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Talk By David OBrien to VOTF Representative Council
Dec. 13, 2003 in Newton, MA
Below is the text of Dave O'Brien's talk.
I have brought with me copies of five documents, among the many I have written about the crisis in the church and the Voice of the Faithful.
First is the text of my talk to the July, 2002, conference in Hynes Auditorium, second is a thoughtful critical article by Fr. Thomas Rausch S.J. and my response, the third is a somewhat extended version of my remarks at the Fordham meeting in October of this year, the fourth is a brief memo I wrote following a Catholic Common Ground Initiative dialogue on the role of Catholic higher education in the crisis, and the last is my exchange with the Fall River priests. Recently Father Landry responded to my response: his letter was long and written in a spirit of dialogue. I have responded to him but I think that I should keep that exchange private until I have his permission to share it more widely. I have not included my Commonweal article but I hope you all saw it.
The themes of these texts which might be of interest include:
First, changing the church ("keep the faith, change the church") is a political task. You know this now. Politics is always about how we go about making decisions, which is to say that it is about power. And even in small local disputes a great deal is at stake.
Second, I have understood you to stay closely to the three original objectives. I have told people from the start that the structural change goal had mainly to do with increasing the role of lay people in the life and work of the church, in the hope of achieving greater accountability, transparency and shared responsibility. This adherence to the three goals and the emphasis on shared responsibility was confirmed by the large Fordham gathering and in the latest report from the structural reform committee.
Third, I have emphasized from the start the usefulness of keeping in mind recent history of the American church. This includes reminders: a) that the sex abuse question has been before the Catholic public since 1984; b) that priests have wrestled with their own role and responsibility in the church since Vatican II and the politics of that question bears directly on the current crisis; and c) that shared responsibility was a genuine goal of the official church from 1965 until at least 1981 and that there is available to us a body of experience and models of modest but successful shared responsibility.
Let me make a few general comments before offering a list of recommendations:
1. When I spoke to the 2002 convention I thought the key words were shared responsibility. Everywhere people were stunned by the long unnoticed gap between the language of people of God and body of Christ, and the structures of decision-making in the church at every level. Laity not only were excluded from the terrible decisions that constituted one large element of the crisis, they were equally excluded from deliberations about what to do about it. When I spoke of the politics of the church in Boston, summer, 2002, I placed the emphasis more on shared than on responsibility. By the turn of the year I realized that responsibility was the first problem. How can one share responsibility if very few people feel responsible, at least to the point that they think they should do something. My Commonweal article was entitled "The Crisis in the Church: Is Anybody Supposed to Do Anything?" My modest suggestions for Catholic higher education, made in several strategic venues, have been rejected. A later Commonwea l cover said it all: under a huge ear was the caption "Are the Bishops Listening?" They alone, it seems, are responsible; the rest of us can speak up, but they are the only one who need to act. So VOTF is almost unique: you have taken responsibility. The huge question is why you so far enjoy so little support, especially from Catholic professionals and lay leaders.
2. Your position within the mainstream church is very difficult to maintain, as you well know. The Fall River priests, in all sincerity, speak for many of those who now exercise power in the church. They will not recognize a place for you in the conversation (if there ever is a conversation) unless: a) you disassociate from all dissenters; b) you make it clear that you accept what they call church teaching. It will not be enough simply to ignore Call to Action and avoid contact with people identified with it, you will be expected to repudiate the causes for which the Call to Action groups are supposed to stand. Or, to put it more positively, you will be expected to affirm as part of your own faith the "teachings" that are under dispute. This will make it very difficult to discuss in public the "causes and consequences" of the crisis. Remember: the Catholic center (Cardinal Bernardin's style of leadership, the Catholic Common Ground Initiative, public dialogue on controversial questions, pastoral emphasi s equal to orthodoxy emphasis, even Peter Steinfels' politically careful book) is now defined as the left, dissent, under suspicion. That's one big reason why all those theologians, university people, priests and religious pat you on the back but don't join or help.
3. Finally this is church politics. Middle class Americans don't like politics, and they are really turned off by politics in church. Conflict, mention of power, even raised voices almost always mean fewer people at the next meeting. There are very large cultural questions at work here, so we should avoid words like apathy and be modest in our expectations. We can get help from memories, and we can learn a great deal from the wisdom of good non-profit organizations.
So a list of recommendations to VOTF:
1. Victims. They still need listeners and advocates and bridges to the rest of the Catholic community. They have been immensely important and your partnership has been appreciated. Unfortunately there is probably a lot more to come.
2. Priests. Try to meet whenever you can with priests, individually, in groups, in their presbyteral councils and associations. The crisis is a huge pastoral crisis and this is where they truly are responsible, where their leadership, collaboration and public responsibility are desperately needed. Monitor the National Federation of Priests Councils, try to meet with its leaders, have local affiliates meet with the diocesan delegation, try to get on their agenda, and always ask about the presbyteral council and ask to meet with it. Develop a similar strategy for dialogue with religious priest. Don't let them off the hook.
3. Catholic workers. Teachers, DREs, parish coordinators and pastoral assistants, youth ministers, teachers, parish nurses, thousands of lay people and women religious, the great unorganized wild card. Ask to attend their meetings, seek their advice on parish affiliates, contact their national organizations and the training centers, write to and in their publications, attend their national meetings and try to get on their programs. Locals should seek their help in gaining access to bishops, priests, parish councils and people, and should always invite them to take part.
4. Get work for parish and diocesan affiliates: give them jobs: seek out the organized victims, ask how the local pastoral care committees are doing, ask them to be more public; ask who wrote the local reports and when they will be public; ask about current status of diocesan and parish pastoral councils and finance committees, how are they working, can they be improved? Do one on ones with members of diocesan committees and boards. Cooperate where they can, agitate where they can't, and seek allies. But the groups need to put practice onto the three goals and they need to be connected to something that seems like a movement.
5. Shared responsibility. Educate yourselves, support research, get pamphlets out, share good models, seek out school boards, charities committees, college and university trustees, work this issue very hard.
6. Monitor and support National Review Board. Its work will occasion national press attention and raise issues for action by local affiliates. Watch for its reports. Get wires into Washington. Have local as well as national response ready. Push all three questions: compliance with charter and recommendations for improvement; numbers and scope (and new areas); and especially causes and consequences. Defend the Board when efforts come to limit or destroy it, and make sure there is a diocesan group everywhere to back it.
7. Challenge Catholic leaders. Where are they? Why have they not joined? If it's too risky, but they acknowledge responsibility, ask why not alternative organizations? Why are moderates letting conservatives win? Use one on ones where appropriate. Get trained teams and go to all the local, regional and national Catholic meetings. Especially challenge theologians and academics, and members of existing boards
8. Target the USCCB's National Advisory Council. Find out who's on it and visit them. Write USCCB and ask for a spot on the agenda, with others perhaps. Watch out for Plenary Council.
9. Local action at the center, as you say, national office to generate all kinds of resources, think about strategy, and work the national Catholic structures.
10. Jim Post asked how to deal with criticism. So far you have done well. VOTF speaks about these matters as grown ups, seeking the adult conversation Fr. Bryan Hehir spoke of. Grown ups need to be respected, and included. And, of course, they differ. Difference, even if it looks like dissent, is like responsibility: it is a fact, not an option. The question is how to handle it. I have tried to suggest we do so by building a culture and structures of shared responsibility. And that takes us once again to the politics question. As I wrote father Rausch:
I find in many comments on the current situation, including Peter Steinfels recent book, a curious innocence about ecclesiastical politics. Should VOTF be clarifying its mind as to what it wants so it can answer that question when the bishops finally ask? Clearly lay people who have representation in existing parish and diocesan pastoral councils, finance committees and boards of church agencies should speak up and push for transparency, accountability and shared responsibility. Peter takes a big step by asking them to do so. But what of those who do not have that access? And what if the bishops (and clergy) simply say no. Or what if more conservative lay groups join the bishops in saying no, and charge that even the request is a form of dissent. What, then? Does lay responsibility only take hold when they are invited into dialogue or collaboration by the clergy and hierarchy? If not, the question I posed in my Commonweal article kicks in: is anybody supposed to do anything? VOTF is answering that quest ion by doing something, what it can. BC has done something, but the rest of Catholic higher education is still talking about doing something. Who else? And if everyone we know avoids the political question--how to get and use power within the church---if we all stay away from that question, constructive, Vatican II reform will almost certainly not survive. Evidence for that claim abounds. And, far beyond that, the hard questions of sexuality, celibacy, authority and pastoral quality will not be faced. The alternative, of course, is to grow VOTF, or organizations like it, multiply alliances with groups of priests, religious, lay and other professionals in ministry, to challenge so-called conservative voices, to provide reasonable arguments and strategies for reform-minded insiders, and to change the dynamics of power in the Catholic community. There are moral and spiritual dangers in that route, to be sure, but they are no more than those in other options.