Inside
NCR The
joy of interacting, interacting ...
Let's get interactive, I suggested
some weeks ago. Like all words said in haste, these leave grounds for regret --
correspondence piling up -- but also grounds for forging ahead. I sort of
solicited homilies and, oh, do we have homilies. Coming soon.
And, many months before, Tom Fox solicited responses to the
lineamenta for the special Synod on the Americas. If you don't even know what
that means -- and I'm not so sure myself -- then you are not one of those who
wrote. We'll get to them eventually.
It is, alas, impossible to respond to everyone who "interacts"
here. But be assured we are happy to hear from you and weigh every suggestion,
including silly ones.
Word about problems at the
Gaithersburg, Md., Mother of God Catholic covenant community started trickling
into NCR's Washington bureau almost two years ago.
There was a "buddy report" form by which members profiled
newcomers so the leadership could track them. Sample questions: "data on
healings needed; sin areas; angers/resentments/bitterness/lack of forgiveness;
sexuality; lying/deceit" or "old idea (refuses to part with)."
As the story (Communities falter under heavy hands) suggests, the
single greatest cause for "angers" etc. seems to have been the Mother of God
leadership.
It is a tawdry tale. NCR, despite occasional bad press to
the contrary, works mightily to publish stories of hope, high achievement and
good cheer -- such as our recent stories of exemplary parishes -- but it is
part of our mission as independent Catholic journalists to tell as many sides
of the overall big story as we can, including the down side.
During the past 20 months, as NCR editor-at-large Arthur
Jones periodically met with members and former members of the Mother of God
community, their fear of reprisals, law suits and victimization of family
members still loyal to the old leadership was palpable, he said. Many meetings
had to be secret.
The article raises further questions. As lay leadership becomes
the norm in many aspects of Catholic life, what are the expectations, the
guidelines, we should look to? The discipline the church hierarchy has been
able to impose on its own clerical class for many centuries is not as easily
imposed on laity. The extent to which this pope supports lay groups apparently
prone to secretive behavior patterns raises further concerns.
A reader from Illinois wrote with a
"brilliant" idea. Since NCR articles so frequently mention public people
who deserve praise or castigation, this letter suggested, we should publish
their addresses so that people could interact with friend and foe.
We did this for a while some years ago. We found some problems.
Such as how to guess whose address people might want in the first place. There
are of course the obvious ones -- the Illinois reader mentioned the pope and
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger -- but we got tired repeating these (they can both be
reached by writing to Vatican City -- every post office on earth knows where
that is).
After that I recommend the internationally acclaimed Jean Blake
solution -- go to the library. Assistant to the editor Blake knows that
libraries have books such as the National Catholic Directory and the Annuario
Pontificio, the Vatican yearbook. Better still, if you call the local chancery
and casually mention the Annuario, they'll think you're a clergyperson and look
it up for you.
Indeed, the folks our readers seem most often eager to contact are
writers of letters to "Repartee." We forward those when we can. Neither the
pope nor Cardinal Ratzinger has yet written to "Repartee."
-- Michael Farrell
National Catholic Reporter, April 18,
1997
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