Vatican targets Weakland:
Higgins, George G.
'RERUM ANTIOUARUM' VATICAN TARGETS WEAKLAND DISHONORING A FAITHFUL CHURCHMAN Archbishop Rembert Weakland of Milwaukee and formerly abbot general of the Benedictine order, is, in my judgment,...
...I first met Archbishop Weakland in Rome in the early 1970s while he was still serving as abbot general, but I got to know him then only casually...
...I share his publicly stated view that it is unfortunate, to say the very least, that they failed to do so...
...The Vatican has not revealed how it came to this conclusion, but it is clear that the authorities in Rome did not consult with or even contact Weakland himself about their concerns with regard to this matter...
...Press reports indicated that the Vatican blocked Archbishop Weakland's honorary degree, not because of his work on the U.S...
...But more than that, and worst of all, it has unfairly damaged Archbishop Weakland's reputation as a faithful churchman and a committed champion of Catholic social teaching...
...My only purpose in recalling this episode in the context of the Fribourg controversy is to point out, in defense of Archbishop Weakland, that while the right-to-life movement, by and large, is filling a noble and absolutely indispensable role in trying to persuade the American people and our elected officials that abortion is a great moral evil, certain fringe and unrepresentative elements in the movement are woefully inept and at times almost viciously ad hominem in their choice of tactics...
...As one of the consultants to the committee, and as one who has worked with many other episcopal committees going all the way back to the middle 1940s, I consider him the best chairman I have ever seen in action...
...RERUM ANTIOUARUM' VATICAN TARGETS WEAKLAND DISHONORING A FAITHFUL CHURCHMAN Archbishop Rembert Weakland of Milwaukee and formerly abbot general of the Benedictine order, is, in my judgment, one of the most intelligent, talented, and pastorally sensitive of all the hundreds of U.S...
...bishops, both living and dead, with whom I have been privileged to work in one capacity or another during my fifty years in the priesthood...
...In short, I think he was the best qualified bishop in the entire American hierarchy to take on that difficult and demanding assignment...
...bishops' pastoral on the economy...
...I fear that the Vatican, in blocking Weakland's honorary degree, may have taken people of this ilk too seriously...
...The conferring of the degree was to have taken place at the opening ceremony of Fribourg's celebration of the forthcoming centenary of Pope Leo XIII's pioneering social encyclical, Rerum novarum...
...I have recently had some personal experience with intemperate zealots of this type in connection with my measured efforts to persuade the national AFL-CIO to remain neutral on the abortion issue...
...There is no way of knowing whom the authorities at the Vatican did in fact consult and listen to, but, inevitably, the impression is abroad that they were overly influenced in their Fribourg decision by extremist elements in the right-to-life movement who have made no secret of their desire to "get" the archbishop at almost any cost, by fair means or foul...
...Because I have such great admiration and respect for Archbishop Weakland, I was saddened-and, like many others, felt a sense of outrage-when I read in the New York Times (November 11,1990) that the Vatican had barred the theology faculty of the University of Fribourg in Switzerland from granting him an honorary degree...
...He deserves better than that...
...GEORGE G. HIGGINS Msgr...
...pastoral, should have been chosen to symbolize Fribourg's commitment to the great tradition of Catholic social teaching initiated by Leo XIII in 1891...
...In the end, the union federation did in fact adopt a position of neutrality, but no thanks to certain extremists in the right-to-life movement...
...George G. Higgins, adjunct lecturer in theology at Catholic University, was for years director of the social action department for the U.S...
...It has also compromised its own vaunted commitment to academic freedom as expressed in "From the Heart of the Church," the recent widely heralded document on Catholic colleges and universities...
...By barring the University of Fribourg from conferring an honorary degree on Archbishop Weakland, the Vatican, needless to say, has cast a shadow over the university's observance of the Rerum novarum anniversary...
...Needless to say, I hope I am wrong about that, but, in any event, I must say again that I am saddened by the Vatican's decision to block Fribourg University from granting Weakland an honorary degree...
...pastoral, but rather on the grounds that his statements on abortion have caused "a great deal of confusion among the faithful...
...It was altogether fitting that Weakland, because of his skillful leadership in drafting the U.S...
...I would add that, in my opinion, the decision by Archbishop John Roach of Saint Paul-Minneapolis, the then president of NCCB/USCC, to appoint Weakland to serve as chairman of the committee on the pastoral on the economy, was providential...
...It was my great good fortune, however, to come to know him very well during the several years that he served with consummate skill and with great openness of mind and heart as chairman of the committee of bishops that drafted the U.S...
...By the sheer crudity and ineptitude of their bullying tactics-foolishly aimed at intimidating the AFL-CIO-they came close to pulling the rug out from under me and thus defeating their own cause...
...In saying this, I am confident that I am speaking not only for myself but for a multitude of American Catholics who share my feelings of profound respect for this good and faithful servant of the church...
...bishops' conference...
Vol. 117 • December 1990 • No. 21
