Appointment in Rome.

Richard John Neuhaus, Appointment in Rome, Crossroad Pub. Co., New York, 1999, 170 pages, $24.95 (US)

Reviewed by Fr. Leonard Kennedy C.S.B.

This is a most readable account of the Synod of the Americas (North, Central, and South) held at Rome in 1997, at which Fr. Neuhaus, editor of the American monthly First Things, was a delegate. He deals with the structure and operation of the synod and reports what was said on many of the topics discussed, such as liberation theology, ecumenism, religious pluralism, the Church's apologies for certain events in the past, social justice, priestly vocations, lay movements, the contrasts between the North (Canada and the United States) and the South (from Mexico to Argentina and Chile), religious communities, and the religious situation in different countries, including Canada. I will refer specifically to these two last items.

Concerning religious communities, he mentions encountering the delegates from the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR) and the Council of Major Superiors of Women Religious. The latter organization, he tells us, "is much smaller than the LCWR but is distinctive in that it is composed of communities that are actually attracting new vocations," and adds: "A number of bishops have been reading the recently published book by Ann Carey, Sisters in Crisis: The Tragic Unraveling of Women's Religious Communities (from Our Sunday Visitor Press). It is a carefully researched, understated, and utterly devastating account of the role of the LCWR and others in getting women religious to follow the lead of progressive theologians in 'renewing' themselves into virtual oblivion... Among [communities] associated with the LCWR, many of the active remnant are among the most aggressively disaffected groups in the Church, and some publicly declare that the vocation of their community is to go out of business."

Concerning the Canadian bishops at the synod, Fr. Neuhaus, who grew up in Canada, says that "they seem to be the only national group that is getting together each night to coordinate their interventions and collectively approve of their texts.... The Canadians speak collectively...."

Bishop Wiesner

Several of the Canadian interventions are as close as the synod comes to what might be called the National Catholic Reporter wing of the Church in the United States....

"Bishop Gerald Wiesner of British Columbia, for example, speaks for the Canadian conference on the question of women in the Church.... His concern is about exclusion, specifically the reservation of the priesthood to men. In Canadian culture, he notes, "any form of exclusion is seen as discrimination" and there is "a common view that all matters are open to discussion...." It is a carefully crafted statement, walking up to an assertion that the magisterium is wrong in saying that it is an infallible teaching that the Church has no authority to ordain women, but stopping just short of saying that. One can, with some effort, resist the inference that the Canadian bishops believe women's ordination should be an open question. The difficulties of those who disagree with Church teaching are very sympathetically depicted by Wiesner.... But Bishop Wiesner has certainly raised eyebrows here with the suggestion that women's ordination is, or should be, an open question. In informal discussions, opinion is divided as to what the Canadians are up to. I hear one or two bishops say that Canadians are courageous for raising forbidden questions, but most seem to be shaking their heads in bemusement.

Bishop Lahey

Here are Fr. Neuhaus' comments on Bishop Lahey of Newfoundland: "'The Gospel is "the good news of great joy for all the people,"' [Bishop Lahey] says. 'This truth, and the positive values people live out in very diverse situations, creates the potential for a "dialogue of salvation" with all of sincere will.' The gospel truth, it seems, is what people accept as joyful news and is in accord with the positive values of people of sincere will, no matter what it is that they sincerely will. That at least is as close as Bishop Lahey, speaking for the Canadian bishops, gets to defining the Gospel that is to be communicated rather than preserved."

Writes Fr. Neuhaus: "Must not the Church, Bishop Lahey asks, reach out to dialogue with 'women...gay and lesbian persons...those concerned about environment and population...those in the New Age movement,' and, not least of all, 'with those who are "pro-choice" and others who struggle with the Church's doctrine that morality is a matter of free, informed choice, in conscience, providing such choice is not destructive.... For the Church,' he says, 'it involves risk; the risk of being unfaithful or being misunderstood. Given the growing marginalization of the Church, however, there is far greater risk in no dialogue.'"

"After this intervention," the author noted, "I assured a synod father that I do not think the Canadian bishops meant to say that marginalization is a greater danger than unfaithfulness, although there is certainly a risk of that misunderstanding."

For Canadians it is useful to note--if they weren't aware of it--that Bishop Wiesner's presentation on women's ordination, and Bishop Lahey's on dialogue with gays and lesbians, represent the collective view of Canada's bishops.

Later, Archbishop Levada of San Francisco, who "no doubt...is responding to the Canadians," asks, "Might not a call for 'dialogue' with women about their concerns, without explicitly saying that, according to our faith, holy orders can be received only by men, run the risk of creating ambiguity or be mistaken for lack of clarity or certitude, thus undermining a genuine evangelical evangelization? . . . If we 'dialogue' about discrimination toward homosexuals, do we not also have to 'evangelize' them about the true meaning of human love and sexuality written in nature and revealed in Christ?"

As explanation for the Canadian attitude, Fr. Neuhaus refers to "the famous niceness of Canadians. One must, above all, give no offence."

Fr. Leonard Kennedy is a priest of the Congregation of St. Basil and a contributing editor of Catholic Insight.