More On The Vatican and American Nuns

Amy Davidson:

What have the nuns done that is so bad? The Assessment mentioned public statements “that disagree with or challenge positions taken by the Bishops.” The health-care debate might be an example. Sister Carol Keehan, the head of the Catholic Health Association and its six hundred hospitals—she received the L.C.W.R.’s Outstanding Leadership Award last year—had endorsed the Affordable Care Act when it was before Congress; President Obama gave her one of the pens he used to sign it. However, when rules requiring Catholic hospitals and universities to get their employees insurance that covered contraception were issued, this winter, Keehan, like the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, objected strongly. The divergence came when the Administration offered a compromise. Sister Carol said that it worked for her. The bishops disagreed. Cardinal Dolan, of New York, told reporters that Sister Carol had “disappointed” him. What is striking, though, is the absence of a smoking gun in the Congregation of the Defense of the Faith’s findings on matters of faith, other than faith in bishops (which is presented as one of the Church’s doctrines). What seemed to bother the Vatican’s investigators was not that nuns were speaking out on political matters, but that they were failing to engage politically in the way the Church wanted them to: the L.C.W.R. had been silent on the right to life from conception to natural death, a question that is part of the lively public debate about abortion and euthanasia in the United States. Further, issues of crucial importance to the life of Church and society, such as the Church’s Biblical view of family life and human sexuality, are not part of the LCWR agenda in a way that promotes Church teaching. The Congregation also noted the absence of initiatives by the LCWR aimed at promoting the reception of the Church’s teaching, especially on difficult issues such as Pope John Paul II’s Apostolic Letter Ordinatio sacerdotalis and Church teaching about homosexuality. In other words, instead of just talking about “social justice,” the nuns should be out on the barricades, agitating against abortion and gay marriage. And, again, they need to listen to the bishops.

This will not forestall the decline of the Church in the United States, and may speed the process. Taking on the nuns is terrible optics.  As if the bishops don't already look terribly sexist, they have to blast the nuns, who are most likely the most popular part of the Church.  I don't think I am the only person in the pews who is tiring of the bishops' forceful forays into politics.  It would help if they hadn't hidden abuse by priests for years, but their credibility is rapidly deteriorating as they seem to be telling the faithful they can only vote Republican.  Worse yet is their leading position in fighting against gay marriage wherever it is considered.  The Church needs not get involved in that argument, because they won't be required to perform or recognize gay marriages, but the bishops can't help but stir up trouble.  The next ten years are going to be brutal for the Church, as demographics and finances turn against them.  And the bishops are making themselves no friends.