Opting out of Conflict to Follow the New Commandment

I recently read an article in the National Catholic Reporter that resonated with something I have been thinking about for a few years now. The article, written by regular NCR columnist Jamie L Manson, tells the story of the community of Spiritus Christi, or Spirit of Christ, in Rochester, New York.

The community grew out of the Roman Catholic parish of Corpus Christi (Body of Christ). “Led by Father Jim Callan, a charismatic priest with a radical commitment to the poor and marginalized, the church was known for taking risks.” One of these risks was allowing Mary Ramerman, “the parish’s lay associate pastor,” a significant level of participation in the celebration of the liturgy — the Mass. Ramerman preached homilies and was even invited “to raise the chalice during the consecration,” a liturgical act which may only be performed by a priest.

When the diocese got wind of what was going on, Callan was moved to another parish and Ramerman was fired. Ramerman formed a new community to which a significant portion of the Corpus Christi congregation gravitated and which Callan himself soon joined. In 2001 Ramerman was ordained a priest and is now the pastoral administrator of Spiritus Christi; Callan is associate pastor. The community celebrates Mass in non-Catholic churches and has continued to develop the ministries and outreach programs that characterized Corpus Christi’s mission during Callan’s term as pastor. Spiritus Christi is an inclusive parish, with a “spirit of mutual trust and the commitment to creating a loving, supportive environment.”

Naturally there is no connection, official or unofficial, between Spiritus Christi and the diocese of Rochester. The reaction of the diocese to the goings-on at Corpus Christi reflects a sad truth of Christianity today: much of it appears to be a large arena in which countless conflicts — over who is right and who is wrong, who is moral and who is immoral, who knows what God wants and who doesn’t — are playing themselves out in an endless loop of YouTube clips, opinion articles, blog postings, and reader comments. Meanwhile, the fundamental teachings of the Rabbi whose brief life and cruel death inspired a movement that spread to every corner of the earth have been largely forgotten in the heat of a war that can never be won.

Spiritus Christi is a small corner of peace in that noisy arena, an alternative to the culture of Christian conflict.

Did Jesus fight? Of course he did. Did he criticize? Without question. In fact, he directed his anger and his scorn at the very behaviour that so characterizes religious life today. But the purpose of his ministry was not to condemn the thinking or the behaviour or the character of those with whom he disagreed; Jesus did not devote his energy to preserving a tradition of orthodoxy or promoting a cause in which his ego was deeply invested. His mission was much simpler but at the same time far more challenging; it was embodied in the new commandment he issued to his apostles: “Love one another as I have loved you.”

The great conflict in the Catholic Church is between the preservers of tradition — who happen to be “in power” — and the so-called progressives. I am certain that this conflict dominates the conversation in many other Christian denominations as well. Because they have not only been excluded from power but have also been subject to the decisions of those in authority — that women may not be priests, that homosexuality is “intrinsically disordered,” that the Vatican and only the Vatican will determine which translation of the Roman missal is valid — many Catholic progressives have adopted a kind of victim mentality. The more vocal and articulate of these people have become spokespersons for their cause. The Catholic blogosphere is rife with article after article, posting after posting, pointing out the hypocrisy of church leaders, the injustice of curial decisions and policies, and the right of this group or that group to be fully included in the life of the institutional Church.

I count myself among the progressives and take the progressive position in all the major issues that make up the greater conflict within the Church. I am often angered or disgusted by what I see as deliberate ignorance, self-righteousness, and mean-spiritedness in my local Catholic press, for example, and I sometimes feel the urge to write a rebuttal condemning the medieval mindset of the writer and the paper.

Yet I have grown weary of the constant sniping — however articulate, however witty, however justified — that is a staple of the progressive Catholic blogosphere. I know that the bloggers are fighting for recognition and full granting of our rights as gay Catholics or divorced Catholics or Catholic women, but I have come more and more to believe that if Jesus were in this world in the flesh today, he would not be engaged in any of these battles. He would be living the new commandment.

Which is exactly what the community of Spiritus Christi is doing. Mary Ramerman says that it has been “immensely freeing to not have to hang on to that mode of thinking that says, ‘We are Catholic, you are not Catholic.’” Once it became evident that the diocese was not going to welcome Spiritus Christ back into the fold, they “realized that they had a newfound freedom to create the church for which they had longed.” The church the community had dreamed of now includes “a mental health center; two rehabilitation houses for formerly incarcerated women and men; a safe home for men recovering from drug and alcohol addiction; an active prison ministry; and outreach centers in Borgne, Haiti, and Chiapas, Mexico. Construction is currently under way on their latest endeavor, a supportive housing apartment building with 37 units.”

Spiritus Christi has opted out of the conflict. Instead they have chosen to follow the new commandment. The community has a (married) woman priest, it performs gay marriages, and it allows lay persons to “take over all the liturgies” when the pastoral team is away, so there really isn’t any reason to fight with the establishment. “They don’t think much about Rome or the hierarchy of the diocese of Rochester anymore.” Which means they have energy to direct towards loving one another and to loving and serving those in need, just as a certain Jewish prophet did two thousand years ago.

If we as progressive Christians spent as much time reflecting upon the life and teachings of Christ as we did on trying to change the institutional Church, an entity that is in many ways dying and is certainly not the Church we loved as naïve children, we might begin to consider the wisdom and the value of creating communities like Spiritus Christi, where action, in the spirit of the new commandment, rather than reaction, is the charism of the day.

Photo Credits

All photos courtesy Rev. Mary Ramerman of Spiritus Christi.

Rev. Mary Ramerman

Community Activism

Spiritus Christi Service

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