National Catholic Reporter
July 31, 2012
Just about any way you look at it, it's five days that could shape the course of some six decades of history.
Nearly four months after a harsh Vatican critique, the leaders of the organization that represents 80 percent of U.S. women religious are due to gather Aug. 7-10 in St. Louis for their annual meeting.
The questions before the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR), which was founded in 1956 but reorganized in 1971 in order to address the changes of the Second Vatican Council, loom large.
Following the Vatican's critique, which came in April and mandated that the group revise and place itself under the authority of three bishops, the first and foremost of those questions is almost certainly whether the group will decide to forego its status as a canonically recognized representative and reform outside the formal structures of the church.
The airing of those questions will come early in the gathering, which includes a number of closed-door "executive sessions" where the leadership of the group is expected to discuss the Vatican's critique, known as a "doctrinal assessment."
The morning before the official evening opening Aug. 7, the group's leadership is to meet with former presidents of the organization to communicate its direction and ask their advice.
Two of the former presidents told NCR in mid-July that their advice for the current leadership may be stark.
Benedictine Sr. Joan Chittister, who headed the organization in 1976, identified what she called a "key question" facing the group: "Will the sisters function in the church as adult moral agents? As fully participating members of the church?"
Mercy Sr. Theresa Kane, who was LCWR president in 1979, said the sisters need to tell church officials that "we are indeed equal, and we come with respect, and we come with knowledge, and we come with a dialogue for what is important in our lives and you need to listen to that."
"We're not looking for approval," Kane continued. "We don't need the approval. It's out of our convictions that we've lived like this for many years."
LCWR's associate director of communications, Immaculate Heart of Mary Sr. Annmarie Sanders, said in an email July 23 that during the assembly "time has been allotted each day for discussion of LCWR's response to the Vatican mandate."
"Those times will include information-sharing, communal contemplation, and an opportunity for the members to hear from one another about next steps that LCWR might take regarding the [Vatican] report," said Sanders, who is also a member of NCR's board of directors. "Since each day's process will build on the previous days, it is not expected that there will be any decisions made about next steps until the final day."
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According to the Vatican's mandate, LCWR is to place itself under the authority of Seattle Archbishop Peter Sartain, who is to serve as "archbishop delegate" for the group and is to be assisted in that role by Bishop Leonard Blair of Toledo, Ohio, and Bishop Thomas Paprocki of Springfield, Ill.
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Discussions about the possibility that LCWR will leave the formal structures of the church are expected to take place during the executive sessions at the gathering and during a scheduled time for a "contemplative process."
Both Chittister and Kane expressed reluctance about the group re-forming as a non-canonical entity.
Kane said she was inclined to "stay with the process" and continue trying "to be creative without raising that question initially."
Chittister, who is an NCR columnist, said that while she would hope the group's leaving would not happen, she also said it's a possibility that "will have to be faced."
Framing the situation as the Vatican "blocking the development of thought and the place of Gospel in that thought," Chittister said, "The obstruction and the control of thought is so important to the evolution of theology and the church itself that if it has to be done outside the structures for a while, then it will have to be done."
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