Clericalism is deeply entrenched in the priesthood.
Recently I found myself having a conversation about
clericalism with a few priests, and it was quite an uncomfortable experience for all.
While students learn about different political systems -- democracy, totalitarianism, communism and fascism, etc -- they have never heard of the one regime that lasted centuries in Cyprus and today exists in a new form:
clericalism. Under this regime, the clergy dominates the political, economic, social and cultural life of a country.
That emphasis -- on both the role of the laity and
clericalism -- is new for a pope in addressing the abuse scandal and seems a direct response to the Pennsylvania findings, said Kathleen Sprows Cummings, associate professor of American studies and history at the University of Notre Dame.
It is
clericalism then that reveals the Church for what it is - an obstacle to unity, and to dialogue with the other Churches, with other faiths, and with the modern world.
Lopez calls for a deeper application of this thought in his most insightful and incisive analysis of the issue of masculinity in relation to the problem of
clericalism in the Church.
I want to get rid of
clericalism, the mundane, this closing ourselves off within ourselves, in our parishes, schools or structures."
On one side, was the menace of
clericalism and of a Catholic Church that, at times, threatened the religious freedoms enjoyed by French Jews since their emancipation at the time of the Revolution; on the other was the threat of anticlericalism and a secular state that promised not only to remove state protection from the Jewish religion but also to open a gulf between French civil law and Jewish religious law.
CLERICALISM is a model of leadership that disempowers those who are led or served, and turns them into clients and dependents.
Readers will want to know more, for example, about the situation in territories with a Muslim majority, where a different kind of
clericalism was in question, and about French missionaries in the period after World War I, which so far has received surprisingly little attention.
Two great dangers facing individual Christians are individualism and
clericalism. Many people are put off the institutional church because of its many blemishes and so they drift into a private faith, deciding for themselves what they believe.
At the same time, however, the group thinks of itself as a lay movement--most of its members, whether celibate or not, are not ordained and continue to pursue secular occupations--and the movement criticizes the "
clericalism" of Catholics who expect the clergy to do the heavy spiritual rifting for them.
The "rebellious peasants" of that period devoted their efforts to the battle against
clericalism, opposition to the aristocracy, bureaucracy and urbanization, and championship of the needs and rights of the individual, especially the small farmer and the agricultural labourer.
(He died in 1633 without having made the attempt; the book was published many years later.) The book shares with Laud and his ilk an exalted view of the clergy--a "new
clericalism"--while being slippery on doctrine and liturgical practice; the focus instead is on providing some help with pastoral practicalities not taught in the universities from which a growing proportion of clergy were graduating.
The complex nexus between clergy sexual misconduct and the church is colored at every level by the socio-cultural reality known as
clericalism. (271)
