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Thursday, October 15, 2015

Gay Priest Latest, Synod NewSpeak? & Fr. Lombardi Responds

Gay Priest Latest, Synod Newspeak? & Fr. Lombardi Responds

Gay priest fired by the Vatican says the Church should stop ‘destroying our lives’

ROME — A gay priest fired by the Vatican for coming out publicly on the eve of the Oct. 4-25 Synod of Bishops on the family has insisted that Catholicism should change its approach to gays and lesbians, saying the Church “cannot continue destroying our lives.”
“We gays, lesbians, and transsexuals were not created defective,” he said.


Polish Monsignor Krzysztof Charamsa, 43, also denied on Tuesday that he has received financial support for his decision to go public, saying “so far I haven’t received anything from anyone, not even a single Euro.”
Charamsa made the comments Tuesday night in an interview with the Italian television network Retequattro.
Until recently, Charamsa had been a minor official within the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican’s powerful doctrinal watchdog agency. His primary role had been to arrange logistics for meetings of the International Theological Commission, a panel of Catholic theologians who advise the Vatican.

The day before the Synod of Bishops opened, where the question of the Church’s approach to gays and lesbians was expected to a major topic of discussion, Charamsa scheduled a press conference in front of the doctrinal congregation to announce that he is in a long-term relationship with a partner from the Catalonia region of Spain named Eduardo Planas.
In the end, however, Charamsa and Planas spoke to reporters in another location. Soon afterward, a Vatican spokesman said that Charamsa could no longer continue in his Vatican position, calling his apparent attempt to influence the synod’s discussions “very serious and irresponsible.”
Homosexuality has been a recurrent theme in the synod, with many participants expressing a desire for a more “inclusive” language, while others insisting it’s important for the Church not to weaken its doctrine.

In the wake of Charamsa’s announcement, some Italian media outlets speculated that he had been paid to come out on the eve of the synod. In his interview with the Italian TV program, however, Charamsa, denied those assertions.
“I heard horrible descriptions and accusations, as if I received money or material goods,” he said, speaking from Barcelona where he’s now living with Planas, to whom he’s engaged. (Spain has permitted gay marriage since 2005).
In fact, Charamsa said, “I’ve lost my job and I’ve not received anything. In the last few hours before deciding what to say to my Church, I found a few Christian friends who gave me a roof over my head.”
“I have no lobby behind me,” he said.


Charamsa told the program he felt compelled to conceal his sexual orientation for virtually his entire career.
“I had to hide being homosexual not only in the Vatican, but for my entire ecclesiastical life: during studies in the seminary, during my work in the university, in my parish, in every ecclesiastical setting,” he said.
“To be gay in that period was something ugly, horrible, which had to be refused, eliminated, and destroyed, even if it was part of you,” Charamsa said.
As a young man, he said, he prayed that God would take away a sexual impulse he was taught to see as “demonic.”
Now, Charamsa said, there’s no going back.
“A year from now, I see myself free, happy, out of the closet, and serving the same ideals and the same values for which I became a priest,” he said.
An Italian prelate invited to join the program, Bishop Giovanni D’Ercole of Ascoli Piceno, a former official of the Vatican press office and later the Secretariat of State, said that he “prays” for Charamsa, but that coming out on the eve of the synod was “the wrong moment.”
D’Ercole also said that while the Church disapproves of gay acts, it has “great compassion” for gay people.

Australian archbishop: Synod must change church’s language, actions


The ongoing worldwide meeting of Catholic bishops on family is being called to explore the “vast middle ground” between never-changing church teaching and committing iconoclasm, an Australian archbishop who leads one of the meetings’ English-language groups has said.

Archbishop Mark Coleridge said that while there are many opinions among prelates at the Oct. 4-25 Synod of Bishops, one impression that has emerged is that some believe the choice facing the gathering is either to “abandon church teaching” or commit to a “bubble of immutability.”

“Between those two extremes … there is in fact a vast territory … to be explored,” said Coleridge, who heads the eastern Australia archdiocese of Brisbane.

“That's what the synod should be about,” said the archbishop. “The words and exercise of pastoral activity -- saying, 'OK, we don't go to one extreme and say we're going to chuck church teaching out the window or the other extreme and say we're going to do nothing.'”


“I think we have to explore all kinds of possibilities in that vast middle ground, where I think the Spirit is moving and calling us to be,” he said.


Coleridge, who also has been serving as the relator, or secretary, of one of the four English language working groups at the synod, was speaking Monday in an NCR interview. During the encounter, which lasted some 45 minutes, the archbishop touched upon an incredible number of themes.


The Australian gave his thoughts on how the synod relates to the Second Vatican Council, defended its organizers as having good intent in their work, called for the church to use more inclusive language towards gay people, said the church must propose a “less negative” reading of reality, and spoke of how bishops should be “unafraid of the future.”


In order to present Coleridge’s thoughts in their entirety, NCR is printing the full interview in two parts Tuesday and Wednesday.

In this first part, Coleridge begins by speaking of the similarities between the synod and Vatican II. The archbishop says this synod is “probably more directly and deeply related to Vatican II than any other synod I've known.”

Coleridge also comments at length on the Instrumentum Laboris, the working document for the synod, and says he does not subscribe to “theories of conspiracy and manipulation” about the organization of the gathering.

Above all, he calls for the church to renew its language -- saying that even words like indissolubility need refreshing.

“I think our language has to become more biblical,” states Coleridge.

“I'll give you a case in point that's come up today in a number of groups,” he continues. “The word that we cling to: Indissolubility.”

“First of all, it's canonical,” states the archbishop. “Secondly, it's negative in its form -- in-dissolubility.”

“Can we speak about what we mean when we use the word indissolubility in a way that is not canonical and is not negative in form?” he asks. “I think we can.”

Following is the first part of the interview with Coleridge, edited only lightly for context.

NCR: You have compared the synod to Vatican II, saying that Vatican II was a language event.

Coleridge: I think that's fundamentally important. I didn't expect to be elected to this synod. But when I was elected, I was very pleased to be part of it. But I was immediately conscious of the need to prepare, because one of the things I've learned in the past with the synod is that if you're not prepared it tends to sweep over you a bit.

So I worked very hard from early May until now to prepare. One of the things I did is read a considerable amount of John O'Malley, the Jesuit historian now based in Boston. And I was very struck by something O'Malley said in various places.

It was that it [Vatican II] was a language event. In other words, in a sense it left the church's core teaching untouched but spoke differently and in a way that was far more than cosmetic. Now, that seems to be really where we are.

And the other thing, in my own thinking I came to think that this particular synod -- or this synod journey, reaching back to late 2013 -- is probably more directly and deeply related to Vatican II than any other synod I've known.

But one of the things that Pope Francis has done is he's moved from the synod as event to the synod as journey, as process. And in that sense it's like Vatican II. Because Vatican II was a great fermentation, where a lot happened between the sessions, not just during the sessions.

And I hope -- it's still hard to know -- but I hope that's true of this journey, too.

It's becoming increasingly clear to me, and I think to all of us, by Oct. 25 we're not going to have done the work. It's just another step along the path of this journey. And clearly the Year of Mercy is radically linked, in the pope's mind I think, as part of this synod process. And it will continue in ways that are hard to foresee.

After the first week of this synod, I think there's a great sense of uncertainty as to where it's all going. And that also includes a sense of confusion about the process, because I've been part of an earlier Synod on the Word of God and the process was much clearer and more manageable.

By contrast, this has a feeling not quite of chaos but of confusion. It's been difficult enough to know what the task is, let alone to know what the method might therefore be. So, I just think that in me and in others -- perhaps many of us -- there's that growing sense of uncertainty about the new format.

And that's primarily an uncertainty about the Instrumentum Laboris as not only the base working document, but the document that frames the entire work of the synod.

The earlier synod that I was a part of the, the Instrumentum Laboris was nowhere near as dominant a frame for the synod discussions.

I personally don't think that this particular Instrumentum Laboris -- which was an extraordinarily complicated document to produce -- I don't think it's a strong enough document to sustain the weight that's been imposed upon it. I think in many ways it's a weak document.

It's just not a strong and rich enough document to sustain the entire work of the synod. I think that there is a fairly basic difficulty at that point. Where that will lead us, I don't know. But I know in my small group the question of how we should go about the task has come up again and again and again.

The first part of the Instrumentum Laboris generated 473 modi, many of which were requests to rewrite, which is almost impossible to do. The second and third parts are longer and more complex. God only knows how many they will generate.

I think the intention underlying the new format is fine. I'm not sure that it was thought through as carefully as it might have been. But that may be easy to say. I don't for a moment question the sound intention of those who reshaped the format. I don't subscribe to theories of conspiracy and manipulation.

That there's a political undercurrent in the synod is undeniable and it's a platitude to say it. I'm not at all convinced about some of the theories of conspiracy and manipulation that are doing the rounds in your trade.

Maybe I'm naive, I don't think I am -- I've worked in Rome and know the way Rome can function. But I just think that there are difficulties at the point of an understanding of what our task is and therefore how to go about it.

Cardinal Tagle said it's even unknown if there will be a final document from the synod, or if there will be an apostolic exhortation or not. Is this new a process of doing discussion in the church for you? Is there a way we're going where we won't get something so definitive, it may be a sort of in-discussion moment?

It may well be. I don't know. I have heard certainly that there will be no apostolic exhortation. Now, if that's true, I presume it's because Pope Francis does not want to give the impression that the synod journey is complete.

Some apostolic exhortations in the past have been powerful documents. Many have not. They've just gone into the black hole of history, in fact. I think the pope is keeping his options open. There's no question that Pope Francis is listening.

I just don't know. What we were told was that there is this commission of ten -- which has been shrouded in some controversy -- that they would be responsible for putting together a final document. But whether that happens or not -- again the question of process.

All of these modi go into some kind of modification of the synod working document. Perhaps, are we looking at some radically modified form of the Instrumentum Laboris that will become the final document of the synod? I don't know.

That uncertainty or un-clarity is itself unusual. It's disconcerting.

I agree that a certain kind of confusion is not an unhealthy thing, if we are serious about a process of discernment. But discernment presumes an openness to the surprises of the Spirit.

I just hope that's the kind of confusion we're dealing with but at times one wonders, inevitably.

On your blog you mentioned that there seemed to be two specific separate camps among the synod bishops.

I wouldn't overstate that. It seems to me there are many positions; there really are. To talk about just in terms of two camps is a gross over-simplification.

But what I was keen to try and say ... was that the impression given at times is that either we abandon church teaching or that we simply opt for a kind of immobilism.

In other words, as I've put it at one point: The only two options we face are iconoclasm or immobilism. I just don't believe that at all. In fact, I don't think either of those two extremes is a real option. It's a theoretical option.

I don't think the synod is going to reject what is regarded as fundamental church teaching, by which I mean the untouchable trinity of marriage, Eucharist and the church. Because if you touch one of those three, you touch them all. This is not marginal stuff. It is fundamentally important.

That's not going to happen, but I also think it's unthinkable that all we do at the end of this synod process is simply say and do what we have long said and done in the area of marriage and the family.

I just think, at that point, you have to ask: Why would we have bothered with this process, this extraordinarily long, demanding, costly process. Why would we have gone through it all if the only thing we can do is speak and act exactly as we have?

When in fact in many parts of the world we know that the language we speak is not communicating and we know that the ways in which we have acted are not touching the lives of many people and, in fact, are proving to be deeply alienating in the lives of many people who need help.

What I was keen to say is that between those two extremes -- even though at times the impression given is almost no space between them -- there is in fact a vast territory between them to be explored.

And that's what the synod should be about: The words and exercise of pastoral activity -- saying, 'OK, we don't go to one extreme and say we're going to chuck church teaching out the window or the other extreme and say we're going to do nothing.'

I think we have to explore all kinds of possibilities in that vast middle ground, where I think the Spirit is moving and calling us to be. And that's where I begin to talk about a language event.

As I have said in the small group, one of the things this synod could profitably and practically do is to compose a list of very practical things that we could do to support families and to help families in trouble.

Not just come at them with waffly churchspeak -- as I have said, there's oceans of that. But to push beyond that kind of churchspeak, to speak a language that is utterly faithful to what we believe and teach but is simpler and more accessible and more contemporary and less gobbly-gook.

In a sense, that's what Vatican II did. That's, in part, what it means to speak of the Council as a language event.

I think our language has to become more biblical. I'll give you a case in point that's come up today in a number of groups.

The word that we cling to: Indissolubility. First of all, it's canonical. Secondly, it's negative in its form -- in-dissolubility. Can we speak about what we mean when we use the word indissolubility in a way that is not canonical and is not negative in form?

I think we can. And that's a practical example of what I mean by a language event. I've also said publicly ... that there are these expressions that we just kind of throw around and everyone just nods or cheers -- things like "the domestic church" and "the Gospel of the family" that I personally think have become clichés and they need to be given a rest.

All of that can sound like semantic quibbling, but it's not. In the Bible, words create worlds. And that's one of things we need to explore as we enter this vast middle ground, the territory between the two extremes.


Fr. Lombardi Issues Statement on Alleged Letter From Cardinals to Pope

The director of the Vatican press office, Father Federico Lombardi, has cautioned journalists about a letter published Monday by the Italian publication L'Espresso, allegedly signed by 13 cardinals and sent to Pope Francis, criticizing the synod's procedures and expressing concerns.
The director of the Holy See Press Office offered his word of caution by issuing a clarification regarding the publication.
"As we are aware," the spokesman noted, "at least four of the Synod Fathers who were included in the list of signatories have denied their involvement," namely Cardinals Angelo Scola, Andre Vingt-Trois, Mauro Piacenza and Peter Erdo.
"Cardinal Pell," he continued, "has declared that a letter sent to the Pope was confidential and should have remained as such, and that neither the text published nor the signatories correspond to what was sent to the Pope."
The Vatican spokesman added that, in terms of content, the difficulties described in the letter were already mentioned on Monday evening in the Synod Hall, as was already explained publicly, although not covered extensively or in detail.
"As we know, the General Secretary and the Pope responded clearly the following morning. Therefore, to provide this text and this list of signatories some days later constitutes a disruption that was not intended by the signatories (at least by the most authoritative). Therefore it would be inappropriate to allow it to have any influence," he said.
That observations can be made regarding the methodology of the Synod, Fr. Lombardi stated, "is neither new nor surprising." However, he noted that once the methodology is agreed upon, a commitment is made to put it into practice in the best way possible.
Pope Francis has made various changes to the methodology of the synod of bishops, including giving more time to the small group discussions.
"This [commitment to the methodology] is what is taking place," Father Lombardi said. "There is very extensive collaboration in the task of allowing the Synod to make good progress on its path. It may be observed that some of the 'signatories' are elected Moderators of the Circuli Minori, and have been working intensively. The overall climate of the Assembly is without doubt positive."
The Vatican spokesman also noted that Cardinal Wilfrid Fox Napier expressly asked to clarify comments published in an interview with “Crux," saying they did not correspond to his opinion.
With regard to the selection of the 10 prelates who will prepare the final text of the synod, Crux reported that Cardinal Napier had concerns about the members of the commission and would "actually challenge 'Pope Francis’ right to choose that.'”
Cardinal Napier has requested that this be corrected, explaining that, in fact, he affirmed the exact opposite: "… no-one challenges Pope Francis’ right to choose that."
Fr. Lombardi made these comments during today's synod briefing and issued the statement of clarification directly after that.
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