“Not by might shall a man prevail” [1 Samuel 2:9 – RSV].
[L&M] Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini and his Coat of Arms. [R] Pope Francis I bowing to receive blessings from the people.
Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini died at age 85 on 31 August 2012.
That the death of Carlo Martini continues to command attention and debate bespeaks the quality of this man. One particular quality of Martini’s that stood out for us and for many was his willingness to speak the truth as he saw it. Coming from the ranks of cardinals in the Roman Catholic Church, he has been a rare breath of fresh air, and really quite admirable. Just as Fr. Thomas Reese, a church expert and fellow at Georgetown University’s Woodstock Theological Center, has observed, Martini had a “rare combination of skills as a scholar, pastor, communicator and holy man”. This allowed him to be an independent voice in an institutional Church that prizes conformity to tradition at all costs and awards obedience to the hierarchy all the way up the “food chain” to the Vatican.
The media sees it clearly, noting that it is not always that the death of a Cardinal is talked about, and certainly not in high or controversial tones, except where this Cardinal was highly revered or was once a Pope. A renowned Jesuit Biblical scholar, a former archbishop of Milan, a widely read spiritual writer, a popular retreat master, it certainly wasn’t for no good reason that Martini was and continues to be held in high esteem, just as he was considered a potential pope. So at his funeral, a stunning 200,000 people surrounded the cathedral, to pay homage to the man whom many regarded as the most outspoken advocate for church reform and dialogue with the modern world.
In August this year, consciously and deliberately, Martini gave an interview to a journalist, published the day after his death. As we see it, Martini intentionally left us with three words in that interview, intending them to be taken seriously as his “dying declaration”. In legal parlance, these three words constitute his “last will and testament”.
[1] The First Word –
A plea for the Church to modernize and the ordained to get rid of their pomposity.
- “The Catholic Church is 200 years behind the times. Our culture has grown old. Our churches are big and empty and the bureaucratic apparatus of the Church is growing. Our religious rites and vestments are pompous. Why don’t we rouse ourselves? Are we afraid?”
Martini had learned his Scriptures well, so he would not run away from his prophetic ministry and go hide fearfully in a cave. He would not want God to peek into his cave as God did to Elijah and ask of him, “What are you doing in there?” Instead, he became an odd member of the hierarchy who did not hesitate to play the role of the “loyal opposition” whenever he deemed it necessary and right to do so, offering “loyal dissent” in the name of truth, in order to be true to his Christian calling. He did not have to be beholden to whichever Pope who appointed him to the episcopacy, for his unwavering focus was Christocentric – he will stay true to Christ his Lord. The Milanese knew Martini as a man who, unlike most of his colleagues in the episcopacy who chose silence, would speak the truth. Even his Coat of Arms motto, Pro Veritate Adversa Diligere, translates into a sort of call for bold reform: “For the love of truth, dare to choose adverse situations.”
So he had been outspoken and critical of the teachings and actions of the institutional church whenever he found them seriously at odds with the teachings of Christ. What he has left us is a prophetic legacy of which the people, the media and the intellectuals continue to affirm.
Fifty years ago, deeply convinced that the church was badly in need of reform, Pope John XXIII called the Second Vatican Council [1962-65]. In fact, pastors and theologians had long before the Council been calling for and making concrete contributions towards healthy reforms in the Church. In them, we see not only the kind of vision and courage necessary for the transformation of the Church, but also the much-needed wisdom to know that faith and reason must be held together, in healthy tensile balance, and holding each other accountable. But they were at the same time labouring dangerously in an uphill battle against an outdated conservatism backed by an institution that was quick to silence and excommunicate. The institutional readiness to turn on that power was all too familiar to many immensely gifted theologians who suffered in the hands of those hierarchs who were way inferior to them in spiritual openness, not to mention vision and intellect. In that historical context, the accomplishment of the Spirit-filled Vatican II was truly great and awesome. It opened the collective window of consciousness to our roles in and for the Church and the world, and the urgency of being active agents in the tide of their evolving history.
Today, we can be grateful to Martini, a man devoted to Scriptures as he was, for shining a beacon of light on the work of Vatican II. He did not care a dime for all this media upheaval, both Catholic and secular, on the clashes between the so-called “liberals” and the “conservatives” in the Church. He knew well that labels unnecessarily limit and quite unfairly constrict, and the accentuated polarization certainly does not help a rich diversity of thinking and convictions.
There is urgent work to be done and Martini’s focus was on this unfinished work. What he was doing in his dying declaration was to urge us to be Church, faithful and alive, and equivalently important to one another and to all. And as we celebrate the work of aggiornamento, of updating and reform, of 50 years since Vatican II, Martini knew well that this work must continue in each of us personally and in all of us collectively. Still, he knew only too well that, this work of updating and of reform, indeed of “conversion”, must begin from the top. This is rare speech. This is rare light. It reminds one of what the Lord Jesus said to his storm-tossed and fearful disciples in a boat, “Have no fear, it is I.” What is painfully clear is the singular stress in the Lord’s encouraging-admonition: He is real; He is present; focus on Him. It is He whom the Gospels identify as standing on the banks and telling the fishermen-disciples to, again, put out to the deep. Recall, too, that Peter, recognizing how sinful and unworthy he was precisely in a moment when he was utterly awe-struck, confessing to the Lord Jesus: “Depart from me, Lord, a sinful man.”
Martini had even suggested a third Vatican Council to modernise some central aspects of Catholic teaching. When, in September 2007, the 16th-century Tridentine Mass was reintroduced as an option for Roman Catholic churches, Martini said he would refuse to celebrate it. He did not, however, openly support women priests.
Now that Martini is gone, who amongst the episcopacy of the world would pick up this mantle of John the Baptist, as it were, and courageously lend themselves to crying God’s voice from the wilderness, instead of timidly worrying about being unworthy to untie some Vatican shoe laces?
The view from the pew is not a pretty one. After a while, it dawns that a great deal of things said and done in the Church – both universal and local – are in grave dangers of being perceived as mere postures for titillated public consumption. Unless these words and actions are actually matched by real deeds, they represent mere forms that are void of Christian content.
Martini leaves behind questions for the official, institutional, Church to answer truthfully:
- How would an office rooted in power and privilege be a ministry of the Gospel? In the course of dropping its old culture and pompous vestments, what ought the officers of the institutional Church do to recognize the dignity and the talents of the laity, and what would they do to give flesh to all the official verbiage about dignity of the women and their equal respect with men?
[2] The Second Word –
A plea to the officers of the Church to turn to the gospel, and govern by compassion and not by law.
- It is of course quite unusual, to see one of the leading lights in the hierarchy of the Church to openly challenge Church teaching and criticise the way in which the Church often expresses its teaching with negatives and prohibitions rather than encouragement to believers.
As a Biblical scholar and obedient to the Word, Martini’s advocacy of reform and modernization of the Church is paired with a pastoral vision which resonates well with the compassionate pastoral approach enacted by Jesus in the episode of the woman caught in adultery [John 8]. The Gospel insight points to Jesus’ blueprint for pastoral work, which puts compassion before legal demands.
- In his tribute to Martini, a fellow Jesuit Federico Lombardi, the Vatican spokesman, said Martini’s style as a pastor set him apart, quoting from the latter’s book – “The Bishop” – that a bishop cannot guide his flock with decrees and prohibitions alone. “Instead, point to the interior formation, on the love and fascination with the Sacred Scripture, present the positive reasons for what we do according to the Gospel,” Martini wrote. “You will obtain much more than with rigid calls to observe norms.”
Resonating with our opening quote from Scriptures, Martini certainly did not think it wise for an officer of a Christian Church to rule by power rather than by love.
What he urged was the positive giving of encouragement, instead of the negative approach of issuing prohibitions.
His advocacy of reform on issues such as contraception and the role of women in the Church is pretty well documented. He criticized the Church’s position on birth control, calling it out of date and lacking compassion. Like some other high-profiled church leaders [e.g., Former Dominican Master-General Timothy Radcliffe and Cardinal Daneels of Belgium] who stayed close to the excruciating realities on the ground instead of remaining content with issuing decrees from a detached higher realm, he said that condoms might constitute a “lesser evil” in combating HIV/Aids, particularly for married couples. He criticised the Vatican’s position on birth control, and questioned the official stance on issues such as priestly celibacy, embryo donation and euthanasia – calling for “greater pastoral attention” for the terminally ill who say “in all lucidity” that they no longer want care that serves no purpose beyond the artificial prolonging of life.
He had also been deeply concerned with the issue of divorce on which the Church has taken a hard stand. He did not stop at mere lamentation, but daringly proposed solutions:
- “The question is not whether divorced couples can receive Holy Communion, but how the Church can help complex family situations.”
- “Unless the Church adopted a more generous attitude towards divorced persons, it will lose the allegiance of future generations.”
Commenting in 1993 on the conflicts and deep divisions in the Church, Martini did not see the reality as something “dangerous” as others might think. He saw neither differences of opinions as avoidable, nor clashes of mentalities as always bad. Instead, Martini came across as one who was big enough to accommodate a rich and “healthy pluralism”, instead of resting content to force narrowly-interpreted, fiercely-contentious views on the rest of humanity. In any case, he seemed optimistic, at least at the time, that the Church in history, which tended to think, move and change very slowly, would eventually come round to understanding human problems better and adapting itself better to reality.
The question Carlo Martini challenges us to face up to is this:
- If Jesus took flesh and dwelt amongst us again, what words published and things done in His name would He disown?
[3] The Third Word –
A plea to the institutional church to embark on a radical path of change, to own up their mistakes, beginning with the Pope and the bishops.
- The Church must admit its mistakes and begin a radical transformation, beginning with the pope and the bishops. The child sex scandals oblige us to undertake a journey of transformation.
For 2000 years, Christianity has made an enormous contribution to progress in terms of education, tolerance, human rights and social development. It would benefit society if the Christian churches could rediscover and reassert themselves according to Gospel values in an era of increasingly self-centered attitudes and materialistic values.
Martini, however, certainly knew that before the churches could inspire any real change in society, reformation and renewal must first take place in the churches themselves. And he had been around long enough to know that any real change at all must begin from the top. What Martini said here is bound to shock many and even incur the ire of those sensitive to any criticism whatsoever against bishops and the pope. But this is nothing new, really. Fifty years ago, The Second Vatican Council insisted in the Introduction of the Decree on the Training of Priests [Optatam Totius]:
- The Council is fully aware that the desired renewal of the whole Church depends in great part upon a priestly ministry animated by the spirit of Christ and it solemnly affirms the critical importance of priestly training. It lays down certain fundamental principles, wherein regulations already tested by the experience of centuries are reaffirmed, and new regulations are introduced, in harmony with the constitutions and decrees of the sacred Council and the changed conditions of our times.
Martini’s third word brings up three points for serious scrutiny.
First, what is the institutional Church feeding the seminarians at the seminaries – what mentality, what attitude, apart from the outmoded straitjacket doctrine of brainless, spirit-stifling, dehumanising “obedience”?
Second, what is the institutional Church feeding the priests and the bishops of the world – what attitude of communion and genuine humble service, apart from the arrogant, unassailable claim of status and privileges, non-transparency and non-accountability?
Third, while this is not something new, Martini did nevertheless bring something different to the table. He was unequivocal in urging the Church to recognise its errors and embark on a radical path of change. Making singular linkage to the clerical sex abuse scandals in which the Roman Catholic Church has been enmeshed, Martini had clearly understood the colossal impact of these scandals on the soul and moral standing of the Church. He calls it as it is: clerical sex scandals are a symptom of a deeper malaise in the Church. And as we write, the general mood in Australia conveyed through the internet is that:
- “until a Royal Commission is held into child sex abuse by the Catholic Church in Australia and they demonstrably change their culture of covering it up and ignoring victims, they have no moral pulpit to stand on.”
From where we stand, the view is clear. We see a particular resonance in the truth uttered by Martini from beyond the grave. His wish was that those who hold official and institutional authority in the Church today must as a matter of fact do all in their capacity to transform (or reform) ‘in the light of present realities’. To conquer the tiredness of the Church, a “radical transformation, beginning with the Pope and the bishops”, must be re-engineered.
Again, Martini helps raise a challenging question:
- If Jesus took flesh and dwelt amongst us again, what pompous style and attitudes of superior-status and privilege-claims by the clergy, the ruling “elites”, would need to change?
The Catholic Church is currently going through very trying times not only [a] as official leaders try to enforce doctrinal orthodoxy, especially in its inquisitional style of doctrinal management of exclusivity over a rich and diverse plurality, but also [b] in the way of its moral authority in the eyes of the world in the light of its colossal sex scandals and financial misdeeds, as well as [c] a heavy-handed top-down introduction of western-style liturgical reforms. From where we stand, difficult times such as these require words of wisdom and hope from great men and women. Carlo Maria Martini has raised a beacon of light to help illuminate the way for us all. He has led a fruitful life and has earned his rest. We do not mourn his loss at all. Our only concern is with his “three last words” uttered from his deathbed which, clearly, the Roman Catholic Church would fail to listen only to its peril and continued impoverishment. In the words of Robert Mickens, the Rome correspondent of The Tablet, Martini’s last three words “must be seen in the context of coming from a man who loved the Church and who gave his life to the institution. He made a profound statement, which he had already said many times to Benedict and John Paul II in private.”
Now, with the election of Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio to the papacy, there are positive signs that Martini’s fellow Jesuit, the first from the Society of Jesus to be elected pope, may indeed begin to live by example, after the manner of arguably the most glorious of saints, a layman like Jesus of Nazareth – St Francis of Assisi.
- As his very first act in public, he in humility asked the people gathered at St Peter’s Square in Rome to pray for and bless him and he bowed properly to receive their prayer and blessing. It is good to see the newly elected pope give credence to the universal priesthood of all believers. Not only did it cut a most impressive image on the humility of the freshly elected Pope Francis, it positively offered an encouraging sign to the millions of Catholics across the globe who have really grown weary and disillusioned with our Church and with all things clerical – “A new pope, so what? It’s just going to be more of the same: pompous, privileged, clergy-centered, scandal-riddled, quite hopeless!”
- Here is a new man at the helm who comes with an encouraging record. As cardinal-archbishop of the Archdiocese of Buenos Aires, Argentina, he gave up the chauffeur-driven privilege for public transport, a bishop’s privileged mansion for a modest apartment, and he reportedly did his own cooking as well. His simplicity has caught much attention, and aptly articulated by another Jesuit, Andrew Hamilton: “I am deeply heartened by the simple way in which he lived as Archbishop of Buenos Aires. He broke with tradition and identified himself with the ordinary people of the city. The witness of simplicity and solidarity are preconditions for proclaiming the Gospel as good news today.”
- In his last Lenten message on February 13, a month before being elected pope, he acknowledged the Church’s share of the “errors and sins” within the great litany of evils in society and, echoing Martini, he lamented the Church’s “limitation … weakness … and … inability to transform this innumerable list of destructive realities.” Can we do something? Must we do something? His message is resoundingly positive: “Lent comes to us as a cry of truth and sure hope, which answers yes, that it is possible not to put on makeup and draw plastic smiles as if nothing is happening. Yes, it is possible that everything be made new and different because God continues to be ‘rich in kindness and mercy, always willing to forgive,’ and He encourages us to begin again and again. Today we are again invited to undertake a paschal journey to Truth, a journey that includes the cross and renunciation, which will be uncomfortable but not sterile. We are invited to admit that something is not right in ourselves, in society and in the Church, to change, to turn around, to be converted.”
- And a telling quote from the then Cardinal Bergoglio runs thus: “We have to avoid the spiritual sickness of a self-referential church. It’s true that when you get out into the street, as happens to every man and woman, there can be accidents. However, if the church remains closed in on itself, self-referential, it gets old. Between a church that suffers accidents in the street, and a church that’s sick because it’s self-referential, I have no doubts about preferring the former.”
From where we are, the election of Pope Francis has brought new hope to a Church mired deep in crisis.
Copyright © Dr. Jeffrey & Angie Goh. March 2013. All rights reserved.
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