An old graduate school professor of mine used to say, “The party out of power is always the states’ rights party.” He would make this comment when the way American political parties have flip-flopped on ideological positions would come up in our class discussions.
The flip-flops are undeniable. Check the record. The Anti-Federalist Thomas Jefferson was willing to assume the kind of political power that he warned about before becoming president, once the possibility of completing the Louisiana Purchase was on the table. The New England states were the ones talking secession in the early 1800s, when a proposed federal embargo threatened their shipping interests; the Southern states defended the Union at that time. Both sides flipped in the years before the Civil War. Arthur Schlesinger, the champion of a powerful presidency during the “Camelot years” of the Kennedy administration, warned the country of the dangers of an “imperial presidency” once Richard Nixon took office.
Similar changes in position have taken place over the role of the Supreme Court. It was the Republicans who defended the power of the Supreme Court during the early years of the New Deal, when the Court tried to stop FDR and the Democrats in Congress in the name of private property rights; the Democrats of that period attacked the Court for legislating from the bench. By the last half of the 20th century both parties flipped. We now take it for granted that liberals and Democrats will defend judicial activism on First Amendment issues and abortion rights, and that Republicans and conservatives will condemn federal judges who overstep their bounds. We could go on. There are many more examples of these ideological inconsistencies.
It is hard not to come to the conclusion that my old professor was right; that self-interest shapes our ideological beliefs; that we argue for the political principles (states’ rights or federalism, judicial restraint or legislative supremacy, etc.) that will result in our side getting its way. (I wonder, for example, what right-to-lifers would think about the power of the Supreme Court if a Republican president somehow managed to appoint a solid majority of pro-life judges to the Court. Would they defend the right of legislatures in, say, New York or Massachusetts to keep abortion legal?)
What does all this have to do with Catholic issues? I would argue that the same tendency to select an ideological stance to serve an agenda can be seen in theological circles. To be specific, it looks to me as if the liberal theologians who are fond of using the term the “people of God” do so, not because they are genuinely convinced that God speaks to the modern world through the “people” rather than through the Magisterium, but because they see this concept as an opening to promote the changes they desire in the teachings of the Church.
Consider a recent syndicated column by Fr. Richard McBrien. In it, McBrien takes note of an “acute polarization that exists within the Catholic Church” caused by a “distance” that exists “between the official teachings of the Church” and the beliefs of ordinary Catholics. McBrien adds that “many priests agree with their parishioners.” He quotes from a speech by Fr. Timothy Radcliffe at the spring convention of the National Federation of Priests Councils to make his point: “How can we make our priestly lives with people and build communities when we are seen as the public representatives of a moral vision that so many people either do not accept or find it almost impossible to live?”
McBrien maintains that birth control is at the heart of this clash between the official teachings of the Church and the views of the ordinary Catholic. It is hard to disagree. The polls indicate a substantial majority of modern Catholics approves of the use of artificial methods of birth control, regardless of what Rome says. But watch what McBrien does with this situation. He argues that “we must be open to the possibility that the gap exists between certain official teachings and the thinking and behavior of many lay persons (and priests) because the teachings themselves are defective in whole or in part and need to be changed, just as two-thirds of the Papal Birth Control Commission once famously urged the late Pope Paul VI to change the Church’s official teaching on contraception.”
Here’s the logic of theologians such as McBrien: The polls indicate that the great majority of Catholics now favor artificial methods of birth control. The liberal theologians hold that this is a manifestation of the will of the “people of God” and that Rome has an obligation to reshape its teachings to coincide with this new “moral vision.”
In other words, liberal theologians have become the “states’ righters,” the “decentralizers.” They are telling us it is a matter of principle; that the Magisterium must be changed to coincide with the will of the Father as reflected in the “moral vision” of the “people of God”; that when a “gap” exists between the will of the faithful and the official teachings of the Church there is a need for the authorities to close it.
The question is whether there is really a matter of principle at stake here. I can’t help but notice that the majority opinion that the liberals tell us is a reflection of God’s will happens to correspond to the changes the liberals have been promoting for the last fifty years. Is that a coincidence? I find that hard to accept.
Why do I say that? Because we didn’t we hear about the will of the “people of God” when the issues were the Latin Mass and female alter servers. Also, why doesn’t the “moral vision” of the majority of Catholics matter when the issues are capital punishment, homosexuality, immigration and the war with Iraq? Could it be because the majority of Catholics disagrees with the liberal theologians on these issues? Maybe I’m being cynical, but it looks that way to me.
How does it work? Does the thinking of the majority of Catholics become a manifestation of the will of the “people of God” only when it overlaps with the opinions of the theologians who challenge Rome on issues such as birth control and abortion? And are the opinions of ordinary Catholics invalid when they reflect traditional views rather than “progressive” thinking on moral issues?
My point is that the “gap” between the Church’s teachings and the thinking of the majority of Catholics on certain issues is being highlighted by the liberals in order to further their agenda. On some issues, a decentralization of power promotes that end. On others it does not. When majority opinion stands in the way of their agenda, the liberals sing a different tune. When that happens, the liberals issue decrees from on high and set in motion the process — the workshops and lectures and sensitivity sessions — needed to introduce the folks in the pews to the latest insights into how to our beliefs can be made “relevant to our changing world.”
What’s the word for all this? Disingenuous? Manipulative? Machiavellian? I am looking for an antonym for honest.
James Fitzpatrick's new novel, The Dead Sea Conspiracy: Teilhard de Chardin and the New American Church, is available from our online store. You can email Mr. Fitzpatrick at fitzpatrijames@sbcglobal.net.
(This article originally appeared in The Wanderer and is reprinted with permission. To subscribe call 651-224-5733.)
