Amid continued controversy over the Catholic identity of U.S. women
religious, a dissenting Catholic newspaper has been awarded a
multi-million dollar grant to cover religious sisters locally and
globally.
Brad Myers, a senior program officer for the Conrad N. Hilton
Foundation's Catholic Sisters Initiative, confirmed to CNA on Aug. 22
that the foundation board last week approved a three-year, $2.3 million
grant to the Kansas City, Missouri-based National Catholic Reporter.
He said the grant is designed to create “what we're calling a global sisters' net.”
“The idea is a website devoted to the coverage of Catholic sisters
globally,” he said. “Initially our focus is going to be on issues facing
Catholic sisters in the United States and Africa. Ultimately we do have
global ambitions. We have stronger networks between these two
countries, so that’s where we'll start.”
“For the most part, we’re looking to improve the support systems among religious life among women.
Our approach is to look at ways to make the systems work better for all women religious,” he added.
Myers noted that the grant was only recently approved by the board and the newspaper has not yet officially accepted the grant.
The National Catholic Reporter's Catholic identity has been called into question by its local bishops several times.
Bishop Robert Finn of Kansas City-St. Joseph in January 2013 said the
National Catholic Reporter takes positions “against authentic Church
teaching and leadership.” He said the agency's perspectives “have not
changed trajectory” since October 1968.
At that time, Bishop Finn's predecessor Bishop Charles H. Helmsing
condemned the newspaper for “its disregard and denial of the most sacred
values of our Catholic faith,” and asked it to remove the name
“Catholic” from the title.
The newspaper's editorial staff announced their dissent from Church
teaching on the ordination of women in an editoral last December.
Myers declined to comment on whether or not the newspaper's history enables it to reliably cover Catholic issues.
The Hilton Foundation previously approved a $150,000 one-year grant for
the National Catholic Reporter in late 2011 to assist with the planning
for a project on women religious, the foundation's website says.
CNA contacted the National Catholic Reporter for comment but did not receive a response by deadline.
The newspaper's coverage and editorial writing has been highly critical
of the Vatican's doctrinal assessment of the Leadership Conference of
Women Religious. The conference represents 1,500 leaders of U.S.
Catholic religious orders.
Myers said that the Hilton Foundation does not take a position on the
controversy between the Vatican and the leadership conference.
“This grant is just not related to the current issues related to the doctrinal assessment of the LCWR,” he said.
The assessment, begun in 2008 by the Congregation for the Doctrine of
the Faith, found serious theological and doctrinal errors in the
presentations at the conference’s annual assemblies. It voiced concern
about “certain radical feminist themes incompatible with the Catholic
faith” that could distort Catholic teaching.
The assessment said that the conference’s material for new superiors and
formators lacks sufficient doctrinal formation and may reinforce
confusion about Church doctrine. The analysis also found that the
conference is a strong advocate on many social justice issues, but has
remained silent on the right to life.
In January 2011 the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith said that
the current doctrinal and pastoral situation of the leadership
conference is “grave and a matter of serious concern, also given the
influence the LCWR exercises on religious congregations in other parts
of the world.”
National Catholic Reporter publisher Thomas C. Fox, in an April 29
editorial, argued that the Leadership Conference of Women Religious was
not “simply a group of ‘leftist’ nuns.” He challenged the accuracy and
the justice of the Vatican investigation of the leadership conference,
characterizing it as “Vatican muggings.”
Myers linked to the editorial and several other National Catholic
Reporter pieces about the leadership conference on his personal Twitter
account. He also engaged a reporter from the newspaper in a joking
exchange about Archbishop J. Peter Sartain of Seattle's address to the
leadership conference's general assembly.
“My personal opinions are my personal opinions,” Myers told CNA in response to a question about his comments.
The Conrad N. Hilton Foundation, based near Los Angeles, was founded by
the Catholic hotel magnate of the same name.
The foundation has long
backed religious sisters and is a major funder of the Conrad N. Hilton
Fund for Sisters, which in 2010 said it had awarded about $75 million in
grants for the educational, health and social service ministries of
religious sisters in 130 countries.
In 2013 the foundation gave a $3 million grant to the Catholic Church
Extension Society of the United States to implement an exchange program
for Catholic religious sisters from Latin America to come to the U.S.
The foundation also gave $4.5 million to Marywood University in
Pennsylvania to teach African sisters and to support graduates of the
Sisters Leadership Development Initiative.
Other grant recipients include the National Religious Vocation
Conference, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, Catholic Relief
Services and the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.
The foundation has given
grants to Wyoming Catholic College, Thomas Aquinas College, Loyola
Marymount University and some Los Angeles Catholic schools.
Hilton family members have a significant presence on the foundation’s
board of directors. One religious sister is on the foundation’s board,
Sister Joyce Meyer, P.B.V.M.