Discussion for article #235351
I’m not a Catholic, but it will be interesting to see what this means on the ground, out in the field, where it affects real humans. When living in San Francisco, I always had a special place in my heart for the nuns I saw. (I am not speaking about the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, though they are rather special in their own way, too).
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It’s one of the great untold and unappreciated stories of American Catholic history:
19th century Catholic women – thousands of them – spreading across the United States, founding hospitals and schools where ever they stopped, building them ( sometimes literally) themselves from the ground up
America owes a debt to Catholic nuns…priests, not so much.
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It’s most un-Christian of me, but I’m interested in seeing whether he manages to create a wave of bishops and cardinals retiring because of blood pressure problems.
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LOL. I second that!
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Very true. Modern hospital policy regarding cleanliness, housekeeping, proper patient care, even the back office–and more–all owe their beginnings to the many selfless, countless nuns who started or restructured so many hospitals all across America, including Hawaii.
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How nice it is to have a Pope who doesn’t see woman as a necessary evil.
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This was always a witch hunt designed to silence nuns who were actually helping people instead of railing against abortion and homosexuality. It was encouraged by the ultra conservative bishops - the ones who are now on the outs with Pope Frank.
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“…Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith,” i.e., the Inquisition with a new, more friendly name. I will consider a return to the large-C Catholic fold when this department, Ratzinger’s old haunt, is wiped out and its offices burned to ashes. It represents a most vile aspect of an unforgiving Church.
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The fact that this Pope has decided not to curtail these nuns’ efforts is the most positive sign of real change to come out of his papacy. Dealing with those bishops and cardinals via early retirement would be a huge second step.
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Respectfully, I don’t know of any Catholic health-care facility that will perform abortions, much less condone family planning outside of abstinence and delivery of babies. As well, most publically-run hospitals in California closed down in the last 30 years because of those self-same Catholic hospitals (among other non and for-profits) dumping all their uninsured patients on the public hospitals… which doesn’t sound very charitable nor Christian to me. As with most things Catholic, it seems they’re most interested in those who can help themselves and the church with money… granted, ain’t that the way of pretty much all religion.
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To quote Sister Simone “Oh my glory!”
Woo Hoo - lets grab some contraception and I’ll meet you down at the Abortionplex where the nuns will be distributing communion.
I think the ashes have to be scattered to the four winds to make it kosher.
When the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith took over the LCWR in 2012, it accused the group of taking positions that undermined Catholic teaching on the priesthood and homosexuality while promoting “certain radical feminist themes incompatible with the Catholic faith.”
(Emphasis added.)
Background: American orders of nuns are required to be self-supporting. (Priests, in contrast, get housing, stipends, etc.) As a result, many women’s orders have, through decades of hard work, thrift and careful attention by thousands of women, developed assets of considerable financial value: hospitals, schools, nursing homes, endowment funds, etc. . . . while the bishops were steadily bankrupting diocese after diocese through their spectacularly bad judgement and endless sense of entitlement.
These “radical feminist themes incompatible with the Catholic faith” that the Witchhunter General was so worked up about are the nuns’ refusal to meekly hand their own hard-earned property over to the bishops. (Did I mention their sense of entitlement?)
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The new Pope is determined to spread Christianity to the US
Long live Pope Francis! I’m afraid things will revert once he retires/passes away. I guess we can enjoy the new direction of the Church in the meantime.
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