Jesus
promised us the kingdom; what did we get? The Church!
~Adolph
Harnack
Ecclesia
semper reformans, semper reformanda. (The church, always reformed, always
in need of reforming.) ~an expression of
the Protestant Reformation
I am a hopeful ecumenist, encouraged by the apparent waning or
blurring of denominationalism,
so it always both startles and bothers me when I realize that I am still
aggravated by a few issues of the sixteenth century Lutheran reformation—issues
such as the nature of the priesthood.
This came to mind a few months ago while watching a 60
Minutes segment on the priest sex scandal in Ireland, and more recently on the occasion of the announced resignation of Pope Benedict, during whose "watch" the Church's response to these scandals came under increasing scrutiny and criticism.
Let me be quick to acknowledge that there have been plenty
of sexual boundary violators in my own Lutheran fold, and I agree that the
solution to this Roman Catholic catastrophe has to be found within the Roman
Catholic Church and not in finger-pointing suggestions from protestant
onlookers, even as I, ironically, humbly offer an observation based on Lutheran
theology. So, to the possible challenge, “What gives you the gall to say
anything at all about this?” I can only reply that what follows is the same
thing I offer my Roman Catholic friends in conversation over coffee.
Also, I understand the Lutheran Church to be a reform
movement within the Church Catholic (Martin Luther never intended to start a
new “church”), and it is in that spirit that I have the temerity to comment.
Although the cause of each case of sexual abuse has to do
with the mental or sexual health of each individual priest involved (and leads critics
within the Roman system to wonder about an approach to priest-formation that perhaps
engages young men at a too-early stage in their psycho-sexual development), and
although the strictures of celibacy are an easy target for speculation (an
issue beyond the scope of this essay), the thing that makes sexual abuse by
priests a grave spiritual crisis for
Roman Catholics is the ontological holiness of the priesthood.
Some will hear this as an understatement of the obvious,
others will say, “Huh?” Let me explain. I know that “ontological” is a big old
sophomore philosophy term, but it’s at the heart of this sad situation. It is a
word that has to do with the very essence of being – of one’s nature. In Roman
Catholic doctrine, the priest, at his ordination, becomes a holier person in
his essential self, in his “being.” Compared to the laity, he is, quite
literally, “holier than thou.” He is, in fact, holy in the same way that Christ
is divine while still being human. In the words of John Cardinal O’Connor:
We become priests at ordination. There is an "ontological
change" in our spiritual nature. Such is a profound mystery. Is it too
bold an analogy to compare the change to Christ the Son of God's retaining His
Divinity while becoming a man? At ordination an ontological change takes place. (Emphasis the cardinal’s.)[1]
This perceived holiness not only makes a trusting person
vulnerable, it also elevates the criminal act to a crisis of faith for Roman
Catholic laity and a crisis of integrity (not to mention public relations) for the
hierarchy. As a laywoman in the 60 Minutes piece puts it, “They covered it up
because the priest is supposed to be perfect.” (In Ireland, these ontologically superior
beings are now allowed to be in the presence of children only under the
supervision of another adult!) Although refreshingly open, the archbishop in the 60 Minutes interview doesn't address the issue of elevated priestly holiness. To my observation, it is never mentioned in churchly or journalistic discussions of this matter. But it is central.
By contrast, the reformation view is that all Christians are
priests (needing no intermediary to approach the Divine), and that a member of
the clergy is one of these priests who is ordained to a certain function (the
care and ministry of word and sacrament), not to a different level of holiness.
If the pastor plays a spiritually important role, it is because the word and
sacraments, not the person, are important. What happens at ordination is a call
to do a job for the community, not a transformation of one’s being.
For good biblical and practical reasons, a pastor is – and
ought to be – expected to live an “exemplary” life. But even though a kind of
folk-theology causes many a protestant layperson to think of the pastor as
especially “holy,” Roman Catholic doctrine assures everyone – the layperson,
the hierarchy, and the priest himself that he, in fact, is, and bases the
priest-people relationship on this holiness.
When a protestant pastor commits an abuse, great damage
ensues (worthy—because it’s in my own clan—of a much hotter essay than this), and
each individual case is every bit as devastating as that perpetrated by a Roman
Catholic priest. But, I suggest, it seems not to have the effect of a
church-wide (or world-wide) spiritual crisis because of the ultimate leveling of
function (vs. ontology); the Lutheran
pastor is not, in the final analysis, understood to be holier than the
parishioners he serves.
What is beginning to sound like a lecture is actually an
expression of frustration. And to the charge, “You’re just rehashing a
centuries-old debate,” I plead guilty. I continue to hope and pray for the
healing of the Lutheran-Roman Catholic breach. I worship lovingly with my Roman
Catholic friends. But ecumenism means speaking honestly to one another from the
strengths of our traditions, and in this case Martin Luther got it right. Roman
Catholic priests need to come down an ontological peg (while the Church itself
comes to honest terms with the causes of this epidemic). Of course only a new
reformation will allow this. It happened before; it will happen again. Semper reformanda.
