Many deacons have valuable professional, managerial and entrepreneurial expertise that could revitalize parochial education. If they were given additional powers to perform sacraments and run parishes, a married priesthood would become a fait accompli. Celibacy should be a sacrifice offered freely, not an excuse for institutional suicide.
It will be difficult, if not impossible, for the superiors of the Legion to overturn these guidelines. But not to impede them. And in the absence of rapid steps forward in the journey of renewal, other priests will leave, not "hotheads" as their superiors say, but some of the best, in addition to those who have already left and been incardinated into the diocesan clergy. The new vocations will disappear, and are already drying up more or less everywhere, for example in Italy, where only one novice entered this year.
Given this situation, if there is the intention to bring trust and courage to the healthy portion of the Legion of Christ, only one urgent signal of transformation can be given: the removal of those leaders, at least the highest ranking, all of whom owe their power to the man who both founded and capsized it. And they still continue to keep it in prison.
It is likely that the Vatican authorities will put the Legion under the command of an external commissioner endowed with full powers.
And he will have to be obeyed by the current heads of the congregation, who are the real obstacle to any movement toward renewal, no matter how slight.
But this leadership group is anything but resigned to giving way.
Freed from the annoyance of the visitors, and not yet subjected to the command of the commissioner, during this interim period which they are hoping will last for "several months" they are doing everything they can to consolidate their power and win the support of the majority of the 800 priests of the Legion, and of the other religious and lay members.
According to some of the testimonies given to the apostolic visitors in recent months, some in this group knew about the founder's double life, about the carnal acts he performed with many of his seminarians over the span of decades, about his lovers, his children, his drug use. But in spite of that, a fortress was built around Maciel in defense of his virtues, devotion to him was fostered among his followers, all of them unaware of the truth, his talents were emphasized, even among the upper hierarchy of the Church. This exaltation of the figure of the founder was so effective that even today it inspires the sense of belonging to the Legion among many of its priests and religious.
Both are Mexican, like most of the upper echelon of the Legionaries. The second most privileged nationality is Spanish.
The Italians, on the other hand, have always been kept away from the important posts. They are seen as less trustworthy, in addition to having too many connections in the Vatican curia, where the Legionaries have friends but also enemies, and more of them enemies now.
The apostolic visit began on July 15, 2009. And the five bishop visitors fulfilled their mandate halfway through this month of March, with the delivery of their report to the Vatican authorities. They were Ricardo Watti Urquidi, bishop of Tepic in Mexico; Charles J. Chaput, archbishop of Denver; Giuseppe Versaldi, bishop of Alessandria; Ricardo Ezzato Andrello, archbishop of Concepción in Chile; and Ricardo Blázquez Pérez, bishop of Bilbao.
It will be the Vatican authorities who decide what to do. The three cardinals charged with the case are Tarcisio Bertone, secretary of state, William J. Levada, prefect of the congregation for the doctrine of the faith, and Franc Rodé, prefect of the congregation for institutes of consecrated life.
But the last word will belong to Benedict XVI, the most prescient of all. Even before he was elected pope and when Maciel still had very powerful protectors in the Vatican, Joseph Ratzinger ordered an extensive investigation of the accusations against the founder of the Legionaries. And as pope, on May 19, 2006, he sentenced him to "a retired life of prayer and penance."
[...]
But that the current leaders of the Legionaries should be left at the head of the congregation is entirely unlikely. The more probable decision is that the Holy See will appoint a fully empowered commissioner of its own, and will set the guidelines for a thorough reform, including the replacement of the current leaders.
But rebuilding from the ground up a congregation still deeply influenced by its disgraced founder will be an arduous enterprise. [Magister then describes the insidious influence of Father Maciel.]
Over the eight months of the apostolic visit, this control was relaxed only in part. Some priests told the visitors about the things they believed were wrong. Others have left the congregation and been incardinated into the diocesan clergy. Others have continued to defend Maciel's legacy. Others feel lost. Still others, finally, have faith in the rebuilding on new foundations of a religious congregation that is part of their lives and that they continue to love.
At the moment when a Catholic priest retires, the church only has responsibility towards him.
But what if the priest was married, has a wife and family?
Where would they go if they had to vacate their parochial home? What would they live on? What would happen to clerical widows or, even more distressingly, orphaned children?
Secondly, how could the Catholic Church maintain its stance on clerical celibacy?
It cannot argue logically that it is permissible for married Anglican clergy to convert to full communion with the Catholic Church and yet deny Catholic clergy the right to marriage.
A friend of mine, a former Anglican actually, brought up an issue that I hadn’t thought about with respect to the new Anglican rite: contraception. In 1930, the Lambeth Conference declared that contraception was not always immoral, and could be used (for serious reason) to regulate the number of children that a married couple had. That declaration prompted a negative response from the Roman Catholic Church–the encyclical Casti Connubii, which declared that the use of contraception was never morally permissible. As most people know, that stance was reaffirmed by Humanae Vitae.
Now, the Roman Catholic Church teaches that the prohibition against contraception is not a matter of “rite” or religious practice–it is a matter of natural law, binding not only upon Catholics, but upon all persons. So Anglicans who join the Catholic Church will be expected to conform to the prohibition There is no such thing as a dispensation from the strictures of negative moral absolutes. It’s true, of course, that many Roman Catholics make their own decisions about this matter, and come to their own private peace with God in the “internal forum” of their conscience. But the new influx of Anglicans will include people who will not be able to come to a purely private peace–the married members of the clergy, who will be required to follow Humanae Vitae no less than other married persons.
As far as I am aware, however, the morality of contraception under certain circumstances has been more or less a settled issue among Anglicans–even traditionally minded Anglicans. How will this change work out?
JH: Bishops in the new Anglican structure will be unmarried. This is out of respect for the tradition of Eastern and Western Christianity. But priests who come from Anglicanism will be able to serve as priests in the new structure, whether married or not, after satisfying certain requirements. The truly radical element is that married men will be able to be ordained priests in the Anglican structure indefinitely into the future. It is anticipated that Anglican bishops who are married when they joined the new structure will still be able to serve as priestly ordinaries, exercising some of the responsibilities of bishops.
A source in Rome tells me that the African bishops have been watching the Anglican developments with interest, in some cases with amazement. Even though England, Wales and the US have been quietly receiving married former Anglican priests to work as Catholic priests for decades, it seems that until this new Apostolic Constitution with its juridical implications was announced, the African bishops had no idea this had been going on.
Now that it is to get canonical standing, some of these bishops are asking, understandably, 'If they can, why can't we......?'
Maybe those who are suggesting the Anglican annexe about to be built onto Rome may be better described as a Trojan horse are on to something. Even the superbly-informed Francis Rocca is writing about the new light this throws on the celibacy issue, so you never know.
American Papist has an open letter by Dr. Germain Grisez to the Legionaries and Regnum Christi. Dr. Grisez suggests that the LC/RC dissolve the current "juridical person" and seek the formation of a new institution.
Is it really just a problem with Maciel? Or is Grisez right that the corruption runs into the operations of LC/RC?
After considering Grisez's article posted by Thales concerning the situation of the LCs, I saw parallels to the situation at Ave Maria. Namely, here was Maciel who it is beyond contention had power to distribute and a society of people under religious vows to obedience and non disparagement of him. It really is the religious equivalent of what Monaghan appears to demand from his henchmen. After all, if you so much as question Monaghan, the people around you accuse you of sin.
From the local paper... My comments in italics and red in some places.
Nice guy, good priest.
Here bedragons!a lot of the usual numbers detailing a decline in priests...
Not my parish, thank God.
Okay, this post is a /little/ mistitled as Mr. Daniel does a fairly good job of keeping it balanced by having some decent quotes from the vocations director and Fr. Belger. Might have been a better article if the reporter had mentioned the return of the Mass of Blessed John XXIII/St. Pius V/St. Gregory the Great/etc. to the area, but we can live without it.
But there are many of these. Some, although not very well known, are astonishing.
One of these, for example, is the Institute of the Incarnate Word.
Founded by Fr. Carlos Miguel Buela in 1984 in Argentina, in the city of San Rafael in the province of Mendoza, after just a quarter century it counts today, in its men's branch, 302 priests, 21 deacons, 195 seminarians studying philosophy and theology, 51 novices, and 95 students in the minor seminary.
Its generalate house and its center of formation are in Segni, 40 miles east of Rome, in the empty buildings of the diocesan seminary. The bishop of Segni, with the approval of the Holy See, recognized it in 2004 as an institute of diocesan right. But it is also present in 32 countries, including Ethiopia, Sudan, Egypt, Jordan, China, Tajikistan, and Greenland.
Its women's branch, named the Servants of the Lord and of the Virgin of Matarà, counts 226 religious under perpetual vows, 251 under temporary vows, and as many novices and postulants. It is headed by a young Dutch sister, Maria de Anima Christi Van Eijk, and is present in 22 countries. A Dutch bishop is also a close friend of the institute, Johannes Baptist Gjisen, who is now in Iceland as head of the diocese of Reykjavik.
Furthermore, there is a burgeoning third order composed of laypeople, under vows and not, with various degrees of membership.
[...]
t's spirituality is founded upon the Incarnation of the Word, and is expressed in both a strong missionary impulse and in the "evangelization of culture."
The central feature of formation in the institute is the teaching of Saint Thomas Aquinas, mediated by one of the greatest Thomist philosophers of the 20th century, Fr. Cornelio Fabro.
[...]
The number of members, predominantly women, some engaged only in constant prayer, others working as teachers, health workers and missionaries, fell 94,790 to 945,210.
Of the total, 753,400 members were women, while 191,810 were men, including 136,171 priests and 532 permanent deacons.
The figures were published next to a report of Pope Benedict XVI's meeting with nuns, monks and priests from many countries gathered in St Peter's Basilica in Rome last weekend.
The BBC's David Willey in the Italian capital says the accelerating downward trend must have caused concern to the Pope.
The Roman Catholic Church has an aging and diminishing number of parish and diocesan clergy and this latest fall is quite dramatic, our correspondent says.
The number of Catholic nuns worldwide declined by about a quarter during the reign of Pope John Paul, and this further drop shows that new recruits are failing to replace those nuns who die, or decide to abandon their vows, he adds.
