Thread: US Catholic Nuns gone rogue

I don't know if this is really a PR offensive by the Church or it's just the newest thread to be picked up by the press, but we'll probably see more stories like this in the coming days:

The Vatican on Monday sharply criticized a book on sexuality written by a prominent American nun, saying it contradicted church teaching on issues like masturbation, homosexuality and marriage and that its author had a "defective understanding" of Catholic theology.
The Vatican's orthodoxy office said the book, "Just Love: A Framework for Christian Sexual Ethics" by Sister Margaret Farley, a member of the Sisters of Mercy religious order and emeritus professor of Christian ethics at Yale Divinity School, posed "grave harm" to the faithful.

[....]

Farley said Monday she never intended the book to reflect current official Catholic teaching. Rather, she said, she wrote it to explore sexuality via various religious traditions, theological resources and human experience.

Vatican criticizes US nun's book on sexuality - Yahoo! News

Originally Posted by Rasselas

I don't know if this is really a PR offensive by the Church or it's just the newest thread to be picked up by the press, but we'll probably see more stories like this in the coming days:Vatican criticizes US nun's book on sexuality - Yahoo! News

This Pope, and the College of Cardinals, seems to be increasingly stepping backward, and hunkering down, on positions their flock does not agree with.

Writing in the parish bulletin of Blessed Trinity Catholic Church in Cleveland under the simple headline “From the Desk of Fr. Doug,” the pastor unleashes a thunderous defense of Catholic sisters and a withering critique of Vatican power. A parish bulletin has rarely crackled with such scorching prose. Read the whole thing here. I’ve pulled some paragraphs that jump off the page and grab you by the hair.

The Vatican sounded like the Pharisees of the New Testament;—legalistic, paternalistic and orthodox— while “the good sisters” were the ones who were feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, visiting the sick and imprisoned, educating the immigrant, and so on. Nuns also learned that Catholics are intuitively smart about their faith. They prefer dialogue over diatribe, freedom of thought over mind control, biblical study over fundamentalism, development of doctrine over isolated mandates.

Far from being radical feminists or supporters of far-out ideas, religious women realized that the philosophical underpinnings of Catholic teaching are no longer valid. Women are not subservient to men, the natural law is much broader than once thought, the OT is not as important as the NT, love is more powerful than fear. They realized that you can have a conversation with someone on your campus who thinks differently than the church without compromising what the church teaches.

The Vatican is hypocritical and duplicitous. Their belief is always that someone else needs to clean up their act; the divorced, the gays, the media, the US nuns, the Americans who were using the wrong words to pray, the seminaries, etc. It never occurs to the powers that be that the source of the problem is the structure itself.

US nuns work side by side with the person on the street. They are involved in their everyday lives. Most cardinals spent less than five years in a parish, were never pastors, are frequently career diplomats. Religious women in the US refuse to be controlled by abusive authority that seeks to control out of fear. They realize that Jesus taught no doctrines, but that the church, over time, developed what Jesus taught in a systematic way.

This investigation is not about wayward US nuns. It is the last gasp for control by a dying breed, wrapped in its own self-importance. It is a struggle for the very nature of the church; who we are, how we pray, where we live, who belongs, why we believe. The early church endured a similar struggle. The old order died. The Holy Spirit won.

A Brave Catholic Pastor Defends Nuns, Blasts Vatican Crackdown | Faith in Public Life

That's a brave man. Good for him.

Originally Posted by Rasselas

I don't know if this is really a PR offensive by the Church or it's just the newest thread to be picked up by the press, but we'll probably see more stories like this in the coming days:Vatican criticizes US nun's book on sexuality - Yahoo! News

Um. Wait a minute...

A cabal of child-diddling perverts and their protectors are worried that a book will do "grave harm" to the faithful?





Wow.

Originally Posted by Babba

A Brave Catholic Pastor Defends Nuns, Blasts Vatican Crackdown | Faith in Public Life

That's a brave man. Good for him.

Woohoooo Fr. Doug!


edit: ps - love this part:

This investigation is not about wayward US nuns. It is the last gasp for control by a dying breed, wrapped in its own self-importance. It is a struggle for the very nature of the church; who we are, how we pray, where we live, who belongs, why we believe. The early church endured a similar struggle. The old order died. The Holy Spirit won.

Originally Posted by Steam Heat

Um. Wait a minute...

A cabal of child-diddling perverts and their protectors are worried that a book will do "grave harm" to the faithful?





Wow.

"Their protectors" is pretty accurate, but not 'cabal of child-diddling perverts'. The vast majority of the clergy did no such thing.

But they did protect the ones that did.

Originally Posted by jackalope

"Their protectors" is pretty accurate, but not 'cabal of child-diddling perverts'. The vast majority of the clergy did no such thing.

But they did protect the ones that did.

Did? Current policy only requires them to cooperate the police if someone else finds out and it is reported to the police. They're under no obligation to report it themselves.

Originally Posted by jackalope

"Their protectors" is pretty accurate, but not 'cabal of child-diddling perverts'. The vast majority of the clergy did no such thing.

But they did protect the ones that did.

Religious or not....One would think then that the Priests who DO NOT would be up and speaking out against those that DO.

Bottom line, the Priests could have cleaned their own mess up Hundreds of years ago in the area of Molesting.

Their Silence is deafening.

The damage done is not easily reversed. innocent people who wanted NOTHING more then to find their way to God, only to be victimized, First by a Priest then later by the Church in the Churches nonchalant actions.

Originally Posted by Rasselas

Did? Current policy only requires them to cooperate the police if someone else finds out and it is reported to the police. They're under no obligation to report it themselves.

Good point. I forgot about that.

Originally Posted by angryamerican

Religious or not....One would think then that the Priests who DO NOT would be up and speaking out against those that DO.

Bottom line, the Priests could have cleaned their own mess up Hundreds of years ago in the area of Molesting.

Their Silence is deafening.

The damage done is not easily reversed. innocent people who wanted NOTHING more then to find their way to God, only to be victimized, First by a Priest then later by the Church in the Churches nonchalant actions.

I agree.