Women in Church

Monica and Worried Parents

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Monica

Today is the feast of St. Monica, the patron of all parents who are worried about their children, that is, almost all parents.

The Catholic Herald summarizes the story:

St Monica was born in 331 and is believed to have been of Berber origin. She married a pagan known as Patricius who was prone to violence and annoyed by Monica’s charity and pious habits.

Monica bore three children; Navigius, Perpetua and Augustine. When Augustine fell ill, Monica was greatly distressed because Augustine, like the rest of her children, was not baptised. She begged her husband to allow her to baptise Augustine and he agreed but then withdrew consent once Augustine had recovered.

Following Augustine’s recovery, he became lazy and wayward and was eventually sent to a school in Madauras. He was 17 and studying rhetoric in the city of Carthage when his father died.

During his time at Carthage Augustine became a Manichaean, a follower of a religion founded by the Iranian prophet Mani. Monica was so upset that she sent Augustine away but relented when she experienced a vision, encouraging her to reconcile with him.

St Monica visited a bishop [St. Ambrose] to discuss her concerns about Augustine and he told her: “The child of those tears shall never perish.”

Monica followed Augustine to Rome but when she arrived discovered that he had gone to Milan. She persevered and followed her son to the city, where she met St Ambrose and to her joy discovered that Augustine had embraced Christianity after 17 years of resisting the faith.

Monica and Augustine spent six months in serenity at Rus Cassiciacum (now known as Cassago Brianza) and Augustine was then baptised in the church of St John the Baptist in Milan. When in 387 St Monica died, her son’s grief inspired him to write his famous book Confessions.

Augustine’s body was lost when the city of Hippo where he was bishop was overrun by the Vandals. However, Monica’s body is still preserved in the basilica of S. Agostino in Rome.

Basilica agostino

The Basilica of St. Augustine in Rome

Several years ago my wife and I were visiting the basilica to pray at her tomb for one of our children who was having a severe crisis. As we left, we encountered on the steps a begging gypsy woman holding a baby (probably borrowed). She knew quite well that any parent leaving the basilica would have a tender heart for children and would open his wallet, which I of course did. I rather liked the gypsy beggars in Rome; they were all dressed a gypsies should be, and I suspect were hired by the city government from central casting to give an authentic flavor to the city.

altar of st Monica

The Altar that contains the body of St. Monica

Someone has written a Litany of St. Monica:

St. Monica, pray for us and for our children.

Model of wives, pray for us and for our children.

You who converted your unbelieving husband, Mother of St. Augustine, pray for us and for our children.

Strict and prudent teacher, guardian of your son in all his ways, pray for us and for our children.

You who carefully watched over his conduct, pray for us and for our children.

You who were sorely distressed at his erring from the right, pray for us and for our children.

You who were untiring in your petitions for his soul’s safety, pray for us and for our children.

You who still hoped on amid the bitterness of your heart and your floods of tears, pray for us and for our children.

You who were filled with consolation upon his return to God, pray for us and for our children.

You who died calmly after faithfully fulfilling your duties, pray for us and for our children.

You who are the prayerful intercessor of all mothers who pray and weep as you did, pray for us and for our children.

Preserve the innocence of our children, we beseech you, St. Monica.

Protect them against the deceits of evil men, we beseech you, St. Monica.

Protect them from the dangers of bad example, we beseech you, St. Monica.

Watch over the movements of grace in their hearts.

Let the Christian virtues strike deep root in their hearts and bear much fruit.

Redouble your intercession for youth approaching manhood.

Obtain for all in mortal sin true contrition and perfect conversion.

Obtain for all mothers to fulfill their duties steadily and perseveringly.

Commend all mothers to the protection of the ever-blessed Virgin Mother of Our Lord.

Favorably incline the heart of your beloved son Augustine to the salvation of our children.

St. Augustine, holy son of a saintly mother, pray for us and for our children.

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Pew Survey and the Decline of U. S. Christianity

in Catholic Church, Masculinity, Men in church, sex differences, Women in Church No Comments Tags: , ,

The Pew Survey has released its analysis of the 35,000 interviews that it conducted around the United States. It conducted the same survey several years ago. The result show that identification with Christianity is declining rapidly.

Even 35,000 interviews in a nation of over 300,000,000 is not a lot, but Pew is confident of the statistical validity of its findings, within a margin of error.

The big news is the rise of the unaffiliated and the consequent decline of those who self-identify as Christians.

Religious affiliation Pew survey

The evangelical group increased in raw numbers, but declined slightly as a portion of the population. The Southern Baptists have experienced a decline in the past ten years, so the evangelicals are found mostly in non-denominational churches (which in my limited experience tend to have Reformed theology and to be generally socially conservative).

The big surprise is the decline of self-identified Catholics, both in numbers and proportion of the population. According to the Pew Survey’s extrapolation, there are three million fewer Catholics today than in 2007. Other surveys have showed Catholic numbers increasing and the proportion of the population (about 25%) staying the same – mostly because of immigration of Hispanics. It is possible that the Pew Survey did not reach Hispanics proportionately; because of their undocumented status and language barriers, many might be hesitant to answer any questions, however innocuous.

As the America article cited in the previous blog pointed out, the connection of many self-identified Catholics is very weak, so the difference between the Pew survey and other surveys may represent the way or context in which the question was asked. In one context, a person who was baptized as a Catholic but hasn’t been to church since then might self-identify as a Catholic, but in another context might not.

The mainline churches have continued their decline. Some sociologists attribute this to the decline of the target population: married couples with children. Despite the claim of liberal churches to be “inclusive,” marginalized people such as single mothers, tend to seek the clear message and help that evangelical churches give.

Catholics have the worst proportion of loses and gains: for everyone who converts to Catholicism, six Catholics leave.

Evangelical groups do far better: for every evangelical who leaves, 1,2 join.

The birthrates differ among the groups:

Birth rates

 

The gender composition of the churches has no surprises:

Catholic: 46% male; 54% female

Mainline Protestant; 45% male; 55% female

Evangelical Protestant: 45% male; 55% female

Historic Black denominations: 41% male; 59% female

The Pew survey represents self-identification. Other surveys show that in matters of belief and practice, women are far more committed to their churches than men are.

Orthodox Christian: 56% male; 44 % female.

Hindu: 62% male; 38 % female

Among some smaller groups, composed heavily of recent immigrants the greater proportion of males may simply represent the tendency to men to precede women in immigration.

Moslem : 65% male; 35% female

But the high proportion of men in Islam may also represent its special attraction to men.

Unaffiliated: 57% male; 43 % female

  • More than a quarter of men (27%) now describe themselves as religiously unaffiliated, up from 20% in 2007. Fewer women are religious “nones,” but the religiously unaffiliated are growing among women at about the same rate as among men. Nearly one-in-five women (19%) now describe themselves as religiously unaffiliated, up from 13% in 2007.

Younger cohorts are less affiliated.

Other surveys have shown that atheists and agnostics are overwhelmingly male.

Thus means the typical churchgoer is an older female; the typical unaffiliated a young male. Whatever is causing the decline in identification with Christianity operates most strongly in the cohort of poor young men, and if they could be reached and converted, other groups also could also be reached and converted.

The Pew survey does try to establish the cause for the increasing tendency not to identify as Christian. Probably merely nominal Christians are putting aside even the name. Their attachment to Christianity has slowly evaporated, and they notice that Christianity is increasingly at odds with modern culture, which has rejected the vision of creation and procreation in Genesis and insists on the right to self-definition, and therefore refuses to conform to any demands outside the autonomous self: non serviam.

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The Typical Catholic is a Woman

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America magazine has an article on the results of studies of the Center for Applied Research on the Apostolate. (CARA). The typical Catholic is

 is a 48-year-old, non-Hispanic white, married woman with a Catholic spouse. She is of the post-Vatican II generation (born between 1961 and 1981).

Her attachment to the Catholic Church is part of her identity, but not the most important part:

Currently, she attends Mass at least once a month and always on Ash Wednesday, Easter and Christmas. She keeps up with her parish community by reading the parish bulletin. Her household gives about $10 at the offertory collection. Mary does not use much Catholic media other than the bulletin and is not very active in their parish outside of attending Mass. She will probably never see this article. Her faith is important to her, but there are other things in her life that are equally important.

This type of person represents

 about 45 percent of Catholics. Another 4 percent of Catholics are “the core” of the Catholic community. These are the individuals who do not just attend Mass weekly; they are part of the small community that makes Masses and other activities happen in parishes. They are avid Catholic media consumers and are involved in a variety of devotional practices. They say the rosary and attend to every detail of Lent and Advent. If you are reading this article, you are probably one of them. They are knowledgeable and active in their faith in almost every way. In many ways, they come closest to living the faith life that the church envisions for Catholics.

The majority of those who call themselves Catholic have extremely weak links to the Church:

That still leaves the majority of self-identified Catholics out there on the periphery, some 51 percent, with much more distant stories. Among this majority there are distinct sub-groups as well. Some attend Mass at Christmas and Easter only. Some have not attended Mass in years, but nonetheless consider themselves as Catholic as anyone else who has been baptized Catholic.

Religious education has failed to transmit knowledge of what Catholic believe:

fewer than two-thirds of Catholics, for example, believe that the bread and wine used for Communion really become the body and blood of Jesus Christ. How can so many disagree with this central teaching of the faith? Surprisingly, it is because many are unaware that this is what the church teaches! Only 46 percent of Catholics are aware of what the church teaches about the real presence and agree with that teaching. An additional 17 percent agree, but do not know this is what the church teaches. A third do not agree with the teaching but are unaware of the teaching. Finally, only 4 percent of Catholics know what the church teaches about the real presence and do not believe it.

This edition of America also has a companion article about the leadership of women in the church:

In the United States, Catholic women are deeply engaged at nearly all levels of Catholic life, starting in their home parishes. Women are not only more likely to show up in the pews in any given week, but a 2012 study by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate found that at the local level, a majority (57 percent) of responding pastoral leaders were female, including lay and women religious serving on staff, pastoral councils, social ministries and other parish duties.

This in fact understates the presence of women: more like 80% of staff, paid and volunteer, are women, Interaction with a paid or volunteer staff member of the Catholic Church is almost always interaction with a woman. The same is true in Germany and France.

America sees nothing anomalous or troubling, and in fact wants to increase the leadership roles of women, and presumably the presence of women in the Church.

But of course, the predominance of women in the pews means the absence of men from the pews.

The absence of men does not bother the writers for America. They seem content to have the Church be a women’s club: the only question now is to get the officers to look like the members.

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The Vineyard of the Lord of Hosts?

in homosexuality, Popular religion, Protestantism, Women in Church 19 Comments Tags: , , , ,

From A Vineyard Church website

Rod Dreher has had interesting blogs Luhrmann’s When God Talks Back here and here. The book was also reviewed in the NYT

I am not a staretz, so I will make no judgment about the prayer practices and experiences of the members of the Vineyard Church. Some of it is very familiar and seems on the whole to be well within the bounds of Christian tradition, although at times it seems a little too therapeutic and one misses the hard calls of the Gospel to repentance.

Luhrmann noticed that erotic overtones of some of these practices

Of the Vineyard’s  music, Luhrmann observes:

“God is intensely human in this music, and the singer wants him so badly that the lyrics sound like a teenage fan’s crazed longing for a teen idol she can touch.” p. 5

and

“Some songs are almost sexual, with a touch so might that teh suggestion could slip past. Here is the megahit “Dwell”: “Dwell in the midst of us/ Come and have your way.” p. 5

Women have “dates” with God.

“That was particularly striking  in the way people spoke about “date night” with God.  Date night was a term only women used. (Men would talk about evenings with “quiet time” with God. The women would set aside the night, and they imagined it romantically; it was a “date.”  They might pick up dinner or set out a plate at the table, and they imagined their way through the evening talking to God, cuddling with God, and basking in God’s attention.” p. 82

Such approaches leave men cold- at least heterosexual men.

Perhaps connected with this, perhaps not, are the sexual irregularities, especially the homosexual ones, that occur in Pentecostal/charismatic communities.

One of the flamboyant founders of the Vineyard Church, Lonnie Frisbee, was a married but was also having homosexual affairs. He eventually died of AIDS.

I was involved with the charismatic prayer group at Catholic University; It turned out that one of the key leaders was an active homosexual who died of AIDS. A renowned liberal theologian at CU was his spiritual director.

In Charlottesville I also attended a charismatic prayer group at an estate outside town. Years later I learned that the married man who was the minister was an active bisexual.

Is there a connection between a eroticized religion and sexual irregularities? I suspect that there is a connection, at least in some cases, and perhaps Pentecostalism is especially susceptible to it

Such phenomenon caused Msgr. Knox to suspect the presence of the erotic element in enthusiasm, but of course it is not confined to emotional movements. Bridal mysticism is a recurrent theme in both Catholicism and Protestantism; very few heterosexual men like to play the role of the blushing bride.

BTW

I believe that tongues is a real and legitimate form of prayer. I don’t know what it is, or why it fell into desuetude after the Apostolic era. Decades ago I started praying in tongues spontaneously one night when I was alone. I recently had an operation and was under anesthesia. The doctor reported that I was praying in tongues during the operation. What part of the brain is praying? I don’t know – but it seems to be real and helpful to many Christians to pray with both the rational part of the mind and with whatever part is praying in tongues.

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Are men or women more irrational?

in conspiracy theories, sex differences, Women in Church 29 Comments Tags: , , ,

While researching my new book, I came across studies that showed that not only were women more religious than men, they were more superstitious when it came to believing in New Age stuff, mediums, astrology, communicating with the dead, etc. However, men were more likely to believe in UFOs and aliens.

I mentioned this to my wife, and she said that she bet men were more likely to fall for nutty conspiracy theories.

She was right.

The Sidney Morning Herald reported on the research of Kylie Sturgess, who tested 1243 Australians  on a variety of beliefs;

“Women are more likely to be at the ‘social’ end of paranormal beliefs,” Sturgess says. “They’re more likely to believe in things like mediums, astrology, psychic healing, and ghosts.


“Men, for instance, are more likely than women to believe in the alien astronaut theories of Erich von Daniken, and more cryptozoological things like the Loch Ness monster.”

Studies have also shown that men are also more likely to believe in conspiracy theories, creationism and the notions of historical revisionists, while women are more likely to believe in telepathy and New Age theories.

I am puzzled; perhaps the sexes are equally irrational. However female goofiness is generally harmless, while conspiracy theories (which always end up blaming the Jews) lead to the gas chambers.

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Evangelical Men in El Salvador

in Masculinity, Protestantism, Women in Church 11 Comments Tags: ,

I have just finished a book by Jose Leonardo Santos, Evangelicalism and Masculinity: Faith and Gender in El Salvador.

Jose Santos studied the interaction of evangelicalism and masculine ideals in  violent post-war El Salvador. Evangelicals in El Salvador (who have Fundamentalist, Pentecostal, and Holiness traits) have attracted equal numbers of men and women, unlike most other religious groups in the Americas. Evangelicals tell a compelling narrative in which men reject a masculine code of violence, honor, drinking, promiscuity in order to become patriarchs, servant leaders who dedicate themselves in self-giving, affectionate love to their wives and children and to society at large. They separate themselves from the masculine “world,” rejecting even the universal passion for soccer, and begin a new, Christian life.

Santos does not know why, but Evangelicals have had more success in effecting male conversion than similar Catholic groups such as the Charismatic Renewal, which uphold a similar idea of true manhood. Perhaps the Evangelicals are able to present divinely ordained rules of behavior in the Bible, while Catholic voices are sometimes discordant and uncertain. For Evangelicals there is no doubt that male and female roles are divinely ordained, and that fatherhood “is a divinely commissioned responsibility and authority.”

Also the Evangelicals have the advantage of many pastors. One priest has the care of several large parishes and has little contact with his flock of 10,000-15,000 nominal Catholics (mostly women). Evangelical congregations are much smaller. There are a few large churches, but most congregations number in the scores or low hundreds. Evangelicals also realize that when the father is converted, the rest of the family almost always follows; but the same is not true if the mother converts.

As a secularist Santos is not happy with the patriarchy, however benign, that the Evangelicals foster, but he admits that Salvadoran women like it, and it is vast improvement on the hyermasculine, destructive male behavior that is common in El Salvador.

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The Courage of Women – “I leave for heaven”

in Catholic Church, France, Women in Church 5 Comments Tags: , , ,

As Chesterton said, the existence of every human being is a testimony to the courage of women. There is so much bad news about the failings of Catholic priests and religious, it is good to remember the examples that shed a light of divine light on our troubled existence.

 

Women and women religious in France during the Nazi occupation were active in the Resistance. They faced a heavy penalty if caught. Here is how one nun responded: 

 

Women, religious and laity alike, were particularly remarkable for their bravery not only in hiding wanted persons and weapons, but also for gathering intelligence, and producing forged documents, from identity documents to ration cards. Even more remarkable was their fortitude when caught. Mother Elisabeth de l’Eucharistie, for example, was arrested in Lyons in March 1944 for concealing arms in her convent. Sent to a concentration camp, in order to fortify the courage of women singled out for extermination because unable to work, she voluntarily joined their number. On Good Friday 1945 she mounted with them the lorry that was to take her to the gas chambers of Ravensbrück, saying, ‘I am leaving for Heaven’ (‘Je pars pour le Ciel‘), adding almost casually, ‘Let them know in Lyons.’ (Politics, Society and Christianity in Vichy France.  W. D. Halls, p. 217)

Another witness said she volunteered to take the place of a mother who was being sent to the gas chamber.

She was born Élise Rivet in Algeria, and died at the age of 46 on March 30, 1945, a few weeks before the end of the war. If the Catholic Church wants to canonize anyone, it could find few better candidates.

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Who Needs Men Anyway?

in Catholic Church, Women in Church 18 Comments Tags: , ,

Occasionally churchmen (and churchwomen) notice the lack of male involvement in the various Christian churches and try to think of ways of getting men involved, but the more common reaction is seeking to make the church ever more and more a women’s club.

 

U.S. Catholic celebrates the feminine triumph in the Church:

It’s lunchtime at St. Clement Parish in Chicago, and although some of the city’s best restaurants are within walking distance, most of the staff members instead opt for microwaved leftovers and conversation with colleagues around the conference table. The building engineer and associate pastor stop by for a quick bite, but otherwise this makeshift lunchroom is Estrogen Central.

A large parish of 4,000 mostly middle- and upper-class families, St. Clement boasts 12 full-time, well-educated lay employees. Only two are men.

St. Clement is a great place to be a woman in the church. The pastor is open and collaborative. Women are visible in leadership and liturgy, and they are accepted and respected by parishioners. Older women mentor the younger ones. And the flexible hours, reasonable salaries, and decent benefits make it possible for women to do the meaningful work they were trained and feel called to do.

Nor is this a peculiarity of St. Clement’s.

Women virtually run the church in the United States. They make up the majority of parishioners, volunteers, and staff at the parish level, and make up at least half of employees at most diocesan offices. A third of Catholic students pursuing advanced theological degrees are women—and most plan to use their education in service to the church.

At the parish level even more employees are women:

Parish employees—as many as 80 percent of whom are women.

The triumphant march of women through the Church will be completed (many of the female employees hope) when ordination is opened to women, and the last vestiges of male presence in the Church are swept into the dustbin of history, and the Bride of Christ will be composed almost exclusively of women – a process that is almost complete in the mainline Protestant churches.

 

As to the men – well, there is sports, war, crime, and other diversions – if the women are lucky. Fascism and Nazism replaced Christianity for many men in Europe in the twentieth century.

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Declining Testosterone Levels at the Altar

in Masculinity, Women in Church 8 Comments Tags: ,

 

The Pope welcomed a gathering of altar servers in Rome. As John Allen notes: 

First, for the first time this year, the female altar servers in attendance outnumbered the males. According to organizers, the balance was roughly 60-40 in favor of females. The official Vatican newspaper, L’Osservatore Romano, pointed to the turnout as a symbol of “the massive entry in recent decades of girls and young women into a role once reserved exclusively to males.” 

This predominance of girls was predictable (anyway I predicted it in my book The Church Impotent: The Feminization of Christianity). Western Christianity has for a long time been regarded as unmasculine. It has been difficult to keep men, especially young men, connected to a church which seems to want to lessen their masculinity.

 

If an activity is obviously and mistakably masculine (such as soldiering), opening it to women does not make it a part of the feminine sphere. But if a sphere is already regarded as feminine (and Western Christianity is), opening an activity within it to women will make that activity a feminine activity.

 

The 60-40 split in altar servers mirrors the female-male split in Catholic church attendance. As boys are busy establishing their masculinity at that age, I suspect that the proportion of boy altar servers will decline further.

 

In many mainline Protestant churches, including the Evangelical church in Germany, women are already the majority of seminarians, and the clergy is being converted into a feminine occupation, like nursing. There are male nurses, but they are rare, and someday we willl have to say male minister, as we now say male nurse.

 

To further increase men’s suspicions about Christianity, in some denominations, such as the Episcopal, the remaining men are often homosexual. The heterosexual, male minister will be a rara avis in the not too distant future in the more liberal denominations.

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The Decline of Males

in clergy sex abuse scandal, education, Masculinity, Women in Church 4 Comments Tags: ,

Nicholas Kristof has an article in the New York Times (The Boys Have Fallen Behind) about the growing alienation of boys from education and about the consequent decline in their academic achievement. This decline is disguised by the fact that the people at the top of most professions are still male; but under them the great mass of males is sinking down the social scale. 

Women outnumber men in college 3:2, sometimes 2:1 in liberal arts colleges. The recession has hit men particularly hard. Obama, in part because it produces immediate results and in part because he wants to reward his supporters, has funneled stimulus money into salaries of the helping professions, such as teaching, rather than into construction, which has an almost completely male work force.  

Males are abandoning schools and are being driven out of the work force; but they had left the Church long ago. 

The revelations of sexual abuse in Europe have led to attacks on the Church as an all-male institution. But it is only odd corners of the Church that are all or even predominantly male. In Europe as in the United States, 80% of the employees of the Church are female. The congregations in both continents are predominantly female.  

In the hundreds of cases of sexual abuse I have read mothers sometimes courageously defend their children, but all too often mothers don’t want to hear the bad news: they ignored it, or punished their children for saying such things about a priest. I understand from psychiatrists who deal with father-daughter incest that the mother often knows or suspects what is going on, but does not want to confront for fear of destroying the family. 

 

I would therefore not place too much hope that the incidence of sexual abuse could be lessened by having more women in positions of authority in the Church. That might be a good idea for other reasons; but it might make the Church even less male-friendly and our society is already alienating males from its other institutions. Alienated males are fertile ground for crack-pot and dangerous political opportunists, as the history of Europe in the twentieth century demonstrates. 

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Father Absence and Failure in School

in education, Masculinity, Responsibility, Women in Church 4 Comments Tags: , ,

Patrick Welsh, who teaches in the Washington D.C, school system, has diagnosed the problem of poor academic achievement among black students: Making the Grade Isn’t about Race. It’s About Parents.

“Why don’t you guys study like the kids from Africa?”

In a moment of exasperation last spring, I asked that question to a virtually all-black class of 12th-graders who had done horribly on a test I had just given. A kid who seldom came to class — and was constantly distracting other students when he did — shot back: “It’s because they have fathers who kick their butts and make them study.”

Another student angrily challenged me: “You ask the class, just ask how many of us have our fathers living with us.” When I did, not one hand went up.

Educators are worried that black children are doing poorly in school because of unspecified “racism” or low expectations. Welsh demurs: 

But focusing on a “racial achievement gap” is too simple; it’s a gap in familial support and involvement, too. Administrators focused solely on race are stigmatizing black students. At the same time, they are encouraging the easy excuse that the kids who are not excelling are victims, as well as the idea that once schools stop being racist and raise expectations, these low achievers will suddenly blossom. 

Fathers have to be present in a home for children to succeed in life; the absence of a father makes it very difficult for a child to succeed. A child growing up in a middle-class community in which almost all children have fathers at home will benefit from this environment, even if he lacks a father. But when whole neighborhoods do not have a father in any home, working, disciplining, guiding, the result is inevitable: academic failure, violence, and out-of-wedlock pregnancy. 

But what can a government do about this? Some policies hurt the family, but churches are really the only way that men can be taught their responsibilities to be responsible fathers and not simply biological males. 

And of course men, especially young men, especially black young men, stay away from church, which they regard as a feminine environment: for women and little children, not for men. 

But all the churches, at least the main-line churches, including the Catholic Church, worry about is how to make more space for women in church – when women are already the vast majority of the congregations.

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Who Would Jesus Smack Down?

in Masculinity, Women in Church No Comments Tags: , ,

The NYT article on the Calvinist and ultra-masculine Mark Driscoll at Mars Hill Church in Seattle is not too bad. Driscoll, by rejecting the prissiness of much of evangelical America, has some success in reaching rough young men with the gospel.

 

The theological analysis in the article uses stereotypes. Calvinists believe in total depravity – but so do Catholics. Calvin did not think that human nature was totally corrupt – because insofar as it is created by God, it is still good. Calvin knew his theology well enough not to be a Manichean. What Calvin thought was that all human powers, including reason, had been corrupted by sin, and Catholics believe that the will was weakened and the intellect was darkened by original sin.

 

Calvin’s doctrine of predestination and the role of the human will is also misunderstood. In Jonathan Edward’s excellent explanation, Calvin (along with Thomists) thought that God was the cause of every human action – including sin, insofar as it was an action and had being. Evil is the deprivation of being, and does not exist, and is therefore not caused by God. This analysis is a necessary corollary of the belief that God is the maker of heaven and earth, of everything, including, in a sense, sinful actions, and therefore of salvation and damnation.

 

Edwards identified the dissenters from this as Arminians and behind them the Jesuits, who both believed in the freedom of indifference. Edwards does not go further back to Occam and Scotus, but I think that their nominalism and voluntarism is the original Western source of the freedom of indifference.

 

During the controversy De Auxiliis, the Jesuits accused the Dominicans of Calvinism, and the Dominicans accused the Jesuits of Pelegianism. The pope resolved the matter by telling them both to stop accusing each other of heresy

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Just in Time for Easter

in Secularism, Uncategorized, Women in Church No Comments

Dietrich Bonheoffer denounced liberal Proetstantism because it preached cheap grace: “Cheap grace is preaching forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession. … Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.”

 A leading minister of the United Church in Canda has decided the the next step is “Taking Christ out of Christianity.”  Seriously. The Rev Gretta Vosper, of the West Hill United Church in Toronto, has decided to excise Jesus from the Easter liturgy: 

But at West Hill on the faith’s holiest day, it will be done with a huge difference. The words “Jesus Christ” will be excised from what the congregation sings and replaced with “Glorious hope.”Thus, it will be hope that is declared to be resurrected – an expression of renewal of optimism and the human spirit – but not Jesus, contrary to Christianity’s central tenet about the return to life on Easter morning of the crucified divine son of God.Generally speaking, no divine anybody makes an appearance in West Hill’s Sunday service liturgy. 

The Rev. Vosper wants to Schliermacherize Christianity completely:

She wants salvation redefined to mean new life through removing the causes of suffering in the world. She wants the church to define resurrection as “starting over,” “new chances.” She wants an end to the image of God as an intervening all-powerful authority who must be appeased to avoid divine wrath; rather she would have congregations work together as communities to define God – or god – according to their own worked-out definitions of what is holy and sacred. She wants the eucharist – the symbolic eating and drinking of Jesus’s body and blood to make the congregation part of Jesus’s body – to be instead a symbolic experience of community love.Theologians asked to comment on her book said they wouldn’t until they’ve read it. But one of her colleagues who knows her well, Rev. Rob Oliphant, the progressive pastor of Toronto’s Eglinton St. George’s United Church, said, “While I’m somewhat sympathetic to the aims of it all – getting rid of the nonsense and keeping the core faith – I think that there is something lacking in it all. Gone is metaphor, poetry, symbol, image, beauty, paradox.”

For some reason she thinks that the world will flock to this Christianity without Christ.   Vosper seems to unaware of her literary antecedents in Flannery O’Connor’s Wise Blood and the church of truth without Jesus Christ crucified. She might do well to read that story.

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Erotic Catholicism in Brazil

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In Chapter Seven of my book The Church Impotent: The Feminization of Christianity (available on line at another part of this web site) I examine the strong streak of erotic mysticism in Catholicism, a streak that turns to turn men off. 

Kath.net has a brief article on Marcelo Rossi, a Brazilian priest who is a hit pop singer whose newest album just sold 1.3 million copies.

Here is a Rossi video Sonda me, Look at me.

Notice:

  • The music is romantic love music

  • 99% of the laity shown are women

  • The erotic atmosphere is unmistakable.

This is not to accuse Rossi of any misbehavior – he is simply using a strong and popular tradition in Catholic popular religion, but one that has unfortunate consequences in alienating men from the Church. 

Our Brazilian housekeeper came in while I was playing the video and expressed her undying devotion to Rossi. Her English is limited, and my Portuguese non-existent, but she was trying to express part of Rossi’s message about the body. I got the drift.

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Women Deacons?

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Hanna-Barbara Gerl-Falkovitz in the Tagesspost (acknowledgement to Kath.net) has asked that the church consider the possibility of opening the diaconate to women. Gerl-Falkovitz is a professor of the philosophy of religion at the Technical University of Dresden. I have heard her speak at the International Institute of Culture’s seminars in Eichstaett, Germany. She is known for her orthodoxy and loyalty to the magisterium.

She proposes that the Church consider an order of women who had earned true holiness through prayer and service (not through academic degrees). These women would have the special role, mostly in hospitals, of accompanying the sick and dying. They would also under certain circumstances have the ability to give the sacrament of the sick, “unter bestimmten Umständen auch die Krankensalbung zu spenden.”

This latter part of her proposal depends on the decision of the Church as to whether the priest is the ordinary minister of the Sacrament of the Sick (as he is of baptism) or the necessary minister (as he is of the Eucharist). A layperson (and indeed even an unbaptized person) can administer baptism is cases of necessity. I do not believe the question about who can administer the sacrament of the sick has ever been asked. The relevant verse in James seems to limit the sacrament to the elders (πρεσβυτερους – priests) of the Church:

Is anyone among you sick? Then he must call for the elders of the church and they are to pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord; and the prayer offered in faith will restore the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up, and if he has committed sins, they will be forgiven him.

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