Booby Traps in the Lectionary; or Expelling the Ghost of Marcion
Several years ago I presented a lecture at the Pontifical Gregorian University concerning the presentation of Jews and Judaism in the Catholic Sunday Lectionary (subsequently published here). In the lecture and article I analyzed the relationships between the Old Testament / Gospel pairings, which had been established after Vatican II according to principles of thematic harmonization or correspondence. (That is to say, the Synoptic Gospels were to be read more-or-less semicontinuously over a 3-year cycle and the Old Testament lections were selected to correspond to the Gospel lections.) One finding of my research was that Year B is particularly bad on two counts: it is the least representative of the diversity of genres and content from the Old Testament; and it is the most suggestive of supersessionist interpretations. Far more frequently than the other two years, Year B’s pairings portray a
discontinuity between the Testaments and a displacement of the Old by the New. To be clear, fulfillment is the teaching of the Catholic Church; supersessionism is not. (E.g., see Cardinal Keeler’s 2004 address in Brazil.) Drawing that line is difficult but essential to sound Catholic theology and preaching.
Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to Year B. The lectionary pairing from last Sunday gets the lowest marks, in my estimation, of any pairing in the entire Sunday lectionary. (If you missed it, here it is.) The pairing of a Levitical law about ostracizing lepers with Jesus’ manual healing of a leper almost certainly leaves a listener with a “Nice, Good Jesus” and “Mean, Bad Jews” message. It’s a booby trap for anti-Jewish preaching, and many homilists step in it.
Texts don’t interpret themselves, of course, and I don’t mean to remove the agency of the preacher. But lectionary preaching is a difficult form of art, and as pressed for time as today’s parish priests are, it makes sense to go in the direction that the lectionary is leading. I’m also not trying to argue the impossible case that the Old Testament doesn’t or shouldn’t say things like this about lepers–the point is that many different texts from the Old Testament could have been chosen, each of which would correspond thematically to the Gospel in its own way and suggest particular motifs for preaching.
For instance, consider that the most widely-used lectionary in Protestant churches, the Revised Common Lectionary, pairs last week’s Gospel instead with the story of Elisha and Naaman the leper (2 Kings 5:1-14). This pairing adds some captivating narrative material from an otherwise neglected (in the lectionary) part of the Old Testament, it doesn’t propagate a negative stereotype of Judaism, and it narrates the identity of God as sustainer and healer in the context of an Old Testament prophet. Moreover, Jesus himself cites this story as a foretaste of his own incipient ministry during his synagogue sermon in Nazareth (Luke 4:27).
Now, lest you think this is all just liberal hogwash, I’ll point out that it’s not only those of us who work in Biblical studies and the field of Jewish-Christian relations that find certain tendencies in the lectionary to be problems worth addressing. The issue was raised at the highest levels, in fact, when the 2008 Synod on the Word of God suggested as one of its propositions to the Pope that “that an examination be carried out of the Roman Lectionary to see if the current selection and ordering of the readings is truly adequate to the mission of the church in this historical moment. In particular, the bond between the Old Testament and the pericopes of the gospels should be reconsidered, so that they do not imply an overly restrictive reading of the Old Testament or an exclusion of certain important passages. The revision of the lectionary could be carried out in dialogue with those ecumenical partners who use this common lectionary.” (Proposition 16, translated from Italian by NCR). Sunday B-6 is likely one of the pairings that our bishops had in mind.
As a final note, Catholics should encourage lectionary reform not only because we care about how Jews and Judaism are presented in our Sunday assembly. We should also do so because the lectionary as it stands can encourage heresy within our own body of believers, namely Marcionism, among the earliest and most seductive of all heresies. The ghost of Marcion–who in the 2nd century taught that the God of the Old Testament was a different, inferior God to the God of the New Testament–has always been with us. Although Marcion’s views were rejected by what became Christianity as we know it, his theological denigration of the Shared Testament has never fully been eradicated from the Church. Every time a Christian utters the phrase “Old Testament God” and “New Testament God”– something which happens all too frequently in Catholic Bible study groups–Marcion is still haunting us. (I myself only discovered that my childhood faith was unwittingly Marcionite when I got to college and took a (required) theology course, but thankfully I had good teachers to counter my previous catechesis in an arch-heresy.)
So my question is, if we do acknowledge the difficulty of expelling the ghost of Marcion from Christian theology, why do we make our task more difficult by using a booby-trapped lectionary?
Lectionary reform is not exactly a hot topic, I know. The story of a couple dozen nerds gathered around a seminar table in Rome to shuffle Biblical pericopes around is not going to generate a catchy press release. But in the long run, a slightly revised lectionary would result in better teaching and preaching, it would be good for Jewish-Christian relations, and most importantly, it could approach a more proper depiction of God each Sunday morning.
PS. If you’re reading, Father, this post is not a comment on your homily from last week. :)
But isn’t the Old Testament God considerably more wrathful and primitive than the New? What about blood sacrifice? Abraham apparently didn’t find it unbelievable that God required him to sacrifice his son, did he? And when Abraham passed the test, a ram was sacrificed, no? Blood sacrifice, by any name.
In case anyone besides me needs this definition: pericope. Puh RIH kuh pee
Having gone from the Roman Catholic Church to the Episcopal Church, and having been a lector in both, I have some familiarity with both lectionaries. The Revised Common Lectionary (or at least the Episcopal Edition) tends to make parallel readings s bit longer, so that the congregation hears more of scripture. Moreover, between Pentecost and Advent there are two tracks for the Old Testament reading. One track keeps the correspondence between the OT and Gospel readings. The other track has continuous readings from the OT, like both lectionaries have for the non-Gospel New Testament reading. This allows more extended consideration of the OT and reduces the likelihood of supersessionist interpretation. The RCC might want to consider these changes.
I agree that last Sunday’s juxtaposition was odd to hear, but I do not think that the time is good for a change. There are too many divisions. The risk is too high that it would be taken over by people with an agenda and no respect for the present lectionary. (I would fear it would be shuffled around for no good reason, and that readings showing compassion, love and closeness of God would be replaced by readings emphasizing our wretched sinfulness and the infinite distance of His majesty). I’d much rather make do with the current imperfections until the atmosphere is more healthy.
This is an excellent post on a serious problem with the Lectionary. I would favor the revision you propose.
One caveat, however. The distinction between fulfillment and supersessionism is useful, but it too is booby trapped because the way it is normally understood carries its own sense of replacement theology. Many people think of fulfillment as exclusive. i.e. the Old Testament is fulfilled only in the New. We need to stress that the Hebrew Bible has an integrity of its own and its own fulfillment within Judaism. Without the refinement, fulfillment is a not so veiled form of supersessionism. In my opinion we should avoid fulfillment language, too.
Michael,
Thank you for an interesting and informative reflection. You write:
“To be clear, fulfillment is the teaching of the Catholic Church; supersessionism is not. (E.g., see Cardinal Keeler’s 2004 address in Brazil.) Drawing that line is difficult but essential to sound Catholic theology and preaching.”
To which Alan Mitchell responds:
“Without the refinement, fulfillment is a not so veiled form of supersessionism. In my opinion we should avoid fulfillment language, too.”
I think this is an imperative discussion within Catholic theology today. I am unable to see how, were we to follow Alan Mitchell’s suggestion, we could avoid either divorcing Jesus from his Jewish background (back to Marcion) or reducing Jesus to one in the line of the prophets of Israel and thereby scant the New Testament’s eschatological claims.
I would be interested in how you would draw the difficult but essential line between supersessionism and fulfillment.
Thank you for this important post, and for sharing your essay.
All the commentaries I read about last Sunday’s Gospel reading refer back to Lev 13 for context needed to understand Mark’s story, so I don’t see any problem in having it as the first reading. I don’t agree at all that this pairing “almost certainly leaves a listener with a ‘Nice, Good Jesus’ and ‘Mean, Bad Jews’ message..”
Wouldn’t getting rid of fulfillment-thought and -language require us to jettison a good deal of the New Testament, too? Think of all those passages in which Matthew says something like: “This was done to fulfill what had been said”, or Paul’s use of typology and allegory, and what do we do with the Epistle to the Hebrews? Must contemporary Judaism also avoid fulfillment-thought and language? There has to be some other solution.
As a catechist, I struggle with this in the RCIA. I am sure revising the lectionaries would be a good idea, but I think most of it has to be done by preachers and teachers. I do not mean to criticize David S, but as long as people see savagery in Isaac, who was spared, and mercy in Jesus, who was not, we will have problems. On the mountain God provides and our hope is always that providential God.
This past Sunday I talked about the role of the role of the priest in limiting the quarantine. If anyone can say someone is leprous, everyone is suspect. We did not pursue the fulfillment in Jesus line of thought, but had a good discussion on sickness not being the all of a person, on lepers being more than their leprosy. I hope they realize that that was an important value in Israel as it is in Christianity.
Regarding Alan Mitchell’s and Fr. Imbelli’s comments: I agree with Mitchell’s emphasis on Judaism as a living tradition with its own developed history from our shared testament. To wit, I very much appreciate Pope Benedict’s own use of living Jewish scholars to aid his interpretation of the Gospels in his published work. This is quite a moment in our shared history! But I disagree with Mitchell because fulfillment and supersessionism can indeed be distinguished; one is a necessary and complex feature of Christian doctrine, the other is a crude and simplistic aberration. In my article (pp. 98-101) I adapted 4 kinds of typological interpretation that I gleaned from Laurence Hull Stookey, a Protestant pastor and professor of homiletics. If you’re interested in reading more about that, one could follow that footnote trail. I also made a case, based on the 2001 Pontifical Biblical Commission document, for which kinds of typological interpretation are encouraged and which discouraged in Christian theology and preaching.
Eugene, could you say something more about how the two track reading cycles work? I very much appreciate the thematically linked readings in the RC system, but it would be very instructive to have continuous readings. That is also the Jewish way. Thank you.
Regarding David Smith’s comment: What you’re proposing (“wrathful and primitive”) formed a core part of Marcion’s argument. Reading the Gospel of Matthew or some of Paul’s letters, for example, gives one a strong sense of a wrathful God. Besides, delaying the wrath and bloodbath to the end of time, as the New Testament does, does not make God’s judgment and wrath any less potent. Regarding sacrifice: bloody animal sacrifice happened every day in virtually every town around the Mediterranean. This was the main source of meat. Sacrifice formed a constitutive part of the theological grammar of the Hellenistic and later Roman worlds. Sacrifice was central to the imagination of how humans and gods related to one another. In fact, Jews were unusually self-limiting in their notion of sacrifice, since unlike most ethno-religious groups, they did not generally build new temples to their God when they emigrated to other places. Through diaspora synagogues they actually developed some of the first and most fruitful ways of being “religious” apart from consistent sacrificial activity. Regarding human sacrifice, your distinction confuses me, I must confess. New Testament theology and soteriology (“how salvation works”) are also built largely on the framework of sacrifice, with Mark, Paul, and the author of Hebrews being the ones who most emphasize the death of a human being as sacrificial atonement.
Very interesting article (thank you), but frankly this past Sunday, listening to the readings, the thought of bad (Old Testament) vs. good (New Testament) never entered my mind. I simply noted that of course one was Old Testament and the other was New Testament referred to leprosy, and that in turn meant that we are all in need of God’s help. I can understand why the lepers were to separate themselves so of course, and I spent some time musing about what life was like then; how folks might have lived and carried on in those days. I was also reminded that Aaron and his sons were the priests (goes back to Exodus from Egypt), and I thought of that for awhile as well.
I also noted that Marc took care to mention how the leper did not just say “help me” but instead said, “if it be your will, please help me . . .“ which to me says that our prayers should not just be an “Lord, I want this” or “Lord, I need that” sort of thing; rather we should try to understand what God wants us to do as well; that His will be done.
Finally, I wondered (still do) what does it mean, how Marc took the time to detail how Jesus told the cured man to just tell the priest and not anyone else, but then later of course the guy blabbed all over to everyone, and so Jesus could barely move around the city. Is that part significant?
Regarding Fr. Komonchak’s comment: We can agree to disagree about where the B-6 pairing leads the preacher and, in turn, the listener in the pew. But my sense of the lectionary pairings is based on the overall set of choices. What I found, among other things, is that there is almost no positive presentation of legal / halakhic material from the Torah in the lectionary. Why not? The problem I’m identifying concerns a pattern of choices that over time and cyclical use lead the preacher and thus the congregation to sense more discontinuity than continuity between the testaments. If the average Christian in the pew senses discontinuity more than continuity, my contention is that the identity of God as revealed in Scripture is being unnecessarily (and unintentionally) distorted, and the ghost of Marcion lives on. About “getting rid of fulfillment-thought and -language,” I presume you were replying to Mitchell’s proposal, and not my post.
On reviewing the web-link, I see my memory is not as good as I thought; no surprise there.
:-)
The Gospel actually reads “If you wish, you can make me clean.”, which of course is much deeper than what I recalled.
First of all, by putting his prayer in this manner the poor leper was affirming that Jesus was God and all-powerful.
Second, In making his request, he did not formally need to ask; it was obvious he needed God’s help and he knew Jesus understood that.
Third, by saying “If you will it” the leper invoked God’s will, left the matter up to Him, trusted that whatever Jesus did, that he (the leper) would the better for it.
Finally Marc notes how Jesus was “moved with pity” and that of course is reassurance for us all; that He wills that all “be made clean” (be healed).
Thanks again, for the thoughtful article and the web-link. The re-read was well worth it!
James Englert:
To illustrate from this year’s cycle:
June 10, 17 and 24: Readings from 1 Samuel
July 1 through August 12: 2 Samuel
August 19 through 26: 1 Kings.
Just to be clear, I realize that one cannot rid the NT of fulfillment language. But one can avoid the exclusivist interpretation of fulfillment when discussing it. Fulfillment does not have to mean replacement, as it has sometimes been interpreted. And so, Michael, I think we are probably a lot closer on this point than would appear from what I wrote above. See my “A Sacrifice of Praise: Does Hebrews Promote Supersessionism?” in Eric F. Mason and Kevin B. McCruden, eds. Reading the Epistle to the Hebrews: A Resource for Students. Altanta: Society of Biblical Literature Press, 2011, 251-67.
I’ve heard it said that Mark’s gospel, because of the fast paced narrative and the frequent use of the word “immediately”, was crafted for Roman audiences who “were on the go”. Be that as it may, it seems to me that his gospel is densely laden with allusions to to the Old Testament. For example, we are told that the woman who touched Jesus’ garment had been suffering with a hemorrhage for twelve years. This incident is immediately followed by that raising of Jairus’ daughter who was twelve years old. Do these two incidents that pointedly mention the number twelve represent the reunification of the twelve tribes of the Davidic (or Messianic) Kingdom and thus point to Jesus as the Messiah?
Jesus’ healing of the leper juxtaposed with the Aaronic proscriptions is not a criticism of the Old Testament Jews and I don’t think the Church means it to be taken as such. Rather, it is a restorative action coincides with Christ’s plan to include everyone into the Kingdom of God. If there’s any criticism, it’s leveled at all of us who can’t or won’t look at others through the eyes of Jesus.
I think that Fr. Komonchak’s point concerning the integral role played by fulfilment-type scenarios in New Testament texts highlights a basic problem faced by the conscientious liturgist, catechist, or preacher when dealing with the NT’s use of scripture–namely, the fact that the liturgist (and so on) and the NT authors occupy wholly different contexts formed by different pasts.
The NT writers are, largely, participating in intra-Jewish discourse that is, naturally enough, deeply informed by the scriptures of Israel. It’s a point that I find frequently requires driving home in Christian circles—polemic al exchanges in the New Testament do not consist of different religions (ie. Christianity and Judaism) slugging it out (with Christianity winning, of course). Rather, you typically see Jews doing the Jewish thing of airing out beef with other Jews’ perspectives.
The contemporary Christian is, of course, faced with the bind of using texts formed within a religious tradition from which they are alienated, while wanting to confront almost two thousand years’ worth of bad behaviour. One first (big) step is, I think, to try to collapse those millennia’s worth of anti-Jewish interpretive strategies in on themselves by actively voicing the fact presented above: that the idea that Judaism was something awaiting replacement was simply not on the radars of biblical authors, that the interpretive coups scored by NT authors occurred in a Jewish context. Obviously, Christians can’t really use the NT while avoiding the fact that a lot of it deals with pretty specific schemes of how the scriptures are to be understood or even realized in light of Jesus. What has to be confronted is the long-lived tendency in Christianity to think of Judaism as something that ceased back in the early A.D. days—as something that is somehow vestigial and sterile. This requires the sort of ambiguous thinking that is typically needed when trying to make the Bible actively important in life. In this case, I think that it means 1) recognizing that even if the notion that tanakh passages foreshadow NT events is key to Christian Bible-reading, it doesn’t mean that those texts are only in existence for that purpose (this just cheats the Christian out of a full experience of the Bible). And 2) admitting that Judaism is a living religion that has developed and continues to develop. Also 3) recognizing that the tendency of supersessionism has been bread-and-butter in much of the Church’s foundational interpretive strategies (peruse something like Ambrose’s commentary on Luke, if you think otherwise).
Abe Rosenzweig: I agree with you about the context of “infra-Jewish discourse” in which most NT texts must be read and about the three comments that end your post. I learned a great deal from J.D.G. Dunn’s book The Partings of the Ways, and wonder what you, and others, think of it.
I have read the scriptures in the liturgy for years and in fact read the Leviticus passage last Sunday to my church. And the fine line between fulfillment and supersessionism has concerned me as it has so many contributors. Thanks to all who have joined the most enlightening conversation here.
Here is how I settled the question in my preparation and reading. I emphasized the word “declare.” By declaring the person unclean the priest completed a formal process of preserving the people from a potential threat to their health and safety. And by various visible signs the affected person also took steps to protect others from the contagion that was thought to take place. We have our own formal processes to give an informed response to perceived danger. I don’t believe that the Gospel passage was intended to deny all this, but merely to show that it was more important to take the risk to one’s own well being in order to include everyone in the plan of salvation. And many men and women of all religions have followed this example, often giving their lives.
Michael, thanks for this extremely thought-provoking post, and thanks to all for the exceptional conversation that has ensued.
Michael, in your opinion, is this week’s pairing less prone to the problems you’ve mentioned?
http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/021912.cfm
Claire is completely correct. Now is not the time to reform the lectionary. There are too many issues being contested at once, and no strong leadership to which all parties can look with confidence to steer the ship. Partisan visions and agendas are uppermost right now. Everyone will feel free to project onto the moment an occasion to settle scores, or gain ground for their particular agenda in the ongoing liturgy wars. Some have claimed that with the new Roman Missal the liturgy wars are over. This is untrue. They are ongoing.
I hate to be so negative, but here is another question. The so-called booby traps have been there for forty years. Are there no helps to steer clear of them, in all this time? Why would this issue seem pressing now, as it hasn’t before? Dealing with inadequate hermeneutical frameworks for preaching and catechesis is a job for the institutions that prepare people for ordination and catechetical leadership. Is the implicit suggestion that there are more boobies in the pulpit these days than there were twenty years ago? I am not arguing that there are, but I am asking if that’s really the underlying concern.
It is true, there is more work to be done to “reform the reform.” Here, for example, is an article explaining why a revised translation of the collects isn’t enough: http://faculty.caldwell.edu/lpristas/novaetveteraweb.pdf
On a lighter note, and with a Godwin’s Law alert, I couldn’t stop rofling at this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vC1RgiLNACM&feature=youtu.be
I think that Abe Rosenzweig raises an excellent point. The Talmud’s tradition of the Oral Torah, a living and dynamic application of the Torah to changing social conditions and deepening theological understandings shows how the Jewish tradition grappled with issues like the purity laws and how to humanely apply them. The tradition developed accordingly.
The danger in all ritual cleanliness codes designed to preserve religious identity and the distinction between the holy and the profane, is that they can easily degenerate into elitism, exclusionism and oppression. That’s probably a very timely message of the dangers in a Catholic Church which is currently reaching back to reclaim a deeper “Catholic identity”.
The key to Mark’s passage seems to be that the leper did not ask to be cured of his leprosy, but to be made ritually clean, ie fit to join the community worship.
How does that apply to those “ritually excluded” from the Catholic Church today ? Homosexuals ? The divorced and remarried ? All our own “lepers” ?
God Bless
In Mark 10, the Pharisees ask Jesus if it is “lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” Matthew 19 adds the phrase “for any cause?”
Here is Jesus’ answer from Mark (again, slightly different from Matthew because of the “for any cause” part of the question.)
He answered them, “What did Moses command you?”
They said, “Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of divorce, and to put her away.”
But Jesus said to them, “For your hardness of heart he wrote you this commandment.
But from the beginning of creation, `God made them male and female.’
`For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife,
and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two but one flesh.
What therefore God has joined together, let not man put asunder.”
Jesus is clearing setting the bar higher than Moses, the lawgiver. Can this admonition against “hardness of heart” be an example of the specter of Marcionism or Supersessionism? Certainly, in the historical context, Christ is talking to and about Jews and is critiquing a piece of the Jewish moral law that he thinks needs development. But I suggest that when Jesus has these types of discussions, he is speaking to all of us who now, like the Pharisees, have had the benefit of an encounter with him.
Contemporary exegetes recommended that we read the scriptures in a historical-critical light. Moreover, they ask that we approach the sacred texts with an awareness of typology and the roles of symbols. We’re asked to look beyond the literal meaning of the text in order to see the broader truth(s) therein. The Jews were the Chosen People, so Christ challenges them first to stretch a bit in light of his coming. But as the restoration of the Davidic Kingdom is a symbol of the establishment of the all-inclusive Kingdom of God, the OT Jews are representative of all of us who are in need of constant reencounters with Christ. And I really believe that today’s faithful intuit this when they hear (contrapuntal) readings from the lectionary.
I meant to say “clearly setting the bar” not “clearing”.
Thank you, Michael (02/14/2012 – 10:25 am) for helping me understand the killing/sacrifice in context.
So both traditions – the old and the new – are “hung up” on the idea of blood sacrifice. Interesting – I’d not thought of it that way, oddly. It’s obvious, but it wasn’t obvious until now.
So I wonder whether that might not at least suggest that humans are destined to kill and be killed. In that, perhaps, we participate in nature, like it or not. We and the saber-toothed tiger are closer kin than it usually pleases us to think, the difference being that we, with our frontal cortex, are obliged to rationalize the killing as sacrifice.
Fr. Komonchak, I agree that the Dunn book is probably a pretty great intro for Christians to some of the Jewish context of the NT that they may otherwise miss.
I’m not particularly satisfied with his discussion of the so-called “parting” because he (and he is up front about this) explains it theologically, while not really dealing at all with the sociological level.
Question: I’ve heard that the directives from the new Roman Missal do not permit women to be among the “12 apostles” (parishioners) who are able to get their feet washed on Holy Thursday. Also priests are directed by their bishops to to have the foot washing ceremony, if they feel that parishioners (women from the parish) will be angry at this restriction. And truth to this—and if so—-
1) Is this directive being followed everywhere in English speaking countries?
2) Are priests really going to follow this?
Correction: Priests are being directed by their bishops NOT to have the foot washing ceremony, if they feel that there will be angry reactions to foot washings ONLY open to the men of the parish.
Little Bear,
I do not know of bishops who are directing this. There may be some. But they need not do so because of the Missal. In the dioceses of the United States it is customary to include both men and women in the footwashing rite. This is accepted and acceptable practice. The USCCB website has an explanation posted here:
http://old.usccb.org/liturgy/q&a/general/feet.shtml
At the bottom of the page, it also says this:
“This is the latest statement of this Secretariat on the question. No subsequent legislation or instructions have necessitated a modification in the statement.”
If anyone is interested in knowing more about the footwashing rite, I would recommend Peter Jeffrey’s book: A New Commandment. He is very clear and persuasive about the origins of the custom itself and of the background to the use of the term “viri” in the Missal. In short, the idea of 12 males “role-playing” apostles is not hoary tradition, and the idea of “play-acting” itself is not in the best tradition of liturgical thinking or practice. The rubric with viri is recent. It first appeared in 1955. Footwashing itself however is very old, and was practiced in many settings, including monastic ones and including women’s communities. No one should feel as though they are “forsaking Catholic tradition” by washing women’s feet.
Rita – it is not customary everywhere.
It is not customary to have women in the foot-washing rite at our parish – at all.
In fact in our parish (California), in all the years I can recall, women have never participated in the foot washing rite. Also, in SD where I was baron and rasied, I never saw women partake in this rite.
I imagine women take part if the cermony takes place in a convent setting, but I have never seen any woman participate in this at the parish/laity level.
Re: the Mandatum and women’s feet: Fr. Z is on the case:
http://wdtprs.com/blog/2009/02/preparing-for-a-yearly-triduum-controversy/
That the page that Rita referenced contains national guidelines that have been in place, apparently officially-uncontested, since 1987 (despite the fact that the 3rd edition of the Roman Missal still specifies “men” in the sex-exclusive sense), suggests that Rome doesn’t feel so strongly about this that it is willing to raise a ruckus over it.
Is there no lowest limit below which the “leadership” (males, of course) will not crawl?
Is there no low point of abuse below which women will say: enough is enough?
Is there no low point of abuse of women below which mel will say: enough is enough?
Where do conscience and personal integrity take the place of misplaced, misguided loyalty?
It could be noted that the traditional antiphons for the foot washing were not just about Jesus washing the feet of St Peter, but also about the women who anointed the feet of Jesus.
Then he turned to the woman and said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? When I entered your house, you did not give me water for my feet, but she has bathed them with her tears and wiped them with her hair.” Luke 7:44
I know for a fact, that in my diocese, there will BE NO women invited to have their feet washed. And the rational being given is that the new Roman Missal states that only men are to be invited. The priests were told that if they think that the women will raise “a ruckus” not to have the washing of feet at all.
Dear Ken,
Thank you for sharing your experience. It makes me doubly glad that I posted the information from the bishops’ conference website. This way, when you do see some parish including women, you will not assume they are doing something wrong or impermissible.
Little Bear,
Can someone kindly inform your bishop that all this scrupulosity is unnecessary? I can’t help but recall the dust-up in Phoenix due to the bishop’s misreading of the rules concerning communion under both forms. A lot of angst could have been avoided. Does he have a liturgy director for the diocese? Is this person competent? Someone ought to address this issue before it hits the streets.
Also, I would hope that it’s more than women who will “raise a ruckus” if women are excluded from the footwashing rite!
Jim P., that blog post you cited is from 2009. Is that what being “on the case” looks like? ;)