Cardinal George: "is it Catholic?"

David Gibson muses at Politics Daily about the recent decision of USCCB head Cardinal George's setting up of committees to determine if voices in education, media and lay groups represent Catholicism. In doing so he sets up the Bishops to be the arbiters of "all things Catholic."

In my opinion, this is something that needs to be done because, simply put, any moron can have a blog (including this moron!) and that doesn't make the moron a Catholic moron. Many people from different facets of the Catholic spectrum indeed attempt to speak with a Catholic voice but really fail miserably at representing themselves as legitimate voices. This includes not only those who would say that they support abortion rights for women but also those who would support, say capital punishment in clearly unjustifiable situations.

So why the sudden hankering from Cardinal George on the need for the watchdog group? David Gibson has some ideas:

Church officials said George's decision to establish the certifying committees reflected his frustration with the many differing Catholic voices and organizations that sprouted up during last year's presidential campaign and claimed to be representing Catholic positions, some of them in support of Barack Obama.

Many of the most prominent bishops were vocal opponents of Obama, who nonetheless won 53 percent of the key Catholic vote despite espousing pro-choice positions on abortion, which is the overriding issue for the bishops. And many of those outspoken bishops -- perhaps still a minority of the entire hierarchy, but an influential one with close ties to Rome -- were also incensed at the University of Notre Dame for inviting Obama to give its commencement address last May. The anger over that invitation, which was issued despite the opposition of the local bishop, John D'Arcy, and the rifts it exposed among the bishops and lay Catholics, still bother George, church officials said. Hence his effort to establish clear parameters on who speaks for the church and what it means to be Catholic.

But several bishops and church officials I spoke with doubted whether George's desire to implement the certifying committees would gain any traction among the bishops. For one thing, beneath the surface of civility, the bishops are as divided on many of these issues as the rest of the American church.

In addition, George played it so close to the vest in setting up the committees -- he launched the initiative over the summer -- that up until the first day of these meetings many bishops didn't know who was on the committees or how many there were. There are, it turns out, three such committees: on Catholic universities, Catholic media, and other Catholic organizations, reportedly those involved in lobbying.

I wonder if the question is really nt "Is this Catholic?" but rather "Is this Catholic ENOUGH?" and that will lead to all kinds of divisions that indeed, may need to be hashed out in some kind of forum.

Ordinarily I would agree with Gibson in that I would have doubts about how much traction this might have. But in a world where there are far too many sources, especially for unchurched seekers and the theologically uninformed, discerning truth from suggestion is indeed difficult. Is this site a Catholic one indeed is an interesting question worth looking at.

However, there's a huge issue that goes far beyond the simplicity of legitimate Catholic source material. That issue is simply media literacy. After all, there are news programs on radio but then there are opinion programs. When I was in radio for years I noticed that there was almost no discernable difference between how listeners viewed journalistic types of programs with the more opinion based meanderings of a Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, John Stewart or Keith Olbermann. The same is true in catholic circles. There's a huge difference between magazines like America or First Things, which serves to raise the level of debate and interesting conversation and catechetical resources that proclaim church teaching definitively. Those are resources that need some review as well. New Advent for example claims that the 1917 Catholic Encyclopedia is the definitive source that all Catholics should use, and it's the one most used by people online. Will the Bishops' committee talk about those differences? Or will they simply focus on external debates in the blogosphere which they clearly have no chance of curtailing. The internet will continue to have opinion blogs with or without the blessing of the hierarchy and they will continue to entertain and inform.

But they don't necessarily teach. That indeed may be where the Bishops might want to regain some control.


Well at least we know one thing: My book Googling God will make the cut. After all, Cardinal George is holding it here with me.

Mandatory Reading for Anyone Who Does Ministry With Millennial Catholics: Young Catholics Are Not TALIBAN CATHOLICS

Amen, Amen I say unto you, John Allen of NCR. As usual, he gets the actual story accurately. I'm taking partial credit for this article because this is EXACTLY what my book Googling God says and John served on the board at BustedHalo®. So I assume my influence and the appropriate back slapping has ensued.

I reflected on the next generation of Catholic leaders. Most empirical data has pegged this cohort of young priests, religious and lay activists as more "conservative," and there's a good deal of truth to that claim. In general, they're more attracted to traditional modes of devotion and prayer, less resistant to ecclesiastical authority, and less inclined to challenge church teaching and discipline.

Yet, I argued, slapping the label "conservative" on all this is potentially misleading, because it assumes an ideological frame of reference, as if younger Catholics are picking one side or the other in the church's version of the culture wars. My sense is that these young people are not so much reacting to (or against) anything in the church, but rather secular culture. In a nutshell, they're seeking identity and stability in a world that seems to offer neither.

Proof of the point comes when you drill with these young Catholics. You'll find they often hold views on a wide variety of issues -- such as the environment, war and peace, the defense of the poor and of immigrants, and the death penalty -- which don't really fit the ideological stereotype.

These observations are hardly unique to me, of course, but I included them because I wanted to issue a plea to Catholics my age and older.

This new generation seems ideally positioned to address the lamentable tendency in American Catholic life to drive a wedge between the church's pro-life message and its peace-and-justice commitments. More generally, they can help us find the sane middle between two extremes: What George Weigel correctly calls "Catholicism lite," meaning a form of the faith sold out to secularism; and what I've termed "Taliban Catholicism," meaning an angry expression of Catholicism that knows only how to excoriate and condemn. Both are real dangers, and the next generation seems well-equipped to steer a middle course, embracing a robust sense of Catholic identity without carrying a chip on their shoulder.

That's assuming, however, that the best and brightest of today's young Catholics aren't prematurely sucked into the older generation's debates -- either by liberals who fear and resent them, or by conservatives eager to enroll them as foot soldiers in their private crusades.

Read the rest here and a further comment from me....

Many people in the younger generation might fall prey to being "co-opted" into one camp or the other when those stuck in the camps of the left or the right take advantage of those who don't have a strong sense of self. What ends up developing is a reliance on a "trusted source" that leads them into an "unthinking piety" on the right or an "action over prayer/ritual mentality" on the left. What really ends up happening to those in the middle who feel forced to choose one side or the other is frustration with older people's baggage and issues.

And what the result is...

They choose nothing. No religion, just an informal spirituality. They become "spiritual but not religious" but long for what could be.

Today let us pray that we have the courage to accept young people where they are and move them into love. Love for the church, love for others, love for Jesus and the love that Jesus had for all. They want to be inspired. But they often are not.

Thanks to John Allen and NCR for an excellent article.

Googling God

Exactly...



H/t to Deacon Greg