When numbers of bishops come together, they are at ease
with discussion of pastoral issues, but much less comfortable with
discussion of profound theological issues. This is true whether we are
speaking of a meeting of the Australian bishops in Conference or of the
Synod of Bishops in Rome, and I believe it was true also of the Second
Vatican Council.
The Council opened up perspectives, raised questions,
indicated directions and made many beautiful and inspiring pastoral
statements, but it frequently did not give the clear theological foundation
on which to plan confidently for the Church of the future. All too often a
tension between very different theological positions was part of the Council’s
treatment of a topic. This was certainly true of the Council’s treatment
of collegiality, conscience and marriage, among others. It is one of the
major reasons why we must entitle this forum "Vatican II: Unfinished
Business".
It is important to understand that these tensions were
present in the Council itself and in the documents it produced. Opposing
groups within the Church can quote different statements to support their own
positions. It is not surprising, therefore, that these tensions are still
with us.
Despite this, I am an optimist about the final outcome of
the Council. In large part my optimism comes from the least likely source
imaginable, the crisis concerning sexual abuse of minors that has engulfed
the Church.
It is my hope that, somewhere around the year 2100, an
historian will be able to look back and say that serious change took place
in the Catholic Church in the hundred years between 1960 and 2060. At first
it was the Second Vatican Council that caused changes in most aspects of the
Church’s life and had a quite profound effect on the way Catholic people
lived their lives. Eventually, however, the changes of the Council seemed to
come to a stop and go no further. It was then, in the twenty-first century,
the historian will say, that the issue of sexual abuse forced further
change. Serious change in an organisation as large and ancient as the
Catholic Church requires an immense energy and it was the issue of sexual
abuse alone that had that level of energy, for it was this issue that
finally caused vast numbers of Catholic people around the world to rise up
and say, "This is not good enough. There must be change."
And so, our future historian might report, a further
series of profound changes came over the Church in the first half of the
twenty-first century. They were mainly in the two areas of sex and power.
They did not come without fierce opposition, but the energy for change
arising from sexual abuse was so great that eventually they did come.
Human development came to be put beside spiritual
development and the two began to walk hand in hand. What was spiritually
healthy and what was psychologically healthy began to shed light on each
other. Sexuality was distinguished from sex, spirit and matter were reunited
and joy in every aspect of God’s creation began to spread. The gifts of
women came to be better appreciated. Power came to be seen as service, as
Jesus had intended, and collaboration and empowerment became daily more
common.
It is extremely unlikely that our historian will be able
to report that everything became as perfect as this, but I hope that she
will be able to report serious progress.
In bringing about these changes, I am not calling for a
revolution or battles in the street in front of cathedrals. The issue of
abuse is complex and sensitive, and it does not allow of instant and
sweeping solutions. (Will you allow me to repeat that sentence: The issue of
abuse is complex and sensitive, and it does not allow of instant and
sweeping solutions.) The whole Church must work together. But the immense
energy for change that sexual abuse has aroused must not be lost. It must
grow stronger, and it must be harnessed and used effectively.
Permit me to give a few examples. I would like to see a
massive request from the Catholic people of the whole world to the Pope,
asking him to put in motion a serious study of any and all factors within
the Church that might foster a climate of abuse or contribute to the
covering up of abuse. I would like to see an insistence that obligatory
celibacy, attitudes to sex and sexuality and all the ways in which power is
understood and exercised within the Church at every level be part of this
study. I would, however, want a truly serious and scientific study, far
deeper than anything I have so far seen in newspapers or heard around a
table.
As a second example, I would like to see a massive
request/demand that the collegiality the Vatican Council spoke of be used to
the full in responding to this crisis. If collegiality is not fully used in
an issue so important, so down-to-earth and so crucial to the effectiveness
of the Church, then the Vatican Council is truly unfinished business. It
does not involve any dogmas of faith, so there is no reason not to respect
the needs and values of each culture. This surely means the Vatican
listening to the needs of each country and not imposing the
"foreign" solutions they have imposed, e.g. establishing a statute
of limitations of ten years for bringing forward an accusation of abuse or
insisting that all cases must be heard by a tribunal consisting solely of
priests and referred to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in
Rome.
As a third example, I would like to see the 32 diocesan
bishops and 150 leaders of religious institutes in Australia give up some of
their independence for the sake of all of us acting as one on this issue.
However, I realise that in the Catholic Church people treasure any
independence they do have and are slow to surrender it. I also know that
before the Council bishops rode roughshod over the rights of religious,
especially women religious, so some religious can today be resistant to any
suggestion that comes from a bishop. As I said, the issues can be complex
and sensitive.
Nevertheless, my thesis is simple. The Second Vatican
Council was the greatest event in the Church in my lifetime. It has inspired
my life over the last forty years. But because its theology was frequently
far from clear, it is unfinished business, and two of the areas that
absolutely demand further work are sex and power. For these two issues the
crisis of sexual abuse alone gives the enormous energy that is needed for
further change to occur. We should respond to the crisis of abuse for its
own sake and the sake of the victims, but we should also seek to use its
energy creatively, sensitively and intelligently in order to take further
the unfinished business of the Council.
In everything he did and in everything he said, Jesus
Christ sang a song. Sometimes, when he cured a sick person, he sang softly
and gently, a song full of love. Sometimes, when he told one of his
beautiful stories, he sang a haunting panpipe melody that, once heard, is
never forgotten. Sometimes, when he defended the rights of the poor, his
voice grew strong and powerful, until finally, from the cross, he sang so
powerfully that his voice filled the universe.
The disciples who heard him thought that this was the
most beautiful song they had ever heard, and they began to sing it to
others. They did not sing as well as Jesus had – their voices went flat,
they forgot some of the words – but they sang to the best of their
ability, and the people who heard them thought in their turn that this was
the most beautiful song they had ever heard.
And so the song of Jesus gradually spread out from
Jerusalem into other lands. Parents began to sing it to their children, and
the song passed down through the generations and the centuries.
Sometimes, in the life of a great saint, the song was
sung with exquisite beauty. Sometimes, however, it was sung very badly, for
the song was so beautiful that there was power in possessing it, and people
used the power of the song to march to war and to oppress and dominate
others. Always, however, the song was greater than the singers and never
lost its ancient beauty.
Among the last places on earth that the song reached was
a far-off land that would later be called Australia. At first the song was
sung there very badly indeed, for the beauty of the song was drowned by the
sound of the lash on the backs of the convicts and the cries of fear of the
aboriginal people. But even in that world the song was greater than the
singers and gradually, in little wooden homes and churches throughout a vast
and dry land, the song was sung with love and affection.
At last the song came down to me, sung gently and
lovingly by my parents. Like so many millions of people before me, I too was
so captured by the song that I wanted to sing and dance it with my whole
life.
A eat Council of the Church came, and I was inspired by
the beauty of the song that seemed to be at the very heart of that Council.
The overwhelming message I received was that here were two thousand bishops,
divided by many issues but united in the song. We met with other churches
and found, perhaps to our surprise, that they loved the song as much as we
did. In the Scriptures and in the council I found the firm foundations on
which I could live my life.
There was always a tension between the beauty of the song
and the weakness and the pettiness that I found within myself and in so many
others who shared this song with me, but the song sustained me throughout
the years.
But then the darkness of evil within the Church gathered
around me, and at times it was so deep that it seemed that the very song
itself had been conquered. But in the depths of that darkness, when my
clinging to the song was based on blind faith rather than on any warm
feeling within me, I realised that the song is quite simply part of who I am
and it is in the darkness that it is most important to me.
The song must not stop with us and we in our turn must
sing it to others. In doing this we must remember that this song has two
special characteristics.
The first is that we, too, will never sing the song as
well as Jesus did – our voices lack strength and go flat, we misunderstand
the words – but, if we sing this song to the best of our ability, people
do not hear only our voices. Behind us and through us they hear a stronger
and a surer voice, the voice of Jesus.
The second is that we always sing the song better if we
can learn to sing it together – not one voice here, another there, each
singing different words to different melodies, but all singing the one song
in harmony. Then people will truly know that it is still the most beautiful
song the world has ever known.
In the early Church, it was customary to take up a
collection of money at the celebration of the Eucharist. That money was
passed on to the poor and needy. The custom endures to the present day. At
the celebration of the Eucharist at the National Forum, a collection was
taken up and the proceeds were given to the Sisters of St Joseph for the
work with the East Timorese. Representatives of the East Timorese community
in Sydney were present to accept the gift. Sr Sue Connolly RSJ, of the Mary
MacKillop Institute of East Timorese Studies, wrote the following letter of
thanks.
"The mass was great last night and we were very
happy to be there. Thanks so much for the opportunity of presenting Timor’s
great need to these good people. The amount given was $3,976.50 plus 40
American dollars! Truly, a perfect indication of the state of the heart of
the people present at the Forum. I do hope that the whole experience was
full of challenge, ideas and a commitment to the hard yards. Love from all
of us here, especially Josephine and me."
