What to do with church buildings when there are no priests is an issue that will face most parishes in the immediate future, despite the fact that church authorities soldier on as though no drastic changes are on the horizon.
Alan McGill puts forward a suggestion on how these buildings can be utilised ‘by predominantly or entirely lay communities so as to continue to be oases of prayer and pastoral care’.
Alan McGill works fulltime as Director of Faith Formation and Liturgy at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart of Jesus in the city-center of Atlanta. He is a native of Dublin.
Various news services are reporting remarks by Pope Francis that appear to indicate his willingness to formally study the possibility of the ordination of women to the diaconate.
America magazine and the National Catholic Reporter remind CDF and Vatican officials that the issue of the injustice of CDF procedures isn’t just going to disappear because they choose to ignore it.
Neither will the issue be disappeared by Vatican officials practising a basic lack of courtesy and good manners in refusing to read or acknowledge a letter sent to them about such a grave issue.
Did they learn nothing of the damage done to individuals and to church in the recent past by their ignoring issues of justice and people’s rights?
ACP meeting with bishops next week
Notice of talk by Fr Gerard Moloney CSsR before “We Are Church” AGM
Pope Francis’ prayer intention for May is for women.
Can we, and Pope Francis, join in this prayer without first challenging our own attitudes about the roles and ministries allowed to women in our church.
Nessan Vaughan recalls the late (Dr) Denis Carroll, whose 9th anniversary occurred on 5th May. Denis was a renowned theologian, scholar, historian, priest and social activist. He was also a founder member of the Association of Irish Priests, one of the forerunners of the ACP. Many will remember him fondly.
Interesting statistics to while away a little time on the May Holiday Weekend. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has published a Report on “The Class of 2016: Survey of Ordinands to the Priesthood”.
Brendan Hoban, writing in the Western People, takes issue with those who would ‘adjudicate infallibly’ on who was catholic enough to have identified themselves as catholic in the recent census.
‘Usually this rigid definition of what constitutes a Catholic … comes not from agnostic or atheistic sources but from very conservative, ultra-traditional Catholics who are impatient with what they regard as any perceived diminution in Catholicism. Usually liberal media .. tend to be more amenable to those who fail to reach the ideal, apart obviously from Catholics, for whom a new and worrying intolerance is developing.’
Opening Comment The Ascension of Jesus will be celebrated next Sunday. As the Easter Season moves towards its second climax at Pentecost, we take heed of the Lord’s final words…
Fr. Tim Kesicki, SJ, president of the Jesuit Conference of Canada and the United States, announced the death today of Fr. Daniel Berrigan SJ at the age of 94.
Brian Eyre, writing from Brazil, raises the issue of a chronic shortage of priests in many places and a possible short term solution by inviting back to public ministry those who were debarred from it because they no longer wished to live a celibate life.
Brian also asks why official Vatican documents still refer to priests who have married as ‘defections’; “why use language like this that is mean, small-minded and very hurtful?'”
We can only join with Brian in querying the use of such uncharitable language. With such an attitude still prevalent in curial circles in Rome is it any wonder the ‘Year of Mercy’ has failed to find traction among people?
Pádraig McCarthy points to the 19 March letter of Pope Francis to Cardinal Marc Ouellet of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America.
Francis has strong words on the importance of laity, and of the dangers of clericalism.
“It is not [for] the pastor to tell lay people what they must do and say, they know this better than we do.”
Hans Küng has released a statement to media about a letter he received from Pope Francis following his appeal for an open discussion about ‘nfallibility’.
The English version was released simultaneously by National Catholic Reporter and The Tablet.
International Coverage for Letter about “A New Process for the Church and the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith”.
The story has got a full page in la Repubblica, the main Italian newspaper.
Gerard Moloney, a Redemptorist priest, and former editor of the magazine ‘Reality’ writes of the appalling experience he suffered at the hands of the CDF.
“How can you defend yourself if you don’t know you are on trial? How can you defend yourself if you don’t know who your accusers are? How can you defend yourself when your fate has been decided even before you discover you have been on trial? It is an utterly unjust and unchristian system.
Something is rotten in the state of the CDF, and while the current people and processes remain in place, nothing will change. Priests, sisters and brothers will continue to be treated as less than human, and will have their lives hurt or broken.
… injustice has a price, and I am paying it every day.”
Fifteen people, including two bishops, prominent theologians, people working in creative areas of ministry, and Catholic writers and broadcasters, have written to Pope Francis and to the Prefect of the CDF, Cardinal Gerhard Müller, asking for an open discussion about the procedures of the Congregation and calling for approaches that respect human rights and the need for free speech, pluralism, transparency and accountability within the church community.
They also say that the CDF “acts in ways that are out of keeping with contemporary concepts of human rights, accountability and transparency that the world expects from the Christian community and which the Catholic Church demands from secular organizations.”
Brendan Hoban in his weekly column in the Western People reflects on his 43 years in ministry in the light of the influence successive papacies have had on church.
‘as hope gradually died a long and difficult death and Rome eventually began to implode, a few years ago the cardinals came to the obvious conclusion that the Curia in Rome had to be reformed, rowing back in the general direction of the Council of Trent had failed and that the vision of Vatican Two was worth a second look.
Unexpectedly Francis emerged from the shadows……….’
Pádraig McCarthy has re-formatted ‘The Joy of Love’ on A4 pages as a downloadable and printable PDF file.
A petition to reinstate Professor Hans Küng as a Catholic theologian.
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