“A NEW WAY of BEING CHURCH” the Title Is from a Speech of Cardinal Blaise Cupich Quoted More Fully at the Conclusion

“A NEW WAY of BEING CHURCH” The title is from a speech of Cardinal Blaise Cupich quoted more fully at the conclusion This presentation has three sections. 1. What I will call The Pius X Church – for reasons that will become obvious very shortly. This part is largely historical because I think it is useful to have a sense of where we have been and why we were that way. 2. Then I will move on to what I describe as The John XXIII Church – again for obvious reasons – and some of its characteristics as spelt out by the 2nd Vatican Council. 3. Finally, I’d like to make some suggestions for a way forward – which I hope you will find worthwhile and challenging. Born in 1944, my early experiences of Church were of an institution described by Pope Pius X, in his 1906 encyclical Vehementer Nos. This encyclical was addressed specifically to the Church in France because of the particular circumstances in that country. Before dealing with those particular circumstances, Pius lays down principles on which to base his subsequent reasoning. He describes the Church thus: “… essentially an unequal society, that is, a society comprising two categories of persons, the Pastors and the flock, those who occupy a rank in the different degrees of the hierarchy and the multitude of the faithful ” (par.8). For Pius, the underlying rationale is a legal concept – the Church as a perfect society: a self-sufficient or independent organisation which has all the necessary resources and conditions to achieve its overall goal, notwithstanding any imperfections or the sinfulness of individual members. It is not subordinate to any other authority or power, e.g. civil government; and it has Jesus promise – the gates of hell will not prevail against it (Mt.16:17-19). Pius X went on: “So distinct are these categories (hierarchy and faithful) that with the pastoral body only rests the necessary right and authority for promoting the end of the society and directing all its members towards that end; the one duty of the multitude is to allow themselves to be led, and, like a docile flock, to follow the Pastors”. This very clear concept of the Church would not, at that time, have been seriously challenged. In passing, I particularly draw your attention to a term used by Pius X namely: ‘the faithful’ to which I will return later. 1 This papal declaration is the theoretical/doctrinal basis for what I have described as the Pius X Church. I was brought up in this Church. I treasure its legacy in my life. In many respects, I am who I am today because of this Church. In my recollection, this Church and its members had many positive qualities. There was a robust sense of identity; a dedication to personal prayer; an awareness of, and respect for, the sacred; a quite vigorous social life (often based on the need for fund-raising); and it was much more representative of the community – age wise – than is the greying Church of today. There were, however, negatives – and I accept that what follows may be generalised and possibly superficial. But this is my memory, my experience of the Church of those days: we were suspicious of the Bible as being somehow Protestant; the requirements of the flock were mostly specified in the negative – about NOT doing (not missing Mass, not eating meat on Friday and especially not doing or thinking anything sexual except in very specific circumstances); faith was seen as acceptance of a set of propositions (as expressed, for example, in the Creed but including other difficult to comprehend items such as Blessed Trinity, Real Presence, Immaculate Conception, etc); being saved was a solitary/individual exercise – my scraping into heaven depended on my own efforts; the practice of the faith was law-based, focussed on the individual and her/his necessary efforts to comply with the commandments and, where that failed, to seek forgiveness through the confessional from a member of the pastoral body. A fundamental flaw in this approach of the Pius X Church can be identified in its presentation of the ten commandments. Ask any Catholic (of a certain age) to recite the first commandment and the confident response invariably will be: “I am the Lord your God; you shall have no other God but me”. My perception of this God was of a remote demanding figure, jealous of His prerogatives (and somewhat prone to anger if those prerogatives were flouted), who recorded my wrongdoings in meticulous detail for the inevitable judgement day (with an ever-present possibility of eternal damnation), and who had to be convinced by the efforts that I made (keeping the commandments, praying, doing penance and the like) to let me into heaven. If I made it, I would do so by the skin of my teeth. 2 However, the fact of the matter is that the statement of the commandment as cited is deficient. The Book of Exodus (20:1ff) actually reads: “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods but me”. THIS GOD, of the missing clause, is a saving God: ‘land of Egypt’, ‘house of slavery’ being metaphors for anything that hurts, frightens or shames me. THIS GOD saves for other reason than His own gracious benevolence. Again, I will say more about this later. The Church of Pius X, especially in its hierarchical manifestation, seems very different from Jesus of Nazareth, friend of, and indeed frequent fellow-diner with, those on the fringes, a man despised by the hierarchy of his time – ultimately executed as a criminal by shameful crucifixion. It’s worth briefly tracing the path from that crucifixion to subsequent episcopal purple and cardinal scarlet. For three centuries after the crucifixion, being a Christian was a felonious endeavour which could result in persecution and death. Early in the 4th century Roman Emperor Constantine, having converted, first decriminalises Christianity and then, grasping an opportunity to unite his disparate territories and people, makes it the state religion. Church leaders come to be influential. The institutional Church becomes part of the political scene with steadily expanding power and wealth. The Papal States – where the Pope was ruler, territorial monarch – date from around the 8th century. In well under a thousand years, the Church’s status shifts from powerless outcast to ruling aristocrat. Thence, until the 16th century the Church, through its hierarchy, is a significant player on the geopolitical stage. Pope and hierarchy are at the same level as nobility giving rise, for example, to the Prince-Bishop phenomenon in parts of Europe. The Gospel is no longer the only priority. Where there is money and power, corruption follows. In 590 AD, Gregorius Anicius is elected – very reluctantly on his part – as Pope. He becomes known to history as Saint Gregory the Great, in part, because of his commitment to reform. The struggle for Church reform has gone on through succeeding generations playing out in many ways, e.g. in the establishment of religious orders like the Franciscans, Dominicans, Jesuits: all of whom started out as fringe movements wanting to set things straight. While there may be differences today in the motivation for reform, CCWWD belongs in that tradition. 3 What we have come to know as the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century was not an isolated event occurring out of the blue. In its genesis, it was a continuation of the constant movement for Church reform. Many of the issues the Reformers wanted to address desperately needed rectification, as can be seen in events immediately preceding the Reformation. Prince Albrecht of Brandenburg, Luther’s bishop, was a member of the aristocratic Hohenzolleren dynasty. He became a bishop at the age of twenty-three and cardinal by twenty-eight. He funded his hierarchical promotion through a sizeable donation to the then Pope, Leo X, for the building of St Peter’s Cathedral in Rome – a donation underwritten by a loan from a merchant banker, Jakob Fugger the Rich. Pope Leo X was a Medici. He became cardinal at the age of thirteen and had to be ordained a priest after his election in order to take up the papal role. To repay the Fugger loan, Albrecht gained permission (today we might call it a franchise) from Leo to trade indulgences. Luther objected. His ninety-five theses, initially far from being a rebellious act, in effect were saying “We need to talk about this”. His intent was to spark theological discussion about the nature of indulgences – discussion which might have brought about change in what was a thoroughly perverted practice. Subsequently and for all sorts of reasons – political, dynastic, personal, theological – a formal ecclesiastical split develops, and new churches are established. The reaction of the Roman Church was, understandably, defensive of itself, though protectiveness of personal position/status may also have played a part. Wagons were circled. Efforts at reform, notably the long-running Council of Trent, were put in place even if two decades were to pass before that Council actually met. Subsequent history then played into this defensive mindset. After the Reformation came the French Revolution, the American War of Independence, the Enlightenment, scientific developments and advances in biblical understanding and interpretation, the unification of Italy with the consequent loss of the Papal States. Because the hierarchy had become so identified with the ruling classes, these events – associated as they were with moves toward 4 democratisation, independent thinking and personal decision-making – generated more defensiveness.

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