Thursday, January 10, 2008

St Cronan "Pastoral Team" Member Receives Summons from Archbishop Burke?

From the "womenpriests" forum, we read:
The following note comes from Sister Jeannine Gramick with a request for prayers. Please remember Sister Louise Lears SC in your prayers. These are some challenging times....
Dear friends,

A friend of mine, Sister Louise Lears SC, who is a pastoral minister at St. Cronan's parish in St. Louis, [Missouri, USA] is being confronted by Archbishop Burke.

On the Saturday between Christmas and New Year's, Louise was served (at home) with a "summons to appear and canonical admonition" at the Catholic Center of the Archdiocese. The letter was signed by Archbishop Burke. The hearing is set for January 15 at 10 am. She is to appear to "take cognizance of the accusation and proofs concerning your apparent commission of the delicts of 1) the rejection of a truth /de Fide/tenenda/ (canon 750) and 2) grave scandal (canon 1399)."

She does not know what the the issue is that has prompted this, but she imagines it is her support of women's ordination. The two women who were ordained to the Roman Catholic Priesthood in October were from St. Cronan's parish. Rabbi Susan Talve, the rabbi who offered her synagogue for the ordinations of the women, was invited to be the guest preacher at one of St. Cronan's Advent Vesper services. Archbishop Raymond Burke asked St. Cronan's to cancel the invitation to Rabbi Talve. Instead, the vesper service took place on the public sidewalk outside the church. Louise presided at the service. This may be what has stirred up the Archbishop, although his summons is mute on its motivation.

The President of Louise's community, Barbara Hagedorn, has been in touch with Dan Ward, the LCWR canon lawyer in Washington DC, who referred her to a local canon lawyer in St. Louis with whom she is meeting. She has spoken with the Parish Council at St. Cronan's and they are standing firm behind her.

Louise asks for prayers in this situation and ideas that anyone may have. Louise also wants transparency and has said this information can be shared as widely as possible.

Courage and peace as the hierarchy sinks further into secrecy and repression,

Jeannine
It's difficult to ascertain whether this is about the recent "Advent Vespers" fiasco or something else...Certainly, there will be more on this from the dissenting crowd at St Cronan's and elsewhere as time goes on...St Cronan's has been and remains a hotbed of dissent, as I understand it. Numerous past posts shed considerable light on this matter...

St Louis Catholic has more on this here...

Let us not forget to pray for the souls of those of the St Cronan parish - and pray for Archbishop Burke as well as he deals with this troublesome situation.

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