from bathersby's letter to Kennedy from 22 august:

"A Bhuddist statue in a Catholic Church or sanctuary just does not make sense ... However the issue of the statue is only one of improper practice. St. Mary's seems to be an authority to itself. Despite the good that it does, it places itself outside the practice of the Catholic church"

"1. The matter of faith - ... the placing of a Bhuddist statue in a Christian church is extremely confusing"

"2. The matter of liturgy – ... ad hoc decisions ..."

"3. The matter of governance – ... Father Terry Fitzpatrick has never been appointed to St. Mary's ... the refusal to acknowledge any difference between ordained and non-ordained membership"

"4. The matter of authority – The Roman Catholic church has a certain structure which needs to be respected ... my authority is scarcely recognized ... there is no other way of finding Jesus except in the Church ..."

And Bathersby quotes some letter from St. Mary's:

<it is the institutional Church in the modern world, and not St. Mary's, which is out of step with what Jesus taught and the example he set>

Bathersby continues:

"It is precisely here that the problem lies. St. Mary's claims an authority and authenticity that belongs only to the entire Catholic church".

Well. The Catholic church has "authority" over itself, and that's it. It has no moral authority, and no religious authority. They don't own jesus.

And "authenticity"? same thing. yes, the Catholic church is authentically itself: a rule-bound collection of sex-obsessed cultist thugs.

yes, they have every right to police their particular club of outdated, narrow-minded twaddle. so what?

George,
Thomas Hobbes perhaps describes your view on being Catholic quite well. He wrote skeptically on the ‘mysteries of religion’, “… as with wholesome pills for the sick; which swallowed whole, have the virtue to cure; but chewed, are for the most part, cast up again without effect." Today, many people are quite unable to swallow the 'pill' of Roman magisterium, with its Papal infallibility, celibacy doctrine etc. – understandably, most if not all outside of the RC faith will choke on such a pill. Internal dissent is also quite clear - a survey of Catholic opinion on Human Vitae showed eight out of ten Catholics disagreeing with the statement that "using artificial means of birth control is wrong."

I guess the ideological quarrels about how Catholicism should institutionalize itself are becoming extremely irrelevant to such people as those tended to by Father Kennedy – and certainly mere “twaddle” to bushbasher and others. BB makes a point though, Catholics nor anyone else don’t ‘own’ Jesus – ‘ownership’ is generally relegated to something quite iconic and empty for those in search of meaning or significance.

For the ultraconservative RC’s, Vatican II was a fundamental mistake that needs to be reversed at least back to Vatican I, if not Trent. The underlying theme of the radicals is antiauthoritarianism - a democratic church would effect needed change. The right fringe creates its own pope - the left fringe replaces a pope with a vote. I don’t think either has the answer…

SJF,
Your comments are perhaps an accurate reflection of a doctrinal stance within medieval Christianity (Augustine, Aquinas etc.) – but Papal infallibility has a caveat, Ratzinger calls it a “development in doctrine.” John Paul, in 1999, said the death penalty is “both cruel and unnecessary.” Human life must not be taken away “even in case of someone who has done great evil.” This approach was evident in RC officialdom to the Iraq war – “…top Vatican officials are unleashing a barrage of condemnations of a possible U.S. military strike on Iraq, calling it immoral, risky and a "crime against peace." (FoxNews,2003)

relda,
thank you for your interesting post. Since I do not remember having presented my "view of being Catholic" I must assume that this is your view which, I have to admit, unfortunately reflects how some Catholics often see themselves. Except that I did not understand the relevance of Papal fallibility, celibacy and Humanae Vitae to the case of Fr. Kennedy but that is probably because I know about this case only what was written in the article.

Yes, Catholics differ from other Christians in that they believe that Jesus "commissioned" Peter to found and lead a particular Church, and that the Popes have been Peter's successors. This - rightly or wrongly - is an essential part of Catholic identity - not something that would be an indivisible part of Christian identity - and I would not want to defend it on theological or historical grounds. Nevertheless, I agree that the Archbishop should not have written that "there is no other way of finding Jesus except in the Catholic Church" because it not only smacks of pre-Vatican II supremacism, but is also irrelevant to this case since Father Kennedy's disloyalty apparently concerned only liturgical insubordination.

I agree that the internal tension between the two extremes of Catholicism - conservative as in your Hobbes quote, and outright rebellion leading to complete loss of identity - is irrelevant to outsiders or those who seek in the Church only comfort, be it material (charity) or psychological (spiritual). For instance in Germany, as you know, there are two established Christian Churches represented in the population by roughly equal numbers. Much of what the impatient reformers or radicals request from the Catholic Church has already been met in the Lutheran Church a while ago. Nevertheless, both the Churches are loosing membership in about equal rates to secular humanists (atheists) and emotional-fundamentalist Evangelicals that I mentioned in my previous post. So the Catholic dilemma is not as simple as outsiders, as well as insiders on both ends of the “being Catholic” spectrum, would want to see it.

I read stories like this and am thankful to be an atheist.

The Christian faith could do worse than embrace the idea of a People's Church that allowed parishioners to find the 'light of God' (similar to the Quakers) in the fellowship of others.

No judgements, no creed, no obsessive doctrines/rituals, no argument about which texts are genuine, whose version of God is genuine and a Church that encourages parishioners to speak should the spirit move them. How many Gods and sons of Gods are manifested within Christianity? To an atheist the lack of homogeneity within Christianity (or Islam, Bhuddism etal) is not a good nor unifying force. But I guess we do not live in a perfect world!

Surely these issues would only be of interest to man than to any God or supernatural being (if one such exalted being were to exist).

Pelican; as an atheist, you should be aware that Buddhism is precisely that- atheist!.
Therefore, it is unreasonable to expect Buddhists to show homogeneity with any religion.
This is because Buddhism is not a religion - it is a lifestyle built on philosophy, psychology and spirituality.
Buddhists do not accept any divine "being", but follow Buddha's teaching that every individual is answerable only to him or her self- that one is singularly responsible for the effect of one's words, thoughts and actions (karma).
The attendance of Buddhists at St.Mary's and the placing of Buddha statues there could be what worries the right wing of the Catholic Church; the idea of an individual taking total responsibility for moral behaviour, not having to cower in the face of doctrinal "authority".

Just to clear up my own position here:

I have absolutely nothing against what Kennedy is doing. His community is building bridges and helping the community in extraordinary ways. The only issue is that it is not Catholic. Note, though, that helping the community is not the "uncatholic" activity I'm referring to. Despite claims to the contrary in earlier posts, the Catholic Church does contribute to the community in a huge way, both locally and internationally. Rosies, St Vinnies, Caritas and many other benevolent organisations are the products of Catholic work. And Kennedy's work is invaluable. Back in my high school days, we went on an excursion to Saint Mary's and what we saw was a very strong, very noble community that was somewhat unorthodox. They were very impressive then.

The issue is that he has strayed from the Catholic way of doing things. This is neither good nor bad - it works for his community and certainly he should be applauded for that. But if he doesn't want to play by Catholic rules, then the Catholic Church shouldn't be expected to continue to pay for his upkeep. He has denounced the Pope as a "tyrant" which is decidedly uncatholic - my question is, how can he continue to be a leader in a Church he is so set on undermining? Perhaps, before he loses any credibility or wears his parishioners down, he should accept that his congregation lies outside the bounds of the Catholic Church and continue doing his work elsewhere.

Before you go and holler at me about the word "credibility", by the way, take a look at the man's public outbursts. Even he has retracted the label of "scab" that he cast upon the Church-appointed administrator. He said he looked the word up in the dictionary and discovered that the man was, after all, not a scab. Interesting.