The Churches

HIGH, HARD ONES . . . Fr. John Smyth of Maryville -- ordered closed by Gov. Blago for various misfeasance and investigated by U.S. Atty. for possible malfeasance -- is a hard man, to judge by quoted newspaper comments. For instance, he accused OP Hepzibah Home director Mary Ann Brown, one of the monitors who wrote critically of M-ville, of seeking work there for her son (denied), and 9/21 in Chi Trib took (unexplained) crack at Blago for not wanting his (baby?) daughter (with him) in Springfield.

What's that about {oddly left unexplained by Trib but explained next day by Sun-Times as his school-age daughter, left back in her Chicago neighborhood school), and why does Smyth shoot from hip that way? Another thing he has done is make sure Cardinal George is the culprit if he has to leave M'ville, making the point strongly that he will leave only if the cardinal tells him to. He made his athletic mark in basketball but apparently plays hardball now.

SHOT ACROSS HIS BOW . . . C. George privately told Gov. Blago he wants to bump P. Smyth, says M. Sneed in S-T 9/23/03. (I don't think she made it up.) She speculates about George's closing the M'ville campus, selling the property for much money that could be used to pay off the sexual abuse victim settlement, calling this richly imagined scenario "a classic case of sending abused kids away . . . to pay off victims abused by priests." (A classic case? As if it's just one of the things that happens.) She hopes it's not true, but says if it is, she "will go after the cardinal with [her] own crozier [bishop's staff]. It's called the pen." She is such fun.

MAYOR V. GOVERNOR . . . That's not all. She paints a picture of The Body Chicago Political as delicious soap opera. MayorDaley II is "not only furious" (oh no), he's "livid" about Blago's deciding to move the Maryville kids. So furious-livid, in fact, that he questions his own ability "to deal with the governor in the future." Please.

He is even wondering (get this) about Blago's "decision-making process," according to "a top source," a.k.a. Iago of Old City Hall.

GOV NOT HAPPY EITHER . . . Then under the umbrella of "Maryville mayhem," we have a subhead-intro, "It's war!" and more of what "Sneed hears." First, that Gov. Blago is "furious" (but not yet livid) with the head man at Dept. of Children and Family Services (DCFS) and this fellow's feckless advisors for somehow "getting him into such a public brouhaha" -- whereby he's in the ever-popular position of battling with a popular if wrongheaded Catholic priest.

Never fear, however, (State's Atty.) Dick Devine is here. Sneed has him sending a memo to all concerned -- Blagojevich, Smyth, the DCFS man, etc., "entreating all to negotiate with calmer heads."

So is "former powerful state Senate President" and current Maryville board member and Oak Parker Phil Rock here. He "worked very closely with Smyth" when he was a senator.

MASS APPEAL . . . He and many others were at Sunday's mass, which apparently celebrated the life and times of Fr. Smyth along with or rather than that of Jesus Christ -- "They have a barrel of ink, and they can lie, and they can distort the truth," he said, per Maureen O'Donnell reporting in Sun-Times, apparently as part of his sermon, and for his trouble got "a standing ovation."

That, I submit is a misuse of the pulpit, the preaching function, and (reductively) the whole priestly mission, a hijacking of the worship experience. Of course, so was Cardinal G's using the St. Giles pulpit to call for a putting down of pens. It's pulpit abuse when the preacher gets up there where no one can raise a hand or ask a question and uses it for his political purposes.

CRIMINAL INTENT . . . So was "highly regarded" former DCFS head man Greg Coler on hand. He told Sneed it's "a crime" what Gov. Blago is doing. In lieu of indictment, he likened moving M'ville residents to "shipping a kid from the Four Seasons hotel to a Motel 6." He also testified to Smyth as "the easiest man I ever dealt with when it came to kids."

PARISH MATTERS: FEELING GOOD WITH JESUS . . . Father Dan recently discussed "what Mass is all about" in the parish bulletin, namely our coming "with full hearts to thank God." Moreover, it is "truly alive . . . when we bring to Mass the everyday things of our lives." Some of his best mass-time experience, he confessed, has been when he is "truly bringing what was in [his] heart to God."

The time-honored but now little-used phrase "sacrifice of the mass," he said "refers to our self-offering to God." This self-offering "feels good" to him because it reminds him that "God is taking care of" his various problems.

But there is nothing in what he said about Jesus' sacrifice on the cross and its redeeming value or its being re-enacted in the mass, whatever we bring. He speaks only about what we bring. Apart from his belief in God as protector, it's as if there were no Christian tradition. Pagans did this much, and probably still do.

If you are wondering what there is about liturgy that reminds you of Rotary Club meetings, picnics, and other gatherings that make you feel good, consider this foray into theology by one of our coming pastors, who apparently does a good job and is probably as theologically literate as most.

INGRATE . . . Is it edifying to read of head U.S. Bishop Wilton Gregory's chewing out reporters at the recent Religion Newswriters Assn. convention for media coverage of clergy abuse, when he might have been thanking them for keeping bishops honest? Consider James Hitchcock's telling a Catholic Citizens of Illinois meeting a few months back that continued publicity is our only hope.

At least Gregory did not tell them to put pens away or liken them to communist apparatchiks taking down every word he said, as Chicago's Cardinal George incredibly told newsies at St. Giles Church in Oak Park some months back.

PRIESTS WITH WIVES . . . Ordain married men? Best argument is that it might break up or at least disturb the current network, giving breathing space until a new one formed, of married and celibate priests and bishops. It's a way to make the tribe increase, but tribalism will out, no matter the rules.

CATHOLIC SCORES . . . 9/2, Sun-Times, RC school scores are kept under wraps in some places. Come and talk to me if you want our scores, says one principal. Scores are not the only way to judge a school, says RC supt., rebutting someone (neither quoted nor mentioned in the article), somewhere, who says they are. Another straw man bites the dust, thanks to top Chi RC educator.

posted by Jim Bowman @ 9/25/2003 10:36:00 AM links to this post

HEAVENLY LITERATURE . . . Let us consider again Sunday sermons in RC churches. I have a modest proposal which has either been tried by the worthies who run seminaries and found wanting or has not been found at all, namely a course of Literature for Sermons. It would call on the body of literature out there in which the future preachers of America might immerse themselves on their way to the pulpit.

I do not mean merely literate and classic sermons, such as by Jonathan Edwards or Lacordaire or even Fulton Sheen, though wide reading in oratory is a good idea, but also a selective presentation of stuff that a preacher might use, from Stoics of old to essayists of today, such as William Hazlitt, contemporary of Wordsworth and Coleridge and in our day Joseph Epstein, author of recent books on snobbery, envy, and ambition, or Robert Vivian, whose Cold Snap as Yearning is near-pastoral in its keen observation of people and their reactions.

Near but not pastoral, however, nor are the others. These essayists did not write for the pulpit, which is just fine. There should be less from the pulpit that's conventionally though for it. The two contemporaries I name would be perhaps shocked and amazed to find themselves as helping successors of today's versions of Jonathan Edwards. But preachers need lots of literature and not just for quoting but to change their own lives. (How widely read are they, beyond newspapers? But that's another whole story.) This course I suggest would provide some spoon-feeding of what is written in a literate and more philosophical vein that if delivered right might leave pew-sitters with something that pops into their heads mid-week or years later, preventing the shameful act and enabling the noble.

INTERRUPTIONS . . . These are some of the great thoughts I have while worshiping at the church of my choice, when I am not recalling days as a mass server at that very church's altar. I seem often to recall various catastrophes that befell -- leakages and excretions, for instance: throwing up during an early week day mass or sneezing messily without access to handkerchief which my mother had not strongly enough reminded me to take along.

The catastrophic sneezing was spotted (during a sermon) across the sanctuary by one of many priests on hand, this being in the days of very solemn high mass, when choir poured forth its premeditated strains from the loft and incense burned and bells rang and all heaven broke loose.

In my case it was more than that, as nasal passages poured forth unpremeditated material. A hand went up and came back requiring immediate attention. There was the cassock sleeve, to be sure, but that was hardly a good option. Besides, there was more on hand (in it, actually) than your average cassock sleeve could be expected to accommodate.

Well. A blessed inability to remember descends. All that remains beside the largely suppressed memory of what had come forth is the priest across the sanctuary, who knew and felt my pain but could not help finding the whole damn thing funny, which it was.

posted by Jim Bowman @ 9/02/2003 05:36:00 PM links to this post