Last week Brian Starks discussed the Vatican’s interest in lay input concerning pastoral challenges facing the family in preparation for the 2014 extraordinary synod on “the pastoral challenges for the family in the context of evangelization.” Since then, the Vatican’s announcement has been widely discussed in both the secular and Catholic media outlets with great interest.  The news has also led to discussions in the Catholic blogosphere over what exactly the Vatican questionnaire means and how Catholics are to interpret it (see here and here for two takes on the questionnaire).  For those interested in reading the preparatory document for the synod, it is also now posted on the Vatican’s website.  It discusses the reasons for the synod and ends with 38 questions pertaining to how Church teaching on marriage and family is understood by Catholics in one’s diocese and how pastoral care regarding certain family issues is addressed.

Since the announcement that the Vatican is interested in lay input regarding these questions, many have wondered how such data would be collected.  While the Catholic Bishops’ Conference for England and Wales (CBCEW) have created an online survey, according to the National Catholic Register the USCCB has noted that the survey is being handled at the diocesan level, and that “each bishop determines what is the most useful and reasonable manner of consultation to assist him in preparing his report for the Vatican.”  At least one diocese, the Diocese of Rockford, has created a way for individual Catholics to respond to the Vatican questionnaire.  Nonetheless, some lay Catholic groups have taken it upon themselves to create their own surveys.  For instance, the liberal Catholic group Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good has created a survey which can be found at www.papalsurvey.com.  Likewise, Catholic Organizations for Renewal (COR), a collation of liberal Catholic groups (e.g., Call to Action, DignityUSA, FutureChurch, and Women’s Ordination Conference), have put together a survey titled “The Extraordinary Synod on the Family 2014: A parish-level survey for US Catholics,” which mirrors the format used by the CBCEW. Continue reading →

Too rarely do I read something that not only makes me take a second look, but also rub my eyes, and then smile in surprise.  Recent news regarding the upcoming Synod of Bishops did just that.  Not that the synod is being held, which is good news, to be sure.  Nor that its theme will be “Pastoral Challenges of the Family in the Context of Evangelization,” though that is surely an important and timely topic.  No, what really shocked me was this:

“The Vatican has asked national bishops’ conferences around the world to conduct a wide-ranging poll of Catholics asking for their opinions on church teachings on contraception, same-sex marriage and divorce.” Continue reading →

A football tailgate, a Sunday homily, over breakfast with an Evangelical friend, between band sets at an Irish pub with a middle-aged lawyer—in the past couple of weeks, it’s been near impossible for me (and for many, I suspect) to avoid conversations marked by delight, disturbance or debate about Pope Francis’s recent interview. This 12,000-word conversation with Jesuit Fr. Antonio Spadaro on behalf of 16 Jesuit publications, which one columnist has called an “extemporaneous encyclical,” continues to reverberate throughout both the Church and media.[1]

Francis’ interview covers a wide range of topics, including his identity as an Argentinian Jesuit, religious faith (and doubt), women in the Church, classical music and film, the Curia, Ignatian spirituality, and the Church’s stance on particular moral issues such as homosexuality, abortion and contraception. Having had a week to observe reactions from inside and outside the Church, it is helpful to step back and consider: Which aspects of Francis’ interview have been emphasized, and by who? Continue reading →

It is always flattering when someone takes the time not only to read one’s work, but to respond thoughtfully to it. In this case, I am especially pleased to have two graduate students in the Department of Theology at the University of Notre Dame respond to my work on the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults (RCIA). I began this project while an assistant professor of sociology at Notre Dame and very much had in mind the idea that the Catholic university in general, and Notre Dame in particular, is a place “where the church does her thinking.” From the outset, I wanted to bring a sociological perspective and methodology to bear on questions of central importance to the church. I targeted the work not only to professional sociologists inside the ivory tower but to Catholic intellectuals outside of sociology and practitioners in the trenches. To the extent that these two young Catholic intellectuals were able to engage my 2012 article in the Review of Religious Research, “Initiation Rites in the Contemporary Catholic Church: What Difference Do They Make?” (54:401-20), I consider my efforts a success. Continue reading →

A very wise and holy priest of the Congregation of Holy Cross once told me, in a moment of challenging simplicity, that the secret to the spiritual life was “showing up.” I was at that time seeking something along the lines of Saul’s conversion experience on the road to Damascus so, like so many inheritors of good advice, I immediately disowned it. But upon reading a recent study by David Yamane on the results of RCIA implementation in over 30 parishes across the diocese of Ft. Wayne/South Bend, I was forced to revisit the priest’s advice. Yamane’s study employs complex sociological research methods and models (and I would suggest anyone interested in the details should read the study and also see Laura Taylor’s excellent post about it). For the purposes of this post, I would like to highlight Yamane’s finding that “the extent of RCIA implementation is the key factor driving this model…If we consider the total effect of implementation (its direct effect plus its indirect effect through rating), we see it is over three times as large as the effect of rating” (413-414). In other words, a more fully implemented RCIA program (including regular practice of the Rite of Dismissal, a longer period of mystagogy, and a continuous precatechumenate) is more effective at facilitating involvement in parish life than the participant’s personal assessment of the RCIA program. Continue reading →

Among other insights, Sarah Moran asks the question, “[Can] ideographs such as ‘new evangelization’ serve to sharply differentiate and even heighten polarization among some ideologically divergent groups ([e.g.] of ‘traditional’ and ‘progressive’ Catholics) even as it unites”?  This is an excellent question that deserves more sustained attention.  For now, I would say we should keep in mind that we have been discussing the “new evangelization” (NE) as a “specialized” and “second-order” ideograph rather than first-order, if you will.  With specialized ideographs we can expect that there will be an effect of differentiation and polarization as she has suggested. Continue reading →

Cyril of Jerusalem, the fourth-century theologian, bishop, and Doctor of the Church, wrote a prolific number of lectures addressed to adult catechumens preparing for full entrance into the Church, compiled into what we refer to as the Mystagogical Catecheses. Overflowing with rich theological exegesis and detailed descriptions of the catechumenate process, Cyril’s ancient lectures provide an exceptional insight into the practice of adult initiation into the Church—one that had fallen out of use for centuries until the Second Vatican Council’s restoration of the practice in the “Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy,” Sacrosanctum Concilium. Since then, the 1988 Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults has become the primary vehicle for adult initiation in the Catholic Church. Yet, its efficacy is one of arguably varied success.

David Yamane’s paper “Initiation Rites in the Contemporary Catholic Church: What Difference Do They Make?”[1] for the Review of Religious Research sheds some much-needed light on the current state of Catholic initiation practices in the United States. Yamane addresses the type of question both liturgists and catechists constantly wrestle with regarding the effectiveness of their work. Specifically, “Do individuals who participate in the RCIA process in the Catholic Church experience an increase in ecclesial involvement and spiritual practice?” Utilizing advanced sociological research methods and supplementing them with the work of eminent theologians, Yamane endeavors to identify the extent of change in different domains of religiosity over the course of the RCIA process, based on data collected in two waves between 2000 and 2002 and encompassing 159 individuals throughout 32 different parishes in the diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend. His conclusion: the RCIA process can make a significant, positive difference in the ecclesial involvement and spiritual practice of initiates, but only in parishes that have more fully implemented initiation programs. As a liturgist who has studied the rites of Christian initiation with one of the theologians referenced in this study, I agree wholeheartedly with Yamane’s conclusion.[2] Continue reading →

“Specialized, Ecclesial Ideography: the “New Evangelization” in the Catholic Church” appeared this month in the Michigan Academician. Authored by one of our contributors, Mike McCallion, and Benjamin Bennett-Carpenter, the paper considers the “new evangelization” movement called for by recent Catholic papal authorities in light of recent sociological and rhetorical theory. A topic that has continued to spark lively discussion and debate on our blog, the “new evangelization” refers to efforts to revive religious belief among baptized Christians and non-Christians alike, particularly in Europe and North America, who have become alienated from religious faith. 

Principally, Bennett-Carpenter and McCallion’s paper argue that the “new evangelization” operates as a kind of specialized, ecclesial “ideograph” specific to internal Catholic relations. But its analysis invites continued and extensive application for analyzing other ideographs in culture, they suggest.[1] After providing some context for the ideograph as a concept, which Michael McGee defines as a summarizing term that galvanizes people in their discourse about certain courses of action, even when they have diverse or conflicting agendas,[2] the authors consider international, national and diocesan sources of the “new evangelization.” Therein, they convincingly point to the term’s plasticity and ability to unify diverse clerical and lay leaders in the Catholic church, which they present as a “heterogeneous organization that responds in both progressive and conservative manners to various socio-political contexts.” In this way, the authors convince one that their ideographic analysis bears implications beyond Catholic, intra-ecclesial relations, and that “further work on ideographs could elaborate on differences within [specialized] contexts, perhaps drawing on ethnographic studies not only of ecclesial or other cultural contexts but also within professional and scientific contexts.” Continue reading →

Lumen Fidei (“The Light of Faith”), Pope Francis’ first encyclical, was written by “four hands,” as he has said. It represents the intellectual and pastoral collaboration of what some might call an unlikely duo: Pope Francis and Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI. The current Pope notes at the outset that “[Pope Benedict] himself had almost completed a first draft of an encyclical on faith… As his brother in Christ I have taken up his fine work and added a few contributions of my own” (7). This collaborative drafting process, combined with the fact that the encyclical was published on the same day as Pope Francis approved recommendations for the canonization of Popes John XXIII and John Paul II, bolsters for some, as one news source has suggested, the perception that its publication is “less the act of a particular pope and more the faithful exercise of… apostolic succession.” 

But in contrast to this interpretive stance, other interpreters have considered the document less as a unified whole, instead seeking to identify which Pope crafted which sections of Lumen Fidei, not unlike redaction criticism in biblical interpretation. Drew Christiansen, S.J., for example, argues that the thinking of Pope Benedict is apparent in the document’s “concern for (unitary) truth as the object of faith, defense of the integrity of the deposit of faith, [and] the ecclesial context of faith and the responsibility of the magisterium to guard the wholeness of faith against attrition over time.” Conversely, he suggests that “chapter 4, on the church’s service to the world, hints of the present pope’s pastoral touch, especially the closing section (56-57) on the consoling role of faith in suffering and dying.”

So how should Lumen Fidei be read? As a unified whole, or even “the faithful exercise of apostolic succession,” or rather, as a multi-authored encyclical with editorial layers that must be detangled? Continue reading →

It seems a new undergraduate blogger is sweeping the American Catholic millenial imagination (and computer screen). If I’ve been asked, “Have you heard of this ‘Bad Catholic’ blog?” once in the past month, I’ve been asked six or seven times. Authored at Patheos.com by blogger Marc Barnes, ‘Bad Catholic’ has more than 10,000 likes on its Facebook page, with undoubtedly thousands more blog followers. Focusing on issues in the contemporary Church, as well as bringing Catholicism and secular culture into conversation, Barnes’ blog has not only taken young Catholics by storm, but has sparked inter-religious debate and even been noticed by the likes of Jonathan Fitzgerald in the Wall Street Journal.

A college student, Barnes’ shares his views on topics as far ranging as politicization in the Church, virtue ethics, the theology of pop music, the philosophy of modesty, and religious pilgrimages, all from the perspective of a young Catholic in the modern world and frequently through the lens of natural law. But from the title of the blog, “Bad Catholic,” one can deduce some of Barnes’ self-understanding as a curious, young Catholic (though not “traditional” or “conservative,” per his piece, “Catholic, Nuff Said”), negotiating the Church and modern world by mingling the Catechism with Top 40s song lyrics, the Church Fathers with contemporary feminist theory. Continue reading →