What We Missed
Five things you can do right now to help Honduras fight for justice from RaceWire
New efforts in Montana to redefine their constitution to add fetal personhood. Sigh.
Interesting NY Times article about progressive US nuns facing scrutiny from the Vatican.
Carmen over at Racialicious launches the Racialicious Experience, a six week workshop series via weekly phone discussions. More details here!
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Sad face for my home state, MT. We just got through fighting for the senate bills to fail that would have made abortion illegal. But do not get me wrong I will continue to fight for the rights of women as those did for me to be able to make my own choice.
They try this in Montana every session and every election and it never passes. Not that we aren't vigilant, but it's better not to get too riled up about it or they start to think we're scared. Luckily (never thought I'd say this) but MT is almost too Libertarian to let people start legislating our privacy. Heck, we don't even take federal money for Abstinence-only education!
Its important to remember to leave space for different ideas. Favor towards rights of a child after conception I feel is a liberal stance as well as a feminist one. I have been adamantly pro-choice for years and have recently understood that the emphasis should be on improving discussion and understanding of sexuality and availability of potential and opportunity and not about the right to abort a child or not. Lets aim for human rights, including the respect towards life enough to reduce the necessity and prevalence of abortion procedures!
Its important to remember to leave space for different ideas. Favor towards rights of a child after conception I feel is a liberal stance as well as a feminist one.
I agree with you.
I'm not suprised the vatican is going after progressive nuns. Saddened, but not suprised. The RCC is trying to supress the reforms of vatican council II, reforms that won nuns some previously unheard of rights. The current pope is rather regressive and looking to crack down.
If the investgation suceeds in cracking down however, the RCC may shoot itself in the foot, as then even fewer girls and women will want to be nuns.
Joan
Joan, many of your points aren't lining up with what I understand about the current situation in the RCC today. Concerning Vatican II, many of the changes that swept through the western world following the council were done "in the Spirit of Vatican II", and when I tried to track down the source of those changes to actual Vatican II documents, it turned out they couldn't be; so when I hear "the Spirit of Vatican II," I automatically doubt that they're true source was Vatican II. Our current pope has said that Vatican II was not implemented until JPII, and he is continuing that implementation; having gone back and read most of the Vatican II documents, I agree.
As for the nuns, reports that I have read indicate that orders which became very secular in dress and practice aren't being refilled with new members, while orders that currently are more orthodox/traditional in dress and practice are growing, many with more women wanting to join than they can accept.
Diocese that are also more orthodox/traditional also show large numbers of men seeking to be priests, whereas diocese that are more secular and liberal have low numbers of men.
I had to admit I was surprised at the Vatican investigating some of the orders of nuns, as those orders seem to be dying off as time goes by, due to a lack of applicants; the Vatican could just leave well enough alone, and let things run their natural course.
As for the nuns, reports that I have read indicate that orders which became very secular in dress and practice aren't being refilled with new members, while orders that currently are more orthodox/traditional in dress and practice are growing, many with more women wanting to join than they can accept.
Dioceses that are also more orthodox/traditional also show large numbers of men seeking to be priests, whereas diocese that are more secular and liberal have low numbers of men.
Out of total curiosity: does this refer to the U.S. only? The growth rate and level of conservatism/traditionalism within the Church tends to vary dramatically by region, so including Africa and Latin America would drastically skew the statistics in that direction.
The reports I have read are of the US only, not Europe or Canada; therefore, Africa and other developing nations would not be an influence.
I started to reply, but ended up writing what could be its own blog post, so I'll just be brief - having lived and worked with an order of nuns that wears secular dress and has de-centralized out of the convent (yet still lives in small communities of sisters throughout the city), if you examine John XXIII's call to renewal for religious orders and examine the history of similar orders, you'll find that these decisions were often made, truthfully, to be more closely aligned with the reforms of Vatican II. My guess is that the orders that remain in convents, cloistered, and/or wearing habits do so because that is more closely in line with their founders' wishes. Furthermore, I think it's rather silly of the Vatican to simply investigate women religious for their declining numbers rather than asking younger Catholic women in the US why we have chosen NOT to join. It's like asking the students who are present where their absent counterparts are.
Orthodox and traditional are relative terms, really. I think they'd need to be unpacked before I can say that I agree or disagree with your analysis.
That is fantastic that you lived and worked with an order of nuns; I hope it was an enriching experience for you.
You wrote about religious orders of nuns making changes to be true to the reforms of Vatican II; yet you don't tell me what reforms specifically, or in which Vatican II document they were addressed. For example, the Vatican II document on adaptation and renewal of religious life is 'Perfectae Caritatis', and the paragraph addressing religious habits is paragraph 17, which mentions simplicity and modesty, but doesn't mention getting rid of the habit.
Growing up,I heard a lot about the "reforms" of Vatican II, the "Spirit of Vatican II." I reached a point where I wanted to know what the Vatican II documents actually said, instead of taking just accepting what others told me. I was shocked to discover that what many people said were Vatican II reforms, in the "Spirit of Vatican II" actually were not in any Vatican II documents; it was as though there were changes people wanted but didn't get, so they made up this "Spirit of Vatican II" so that they could push through the changes they wanted but didn't get. Go read the Vatican II documents for yourself, and you will see.
http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/index.htm
As for the investigation of women's religious orders by the Vatican, read paragraph 21 of Perfectae Caritatis.
Young American women who are being called to the religious life are entering convents; the Vatican is not investigating those. I suspect the religious orders being invetigated have strayed far from communion with the universal Catholic Church, which is why they are not receiving new applicants.
Orthodox and traditional don't mean the same thing, but do compliment eachother nicely. Orthodox is defined as being sound in opinion or doctrine - given that the Catholic Church, more than any other Christian denomintion has developed its doctrines to the nth degree in some places, I would say that isn't too relative. Traditional, given the changes that did occur following the Vatican II Council, that line seem spretty well drawn in Catholic circles and isn't too relative.
VII said that women and men could serve god in many ways, not just as 'tradational' nuns and priests. That is why many nuns left the convents after VII and the nuns that remained threw off their habits and started diffrent careers.
VII also removed some of the anti-semtism the church was based on but some of those changes (in prayers) were recently returned to the old, pre-VII prayers.
The nuns I've known revel in their freedom to wear what they want and travel. None of them have the desire to be cloistered again.
I do think orders of nuns will disappear. It is a little sad. Nuns have very little voice in the RCC though- and who wants to occupy a postion of powerlessness? Now, if the RCC let women become priests or let priests marry, then more people would want to join up.
Joan
Yes, it is great that Vatican II reminded the laity that they too are called to serve God in many ways - this is very reminisent of "Introduction to the Devout Life," written by St. Francis de Sales, written in the late 16th or early 17th century, for lay people, reminding them that they too are called to holiness; I highly recommend reading it if you haven't.
What does reminding the laity of their call to holiness have to do with religious disregarding the vows they made to God of their own free will? You have a couple of years before you take those vows, and you take them of your own free will; why make them if you have any doubt of being able to keep them?
Anti-semitism and the Catholic Church is a topic I am currently reading up on ("The Jews" by Hilaire Belloc). I think that saying that some of the Catholic Church was based on anti-Semitism is a stretch; but I am open to arguments to the contrary. As for the prayers you reference in the Good Friday Liturgy, I don't see anything anti-semetic about them, and would expect Jews to pray a similar prayer for conversion of Christians, who they would reasonably see as crazy radicals following a false messiah whose claims of being the Son of God, and One with the Father as being heretical in the extreme.
Long before the women's liberation movement, nuns were running schools and hospitals, and even in the Middle Ages there were women who were declared to be Doctors of the Church (made major conributions to the development of theology). And let's not forget the book of Judith in the Old Testament (Which Protestants erroneously don't recognize as being cannonical). These aren't exactly positions of powerlessness. As for that topic, I will defer to Cardinal Ratzinger in "Salt of the Earth," where he says that the prieslty ministery is one of service, not power, and those who go there looking for power will realize that it is not there (I grossly paraphrased, but that is basically what he said.)
As for ordaining women to the priesthood, the Catholic Church has, in recent memory, had much to say on this topic, and that must be brought into the conversation before a discussion on the topic can make any progress.
The Catholic Church could open the priesthood to married men, but has not the authority to allow ordained men to marry. I respectfully disagree that it would be good to allow married men to the priesthood; the spiritual benefits are far greater with the current situation, and would hurt the Church far more to open the priestly ministery ordinarily to married men. Numbers should never be the justification driving changes to so precious of a resource.
Well, that's a mouthful. I hope I have come across in a respectful manner, and I apologize for where my rhetoric may have failed me.
Also, action for Honduras from SOA Watch:
http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/727/t/3823/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=27531
uhhh $300 for the racialicious experience...with no opportunities for scholarships?
i looked at what the whole 'experience' entails...all the reading materials are previous blog posts and discussions are over conference call. so why does it cost so much?
and to just apply, you have to may $25, because they only want 'serious' applicants. and by 'serious', they mean rich...
if you want serious applicants then ask serious questions on the application. and if you want a diverse group of people who are coming from a variety of backgrounds to contribute to this 'experience' then shouldn't class be factored in to the application process? wtf. not impressed.