U.S. Nun Group Rejects Vatican Condemnation - AFP/RawStory

[WillyT]

U.S. nun group rejects Vatican condemnation
By Agence France-Presse/RawStory
Saturday, April 21, 2012 16:40 EDT

<snip>

The leader of a group of US Catholic nuns on Saturday rejected condemnation from a Vatican report that said it defied Church doctrine. “We haven’t violated any teaching,” Sister Simone Campbell, executive director of Network, a Catholic social justice lobby, told AFP, insisting the group would not stop “caring for the least among us on the margins of society.”

Network was singled out for supporting women’s health rights in aVatican report this week condemning the main US association ofCatholic nuns, the Leadership Conference of Women Religious(LCWR). The three-year inquiry by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which oversees Roman Catholic doctrine, criticized the LCWR for taking liberal stances on contraception, homosexuality and female priests.

Campbell said that Network, which works with the LCWR and vocally supported President Barack Obama’s healthcare reform legislation, would not shy away from its mission, calling theVatican’s report “painful,” and also puzzling.

“It was a total shock for many reasons, no one talked to us” during the inquiry, Campbell said. “We are a political, not doctrinal, organization: we don’t teach theology.” The LCWR has also said it was “stunned” by the report, which pointed to “serious doctrinal problems” and “unacceptable positions” on a range of issues.

The report accused members of the LCWR, which represents around 80 percent of the 45,000 nuns in the United States, of “corporate dissent” with the Church’s teachings against homosexuality, and claimed it was pursuing “radical feminist themes.”

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More: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/04/21/u-s-nun-group-rejects-vatican-condemnation/

“corporate dissent” ???

[Fresh_Start]

1. Wonderful strong women

Sister Campbell said this is all about a "clash of cultures" within the church. The male leaders live in a monarchy, while for decades, good sisters have lived in the real world, pursuing democratic principles in their service to the poor and their exploration of the new.
....

"Where was Jesus?" she asked. "Jesus was with the poor, with the marginalized, with the outcasts."

"God did not make mistakes," said France White, who told me she believes people ought to be able to express their love for each other regardless of sexual orientation. As for birth control, she opined that "the methods the church says are acceptable don't work."

Boy, she's out there now, but White's conscience is free. She suggested the pope and his minions could have saved a lot of time and trouble if, before investigating and trying to control so many devoted, hard-working nuns, they had asked themselves: "What would Jesus do?"


http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-lopez-nuns-20120422,0,7617042.column

[caraher]

2. I think the phrase "corporate dissent" means the nuns dissent as a single "body"

as opposed to it being an individual thing. From a completely different document:

Responsible dissent begins as an act of conscience and continues as part of a committed life in the Church. It is not habitual but arises in particular instances out of concern for the truth. It requires a certain discipline in order to be done well. The value guiding it in all cases should be the common good. Differing with institutional authorities in the Church must always be for the Church, for the present and future growth of the whole community in truth and love. With that controlling value in place, several discrete norms shape individual and corporate dissent.

[MADem]

3. I think these nuns ought to team up with some of the defrocked priests who wanted to get married

and establish an American Catholic Church. It would be a modern church that would welcome married priests, women priests, gay priests--and it would appeal to a vast majority of the people who were once associated with the Catholic church but who have fallen away because they are right wing batshit crazy these days---none of that "Going My Way" shit like the good old days!

There are a number of Catholic churches in the world, and they all do not answer to Rome. I think it's past time for a divorce between the Catholics of America and the nefarious influence of the Roman Catholic hierarchy. There are plenty of churches on the real estate market, too--the Catholics are jettisoning them to pay for the sex scandals.

I'd bet that the "Catholics Come Home" effort would work a treat if Pope Bennie was taken out of the equation as "infallible."

Many other branches of Catholicism look at the Pope as "a" religious leader, not "the" religious leader, and they do not regard him as infallible. He's just one asshole with an opinion, and they can agree, disagree, or say "Eh--whatever."

I think they should fire this shit up in the big Catholic cities--NY, Boston, Chicago, etc., and see how it rolls. I'll bet they'd give Rome a huge run for their money.