Cardinal Sean O’Malley will meet with leaders of Voice of the Faithful next week. Before we deal with the actual meeting, let’s look at the article itself. In it, the reporter refer to VOTF as “the lay reform group that has energized a group of active churchgoers” while those who say that VOTF is just another heterodox group are said to be “some conservatives” and we are accused of “demonizing” them, a word that bears the connotation of a false accusation.
While VOTF is characterizing the meeting as symbolically significant, and they say they hope it will mean official acceptance, including an end to the ban on their meeting on church property, Cardinal O’Malley is simply reaching out to a group of Catholics. He sees them as earnest people, if misguided, and wants to bring them into the fold. Unfortunately, the way this is being played in the media, it looks—and could look even more after the meeting—like an official change of heart and endorsement.
In case, anyone at the chancery has forgotten, could someone forward to the cardinal’s office copies of the following:
- Various articles on the “Educating Ourselves” page of the national organization’s web site. Although VOTF claims not to take a position on controversial Church teachings—which in itself is taking a position, if you think about it—all of the articles are written either by well known dissenters and/or include serious dissent from Church teaching.
- Take a look at the “Suggested Readings & Resources” page: “Constantine’s Sword”, by James Carroll; several by Sr. Joan Chittisters; a number of others that dispute the Church’s teaching on the male and celibate priesthood; Hans Kung; and on an on with dissenters from the Church. The orthodox offerings are well outweighed by the heterodox ones and are basics like the Catechism and St. Thomas Aquinas.
- How about the proposal before the national VOTF council to push for women priests?
- At the same link, you can see that they’re preparing a conference with several schismatic and Protestant groups to discuss “Emerging Models of Church.” Yes, emerging right into schism.
- There was the VOTF chapter that kvetched that the Diocese of Bridgeport was conducting an evangelization campaign instead of attending to VOTF’s priorities.
- Let’s not forget their “Palm Sunday Vigil for Accountability” at which they taught that Jesus had originally come only to save the Jews, but the Caananite woman in Matt 15:27 changes his mind; thus if Jesus could change His mind about “doctrine,” surely the Church can change doctrine.
- Let’s not forget the call from VOTF members and leaders alike that Cardinal O’Malley allow for married priests and say that gay adoptions are okay (which he couldn’t do even if he wanted to.)
- A VOTF group in LA joined a vigil in support of gay priests.
- VOTF also protested the Vatican’s Instruction on homosexuality and seminarians.
- It doesn’t take much sleuthing to find in fact that VOTF seems to associate itself with all the usual heterodox suspects: Call to Action, FutureChurch, Rent-A-Priest, and so on.
- Here they are promoting a women’s ordination conference.
- Don’t forget the early plan—long since hidden away by VOTF but saved by some of us—to re-structure the Church along the lines of the US Constitution. No really.
- A VOTF group in Chicago protested the cardinal’s order that gay protesters at Masses were not to receive Communion as unnecessarily divisive.
- And since this getting long and I already did a convenient round-up at about this point, here’s a list of other entries on VOTF’s heterodoxy.
The reality is that Voice of the Faithful has shown time and again, despite its protestations to the contrary that at its heart it is a group of people pushing heterodoxy in the Church, and while some well-meaning people may have been taken in by its stated mission to stop the abuse of kids, it has moved well beyond that original aim and become just another heterodox group of dissidents along the lines of Call to Action and Future Church and the like.
Technorati Tags:bishops, Boston, cardinal, Catholic, dissent, doctrine, O’Malley, Voice of the Faithful
VOTF and Call to Action, ad nauseum, have virtually nothing to do with God, with Faith, with the Gospel, with the living essence and being of Judeo-Christianity, but everything to do with power, with politics, with social agendas, and social engineering. The road to hell, it has long been said, is paved with good intentions and it is rather their fruits that prove them treasonous to the Church and ultimately even to themselves.
I vote to have people call Cardinal O’Malley (617-782-2544) and Vicar General Fr. Erickson (617-254-0100) on Monday and insist they cancel the meeting.
Is there a list of the actual links to the dissident content somewhere?
By the way, I see a Google ad coming up for http://www.votf.org on your site. It leads to Gregory Books, which is described as:
“Books in the progressive spirit of Vatican II”
One of their books for sale is The Davinci Code
Here’s their fax number too, 617-783-4564.
I’ll be calling on Monday.
Mary Jane: Yes the list of links is right there up above in my post. Click on those links and it will take you to it.
I remind everyone of the well thought out 2003 pastoral letter about VOTF written by 3 priests in Hyannis: Voice of the Faithful: What Faith Are They Trying to Keep? It’s worth a reread.
http://www.ewtn.com/library/ISSUES/ZVOTFCRT.HTM
VOTF “claims” to be many things but it’s actions suggest otherwise. Should we believe its words or actions?
They have 3 platforms:
Have they stood behind any of the Church’s tougher teachings? If not, how can they say they are “keeping the faith.”
Have they truly supported the many priests of integrity throughout the country? Or do they just recognize the ones that criticize authority? Is disrespect and disobedience the only sign of “integrity” in VOTF’s eyes?
Many believing Catholics were so upset at the abuse crisis and were led to join VOTF as one way to respond for the need for change. So there are good “members” in VOTF. But the organization as a whole should not be recognized or endorsed until their actions show that they are worthy to have a seat at the table.
Hopefully Card. O’Malley will recall the article in the Boston Globe,May 11,2004,p.B3:“Lay group says bishops divisive on gay marriage-Leader dismayed at active opposition” by Michael Paulson. It states:“We look with dismay at bishops who openly criticize the homosexual community and criticize gay rights.”,James Post,
the organization’s president,told about 150 people at a Voice of the Faithful meeting at St. Eulalia Church,Winchester.”
“In an interview afterwards, Post told reporters,“It is discouraging to see the archbishop using archdiocesan resources to run this campaign against gay marriage and to speak out in a way that is so divisive.”“
Can any Massachusetts voter who worked so hard to collect the 170,000+ signatures for the Marriage Amendment to protect marriage as the union of one man and one woman, think of anything more damaging than to have Cardinal O’Malley give credibility to James Post and the leaders of Voice of the Faithful? Certainly we were hoping at this crucial time before the Constitutional Convention is recalled on Nov. 9, that Cardinal O’Malley would do everything he possibly could to support the teaching of the Catholic Church on marriage!
Also, I personally had a conversation with Bill Dittrich, who at that time was the Director of the Archdiocese Institute for Ministry(AIM), who has also been in charge of the Structural Change section of Voice of the Faithful, around the time of the 1st Marriage Petition in 2002. He sympathized with those who were engaging in same-sex sex acts and told me that I should support PFLAG rather than Courage! Since Cardinal O’Malley recently had a meeting for the priests and deacons of the diocese to learn about Courage
by inviting Fr. John Harvey, the founder of Courage, to speak to them, it was hoped that the priests and deacons of the Boston Archdiocese would now be supportive of Courage/EnCourage and that those who were sending parishioners to join PFLAG would realize how seriously wrong they were to support PFLAG. But now the cardinal will be undoing all of the good he did in supporting the way of Courage which calls for chastity, if he supports VOTF since their leaders support the way of PFLAG. How tragic that would be!!!
Woah! Hold on a minute. I think some of you are making some assumptions here.
O’Malley could be meeting with them to lay down the law and bring them back onto the path. I doubt that the friendly approach will be all that effective, but it’s a first step. I doubt we’ll see a loosening of restrictions after this.