Vatican Does Nothing About Dissenting Nun

by Christopher A. Ferrara

        In a recent column I noted that the so-called Benedictine nun, Joan D. Chittister, has received no discipline from the Vatican despite her very public refusal to avoid attendance at a forum to promote the absurdity of women priests. Despite a timid Vatican suggestion that she not attend, she very loudly proceeded to do so, and was backed up by the Mother Superior of her order.

        Now this professional dissenter is publishing "prayers" in tribute to homosexuality at the catholiclesbians.org website. Among other things, this blasphemous "prayer" dares to invoke the name of Our Lord in support of "gays" and lesbians: "let us love and support all those who proclaim your name to the gay and lesbian community." The "prayer" openly dissents from the definitive teaching of the Magisterium that homosexuality is an intrinsically disordered condition:

Give us all the grace to own our sexual identity,
whatever its orientation,
as another manifestation of your goodness.
Give us the vision to recognize and reject
the homophobia around us and in our own hearts, as well.

        Note carefully: this obnoxious dissenter from Catholic teaching dares to proclaim on the World Wide Web that an intrinsically disordered condition is a manifestation of God’s goodness. She even makes bold to declare that her "prayer" is "a response to the May 1999 decision by the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith to silence the ministry of Father Robert Nugent and Sister Jeannine Gramick to gays and lesbians, said in church documents to be ‘intrinsically disordered.’" So, one dissenter from the Magisterium offers a public "prayer" in tribute to other dissenters, and impudently makes a direct challenge to the CDF’s defense of the Church’s infallible moral teaching. And what does the Vatican do about it? Absolutely nothing.

        Meanwhile, in Canada, a Catholic priest who is utterly faithful to the Magisterium finds himself denounced before the whole world by the Congregation for the Clergy. I mean, of course, Father Nicholas Gruner, whose "offense" is to remark the obvious about the state of the Church and the world in light of the Message of Fatima.

        From time to time I will provide examples of the pernicious double standard of justice that afflicts the Church today. We can learn a great deal from examining what certain Vatican officials condemn, and what they are prepared to ignore or even reward (as in the case of Cardinals Kasper and Lehmann, who were given red hats after years of defying the Pope’s order to stop issuing abortion certificates to German women).

        These are terrible and mysterious times in the history of our beloved Church. Yet we must confront the reality of our situation rather than pretending it does not exist. As Pope Saint Gregory declared: It is better that scandal takes place than that the truth be covered up.