A recent development in the Vatican's investigation of U.S. nuns has the sisters and their supporters breathing a little easier.
Archbishop Joseph Tobin, an American who acknowledges the
investigation has caused "anger and hurt" among U.S. nuns, has been
named secretary of the Vatican panel conducting the investigation.
Tobin, who grew up in Detroit, has said he will work to heal any
rifts between American sisters and the Catholic hierarchy in Rome. He
also hopes to lift a shroud of secrecy surrounding the probe.
"We're very excited by his appointment," said Sister Mary Ann
Flannery, director of the Jesuit Retreat House in Parma. "He's coming
from an American culture that believes you have a right to defend
yourself, a right to have your voice heard."
The investigation, officially known as an "apostolic visitation," is
meant to "look into the quality of life" in sisters' religious
communities, according to the Vatican.
Currently, the investigative reports are to be kept confidential and
turned over to the Vatican panel. Not even the nuns will be allowed to
see them.
"That is so offensive," said Flannery. "We basically don't trust any of this."
But Tobin, who took over his new position in September, said in an
interview this month with National Catholic Reporter, a biweekly
newspaper in Washington, D.C., that he will work to make the
investigation more transparent.
He told the newspaper he will "strongly advocate" for the rights of
nuns to know the findings of the investigation and to respond to them.
"I'm hoping he will be allowed to fulfill his goal of working for
more transparency," said Flannery. "I hope no power [in Rome] finds a
way to stifle his voice."
The investigation, begun in December 2008 and to continue until the end of next year, has been criticized by many U.S. Catholics who see it as oppressive and unnecessary.
The critics believe it's a way for Rome to rein in U.S. nuns because
they are regarded by church hierarchy as too independent and generally
too liberal on social issues.
Many sisters answered the call of the church's Second Vatican
Council, which, more than 40 years ago, encouraged social activism,
freedom of expression and conscience and respect for other religions.
They shed their habits, rolled up their sleeves and took their works
of mercy to the streets, feeding the hungry, sheltering the homeless and
visiting the sick. Some moved out of convents and lived independently.
Critics believe the hierarchy in Rome is trying to turn the clock back to a more conservative and traditional church.
"The heart of the issue is not about nuns," said Sister Diana
Culbertson, a retired professor of literature and Scripture at Kent
State University. "It's about the interpretation of Vatican II. The
current hierarchy of the church does not have the same interpretation of
Vatican II as we do."
Culbertson, who refers to the investigation as the "nunquisition,"
said: "They see us as Marxist-feminist radicals. Rome has a picture of
American nuns that doesn't correspond to the picture we have of
ourselves.
"They want us in our place. But we don't make vows to the hierarchy. We make our vows to God."
Though Culbertson welcomes the appointment of Tobin to the Vatican
panel, she challenges his call for a "reconciliation" between the
Vatican and U.S. nuns.
"Reconciliation suggests we both have something to apologize for," she said. "Nuns have no apologies to make."
The investigation was ordered by Cardinal Franc Rod , the prefect of
the Vatican panel.
Tobin, as secretary, is in the No. 2 position on the
panel.
Rod appointed Mother Mary Clare Millea, superior of the
Connecticut-based Apostles of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, to carry out
the investigation.
Millea has mobilized teams of investigators to visit and take notes
in sisters' communities across the nation.
Those conducting the
investigation have declined to comment about it.
Earlier this month, five investigators spent five days at the Cleveland-based Sisters of the Congregation of St. Joseph.
"We weren't apprised of the reason for it or what they were looking
for," said Gina Sullivan, spokeswoman for the congregation. "We still
don't know what the outcome will be. Whether we will ever know remains
to be seen."
Sullivan said the investigators were polite, gracious and
well-received by the congregation. Investigators met with nuns in groups
and individually.
A prepared statement by Sister Nancy Conway, head of the St. Joseph
congregation, said, "We are hopeful that the Apostolic Visitation will
offer an opportunity for the institutional Church to learn more about
our spirituality and ministry, which our sisters have lived in fidelity
to the spirit of our foundresses for more than 350 years."
One of the questions investigators ask, according to the Visitation's
Web site, is: "What is the process for responding to sisters who
dissent publicly from church teaching and discipline."
That question, says the Rev. Thomas Reese, a Jesuit theologian at
Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., shows what the inquiry really
is all about -- the idea that nuns should not think for themselves or question church authority.
Reese, an outspoken critic of the investigation, said the appointment
of Tobin, a Redemptorist who had been the superior of his order, is
"extraordinary."
"It's also extraordinary how he has been outspoken about the
visitation," said Reese. "This guy has been forthrightly acknowledging
that the visitation has upset people tremendously in the United States
and that the Vatican has to respond. It's obvious he has heard the
concerns."
Another Vatican panel is investigating the Leadership Conference of
Women Religious, an organization that represents 95 percent of the
nation's 59,000 nuns.
The investigation, begun in spring 2009, is called a "doctrinal
assessment of the activities and initiatives" of the leadership
conference.
According to a letter the conference sent to its members announcing
the assessment, the Vatican doesn't think nuns have adequately addressed
three issues: Allowing only men to become priests; the idea that Jesus
and the Catholic Church are central for achieving salvation; and "the
problem of homosexuality."
Officials of the conference, based in Silver Spring, Md., have declined to discuss details of the investigation.
However, Sister Annmarie Sanders, spokeswoman for the conference,
said this month that leaders of her group have had no communication with
the Vatican panel since April.
Asked whether she feels the nuns' conference is being kept in the
dark regarding the investigation, Sanders said, "Very much so."
SIC: CPD/USA