Column Church labors under heavy hierarchy
By TIM UNSWORTH
A few weeks ago, I spent an
afternoon watching the funeral Mass of the late Cardinal John OConnor,
colorful archbishop of New York since 1984. He was a hard-working, decent
churchman with strong pastoral skills, especially in his declining years. He
was also a favorite of John Paul II and thus enjoyed more papal clout than any
man since Cardinal Francis Spellman, who ruled New York -- and the American
church -- from 1939 until 1967.
OConnor had a fierce loyalty to John Paul, defending him on
every issue. Most important, the former chief of chaplains of the U.S. Navy had
an immense influence on the political and theological drift of the American
church because of his membership on the papal congregation for the appointment
of bishops -- a post he took very seriously, often traveling to the Vatican to
take part in the monthly cattle call. With at least 70 percent of the U.S.
bishops appointed during John Pauls tenure, OConnors
interventions may have changed the complexion of the American hierarchy.
It is ironic that OConnors own successor, Edward M.
Egan of Bridgeport, Conn., was probably not one of his suggestions.
OConnor wanted a New Yorker -- one of his own -- someone who was not an
office priest.
Egan was thrust upon him in 1985 as an auxiliary. They had a
correct but strained relationship until Egan went to Bridgeport in 1988. A
native of Chicago from a lace curtain Irish family, which likely had fruit in
the house even when no one was sick, Egan was on the episcopal track since his
high school seminary days. He is a talented careerist with limited pastoral
experience and administrative instincts more typical of Chicagos George
Mundelein (1915-1939) or New Yorks Spellman.
Egan will face the Vatican, not St. Patricks Cathedral. The
lambs are being slaughtered for his pallium, and the silk is being watered for
his red soutane. He will be New Yorks eighth cardinal since the United
States got its first one -- John McCloskey -- in 1875.
I couldnt watch OConnors final services without
comparing them with those of Chicagos Joseph L. Bernardin who went to his
grave in 1996. His final liturgy, carefully designed by him during his final
illness, was a clear reflection of what he hoped would become the new church,
replete with laity. Six women served as his pallbearers. There was a homily by
a priest friend -- not a fellow cardinal. A sign in a fast food restaurant
across the street from Holy Name Cathedral read: Goodbye, Brother
Joseph.
OConnors funeral service recalled the triumphalist
liturgies of an earlier time when clergy dominated every aspect. It had
dignity, reverence and style, and a tone so serious that it could have used a
John OConnor to inject some life into it. Every aspect was carefully
calibrated by clerical thinking reminiscent of another time. Ecclesiastical
protocols moved the higher clergy far into the sanctuary -- acres from the
laity they had pledged to serve. Monsignors with cadaver faces served as altar
boys while carefully groomed seminarians in full cassocks and long surplices
crisscrossed the sanctuary on one mission or another.
Bernardins funeral was a plea for change, a call for
recognition of the laity in virtually every aspect of the church.
OConnors service reminded me of a revisionist church. It was a
statement that the clergy viewed itself as unapologetically still in charge and
that they would cling to power until the last bishop ruled from a pile of
rusted crosiers over a church that could readily fit into the cardinals
private chapel.
The invasive TV cameras played on the cracked faces and the
grandmothers jaws of the hundreds of aged prelates -- all garbed in
identical chasubles designed for an earlier papal visit. They looked like good
men who, if not called to the priesthood, might have been respected neighbors,
men who mowed their lawns and wrapped their garbage. These are men to whom you
would readily give your house keys so that they could feed the cat while you
took your kids to the shore. They were described in one paper as loyal
and good soldiers in the army of Christ. But they are men locked into a
system better suited to another time. Their episcopal ancestors had once
condemned the locomotive as an instrument of the devil and chocolate as an evil
food because it was said to be an aphrodisiac nearly as potent as Viagra.
However, they are also men who built nearly as many churches as there are
McDonalds franchises, one of the best school systems in the world, and a
network of social services that still outshines most federal or state agencies.
Its just that you wouldnt tell them that you practiced birth
control, that your brother was gay or that your sister married a resigned
priest. (It likely wouldnt be too smart to tell them that youre a
Democrat.)
Now, the poor bishops struggle with leaky roofs and sagging walls.
Their seminarians barely fill a bicycle to drive to their ordinations. They
labor in vain to contain the Catholics that the church educated so well that
they are now talking back or simply walking away. They have created the largest
denomination in the United States as well as the second largest -- lapsed
Catholics. Most of the bishops would be happy to have one-third of their people
in church on Sunday but most get only about 25 percent and some are as low as
13 percent. Yet, they can fill a cathedral sanctuary for a funeral and return
home thinking that the faithful are in procession behind them.
Whatever made me think that they would share the power they claim
to have inherited from Peter? Whatever made me imagine that someday women would
be buried in the crypt under the sanctuary? Whatever made me think that they
would tell the Vatican bureaucrats that Ex Corde Ecclesiae was little
more than an echo of the century-old statement against Modernism that nearly
destroyed a fledgling intellectual American church? Whatever made me think that
theology professors would be encouraged to search for even richer truths that
continue to evolve and that they would report back to their encouraging
bishops? What made me think that they would stand up to Rome on the language
issue? What made me think that the last priest in America would be a parish
priest?
Instead, the bishops continue to send a clear message: We are in
charge and we will be in charge until the last Catholic closes the door of his
or her local cathedral.
Shortly, Edward Egan and perhaps a few dozen others will be
cardinals. (Its hard to keep count of cardinals. At the last annual count
49 of the 154 cardinals were ineligible to vote because they had completed
their 80th year. Conceivably, John Paul could appoint at least 15 to bring the
eligible roster up to 120, the present full voting house.)
While most bishops are measurably older than their parish priests,
it will take several more generations of bishops before their complexion
changes. In a dozen years following the death of John Paul II, many of his
appointments will be resting under marble. However, their political and
theological heritage will change but slowly. By the time it does, the distance
between shepherd and sheep will be all but unbridgeable. The mournful bishops
at OConnors funeral will have a church that is utterly removed from
the people of God.
The episcopacy has steadfastly refused to face the truth their own
research has taught them. Instead of sharing power with their faithful, they
still cling to the concept of power over them.
Im place-dropping now, but I am writing all this at a lovely
city called St. Jean de Luz, a resort of about 13,000 people at the foot of the
Pyrenees Mountains in the Basque country of Southwest France. My wife, Jean,
and I are on one of those tours designed for people of a certain age.
The Basques go to Mass; there are few other faiths. The
16th-century Basque church where Louis XIV married Marie Therese of Austria in
1660 was crowded with people who filled the church with song. Alas, it is not
that way elsewhere in France, where Mass attendance can run as low as 3
percent. But the country, which is about the size of Texas, has 94 dioceses,
presided over by five cardinals and 172 bishops. The higher church labors under
the immense weight of accumulated power. The structure remains in place for a
church that has more parishes than priests. Now the United States is drifting
toward a French model -- one that cannot distinguish between maintenance and
mission.
John OConnor was laid to rest in a manner that befitted his
style. He had worked as hard as any priest for a church that is still stuck in
rigidity, rubricism and fear of the laity. Now, the bishops must put aside fear
of the future, fear of change. Now, they must listen, listen to events outside,
listen to the sounds of the times and the needs of Gods people. But
Im terrified they wont.
Tim Unsworth writes from Chicago. You can reach him at
unsworth@megsinet.net
National Catholic Reporter, July 14,
2000
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