Pastoral Practice After Fiducia Supplicans by Eve Tushnet

[Michie]

Picture it: you are a normal priest, or you try to be, and you are a little less normal than usual because it is the week before Christmas: special liturgies, special confession times, family togetherness (yikes)! And then, your phone buzzes—and it buzzes again—and it buzzes again. Everybody is sending you images from CNN or MSNBC or Fox, and all the news tickers at the bottom of the screen say, “Pope approves blessing of same-sex couples.”

The doorbell at the rectory buzzes. You answer it. Two men in tuxes are standing there, with bouquets and big hopeful grins.

It is now weeks later. The candy canes are stale, you are starting to recall that the carol does not go, “God bless you, merry gentlemen, you fill us with dismay!” and you are wondering whether you handled that situation well. Maybe the men wanted to be married in your church, and you had to say no, and that you wish you had been able to say it so that it sounded like a door opening instead of closing. Maybe they just wanted a blessing, and you had to navigate the stringent prohibitions and vague positive suggestions of Fiducia Supplicans, the document from the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith that started this whole mishegoss. The recent press release clarification has not helped much (all this drama is about blessings that are supposed to be “10–15 seconds” long?) and neither has the outraged thundering or bland support of your bishop. You want to be obedient to your superior and also to the Holy Father; you really do not want to risk rebuke, scandal, or punishment.

And yet you also feel the responsibilities of a shepherd. You know you need to offer both welcome and orthodoxy—neither, “Go away and come back when you’re chaste!” nor, “Do what you feel, it’s the new Catholic Church, baby!”

You do not know what you should have done. And you are pretty sure you are going to have to do it again.

As a lesbian seeking to live obediently to the Church, who writes frequently on gay people’s spiritual lives, I have had hundreds of formal interviews and informal conversations with LGBT+ and same-sex-attracted Catholics across the full spectrum of relationships to the Church. I have noticed patterns in what nourishes faith—and what damages someone’s trust in God. As Fiducia Supplicans itself reiterates, every soul’s journey and needs are unique. But there are questions that you as a priest can ask and possibilities you can look out for.

Each section below begins with a question or set of questions responding to the hopes and fears of real gay and same-sex attracted Catholics. They are intended to illuminate the reasons people come to you for a blessing, whether or not you are allowed to give that blessing. If you ask these questions with a spirit of curiosity, you will almost certainly hear something unexpected—and open a door to the Love that surpasses all our expectations.

What brings you to the Church today?

Continued below.

Pastoral Practice After Fiducia Supplicans

Eve Tushnet on tending to gay Catholics.

churchlifejournal.nd.edu

 

[fide]

This article surprised me, Michie. It was not something I would have expected in this forum, and as soon as I read the author write she was "a lesbian" I began to look for errors in her thoughts. I found something beautiful, however: I heard in her writing a beautiful desire to offer charity to persons living in contradiction. I believe, however, Fiducia Supplicans and her article are fundamentally imprudent and inadequate to the best of the motivations which may be in them.

I looked back to my own life experience as a "former Catholic" who believed in neither Christ nor a [Personal] God, and I applied the question to my back-then self: "What brings you to the Church today?". The answer was not a search for someOne (God) or someThing (Church) that would "bless" me or be a blessing for me. I was not looking for affirmation - I was looking for truth. In a world that seemed to be dominated ultimately by the Fundamental Reason for human choices: "It's all about ME", I was searching for something beyond me.

When I found "it"(actually, when He found me), my life began.

My point is, I believe that it is not charitable to search for a way to say "yes" to human persons drowning in the loneliness of modern godlessness, by offering a "blessing" to them from a church or a god having no more depth or reality in their understanding than the rest of the sea of darkness they are sinking in. They are not helped by another empty or at best shallow "yes" to themselves. They need to encounter, or even be confronted by, what (Who) is beyond and greater than themselves. We are created and designed for God, not for His "blessing" on who we are apart from Him. We find ourselves only in Him, not by His "good word" to us outside of HIm. HIs blessing is found in Him. What we must find, is Him in Truth.

 

[Michie]

This article surprised me, Michie. It was not something I would have expected in this forum, and as soon as I read the author write she was "a lesbian" I began to look for errors in her thoughts. I found something beautiful, however: I heard in her writing a beautiful desire to offer charity to persons living in contradiction. I believe, however, Fiducia Supplicans and her article are fundamentally imprudent and inadequate to the best of the motivations which may be in them.

I looked back to my own life experience as a "former Catholic" who believed in neither Christ nor a [Personal] God, and I applied the question to my back-then self: "What brings you to the Church today?". The answer was not a search for someOne (God) or someThing (Church) that would "bless" me or be a blessing for me. I was not looking for affirmation - I was looking for truth. In a world that seemed to be dominated ultimately by the Fundamental Reason for human choices: "It's all about ME", I was searching for something beyond me.

When I found "it"(actually, when He found me), my life began.

My point is, I believe that it is not charitable to search for a way to say "yes" to human persons drowning in the loneliness of modern godlessness, by offering a "blessing" to them from a church or a god having no more depth or reality in their understanding than the rest of the sea of darkness they are sinking in. They are not helped by another empty or at best shallow "yes" to themselves. They need to encounter, or even be confronted by, what (Who) is beyond and greater than themselves. We are created and designed for God, not for His "blessing" on who we are apart from Him. We find ourselves only in Him, not by His "good word" to us outside of HIm. HIs blessing is found in Him. What we must find, is Him in Truth.

I cannot disagree. I do think it’s important to look at the various ways people are receiving this document though.

 

[fide]

I cannot disagree. I do think it’s important to look at the various ways people are receiving this document though.

Yes, I agree with that concern. We can see already the ways the document is "used" to promote, normalize, and enculturate further the evil being sown around the world.

 

[Michie]

Yes, I agree with that concern. We can see already the ways the document is "used" to promote, normalize, and enculturate further the evil being sown around the world.

Exactly. That’s why I think these pieces are so important. I cannot say I’m surprised though.

 

[zippy2006]

This article surprised me, Michie. It was not something I would have expected in this forum, and as soon as I read the author write she was "a lesbian" I began to look for errors in her thoughts. I found something beautiful, however: I heard in her writing a beautiful desire to offer charity to persons living in contradiction. I believe, however, Fiducia Supplicans and her article are fundamentally imprudent and inadequate to the best of the motivations which may be in them.

Church Life Journal published a pair of contrasting articles, one on Friday and one on Saturday. Tushnet's piece came second, on Saturday. The article published first was, "Fiducia Supplicans and the Casuistry of Blessings."

I want to quote from it given the current atmosphere on this subforum:

This passage [from Fiducia Supplicans §25] includes a quote from a document[2] on popular piety and liturgy, which was issued in another context and for another reason. Used in the context of the discussion in FS, it conveys the impression of a disdain for anyone who dares to suggest that there is a problem with the issue of blessings for same-sex couples. Anyone who finds fault with the ruling of the DDF on this issue is therefore “narcissistic,” “authoritarian,” and “elitist.” But is that really true? The drafters of this text have not done justice to Pope Francis, who has always indicated his approval of healthy theological disputations as an important way to get to the truth of the gospel. Does this same verdict also apply to the 2021 Responsum from the same DDF, which, in direct opposition to the Fiducia Supplicans of 2023 from the same dicastery, asserts that “it is not licit to impart a blessing on relationships, even stable, that involve sexual activity outside of marriage (i.e., outside the indissoluble union of man and woman open in itself to the transmission of life) as is the case of the unions between persons of the same sex.” Is this statement, which also claims to have been issued after consultation with the Holy Father, also elitist, narcissistic, and authoritarian?​

 

[chevyontheriver]

Picture it: you are a normal priest, or you try to be, and you are a little less normal than usual because it is the week before Christmas: special liturgies, special confession times, family togetherness (yikes)! And then, your phone buzzes—and it buzzes again—and it buzzes again. Everybody is sending you images from CNN or MSNBC or Fox, and all the news tickers at the bottom of the screen say, “Pope approves blessing of same-sex couples.”

The doorbell at the rectory buzzes. You answer it. Two men in tuxes are standing there, with bouquets and big hopeful grins.

It is now weeks later. The candy canes are stale, you are starting to recall that the carol does not go, “God bless you, merry gentlemen, you fill us with dismay!” and you are wondering whether you handled that situation well. Maybe the men wanted to be married in your church, and you had to say no, and that you wish you had been able to say it so that it sounded like a door opening instead of closing. Maybe they just wanted a blessing, and you had to navigate the stringent prohibitions and vague positive suggestions of Fiducia Supplicans, the document from the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith that started this whole mishegoss. The recent press release clarification has not helped much (all this drama is about blessings that are supposed to be “10–15 seconds” long?) and neither has the outraged thundering or bland support of your bishop. You want to be obedient to your superior and also to the Holy Father; you really do not want to risk rebuke, scandal, or punishment.

And yet you also feel the responsibilities of a shepherd. You know you need to offer both welcome and orthodoxy—neither, “Go away and come back when you’re chaste!” nor, “Do what you feel, it’s the new Catholic Church, baby!”

You do not know what you should have done. And you are pretty sure you are going to have to do it again.

As a lesbian seeking to live obediently to the Church, who writes frequently on gay people’s spiritual lives, I have had hundreds of formal interviews and informal conversations with LGBT+ and same-sex-attracted Catholics across the full spectrum of relationships to the Church. I have noticed patterns in what nourishes faith—and what damages someone’s trust in God. As Fiducia Supplicans itself reiterates, every soul’s journey and needs are unique. But there are questions that you as a priest can ask and possibilities you can look out for.

Each section below begins with a question or set of questions responding to the hopes and fears of real gay and same-sex attracted Catholics. They are intended to illuminate the reasons people come to you for a blessing, whether or not you are allowed to give that blessing. If you ask these questions with a spirit of curiosity, you will almost certainly hear something unexpected—and open a door to the Love that surpasses all our expectations.

Continued below.

Pastoral Practice After Fiducia Supplicans

Eve Tushnet on tending to gay Catholics.

churchlifejournal.nd.edu

Eve Tushnet has one interesting example:

Fiducia’s mention of blessings on pilgrimage and at shrines made me recall a same-sex love that opened the door to renewed faith.​

Midway through the dark wood of the twentieth century, two men in an “irregular situation” made a pilgrimage to the shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham. The American poet Dunstan Thompson had been raised Catholic, but shed his faith at Harvard; he became famous for daring, confessional poetry of gay longing and sexual torment. During World War II he met his partner, the English journalist Philip Trower. Domestic happiness with Trower gentled his poetry—and, perhaps, allowed him to reopen the doorway of faith. The two men, still your basic sexually active gay couple, traveled to Rome in 1950 for the proclamation of the doctrine of the Assumption. At Walsingham, they were more than tourists: Thompson knelt before a Eucharistic procession as the Host passed by. But he was still ambivalent. He feared that if he returned to his faith, he would be told to separate from Trower—from the man who had loved him into peace.​

At last he took the leap of faith. He made his confession, and explained to Trower that they would have to live chastely; could Trower accept this? Trower, who himself would later become Catholic, records simply: “I said Yes.” Thompson’s priest encouraged him to continue living with his partner, discerning that their love offered not primarily sexual temptation but support in following God.​

I could maybe see blessing these folks as individuals or even together because what 'couples' them is now NOT sodomy. These guys are not the problem. Blessing them would not be blessing continued sin. These folks could possibly have been blessed without scandal before Fiducia Supplicans. Is that what cardinal Fernandez intended, and only this kind of thing? I don't believe that for a moment. I can't see the original intent as anything other than as understood by James Martin, tight friend of the pope. It was and is a jesuitical opening to be as liberal as the Anglicans, forcing all of us to bow in obedience to the Vatican upending of the faith.

 

[chevyontheriver]

This article surprised me, Michie. It was not something I would have expected in this forum, and as soon as I read the author write she was "a lesbian" I began to look for errors in her thoughts. I found something beautiful, however: I heard in her writing a beautiful desire to offer charity to persons living in contradiction. I believe, however, Fiducia Supplicans and her article are fundamentally imprudent and inadequate to the best of the motivations which may be in them.

I find Fiducia Supplicans to be impossible morally and likely impossible liturgically, as well as deeply imprudent. Scandalous too. Eve Tushnet I respect but I don't find the whole of what she wrote here convincing. It would have been far better if Fiducia Supplicans were not written. It would be best to take it back for further study and correction or burial. It is not adequately pastoral. Eve at least has some pastoral sense of what is needed, and that because she actually tries to live a chaste life. I wonder how many promoters or authors or collaborators on the text of FS actually try to do that?

 

[fide]

I find Fiducia Supplicans to be impossible morally and likely impossible liturgically, as well as deeply imprudent. Scandalous too. Eve Tushnet I respect but I don't find the whole of what she wrote here convincing. It would have been far better if Fiducia Supplicans were not written. It would be best to take it back for further study and correction or burial. It is not adequately pastoral. Eve at least has some pastoral sense of what is needed, and that because she actually tries to live a chaste life. I wonder how many promoters or authors or collaborators on the text of FS actually try to do that?

Except for the very high demands of the word "impossible" I don't disagree with what you have written, but I did want to stress what I included in my post, "I found something beautiful, however: I heard in her writing a beautiful desire to offer charity to persons living in contradiction."

When I first heard of the growing devotion to "Divine Mercy" - streaming from the Sacred Heart of Jesus - I thought "mercy" was being over-emphasized at the expense of moral Truth, Righteousness and Holiness. More recently, seeing what I perceive to be an over-reaction to the over-emphasized virtue of mercy, I became more acutely aware of an evil at work among believers, and the Church - namely - a division among us over what is more important - mercy or truth, mercy or righteousness and holiness. Yes, the Lord Himself separates the lovers of the world from the lovers of God, but this division I speak of is not that. Excepting those most holy souls in the highest stage of the Transforming Union in the Life of Prayer - the 7th of Teresa's Interior Castle - the rest of us struggle probably daily with desires not wholly conformed to eternal life.

And in that context, the context of a Church highly populated with members in inner contradiction (some earnestly struggling, some barely conscious of the fact of it) I saw beauty in a person seeking to offer a gift, a help, an encouragement, to other persons in lives of inner contradiction. I now believe the virtue of mercy is not over-emphasized at all, but under-emphasized as are also the virtues of holiness and righteousness. I am concerned that to a large degree we do not understand or even recognize, not to mention live, the virtue of mercy. John Paul II wrote (emphasis added for stress):

Following the teaching of the Second Vatican Council and paying close attention to the special needs of our times, I devoted the encyclical Redemptor hominis to the truth about man, a truth that is revealed to us in its fullness and depth in Christ. A no less important need in these critical and difficult times impels me to draw attention once again in Christ to the countenance of the "Father of mercies and God of all comfort."[2 Cor. 1:3]