My Head Is Still Reeling

Earlier tonite I was over at the Cave & followed a link put up by Cavey in a post (A New Catholic Podcast! ). I followed the link to the blog & came across an post about an article in the Non-Catholic Reporter. The post loks at an article by Sr. Sandra Schneiders from the Immaculate Heart of Mary. In it reflects on the meaning of religious life today. By the time I got through the twisted & perverse logic of Sr. (?) Sandra my head was spinning. IMHO, if Sr. Sandra is serious about her claims then she is ready for a padded cell where the key is thrown away after she is locked in it.

Fortunately the person who runs the blog, Mary Rose, has her head screwed on straight & does an excellent job of refuting the errors in Sr. Sandra's rants & ravings. Here islands of sanity helped to keep my head from totally spinning off Here are the 1st 3 paragraphs of Sr. Sandra's delusional claims with Mary Rose's response. Follow the link for the rest of her take. (Note: her comments are in red, emphasis is hers as well.)

National #Catholic Reporter's Series on Women Religious - Who Doesn't "Get It?"

Little by little pressure from a variety of sources seems to have uncovered the answers to those two questions. The “charges” are that LCWR (Leadership Conference of Women Religious)-type Congregations (the vast majority of Religious in the country) have implemented in their lives and in their ministries changes called for by Vatican II to the detriment (manifested in the decline in numbers of vocations) of religious life itself. (First, I don't agree with the approach Sr. Schneiders is taking. To frame this investigation as "criminal" misses the point. The Vatican is concerned about declining numbers of women religious. They want to evaluate the situation. How anyone can deny the fact that these communities are not receiving new vocations as a valid concern, is beyond me. It seems as though some women religious are looking at the issue from only one perspective. Is it because the Vatican is backward or hasn't allowed women to be priests? But if that is the case, how is it that the more traditional communities are increasing?) Cardinal Rodé (the highest officer in Rome on religious life) believes, in his own words, that the council precipitated the first “world-wide crisis” in the history of the church and women religious, in his view, are primary promoters of that crisis in the United States.
The “accusers” are a small group of extremely conservative women religious who, in September 2008, held a conference at Stonehill College in Massachusetts on consecrated life as they understand it, to which they invited Cardinal Rodé. (From everything I've read, this does not seem to be true. There are many Catholics who have been concerned.) At this conference, which included no presentation of positions at variance with their own, they put contemporary ministerial religious Life on trial in absentia, found it seriously wanting, and raised the cry, “Investigate them!”
Cardinal Rodé, having heard what he apparently thought was a widely held consensus that U.S. women’s apostolic religious life was in serious decline concluded, (Again, numbers do not lie. Losing 49% of women religious within 30 years obviously is going to send up a red flag.) “We have no further need of witnesses.” (Does anyone read statistics?) Unfortunately, he failed to consult the many thousands of Catholic laity who have received from women religious their formation in the faith, ongoing spiritual support, pastoral care in times of need, and colleagueship in ministry and who are now expressing their solidarity with the sisters by petitions and personal letters of protest to the Cardinal, the Visitator, the Apostolic Delegate, and local ordinaries as well as by individual and collective testimonies to and about the sisters (see, e.g., U.S. Catholic, “Entered into Evidence [75:1, Jan. 2010]).

The next paragraph starts with Sr. Sandra saying: "He failed to consult moderate bishops, like those in California, who have publicly testified that without women religious their dioceses would not have become what they are and would not be functioning as well as they are today." Mary Rose follows with: "(I could be really snarky here, but I'll refrain. Proof is in the pudding.)"

I admire her restraint given who the Bishops are Sr. Sandra is refering to. 1 of them is Nancy Pelosi's Bishop, Archbishop Niederauer. Over the last few days I have put up a couple posts about the goings on in that diocese & its ongoing support of an abortion-funding health plan with CCHD funds. Then there is the infamous Cardinal Mahony over in Los Angeles who isn't exactly known for his love of orthodoxy either. I wouldn't exactly call either of them moderate. Too be fair, in Sr. Sandra's "Spirit of Vatican II" world where anything that even reeks of orthodox Catholic teaching is considered radically far right conservative, the 2 examples I mentioned would appear moderate to her.

As I said, follow the link for the rest of Mary Rose's take on Sr. Sandra. & be sure you are sitting down when you get to the point that Mary Rose prefaces with (This next section is simply breathtaking.). It literally is. You will have to read Sr. Sandra's blashpemous (for lack of a better word) take on why Jesus died on the cross to believe it. (Unfortunately I do as I have come across this garbage before.) I couldn't do a better job of refuting that garbage than Mary Rose does so I will again suggest you follow the link.

Sr. Sandra may think she is defending her cause, (again to be fair, in the delusional SOV2 world she os), but instead she is making the case for both the visitaion & investigation of the LCWR by the Vatican. Sr. Sandra, the Non-Catholic Reporter & their ilk are the modern equivalent of the Arians operating under the guise of Modernism. Like Arianism, Modernism has been condemned by the Catholic Church. & like Arianism, those promoting it will end up on the wrong side of history because what they are promoting is not the truth but a demonic attempt to destroy the Catholic Church.