I am not a Catholic nor do I have anything against Catholics. Some of my best friends are Catholics. At least I think so.
Let me stop right there.
Here’s the thing; you may or may not have been paying attention to some of the ruckus going on recently within the Catholic Church regarding what appears to be a decision by the top dog Catholic leaders in Rome to reassert (reimpose) a more conservative vision of Catholicism. That more conservative vision is apparently designed to rein in some of the more liberal strays from the pack who have been spending way too much time on such issues as caring about what happens to poor people. In case you think I’m lying, check this out. Or you can check this out from a recent article in the Los Angeles Times.
The Vatican has ordered an overhaul of the most important group of nuns in the United States after an investigation found what Roman Catholic Church officials called “radical feminist themes” that questioned official positions on homosexuality and the ordination of women.
In a bluntly worded report, the Vatican’s watchdog of orthodoxy, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, found what it called “serious doctrinal problems” with some of the comments and actions by the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, based in Silver Spring, Md. The Vatican on Wednesday named Archbishop Peter Sartain of Seattle to oversee changes in the group, a process that could take up to five years.
The Leadership Conference, which says it has more than 1,500 members representing more than 80% of the 57,000 women religious in the United States, stated it was “stunned” by the official assessment.
“This is a moment of great import for religious life and the wider church,” the group said in a statementposted on its website. “We ask your prayers as we meet with the LCWR National Board within the coming month to review the mandate and prepare a response.”
The Vatican’s actions come at a time when Rome appears to be reasserting its conservative vision over some elements of the church, particularly in the United States.
Nuns have questioned a variety of church positions, including the ban on ordaining women. In 2010, American bishops opposed the Obama administration’s healthcare insurance overhaul, but some nuns were very visible in supporting the plan, whose constitutionality is now being considered by the Supreme Court.
In its assessment of the Leadership Conference, the Vatican cited letters from some in the group “protesting the Holy See’s actions regarding the question of women’s ordination and of a correct pastoral approach to ministry to homosexual persons.”
“The terms of the letters suggest that these sisters collectively take a position not in agreement with the Church’s teaching on human sexuality. It is a serious matter when these Leadership Teams are not providing effective leadership and example to their communities, but place themselves outside the Church’s teaching,” the report said.
So anyway, there are these nuns who now even have their own website, and it’s called Nuns on the Bus. Pretty basic, I know. Nothing evangelically fancy pants like The Holiest of Rollers or His Holy Caravan. But then I don’t guess there’s any real need to be flashy when the mission is so plain and straightforward that it doesn’t require much embellishment, namely to tour the country letting folks know just how dangerous and destructive the Ryan Budget Plan really is to ordinary people – and then offering an alternative and far more humane budget. I doubt I’ll be converting to Catholicism anytime soon, but you can definitely sign me up as a fan of these intrepid (and rather brave) nuns who have calmly registered their response to conservative Rome by getting on a bus and heading in the other direction. Let them tell you themselves:
Every hour of each day, Catholic Sisters stand in solidarity with all who live in poverty, and we confront injustice and systems that cause suffering.
We cannot stand by silently when the U.S. Congress considers further enriching the wealthiest Americans at the expense of struggling, impoverished families.
As part of our campaign for budget fairness we are taking a bus trip. Our bus will travel to places in many states where Sisters actively serve people in need. For they are our best witnesses to the suffering our federal government must not ignore.
We ask all who visit this website to join us in prayer and to support our work to defeat government actions that would add to the suffering of already struggling families. …
As Catholic Sisters, we must speak out against the current House Republican budget, authored by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI). We do so because it harms people who are already suffering.
The Ryan Budget would:
- Raise taxes on 18 million hardworking low-income families while cutting taxes for millionaires and big corporations.
- Push the families of 2 million children into poverty.
- Kick 8 million people off food stamps and 30 million off health care.
NETWORK’s Executive Director, Sister Simone Campbell, said in a recent media interview that Catholic Sisters “know the real-life struggles of real-life Americans.” It is this knowledge that impelled us to organize this bus trip. When the federal government cuts funding to programs that serve people in poverty, we see the effects in our daily work. Simply put, real people suffer. That is immoral. Click on the links below to see how the Ryan budget affects people in your state.
- How the Ryan Budget Hurts Illinois
- How the Ryan Budget Hurts Indiana
- How the Ryan Budget Hurts Iowa
- How the Ryan Budget Hurts Michigan
- How the Ryan budget Hurts Ohio
- How the Ryan Budget Hurts Pennsylvania
- How the Ryan Budget Hurts Virginia
- How the Ryan Budget Hurts Wisconsin
We have an alternative.
A collaboration of Christian, Jewish, Muslim and other faith communities and organizations, The Faithful Budget promotes comprehensive and compassionate budget principles that helps lift the burden on the poor, rather than increasing it while shielding the wealthiest from any additional sacrifice. View the faithful budget here.
When the nuns are pissed off enough to become revolutionaries, you know we’re in for a serious fight folks.
Keith Owens (AKA Black Liberal Boomer) is a Detroit-based writer who has worked for The Detroit Free Press, Detroit’s alternative newsweekly the Metro Times, the Fort Lauderdale Sun Sentinel, and other newspapers. He was also a nationally syndicated columnist with Universal Press Syndicate for three years beginning in 1993.
A bunch of old wrinkled men, running around in dresses in a huge castle in Rome are going to tell everyone what the world is like? Wow, talk about ignorance to the highest degree. The Catholics have appointed a Pope that was a Hitler Youth, someone that he probably thinks fondly of, even though millions died at the hands of the murderous Nazis. The Catholic Church was responsible for stirring up very stupid ideas about killing all the cats that only made the black death that much more horrible. They fight against condoms the ONLY way to really stop or slow the transmission of sexual diseases of ALL sorts. Who knows how many deaths that stupid decision has help to cause. The backwards and asinine idea that the boy hookers can use condoms, I guess some of the dress wearers in the Vatican are catching HIV and who knows what else. And while there are an untold number of priests that have molested boys, and permanently harmed the boys’ life because of it, they want to continue the asinine hatred of God or whoever. I hear tell that the Catholic Church was the only one that “jesus” set up, I don’t know, and don’t care. But since the Catholic Church and the Vatican are still trying to live in the dark ages where the priests can have sex with anyone they want with no consequences because they are the “lawd’s” whatever. The Catholic Church needs to move forward and into the future. That was the basis of what Jesus was teaching, “Move forward, Learn, Care about those who have less than you, Love others, Care for the sick, infirm, and all those that make the rich cringe.” I can not find ONE quote by Jesus that tells anyone to HATE, not ONE, even once. I see a bunch of old men who wrote stories about all this in the bible, but I’ve seen Rush Limbaugh Arrested at the Mexico Border with a Huge Bottle of Viagra with someone else’s name on it to hire young if not underage hookers. So am I going to believe Jesus, or the idiots who tell me they have the knowledge of the ages, but no proof they know what the world looks like outside of their own rectums.
Excellent post, Bob. I think that not only the Catholic Church, but many other churches no longer care about what Jesus told us to care about. They care about money, their own glory, and the power to hold sway over the lives of millions around the world. Why anyone who calls him/herself a follower of Christ listens to these faux Christians is beyond my ability to understand, but I do know that, according to my Bible, they have strayed from the path that Jesus established. The Vatican and Catholic Bishops may not like what the nuns are doing, but imho, they are the ones doing the Lord’s work.
Who’d have ever guessed that the portion of the church more directly run by a former hitler youth would be fixated on spreading intolerance?
I applaud the nuns for doing this. They’ve always been at the forefront where priests dare not tread.
So based on that they are keenly aware of the suffering out there, and are the best equipped to mobilize in support of the wretched refuse.
The U.S Council of Catholic Bishops — the group that is doing their “Fortnight of Freedom” because they’re butthurt over not being able to deny access to contraception — might want to rethink that “moral authority” crap when their Fearless Leader is paying off pedophile priests. http://abcnews.go.com/US/cardinal-dolan-quiet-20k-payments-pedophile-priests/story?id=16467662#.T-_avZFIW_I
The really sickening line is the one about how they wanted to make sure the priests could still access their healthcare. Nice they have so much more concern with those creeps than they do the poor, the sick, etc.
I left the church last year after 56 years of being a Catholic.
I was educated in Catholic schools for 12 years and the education I received was based more on the nun’s Catholicism then those of the pope or bishops.
We were taught to emulate Christ,to do good every day, to fight injustice and take care of the poor.
I do not see the pope or bishops doing this. Their ‘catholicism’ is more about making a purer, smaller church and preserving ‘their’ status quo. The Church is supposed to be of and for the people, not to serve at the pleasure of the pope and bishops.
Give me that ole time Catholic social justice teaching and get rid of the church hierarchy!
GO NUNS GO!!!!!!!
Really! Who didn’t see that coming a mile or longer Away? I remember when he was first chosen..didn’t seem like a good thing for the Planet.
Most Definitely..GO NUNS GO! The Nuns are doing a great service for people who need Help not to be further burdened by paul ryan and his ilk. They’re doing a great service for their ocuntry!
These Nuns are Savvy! Thanks for Spreading their word, Black Liberal Boomer.
Why of course not! Where would anyone get the idea that the Pope’s childhood indoctrination would affect him all his life and “stick” to his brain cells like peanut butter on white bread? Why, he’s the Holy See, not human! Surely everyone can see that how special someone with his perchance for authoritarianism in his life can rule de’verld!!
The guy has the face of evil…and I’m sure the politics inside the Vatican are discussed in underground tunnels like they were in medieval times…without those pesky nuns around!
I really admire what they’re doing, and this suggests that there may be some hope in the RC church after all.
The nuns actually believe what Jesus preached. The evil men in the Vatican do not. If they did believe in their church’s tenets and Jesus, they would have flushed those vile pedophiles out and sent them to the proper authorities from prosecution. As it stands, they do not believe in heaven or hell, just power.
Religion comforts…and cripples.
No Black Liberal Boomer, you’re not a Catholic – which is why you put this sensationalized headline on your misleading article.
Being most people don’t read beyond the headline, you are spreading misleading, false information.
The Catholic Bishops are in full support of this mission by the nuns a they universally (along with the Episcopalian Bishops & several other religious leaders/groups) have condemned the GOP Ryan Budget. The Nuns themselves have been clear to say so – check out any/all of their interviews. See this one on the Ed Show.
http://video.msnbc.msn.com/the-ed-show/47883230#47883230
Posts filled with contrived conjecture “he probably think fondly of him”… Are not “excellent”.
Sorry.
Your clear hatred of the Church has nothing to do with the fact that they & the nuns are universally decrying the Ryan Budget.
The Bishops & the nuns are in total agreement on this – that headline is misleading which is below Politicususa’s standards & a disappointment.
See my OP with the link of one of their interviews:
http://video.msnbc.msn.com/the-ed-show/47883230#48021889
Your hateful opinion doesn’t constitute fact – but I can’t entirely blame you given the misleading headline above.
The Bishops fully support of the Nuns on the Bus:
http://video.msnbc.msn.com/the-ed-show/47883230#48021889
They along with the Episcopalian Bishops & other religious orgs have universally decried the GOP Ryan Budget.
It’s on other social matters (ie, homosexuality, masturbation) that their pov’s diverge. Personally, I’m with the nuns on everything – because they more aptly model Jesus. :)
“The ‘Holy’ Roman Catholic Church.” Whats holy about a costly marble brick and wood building with plenty of gold on the ulter. the real holy living breathing sons and daughters of God, of ‘ALL’ ages on THIS side of the womb, each of them contain within them the entire Kingdom of God.
Just can’t say that for that ‘church’ building, especially with the ungodly things going on in it.
Jesus was the greatest ‘Socialist’ that ever walked the Earth, the first Christian communities were 100% Socialistic, and I am so proud to be another ‘Socialist’.
In My Opinion, the devil entered almost all churches on the wings of the republican party.
One ‘churchless’ solitary follower of Christ.
Love to all, Darlene
The Vatican better be careful. Martin Luther’s intention wasn’t to break with the Catholic Church when he posted his 95 Theses in 1517. but reform. We all know how that turned out.
Elisa,
In a previous story, we talked about the Bishops joining the nuns:
http://politicususa.wpengine.com/nuns-bus-roll-paul-ryans-hometown-protest-budget.html
I believe the author used this headline to evoke the pope and his patriarchs, but you are correct that the Bishops have joined the Nuns on this matter, and that is worth noting.
It appears the Vatican and the catholic leaders have exposed themselves as an adjunct to the Republican party.
Their altruism is abating by the revelations of their priorities to the opposition of the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, as well as their attempt to control and suppress nuns who advocate helping the poor and suffering, and instead support the Ryan plan, which skews the moral balance of financial fairness even more extreme.
It is further proof from their diminished membership, their lack of modernizing to accept diversity, their bigotry on the benefits of condoms for all, not merely those in one selected sect of their choosing, and their years of continual cover-up of pedophiles amongst their ranks, that they are becoming more stringent in their doctrines instead of adapting. Fear has a way of secluding those by the exclusion of change!
It is more with the direct Catholic community support which makes true differences for people in need, as I’ve always been repulsed by the high ranking division hypocrisy with presenting themselves as servile followers of Jesus, yet they live and dress in opulence and now overtly support those that choose to assert further suffering for many more.
If I was those nuns, I’d get in that bus and drive away to a new life that involves an authentic institution run exclusively by nuns and live the altruistic life they are striving for now and have based their beliefs on!
I don’t see any nuns – just a bunch of old women dressed up in Walmart clothes.
A person doesn’t have to be Roman Catholic to accurately report on or discuss the Roman Catholic Church and its hierarchy. I’ve been critical of them for years, because a top-down hierarchal structure is almost a guarantee of abuse. The present Bishop of Rome is questionable in many of the stances he takes, not only including those on sexual matters, but also on other topics such as evolution (been some hemming and hawing on that one), economic justice, and separation of church and state. He’s reconciled with some of the most horrific elements in extremist Roman Catholicism, and at the same time is intolerant towards other viewpoints. Worst of all, he is insulting and denigrating towards other christians, and won’t accept or admit that his church is no more or less legitimate than any other.
Also remember – there are other legitimate Catholic churches besides Roman, who have every right to claim to be Catholic.
Very true, and as it turns out, there were many other reformers. The conservative elements in the RC church won out, and rooted out (and burned at the stake/murdered/tortured/etc.) any of the others who could be found.
Luther and the others were rather out-of-reach, and influenced enough people that they were protected.
I think it might be time for the “Holy Father” to listen. He does not see “First Hand” on what is going on in the church. He tells US what God wants us to do.
Things have changed since the time of our Lord. The Nuns are teaching US and we listen. Now its time for the Pope to ease off and listen to the Nuns.