ROME
Vatican Insider
“Silent schisms” and the Pope’s reminder about the essential elements of the Christian message
Andrea Tornielli
Vatican City
Although (understandably) a great deal of media attention has been given over the past weeks to the outcome of the dialogue between the Holy See and the Society of St. Pius X, the Fraternity founded by Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre which could soon enter into full communion with the Catholic Church again, there is no doubt that a whole different kind of dissent of much vaster and widespread proportions is present in today’s Catholic Church. This dissent, which is spreading through central and northern Europe – in Austria, Germany, Belgium and Ireland – is leading groups of priests to sign appeals to disobedience, adopting highly critical stances against the “Roman” line of thought, on subjects such as sexuality, communion for remarried divorcees, priestly celibacy, female priesthood and the role of the laity in the Church. Meanwhile, the controversy over the stance taken by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith towards the U.S.’s Leadership Conference of Women Religious – the organisation with the largest number of major Superiors of congregations of Catholic women religious in the United States – continues to rage on. The LCWR has been placed under supervision for its positions on abortion, homosexuality and priesthood, which are not in line with the doctrine of the Catholic Church. There are silent “schisms” forming which the press is necessarily and mercilessly talking about. In doing so they are are shattering the image of an ever triumphant Church. These “schisms” cannot easily be swept under the carpet as hiccups of the post-conciliar dispute or of the old progressivist fringes destined for extinction.
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