Bishops Behaving Boldly - 4 Stories

Because the myopic vision of those who insist on only passing along negative news about the Bishops represents a tiny minority of what our Shepherds do.

1) Archbishop Dolan on building a culture of vocations

In an interview with The Catholic Answer, Archbishop Timothy Dolan of New York discusses his ideas for building a culture of vocations.

“I always tell my priests that when we tell you to preach on vocations to the priesthood, preach on vocations to the priesthood bluntly, in an unapologetic way — not watering it down by saying, ‘I don’t mean to demean this other vocation,’ or ‘I wish we could ordain married men,’” he said.

Archbishop Dolan recounted:

"What I mean by a culture of vocations is that when our young people grow up in a culture that encourages you to do God’s will and that affirms one in his desire to be a priest, you are going to get priests. I grew up in such a culture. I said to my teachers in grade school, “I think I want to be a priest,” and they beamed and did everything possible to encourage me. My parish priest would. My folks would. My neighbors would. The parish would. I can remember as a kid — I must have been 9 or 10 years old — getting a haircut, and the barber said, “Hey shrimp, what do you want to be when you grow up?” I said, “I want to be a priest.” And he wasn’t even a Catholic, but he said, “Hey, isn’t that great?” Now that is the culture of vocations that we need in the Church."

Asked whether the Church is experiencing a new springtime of priestly vocations, he said, “I think we have to be realistic. I think we might be in early March.”

2) Archbishop Wenski: Obama administration ‘running roughshod’ over conscience rights

The Obama administration is “running roughshod over conscience protection provisions long part of the law,” and Catholic supporters of health-reform legislation were “played by the president,” Archbishop Thomas Wenski of Miami said in an op-ed column.

“It seems that pro-life Catholics such as Democratic Congressman Bart Stupak and the Catholic Health Association’s Sister Carol Keenan — who trusted the administration’s position that abortion was not part of the healthcare bill — along with Notre Dame’s leadership have been played by the president,” the prelate wrote. “His administration is running roughshod over conscience protection provisions long part of the law that find their justification in the First Amendment guarantee of freedom of religion, a foundational human right.”

“It is one thing for an administration to support and promote an agenda; it is quite another to force those who disagree with it to violate their moral and religious principles,” he added. “The long line of evidence is disturbing … Catholic social and healthcare providers — the largest private network in the nation — are at risk of being left out of all federal programs, despite their well-earned reputation for providing superlative service to the American public. In effect, the Obama administration is telling these Catholic providers to surrender their conscience rights and their Catholic ethos or shut their doors.”

3) Bishop Lynch will end diocesan health coverage unless conscience concerns addressed

Surprising attendees at the annual Red Mass, Bishop Robert Lynch of St. Petersburg announced that the diocese will no longer provide health insurance to its 2,300 employees if the Obama administration’s proposed implementation of health care legislation is not changed. Employees would instead be given an additional stipend and asked to purchase their own insurance.

Under a draft mandate announced by the Department of Health and Human Services, all insurance policies--apart from those that fall under a very narrow religious exemption--would be required to cover contraception and sterilization without copayments.

Stating that “I'm extremely uncomfortable with even thinking of such a thing,” Bishop Lynch said that the Church is at a “moment of history" in which it must defend "religious liberty and individual moral conscience.”

4) Kentucky bishop demands adherence to new Missal, liturgical directives

A Kentucky bishop has directed his priests to follow the new translation of the Roman Missal “exactly as it is written,” and called for appropriate music and gestures in the liturgy, in a pastoral letter.

Bishop Roger Foys of Covington warned priests against straying from the approved liturgical texts. He said that the music for the Mass should be “theologically sound and properly composed in accord with the teaching of the Church on sacred music.” And he cautioned that the choir should not be in the sanctuary during Mass.

Among other liturgical directives in his pastoral letter, the bishop said that it is improper for lay people to extend their hands during the Lord’s Prayer:

No gesture is prescribed for the lay faithful in the Roman Missal; nor the General Instruction of the Roman Missal, therefore the extending or holding of hands by the faithful should not be performed.