via phoebeofthesea @ flickr
Technically, this is yesterday’s news, but for anyone who hasn’t yet heard, the Vatican is ratcheting up its scrutiny of nuns here in the United States. The New York Times had a fairly comprehensive article on the subject yesterday, and while I wish I had been able to tackle it before this afternoon, here are my (slightly belated) thoughts:
- The number of nuns in America has been steadily dropping over the past few decades. This “doctrinal inquisition,” as the article terms it, is probably not going to help turn that around anytime soon.
- “The visitation focuses only on nuns actively engaged in working in society and the church, not cloistered, contemplative nuns.” In other words, the Church is only alarmed by those women who are not cloistered and who dare to actually try and help the communities they’re living in. They could be spreading dangerous womanly ideas! But no worries about priests (or monks) who are doing the same thing. Being a nun does not equal being a hermit — at least, it shouldn’t.
- I would think there are a few other active issues that might get priority over whatever “renegade” tendencies these sisters may have. Last I heard, sex abuse hadn’t been eradicated from the clergy and I’m sure that’s more deserving of apostolic visitations.
- One of the organizations being investigated is The Leadership Conference of Women Religious, a probe which is the result of:
“[A] letter to the Leadership Conference saying an investigation was warranted because it appeared that the organization had done little since it was warned eight years ago that it had failed to “promote” the church’s teachings on three issues: the male-only priesthood, homosexuality and the primacy of the Roman Catholic Church as the means to salvation.
How much “promotion” needs to be done on those issues? They seem pretty self-evident as far as current doctrinal certainties within the Catholic Church. Those are three of the first things this Harpy — a former theology major — learned when she started reading about Catholicism. Of course, the male-only priesthood and the belief that homosexuality is a sin are two of the biggest patriarchal bugaboos, and the fear that they are not being actively touted, especially by women, probably does scare the Church a lot more than some other, more pressing issues.
- Finally, nuns are not the only people within the Church who may choose to agitate for change. But they are women. The only time I can recall any kind of wide-scale scrutiny of male members of the Church is when it was part of pedophilia investigations, and not because of any perceived doctrinal missteps. In other words, when the Church’s sisters get out of line with their words and deeds, it becomes a Very Big Deal that must be investigated. If the Church’s fathers or brothers get out of line, it’ll be ignored and/or swept under the rug as quickly as possible. It’s enough to make me want to rap the Church’s knuckles with a very stiff ruler.
I think this story is fascinating. I’m Jewish, so I can only comment as a spectator, but my sense is that nuns are pretty tough cookies as a whole. A number of years ago I was one of a group of 3 women who went around doing interfaith talks. My companions were a Muslim businesswoman and a nun who was a staffer at a local Catholic-run women’s college. Ellie, the nun, liked to stir it up in front of Catholic groups. She would talk about how nuns should be able to be ordained as priests and how priests should be allowed to marry since their world view was warped from their abstinence. When she did this, I’d sort of shift to the side. I figured this was not a good place for a Jew to be.
I suspect the Pope is going to be sorry he started this.
Oh my gosh, they’re going to scrutinize all ten of them?
My mother had five aunts and four of them became nuns. I’m glad they’re all dead because this kind of bullshit would have killed them!
The were not cloistered but in fact were and continue to be remarkably involved in society. The website for the convent has sections on social justice and caring for the earth for God’s sake! I wish that American catholics would form their own denomination and tell the pope to suck it!
Oops, I wanted to post a link to their site and forgot.
The Dominican sisters of Blauvelt
http://www.opblauvelt.org/
@Aftercancer: Thanks for the link!
@mischiefmanager: I confess I always liked the idea of being a cloistered nun as a child, but there was always that whole atheism thing standing in the way. Also, my Jewish mother would probably be shocked into an early grave.
As for the Pope ruing the decision, Benedict doesn’t seem like the kind of guy who has much use for regrets.
Oh, and I meant to observe that at the clinics at which I have escorted, rarely have I seen a nun, at least one in a habit. But priests are a dime a dozen. I’m sure it’s just a coincidence.
And yeah, SOALG, if he’s not sorry about the whole Nazi thing, he’s not familiar with the concept.
Not to defend him, but I suspect this actually is rather consistent with his past focus on doctrinal conformity. IIRC, when he was head of the Inquisition, he made stamping out liberation-theology a big priority (and that was often male priests). But yeah – consistency in pursuit of iniquity is hardly a virtue.
I agree – in my life (including 9 years of Catholic schooling), nuns have been the most accessible, warmhearted people in the Catholic hierarchy. It surprised me to see that the nun conducting this investigation is from the same order that my teachers in grade school and junior high were.
Maybe it shouldn’t have, since they were one of the few orders left who wore habits and a few of my teachers were vocally anti-choice, but I remember them as being very committed to calling out sexism in the media. The same nun who had us make luminaria for an anti-choice demonstration in our town square also decried the message of the movie Grease, which was experiencing a revival when I was in junior high in the late 1990s (the message being that girls should change for a boy so they can keep him by any means necessary). I don’t know. It’s a small example, but it wasn’t rare. This upsets me more than I thought it would.
It’s so irritating that this Vatican, and even to a certain extent the last one, seems to have entirely given up on the unfinished goals of Vatican II. Like all attempts at orthodoxy, this one picks and chooses which church teachings it deems worthy of enforcement.
As x. trapnel points out, this is part of a much longer history, stretching back as early as the first century, of church efforts to control female religious life. Many of the disciplined of course later being recognized as saints. To be fair they also discipline radical male religious, but that doesn’t erase the gendered aspect of what is happening here. Though the investigator is a woman thank goodness, the male supremacist nature of the Vatican means this practice is inherently a sexist exercise in the male gaze and baldly patriarchal control of womens spiritual life. It’s sad that the Vatican and in particular Benedict can’t see how deeply their institutional misogyny poisons and corrupts even legitimate uses of power.
Can I also just give a huge shout out to all the harpies; for a quartet of godless heathens you guys give great coverage and respect to religious women.
@x. trapnel: Oh yeah, there is (unfortunately) a long trail of precedent for this. And Benedict XIV is one of the most rigid-minded Popes in the past hundred years, with echoes back to Pius XII.
@J.D. You’re too kind. I love writing about religion. My own spiritual views are a bit in flux right now, and covering women of faith is definitely something that I find to be intellectually challenging in the best way.
Sarah, to me one of the beautiful things about belonging to a religion that has saints is that in times when my own mind can’t be trusted, or I don’t know where I am, I just turn to their lives, their struggles and doubt, and am inspired to be patient with my own path. If I only look to divine persons for inspiration it’s pretty easy to get discouraged. I love the messy realities of holy people so much more. After all as some wise man said, it doesn’t take an angel to be a saint.
Not that all nuns are saints. I’m just saying.