AMERICAN NUNS ON THE MARCH...

NUNS WEIGH RESPONSES TO SCATHING VATICAN REBUKE:  New York Times / Laurie Goodstein.

I have talked at length about American nuns at odds with the Vatican on policy or shall we say doctrinal fundamentals. The nuns respond to and embrace the “signs of the times” or issues of modern life while the Vatican considers modernity a threat and demands a return to the past.

Nuns are also engaged in serving the sick, the poor, children and immigrants and not sitting in thrones deciding issues of theology; the nuns are with the people and on the ground and engaged in the realities of modern life which often do not jive with Vatican rules.

The nuns are also still engaged in Vatican II and its dictum to open the church to the modern world while Pope Benedict wants to cancel what Vatican II tried to do and return to pre-Vatican II times of darkness and obedience.

The nuns are supposed to be obedient and silent and Benedict has dispatched bishops to bring the nuns into line with the thinking of Benedict and not Vatican II.

American nuns are meeting in St. Louis to come up with a response to the Vatican’s call to bishops to overhaul their organization LEADERSHIP CONFERENCE OF WOMEN RELIGIOUS.

Yes, the nuns can bow and accept the bishop’s takeover and leadership of their organization OR they can form a new organization independent of Vatican control…wow…most American Catholics are for the nuns and are cheering them on…and so am I!

The problem the nuns find with the Vatican is that the Vatican regards questioning as defiance. The same thing happened to me during my Catholic education, when I asked questions I was told to shut up because the devil is making me ask those questions; I could never ask, just obey and the nuns are saying no to blind obedience and yes to discussion because discussion is good for the Church and its members.

The Vatican says that the Church must speak with one voice and that is correct but the Church has not found that voice yet and must work with members of the Church to develop that voice and it must be a new voice and not the voice of the past.

That is a problem because the past popes were conservatives and appointed fellow conservatives to positions of power in the Church and unless a progressive pope is elected which is doubtful given that most cardinals are conservatives, the nuns have to take leadership roles into moving the Church into modernity.

I feel that once the nuns resist the pressure from the Vatican, they will be joined by other religious organizations in pressing the Vatican to change or at least produce another John XXIII.

LET THE REVOLUTION BEGIN…IT NEEDS TO BEGIN NOW!