Musings on 'Brokeback Mountain,' catechesis, secularism and celibacy from Anaheim
Print Friendly VersionBy JOHN L. ALLEN JR.
Anaheim, California
In what has become a standing annual appointment, I spent the weekend at the Anaheim Convention Center for the Religious Education Congress sponsored by the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. As I said during my workshops, for me the congress is the spiritual equivalent of drinking a case of “Jolt Cola” all at once – it’s a mad, once-a-year adrenaline rush, fueled by the excitement of 40,000 catechists, teachers, pastoral workers, and rank-and-file Catholics of every stripe.
I offered two presentations, one on Catholic mega-trends and another on Benedict XVI and Islam.
Each workshop period at the congress usually features 25 options or so, spread over several facilities. As I’ve written before, the sheer size means that all the Catholic tribes are represented in one way or another – but that said, there’s no doubt the center of gravity tilts slightly to the left, reflecting the spirit of the Los Angeles archdiocese under Cardinal Roger Mahony. One of the keynoters this year, for example, was Jim Wallis of Sojourners magazine.
Given the scope of the offerings, it’s impossible for any one person to get a sense of the whole. Herewith, however, four slices of life I was able to pick up around the edges of my own schedule.
I heard Bishop Richard Malone of Portland, Maine, speak on adult faith formation in light of the National Directory for Catechesis, issued by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. Malone is a longtime veteran of catechetical efforts, and he has the disarming sense of humor of a natural teacher. For example, he began by confessing that while he urges catechists to “get with the times” and use Power Point presentations, he hasn’t yet done so himself – meaning that he doesn’t always take his own advice.
“That’s how bishops are sometimes,” he conceded, to appreciative laughter.
The heart of Malone’s argument, drawn from the national directory, was that the Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults (RCIA), the program through which converts are gradually prepared for Easter baptism, should be the model for all adult faith formation in the church. Malone led his audience through a discussion about what works in RCIA, with most people stressing its opportunities for faith sharing, prayer, and common spiritual experience.
Malone stressed the combination of faith sharing, instruction in doctrine and the tradition of the church, and the capacity to “read” one’s life experiences in light of scripture and church teaching.
Some questioned how easily the RCIA experience could be replicated. As one person put it, in a typical parish there might be 10-15 “catechumens” (the term for someone preparing for baptism), who are served by a team of RCIA leaders, and who are usually treated as a priority by the pastoral staff. Could the same concentration of resources really be brought to bear in other areas?
Malone conceded the point, stressing that drawing inspiration from the RCIA does not mean cloning all its particulars into other programs.
I also saw Australian Jesuit Fr. Richard Leonard, director of the Australian Catholic Film Office, address a packed auditorium about a couple of movies which stirred considerable Catholic reaction: “Brokeback Mountain” and “The Da Vinci Code.”
Leonard asserted that “Brokeback Mountain,” which tells the story of two cowboys who struggle with sexual longing for one another, “does not advocate the gay lifestyle.”
“At the end of the film, one man is dead and the other is a shell of a human being,” Leonard said. “This is hardly advocacy for a happy gay life.”
Leonard said that a colleague of his at the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops “almost got fired” for writing a review which reached the same conclusion, and, under pressure, had to “upgrade” the rating given to the film for morally objectionable content. Leonard said the reviewer received “hate mail” in “thousands of letters.”
“Very few issues trigger a frenzy like this one,” Leonard said.
Leonard went on to argue for development in Catholic moral reflection on homosexuality, because as it stands, he said, the church does not distinguish between promiscuous behavior and a lifelong committed relationship. The church’s blanket indictment of homosexuality, he said, means there is no “moral moment” towards which to build with regard to gay relationships.
“We lump it all together, but I’m not sure God does,” Leonard said.
Leonard also said that in presenting its teaching on homosexuality, the church should “remember the human beings behind the slogans.” Homosexuals merit “respect, compassion and sensitivity,” he said.
As for “The Da Vinci Code,” Leonard said the fairly lackluster character of the film didn’t stop it from taking in $750 million worldwide, mostly due to the phenomenal interest generated by the Dan Brown novel. He offered two explanations as to why many people took the novel seriously, despite its numerous historical inaccuracies: first, Leonard said, because the claim that the Catholic Church has “suppressed women’s leadership” came across as believable; and second, because the novel appeared at the height of the sexual abuse crisis, so “it was not hard for a cynical public to buy that the church had a covered up a sex scandal that, if true, would rock its foundations.”
At the same time, Leonard argued that the book and movie “did the church a favor,” since the origins of Christianity become a popular subject “at dinners and barbeques all around the world.”
Leonard stepped through several misrepresentations in “the Da Vinci Code.” For example, he said, Brown presents the “Priory of Sion" as a secret European society whose grand masters over the centuries have included Leonardo Da Vinci and Isaac Newton. In fact, however, its real founder, Pierre Plantard, admitted in a 1993 court case that the “priory” was actually created in France after WWII. Plantard invested the group with a fictitious past, some of which, he conceded, was dreamt up under the influence of LSD.
Leonard also took issue with the presentation of Opus Dei, as well as Brown’s decision to make his murderous monk an albino. That choice, Leonard said, reflects a “dreadful calumny” which holds “that really evil people often have some genetic disability or disorder.” He called this linkage “absolutely monstrous” and a “scandal.”
On Saturday, Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of Dublin, Ireland, made a case for what he sees as a basic “consonance” between religious belief and modern secularism. While secularism has its positives and its negatives, Martin said, most of us prefer it to the alternative.
“Most of us would prefer living in the United States to living in Iran under Khomeni,” he said.
Prior to his appointment to Dublin, Martin spent more than 30 years in the Vatican, working in the Council for the Family, the Council for Justice and Peace, and in Geneva as the Holy See’s representative to the United Nations agencies there.
Martin pointed to recent data from the European Values Study which indicates that Europe is not as “post-religious” as commonly believed. Such results, he said, show that religious belief and secular culture are not necessarily opposed. In fact, he said, “democracy has offered new opportunities to religion.”
On the other hand, Martin said, there’s a “cult of secularization” in some circles rigidly opposed to public expression of religious belief. Catholicism is the force most likely to challenge this “cult of secularization,” Martin asserted, which is why ideological secularists have an especially “deep fear of a Catholic revival.”
Martin said that Gaudium et Spes, the document of the Second Vatican Council (1962-65) on the relationship between the church and the modern world, offered an effective vision for Catholic engagement with secularism.
At one stage during his time in Geneva, Martin said, he noticed that more than half of the senior staff of the United Nations was composed of Catholics. Martin said he asked one of these staffers how they explained that, and the answer was Gaudium et Spes.
“If you look at their ages, it seemed about right,” Martin said. “Their religious motivation led to success in the secular world.”
Martin represented the Holy See in the mid-1990s at international conferences on population, which featured intense debates about issues such as a proposed right to abortion under international law. He told the story of meeting with John Paul prior to one of those sessions.
“He told me to support all that is good, and to denounce, clamorously if necessary, all that is bad,” Martin said. “The important thing was to do both at once.”
Also on Saturday, Fr. Donald Cozzens of Cleveland’s John Carroll University, author of The Changing Face of the Priesthood, argued that it’s time to “set celibacy free” by making it optional for Catholic priests.
“Celibacy is a witness to the reign of God, but so is married love, Cozzens said.
Cozzens stepped through what he described as three current “exceptions” to the discipline of clerical celibacy:
• Eastern Rite churches in communion with Rome who have married priests.
• Priests in the Latin Rite who have joined the Catholic Church from another Christian denomination, such as the Episcopal church, where they were married and a member of the clergy, and who later have been ordained as a married Catholic priest with special permission of the Vatican. (Cozzens said he’s heard conflicting reports as to how many such Catholic priests there are in the States, with some saying 200, and others no more than 80.)
• Parts of the developing world where, according to Cozzens, celibacy may be “on the books,” but it is not widely practiced.
Cozzens said a priest once told him that during prayer, he found himself spontaneously crying out, “God takes no pleasure in this loneliness,” referring to his struggles with celibacy.
Cozzens then laughingly told the story of asking another veteran priest what he thought about celibacy.
“It’s okay,” the old-timer said, “during the day.”
Cozzens cited statistics to the effect that there are 20,000 active diocesan priests in the United States, but some 22,000 who are inactive – many, he said, who left to get married, but otherwise still felt the call to a priestly vocation.
Cozzens said that rather than defining the priesthood in terms of celibacy, the “signature” of the priesthood ought to be “servant leadership” and “gospel simplicity.”
Perhaps we need to stop
Perhaps we need to stop looking at celibacy (or its loosening) in an utilitarian way - as a solution or not. Those who promote it can speak of its value. But does that therefore devalue marriage? Cannot both values be embraced as well as the gift of freedom? To me, the legislation-heavy character of celibacy in the church betrays both fear and lack of true freedom.
This was a great column. I
This was a great column. I would just like to comment on DanBrown's "daVinci Code". Allan speculates as to why it was so successful, despite the movie, the mediocracy of the book and even its lack of credibility.
a) The book described in detail the blatant and maciavellian institutionalism that plays out just below the surface of the Church hierarchy/magesterium. The sexual abuse scandals did reveal this dimension in a way that probably hasn't been seen in centuries. The accuracy (or lack of accuracy) of detail is secondary the stark reality.
b) The book attested to a general audience what ordinary catholics know implicitely (whether or not they admit)and others kept to themselves to avoid accusations of "bigotry",i.e., the Church's systematic relegation of women to "non-status" and to subjugation.
c) It demonstrated is the ageless and ruthless "Tradition" of applying its skill in (a) to (b), disguised as respect.
d)It described the de facto vulnerability of mystic belief and practice to rational exploration and exposure.
Dear Gino~ You are guilty of
Dear Gino~ You are guilty of elevating the arguable to the absolute, as Sister Joan so abely described. I don't just mean this humourously. You did it. You say "...scholars affirm..." you should say, in honesty, "some... scholars...";you say "...the obligation of celibacy at least continence became canonical law as far back as the fourth century...". The tradition is suspect, and if, as you say, lacked the efficacy of law, was not outlawed.
Your romantic view of celibacy is quaint but rather then being the "pearl of great price", it is one of the weighty millstones.
My oldest is 18, my youngest
My oldest is 18, my youngest is 8. Whatever I do for fun, I include them. Perhaps I have been especially blest, but my older children, the boys, enjoy our "sophisticated" adult company more than they do that of typical teens. Our adult friends also enjoy their company. While our boys do have friends, our girls have many more friends outside the family, and the families of those girls are like family to us now as a result. I don't know what needs I would have beyond a supportive social environment and time. I had another identity before I became a mother, but I have an identity that transcends both of these. I see nothing in my previous post that claims my life is the gold standard, only that it is possible to live in harmony with the demands of one's life.
Thanks, Bengeorge. It never
Thanks, Bengeorge. It never would have occurred to me that your comments were proceeding out of hatred of gay people. I understood the theological position you were articulating. While I respect it, I don't agree with it--for reasons I've set forth on a number of threads, so I won't repeat them here.
I don't read sensum fidelium as democratizing the church or acceding to the opinions (or even worse, feelings) of a majority of churchgoers. This is why I spoke about how doctrine has to reach real people as they live their real, graced lives--to be received by them as they struggle to be faithful to the gospel in their everyday lives.
To me, this describes something much deeper than opinion polls. When there is a large disconnect between many, many good, faithful Catholics and the teaching of the church--and there definitely is re: the natural law theology of human sexuality--then I think something is awry. The doctrine has to be re-thought, or expressed in some other way, to reach people where they live and move and have their being. Those who reject this teaching have not arrived at the position of questioning lightly--I haven't; and I know many others who haven't. We've done so with much self-questioning, must prayer, much study, much consultation with others. And we have sometimes paid a price for following our consciences.
You bring up a good point when you note that the church in some parts of the world doesn't necessarily think about these issues as people in other parts of the world do. You're right, Africa is a good case in point, and the latest article by Mr. Allen on these threads addresses the situation of the Nigerian church.
I'd like to think more carefully about what we mean, though, when we propose that the African church should lead the way in determining for us today how to formulate sexual teachings. For one thing, it's worth pointing out that there is not uniformity among African Christians on these issues, though the American media often speaks as if there is.
Desmond Tutu is at a very different place than, say, the primates of Nigeria when it comes to gay people. South Africa has just legalized gay unions.
Second, it seems interesting to me that some of the laws now being proposed by the Nigerian legislature, with ardent backing of many Anglican primates, actually hark back to the colonial period. If I have understood correctly the debate about criminalizing same-sex behavior in Nigeria, the laws criminalizing same-sex expressions that are already in existence date to the colonizers of the country. This suggests to me they aren't "traditional" African understandings of these issues, but were imposed by the colonizers who took possession of these nations in the early modern period.
Does it strike you as perhaps strange that many African pastoral leaders are intent on keeping alive a legacy rooted in colonialism?
I don't see any one church as the ideal expression of the reign of God. But I do think that expressions of the gospel that have been formulated in particular cultural contexts may serve the reign of God better than expressions of the gospel formulated in other cultural contexts. And I think we can say this honestly and discuss it openly without being imperialistic or elitist. I think there has to be a give and take process between the churches of the world about many issues, with respectful dialogical interchange in which we all seek a truth greater than any one of us sees on our own.
Do we really want to suggest that the subjugation of women, or genital mutilation, practiced in many cultures outside the West, is the ideal for which we want to aim? Is the pattern of priests raping nuns, which has happened in some African countries, the ideal for the church as a whole? In the name of defending "traditional" sexual values in Western churches through recourse to the church in non-Western nations, do we want to reimport some very humiliating and demeaning practices based in gender prejudices that some other areas of the world have begun to challenge?
I speak as an outsider to the cultural context of the African churches, and in that sense, have no real right to pass judgment. What I say reflects both reading and conversation with many Africans. I work in an institution that has a large number of Nigerian faculty members. Many of them tell me they are frankly happy to be away from some of the paternalistic and dictatorial patterns of their home country, as much as they miss their country and their families there.
I would add one more point that, in my view, deserves much more attention in the American media. It is that huge amounts of right-wing American money have been poured into fueling the anger of some African Christians against gay people and against the "liberalization" of North American Christianity re: sexual and gender issues. It seems ironic to me, to say the least, that many of those pouring this money into what is a dishonorable crusade were, a half century ago, resisting the integration of American churches with the same fierce vigor with which they are now resisting women's rights and gay rights.
William D. Lindsey
Dennis, you're the one who
Dennis, you're the one who really nails it when you say, "the Church does seem to have 'fallen out of love' with truth so that it doesn't nurture it, let it grow, offer it with gentle hands to find new homes as it blossoms."
That's a much more beautiful description of the point I was hoping to make. The kind of truth we talk about when we talk about religious truth is not that Platonic kind that just stands out there like the stalwart soldier, pointing "the" way, take it or leave it.
It's truth that engages us, grabs our minds and hearts, and moves us. That is, it's meant to do that.
When the church starts substituting your definition of truth for the one inscribes in your philosophy teacher's text--Truth is not concerned about how many it convinces--it's in trouble.
This is where the church in the U.S. has been for some time now, in its political tactics. It hasn't worked. Standing like the resolute soldier and hurling "The Truth" at a refractory society has had almost nil effect on changing the culture or the political sphere. And at the same time tht we keep hurling "The Truth" (i.e., about abortion and homosexuality) down from the heights of the fortress, there are so many other transformative truths society needs to hear, about which we keep our mouths shut.
It's time for us to break with these patterns and try a new tactic altogether, one of respectful listening and dialogue, in which "The Truth" is what we are all seeking together and what no one possesses unilaterally. Whether the bishops can lead the way in that shift remains to be seen.
Personally, I doubt it. Too many of them are ecclesiastical careerists. Too many were placed in power during the the reassert-Catholic-identity era.
But even more to the point, far too many of them have forfeited credibility through their behavior in the abuse crisis.
I think the laity are going to have to lead the way now. I only wonder if there are sufficient numbers of laity left who care very much, given the deliberate purges of some of our best and brightest as we reasserted Catholic identity, and the slow, silent hemorraging of many others in recent years--a movement the bishops have watched with the same dismal silence with which they have "addressed" the abuse crisis.
William D. Lindsey
AnnieO, you make an
AnnieO, you make an excellent point I had never thought about. The assumption that only the church has "The Truth" implicitly denies what the church itself teaches about natural law--that we all have the truth written inside our minds and hearts.
I love your conclusion that "truth of doctrine that does not connect with human experience is just pretty talk."
I've thought for some time now that, in addition to requiring seminarians to study philosophy, the church should make psychology and sociology mandatory for seminarians. It seems crucial to me that we learn to figure out what doctrine means, when it takes flesh in people's lives (or when they simply dismiss it as tangential to their lived experience). There's no way of talking about the real meaning of doctrine--its truth--apart from looking at how doctrine affects real human beings in their real lives.
If someone wants to know whether the church's teaching about the intrinsic disorder of homosexuality is true or not, the first people who should be consulted, seems to me, are gay Catholics themselves. Unfortunately, there are absolutely no mechanisms set up within the church for the kind of dialogue (and listening on the part of pastoral leaders) that would allow for such interchange.
William D. Lindsey
Mr. Allen, thank you for the
Mr. Allen, thank you for the outstanding discussion of Fr. Leonard's presentation on "Brokeback Mountain." You quote him to say,
"Leonard also said that in presenting its teaching on homosexuality, the church should 'remember the human beings behind the slogans.' Homosexuals merit 'respect, compassion and sensitivity,' he said."
It seems to me that part of the "meaning" of all doctrinal definitions is how those definitions impact real human lives. Doctrine is always more than formula. It is theological or ethical teaching that addresses and affects human beings, and the truth of doctrine can be ascertained, in part, by how it is received by real people--how it affects the lives of real human beings.
I am not surprised that the reviewer who wrote the initially positive review for USCCB received thousands of hate letters. This is where the American church is, in part. It grieves me to hear of such a response. At the same time, I know this response articulates something that is out there in force.
As Fr. Leonard states, few issues cause such a frenzy in today's church. I read recently on an Episcopal blog something to the effect that, as a rule of thumb, when a church starts succumbing to rampant secularism and departs from tradition and scripture, it always begins by trying to include gays and lesbians.
William D. Lindsey
Would it be a gift, then?
Would it be a gift, then? Or is it perhaps a curse? Whichever it is, I'll try to keep making language sing, in my own peculiar melodies.
You're right, I don't think I've seen a single sfingi around, though I suspect the Italian bakery near me would have them--and the cannolis I miss from New Orleans bakeries. Unfortunately, I'm supposed to avoid all such frivolities, so my celebrating was limited to some bean soup, I'm afraid.
One of the delights of living in New Orleans was seeing St. Pat's, when there was a parade in which cabbages, carrots, and potatoes were thrown to the crowd, followed by St. Joseph's, when altars were set up by famliies all over the city. These invariably had bread to be given to the poor, and the most elaborate fig cookies I've ever seen, cooked in fascinating shapes and decorated with little colored beads of sugar.
Catholic culture is such a patchwork quilt of all kinds of cultural traditions, many of which seem to clash, when such celebrations are held back to back with each other. But we're richer for the diversity, no?
William D. Lindsey