“You have the words of eternal
life. We have come to believe and are
convinced that you are the Holy One of God.”
Peter’s response to Jesus in today’s Gospel reading (John 6:60-69)
encapsulates the central teaching of our Catholic Christian faith.
As
the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America recently voted to allow individual parishes
to decide whether to call non-celibate homosexuals to the pulpit, Michael Perry
asks “What does the ELCA get that, say, the magisterium doesn’t? Or vice versa?”
I'll leave it to others to more directly address the theology of the body that underlies the Magisterium’s
teaching on sexual morality. Instead, I wonder whether one possible answer lies in the Catholic Church's general integrity in proclaiming the
Deposit of the Faith left by Christ By “integrity”
here, I mean not not so much soundness and candor (although those are vital as well) but a sense of cohesion and
completeness. When the Catholic Church teaches
about morality, including a proper attitude toward the body and the gift of
sexuality, that teaching cannot be divorced from the Church’s robust theology and
understanding of Christ.
Might
a departure from traditional Christian teaching on sexual morality set the stage
for a broader dis-integration, not only of church structure and world-wide
communion, but of basic Christian doctrine?
In this regard, the example of the Episcopal Church in the United States
should be sobering. Others have written widely about how the Episcopal Church has lost nearly half of its membership and now risks being separated from the larger Anglican communion, especially in Africa and Asia. But I mean to emphasize something different here, the attendant dilution and adulteration of Christian doctrine. As a former
Episcopalian, I speak from personal experience about how something that was portrayed as
but a single issue that could be discretely addressed instead proved to be the first step on an ever longer
journey away from that Deposit of Faith. It remains to be seen whether the ELCA will follow that same path.
In
the general news media, and often for the typical Episcopalian in the pews, the
great debate inside the Episcopal Church has been understood as a focused division about
homosexuality among a group of fellow believers who otherwise stand largely in agreement on the basic theology and canons of the Episcopal Church. That simply was not and is not the case. Perhaps in theory, and certainly in the minds
of some Episcopalians, a person could be orthodox in Christian faith generally
and yet support recognition of committed same-sex unions. But the active vanguard of the liberal
movement in the Episcopal Church has hardly been limited to the matter of gay rights in its general
desire to remake and redefine that denomination.
Within the Episcopal Church, those who took the leading role in challenging traditional church teaching on homosexuality tended to be quite liberal, even
radical, in their thinking about moral questions and theology generally.
Leading gay priests have published books, not only advocating the full inclusion
of gays in the church, but further insisting that monogamy was unrealistic and should not
be expected of gays. Indeed, monogamy in general
gets little respect in the Episcopal Church today. Divorced and remarried priests are common. In fact, multiple divorces and
remarriages, even for a bishop, are no bar to leadership in liberal
Episcopal dioceses and parishes. In effect, a form of serial
polygamy enjoys growing tolerance in the Episcopal Church. Having retreated from expectations of fidelity to monogamy among adults, the Episcopal Church not surprisingly has been in no
a position to teach sexual morality to young people. Instead, church leaders often trot out the “safe
sex” canard that dominates non-religious discussions, largely defaulting to secularized approaches to the matter.
In addition, while there are exceptions, support
for embracing same-sex sexuality has tended to go hand-in-hand
with support for abortion. Reversing traditional
Episcopal positions on legal protection of unborn human life, the formal
General Convention resolution in place today expresses “unequivocal opposition”
to any executive, legislative, or judicial limitation on access to
abortion. The division in voting among the delegates on abortion and gay rights resolutions tend to be parallel. The new Dean of the Episcopal
Divinity School, a lesbian and leader in the gay rights movement, is also a
board member of NARAL Pro-Choice and most notoriously has described “abortion as a
blessing.”
Importantly, along
with moral teaching, Christian theology is being subjected to ongoing post-modern revision inside the Episcopal Church (or at least those dioceses most aligned with the national church). In liberal Episcopal venues, the death of
Christ on the cross as a propitiation for our sins often is seen as
an embarrassment to be quietly neglected or openly denigrated as retrograde. Liberal Episcopal seminary teachers, priests, and
bishops regard the
resurrection of Christ as nothing more than a mythical message of hope, not as a
factual description of an empty tomb. The Nicene Creed is re-interpreted, so that its statements of the faith are watered-down into allegory and symbol, bearing little of their traditional meaning.
In
liberal Episcopalian re-imaging, Jesus is left to molder in an abandoned grave,
while Peter’s response to Jesus in today’s Gospel – that Jesus has “the words
of eternal life” and is“the Holy One of God” – becomes unthinkable. Even if Jesus was touched by holiness, he is
demoted to one spiritual guru among many from many different religions and cultures, all of which
are equally viable paths to God. And with the most recent 2009 General Convention of the Episcopal Church, that liberal wing plainly is in the driver's seat. No
wonder that many fear the Episcopal Church could be moving into a Post-Christian Era.
Will the Evangelical
Lutheran Church in America be able to avoid the same fate as the Episcopal
Church, not only by averting a break-up of the
denomination, but by resisting the disintegration of Christian teaching? Is it possible to pluck out one thread from millennia of Christian teaching on sexual morality without starting to unravel
the entire doctrinal garment?
Greg Sisk
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Michael Scaperlanda’s sobering reminder of the fleeting nature of life was poignantly timely for me. I have been thinking along similar lines over the past couple of days. For me, this increased awareness of mortality began with a comedic error that prematurely announced my passing. But the episode has also unsettled me, forcing a pause in my daily routines and challenging my assumptions that there will always be another day.
Although I grew up in Wisconsin (until half-way through my junior year), I actually graduated from Beaverhead County High School in Dillon, Montana. Yesterday, I happened to send a greeting by email to an old friend from my Montana high school days with whom I hadn’t corresponded in a few years. To say that he was “shocked, shocked” to hear from me would be an understatement. To explain the source of his astonishment, he referred me to a classmates update booklet that had been distributed at the 30-year high school reunion held last summer in Dillon. (I had not been invited to the reunion – and now I guess I know why).
As you can see in the picture posted immediately below, the second page of the reunion booklet displays my old high school yearbook picture as part of a memorial to “Our Departed Classmates.” (And, yes, that is an accurate depiction of how I looked in high school in 1978 – in fact,I had cut my hair short for graduation picture day).
After confirming this was not a practical joke, I learned that the reunion committee had received a confidently-expressed report that I had passed away. Indeed, I was told that several stories circulated at the reunion about the cause of my death. I wish that those stories of my death had been about how I had dived into a raging river to save drowning children or how I had rushed into a burning building to rescue a trapped person. Instead, as I gather, the story with the most legs was that I had died several years ago after a massive asthma attack. Given that I’ve never had asthma and remain pretty healthy (although I sure could lose a few pounds), I have no idea where or how this tale originated.
At first, I saw only the humor in the affair. After all, it allowed me to dust off that classic Mark Twain gem: “The rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated.” The incident also prompted me to touch base with a few others from my Montana days. (And I’m pleased to say that they all were delighted to learn that I remained in the Land of the Living – or at least they were kind enough to say so.)
Later, however, I found myself feeling a little disturbed, even queasy about, this episode. It is more than passing strange to realize that, for almost a year, dozens of people have been thinking of me only in the past tense. And reading the reunion booklet was a little like reading one’s own obituary. (In addition to my portrait appearing on the memorial page, the booklet lists all classmates in alphabetical order with information about their jobs, families, and lives. The listing for me reads simply “DECEASED.”) It was all starting to become a little creepy.
As Michael well says, we should never forget the “fleeting nature” of our own lives and must come to terms with the fact that, in only a century, little trace is likely to remain of us. As a group of legal professionals and academics whose vocation is to work toward a better world and a stronger society, we are called to think about and plan for the future. But we should also remember to live for today, never missing the daily opportunities to care for the most importantthings in our lives, that is,the people around us. We were never promised an unlimited store of tomorrows. Even if it was premature in my case on this occasion, we all someday will be the subject of a picture on a memorial page or in an obituary.
Is it morbid to think along these lines? It certainly can be. And I am not suggesting that we dwell on our inevitable demise (although I could hardly avoid it these past couple of days). Instead, even as we rely upon the promise that death is not the end, we should we recall our mortality for the very purpose of making our days count and for strengthening our daily communion with those brought into our lives.
Greg Sisk
Thursday, March 5, 2009
In the hope that my words might help to clarify the nature and dimensions of the dispute playing itself out on the Mirror of Justice, let me offer a parable about politics and political relationships that might help us understand why principled passions may flare and to think about how to define the appropriate boundaries of political positions and affiliations that all faithful Catholics might recognize.
There once were three professing Catholic candidates running for mayor of a city:
Candidate A campaigned on an anti-pornography platform, pledging to devote her tenure as mayor to ridding the city of adult book and video stores.
The other two candidates both stated that they were firmly opposed to censorship on freedom of speech grounds and thus would not use the power of city government to close adult establishments.
Candidate B insisted that he was personally offended by pornography and fully accepted Church teaching on the harms of pornography, but explained that he had concluded that direct censorship was too dangerous for a free society.
Candidate C, while occasionally saying that he too was offended by pornography, was nonetheless willing to speak at the adult film convention, knowingly accepted campaign contributions from the pornography industry, hosted a reception for a well-known pornographer, and opposed even limited regulations on pornography (such as those designed to protect children against inadvertent access to adult material).
Faithful Catholics in that city were divided on how to respond to two of the candidates.
Some argued that the only justifiable position for Catholics was to adamantly resist the evil of pornography. They contended that a good Catholic should, even perhaps must, support Candidate A.
Other Catholics reasoned that, while they may be troubled by Candidate B’s unwillingness to take on the scourge of pornography, his position on other important issues facing the community made him a preferable choice to Candidate A.
A few Catholics even believed that, unlike other evils posing such grave harm as abortion or racism, Church teaching did not demand a single legal answer to every question about pornography. These Catholics concluded that Candidate B’s position was not only tolerable, was not only outweighed by his commendable views on other important issues, but was acceptable on its own merits. (As full disclosure here, I myself have been something of a free speech absolutist in the past, falling into what would be Candidate B’s camp on this issue. Although more troubled about aspects of that position today, I have not yet thought through any change to my longstanding position.)
But Catholics in that city were not without common ground. Everyone agreed that Candidate C was unacceptable. Candidate C’s conduct in knowingly affiliating with purveyors of pornography was shocking and outrageous. By embracing the pornography industry through speaking engagements, campaign contributions, and personal contacts, as well as taking extreme positions on the pornography question, Candidate C had moved beyond the pale and could no longer make any legitimate claim on the support of Catholics concerned for the common good of that society. Surely, all could agree, a professing Catholic who was not merely reluctant to use the force of law to control the dehumanizing and obscene depictions of pornography, but who actually embraced those engaged in production of that filth had thereby disqualified himself from public office.
Now I hasten to acknowledge that the Catholic supporters of Governor Sibelius’s nomination to be Secretary of Health and Human Services would insist that her political conduct and affiliations with respect to the subject of abortion (and abortionists) are not factually parallel to and thus are not captured by the parable I have told. But that should be the crux of the debate, then, shouldn’t it?
Has Governor Sibelius lent her voice as a speaker at abortion industry events? Has she knowingly accepted (and even solicited) campaign funds, not merely from pro-choice political groups, but from abortionists or abortion industry funds? Is she fairly and morally held accountable for the hosting of a reception, together with apparently jovial photo sessions, for a man who is the most notorious late-term abortionist (nothing short of infanticide) in the nation?
If we were able to come to a point of agreement on what the facts are (and perhaps we cannot), wouldn’t we have to come to common point of evaluation of the moral significance of those facts? And, if not, then what remains of the Catholic witness for the sanctity of human life?
Greg Sisk
