Reining in the Jesuits

Why the Pope had to crack down.

Over the past two and a half years, Pope John Paul II has taken unusual measures to return the Jesuits to their traditional role as the “pope’s shock troops”—a role from which they had veered since Vatican II unleashed a ferment of change.

After driving his concerns home at the February 23 to March 3 extraordinary assembly of provincial superiors of the Society of Jesus, the Pope appeared to back off a bit. But that may be more appearance than reality. No Jesuits resigned as a result of the sessions, and the order affirmed its vows of obedience to the Pope. That, too, may be more appearance than reality.

What should Protestants make of the face-off, and what can it tell them about the future course of the Roman Catholic church?

There is strong irony in the fact that it is the Jesuits that the Pope found necessary to bring to heel. The Jesuits were founded in 1540 for the express purpose of defending the Roman Catholic church against the revisionist forces loosed by Martin Luther and the Reformation. As such, they were for centuries the watchdogs of Catholic tradition—an awesomely disciplined formation that pledged unquestioning obedience to the pope. After papal infallibility was declared at Vatican I in 1870, they were the moving force behind the centralization of the church in Rome.

But the Jesuits countered the Reformation by being apologists for Catholic doctrine, becoming, in the process, the scholarly wing of the church. And scholars prize their independence. Also, as “the pope’s vanguard,” the Jesuits became a dominant force in Third World areas, where they have increasingly criticized authoritarian rulers and rallied to the side of the common people. This grass-roots emphasis has tended to undermine hierarchical discipline.

After Vatican II, in the early 1960s, the Jesuits—the largest Catholic order, with 26,600 members—had come full circle and now themselves moved into the forefront of Catholic theological revisionism.

This trend has been strongest in the United States and the Netherlands, but is widespread. Vatican II encouraged experimentation with new forms of liturgy, and many Jesuits responded enthusiastically. In 1980, for instance, a Catholic magazine reported on a seminarian at the Jesuit School of Theology in Berkeley (Calif.) dancing in black leotards as he distributed the Communion host (wafers).

Increasingly, Jesuits moved out of their elite centers of learning, donning blue jeans and living in small urban communes. They began to see celibacy as inappropriate outside of monastic settings, and some theorized a “third way”—neither celibacy nor matrimony in sexual relations between priests or priests and nuns. One Catholic magazine acknowledged that some Jesuits had adopted “relaxed” sexual lifestyles. Some Jesuits have raised doubts about the divinity of Christ.

In the political area, the Jesuit crusade for social justice led some to espouse Marxist doctrines. Gustavo Guttierrez, considered the father of Latin American liberation theology, is a Jesuit. Jesuits are reportedly active in revolutionary movements in Guatemala and El Salvador. In Nicaragua they played a role in the Sandinist revolution. And in the Philippines, a Jesuit priest is accused of plotting to destabilize the government of President Ferdinand E. Marcos.

Elected superior general of the order in 1965, the popular Basque priest Pedro Arrupe, now 74, fit the post-Vatican II mold. He repeatedly called on the society to step up its work among the poor and the underprivileged and to phase out activities that seemed to identify it with the well-to-do. To maintain personal contact with its members, he visited almost all of the 103 nations in the world in which the order serves—even visiting Daniel Berrigan, the antiwar Jesuit serving a sentence for participating in the destruction of draft-board records, in a U.S. federal prison.

Regarding Latin America, Arrupe said in 1979 that “one cannot exclude a priori the possibility of a certain kind of dialogue, and even a critical collaboration, with Marxist groups and movements.”

The trend of the Jesuits and their liberal leader has concerned three consecutive popes. Pope Paul VI first publicly complained about them in 1979, but intervention was not his style. Before his death, Pope John Paul I, during the brief months of his tenure, prepared a pronouncement on the subject. And John Paul II has not hesitated to make his position clear.

In 1979, a year after his election, John Paul II began by sternly telling a gathering of high-ranking Jesuits that the current crisis in religious life “has not spared your society, causing confusion among the Christian people and anxiety to the church, the hierarchy, and also personally to the Pope who speaks to you.”

The next year Arrupe informed the Pope that he was resigning, citing health reasons. The Pope, however, asked him to stay on, apparently because he needed more time to decide what to do. (All previous Jesuit leaders have died in office.) But last August, while John Paul was still mending from the assassination attempt he survived, Arrupe suffered a cerebral stroke, leaving him partially paralyzed and temporarily unable to speak. Vincent O’Keefe, 61, an American, and one of Arrupe’s four main advisers, stepped into temporary leadership. He was probably Arrupe’s own preference for a successor—but not the Pope’s.

Two months later, John Paul stunned the Vatican by appointing his own personal delegate (and deputy) as interim head of the Jesuits. It was the first time in the order’s 488-year history that a pope had set aside the society’s constitutional entitlement to elect its own leader.

The Pope’s choice, Paolo Dezza, an energetic 80-year-old Italian, reflects the Pope’s views: no matter what innovations may be necessary, fidelity to church law and the Pope remain the basis of Jesuit life. Jesuits must build affection for the institutional church rather than criticize it. Jesuits must not trade in intellectual attainment for social commitment. And, according to the Italian press, Dezza is a conservative “who has never hidden his desire to free the society from its Marxist tendencies.”

His deputy, Giuseppe Pittau, 53 and also an Italian, is a former student of Dezza and a personal friend of the Pope. John Paul would probably like to see him elected the next superior general.

This is distinctly possible because of the monarchical, highly centralized manner in which the Jesuits are governed. All 110 provinical and other superiors are named by the superior general for a three-year term. This means that in a period of one year, a determined leader could place new superiors in one third of the positions. Already, it is reported, Dezza has created a 15 percent turnover among the provincials, naming men attuned to the Pope’s philosophy. It is the provincials, plus one or two elected delegates from each province (according to its size), who elect the superior general.

Most recently, the Pope called the extraordinary assembly in a villa south of Rome. After Dezza had conveyed the Pope’s desires for several days, they trooped to Rome to hear from him directly.

After outlining his expectations of the order, the Pope announced that a general congregation would be called before the end of the year. This meant that he is returning to the Jesuits their right to elect their own leader. But given the months required to prepare for such a gathering (there have been only 32 in the history of the order), it is unlikely to occur before mid-1983. Liberals will push for it to convene earlier, but conservatives will drag their feet, since the later it is held, the more conservative will be the composition of the provincials.

The upshot seems to be that change in the Catholic church cuts both ways. The general loosening after Vatican II ushered in Bible studies and Mass in local languages, and seemed to downplay papal infallibility. But it also marked an outbreak of radical teaching and causes. Today those excesses are being curbed, but the church is also returning to a more monolithic stance and to traditional doctrines—such as veneration of Mary; and traditional practices—such as processions with relics—that had been soft-pedaled in recent years.

If evangelicals could have their preference, they would choose to relate to a Roman Catholic church that is becoming conservative in biblical doctrine and liberal in structure. That combination is nibbling at the edges of the church in the form of the charismatic movement, but it will not characterize the major institutions of the church any time soon.

HARRY GENET with ROYAL PECK in Rome

North American Scene

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that members of a Pennsylvania Amish community may not be exempt from social security taxes. The ruling reversed a Pennsylvania district court’s decision that members of an Old Order Amish religion would not have to pay the taxes against their conscience. Chief justice Warren Burger, in his opinion, wrote that “not all burdens on religion are unconstitutional.” Voluntary participation in the social security system would undermine it, he said. “The state may justify a limitation on religious liberty by showing that it is essential to accomplish an overriding governmental interest.” Congress had earlier exempted self-employed Amish from the social security tax.

Seeking to rebut advertisement’s by Norman Lear’s People for the American Way, Christian Voice will have its own celebrity advertisements on radio and TV. Lear, producer of the TV series “All in the Family,” has spoken against the Christian Right, including such groups as Christian Voice. He has produced political TV and radio commercials featuring celebrities like Woody Allen and Muhammad Ali. Now Christian Voice has made its own TV and radio spots, with stars Buddy Ebsen and Efrem Zimbalist, Jr., speaking out for school prayer and national faith in God. Christian Voice’s Robert Grant said the group is not attacking Lear. “We just want to do something to provide a balance.”

Four members of the Christian College Coalition were listed in The New York Times Selective Guide to Colleges 1982–83. Calvin College (Grand Rapids, Mich.) is said to offer “a challenging education and a respected degree.” Gordon College (Wenham, Mass.) has “taken major strides toward building up its faculty and otherwise establishing itself as a major intellectual bastion of Protestant evangelicalism.” Houghton (New York) College is said to value “academic freedom and scholarly excellence.” And Wheaton (Ill.) College “draws enough National Merit scholars to put it on par with the best colleges of its size.”

Canadians may have little faith in organized religion, but most believe in one or more aspects of the supernatural. Reginald Bibby, a University of Lethbridge sociologist, earlier reported that less than half of the members of the United Church of Canada, the country’s largest denomination, believe in God (CT, Feb. 19, p. 28). Now Bibby reports findings of his study that show that 75 percent of Canadians read horoscopes and half of those believe astrology is true, 70 percent believe in extrasensory perception, and 70 percent of those people interviewed for the survey on religion and the supernatural believe it may be possible to communicate with the dead.

A Terre Haute, Indiana, district attorney has fulfilled campaign promises by successfully prosecuting pornographic establishments in that community. Eric Abel, a 33-year-old professing evangelical, recently prosecuted an adult bookstore, eliciting a jury’s judgment that the store’s material was obscene by community standards. After Abel’s first four years in office, all illegitimate massage parlors are gone from Terre Haute and the few remaining adult bookstores are said to be facing severe economic pressures.

B. Sam Hart has withdrawn his nomination for membership on the U.S. Civil Rights Commission. The black Philadelphia evangelist came under fire from critics of his positions against the Equal Rights Amendment and homosexual rights. Hart was also found to own a broadcast company that defaulted on a $100,000 loan. Hart said before stepping down that the press was unfair and vindictive.

High school students have been using fewer illicit drugs since the late 1970s, according to a study by two University of Michigan professors. They surveyed 17,000 high school seniors and found a substantial decline in the number of students who say they use marijuana. In 1978, one in every nine students said they were daily users; by last spring the ratio had dropped to one in fourteen. The study found that use of almost every class of illicit drugs, as well as alcohol and tobacco, has declined in the last year. This may be due to prevention efforts like antidrug advertising and school awareness programs, the study’s authors said.

World Scene

Colombian authorities believe they have captured the slayer of Chester Bitterman, the Wycliffe missionary who was kidnapped and shot a year ago. General Gustavo Matamorros, the armed forces chief, last month announced that a Bogotá raid yielded Hugo Oswaldo Chávez, whom he identified as the leader of the guerrilla band that abducted Bitterman. The guerrillas had demanded that the Summer Institute of Linguistics cease its Colombia operations.

Ian Paisley’s militant Protestants suffered a setback in an election held last month. The voting was for a successor to clergyman Robert Bradford, who represented south Belfast in the Northern Ireland Parliament and was killed by the Irish Republican Army in November. Bradford was a close associate of Paisley. The clergy candidate for Paisley’s Democratic Unionist party, William McCrea, finished last in a field of three. The winner, W. Martin Smyth, is a minister of the Irish Presbyterian church and the candidate of the official Unionist party. He is relinquishing his pastorate to serve as a member of Parliament.

The Pope has declined an audience with Hans Küng, the Swiss-born theologian who was stripped of his authority to teach as an official theologian of the church at Tübingen University in West Germany. It has not been a precipitous decision. Küng wrote last August 25, requesting the meeting to discuss their dispute. The Vatican reply was dated January 2 and said no invitation would be forthcoming until Küng gave a sign he had changed opinions, such as his criticism of the doctrine of papal infallibility.

Austria’s evangelicals recently launched the world’s first public meetings on the United Nations’ 1985 International Year of Youth. Two programs were presented in Vienna: one for diplomats held at the Austrian United Nations center, and the other for the public at a Viennese university. Speakers addressed the three main themes of peace, development, and participation from an evangelical perspective; and working committees are being formed to promote these themes. Austria’s evangelicals form less than 1 percent of the population.

A bill was presented to the Greek Parliament in February to end the prosecution of adultery as an offense punishable with imprisonment, and to allow civil marriage. Left-wing critics of Prime Minister Andreas Papandreou’s Socialist party accused the government of partly giving in to the Greek Orthodox church, as the bill would not make civil marriage compulsory but would grant it a legal status equal to that of religious ceremonies. The bill, a bold move to modernize Greece’s social legislation, is expected to receive overwhelming approval; the ruling party has a large majority in Parliament, and the bill is also favored by the opposition.

Evangelist Leighton Ford packed Sydney, Australia’s upper-class northsiders into a big-top tent last month for a two-week “reachout.” Some 160 churches from 12 denominations actively supported the evangelistic meetings. The 6,000-seat “celebration tent” was packed out some evenings, and attendance averaged more than 4,000. Canadian Ford’s clear, direct, and cool style went down well with Australians, and more than 2,000 indicated a commitment to Christ.

More than 1,500 worshipers were forced into the street at gunpoint at an Ash Wednesday liturgy in the Roman Catholic cathedral in Kampala, Uganda. The cardinal-archbishop, Emmanuel Nsubugua, protested the army’s “godless and sacriligious act.” The government responded that its troops were reacting to guerrillas who had set up a mortar position on the cathedral steps.

Communist party officials in China plan to tighten political control over Christians; so says Jonathan Chao, an evangelical leader in Hong Kong. He feels that this will form part of the government’s attempts to reverse recent disruptive trends—growing cynicism, loss of confidence in Marxist thought, and a decreasing faith in the party. The main targets of this attempt to suppress self-expression are religious followers whose beliefs are considered divisive. Foreign Christian contacts, especially those associated with the importing of Bibles and Christian literature, are expected to be cut off.

The U.S. government has lifted its embargo on the shipment of 86,000 school kits to Kampuchea by the Mennonite Central Committee (MCC). The license for the nonemergency aid was granted because of “the special humanitarian intent of the donors and the simple consumable nature of the gift,” but on condition that the MCC monitors its distribution. Bert Lobe, MCC secretary for Asia, said their Kampuchean representatives will be able to supervise the distribution. The kits form a small part of the projected $1.5 million aid the MCC intends to send to Kampuchea over the next two years.

Egypt is slowly but steadily releasing its religious detainees. The last of the evangelicals were released in February, along with three Coptic Orthodox priests. Those still in custody included five bishops and Father Zakaria, the priest who was restricted by his superiors after leading popular Bible study sessions in Cairo. Observers predict that President Hosni Mubarak will release the rest soon.

Bangladesh’s largest newspaper has praised publication of the New Testament in Muslim. A recent article lauded the Bible society for its simplified translation, produced to make the gospel more intelligible to the 78 million Muslims of Bangladesh.

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