Back to the Future

Honestly, I had trouble with the Roman numerals. I was taking notes by hand listening to Cardinal Joe Tobin’s talk in Chicago, and I kept writing something like JP XXXIII and crossing out the unnecessary letters. How infrequently I hear someone referring to John the Twenty-Third these days!

Tobin, whose screen name is above, gave me hope in a hard time. His topic was “Synodality and the Long Game of Pope Francis” and the Hank Center at Loyola said more than 1000 registered. I began to wonder how many of these were survivors of Vatican Council II. I know that’s ancient history to the generation I count on to carry the church to the future, like the Latina women in the previous Table post. 

The Cardinal connected J XXIII with that long game, and quoted John O’Malley, SJ, whose summary of VC II is the kind of theology that might win a few more generations. 

But, as in everything, the controversy is in the details. Tobin suggested that Francis is process-oriented, not interested in the abstract theological formulations that Councils seem to issue. He wants the participants in the Amazon Synod to “show their work” on the ground before there’s a change in the ordination of married men.  I would argue that this work could have begun with more than a follow-up led by Amazon bishops, but I’m not the Pope or a collegial Cardinal. 

Christopher White in NCR summarizes Tobin’s understanding of Synodality: “such a course must be guided by a church willing to journey together, recognizing the importance of conversion and the role that mercy plays in that process.” I read that directed at, oh, say other members of the USCCB, but recognize it as maybe necessary for me, too.

By the way, Jesuit Tom Reese weighs in this week on the USCCB Holy Communion debate. He says to secular journalists: “This is a stupid story for canonical, theological and political reasons.” 

The canonical reason seems to me 50-50 right now. The decision is in the hands of the local bishops, which would be Cardinal Wilton Gregory in Washington, who will, and the new replacement bishop William Koenig in Wilmington, who wants to talk to Biden. This situation created by the USCCB makes either action newsworthy, an unfortunate turn of events.

“Theologically,” Reese says, “no one is worthy to go to Communion.” We know that and we still receive. 

No, “It is all politics,” Reese concludes. He does cite the inconsistent stances of “more than half of Catholics” who believe, like Biden, that “abortion should be legal. At the same time, he notes that “a majority of Americans oppose federal funds for abortions.” 

I am uncomfortable with his framing: “The Democratic Party has abandoned any semblance of giving space to opponents of abortion…Opponents of abortion see no alternative to the Republican Party, and they are willing to wage war on Democrats no matter what. The Communion wars are part of this political strategy, not any spiritual one.” But this political strategy is deplorable and narrow. 

Reese suggests: “Everybody has their list of people who should be denied Communion. Who is to decide?” As a matter of fact, the bishops are being asked to decide on this one. If two-thirds of them agree, Reese says it can be sent to Rome, where he seems to believe that Francis will not approve it. Remember blessing gay couples? Remember ordaining viri-probati? Which way will the dice fall? What is the long game? 

Nothing better illustrates the politics of the USCCB than Marianne Duddy-Burke’s deeply-felt opinion piece in NCR. If you can’t believe that bishops lobbied quietly to get Congress not to fund the suicide hotline, your imagination has failed. Why did they do this? Duddy-Burke answers: “The legislation contained funding targeted at addressing the staggering epidemic of suicide and suicide attempts by LGBTQ people, especially youth.” 

Fortunately, the bill passed, despite the efforts of bishops heading up Committees for Religious Liberty; Domestic Justice and Human Development; and Catholic Education; as well as the Ad Hoc Committee Against Racism and the Subcommittee for the Promotion and Defense of Marriage. I don’t have their pictures. 

Fortunately, Duddy-Burke links to photographs of bishops who “join with the Tyler Clementi Foundation in standing up for at-risk LGBT youth in our country.” This especially touches me because the story of this young gay man who committed suicide was widely reported in the Philadelphia-South Jersey media. Look at all the bishops. First is Cardinal Tobin. 

What is the future? In his talk, Tobin recounted the story of Juan Carlos Cruz and Pope Francis to illustrate what will characterize the future: mercy because of the conversion of the center by the peripheries. 

When Christopher White broke the suicide hot line story in the NCR, he connected it to other “gender identity” lobbying by the bishops. His second example? The Violence Against Women Act, “bipartisan legislation that established a separate office and additional funding for the prosecution of violent crimes against women.” What was their problem with that? Use of the terms “’sexual orientation’ and ‘gender identity.’” 

Will this kind of thinking define us as a church? Fortunately, fourteen bishops could break out of the lockstep and remind us: “As we see in the Gospels, Jesus Christ taught love, mercy and welcome for all people, especially for those who felt persecuted or marginalized in any way.” We must stand together and go back to a future which we all can share.