Catholic Religious Australia (CRA) issued a
statement expressing distress, and questioning the process, that led to
the forced retirement of Toowoomba's Bishop William Morris, reports the National Catholic Reporter.
The assessment - which came in a letter signed by CRA president, Sr
Ann Derwin RSJ, and sent to the country's apostolic nuncio - says that
members of religious orders, "are especially distressed at the loss of
their pastor, a man they believe to be solicitous of all Christ's
faithful entrusted to his care -- especially the needy and
marginalised."
"They and the people with whom they minister are left with an abiding
sense of
disempowerment and confusion," the letter continues.
The organisation's executive group - consisting of Sr Derwin, Divine
Word Missionary Fr Tim Norton and Mercy Sr Marie Duffy - says in a
separate letter to Australian religious congregation leaders that they
were present throughout a week-long meeting of the Australian bishops as
they "grappled with their response to the situation."
In the letter to the nuncio,
Archbishop Giuseppe Lazzarotto, Sr Derwin writes that she is advancing
three questions that are being asked as a result of conversation with
religious throughout the church in Australia:
First: How can all in our church be heard and empowered by our
ecclesiastical leaders and processes when private and confidential
opinions are given such importance?
Second: How is the decreasing availability of the Eucharist, 'the
source and summit of our lives,' to be addressed into the future?
Third: "What do we say to the people who have lost an inspirational shepherd and pastor at a time that the people most need him?
A third letter, similar in content to the one addressed for
Lazzarotto, was sent to Archbishop Philip Wilson, president of the
Australian bishops' conference, with the hope that the questions
outlined would be carried to Rome during the ad limina visit, the NCR
report adds.