BishopAccountability.org
	Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted Defined by Dedication By Michael Clancy Arizona Republic December 27, 2010 http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/news/articles/2010/12/27/20101227bishop-thomas-olmsted-dedicated.html When Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted called a news conference last week to announce that he was stripping Phoenix's oldest Catholic hospital of its Catholic status, it was a rare public appearance for a man who has long rebuffed media questions and avoided much of public life. Olmsted had already drawn public outcry for declaring that a surgery performed at the hospital was contrary to church teaching. He was asked about the further criticism he was likely to face. "I try to pray each day to find my identity in Jesus Christ," he said. "Praise or ridicule do not matter. I am called to be faithful to the church." That faithfulness defines the man who has polarized the Diocese of Phoenix since he arrived seven years ago. His supporters describe a humble servant who washes his own dishes and is dedicated to his beliefs. They say the man who has direct control over 92 parishes, 60 schools, 303 priests and thousands of other employees must show leadership in line with official doctrine. Critics say that unswerving commitment to doctrine leaves him unable to lead with care or compassion. They say Olmsted focuses on rules without capacity to see the needs of the people involved, and that he focuses on issues of sexuality and reproduction while neglecting social issues that should be key to the church. Controversy over Olmsted's rigorous stances was brewing for years, though the debate with St. Joseph's Hospital and Medical Center in Phoenix brought it into sharper focus. A woman with a history of pulmonary hypertension sought treatment at the hospital when she was 11 weeks pregnant. The condition, which affects the heart and lungs, is often fatal for pregnant woman. While at St. Joseph's, the woman's condition worsened to the point that doctors described her as "moribund." Health workers consulted with the hospital's ethics board and agreed that terminating the pregnancy would be allowable under church health rules, because the intent was not to kill the fetus but to save the woman's life. When he learned of the case, the bishop disagreed. The hospital should have guarded both lives equally, he said, rather than saving one by ending another. After a year of talks with hospital administration, Olmsted declared the hospital to be no longer Catholic, because officials failed to agree with him that the surgery was an abortion and also refused to accede to his other demands about complying with church health rules. That decision drew cheers from some who said the church should not be swayed from its key principles. But it was also the latest case in which Olmsted drew fire for a decision that left church members and leaders feeling turned away. Since 2004, he has blocked controversial speakers, kept a governor out of church facilities for her stance on abortion rights and ousted priests who disagreed with him on social issues. One of those priests was the Rev. Vernon Meyer, who was excommunicated after joining the United Church of Christ. He said Olmsted is unwavering when it comes to moral principle. "He believes that being a good Catholic means following the rules to the letter," Meyer said. "He also believes that everyone else should do the same." A bishop in the making Olmsted grew up far from the rough-and-tumble of public life in a large city. He was born in 1947 on a farm in northern Kansas, attended school in a one-room schoolhouse, entered the seminary as a high-school student, and became a priest in Lincoln, Neb., a small diocese now led by one of the most conservative Catholic bishops in the United States. He spent only seven years of his 37-year priesthood in parishes working closely with Catholics. He spent much of the 1970s and '80s in Rome, serving as an assistant at the Secretariat of State of the Holy See for nine of those years. Later, he was head of a seminary in Columbus, Ohio, then a bishop in Wichita, Kan. In Wichita, Olmsted was praised as a humble and spiritual man with a command of church doctrine. His chancellor in Wichita, the Rev. Robert Hemberger, said Olmsted may not possess "backslapping pizzazz, but he grows on you." Olmsted came to Arizona at the end of 2003, to face perhaps a greater challenge than he had faced before. The year had been tumultuous for Valley Catholics. Olmsted's predecessor, Bishop Thomas J. O'Brien, came under fire in the clergy sex-abuse scandal. Some argued that he was negligent in his oversight of priests. O'Brien stepped down after a hit-and-run accident that killed a pedestrian, and his trial began shortly after Olmsted took office. Local Catholics and other religious leaders had high hopes that Olmsted would calm the troubles and heal public perceptions of the diocese. Controversial positions Progressives in the church at one time had found a kindred soul in O'Brien. Under Olmsted, they would find things had changed. Within days of arriving, the bishop prayed outside a Planned Parenthood clinic for an end to abortion. He disciplined priests over a letter of support for gay people put together by an interfaith group of clergy. He barred a controversial but famous Swiss theologian from speaking at a church. He also ordered that no politicians who support abortion rights would be welcome on church property. The order included the governor at the time, Janet Napolitano, who was close friends with Monsignor Ed Ryle, one of the previous bishop's confidants. Olmsted appeared to deal effectively with the aftermath of a priest sex-abuse scandal. Today, the former leader of the local chapter of the activist group Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP, now leads the diocese's child-protection office - a testament to Olmsted's success in the area. Those close to the bishop echo the praise that followed him from his earlier roles. The Rev. Rob Clements served for six years as rector of Sts. Simon and Jude Cathedral, where Olmsted has resided since he came to Phoenix. Asked to describe the bishop's personality, Clements responds, "Integrity and kindness come to mind. There is nothing fake or phony about him." He describes a man who clears the table and does the dishes, and who picks weeds in the rectory garden. He said the bishop is humble but committed to church teaching and principle. "He is a faithful and convinced Catholic, as am I," said Clements, now pastor of the All Saints Catholic Newman Center at Arizona State University. In other areas, some in the church are less satisfied. Rarely has Olmsted stood up for immigrants' rights, and church leaders involved in Hispanic ministry fear they have lost support. He has almost never spoken out on the death penalty, poverty or other social issues, leaving those things to the Arizona Catholic Conference, the lobbying arm of the three Catholic dioceses in Arizona, or other leaders. And his actions have publicly spurned some in the church. A former, nationally respected head of the child-protection office was fired when she married outside the church. When he learned of the surgery at St. Joseph's, he announced that Sister Margaret McBride, a nun who was on the ethics team that approved the procedure, had excommunicated herself. A reclusive figure For the public, and even for many Catholics, Olmsted is a reclusive figure. He almost never does one-on-one interviews with the media, and only rarely presides over a gathering like the news conference that took place last Tuesday. He declined to be interviewed for this article. He does not post his public schedule, and tends to communicate through his articles on the diocese website and in the diocesan paper. Olmsted's articles, including the most recent, titled "The wondrous mystery of the Lord Jesus; Part II: The Church: How Christ remains with us," often are strictly religious in nature and densely packed with references to Scripture, papal writings and other church documents. He takes on issues of the day infrequently and has not written extensively on immigration, the economy or war. When he does take on current events, the position is almost inevitably conservative, restating the church position on marriage, homosexuality and ordination of women. Olmsted is most outspoken when it comes to abortion, which the church in virtually all circumstances holds to be a murderous taking of innocent life. In the St. Joseph's case, numerous medical and religious ethics experts disagreed with the bishop. But as soon as he found out about the case, he determined the surgery was forbidden under church doctrine. As bishop, Olmsted was well within his rights to strip St. Joseph's of its Catholic status. His position gives him authority, as far as religious practice is concerned, over a broad range of institutions that want to be considered Catholic. John Garcia, spokesman for the Knights of Columbus in Phoenix and board president of Arizona Right to Life, says the bishop has "a zeal" for the pro-life cause, and that his decisions are "always" in line with the teachings of the church. The Knights are a Catholic service organization. Malcolm Martindale, a Catholic who lives in Phoenix and says he attended a recent session with the bishop on the election, came away with a different impression. "For four hours, each topic of discussion was sex-related: abortion, homosexuality, or contraception. Not a word on social justice, immigration, poverty or other issues," he said. Meyer, the priest who was excommunicated after leaving the church, said the bishop's handling of the hospital conflict showed just that. He was horrified that not once did the bishop refer to the patient in the case in a way that sounded supportive. "People never heard any compassion or concern for the people involved," Meyer said.
Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.