FIDDLING ON THE TITANIC OR SINGING ON THE ARK?

I have been reading the admirable French daily La Croix’s decennial survey of the state of the French Catholic church and its presumed development over the next ten years. It is dire, of course: the number of baptisms is falling, the number of committed lay persons is falling, the number of those calling themselves Catholic is falling, and the number of vocations is plunging.

The suggested remedies are many, various, energetic and coming from all over. They include foreign priests, more work by the laity, reorganising dioceses, etcetera. And yet there is a vast and dense silence on a number of possibilities that instantly suggest themselves to a non-Roman-Catholic.

In the first place, married priests. Admittedly, that would prove complicated in terms of salaries, pensions, and adaptability to movement. But it would instantly augment the number of vocations, and in the face of 450 years of Anglican experience it is impossible to maintain that married men make less good parish clergy. To do the Pope justice, he did recently tell a bishop from Amazonia that the church would not exclude the consecration of viri probati, “proven” married men. But only in such extreme cases.

Secondly, women priests. This would double the pool of vocations if not triple it. And again, as the Anglicans are discovering, women make excellent priests.

Thirdly, a conservative redefinition of celibacy. Conservative in the sense of going back to medieval practice. Celibacy should mean not living in the context of a marriage and a family, and thus being available on a permanent basis. It should not mean giving up all sexual relations for the rest of one’s life. That is a great deal to ask of young males: and such a demand may be fine when there are many – in ages where priesthood confers status, education, and security --, but it should be completely reconsidered when the flood of vocations is reduced to a trickle.

Fourthly, the possibility of couples, straight or gay, both serving as priests, perhaps in the same parish or neighbouring parishes.  

Pope Francis memorably said, a year or so ago, that it would be wonderful if the Church could stop thinking about sex all the time. Notice that all the solutions I’ve mentioned as not being discussed or (publicly) envisaged have to do with sex.

As for the dwindling of the laity, I have long suspected that it had something to do with the Church’s (no: the churches’) relentless “updating” and “modernizing” of their habitus. And I notice that all the suggested remedies in the La Croix issue go in the same direction.

If each diocese decided to have a number of churches where a traditional liturgy was used – and not only at 8 a.m. -- , these might stop the drifting away, or the not turning up, of those whose faith is best served by a liturgy of reverence, of formal beauty, and of some distance. At the moment, such believers are faced with the choice of either post-Vatican II liturgical chumminess or Lefebvrist theological archaism. An unfair choice, that I’m sure alienates a larger number of the faithful than the Church realizes.

Finally, a number of French dioceses are moving in the direction of laymen getting together for church services without a priest. I have attended one or two of those, and they are embarrassing in their lack of direction and form. Once again, if there were more contact between French Catholics and Anglicans, the latter could suggest a translated version (which exists already) of their Prayer-Book Matins and Evensong services (minus the prayers for the Royal Family), which would meet the case admirably. This would also mean going back to an earlier conception of Communion, or Mass, as an occasional, say monthly, liturgical high point; something the Reformation instituted but has been moving away from.

In a time when the seas are rising, Christians should reflect on the nature and course of the ship they are manning. Are we bound for an iceberg or for Ararat?

ANGLICANS, ROME, AND SEX

A couple of years ago, a group of Anglican priests went over to Rome to join something called the Ordinariate, created especially for them. I was asked what I thought of the matter, and of the reasons for their going, and of Anglican positions thereon. So I put up the following on my old blog. I repeat it now because, with a change of Popes, there are new urgings for Rome to change on some issues, and the old arguments still hold. 

[Spoiler alert: those whose hackles rise at the word or concept "religion" should read no further, while those who feel that women priests are an abomination probably should.]

In my French Catholic newspaper La Croix, the news that five Anglican Bishops had joined the Church of Rome was given a half-page spread, complete with photograph of the ceremony with the five 'flying bishops' prostrate before the altar in Westminster Cathedral.

There had been a few previous mentions of the Anglican Ordinariate proposed by the Vatican, and the rumblings within the Church of England; but by and large Anglican matters are not much reported across the Channel.

What caught my eye was a little sidebar explaining that the bishops in question, and indeed any other Anglican priest following their example, would have to be re-ordained according to the Roman rite, as Pope Paul IV had declared Anglican sacraments null in 1555 and this had been upheld by Pope Leo XIII in 1896. A Belgian canonist, interviewed on the subject, explained with what seemed like faint embarrassment that this was a purely juridical matter, and that in an ecumenical context Anglican sacraments were of course respected.

And all this, I reflected, not for the first time, took place not because of the Filioque clause, nor because of the Real Presence, nor Ubiquitarianism nor even Utraquism. No, like most current controversies in the Anglican Communion, it is about what we used to call sex and now call gender.

For good and sufficient family reasons, this is not a question I have been able to shirk, and I have many and complex thoughts and feelings on the matter. However, what bothers me is that the public -- and even, I believe, the Anglican public -- is at no time being offered reasoning on the subject at any level that goes beyond the social and the political. The prevailing impression is that since we live in an age where women need to fulfil themselves and society is finally catching up with their justified ambitions, ordaining women priests and bishops is simply in tune with the time.

The result is that those who do not agree can revel in provocative curmudgeonhood and flashily defect to Rome, in the hope of being seen as new Newmans. That their priesthood is not recognised appears not to faze them, though I suspect it must give them second thoughts.

But the Church of England's response to all this has been sadly lacking in theological muscle, confirming many suspicions that its theology is driven by social and political pressures as reflected by the media.

What might the Church of England have done, and what might it still do, to dispel such an impression?

There is a concept, originating in Stoic philosophy but very much revived and developed in Reformed Christianity (especially by Melanchthon), that fits the situation admirably. Here is what the Church of England might, and in my view should, say loudly and clearly to Rome:

'We should like to remind you of the concept of adiaphora, those things which may form part of Christian practice and Christian life, and even of Christian liturgy,  but which are not essential to the Christian's faith in God. Definition of these has differed, and changed, in various times and places. Some Presbyterians, for example, believed that since hymns are not mentioned in Scripture and are not an immediate serious consequence of Scripture, they should not be allowed; but most Presbyterians regard hymns as adiaphora. Most Catholics regard the wearing or not wearing of a biretta by the priest as such.

'We, the Church of England, have decided, after ripe reflection, that the sex of the priest is an adiaphoron, i.e. a non-essential element of the Christian faith. And if you, the Church of Rome, maintain that the sex of the priest is an element essential to the Christian's faith in God, we challenge you to provide the reasons and we are willing to debate this in any venue of your choice.'

To the argument that Jesus entrusted the care of his followers only to men, the answer might invoke other aspects of the Gospel and its world that the Roman Church has not seen fit to perpetuate as essential elements of the faith -- it does not require a council of twelve to oversee the whole Church, it does not insist that the Supreme Pontiff be chosen from among fishermen, nor does it encourage him to dine with hookers and confidence-tricksters -- not to mention 'essential' elements -- dogmata -- not found in Scripture, such as the Perpetual Virginity, (traditional but reaffirmed by Vatican II), Immaculate Conception (1854) and Assumption (1950) of Mary. 

Agreement, clearly, would not be reached; but the disagreement might then be pursued on a higher level, i.e. that of the theology of dogma and adiaphora. It would give new topicality to the old rule 'In necessariis unitas, in non necessariis libertas, in utrisque caritas'; and it would permit the Church of England to provide its lay members with serious arguments which would allow, indeed urge, them to make choices upon considerations other than those of society, politics, and Zeitgeist.