Vatican probe ends with olive branch for US nuns
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1John5918
Vatican probe ends with an olive branch for American nuns (Crux)
An unprecedented and highly controversial Vatican investigation of every community of Catholic sisters in the United States that began with criticism of nuns... ended Tuesday with a report full of praise, and without any disciplinary measures or new controls.
The result likely will be seen as a major olive branch from the Vatican for American nuns, as well as another sign of a more conciliatory approach under Pope Francis...
Visitation report takes mostly positive tone toward US sisters (NCR)
The final report of a controversial and unprecedented six-year Vatican investigation of tens of thousands of U.S. Catholic sisters takes a roundly positive, even laudatory, tone towards their life and work but also includes several couched but barbed criticisms of them...
An unprecedented and highly controversial Vatican investigation of every community of Catholic sisters in the United States that began with criticism of nuns... ended Tuesday with a report full of praise, and without any disciplinary measures or new controls.
The result likely will be seen as a major olive branch from the Vatican for American nuns, as well as another sign of a more conciliatory approach under Pope Francis...
Visitation report takes mostly positive tone toward US sisters (NCR)
The final report of a controversial and unprecedented six-year Vatican investigation of tens of thousands of U.S. Catholic sisters takes a roundly positive, even laudatory, tone towards their life and work but also includes several couched but barbed criticisms of them...
4timspalding
It'll be interesting to see how the LCWR probe turns out. It may well test Muller's power.
When all's said and done, however, the decline in numbers and influence is overwhelming. I'd be the last to blame everything on Vatican II. Indeed, contrary to myth, orders of "conservative nuns" are doing just as badly as the "radical nuns." But the decline is breathtaking—from 181,421 in 1965 (partially a blip) to under 50,000 today, and a median age in the late 70s. I don't have the projections in front of me, but all the signs are downward. Last year, there only 110 religious sisters took vows. So we're looking at low-thousands soon.
So, what's the solution?
1. Purge the masons and feminists and the real Catholics will have enough nuns!
2. Don't worry, the decline is okay. God would call them if he wanted them. Maybe they're an anachronism.
3. We need more forms of religious life, e.g., the sort of semi-vowed communities the Anglicans have—although they're hardly growing either!
4. There is no solution.
My feeling is number four. Lifelong obedience and dedication has become nigh-unintelligible today. This is not entirely a bad thing, but good or bad, it's a stone-cold fact. People grow up slowly, with lots more education and world experience, and then they live forever. Vowed celibacy is no longer there as a potential escape hatch for gays, lesbians and other people who just don't want to marry. Obedience in general is unintelligible, and absolute obedience to a religious superior is more so. We're not going to get it back.
My hobby horse is that the church needs to revisit temporary vows, along the lines of the Crusading Vow, but slotting into our modern, neotenous and long-lived culture. There are a lot of 20-somethings who'd take a one, two, three or even five-year vow. Consider something like City Year, which is growing quickly.
Temporary vows would provide a model that fits with current society. And, since we're losing the Catholic schools that once fed religious life, it might even serve to reinvigorate lifelong religious life.
When all's said and done, however, the decline in numbers and influence is overwhelming. I'd be the last to blame everything on Vatican II. Indeed, contrary to myth, orders of "conservative nuns" are doing just as badly as the "radical nuns." But the decline is breathtaking—from 181,421 in 1965 (partially a blip) to under 50,000 today, and a median age in the late 70s. I don't have the projections in front of me, but all the signs are downward. Last year, there only 110 religious sisters took vows. So we're looking at low-thousands soon.
So, what's the solution?
1. Purge the masons and feminists and the real Catholics will have enough nuns!
2. Don't worry, the decline is okay. God would call them if he wanted them. Maybe they're an anachronism.
3. We need more forms of religious life, e.g., the sort of semi-vowed communities the Anglicans have—although they're hardly growing either!
4. There is no solution.
My feeling is number four. Lifelong obedience and dedication has become nigh-unintelligible today. This is not entirely a bad thing, but good or bad, it's a stone-cold fact. People grow up slowly, with lots more education and world experience, and then they live forever. Vowed celibacy is no longer there as a potential escape hatch for gays, lesbians and other people who just don't want to marry. Obedience in general is unintelligible, and absolute obedience to a religious superior is more so. We're not going to get it back.
My hobby horse is that the church needs to revisit temporary vows, along the lines of the Crusading Vow, but slotting into our modern, neotenous and long-lived culture. There are a lot of 20-somethings who'd take a one, two, three or even five-year vow. Consider something like City Year, which is growing quickly.
Temporary vows would provide a model that fits with current society. And, since we're losing the Catholic schools that once fed religious life, it might even serve to reinvigorate lifelong religious life.
5John5918
>4 timspalding: I tend to agree with you. Social change is a reality, regardless of whether one likes it or not.
I agree with you on temporary vows. Many missionary congregations have lay associates. A handful of them go on to make lifelong vows (while remaining laity) but most serve for a few years and then move on.
Mind you, decline in numbers is not universal. I have a lot of interaction with the Pauline Sisters in Nairobi and Juba, whose main charism is communications (including publishing). I'm really impressed at their ability to attract intelligent, creative and committed young women.
I agree with you on temporary vows. Many missionary congregations have lay associates. A handful of them go on to make lifelong vows (while remaining laity) but most serve for a few years and then move on.
Mind you, decline in numbers is not universal. I have a lot of interaction with the Pauline Sisters in Nairobi and Juba, whose main charism is communications (including publishing). I'm really impressed at their ability to attract intelligent, creative and committed young women.
6nathanielcampbell
>4 timspalding: "Obedience in general is unintelligible"
"Not my will, Father, but thine be done."
"obedient even to the point of death upon the Cross"
How does a Christian make sense of these if obedience is "unintelligible"?
"Not my will, Father, but thine be done."
"obedient even to the point of death upon the Cross"
How does a Christian make sense of these if obedience is "unintelligible"?
8MyopicBookworm
I remember a friend (who knew that sort of thing) commenting -- some years ago and from a mainly UK perspective -- that the Roman Catholic women's religious communities were struggling but the men's communities were thriving, while the reverse was the case among Anglican religious.
9sullijo
>6 nathanielcampbell: Through fear and trembling, and asking for the gift of wisdom.
Obedience is largely unintelligible in the modern Western world. We're too inoculated against authority for it to be otherwise.
Obedience is largely unintelligible in the modern Western world. We're too inoculated against authority for it to be otherwise.
10John5918
>9 sullijo: And perhaps also too individualistic?
11timspalding
>6 nathanielcampbell:
Well, I think the simple answer is that obedience to God is different from obedience to men, and obedience overall is not the modern frame. Modern people understand moral laws. They get "don't get drunk and kill someone." But they do not conceive of this as a matter of obedience, but just of morality. That is, the modern understands that drunk driving is wrong, and thinks people shouldn't want to it. But they don't naturally frame it as "obedience." That's not their mentality. And, FWIW, they don't because that implies that not driving drunk isn't about not wanting to hurt others, but to follow essentially arbitrary directions from someone with more effective power than you. Or take the reverse. You will hardly ever hear a modern Christian frame charity, or love of neighbor, as fundamentally a question of obedience!
There is a deep societal change under all this. People fifty or a hundred hundred years ago lived in a society where you had to do what you were told--by parents, by husbands, by your boss, by your country, etc. This just isn't the case now. Parents don't just tell you what to do anymore. Marriages are far more equal. Office hierarchies are much more distributed and flat. Nobody gets drafted and sent to die because the country told you to. Equality and agreement are the norm, obedience to superior authority a rarity--and disliked when it happens.
As is typical, some Christians see this as the core problem. Thus many evangelicals and traditionalist Catholics obsess that man be kept the "head" of the family, and children be kept little obedient minions—by belt and hair brush if necessary. But that world is going or gone. And it's not coming back. And if Catholicism requires that cultural context, and can't re-express its timeless truths in culturally meaningful forms, it's not going anywhere good either.
Well, I think the simple answer is that obedience to God is different from obedience to men, and obedience overall is not the modern frame. Modern people understand moral laws. They get "don't get drunk and kill someone." But they do not conceive of this as a matter of obedience, but just of morality. That is, the modern understands that drunk driving is wrong, and thinks people shouldn't want to it. But they don't naturally frame it as "obedience." That's not their mentality. And, FWIW, they don't because that implies that not driving drunk isn't about not wanting to hurt others, but to follow essentially arbitrary directions from someone with more effective power than you. Or take the reverse. You will hardly ever hear a modern Christian frame charity, or love of neighbor, as fundamentally a question of obedience!
There is a deep societal change under all this. People fifty or a hundred hundred years ago lived in a society where you had to do what you were told--by parents, by husbands, by your boss, by your country, etc. This just isn't the case now. Parents don't just tell you what to do anymore. Marriages are far more equal. Office hierarchies are much more distributed and flat. Nobody gets drafted and sent to die because the country told you to. Equality and agreement are the norm, obedience to superior authority a rarity--and disliked when it happens.
As is typical, some Christians see this as the core problem. Thus many evangelicals and traditionalist Catholics obsess that man be kept the "head" of the family, and children be kept little obedient minions—by belt and hair brush if necessary. But that world is going or gone. And it's not coming back. And if Catholicism requires that cultural context, and can't re-express its timeless truths in culturally meaningful forms, it's not going anywhere good either.
12hf22
>11 timspalding:
People say this a lot, but I just don't know if it is true, at least outside the USA with its particular history.
The modern Western State has countless essentially arbitrary laws, which the great majority follow without question. And when Government and police tell people to do things, generally they just get done.
Personally, I think modern Western publics are possibly more obedient to authority than in times past, and at least no less so.
People say this a lot, but I just don't know if it is true, at least outside the USA with its particular history.
The modern Western State has countless essentially arbitrary laws, which the great majority follow without question. And when Government and police tell people to do things, generally they just get done.
Personally, I think modern Western publics are possibly more obedient to authority than in times past, and at least no less so.
13timspalding
There is a big difference between "that's the law" and "I do this because I am obedient to the Federal Government." Whether someone follows the law is not the point. The point is why one does it. Obedience per se has vanished as a cultural value, and institutions based on absolute lifelong obedience to people--especially in a religion that stresses freedom and the sinfulness of people!--is unintelligible today.
14nathanielcampbell
>13 timspalding: "institutions based on absolute lifelong obedience to people--especially in a religion that stresses freedom and the sinfulness of people!--is unintelligible today"
Only, I think, because of a fundamental misunderstanding of ecclesiastical obedience. Reread the Regula Benedicti -- obedience to the abbot is obedience to Christ, not to a sinful person. Fundamentally, a rejection of the ecclesiastical alter Christus is a rejection of sacramentality, i.e. the flow of divine power/grace through creatures -- and sacramentality is, in turn, an essential of catholic Christianity.
Only, I think, because of a fundamental misunderstanding of ecclesiastical obedience. Reread the Regula Benedicti -- obedience to the abbot is obedience to Christ, not to a sinful person. Fundamentally, a rejection of the ecclesiastical alter Christus is a rejection of sacramentality, i.e. the flow of divine power/grace through creatures -- and sacramentality is, in turn, an essential of catholic Christianity.
15hf22
>13 timspalding:
Yeah, I think you might be dealing with US specific factors. Here, in general, if say the police ask people to do something they do it (even if not legally required). Precisely because they recognise the authority vested in the police.
My impression is the same also applies in Europe.
It might not be a key cultural value, as say it still is in for example China, but people understand it fine.
In any case, even if we were in the business of bending to the winds of current cultural understandings, why would such a Western specific cultural more matter? The global Church is not mostly in the West anymore.
Yeah, I think you might be dealing with US specific factors. Here, in general, if say the police ask people to do something they do it (even if not legally required). Precisely because they recognise the authority vested in the police.
My impression is the same also applies in Europe.
It might not be a key cultural value, as say it still is in for example China, but people understand it fine.
In any case, even if we were in the business of bending to the winds of current cultural understandings, why would such a Western specific cultural more matter? The global Church is not mostly in the West anymore.
16timspalding
>15 hf22:
Yeah, I don't buy it. The US. Then add Europe. Are we to imagine Canada's got a different idea about obedience? Seems unlikely to me. Australia? Bulwark of obedience? I doubt it.
The "West." Well, is Latin America "the west"? Latin America is in full-on retreat from Catholicism, toward structure-less, anti-hierarchical pentecostalism. Vocations, male and female, are in the decline.
This goes nowhere but down. Take a simple metrics of traditional obedience--the percentage of Latin Americans who say wives should obey their husbands. The "least obedient" countries on the list are Chile, Uruguay and Argentina (see PEW). What countries have the highest GDP per capita? The same three--Chile, Uruguay and Argentina. Do you imagine that's a coincidence? Do you imagine the economy of Latin America will stop growing?
China? There are 12 million Catholics in China, 1% of the total. And anyone who's paid attention to Chinese social changes sees the constant pull between old patterns of obedience, especially to family, and new norms. It's the social story of the last 20 years. Chinese may be more "obedient" than westerns, but they're becoming less so with each tick of the economic clock.
We're up to about 84% of Catholics--leaving only Africa. Sure, that continent remains largely outside these cultural shifts. Apart from South Africa—not coincidentally the African country with the highest GDP*—Africa stands apart on such issues. One can point at a place like South Sudan and say "there are the real Catholics—the ones that understand obedience!" But you can also point at them and say they're one of the poorest countries in Africa, with an average life expectancy of 55 and an adult literacy rate of 27%. It defies the data to imagine that this is primarily about African-ness, not about under-development. In other words, don't hold your breath for traditional values, including the virtues of obedience, if Africa ever gets rich.
* Excluding Nigeria, which gets it from oil and doesn't spread it around much, and some other Muslim petro-states.
Yeah, I don't buy it. The US. Then add Europe. Are we to imagine Canada's got a different idea about obedience? Seems unlikely to me. Australia? Bulwark of obedience? I doubt it.
The "West." Well, is Latin America "the west"? Latin America is in full-on retreat from Catholicism, toward structure-less, anti-hierarchical pentecostalism. Vocations, male and female, are in the decline.
This goes nowhere but down. Take a simple metrics of traditional obedience--the percentage of Latin Americans who say wives should obey their husbands. The "least obedient" countries on the list are Chile, Uruguay and Argentina (see PEW). What countries have the highest GDP per capita? The same three--Chile, Uruguay and Argentina. Do you imagine that's a coincidence? Do you imagine the economy of Latin America will stop growing?
China? There are 12 million Catholics in China, 1% of the total. And anyone who's paid attention to Chinese social changes sees the constant pull between old patterns of obedience, especially to family, and new norms. It's the social story of the last 20 years. Chinese may be more "obedient" than westerns, but they're becoming less so with each tick of the economic clock.
We're up to about 84% of Catholics--leaving only Africa. Sure, that continent remains largely outside these cultural shifts. Apart from South Africa—not coincidentally the African country with the highest GDP*—Africa stands apart on such issues. One can point at a place like South Sudan and say "there are the real Catholics—the ones that understand obedience!" But you can also point at them and say they're one of the poorest countries in Africa, with an average life expectancy of 55 and an adult literacy rate of 27%. It defies the data to imagine that this is primarily about African-ness, not about under-development. In other words, don't hold your breath for traditional values, including the virtues of obedience, if Africa ever gets rich.
* Excluding Nigeria, which gets it from oil and doesn't spread it around much, and some other Muslim petro-states.
17hf22
>16 timspalding:
I never said it was a "Bulwark of obedience", just that people understand and accept the concept just fine. To be honest, I think the change in modern times is the loci for obedience have been reduced, primarily to the State.
But the USA has a particular history regarding obedience to the State, so it is a little exceptional in this regard.
And are you really trying to tie the losses of the Church in say Latin America primarily to matters of authority and obedience? That is as simplistic and false as saying Vatican II did it. Obedience certainly does not tend to rate highly on the various surveys done around the world about why people leave the Church.
Finally, we can all play a number equally uninsightful statistical games with what happens with rising income levels. Like what happens to birth rates, and what that does to the demographics of the future. But demographic projections are not prophecy - The future in 100 years will not look much like what trends suggest.
I never said it was a "Bulwark of obedience", just that people understand and accept the concept just fine. To be honest, I think the change in modern times is the loci for obedience have been reduced, primarily to the State.
But the USA has a particular history regarding obedience to the State, so it is a little exceptional in this regard.
And are you really trying to tie the losses of the Church in say Latin America primarily to matters of authority and obedience? That is as simplistic and false as saying Vatican II did it. Obedience certainly does not tend to rate highly on the various surveys done around the world about why people leave the Church.
Finally, we can all play a number equally uninsightful statistical games with what happens with rising income levels. Like what happens to birth rates, and what that does to the demographics of the future. But demographic projections are not prophecy - The future in 100 years will not look much like what trends suggest.
18margd
Listening to Krista Tippett's full length interview with a strong, smart nun, I better understand why some US bishops felt threatened. (Sr. Simone reads her own poem at end--Loaves and Fishes".)
Simone Campbell —
How to Be Spiritually Bold
She became a national figure as the face of the Nuns of the Bus. Sr. Simone Campbell is a lawyer, lobbyist, poet, and Zen contemplative working on issues such as “mending the wealth gap,” “enacting a living wage,” and “crafting a faithful budget that benefits the 100%.” She is a helpful voice for longings so many of us share, across differences, about how to engage with the well-being of our neighbors in this complicated age.
http://onbeing.org/program/simone-campbell-how-to-be-spiritually-bold/7654
Simone Campbell —
How to Be Spiritually Bold
She became a national figure as the face of the Nuns of the Bus. Sr. Simone Campbell is a lawyer, lobbyist, poet, and Zen contemplative working on issues such as “mending the wealth gap,” “enacting a living wage,” and “crafting a faithful budget that benefits the 100%.” She is a helpful voice for longings so many of us share, across differences, about how to engage with the well-being of our neighbors in this complicated age.
http://onbeing.org/program/simone-campbell-how-to-be-spiritually-bold/7654
19John5918
>18 margd: I've known some really fine US nuns, both in the USA and here in South Sudan. impressive people.
And another strong nun in the media (and also a reminder to those who think all Christians are right wing!):
Homily to Catalonia: the nun entering Spain's regional politics (Guardian)
Sister Teresa Forcades hopes to change a ‘sick society’ by leading a leftwing movement that could bring together parties as diverse as Podemos and the Catalan republican left...
And another strong nun in the media (and also a reminder to those who think all Christians are right wing!):
Homily to Catalonia: the nun entering Spain's regional politics (Guardian)
Sister Teresa Forcades hopes to change a ‘sick society’ by leading a leftwing movement that could bring together parties as diverse as Podemos and the Catalan republican left...
20margd
Interesting concept--a sabbatical from monastery to heal a societal ill. I wonder if it will attract neocon censure as did liberation theology and the "nuns on the bus".
23margd
Vespers, St. Patrick's Cathedral, 9/24/2015:
...Draped in elegant green and gold vestments, Francis clearly aimed to reassure U.S. religious women after several years of troubled relations, singling them out for special praise and thanks, starting with Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton, the first U.S-born saint, who founded the first free Catholic school for girls in America.
“What would the Church be without you? Women of strength, fighters, with that spirit of courage which puts you in the front lines in the proclamation of the Gospel,” he said. “To you, religious women, sisters and mothers of this people, I wish to say ‘thank you,’ a big thank you… and to tell you that I love you very much.”
He received three sustained ovations during that single paragraph in his speech, despite pleas by church officials beforehand that no one applaud during the ceremony.
The relationship between the Vatican and U.S nuns has been tense at times in recent years, particularly after Holy See’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith released a 2012 assessment of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, accusing the group of straying from Catholic orthodoxy, particularly on issues such as women’s ordination, abortion, and same-sex marriage.
Last December, the Vatican’s investigation into the American nuns concluded on a conciliatory note. Rather than calling for any changes in their behavior of women in U.S. religious orders, it professed “profound gratitude” for their work. It was widely seen as an effort by Pope Francis to mend soured relations with the nuns that started before he became pope.
His message was eagerly welcomed by religious women at St. Patrick’s.
“It’s just so nice to hear him affirm our vocation and our fidelity, which we know is true but had been called into question,” said Marylin Gramas, 73, a nun who lives in Harlem.
“It just wasn’t fair, but we had to live through it,” she said. “Hearing him be a brother to us means a great deal to us. He’s just a great gift to us, to the church and to the world.”
Patricia Bruck, 76, another Sister of Saint Ursula nun, said she hasn’t felt so warmly toward a pope since John XXIII, who died in 1963.
“I love this pope’s incredible openness, his desire to be among the poor, his preference for the poor—that’s right up my alley,” said Bruck, who recently retired after 57 years teaching at a Catholic girls’ school in New York.
“With all the criticism we’ve had recently, his approval is very refreshing,” she said. “I feel heard. I feel appreciated.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2015/09/24/pope-francis-to-...
...Draped in elegant green and gold vestments, Francis clearly aimed to reassure U.S. religious women after several years of troubled relations, singling them out for special praise and thanks, starting with Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton, the first U.S-born saint, who founded the first free Catholic school for girls in America.
“What would the Church be without you? Women of strength, fighters, with that spirit of courage which puts you in the front lines in the proclamation of the Gospel,” he said. “To you, religious women, sisters and mothers of this people, I wish to say ‘thank you,’ a big thank you… and to tell you that I love you very much.”
He received three sustained ovations during that single paragraph in his speech, despite pleas by church officials beforehand that no one applaud during the ceremony.
The relationship between the Vatican and U.S nuns has been tense at times in recent years, particularly after Holy See’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith released a 2012 assessment of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, accusing the group of straying from Catholic orthodoxy, particularly on issues such as women’s ordination, abortion, and same-sex marriage.
Last December, the Vatican’s investigation into the American nuns concluded on a conciliatory note. Rather than calling for any changes in their behavior of women in U.S. religious orders, it professed “profound gratitude” for their work. It was widely seen as an effort by Pope Francis to mend soured relations with the nuns that started before he became pope.
His message was eagerly welcomed by religious women at St. Patrick’s.
“It’s just so nice to hear him affirm our vocation and our fidelity, which we know is true but had been called into question,” said Marylin Gramas, 73, a nun who lives in Harlem.
“It just wasn’t fair, but we had to live through it,” she said. “Hearing him be a brother to us means a great deal to us. He’s just a great gift to us, to the church and to the world.”
Patricia Bruck, 76, another Sister of Saint Ursula nun, said she hasn’t felt so warmly toward a pope since John XXIII, who died in 1963.
“I love this pope’s incredible openness, his desire to be among the poor, his preference for the poor—that’s right up my alley,” said Bruck, who recently retired after 57 years teaching at a Catholic girls’ school in New York.
“With all the criticism we’ve had recently, his approval is very refreshing,” she said. “I feel heard. I feel appreciated.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2015/09/24/pope-francis-to-...
25John5918
A friend of mine, an elderly Canadian nun who does both teacher training and trauma healing throughout South Sudan, recently showed me a copy of However Long the Night: Making Meaning in a Time of Crisis, subtitled "A Spiritual Journey of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR)", which is a collection of essays edited by Annemarie Sanders, published in 2018. It chronicles the spiritual journey of LCWR during the period of misunderstanding with the Vatican. It's an inspiring story of dealing with conflict lovingly.
I was really struck by the "Rules for a Dialogic Community" (on p 58, based on the work of Bernard Lee), which they tried to implement at all times. In particular:
I rather think we would all benefit if some of these principles were to be applied to some of the conversations on LT Talk!
I was really struck by the "Rules for a Dialogic Community" (on p 58, based on the work of Bernard Lee), which they tried to implement at all times. In particular:
1. When I speak, my entire reason for speaking is to give another person his/her best chance for understanding me... If I ever have the intention, while I am speaking, of convincing another person to see it my way, I have lost it. I speak not to convince, but to be understood.
2. While I listen, my entire reason for listening is to give me the best chance of understanding another person. I must hear them on their own grounds and let their words mean what they mean to them, not what they mean to me. If I start refuting or arguing when I listen... I have lost it.
I rather think we would all benefit if some of these principles were to be applied to some of the conversations on LT Talk!
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