Join me in supporting Bishop Gumbleton

February 07, 2007
Call to Action continues to get no respect from Bishop Thomas Olmsted or his counterpart in the Diocese of Tucson, Bishop Gerald Kicanas. The Phoenix and Tucson chapters of the Chicago-based organization, seeking reforms and moderinization in the Roman Catholic Church, have gotten their plans stymied by the bishops, ever obedient to the Vatican. It’s an organization that has become a pariah of the church because of its relentless calls for change.

Call to Action chapters in Tucson and Phoenix had arranged for retired Detroit Bishop Thomas J. Gumbleton, 77, to speak this week. An outspoken advocate for the victims of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church, Gumbleton says he has been restricted by the Vatican because of his statements. A year ago, he told the Ohio Legislature that it should legally expand the time frames for abuse victims to file lawsuits, as people come forward with stories of abuse from many decades ago. Gumbleton has stated that a priest sexually abused him while a boy.

Now, the papal nuncio, or Vatican’s ambassador to the United States, Piedro Sambi, has been put in charge of approving all requests for the bishop to speak, Call to Action says. Gumbleton further has to get permission of the bishops in the jurisdictions before speaking. He was turned down by the two Arizona bishops and subsequently canceled his talk. It’s a policy that Vatican has applied to other dissidents in leadership roles in the church, including barring all kinds of Catholic and non-Catholic speakers from church property if their message departs from Catholic orthodoxy.

Gumbleton, longtime writer of “The Peace Pulpit” column in the National Catholic Reporter, had been slated to speak Tuesday in Tucson on “Homosexuality and the Church.” His Phoenix topic was to be “Gospel for Today.” Gumbleton, a founding member of Pax Christi USA and an unspoken critic of the war in Iraq, is being called a “prisoner of conscience” by Call to Action. According to press reports, Gumbleton has said that it is only in bringing all clergy abuse “to full exposure and full accountability,” including those barred because of statutes of limitation, that the Catholic church has “any possibility of restoring credibility in church leaders as moral teachers and guides.”

“It seems that the time has come for Catholics to reclaim their church, their church property and their God-given freedom of choice regarding selection of prophetic voices,” John Chuchman, a Call to Action member from Scottsdale, said in a widely distributed e-mail, including those in the organization. Call to Action was planning to bypass the bishops by playing a DVD of a recent talk by Gumbleton at 7 p.m. this Wednesday (Feb. 7) at the Church of the Beatitudes (United Church of Christ), 555 W. Glendale Ave., Phoenix.

In Tuesday’s Arizona Republic, Phoenix diocesan spokesman James Dwyer stated that the bishops were not having a problem with Gumbleton but with Call to Action. “The bishop (Olmsted) is pleased that Bishop Gumbleton has decided to cancel,” Dwyer stated. “I don’t believe he or any bishop has to explain in detail why we do not endorse Call to Action. The record speaks for itself.” Among Call to Action’s issues for change are lifting celibacy requirements for priests, allowing women to become priests, and permitting lay people to have greater voice, including in the selection of leaders like bishops.

The national CTA web site (www.cta-usa.org) draws attention to the Gumbleton controversy. It urges people to contact the bishops to register their feelings. “The good news is that CTA members across Arizona are rising up in gospel nonviolence resistance, providing the opportunity for Catholics to hear Bishop Gumbleton speak via video and creating a cross-country campaign with fellow Catholics in Detroit,” it says.

Catholics are urged to tell bishops that “I am a Catholic who supports Bishop Gumbleton and believe that all bishops should have spoken out like he did to support the survivors of sexual abuse.”

Said Chuchman, “The good to come out of all of this is that the hierarchy’s oppressive and un-Christian attitude, even towards one of their own who dares speak the truth, gets very visible and public exposure.”

Bishop Tom

He Spoke Out
Lovingly
about
Peace and Justice and Love and Humility.
In the Footsteps of Jesus,
He is
Inclusive, Non-bureaucratic, and Disrruptive
thus posing a threat
to the status quo
and those who wish to maintain it.

Crucify Him, Crucify Him,
They Yelled.
We cannot allow him to spread
The Truth.

Love, John Chuchman

See my website: Sacred Quest at www.torchlake.com/poetman

Heresy

People are excommunicated,
not for sins of morality,
but for sins of heresy.

The New Testament Greek word for heresy,
hairetikos,
translated by church
as a belief opposed to orthodox doctrine,
in fact, literally means
"able to choose,"
a capacity unwelcome
in institutional religion.

There seems to come a point
in a person's life
when a bishop's threat of excommunication
cannot muffle
God's call.

All Christians are Christ-bearers.

Love, John

See my website: Sacred Quest at www.torchlake.com/poetman

Re Arizona Bishops banning of Bishop Gumbleton;

It is interesting that the Arizona Bishops attribute their banning of Bishop Tom Gumbleton's speaking engagements to their not approving the organiaztion sponsoring Tom, rather than their own un-Christlike oppressive hands. (Perhaps the United Church of Christ or another should have invited him.)

Bishop Tom Gumbleton preaches Peace, Love, Compassion, Humility, and Inclusiveness, but because his words tend to pose a threat to the status-quo and hierarcical control, he is forbidden to speak in Arizona.

The good to come out of all of this is that the hierachy's Oppressive and Un-Christian attitude, even towards one of their own--who dares speak the truth--gets very visible and public exposure.

In addition to exposing the heavy hands to the rank and file, this should serve to increase the audiences for all of Bishop Gumbleton's future talks.

Love, John

See my website: Sacred Quest at www.torchlake.com/poetman

Gumbleton’s replacement named in Detroit parish
Posted on Jan 22, 2007 13:34pm CST.

By DENNIS CODAY
NCR staf writer

Auxiliary Bishop Thomas Gumbleton’s replacement as pastor of St. Leo Parish in Detroit was announced to the parish community at Sunday Mass, Jan. 21. Effective today, Jan. 22, Fr. Gerard Battersby will be pastoral administrator of the parish Gumbleton has led for 23 years.

The announcement came as an open letter to the parish from Cardinal Adam Maida. Auxiliary Bishop John Quinn, in charge of the archdiocese’s central region, delivered copies of the letter to St. Leo’s pastoral council at a meeting June 20. Gumbleton was not in attendance because of a prior engagement.

Read the full story here

Did Bishop Gumbleton write one thing (he's going, he understands the problems for the new pastor that would be created by his staying, etc) and mean something completely different? It seems a shame not to let the man retire in peace.

I tried to sign the ad, but the site won't accept my name unless I make a donation to Call to Action. I like call to Action and I've given them money in the past, but I don't like the sine qua non approach.