That They Might Be One

Continuing to reflect on what it means to be part of the catholic church - whether in full communion with Rome or not - I'd like to share an insight from the late Pope John Paul II. In his 1995 encyclical Ut unum sint (That They Might Be One), John Paul takes up one of the central themes of his pontificate: ecumenical dialogue and reconciliation. Though firm in his belief in the ministry of the papacy, the late pope expresses some openness to the possibility of re-visioning the structure and nature of the papal office. For example, at one point John Paul invites, "church leaders and their theologians to engage with me in a patient and fraternal dialogue on this subject in which, leaving useless controversies behind, we could listen to one another, keeping before us only the will of Christ for his church" (96).

Though sadly John Paul was never able in his lifetime to grasp what many other women and men of sincere faith and conscience believe is the imperative of the Gospel to set God's lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender daughters and sons free to live fully their human dignity, I believe he did at least sense the need for a new vision of the way power and authority are exercised in the church. Rather than the often monarchical and rigidly hierarchical current model of church leadership in many places, what is needed is space for the church to continue to preach the Good News in each new generation, according to the needs of each time and place.

Although, of course, there is always need for caution and prudence as we move forward, there is likewise the imperative that comes to us from Christ himself to make the Gospel - the good news of salvation - heard again in our day (Matthew 28:19). Tragically, refusal on the part of many church leaders to set LGBT people free is just one example of how the command to preach the Good News has, in our own time, found itself frustrated and hampered precisely by the church structures that exist to promote the Gospel. Without doubt, new visions are needed in order that Christ's command to share God's love with all might come alive again in our time. For this reason, it is vitally important that the larger church - the community of disciples of Christ among the various denominations and traditions within Christianity - take up John Paul's challenge to enter into respectful dialogue and conversation and look for ways together to communicate the Good News again in our own time.

One further implication of what John Paul said deserves some attention. It appears quite clear that the pope was right to call the broader church community to dialogue over new ways to envision leadership and authority in the church. However, in the meantime, until and unless the pope, Roman Catholic bishops, bishops in other denominations, and other church leaders truly undertake what John Paul suggested, progress will be difficult if not impossible to make. This conversation and the necessary changes that will flow from it will not be easy, but at the same time they are vitally important if the message of God's love we have received from Christ himself is to continue to reach human hearts in our own day.

A further corollary of the pope's ideas relates to Christians who find themselves in church communities that do not reflect what they sincerely in conscience know to be the truth of God's love for all. Precisely because the type of church John Paul calls us to is not yet present, individuals and communities are under no obligation to stay formally within communities that discriminate against or oppress them. In other words, if John Paul's call for openness to new models of church authority was both sincere on his part and commendable from an evaluative standpoint, both of which seem clearly to be true, then it follows logically that until the new models of church authority the pope envisions emerge no one is under any binding obligation to submit to ecclesiastical authorities that would attempt to tell them their sexual attractions and the noble longings for transcendence, care for others, and sharing with God in the nurturing and promoting of life that go with them - an essential part of their being - are disordered, shameful, sinful, unnatural, or wrong. This kind of church authority, the kind that unmindfully restates doctrine without sincere consideration of the witness and experience of the prayer, scholarship, and human experience of the community - this authority is precisely the kind that must be brought into conformity once more with the demands of the Gospel, lest the Good News of God's love for all be lost amid the scandal of a church manifestly motivated more by fear than by faith, hope, or love.

For that reason, whether Roman Catholic, Lutheran, Methodist, Episcopalian, or of whatever other denomination - believers have no obligation whatsoever to obey unjust church laws or rules that only thwart the potential witness of the Gospel. Rather, as women and men charged with the imperative - in fact the moral obligation - to share the Good News, it is our sacred duty to stand up for what is right and to refuse to obey orders that can, have, and continue to frustrate the spread of the Good News.

In each of our individual lives this may look different - some of us may remain in a denomination that officially preaches discrimination because we believe God is calling us to help effect healing from within. Others may discern in conscience that we are called to worship outside the community in which we were raised in the hopes of promoting true unity through witness to the priority of the Gospel. Whatever the case may be in each of our lives, what unties us all is in fact essentially what John Paul stated in his encyclical - the knowledge that we are all called to unity in Christ and that it is God who will guide us to our goal.

May God's Spirit bless the church abundantly with gifts of courage, grace, fortitude, determination, and hope as we venture forward, confident of God's love for us and unflagging in our expectation of the gift of true unity, based in the authentic charity that roots out all fear, which God alone can give.

Peace,
Padre Chuck