methods and the certification of truth.

The continuity between reason and faith is the bridge for the continuity of science and religion, and the continuity of science and religion is the bridge for the continuity of Vatican I and Vatican II. Vatican II proceded under the principle: “faith supposes reason as grace supposes nature,” (John Courtney, SJ.) Reason, as the supposition of faith, evolved out of the enlightenment experience after the Protestant Reformation and the accelerated expansion of science in the inbetween time of the two Councils.

German Lutheran theologians developed scientific methods for interpreting Scriptures; first official Catholic response was negative until Pope Pius XII published his encyclical “Divino Afflante Spiritu.” In his encyclical Pius XII reinforced the notion that scientific methods should indeed be used in the hermeneutics of Scriptures. Pius XII recognized that conditions of the times, the local circumstances of the writer, politics, culture and prevailing philosophies, all influenced the content and intent of individual scriptures and writers. This norm of reason for discerning truth in Scriptural interpretation was an important continuity shift from excessive reliance on clerical authority and faith only.

In the early church, Irenaeus with fellow bishops decided for the church then, and for the future, that a plurality of bishops could decide what orthodoxy is and what the faithful had to accept under penalty of sin. "Continuity" in this traditional model means that all new orthodoxy has to tie back to the old if it is to be authentic. To modern consciousness, this seems to be an incestuous expectation of closed-minded control. What needs to be explored is the weight and role of the "continuity of science" —also— as it pertains to the "continuity of orthodoxy?"

In fairness to the integrity of bishops and the early Church, the underlying rationale of orthodoxy they proclaimed presumed the "science" of the time. The "continuity of orthodoxy" requires acceptance that the grounding of first orthodoxy presumed the science of the static-centrist worldview, which worldview continues in traditional Church culture until this time.

On premises of the muddled times, Pope Pius IX condemned modernity (especially evolution), and Vatican I Fathers rubberstamped his claim of infallibility. The dire world and political circumstances of the time and the particular animus of Pius IX imposed heavily on the free judgment of the gathered bishops. The Pope was under imminent threat of losing his kingdom of the Papal States, and in fact did lose them and he became a “Prisoner of the Vatican.” Leo XIII, successor to Pius IX came to recognize there would be no recovery of the Papal States; he moved the attention of the Church to the Gospel of Peace and Justice, which was being developed by other Christian churches (cf: Walter Rauschenbusch, The Social Gospel, 1908)

Vatican II retrieved scientific sensitivity for the hermeneutics of Council deliberations as Pope Pius XII had done for the hermeneutics of Scripture. The Council recognized the "sensus fidelium" which accepts the science of evolution. So how can bishops round out the square box of their making to fit evolution’s peg? The "hermeneutic of continuity" makes sense if it includes the expectation that the continuity of science applies also to understandings that underlie Council intentions. Between condemning evolution and accepting it, there is no "hermeneutic of continuity-orthodoxy," except when discerned from the norm of cumulative science in contributing to truth understandings.

The norms of truth and credibility are so paramount that no method or technique should be excluded that can add to the clarity and applicability of truth. Surely, everyone interested in the advancement and application of truth would want to exclude any method or test of time that clarifies and enlarges on truth. It must be recognized that the muddle of the times not only obscure matters of science yet to be revealed, but also errs albeit in good faith by bringing forward from the past mistakes of assumption and presumption. To err is human, and humans will err no matter in what venue they operate.

History and human nature testify to life’s mysteries and truths that come to light over time and only, bit by bit. It is not inconsistent with the hermeneutics of continuity to acknowledge this fact of truth and accept clarifications that informed science brings to understandings of truths. A muddle of consciousness and ideological conflicts prevailed inside and outside the Church at the time of Vatican I so that judgments were certain to be reflective of the unsettled times.

With respect to the pursuit of the hermeneutics of continuity between the two Vatican Councils, it is consistent with truth to acknowledge the heat and intolerance of the time, and that under such circumstances less than fully informed judgments would be made. In the matter of faith understandings, evolution is scientifically established as it bears on consciousness and practical living. So the attitudes of Church toward evolution need to be evaluated in the light of established science. To do less is to be unfaithful to the "hermeneutic of continuity.” The least norms of integral truth require nothing less than new “analysis and synthesis” of faith correlations to evolution, as called for by Vatican II.

"There’s simply been too much reform, too much theology advanced, too much demographic change, too much practice that’s worlds different from 45 years ago to suddenly claim that little has actually changed."
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Compare to a bus heading off a cliff: "There's simply been too many tire changes, too many engine inspections, too many different riders, too much new technology from 45 years ago to suddenly claim that little has actually changed."

On the contrary, we can claim that little has changed. The bus is still heading off the cliff despite its various makeovers. Facing the reality of the cliff we can, indeed, choose to turn the bus around and head back to the fork in the road from whence we took a wrong turn.

Of course, funny how the "we're too far along to change now" argument didn't work in 1962 after nearly two millenia of successful reform, theology, demographic change, and practice, but we're supposed to buy into that argument now.

Lay people in the Catholic Church got much smarter and the caliber of intelligent men as bishops went in the opposite direction since John Paul II took charge in 1978. Joe Ratzinger, in spite of what historians have tried to tell us, was a reactionary on the right just a few years after the close of the Council. He was never anything but a career politician on the far right and he seized every opportunity to promote both himself and his far right views of Catholic thinking. No matter how hard he tries to short circuit the reforms of Vatican II, it will only backfire and increase the rate of implosion and decay of the Latin Rite Church. Accountability and transparency are the front burner issues that right wingers can't face with honesty. They are deceivers and manipulators. They are a disaster for the Church. We will see a new Church evolve out of the ruins that Benedict leaves behind and history will not judge Joe Ratzinger well at all!

This article represents a valid dimension of the regression but it seems to over simplify and diminish both the process, the underlying "policy" and the intended outcome. With respect to the personal integrity with which Benedict XVI holds his perspective, he holds an european medievalist vision of church; a greek platonist vision of truth, an unwavering dedication to the notion that "God's word" became incarnate with latin and a blindly scholastic professorial notion that the faithful are simple students who must be "formed" and that bishops are principal "custodians" of "little people" who know no better and must be protected from "intellectuals". All of this seems to be wrapped-up in an Augustinian vision of nature as, on the one hand, "intrinsically disordered" and, on the other hand, paradoxically, "immutable".

Unfortunately there is more. Added to this quagmire, is a management coterie of dominant hierarchs in preferred status, who are either sychophants, "true believers" or opportunists who see a domination church as their personal ambition route. This is an institution that is "intrinsically" screwed-up and indeed scary. Followers of Christ and His message cannot exercise their 'image and likness' to the Creator in submitting their intellect and will; believers in Christ and message have an intrinsic obligation to work towards a more Christlike community. So, to those who would invite me, and others like me, to leave, no way. Christ needs and wants us.

Dividing Catholics, especially as a way to push through a new (and really not too bad) translation, will likely backfire - either because some will think the new translation is superior while other just ignore them or because everyone will become ticked over the process and clamor for a separate Great Church, say a restoration of the ancient gallic Church of Gallatia.

To the Editorial Staff,      

Wow!     What a spot-on home run with this analysis.
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One of the problems of Church hierarchical culture and its 'creeping infallibility' ethic,   is the false fearful notion that to admit major screw-ups in multiple areas   (and then to reassess and correct themselves),   will somehow undue any remaining credibility and cast doubt on all Church teaching authority.
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Whilst casting the laser beam of investigation,   critique   and   change,   everywhere but within their own hierarchical circle of power,   'what they greatly feared has come upon them' — but for the exact opposite reason.     How tragic for all of us.

Following a meeting of Pope Benedict with the Irish bishops, Vatican radio makes note of the “serious situation” that has emerged in the church “in Ireland.” One has to wonder, after the “serious situation” in America and the “serious situation” now coming to light in Germany, what is the full scope of secrecy and betrayal that keeps falling from the folds of Roman Catholic episcopal regalia.

The Holy Father is right that sexual abuse of children (by priests) is a “heinous crime” and a “grave sin,” but what does he have to say about the callous and systematic pastoral failure of bishops who caused the harm to be multiplied exponentially? These were “errors in judgment and omissions,” he explains, not crimes or sins but well-meaning mistakes and administrative bungles. But these shepherds, rather than caring for their sheep—their lambs!—didn’t just knowingly allow the wolves to roam freely amid the flock; they abetted the crimes by hiding the predators in sheep’s clothing, moving them again and again and again every time their real identity could no longer be concealed. By now it’s a familiar pattern.

This “grave crisis” can’t be dealt with simply by placing “trained and dedicated lay volunteers” into parishes to “ensure the safety of children in all church activities.” I am a Sunday-school teacher and was required to undergo such training through the Archdiocese of Philadelphia when the sex-abuse scandal broke there—all the while wondering, Why am I, a parent, the one being trained to look out for our kids? What about the bishops, who seem to think themselves entitled to collude and lie and cover up—not to mention intimidate and retaliate against victims and their families—with impunity? Where is the accountability? Do the bishops (or the pope) even understand what they’ve done? The evidence suggests they neither see it nor accept it. We’re still waiting to hear “through my fault, through my fault, through my most grievous fault,” but all we get are oblique references to “mistakes were made” and “we wouldn’t do the same things today.”

After a three-year investigation into wide-spread clergy sex abuse and its cover up in Philadelphia, a grand jury concluded that “the Archdiocese’s ‘handling’ of the abuse scandal was at least as immoral as the abuse itself.” The panel stated that “prompt action and a climate of compassion for the child victims could have significantly limited the damage done. But…as abuse reports grew, the Archdiocese chose to call in the lawyers rather than confront the abusers.” Archdiocesan attorneys and officials called the grand-jury report “biased and anti-Catholic,” but in a rebuttal memo, Philadelphia’s district attorney recognized the response as part of the “all too familiar denials, deceptions and evasions” that investigators had to wade through for three years—and the laity has had to endure for far longer.

I am no longer angry at the bishops, but I do feel profoundly sad—even contrite myself. In some sense, I see my own sin in the bishops’ behavior—we all share in this “communion of sin.” The church as the People of God is precisely a fallen people—laity, clergy and hierarchy—who stand in need of redemption and whose turning to Christ is a recognition of this poverty and need in the depths of us all. We lift our voices to God because we can’t save ourselves—we can’t “fix” original sin. (Marx tried, and look where it got us.)

Sometimes I think church leaders are too invested in themselves as “the magisterium” and don’t recognize how that can give rise to a kind of false self—a shepherd expected to have some privileged access to “the truth” or the will of God. It’s a burden really, and probably an unnecessary one—the impersonation of some theological construct, a pose church leaders feel they have to maintain and defend rather than admitting that they sometimes screw up. Who doesn’t? This whole illusion of protecting the reputation of the church would go away, if we were more honest about how deeply flawed the church is and was and always will be. A good remedy might be to listen to what Jesus said to Peter (the “first pope”), “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling stone to me. You are thinking not as God does, but as human beings do.” (Matt. 23:16) How come the church has not developed that aspect of Petrine theology and ecclesiology? Certainly many of us are finding the church to be a stumbling stone these days.

The “breakdown in trust in the church’s leadership,” which the pope alludes to, is exactly that—a deepening doubt about the integrity of authority at the highest levels, and not just in Ireland. It’s not the wolves we are suspicious of but the shepherds themselves—leaders who apply one standard to their flocks and another to themselves. “They tie up heavy burdens and lay them on people’s shoulders, but they will not lift a finger to move them” [Matt. 23:4]. The priest abusers have been outed and separated from the flock, but what about those shepherds who enabled the molestation and rape of children to build to catastrophic proportions? Their betrayal, and the far-reaching pain it has inflicted, was forced into the open by a scandal-hungry media and the criminal investigations those disclosures spawned. Only then did the hierarchy begin to face its malfeasance—reluctantly, often resentfully and not always without obstruction.

One would hope Pope Benedict’s Pastoral Letter to the People of Ireland would be clear sighted enough to address this stunning and apparently global pastoral failure, which is “at the heart of the crisis.” But given the inability of a stiff-necked episcopacy to see its ongoing sin of upholding the reputation (and the assets) of the institutional church at the expense of accountability, it’s hard to hope for much from a papal missive.

Perhaps that is the real character of the breakdown in trust: The bishops are the apostolic successors, the God-appointed proclaimers of revealed truth, but except for dogmatic formulas and by now rote moral positions, they no longer seem to see the truth. Seeing things not as God does but thinking as humans do, they have become stumbling stones. Their teachings and pronouncements ring hollow, and for those of us in the pews, it’s growing harder to accept their unenlightened authority. In fact, it’s beginning to dawn on many that it might even be a mistake.

“While they were preaching at us, they were damaging our children,” an old Irish woman summarized. “What more can you say?”

Well, at least we know where NCR stands (as if there were any doubt).

The reality (for those interested in that) is that Vatican II was never meant as a clean break with the past, nor was it meant to be some dramatic shift in the Church's understanding of herself. Vatican II was meant to reform the Church in a manner consistent with tradition, it was supposed to be an organic growth, springing out of what went before.

Blessed John XXIII called Vatican II in an effort to spur an "aggiornamento", an updating of the Church, based on a "resourcement", or a return to the historical sources of Catholicism. Since the Council of Trent, the Church had focused itself mostly on Trent and on the years following, sometimes neglecting the Church's history, particularly the early Fathers of the Church. In addition, a great deal of superfluous things that got in the way of the Church's ability to preach the Gospel. Thus, the Council desired to update the Church's presentation of her traditional teaching in a manner that would reach the modern world, while at the same time returning that teaching to the original sources of the Faith, to ground the Church's teaching and practice in the historical context, not only of the 500 years since Trent, but also of the 1900+ years since the time of Christ Himself.

Finally, Vatican II sought to balance an imbalance in the Church that was the result of the premature ending of Vatican Council I. After Vatican I, the balance was tilted toward the authority and office of the Pope, since the Council was not able to address the office and ministry of the bishop (which was supposed to be addressed). So, it was necessary to call Vatican II to address that imbalance, while, at the same time, addressing the proper role of the laity in evangelization of the world.

Reading the documents of the Council, one will find the Church's teaching and her traditions affirmed, while, at the same time, the METHOD by which those teachings are passed on were updated. The documents of the Council reflect no dramatic reform, despite what the purveyors of the so-called "Spirit of Vatican II" may claim. The Council was an organic growth out of the Church's tradition and history, not some sudden break with that tradition and history, and it did not call for radical reform, but rather updating of methods.

Troubles of the hierarchal culture? That's not a culture--there's an entire structure of the Church. Undermine the authority of the Holy Father (the Successor to Peter) and the bishops (the apostles) is to destroy the very structure that Christ intended, and that has been affirmed through 2,000 years of Tradition. More so, it has been affirmed by the Second Vatican Council itself. If the Vatican II fathers had intended us to work in a democracy, they would have set up it. Guess what? It didn't happen. So join in communion with the bishops rather than rail against them. That's true communion.