A Deprived Language
With the selection of “orthodox”, “ultra conservative”, etc., Timothy Dolan as archbishop of New York, it has become abundantly clear we have reached a crisis of language in ecclesial affairs. Certainly I won’t be the one to question his bonafides in either regard, but if this is how we are going to describe ecclesial appointments for the next decade or so, then they all are going to be “orthodox” and “ultra conservative.” Unfortunately, none of this is really fair to Archbishop Dolan.
The more secular wing of Catholicism seems to be waiting for the choice that affirms a woman’s control of her reproduction is key to her achieving humanity and salvation is found through self-actualization, i.e. if having sex with people of the same gender brings you joy then God is happy too. I suppose through such a lens, Archbishop Dolan looks orthodox. In regards to feminity, this view of feminism has never really taken hold in the Catholic Church as a whole although it has seen some fits in the US and Canada. In regards to homosexuality, whatever path is taken toward liberalization – a presumption at this point – such liberalization won’t take place based on the pop-psychology that views all choices solely based on the interests of the individual rather than the family (larger than nuclear) and society. (Ditto divorce.) The 60s are over. In so much as the sexual revolution has been affirmed, it has been done so outside the Church.
As for what to expect from a Dolan regime, I would expect a relatively parochial one. Expect competent administration. Expect those willing to work for the advancement of the diocese to advance and those more consumed with their own interests to be marginalized. Daniel Maguire is a fine example of the latter. As for what the online community seems consumed, I wouldn’t anticipate Dolan taking a public leadership role in addressing politicians that support abortion, specifically denying them communion. He hasn’t to date. With politicians and with clergy, he is likely to take the attitude of working with what he has rather than trying to remake either in his own image. So, perhaps conservative is the proper term after all.
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I think it is silly to use terms like “liberal” and “conservative” to apply to bishops, especially when using these terms in the hopelessly misguided American secular sense.
Anyway, I think Dolan is a good choice– if somewhat predictable!
I think anyone who describes Archbishop Dolan as “ultra-orthodox” is merely giving us an uninformed, idiosyncratic caricature (I mean, seriously, does orthodoxy admit of such degrees?). I seriously recommend the book The New Men which chronicles a year at the North American College in Rome when Dolan was the rector. He’s a moderate, pastoral shepherd who would likely eschew the rallying cry of those self-depicted “ultra-orthodox” Catholics. However, based on my experience, those sort of Catholics tend not to read very many books, so perhaps my recommending one is an exercise in futility.
I think labeling Dolan politically is short sighted period. Doing so overstates his political ambitions. As far as theological labeling goes, I’m not real sure what liberal theology is anymore other than a shorthand for heterodox. If it is just a matter of liturgical preference, then Morning’s Minion gets to be an ultra-traditionalist, lol. By the same token I’m not sure what “conservative theology” would entail either. I’m sure there are technical senses to both terms, but I don’t think the people throwing out the labels are using them technically.
On the technical theological use of “liberal” and “conservative,” the term “liberal theology” does have a technical meaning, referring to a certain strand of theology that flowed from Enlightenment questions and concerns. It’s certainly not a synonym for “heterodox,” although you’re right, that’s how the term is used in BlogLand. Interestingly, right wing Christians incorporate a lot of liberal theology (in the technical sense of the word) in their own “anti-liberal” theology (in the BlogLand sense of the term).
“Conservative theology” is not a term that is used in, you know, actual theology. It’s a term also used primarily in BlogLand.
Dolan seems pretty moderate to me, from what I have read about him.
Reading the extensive coverage of the Dolan appointment in this mornings New York Times I came away with a generally positive impression of the man -
he certainly has a spine. The catholic church would be in much better shape if we had more folksy solid characters like that man.
Dolan seems to me to be someone who wants to work gradually to minimize heterodox theology in both schools and parishes. He was certainly less confrontational with Marquette than someone like Burke would have been, and that might have been better for achieving what are probably the same goals. But I’m unaware of how much of an effect he’s had on circumscribing the more liberal strains within the Archdiocese of Milwaukee. MZ, how much success do you think he’s had?
MZ, how much success do you think he’s had?
He stopped the bleeding. His goals were a bit more expansive than just stopping dissent. There were parish closings and schools closings, and there would have been more if the more liberal priests were asked to move on. As far as Marquette goes, there was plenty going on behind the scenes there. I’m pretty sure we have some Marquette people reading the blog who can elaborate more, but Marquette was never as bad as people made it out to be. Tenure is what it is, and they are governed by a lay board.
I fall into using Liberal or (Progressive) and conservative or (Orthodox) as to to these things.
THe problem is what to use in replacement for it. Orthodox versus what? HEretic? Destroyer of the Deposit Faith, Radical?
The terms to use to replace it are far more offensive thatn the term liberal to the hearer
I fall into using Liberal or (Progressive) and conservative or (Orthodox) as to to these things.
I don’t see a problem either using these labels only if they are used in the context of Catholic theology rather than secularism or American politics. I find myself using such labels when talking about the Second Vatican Council or when we attend horrible 70s-style Masses.
I would refer you all to the November 19, 1999 edition of Commonweal. With insightful responses by Margaret O’Brien Steinfels, Peter Steinfels, John T. Noonan, Jr., John T. McGreevy and E. J. Dionne Jr., Chicago Cardinal Francis George gives his famous address declaring that “Liberal Catholicism is an exhausted project.”
I think it is one of the hallmarks of Liberal Catholicism that its defenders (the respondents) actually ehjoy and appreciate a learned, thoughtful, civil criticism. The exchange itself was a positive good.
The Cardinal made his case that Liberal Catholicism had contributed much to the Church but was no longer useful. I have my points of agreement and disagreement with him, but his lecture was not only soemthing that had much value, it was tremendously refreshing.
I think Cardinal George is very much in the same mold as the Archbishop who, for a few more weeks, lives up the lake from him.
And with all respect, I will say to the Cardinal, if liberal Catholicism is an exhausted project, I’m prepared to take a little nap and wake up refreshed to again serve the Church.
I’m pretty sure we have some Marquette people reading the blog who can elaborate more, but Marquette was never as bad as people made it out to be. Tenure is what it is, and they are governed by a lay board.
Uh, as someone who just completed a BA and MS at Marquette, I can tell anyone interested in a first-hand account that Marquette really is as bad as anyone might think it could be, though to give it some credit it isn’t nearly as bad as most other liberal Jesuit institution.
Anti-Christian and anti-Catholic speakers and faculty par for the course. A new-ish Jesuit faculty member in the Theo Dept who managed Saddam Hussein’s propaganda efforts in Iraq. Marginalization of devout Catholic students, particularly (God bless them) theo students.
A Jesuit president who believes that fundraising goals are the “true measures of a great university”. On a non-political note, the MU bureaucracy calls the frequent kidnappings “armed robberies”. Yeah, alright.
For potential students and their families worried about liberal indoctrination when balancing school alternatives, Marquette’s Professor of Political Science John McAdams summarized it best: They can get political correctness a lot cheaper.
George,
Can you tell us about this theology professor — your words are quite unclear, who do you mean, what propaganda did they support, and of the kind which was, how was it anti-Christian?
Henry– don’t you realize that “orthodox” Catholics theologians all support American military policy in Iraq and elsewhere? :)
On a more serious note, the early-1990s era Marquette management engaged in some rather shameful practices–they basically purged the theologians they did not like from the department (more personal than ideological). Their tactics were quite wicked. I can’t say any more than that.
A side issue.
Some of us are so old, when we were born it was a debatable issue if a man of our faith could be elected president. Certainly members of our faith were kept out of certain social clubs, professions, firms and housing opportunities.
This sort of prejudice is anti-Catholic, as is a direct institutional assult on the Church’s legitimate freedoms.
The recent adoption of the term ‘anti-Catholic’ to mean having a different opinion on a matter of social debate than the Catholic bishops is really a use of term I find offensive or at least insensititve to the real bigotry that many have worked to overcome.
Could we have a moritorium on such usage?
Henry,
His name is Simon Harak. Here’s more information from McAdams’s blog if you want more.
Harak was responsible for organizing Saddam’s human shield movement and organized publicity trips for Western peacenik organizations during the sanctions period to blast the UN imposed sanctions as killing innocent people, drawing attention away from Saddam’s own acts of genocide.
An example, from 1998.
SING SONGS TO HIM
“People actually sing songs to him on television. His picture hangs everywhere,” Harak said.
After the bombing of Pearl Harbor the American people “rallied around the flag” and supported their president, Harak said. The Iraqi people have done the same with their president, he said.
“The picture of what is going on there is different than what is presented in the United States,” Harak said.
Nothing of what you said about him suggests he was anti-Christian; indeed, that he was a peace maker, and working against an unjust war, and going against the unjust sanctions which were against Iraq (killing innocent children, as is well known), I would say he did a very Christian act in his act of charity. That people supported Saddam is also correct, indeed, many still think it was better under Saddam — the Christians in Iraq themselves said don’t go to war, and pointed out the good Saddam had done for them. This is not to say Saddam did not do evil — obviously he did, but that does not justify evil in response.
In regards to homosexuality, whatever path is taken toward liberalization – a presumption at this point – such liberalization won’t take place based on the pop-psychology that views all choices solely based on the interests of the individual rather than the family (larger than nuclear) and society.
I wonder if you think that the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, is “heterodox” and “anti-family” when he says something like this (quoted in the Atlantic article about him):
“From a sex scene in Paul Scott’s Raj Quartet, [Williams] drew a definition of grace as beautiful and convincing as any I know.
There may be little love, even little generosity, in Clark’s bedding of Sarah, but Sarah has discovered that her body can be the cause of happiness to her and to another. It is this discovery which most clearly shows why we might want to talk about grace here. Grace, for the Christian believer, is a transformation that depends in large part on knowing yourself to be seen in a certain way: as significant, as wanted.
From there, the essay has the inevitability of a proof in philosophy. Gay people, too, deserve to be wanted sexually—deserve the body’s grace. The full expression of this grace through sexual relations takes time and the commitment of the partners to come to know each other—through the commitment of marriage or something like it. Sexual fidelity is akin to religious fidelity—“not an avoidance of risk, but the creation of a context in which grace can abound.” For the church to stand in the way of such relationships, straight or gay, is to stand in the way of God’s grace.”
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200903/archbishop-canterbury
I recognise that for you Roman Catholics, Archbishop Williams isn’t a Catholic at all, but, to me, he is—and perhaps now, considering the attempts, by the last two popes, to “restore” the authoritarianism, the un-accountability and the doctrinaire close-mindedness of the pre-Vatican II Church, more “catholic,” actually, than the Romans.
Certainly he has a better idea of what a “family” is—especially of what an “extended” (or non-“nuclear”) family is—and of how grace can flow even through the most unconventional of family arrangements!
Find another way to put that one.