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Contents © 2004
by Jim Holman.
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NEWS
April 2004

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SYMBOLS ARE REAL. In a January 12 letter sent to all the parishes of the diocese of San Jose, Bishop Patrick McGrath said he wanted to share "some thoughts on the importance of our liturgy and the direction of liturgical practice I ask our diocese to undertake at this time." The bishop started off explaining symbol. The Eucharist, he writes, in fact, "every liturgy, is made up of symbols and symbolic actions. Symbol is the language of ritual." Though "in the Church's history," McGrath writes, "'symbol' was interpreted by many as something that was not real, just a symbol," today "the Church has recovered the fuller understanding of 'symbol' to mean something that unites two different realities to reveal their deeper meaning."

This is all very important for Bishop McGrath, for "the symbols and symbolic actions in our Mass have profound meaning for us and for all who witness what we do. In a real way, our actions speak louder than words. What do our symbols and ritual actions have to say?" The bishop writes that he believes "that the symbolic language of our Eucharistic celebration in this diocese has the potential to communicate a very powerful message." Thus, Bishop McGrath asks "priests and liturgists to work on making our prayer a clearer symbol of the message the Eucharist is trying to communicate. During this last year, your pastors, liturgists, and I have been renewing our efforts to implement many of the directives that have been the Church's teaching since Vatican Council II."


ALL FOR UNITY -- SORT OF. One area Bishop McGrath addresses is the posture of the faithful during the liturgy. He lays out what he thinks is the direction "our diocese needs to go in order to communicate a message of unity and solidarity to our world." The message of unity, however, remains unclear, since the bishop mandates and allows liturgical practices out of sync with most other United States dioceses. For instance, Bishop McGrath said that in his diocese "we will continue to stand after the Agnus Dei" -- but the United States norm is kneeling after the Agnus Dei. McGrath writes that standing after the Agnus Dei should be maintained "so that our diocese may continue to be unified in this posture;" but the bishop allows disunity in his diocese in the congregation's posture during the Eucharistic prayer. "I am asking each assembly to take a unified posture during the Eucharistic Prayer, whether it is kneeling or standing throughout," McGrath writes. "The posture would be determined by each parish and would be the normative posture for that parish." But the bishop returns to diocesan unity with the posture for receiving communion. "Standing is the normative posture during Communion," writes McGrath.


SO OPEN AND, GOSH, SO UNIVERSAL! The February 2004 edition of the Observer, the newspaper of the Monterey diocese, featured a piece by one Barbara Meister, "a member of Holy Cross parish since January, 1997 when my husband Tim and I moved to Santa Cruz." Mrs. Meister writes of her pleasant discovery of Holy Cross' various "outreach ministries." Her epiphany came "the very first Sunday I stepped in the door and opened the bulletin," wherein she "learned that there was a Sunday Potluck Dinner for Gay and Lesbian Catholics." Meister explained that Holy Cross' Gay and Lesbian Faith Community "gives gay and lesbian Catholics an opportunity for reconciliation, spiritual development and a place for community every 3rd Sunday of the month for prayer, fellowship and food." Meister said, reading of this "faith community," she thought to herself, "now here is a parish community that truly practices the meaning of the word 'Catholic'-- that is, to be 'universal' -- to be Church for everyone. I decided then that Holy Cross was my parish."

Meister shared that when she reflects "on the Gospel stories about this man named Jesus, who came to teach us how to live with one another," her "favorite image of him is as a man who hung out with the losers, the low-lifes, the rejects -- he hung out with the prostitutes, the lepers, the sinners. Jesus, a Jew, spoke to the Samaritan woman -- in violation of the cultural and gender boundaries of his time." Jesus, wrote Meister, "took risks and caused a lot of discomfort among people in power in that society."


RESULTS OF A SURVEY ASKING PRIESTS in Northern California whether they support an open discussion on priestly celibacy showed that a majority of respondents said they did. According to the February 23 Catholic Voice, the newspaper of the diocese of Oakland, the survey was conducted late last year in the dioceses of Fresno, Monterey, San Jose, Sacramento, Stockton, and in the archdiocese of San Francisco. It was released in early February this year. Of the 1,339 diocesan and religious priests who were mailed the survey, less than half, 458, responded. In Oakland diocese itself, 126 priests out of 301 responded; of these, 106 said they favored an open discussion of celibacy. The range in other dioceses went from 48 percent of priests respondents in Stockton diocese favoring an open discussion to 68 percent of respondents in San Francisco. The archdiocese also had the largest number of respondents opposing an open discussion.

The survey was carried out by Call to Action, which the Voice described as "a Catholic advocacy group that supports open discussion of the issue" of clerical celibacy. The Voice failed to note, however, that Call to Action also favors open discussion on a variety of other issues, including women's ordination, the democratization of the Church, the acceptance of homosexuality as a valid orientation, and a change in the Church's teaching on artificial contraception. According to the Voice, Call to Action plans to perform the same survey in as many U.S. dioceses as possible.


THE VOICE ARTICLE did note that "Pope John Paul II has repeatedly said that the discipline of mandatory celibacy will not be changed." The article also reported two interesting responses to the survey from Oakland priests. "The discussion should not be based on our needs and desires," wrote one priest, "but on who Jesus is! We are to conform ourselves to him. There are many ways of doing this, and celibacy is one such way of giving ourselves completely." The other priest wrote, "I have freely and lovingly chosen -- and continue to choose -- to be celibate." But, calling celibacy a "viable, authentic and deeply life-giving way of life," the priest said he supported dialogue on mandatory celibacy.


DURING A CEREMONY in which he received the credentials of the Mexican ambassador to the Holy See, Pope John Paul II addressed the subject of immigration and its causes. According to Zenit news, over the last three years, about 1.17 million Mexican nationals have inmigrated to the United States, with over 1,000 Mexicans crossing the border daily. The pope noted that immigrants leave their home country "in search of better conditions." "The painful and vast problem of poverty, with its grave consequences in the areas of the family, education, health and housing, is an urgent challenge for political leaders and authorities in public life," said John Paul. "Its eradication surely requires measures of a technical and political character, so designed that economic and productive activities take into account the common good and, very especially, the most depressed groups."

The pope insisted, however, that "it must not be forgotten that all these measures will be insufficient if they are not animated by genuine ethical values." The pope called for a "detecting and remedying, above all, of the causes that make so many citizens feel obliged to leave their land."


THE POPE NOTED that the government and the Church in host countries should pay special attention to immigrants. "To the uncertainty of those who leave in search of better conditions," said John Paul, "is added the problem of cultural uprootedness and the painful dispersion or distancing of the family, without forgetting the disastrous consequences of so many cases of clandestinity." The Church, said the pope, "reminds all that the measures developed in host countries" to deal with immigration "must be accompanied by determined attention to the country of origin, where emigration is managed." The immigrants' home country, he said, must also participate in aiding immigrants. "Mexicans residing abroad must not feel forgotten by the authorities of their country, who are called to facilitate assistance and services that will help them maintain contact with their land and their roots," said the pope.

John Paul encouraged "meetings between bishops of border dioceses of Mexico and the United States" in order to seek "joint measures to improve the situation of the emigrant population. Parishes and other Catholic institutions are the principal points of reference and identity that they find abroad."


GLOBALIZATION OFFERS both dangers and opportunities, said Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga of Honduras, but "injustice and inequality" have been its byproducts. According to the February 6 Catholic San Francisco, Cardinal Rodriguez addressed an assembly of 500 people at Stanford University in Palo Alto on January 26. According to Cardinal Rodriguez, countries that benefit from the removal of tariff and non-tariff protection barriers as well as from the eradication of restrictions on the flow of international investment are "manufacturing and reproducing exclusion." The major economic powers benefit from the globalized economy, while poor countries suffer. "The world is becoming globalized to the rhythm and in the way the major economic powers want," said the cardinal. In the past, Cardinal Rodriguez has vehemently condemned the foreign debt burden placed on Latin American countries, in particular. He has said, "It's necessary to remove the tombstone over many countries. When you look at the interest paid by these countries, there's even more injustice. How can we develop? We cannot. Our first exports are American currency, illegal immigrants and drugs."

Cardinal Rodriguez said the antidote to the problems faced in globalization is "solidarity in globalization." Every individual must promote the universal destination of all created things, prevent contamination of the natural environment, and rein in business corruption. "The economic crisis raises one basic question to the moral conscience: the way we face it will depend on whether or not our society will have much more solidarity in the coming years or become more selfish," said the cardinal.


LETTER WRITERS to subsequent issues of Catholic San Francisco took issue with Cardinal Rodriguez's speech. One, Mike DeNunzio, head of the Republican Party San Francisco, wrote that it's not globalization, but protectionism on the part of countries like the United States "that promote injustice and inequality." Protectionist measures that would prevent American businesses from "outsourcing" to other countries also lead to stagnation, wrote DeNunzio. Outsourcing, said DeNunzio, is "how the new global economy is improving the lives of billions of people throughout the world, including the U.S."

Yet, a 1991 study by the Center for Economic and Policy Research, The Scorecard on Globalization 1980-2000: Twenty Years of Diminished Progress, gives some support to Cardinal Rodriguez's contention that globalization has been bad for poor countries. The study compares major economic and social indicators for the years of globalization (1980-2000) with those for the two decades preceding globalization (1960-80). The study says that the poorest countries experienced a decline in economic growth rates in the globalization period, their per capita gross domestic product declining from 1.9 percent annually in 1960-80 to 0.5 percent annually in 1980-2000. What are called the "middle group" of countries also saw a sharp decline in annual per capita growth rate from 3.6 percent to less than one percent. "Over a 20-year period," said the study, this represents the difference between doubling income per person, versus increasing it by just 21 percent."

The poorest and "middle group" of countries also experienced a decline in life expectancy, in progress in reducing infant mortality, and in education and literacy, according to the study.

The study cautions that its findings only present "a very strong prima facie case that some structural and policy changes implemented during the last two decades are at least partly responsible for these declines. And there is certainly no evidence in these data that the policies associated with globalization have improved outcomes for most low to middle-income countries. To argue that this is the case, it would be necessary to show that outcomes would have been even worse in the era of globalization, if countries had not adopted these policies."


GAY LIFESTYLE, YES. GAY MARRIAGE, NO. A poll released by the Public Policy Institute of California on February 20 said that 62 percent of California voters polled accept the "gay lifestyle" as part of society, but less than half of those polled said they favored homosexual marriage. Still, while 51 percent of voters polled opposed, and 43 percent favored homosexual marriage, the number of those favoring it has risen six percentage points since 2000. The poll questioned 1,013 likely voters and had a plus or minus three percentage points sampling error.

Among religious voters polled, Catholics were the most likely to support homosexual marriage (64 percent), while Protestants split 46 percent for acceptance and 47 percent against.


CATHOLIC POLITICIANS, GIVE HEED. In receiving Argentina's new ambassador to the Holy See, Pope John Paul II said that lawmakers cannot support laws against marriage and life, according to a February 29 Zenit news report. "I think it is opportune to recall," said the pope, "that the lawmaker, and the Catholic lawmaker in particular, cannot contribute to formulate or approve laws contrary to the first and essential norms that regulate moral life." Such norms are an "expression of the highest values of the human person and proceed, ultimately, from God, supreme lawmaker." The pope insisted that "no one can claim for himself the power of violating" the right to life.


THE DIOCESE OF SAN JOSE released its report on sexual abuse of minors by priests over the weekend of February 14 and 15, said the February 16 San Francisco Chronicle. In the report, Bishop Patrick McGrath apologized "to all members of the Church and the wider community for this reprehensible breach of trust," and said that he and the diocese "renew our pledge to care for victims and survivors and to do all in our power to ensure that no one ever again suffers the tragedy of sexual abuse or misconduct by any of the priests, deacons or other employees of the Diocese of San Jose." Five priests, according to the diocesan report, have had "credible allegations" of sexual abuse of minors leveled against them; of these five, one is dead, and the remaining four have been removed permanently from ministry.


QUANTIFYING SEXUAL ABUSE of minors by Protestant ministers is quite difficult, said a February 23 Associated Press report. According to Michael Smith, a Lutheran corporate attorney who collects data on abuse by Protestant ministers on the website, www.reformation.com, the fact that abuse by Protestant ministers is scattered among many denominations makes it harder to quantify. Many cases are not reported at denominational headquarters, and many congregations are self-governing and so report to no one higher than their own elders or trustees. Since, according to Smith, many cases of Protestant abuse cases never reach court, the media pay little attention to them. And, according to James Cobble, Jr., who advises churches on legal and tax issues, many cases don't reach court because small Protestant congregations do not have insurance coverage and deep pockets, like Catholic dioceses. These facts, according to Cobble, mean that Protestant abuse cases are "dramatically" underreported. Smith thinks Protestants and Catholics differ little in the percentage of abusing clergy and in the tendency to deny the occurrence abuse.

One difference between abuse by Protestants and Catholics, however, is the sex of the victims. According to Donna Scott, a Protestant specialist with a website (www.advocateweb.org) which aids abuse victims, anecdotal evidence says that the majority of victims of sexual abuse by Protestant ministers are female. Most victims of Catholic clergy, however, have been male.


A FEDERAL JUDGE in Sacramento issued a permanent injunction against the California state legislature issuing automobile license plates promoting issues of private non-profits. The suit which led to this ruling was brought before U.S. district court judge Garland Burrell, Jr. by the Women's Resource Network, a non-profit that promotes adoption over abortion. Women's Resource Network had wanted the California assembly to issue a license plate with the message "Choose Life"; but last April, the assembly refused to pass a law allowing the making of such a plate. Judge Burrell ruled that the section of state law giving the legislature the discretion to decide which non-profits would benefit from bills authorizing license plates violates the First Amendment of the United States constitution, since the law lays down no standard by which the judgment would be made.

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