Roma, Italia
The
Laity and Reform in the Church:
(Germany, Spain, Ireland, United States, Italy, Poland, Philippines)
and
Michael
Hout, University of California at Berkeley
For
further information or an interview with Rev. Greeley, contact:
June
Rosner: 312-664-6100
Chicago,
IL (Central Time in the USA)
THE
LAITY AND REFORM IN THE CHURCH:
(N.B.
This was written prior to receipt of the German data. See accompanying article
on Germany for the seventh nation in the study).
By Michael Hout and Andrew Greeley
The Catholic laity hopes for a new pope who will be attentive to the
realities of their lives and open to change. He should achieve these goals by
giving autonomy to the local bishops, appointing lay advisors, returning to the
practice of electing local bishops, ordaining women, and allowing priests to
marry. If enacted, these reforms will make the church a more pluralistic and
democratic institution.
Our analysis of representative national surveys of the Catholic laity in
six countries - Spain, Ireland, the United States, Italy, Poland, and the
Philippines -- support this conclusion. The younger and better educated laity
in each country lead the call for reform. (Data from the Germany will be
available in the spring).
To separate Catholics' image of the church they would like to see, from
their personal loyalty (or animus) to the present pope, we asked them about the
next pope - the one who will be chosen by the
cardinals
after the death or retirement of Pope John Paul II (whenever that may be). We
posed the question this way:
"We are interested in what type of leader Catholics would like to
see elected the next pope. As you may know, when a pope dies the cardinals meet
in Rome to elect the next pope. The last time a pope was elected was in 1978 when Pope John Paul II was elected."
We followed this preamble with seven questions (more in some countries)
that addressed concerns with the institutional form of the Catholic Church. We
did not ask about doctrinal issues, save arguably the ordination of women, or
matters of faith.
The accompanying table shows the exact wording of each question and the
responses in each country. A majority of the laity support change of some sort
in each country, and in some countries, majorities support all seven reforms we
proposed to them.
The most reform minded countries are - hold your breath - Spain and
Ireland. These two very Catholic countries want change more than any of the
others. Each of the seven reforms gets support from over 58 percent of
Catholics in Spain and Ireland. The exact profile of support differs slightly
between them. They are the two countries where the largest majorities stress
the next pope's "openness to change." The Spanish Catholics give
particularly strong support to proposition that the pope should attend to the
life of the laity and grant their bishops more autonomy; they are less keen
about the election of local bishops. The Irish Catholics particularly favor lay
advisors and married priests. Support for the ordination of women is highest in
these two countries (with the United States not far behind).
The United States and Italy fall in the middle of the six countries in
this study. American Catholics endorse six of the seven items by roughly a
two-to-one margin. The exception is the item about autonomy for local bishops
that gets "only" 58 percent support.
The Italians are among the most populist nations with 77 percent
supporting a pope who will emphasize the life of the laity over religious
themes. On the other hand, autonomy for local bishops fails (by two percentage
points) to get a majority. The Italians also show a lower level of support for
"a pope open to change" than would be expected from their support for
specific changes.
Polish Catholics, on the other hand, support specific reforms less than
might be expected given their strong (58 percent) support for a pope more open
to change. A majority of Poles support the election of bishops, autonomy for
bishops, an emphasis on the life of the laity, and marriage for priests. The
call for lay advisors falls one percentage point short of a majority. Only
ordination of women is strongly opposed - but that by a three-to-one margin.
Catholics in the Philippines are the most conservative. A strong
majority thinks that lay advisors would improve the church and a slim majority
supports electing bishops. None of the other reforms secures the support of a
majority. Changes in the composition of the priesthood get particularly strong
opposition in the Philippines; they would stay with a celibate, male-only
clergy by a four-to-one margin.
Remarkably, the only reform to win a majority of support in all six
countries is the election of bishops. Remarkable because this issue is not an
item on any group's agenda for change. Many respondents were probably stating
an opinion on the matter for the first time when they answered this question
(unlike some other issues like the ordination of women and allowing priests to
marry which are widely discussed). They answered in a manner consistent with the
democratic institutions that surround them. Each of the six countries selects
their head of government and local officials democratically. When asked about
selecting a church leader democratically, they responded in the affirmative.
Could
it be that some Catholics seek reform in some issue domains, say church
governance, while others emphasize their issues, say ordination of women,
without much general support for change? It could be but it is not that way.
The support for reform lies along a clear pro-reform / anti-reform continuum in
each country. We performed factor analyses of the seven items in each country
and found a single, dominant factor in each.
Catholics under
40 and those with an academic education more strongly support reform than older
and less-educated Catholics. We can see this by comparing responses to the
election of bishops. Similar patterns hold for the other six items and going
through all the results would be redundant.
The younger Catholics in each country support election of bishops more
than older ones do. The
margin
ranges from 14 percentage points in Ireland to no difference in the
Philippines. Seventy-one percent of the Irish under 40 support the election of
bishops compared with 68 percent of Americans, 62 percent of Spaniards, 61
percent of Polish, 60 percent of
Italians, and 48 percent of Filipinos.
Academically educated Catholics in each country support the election of bishops more than less educated Catholics do. Seventy percent of Irish with an academic secondary education, some university education, or a degree from a university support the election of bishops - compared with 66 percent of similarly educated Spaniards, 65 percent of Americans with some college or a degree, 61 percent of Poles with academic secondary or university education, 60 percent of Italians with that kind of education, and 56 percent of Filipinos with post-secondary education.
American women give more support to reform than American men on every issue except the ordination of women - an issue on which interestingly enough men are more supportive. Gender gaps are much less pervasive elsewhere. In Spain, Ireland, and Poland, men and women do not differ significantly on the election of bishops or most other items. In Italy 64 percent of men but only 46 percent of women support election of bishops; in the Philippines, 54 percent of men and 47 percent of women support episcopal elections.
After a generation of private opposition to Vatican teachings on sexual
conduct, Catholics from a wide variety of nations in Europe and from the United
States call for institutional reforms that will reflect the pluralism in the
church. Large majorities support changes that will open the church in ways that
will allow many voices to be heard. Through electing bishops, advising bishops
and the pope himself, and exercising same degree of local autonomy, lay
Catholics could carve a more influential niche for themselves. They hope that
the next pope will accord them the opportunity.
Catholics also support changes in the clergy. They like the idea that
priests might marry. In Spain, Ireland, and the United States, they support the
ordination of women by a two-to-one margin. In Italy, a clear majority also
agrees. The Polish and Filipino Catholics oppose ordaining women.
Against those tempted to dismiss these findings on the grounds that the
Church is not a democracy and hence the Cardinal-electors need not consider the
wishes of the laity we offer the arguments of prudence and history. While not
required to consider the views of the laity, the Cardinal-electors would be
very well advised to do so.
For the Church is not now nor has it ever been embodied in the
hierarchy. It is standard teaching that the people of the Church are the Body
of Christ. Their concerns should carry enormous weight with those who would be
their leaders. From history we know that local bishops used to be elected - in
less democratic times. There may be arguments against the practice but only
those ignorant of history could suggest that an elected episcopate is foreign
to the nature of the church. Electing bishops respecting
their
autonomy in matters of local concern would return the church to an
ecclesiastical administrative style taken for granted for over a thousand
years.
Speaking from the perspective of sociologists we are unable to respond
directly to those who say that the election of the pope is the right and
privilege of the cardinals and is no one else's business.
However, three observations of a sociological sort can be made:
1)
No one could possibly claim that the right of the Cardinal-electors is part of
the essence of the Church (much less their preference to do as they please).
2)
In the contemporary world those who are unhappy with the selection of a leader,
any leader, are less
likely
to follow that leader, even if they do not formally break with him or her. Such
a leader may reign, to be sure, but it will be harder for him or her to rule.
3)
As we understand Catholic theology - and we are subject to correction by those
more learned in these matters - the Spirit of God is present in the people as
well as in the leadership. The leadership would be imprudent, not to say
arrogant, to dismiss the possibility that the Spirit might be speaking to them
through the wishes and insights of the ordinary people.
In a recent article on
pluralism in the Church we reported that our research in Spain, Italy, Ireland
and the United States demonstrated that a large majority of Catholics supported
the idea of a Pope who would introduce major changes in the Church which would
make the Church more democratic than it presently is - or perhaps return it to
the structures which existed for much of the first millennium of Christianity.
Of the seven questions
asked, six did not pertain to doctrinal matters - more power to local bishops,
election of bishops by priests and people, representative lay advisors on the
Pope's staff, more change in the Church, greater interest on the part of the
Pope in the problems of ordinary lay people, and married priests. Only one
issue, the ordination of women, involves doctrine. The other six reforms could
be implemented tomorrow without any change in Catholic doctrine (from which it
does not follow that as sociologists we can say that they should be
implemented).
We introduced the
interview with this question:
We are interested in what type of leader Catholics
would like to see elected the next pope. As you may know, when a pope dies the
cardinals meet in Rome to elect the next pope. The last time a pope was elected
was in 1978 when Pope John Paul II was elected.
More recently we have
obtained data from the Federal Republic of Germany collected by from a
representative sample of 422 German Catholics by GiF-Getas. Germany replaces
Spain as the most "radical" of the countries we have surveyed with an
average score of 78% in favor a Pope would institute major democratic reforms.
Eighty-three percent (83%) of Germans favor married priests (as opposed to 69%
in the US); 81 % support representative lay advisers to the Pope (65% in the
US); 76% want more change in the Church (65% in the US); 75% support popular
election of bishops (65% in the US); 75% are in favor of a decentralization of
power to local bishops (58% in the US); and 71 % support the ordination of
women (65% in the US).
Why would German
Catholics be more supportive, on the average, of democratic reforms than
Catholics in the other six countries? Perhaps because Germans are legitimately
proud of the functioning democratic political structure they have built in
their country in the last half century and see no reason why it cannot be
reflected in their Church. If we can fashion a democracy that works, however
imperfectly (as do all democracies), in such a short period of time, they may
be saying, why can't the Church? They might well add: especially since the
Church was democratic for much of its existence.
We do not suggest that
Catholics in Germany or any of the other countries will leave the Church if the
Pope should refuse any or all of these institutional reforms. Quite the
contrary, it is our very strong impression from these and other data that
Catholics generally remain in the Church, or leave it for reasons which have
little to do with institutional structure.
Nonetheless, the
democratic spirit which pervades the Catholic laity in democratic societies
remains a problem for the Church. The Church leadership can ignore that spirit
only at the risk of diminishing its credibility substantially. Since only one
of the items in our survey touches on doctrine, Church leaders cannot out of
hand reject the possibility that the Holy Spirit is speaking to them through
the opinions of the laity.
There has been
considerable controversy about the petition drives for Church reform which have
been launched in various countries. The results of such campaigns have been
dismissed as 'unrepresentative.' Our results suggest that the outcome of the
German petition campaign represents accurately the feelings of more than three
quarters of German Catholics.
Doubtless those who do
not want to see change will find a reason to dismiss survey results too -
perhaps with the dictum that the Catholic Church does not make doctrinal
decisions by taking surveys. However, our study is not about doctrine but about
institutional structure. Nor will it do to repeat the hallowed cliché that the
Catholic Church is not a democracy. It was democratic in structure for many
centuries and it can be again.
The final response to
the petition drives and to our surveys of representative samples is that Canon
Law reserves the right of selecting a Pope to the Cardinal electors and they
can do what they wish. We note that this form of election is not part of the
Catholic doctrinal heritage. Moreover, the Cardinal electors would minimally be
imprudent to dismiss the possibility that the Spirit might be speaking to them
through the wishes and the insights of the ordinary Catholic lay people.
Andrew Greeley
The University of Chicago
Table:
"Pluralistic" Responses by Country
BRD* Spain Ireland USA Italy Poland Philippines
Life of Laity 79%
87% 75% 69% 77%
51% 47%
Married Priests 83%
79% 82%
69% 67%
50% 21%
Elect Bishops 75%
58% 63%
65% 67%
55% 51%
Lay Advisers 81%
77% 82%
65% 62%
49% 68%
Local Bishops 75%
74% 63%
58% 48%
53% 37%
Women Priests 71%
71% 67%
65% 58%
24% 18%
More Change 76%
74% 79%
65% 51%
56% 48%
Average 78% 74%
73% 65%
61% 48%
41%
N= 422
1080 489
770 687 830 1029
*Federal Republic of Germany
Question Wording:
We
are interested in what type of leader Catholics would like to see elected the
next Pope. As you may know, when a pope dies, the Cardinals meet in Rome to
elect a new pope. The last time a Pope was elected was in 1978 when Pope John Paul II was elected:
1)
Which would you consider more important in choosing a pope, that the pope show
more concern about what life is like for ordinary people or that the pope
should show more concern about religious issues?
2)
Would you favor or oppose the next pope permitting priests to marry?
3)
Currently Catholic bishops are appointed by the Vatican. In the past bishops
were elected by priests and people within their own dioceses. Would your prefer
the next pope to continue to appoint bishops or would you prefer to have
bishops chosen by priests and people within their own diocese?
4)
How would you feel about letting representative lay people have more of a voice
in the Catholic Church for example by serving as advisors to the pope. Would
you favor this.?
5)
Would you like to see the next pope give more decision making power to the
bishops in this country or do you think the pope should continue to make most
of the decisions for the church?
6)
Would you favor or oppose the next pope allowing the ordination of women to the
priesthood?
7)
Would you like the next pope to be more open to change in the church or do you
think things are OK the war they are?