Catholics: What Century Are You Living In?

-I declare that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church’s faithful. –Pope John Paul II, Ordinatio Sacerdotalis 4

-Let no one deceive you with shallow arguments. –Ephesisans 5:6

Women can’t be priests? Really? Forgive me for beginning with such an obvious and tired old subject, but really?

Catholics are generally an educated bunch. So why do so many accept such an obviously discriminatory policy? I believe that no Catholic should accept the teachings of their church because it is officially a discriminatory organization. Only years of indoctrination can cause an educated person to overlook this outrageous fact.

I’ve heard some Catholic leaders explain why women can’t be priests. Their reasoning is wildly nonsensical. It should be offensive to anyone with a brain. In fact, I’ll refer to today’s passage from the scripture and encourage readers to take it to heart: “Let no one deceive you with shallow arguments…Learn to judge for yourselves what is pleasing to the Lord” (Ephesians 5:6-10). Each Catholic should judge for himself or herself whether they want to swallow the backwards teachings of a religious group mired in the past, blind to equality and reason. Just google “Why can’t women be priests” and read the insulting games of logic for yourself.

But none of this is actually what church this week was about. It’s just what I thought of as I sat in a crowded, downtown Catholic church waiting for the service to begin. I watched people genuflect before entering the pews. I watched them cross themselves. I listened to songs in Latin. And I began to wonder whether religious people place more value in things just because they have always been done than in their own ability to think.

The priest’s sermon had some really strong points that I agree with, but ultimately led me to ask the same question. What century are they in? He referenced a story from the Gospel of John, in which Jesus heals a blind man. The people asked what the blind man had done to deserve his blindness, and Jesus said nothing—he was blind so that God could reveal his glory by healing him.

OK, so that guy is pretty lucky. Jesus heals him, he can see, dances off down the street, whatever. Everyone’s amazed at God. Excuse me, but what about all the blind saps that Jesus didn’t heal? Why did God make them blind? Couldn’t he just show his power more effectively by miraculously making everyone able to see. No wait—why stop there. He could miraculously make everyone healthy. Oh, and make enough food for everyone to eat. Heck, he could throw in ice cream stands on every street corner in the deserts of Israel. Seems to me there are better ways for God to show his glory.

Ah, but I’m being unfair. The priest wasn’t interested in all these potentialities. He was merely trying to extract from this ancient and probably untrue story a reasonable lesson for today’s listeners. And it is here that I must admit he had some good things to say. He was addressing some real and serious issues that we all think about. Why is there suffering? Why is there illness? How are we to respond to pain? He told a story about a person with Downs Syndrome and how she brought much joy to the lives of people she touched. He suggested that all people have gifts to bring, that all people can make life better for others. He made the beautiful point that we should not measure quality of life by physical ability. The disabled, sick, and elderly are equally human, and we should not as a culture be afraid of physical diminishment. What does it mean to be fully alive?

I’m glad I went to this church and heard this lesson. Indeed, I am better off for hearing and pondering this message.

At the same time, I am deeply angry. He suggests that we should explain away suffering as something that God wants. Suffering as we think of it—well, that’s not actually suffering. If you think that blindness is bad, you’re just not getting it. If you think that a child dying of cancer is bad, well, you’re just missing the point. If you think that someone being born without legs and consequently being forced to beg for pennies next to a trash heap in Nepal is bad, then you’re not realizing God’s true purpose.

If it is for the glory of God that these people suffer, as Jesus suggests in John 9:3, nobody should worship that God. They should reject him.

Thankfully, it is not for the glory of any god that people suffer. If it were, that would be a cosmic cruelty without reason for hope. Rather, suffering has reasons that we can understand and do something about. We might not be able to cure blindness or cancer yet, but perhaps someday. We might not be able to give people legs, but perhaps someday. And until that day, we can organize human civilization in intelligent ways that respect the dignity of all and ease suffering everywhere. Pie in the sky? Unrealistic? Cheesy? Yes, all of the above, but certainly better than worshipping the imaginary being who caused the suffering for his own glorification. We should be beyond that in the 21^st century.

Jesus ends the story of the blind man with this observation: “It is for judgement that I have come into this world—to give sight to the sightless and to make blind those who see…If you were blind you would not be guilty, but because you claim to see, your guilt remains” (John 9:39-41). The Catholic Church would do well to heed Jesus’s words. They claim to see. Jesus himself says that those people who claim to have all the answers are the most ignorant. But wait, churchgoingatheist, wouldn’t that apply to arrogant bloggers like yourself? To anyone? Yes, I suppose it would. Jesus’s words create a paradox, by which nobody can ever speak to anything with authority. Another logical trap, causing people to remain in perpetual ignorance rather than thinking for themselves.