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The dilemma of the Christian in a totalitarian
church
by Michael Keane
from the BASIC NEWSLETTER, Spring 2003, pp. 9-12
The Reverend Michael Keane, a contemporary of the
signatories to the Irish Bishops Pastoral, The Work of Justice, was recently
reinstated after a 23 year suspension visited on him in response to challenges
based on conscience......
2002
was the twenty-fifth anniversary of the issuing of the Irish Bishops’
Pastoral, The Work of Justice. It was signed on behalf of the bishops by
Archbishops Dermot Ryan [Dublin], Thomas Morris [Cashel] and Joseph Cunnane
[Tuam].
The
following is an extract from that pastoral: “One of the effects of the
new interdependence of people is that more and more decisions are now taken for
individuals by their group leaders. People will often, in private, admit that
they disapprove of actions decided by their organisation and deplore the harm
it does to others. But still they go along with it. Private dissent does not
dispense one from responsibility. Each one has his own conscience and must
follow it. Each one is responsible, alone, to God. We cannot ‘pass the
buck’ to others.”
“People today talk much about following their own conscience. Yet the
strange thing is that this is the very time when so many people will follow
with blind obedience in whatever direction their conscience is led by their
group or movement or political party, their firm, or union, or professional
organisation. We allow much of our moral thinking to be done for us by
committees or by ‘headquarters’, or by the mass media. We need to
inform and educate our conscience and have the courage to stand by it even if
we stand alone. We cannot rest content with situations where we find ourselves
as members of some organisation, doing things which personally we would never
do and which privately we know to be wrong, or failing to say or do things we
know to be our duty. As someone put it recently, ‘We must not allow
governments, corporations and unions to do our sinning for us’. Selfish,
sectional and unjust actions committed by my group are in part my
responsibility. It is not enough, to examine my conscience about my personal
behaviour, I need also to examine myself about actions of a group of which I am
a member.”
“Since all have not the ability to speak persuasively in public or to
carry influence at meetings, this responsibility is in practice limited by the
rules and conventions of the organisation. Sometimes these rules and procedures
are such as to inhibit free and open discussion and to pressurise conscientious
dissenters. Members should then press for reform of the rules with a view to
encouraging open and responsible discussion and the greatest possible freedom
and the widest possible participation in the taking of decisions.”
God
submits God’s very existence to our conscience. There are people who do
not believe God exists. Some years ago it was being said by some, “God is
dead.” Others reject false ideas about God: e.g. That God is a celestial
policeman. There are agnostics who hold the view that they don’t know
whether God exists or not. And then there are the believers. Hopefully atheists
and agnostics will be pleasantly surprised when they pass on from this life and
meet God face to face.
The
quotation from the pastoral The Work of Justice at the head of the
article is inclusive of all organisations, even the ‘institutional
church’ - which people tend to follow with blind obedience - and which
also might be counted among that group of organisations that we allow to do our
‘sinning’ for us. Though the temptation to allow our moral thinking
to be done for us by ‘headquarters’ - the Vatican - is very strong
and though the pronouncements of the Pope and the teaching of the Church must
be given serious consideration, such items must be submitted to our conscience
before we arrive at our personal conscientious decision. It is out of the
collective of these personal conscientious decisions that the ‘sensus
fidelium’ or the ‘insight of the faithful’ is established, that
determines whether a teaching or pronouncement has been ‘received’ by
the faithful, through which it ultimately becomes the full teaching of the
Church.
Our
silence and lack of action in certain circumstances can be sinful and we must
become aware of that fact. I am reminded of a story told by an old parish
priest. It relates to a time when people in Ireland had to go to an assigned
place to pay rent to the bailiff of the local Landlord. Johnny went to pay his
rent to the bailiff in Ballinlough, a small town in Co. Roscommon. There is a
townland between Ballinlough and Ballyhaunis called Gorta Ganny, about five
miles west of Ballinlough. Johnny, in the visiting house that night was telling
his neighbours how he gave the bailiff a real telling off, calling himself and
the Landlord a pair of low-down scoundrels. The neighbours were open-mouthed
with disbelief. Pat said to him “surely you didn’t say that to the
bailiff?” “Faith and I did” said Johnny, “but I was in
Gorta Ganny when I said it!”
So
often like Johnny, we sit at home criticising people for their actions and
attitudes but fail to say anything in public against them or take action to
counteract them. There is a social as well as personal aspect to conscience.
Conscientious dissenters are the bane of the Vatican and of those who play up
to the Vatican. A few years ago a bishop addressed his priests on Holy Thursday
in these unfortunate words “a dissident priest is like a boil on the
body that must be lanced.” Those words were in sharp contrast to the
words with which Christ addressed his apostles on the first Holy Thursday -
“ will not call you servants but friends.”
One
often hears establishment people using such phrases as “if you are in a
club, you keep the rules” or “when you are in the army, you wear the
boots.” That kind of talk is alright as far as it goes, but if the rules
are inhibiting or limiting or pressurising, then there is an obligation on us
to agitate for a change of those rules.
Christ said “by this you shall know my disciples, that they have love, one
for another.” One would think that that sentiment might be incorporated
into the ceremony of ordination for a priest. Instead the young priest is
obliged to promise obedience to his bishop and to the bishop’s successors.
And the successors are not yet known and are likely not yet bishops! And he
promises obedience about actions, the contents of which he is not, at the time
of the promise being made, aware! Is not such a promise rather rash? - not
unlike the promise that Herod made to Salome? We cannot abdicate our
conscientious judgement to any human being, no matter how exalted. In the words
of the pastoral, “We cannot ‘pass the buck’ to others. Everyone
of us is responsible to God, alone. Peter and John retorted to the Sanhedrin -
as recounted in Acts IV: 19 in these words - ”Judge for yourselves whether
in God’s eyes it is right for us to obey you rather than God." The promise
of obedience should be replaced by a mutual expression of love between the
bishop and the ordinand. That expression of love should encompass obedience to
the bishop in all his reasonable requests. The promise of obedience is a
control mechanism is a control mechanism by the church establishment which has
turned the vast majority of priests into conforming robots to the detriment of
the church of Christ. One of the old Roman emperors used to say
“Oderint dum metuant.” which means “let them hate me
provided they fear me.” Bullying type bishops in the past may have
operated on a slightly changed version of the emperor’s attitude -
“oderint dum obediant” which is “let them hate me,
provided they obey me.”
Conscience is that “still small voice” that a discreet and
self-effacing God permits in dealing with us creatures. A good, informed
conscience is to the soul what health is to the body. St. Paul in his letter to
the Romans outlines the struggle that goes on in the conscience of everyone of
us “the good that I will, I do not; but the evil that I will not, that I
do.” In his helplessness he cries out “who will deliver me from the
body of this death?” He gives his answer, “the grace of Jesus
Christ” That is available to us for the asking.
Every
time we act conscientiously, we strengthen our moral sense and become better
persons. The Czech writer and former President, Vaclav Havel’s credo runs
thus “I simply take the side of truth against any lie, justice against any
injustice.” Conscience is at the core of human dignity and integrity. It
is the sanctuary where we are alone with God.
When
Vatican officials decided to prohibit Sr. Joan Chittister, OSB., from
addressing the Women’s Ordination Worldwide Conference in Dublin in 2001,
they chose to use her religious superior, Sr. Christine Vladimiroff, OSB, to
command the prohibition. After consulting her community of 128 sisters, all but
one of whom said ‘No’, the prioress told the Vatican she would not
issue any such mandate.
Joan
Chittister spoke in Dublin. The Vatican had met a challenge from religious
sisters who viewed obedience in a traditional Benedictine way. The Vatican did
not comprehend. In November 2002, Sr. Christine received the prestigious
‘Call to Action’ award in the name of her community. Among the
sentiments mentioned in her acceptance speech, she mentioned....
“........I accept this award for finding our voice and expressing in words
what we felt in our hearts was the right thing to do. It was a quiet act of
bravery by women who love the church.....it was an act of deep and abiding
loyalty.... a gesture of profound love.... an act of fidelity to the Spirit
speaking within."
“Yes, it was an act of conscience. It was an act of commitment to all
women whose voices have been silenced in history, whose stories have never been
heard, whose wisdom we have denied. We move through the pain to hope, willing
to ”listen with the ear of our heart" as Benedict instructs us."
“These are dark days in our church and to name the moment we are in is an
act of hope. We must be personally committed to show another way. In those
instances when we withhold our truth, we silence ourselves. It is an act of
leadership to instil hope and courage in the institutions and organisations in
which we find ourselves. Cynicism is not a virtue. It is a violent act that
destroys hope and creates the chaos that leaves people in despair of ever
finding meaning. As a community we move into the future, accessing our personal
power within an institution that denies us organisational power. What fuels my
passion? I am convinced that things are not right, but equally convinced that
we are capable, together, of setting them right.”
“The one who is different is to be offered Benedictine hospitality where
guests are received as Christ. I have hope because I think religious women are
taking seriously their role as gift to the Church... there is a seamless
movement from prayer and community to action on behalf of justice that
characterises our activity... with the same voice that chants the psalms, we
will raise the significant issues in the halls of the powerful and be the
advocate for the poor..... we continue as women in the
church, to lay claim to our capacity to answer the call to discipleship. Jesus
has not excluded us. Gender does not diminish the power of Baptism in the
church of Jesus. We will opt for dialogue rather than silence. We bring
community and make it visible through the values of inclusion participation,
mutuality, compassion, shared decision making and leadership as service.
Individuals join communities to do together what they cannot do alone. It is
through living and growing in community that we find the generosity of spirit,
the consistency of commitment and the integrity of heart to change first what
needs to be challenged in our lives personally, and in our commitment to
community that will allow us to be a moral voice and a prophetic sign of hope
to our world..... It is through our prayer and community that we find the
passion of our convictions to be radically concerned for the welfare of others.
Is that not the heart of the gospel message of Jesus?....... People’s life
purpose and power is revealed in where they draw a line, where they take a
stand, what they choose."
“It was with great fear and courage, with great confidence and doubt that
we as a community stepped out into a new place. We were required to grow beyond
the boundaries we had inherited and those that were established for us by our
church..... what was important was that we struggled together.... we trusted
ourselves to move into uncharted waters, and there in that liminal space we
encountered our truth. It was not a ‘NO’ that was uttered; it was a
‘YES’ and therein we are all perceived as dangerous!”
Finally, the Pope, bishops, parish priests and others must realise that they
only govern the people of God with the consent of the people of God ...... and
the sooner that that dawns on them, the better for the Church of Christ.
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