Bishop Geoffrey Robinson has certainly been generating plenty of media coverage from his speaking tour in North America. Our colleagues, Ted Schmidt and John Quinn at New Catholic Times Sensus Fidelium in Toronto, Canada, report that the Archbishop of Toronto has now attempted to obstruct Bishop Robinson from speaking in his Archdiocese. Bishop Robinson is persisting though in his quest to have the issues of power and sex discussed openly and sensibly in the Church. These articles by the editor of New Catholic Times, Ted Schmidt, and John Quinn is how they are reporting the developments in Canada. This is the first of a regular exchange of commentaries we hope to bring Catholica readers from New Catholic Times. Catholica readers might also be interested in how National Catholic Reporter covered the first of Bishop Robinson's addresses in the United States. The NCR report can be found HERE. NCR also carries a report HERE of Bishop Robinson being presented with an award from Voice of the Faithful for priestly integrity.

How Bishop Robinson's talk is being promoted in Canada…

The Western Catholic world is all abuzz with L'affaire Robinson. The prestigious London Tablet and America's National Catholic Reporter as well as our own Canadian paper newcatholictimes:sensus fidelium and Catholica have all made it their lead stories in the last two weeks.

Fr. Ron Trojcak

The story is this. Bishop Geoffrey Robinson a recently retired auxiliary bishop in Sydney Australia has written a Catholic best seller, here and in Australia. The title is self-explanatory: Confronting Power and Sex in the Catholic Church: Reclaiming the Spirit of Jesus.

Fr. Ron Trojcak of King's College, University of Western Ontario in a review in our paper says this about the book: "Bishop Geoffrey Robinson is a member of the Church's 'old boys' club,' Second, his status as former auxiliary is the reason he wrote the book. But here is some additional information: he is a canon lawyer; he was considered to be the intellectual 'star' of the Australian hierarchy, and finally, he headed the commission 'overseeing' the matter of clerical pedophilia for the Australian bishops. He resigned his post as auxiliary bishop as a result of his frustration with, and disappointment over the official response to the pedophilia scandal. The response is reflected in the books title"

Professor Trojcak continues: "Most remarkable, or course, if the book itself. It is an extraordinarily rich compendium including biblical exegesis, spirituality, canon law, Church history and theology, especially ecclesiology, together with a searching analysis of the current state of the Church. And in nothing in the remarkable range of topics, can one find any trace of a dillettantish superficiality. This man is fully in possession of knowledge that is not only wide, but deep. He is anything but a dabbler, and is deeply conscious of the seriousness of the issues he addresses. He has been quoted as saying that he has never felt himself to be so thoroughly as pastor as when writing the book."

Having read the book we thought that we would like to invite Bishop Robinson who is on a North American tour to speak to Toronto area Catholics. He is being welcomed south of the border by among others the Paulist Fathers in Boston and the Jesuits in Fairfield Connecticut. But the welcome mat has been pulled from under him in Toronto (as it was in Los Angeles). Auxiliary bishop Richard Grecco speaking for Archbishop Thomas Collins has let it be known that it would be an embarrassment to the Church to have this fellow bishop in good standing appear in any Catholic venue.

Now the doors have been slammed shut in all Catholic institutions but sadder still ecclesiastical minds have been closed by the Toronto hierarchy proving that the "ice age" of Pope John Paul ll Catholicism is still with us. The dialogue championed by popes John XXlll and Paul Vl have become tired monologues which deeply insult the intelligence and integrity of the broader Catholic church.

Luckily the clerical caste is but a very minor part of the Catholic Church, so we offering hospitality to Bishop Robinson at the United Church theologate of Emmanuel College, 75 Queens Park Circle (Museum subway) at 2 P.M. next Sunday June 1. All are welcome to come and dialogue with Bishop Robinson.

Ted Schmidt
Editor
New Catholic Times Sensus Fidelium
www.newcatholictimes.com

John Quinn's report of the Symposium at Temple University with Bishop Robinson…

The audience at Anderson Hall

One of the advantages of so-called-retirement is to be able to pick up and go. On Friday May 16th I drove to Philadelphia to attend the Symposium: Rebuilding The Catholic Church at Anderson Hall, Temple University. This was the first stop on Bishop Geoffrey Robinson's speaking tour of America and Canada.

The event was organised by Voice of the Faithful, Call to Action and The Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church (ARCC). The weekend was full, challenging, invigorating and Catholic.

Bishop Robinson began the proceedings by suggesting that an adequate response to the revelation of sexual abuse within the Catholic Church will require three things:

• A study of the more immediate causes of abuse, in particular the coming together of unhealthy psychology, unhealthy ideas and unhealthy living conditions.
• A study of the institutional causes of the poor response by many leaders
• A study of all aspects of power and sex in the church.

Despite the fear seen in the letters of the Australian Bishops Conference and Cardinal Mahoney of Los Angeles and in the fear of "embarrassment" by Toronto's Bishop Richard Grecco the intent and praxis of Bishop Robinson "does not to seek to harm the church, but to create a better church". Bishop Robinson responded to a variety of questions in a quiet, thoughtful way, never once showing disrespect to his fellow bishops, but always keeping in mind the dictate that we are a church "semper reformanda".

Bishop Tom Gumbleton, Professor Ingrid Shafer and Bishop Robinson

After his talk, which was attended and applauded by Bishop Tom Gumbleton of Detroit, Professor Ingrid Shafer, on behalf of ARCC, presented Bishop Robinson with the 2008 Hans Kung ARCC Catholic Rights Award.

The rest of the weekend saw a variety of talks, question and answer sessions, and panel discussions that illustrated the unofficial motto of New Catholic Times Sensus Fidelium: Conflict is our reality, conversation our hope.

Joseph O'Callaghan, Professor Emeritus, Fordham University, author of Electing Our Bishops: How The Catholic Church Should Choose its Leaders, took us on a journey through our history beginning with the ancient tradition of the Church when the clergy and people of the diocese would elect their bishop. We looked at church councils and liturgical texts that stressed the role of the clergy and people in choosing their bishop and reminded the bishop of his obligation to be faithful to them. We finished following Vatican II where various proposals have been made to allow a far greater, but still limited local input into the process of selecting bishops.

David P. Efroymson, Professor Emeritus La Salle University asked the question, History: What Went Wrong And Why? He invited us to recognise that in order to understand more adequately "what went wrong" it is essential to take history seriously, and not as an inevitable (and "providential") development leading to the present situation. It demands attention to:

• The original root of papal/Roman authority
• Increasing Roman claims, and some of their causes: investiture and the princes; "reform";
• Resistence to papal claims;
• Conciliarism; Gallicanism; Trent;
• Vatican I, II, and beyond

After a break Sister Christine Schenk, a Sister of St. Joseph, reviewed contemporary scholarship about biblical and historical women leaders of early Christianity (1st–12th century), many of whose stories have been left untold, deleted, or made optional in lectionary readings for Mass. The painstaking work of contemporary scholars has discovered compelling evidence that women held leadership and ministerial roles in many early Christian communities equivalent to those held by men.

Fr. Paul Stanosz, the pastor of St. James Catholic Church, Franklin, Wisconsin used the research he conducted in seminaries to present on the unequal distribution of power within Roman Catholicism, hierarchically establishing clergy over laity. His conclusion is that changes in the governance structure of the church, that is, its political body, are unlikely unless there are epochal changes in Church beliefs and practices regarding sexuality, including mandatory celibacy.

Bishop Robinson chatting with Professor Leonard Swidler

Leonard Swidler, Professor of Catholic Thought and Inter-religious Dialogue at Temple University, in his presentation on Constitutional Catholicism reminded us that in 1965 Pope Paul VI called for a Constitution of the Catholic Church. He then set up a Commission to draft a Constitution, which worked intensely for 14 years. When Karol Wojtyla became Pope John Paul II he dismissed the Constitution Commission. (Author's note. In its place he gave us The Catechism of the Catholic Church. A Constitution is for adults, a Catechism for children.)

Professor Swidler argued that for the reform of the Catholic Church in the spirit of Vatican II must come from below by two major efforts:

Robert Blair Kaiser enjoys a laugh with Bishop Tom Gumbleton

• Encourage parishes to call parishioners to draft a Parish Constitution, install it liturgically, live by it, "evangelize" other parishes to do likewise, and form a network of Constitutional Parishes.
• Without delay, work to hold a National Catholic Council (continuing the tradition of the national Councils of Baltimore, initiated by Bishop John England)

Robert Blair Kaiser who covered Vatican II for Time Magazine, worked on the religion beat for The New York Times, was a contributing editor in Rome for Newsweek and a Vatican consultant for CBS-Television brought all the presentations together in noting that the post-conciliar Church failed to follow through on the charter of Vatican II — to give the Church back to the people. It failed because Rome insists on maintaining a top down governance in a bottom-up kind of world. It is likely that Rome will continue to keep the entire Church in thrall with its particular brand of feudalism and clericalism, unless and until local churches can create a new kind of Church polity according to an ancient mode.

John Quinn
New Catholic Times Sensus Fidelium
www.newcatholictimes.com

PHOTO CREDITS: Thanks to John Quinn and Dr Ingrid Shafer for the photographs.

[Index of Commentaries from New Catholic Times]