Young Adult Catholics

In his article “Benedict’s ongoing battle against secularism,” National Catholic Reporter columnist John Allen claims that European secular attacks on Catholicism led to Pope Benedict XVI’s recent controversial decisions to allow the Society of St. Pius X and conservative Anglicans into the Catholic fold. 

Allen points to a recent court ruling as evidence that Europe has become overly secular. The European Court of Human Rights, based in Strasburg, “issued its ruling in response to a petition from an Italian woman named Soile Lautsi, who lives near Padua and who claimed that having crucifixes in the public school classrooms attended by her two children violates the church/state separation provisions of the European Convention on Human Rights. The court agreed, awarding Lautsi 5,000 euros (roughly $7,400) in damages.”

Allen argues that, following this ruling by the European court, we cannot fault the Pope and his prelates for seeing European secularists as ferociously attacking Catholic identity. This is why the Pope, according to Allen, is welcoming “groups into the church who are ferociously committed to important markers of identity, such as traditional forms of liturgy and devotion and traditional moral teachings.” (The court did eventually rule that crucifixes hanging in public classrooms in Italy were a violation of religious freedom.)

While I find Allen’s assessment correct, I am troubled by the fact that Catholic identity hinges on revering crucifixes, celebrating traditional forms of liturgy, and adhering to conservative moral teachings, such as avoiding contraceptives and not co-habiting before marriage. There has to be more than this to the Catholic tradition and identity as a follower of Jesus.

After all, according to many scholars, the crucifix wasn’t even the original symbol for Jesus. Scenes of Jesus sharing a meal with the marginalized and healing others were the two most common representations of Jesus among the early Christian communities. Eating together with the oppressed and healing do not belong to any particular faith. These acts of compassion belong to all humanity but are nevertheless central to Christianity.   

Rather than bemoaning the removal of crucifixes as proof of secular hatred toward Catholicism, let’s explore why most secularists see Catholicism as backward in the first place.

The Catholic hierarchy is partly to blame, for it always seems to be playing catch-up with the secular world. It had to admit that the earth did in fact orbit the sun and then offer an apology to those it persecuted for that discovery. It officially recognized the workers’ plights and rights several years after Karl Marx published his Communist Manifesto. And, in the early 1900’s, the Catholic hierarchy was condemning biblical scholarship, only to embrace it several years later to keep pace with Protestant and secular biblical scholars.    

Is it any wonder that many secularists are suspicious of a faith they view as always late to the occasion?

I don’t see how bringing ultra-conservative individuals into the fold will assuage the secular stereotype of the backward church. On the contrary, bringing the Holocaust-denying Lefebvrites and homophobic and misogynist Anglicans into communion with Rome buttresses this notion. If we are to sympathize with the Pope for seeing European secularism as a threat to Catholicism, then we must also understand why secularists see Catholicism as a threat to the forging of a just social order. 

This is a sad realization. Catholicism has a rich social teaching tradition. But, the Pope’s reactions to secularism show the laity that their Catholic identity depends on looking at the crucifix with reverence, by worshipping in traditional forms, and by adhering to strict sexual moral teachings.

The erosion of the Catholic social tradition among Catholics is a more serious threat to Catholic identity than the removal of crucifixes or the playing of modern instruments during a liturgy. 

I attended a Catholic university and could honestly say that the Catholic social tradition was relatively unknown and even ignored by professors, administrators, fellow students, and even some priests and deacons. They, with a few exceptions, knew little about various liberation theologians and the social writings of all popes since Benedict XIV. 

Yet the Catholic social tradition is much more than a treasure trove of texts. Benefiting from years of wisdom, the Catholic social tradition provides a sound framework for prayer, critical reflection and action in response to today’s major social and environmental issues. Hence, even with the publication of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace’s Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, Catholic social teaching still remains the Catholic church’s best kept secret.

Perhaps secularism is right to decry Catholicism’s current backward state. Maybe the Catholic hierarchy and laity need to discover and rediscover a tradition that seems to be forgotten and ignored, but is fundamental to the Catholic identity of following Jesus.

Jesus worked for justice and the elimination of oppression and marginalization. Jesus did not worry about the removal of holy symbols, correct liturgical procedures, and one’s personal sex life. He focused on eradicating political and religious corruption. He worried about the naked, homeless, starving, and impoverished individuals.

This is what the Catholic social tradition represents, and this is what many Catholics have forgotten or ignored. Perhaps secularism, by removing the crucifixes, can help us recall the original images of Jesus healing and eating with the oppressed and marginalized – acts of compassion both secularists and Catholics should do more often to forge a socially just global humanistic civilization.

César J. Baldelomar, a graduate student at Harvard Divinity School, is the executive director of Pax Romana Center for International Study of Catholic Social Teaching and a regular contributor to Sojourners’ God’s Politics Blog. He is also the co-editor of the upcoming study-guide on the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, which will be published by the Pax Romana Center. You can visit Cesar at his website (www.cesarjb.org) and read his blogs at www.holisticthoughts.com