The last interview given by the late Cardinal Martini will be the subject of a discussion organised by this media organisation on Tuesday. My lecture commitments at the University prevent me from attending, but I propose this commentary as my contribution.
It is a pity that Martini’s interview was given the silent treatment by many in the Church- Fr Joe Borg
It is a pity that Martini’s interview was given the silent treatment by many in the Church. Cardinal Angelo Scola’s homily was neither here nor there. Cardinal Camillo Ruini respectfully disagreed, as is his right. But most chose to ignore it at least, publicly, probably finding it too hot to handle.
Quite the contrary was the reaction of the media and the social networks. Undoubtedly, there were people in the media who spun the interview to suit their agenda. The Catholic right wing used the social media to spew their bile for the great master. Several commentators sensationalised it but many offered serious reflection.
No Catholic organisation in Malta came forward to debate Martini’s interview. This lacuna is being addressed by a media organisation ironically accused by some in the Church of having an anti-Church agenda! It is important for the Church to listen to what the secular world is saying. Paul Tillich (the famous Protestant theologian) had urged the Church in the 1950s to heed advice and warnings from those who are part of the ‘latent Church’ – that is, people who are not part of the Church or are on its fringes.
Initiatives such as the Courtyard of the Gentiles are praiseworthy efforts in that direction. But is not the credibility of such initiatives undermined when the voice of this important prophet of the manifest Church is routinely and studiously ignored?
I have read Martini’s interview several times. The more I read it the more I admire its depth. It is replete with challenging food for thought. (Read the full text here: www.corriere.it/cronache/12_settembre_02/le-parole-ultima-intervista_cdb2993e-f50b-11e1-9f30-3ee01883d8dd.shtml). It is, as I had written in my commentary of September 9, the cri de coeur of someone who intensely loved the Church and eminently served it.
The catchphrase of the interview describes the Church as being 200 years out of date. Let’s not quibble about the number of years. In one Synodal address a while back, Archbishop Paul Cremona had implied that some Maltese Catholics are 30 to 40 years out of date: wallowing in nostalgia! The interview is much more than this slogan. Martini gives both an analysis of the failings that exist, while at the same time proposing the way forward.
The opening salvo of the interview sets the scene. “The Church is tired, in prosperous Europe and in America. Our culture has grown old, our churches are large, our religious houses are empty and the bureaucratic apparatus of the church is becoming bloated, our rites and our garments are pompous.”
I naïvely thought that this description of the state of affairs in the Church would be accepted by most.
Isn’t it a fact that even in Malta Church attendance is on the decline? We gauged this by periodical Mass censuses. After each one, we beat on our collective breast and always pleaded that something had to be done.
But has anyone seen any rejuvenation of our Sunday liturgies? Hardly. In recent years there was a concerted drive to devise more and more pompous garments and rites. The ‘hip’ counter reaction is the generally inept use of large screens in our churches.
Last year there should have been another Mass census. This would have given us the current state of Church attendance. But wait for it! It wasn’t organised. Instead of facing the ever diminishing figures of Mass attendance we stopped counting!
Martini is more than correct to critically note that the bureaucratic apparatus of the Church is becoming bloated. Bureaucracies are essential but they have the tendency to become self-serving and self-referential as studies about the sociology of organisations amply demonstrate. This has disastrous consequence for any organisation but particularly so for the Church.
Dostoyevsky’s The Grand Inquisitor, which forms part of The Brothers Karamazov, presents us with the story of Jesus returning to earth only to face persecution by the Church’s established bureaucracy. If you don’t have time to read the text, please do watch John Gielgud’s fantastic rendering of the Inquisitor’s speech in a video pro-duced by the Open University (www.youtube.com/watch?v=om6HcUUa8DI).
Martini also begged the Church to consider its position on several important topics and the way they are communicated. During this interview and throughout many other of his publications, Martini asked the Church to push the envelope in the area of “sexuality and about all of the topics that involve the body”. He challenged us to reconsider the appraisal of cohabitating couples, gays and gay partnerships; the beginning of life and IVF; a limited condom use and a decentralised Church government.
He did not hold back from criticising Dominus Iesus, a document widely considered to be penned by Cardinal Ratzinger, then the Prefect of the Congregation for the Faith.
Martini described it as “theologically rather dense” and “risks being rather strong”. He countered this by his pastoral letter where he stated that “salvation is possible for everyone, outside of any Church, so long as they follow the will of God.”
Martini points towards the roadmap that should be followed by the Church – institution and community; hierarchy and people – to redeem itself of its fatigue: conversion, the Word of God and the sacraments as instruments of healing not an instrument of discipline.
Tuesday’s discussion of Martini’s interview, organised by a leading secular institution, is a recognition of the social significance of the Church as one of the most important institutions in Malta. It can also be fruitful as this is a forum more conducive to the airing of the views of the latent Church. However, the most useful discussion of Martini’s spiritual testament can best happen in an environment of prayer and faith.
The Church, besides being a massive human structure, is a divine set-up that is nourished by the Word of God. It is not a coincidence that the great critic, who wanted this interview under discussion to be his spiritual testament, was a distinguished scholar and most devoted servant of this Word.
His dissent is inspired by the desire to clear away the ashes that accumulate over time endangering the suffocation of the coals that warm our hearts and give light to our path. Martini enjoins us to cooperate with the Spirit to blow away the ashes and let the coal be bright.
Let us stop giving him the silent treatment.
joseph.borg@um.edu.mt