Yesterday I went to retreat in Auriesville with my mother for a retreat of the deacon's wives of the diocese. It was a lovely, relaxing, day away from the rigors of housewifery. I find that it is nice to be around women. I have never been a male-bashing feminist, and have always enjoyed the company of the menfolk in my family. I never complain that I never get to see chick flicks, or that reading discussions are centered around Mario Puzo as opposed to Jane Austin or that conversation is around the Yankees or the Mets and not about the Cake Mix Doctor. Lately with a husband and four boys, I long for more female companionship on occasion.
The women were all very warm and friendly. But the retreat was littered with lots of remarks of the need for female clergy, how Teilhard de Chardin needs to be canonized, eye rolling at the term "obedience", and a lack of respect for the concept that "bringing the Gospel out to the people" would include raising our children in the faith or our duties as Catholic mothers in the home.
We attend Mass at the Shrine every Sunday throughout the summer, and one of the priests who says Mass revealed yesterday that he often wants to give Homilies promoting ordaining women, but knows people will complain. He mentioned he felt comfortable in this group to say that. I felt as if I heard something I should not have.
These revelations left me feeling very sad. Here we have this wonderful faith that should bring us together, yet many people do not find it so wonderful. I am at a loss as to why. I also wonder why the Church attracts people who have such problems with the Church to be in the positions of clergy.
how Teilhard de Chardin needs to be canonized
oh puh-leeze. Do these people not realize how geriatric this makes them sound?
Where is the Spanish Inquisition now that we really need it?
Henry
I seriously doubt if you want the Inquisition back because you might be on the wrong side of it. I have always wondered why they thought tormenting, torturing and burning people helped to save their souls from so called heresy. Jesus would have fallen foul of their orthodoxy.
http://www.crisismagazine.com/october2003/madden.htm
oh puh-leeze. Do these people not realize how geriatric this makes them sound?
I kept thinking that as well. They kept going on and on about VII-they were so stuck in the 60s...
"Here we have this wonderful faith that should bring us together, yet many people do not find it so wonderful."
This line drove home the point for me that the Church really is like a family. Some of us were born into it, others came in later in their lives. Even in the happiest of families, there are always going to be some people who don't agree about one thing or another, just as there are always going to be some people who turn their backs and leave outright. Those of us who stay have our own unique reasons for staying.
I, too, don't understand people who try to change the Church -- it seems to me, it is what it is, and you either accept it, or you don't. But I know that there are people who don't understand me, either -- they ask, if I don't agree with something, why do I accept it and not work to change it? And of course there are people who ask, if you don't like everything about your family, why do you keep going back to them? Why don't you just leave, too?