Singing Their Own Song in Ireland

The great flood of tears that we've cried
for our brothers and sisters who've died
over [fifteen hundred] years has washed away
our fears and strengthened our pride.
Now we turn back the tide.

We will no longer hear your commands,
we will slide your control from our lands;
redirect the flame of our anger and pain
and pity the shame for what you do in God's name.

– From "Sing Our Own Song"
by UB40 (with modified lyrics by Michael Bayly)

One of the most inspiring quotes I've heard in the wake of the overwhelming "Yes" vote for marriage equality in Ireland came from Leo Varadkar (pictured at left). Varadkar is a cabinet minister who came out as gay at the start of the government-led effort to amend Ireland’s conservative Catholic Constitution so as to extend civil marriage rights to same-sex couples. He's quoted in an Associated Press news story as declaring the following.

We’re the first country in the world to enshrine marriage equality in our constitution and do so by popular mandate. That makes us a beacon, a light to the rest of the world, of liberty and equality. So it’s a very proud day to be Irish. . . . People from the LGBT community in Ireland are a minority. But with our parents, our families, our friends, co-workers and colleagues, we’re a majority. For me it wasn’t just a referendum. It was more like a social revolution.

Amen, brother!

In celebration of yesterday's historic vote in Ireland I share Buffy Sainte-Marie's cover of UB40's "Sing Our Own Song."

Why this particular song? Well, let me explain . . .

The original version of "Sing Our Own Song" by UB40 was released in 1986 and reached #5 on the UK charts. Written as an anti-apartheid anthem, it was censored in South Africa by the ruling apartheid regime as it contained the ANC rallying cry of Amandla Awethu ("Power to us").

Buffy Sainte-Marie's version of the song features on her recently-released album, Power in the Blood, and celebrates indigenous resistance to colonial control. Her modified lyrics reference contemporary issues facing First Nation peoples, along with two of the movements that are responding in positive ways to these issues: Idle No More and Occupy.

Sings Buffy:

When the ancient drum rhythms ring,
the voice of our forefathers sings.
The will to live will beat on,
we will no longer be pawns
to greed and to war;
we will be Idle No More.
. . . When the ancient drum rhythms ring,
the voice of our grandmother sings.
Native America run,
we will no longer succumb
to oil and to ore.
We will be Idle No More.

Dance, dance for the right to be free,
we will rebuild our own society.
And occupy for the right to be free,
we will rebuild a just society.
And we will sing, we will sing,
we will sing our own song.

Now, here's why I consider "Sing Our Own Song" appropriate for celebrating yesterday's marriage equality victory in Ireland: The song's opening lyrics, which remain the same in both UB40's version and Buffy's version, are applicable to any group of people who resist and overcome the denial of their human and civil rights by a corrupt system of power and control. My modifying of these opening lyrics at the beginning of this post reflect my belief that in many ways, especially in relation to its understanding and "teachings" on gender and sexuality, the Roman Catholic hierarchy is one such corrupt and dysfunctional system, and has been for over fifteen hundred years.

For centuries, this feudal patriarchal system has exercised a destructive influence and an often abusive control over people, including the citizens of Ireland. Yet as yesterday's vote clearly shows, this is no longer the case. As one "Yes" campaigner notes, "Love has conquered all" . . . including the power of the Catholic hierarchy over people's sexual lives and decisions.

Catholic theologian Hans Küng has said the same thing in another, though no less helpful and liberating way:

The gospel of Jesus is stronger than the hierarchy.

And, yes, for many Catholics, the recent manifestation of this reality in Ireland is a cause for celebration.

. . . And we will stand for the right to be free,
and we will rebuild a just society.
And we will sing, we will sing,
we will sing our own song.

I conclude this post by sharing excerpts from two powerful pieces published in response to yesterday's historic marriage equality vote in Ireland. The first excerpt is from an Associated Press article by Shawn Pogatchnik.

Gay couples flocked to central Dublin to celebrate a "historic watershed" on Saturday as a large majority in the traditionally Catholic country voted to allow same-sex marriage, the culmination of a four-decade struggle for gay rights.

Waving rainbow flags, embracing and crying, two thousand people gathered to watch the official results in the courtyard of Dublin Castle after voters, young and old, accounted for one of the highest turnouts in a referendum for decades.

"The amount of people who came out to vote is just such an emotional thing for us," said Fred Schelbaum, 48, standing with his civil partner Feargal Scott, 43, who he said he intended to marry.

"Up to now a lot of gay people felt they were tolerated in Ireland. Now we know that it's much more than that."

The second excerpt is from "After This, No Exile," an op-ed by Bernárd Lynch, a gay Irish priest. In his op-ed, Lynch reflects on what he calls Ireland’s "declaration of independence" from "our colonial past and our colonial governance by the Roman Catholic Church."

Although still Catholic, the majority of the Irish people have voted that the freedom to love transcends their deepest religious beliefs. This marks a seismic shift in the mind of the nation. This consciousness serves not only the LGBT community but the entire people of Ireland in their long and arduous struggle for justice and co-equality among all their citizens.

As LGBT people, we had been robbed of our birthright: our absolute right to live and love as co-equals in our families, churches, towns, villages, and the country of our birth. Many of us left our homeland not for work and employment or for education – as the Irish have done for centuries by the millions – but simply because those of us who are LGBT were not welcome. Ireland up until now failed to honour its own Constitution in not “cherishing all her children equally.”

But, Friday, May 22, 2105, this changed forever. We have broken the shackles of our colonial past and our colonial governance by the Roman Catholic Church. We are free at last to live and love as we were born to be. For freedom – not happiness – is the precious stone. One cannot cling to happiness; it submits to no clinging. To be free, to live and love in your homeland, this is the most precious stone into which all others fade by comparison.

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• Quote of the Day – May 21, 2015
• The Same Premise
• The Blood-Soaked Thread
• Louis Crompton on the "Theological Assault" of the Ulpianic-Thomistic Conception of Natural Law
• Catholic Hierarchy Can Overcome Fear of LGBT People
• Threshold Musings
• No Matter What
• No Patriarchal Hierarchy, No Rigid Conformity
• Tongues and Souls on Fire
• Quote of the Day – July 24, 2012

Related Off-site Links:
Ireland "Changed Utterly" by Gay Marriage Vote – AFP via Yahoo! News (May 24, 2015).
Ireland Backs Gay Marriage in "Landslide" Victory – Amy R. Connolly (UPI, May 23, 2015).
Ireland Says "Yes" to Same-Sex Marriage in Historic Vote – Colm Coyne and Louise Roug (Mashable, May 23, 2015).
Irish Catholicism Supports Same-Sex Marriage! – Mark Silk (Religion News Service, May 23, 2015).
A Great Day for Irish Lay Catholics! And for Lay Catholics in El Salvador, Too! – Francis DeBernardo (Bondings 2.0, May 23, 2015).
Amnesty International Welcomes Ireland's Historic Decision to Say "Yes" to Marriage Equality – Amnesty International (May 23, 2015).
Irish Anti-Gay Groups Gracious in Defeat – Bil Browning (The Bilerico Project, May 23, 2015).
Ireland Has Left "Tolerance" Far Behind – Fintan O'Toole (The Irish Times, May 23, 2015).
Dublin Archbishop: "The Church Needs to Do a Reality Check" – Terence Weldon (Queering the Church, May 23, 2015).
For One Irish Catholic Couple, Backing Gay Marriage Is a Matter of Family Values – Hanna Ingber (The New York Times, May 22, 2015).
Why One of the World's Most Catholic Countries Might Approve Gay Marriage – Mo Moulton (The Atlantic, May 21, 2015).

Image 1: Charles McQuillan/Getty Images.
Image of Leo Varadkar: Photographer unknown.
Image of Buffy Sainte-Marie: Matt Barnes.
Image 4: A woman walks past a pro marriage equality mural in Dublin, Ireland. (Aidan Crawley/EPA)
Image of Bernárd Lynch: Photographer unknown.
Image 6: A double rainbow over Dublin on the day the referendum result was announced. (Karl via Facebook)

Hans Küng: "The Gospel of Jesus Christ is Stronger Than the Hierarchy"

In some parallel universe I'm not only a renowned dancer but Hans Küng is pope! Or better still, he's part of the team of diverse people that makes up the papacy!*

Back in this universe, however, I still have trouble touching my toes, while Catholic priest and theologian Hans Küng (pictured at right) addresses the faithful not in St. Peter's Square but in places like Detroit.

Yes, as you may know, Küng addressed the American Catholic Council in the Motor City yesterday via a video-taped interview. Over 1000 people are attending the ACC this weekend – including a number of my friends from the Twin Cities.

Following are excerpts from Jerry Filteau's National Catholic Reporter article about Kung's inspiring and hopeful message to the ACC.

_________________________________

Famed theologian Fr. Hans Küng has called for a “peaceful” revolution by world Catholics against the absolutism of papal power.

He made the call in a video message June 10, the first evening of a conference in Detroit of the American Catholic Council.

“I think few people realize how powerful the pope is,” Küng said, likening papal power today to the absolute power of French monarchs that the French people revolted against in 1789.

“We have to change an absolutist system without the French Revolution,” he said. “We have to have peaceful change.”

Küng, who was perhaps the most famous of the theological experts at the Second Vatican Council nearly 50 years ago, was born in Switzerland but spent most of his life teaching at the University of Tubingen, Germany.

Now 83, Küng is ecumenical professor emeritus at Tubingen and rarely travels for health reasons, so his message to the ACC was delivered in the form of a half-hour videotaped interview with American theologian Anthony T. Padovano, conducted last year at Küng’s home. [Note: Padovano will be the keynote speaker at the Twin Cities-based Catholic Coalition for Church Reform's September 17 Synod of the Baptized: "Making Our Voices Heard."]

John Hushon, co-chairman of the ACC, said the conference, being held June 10-12 at Detroit’s Cobo Hall had more than 1,800 registered participants, from at least 44 states and 13 foreign countries.

In the interview with Küng, played on two giant screens in one of the convention center’s main rooms, the theologian predicted change in the church despite resistance from Rome. Vatican II “was a great success, but only 50 percent, he said.

On the one hand, he said, many reforms were realized, including renewal in the liturgy, a new appreciation of Scripture, and other significant changes such as recognition of the importance of the laity and the local church and various changes in church discipline.

“Unfortunately the council was not allowed to speak about the question of celibacy, about the question of birth control and contraception. Of course, ordination of women was far away from all the discussions,” he said.

“Many documents of the council are ambivalent documents because the Rome machinery – the Roman Curia – was able to stop any movement of reform, to stop it not completely, but half way.”

“What also I did not expect,” he added, was “that we could have such a restoration movement as under the Polish pope, and the German pope now.”

When asked what reasons he had for hope of reform in the church today, he answered that hope today is “sometimes a little difficult” in the face of a restorationist hierarchy, but “the world is moving on, going ahead, with or without the church” and “I believe the Gospel of Jesus Christ is stronger than the hierarchy.”

Referring to current crises in the church – clerical sexual abuse of minors, the shortage of priests, alienation of women and youth – he said, “Humanity learns most by suffering” – whether in the church or in the recent U.S. economic crisis. Even though many economists and others saw the economic meltdown coming, “it was not possible to have a law in Congress before the catastrophe,” he said.

He said he thinks at least some Vatican officials are similarly recognizing that change is needed in the church.

“If we do not learn now, we have to suffer more – more priests will be leaving, more parishes will be without pastors, more churches will be empty” and more young people and women will leave the church or dissociate internally from it, he said. “All these are indications, I think, that we have to change now.”

Chief sponsors of the American Catholic Council are three independent Catholic groups seeking changes in the church: Voice of the Faithful, CORPUS and FutureChurch.

Hushon said when the ACC was formed three years ago it sought to create a “big tent dialogue among all” sectors of the U.S. church, independent of partisan or ideological lines, but “group after group, bishop after archbishop, said no, or ignored us.”


To read Filteau's article in its entirety, click here.


* One Catholic theologian who advocates for a team model for the papacy is Mary Hunt. Speaking on Pacific Radio’s Democracy Now! program shortly after the selection of Cardinal Ratzinger as Pope Benedict XVI in April 2005, Hunt said:

I still favor and put out to your listeners, a possibility: the notion of an international team for the papacy. If the papacy is supposed to be a symbol of unity and not a person with authority, then it makes much more sense in a post-modern time to think not about one person . . . but in fact to think about an intergenerational, international team of men and women who could in fact meet and lead a billion people using technology and travel as a way to bring many voices into the discussion. So we’re really pushing for a horizontal model of church, not the vertical one that Cardinal Ratzinger represents.

For more discussion on the papacy, see here.


Recommended Off-site Links:
The American Catholic Council: Küng Starts Things Off But I Write About Fox – Colleen Kochivar-Baker (Enlightened Catholicism, June 11, 2011).
American Catholic Council, Detroit – First Impressions – Brian Coyne (Catholica Forum, June 11, 2011).
Hans Küng Says Only Radical Reforms Can Save the Catholic Church – Anli Serfontein (ENInews via The Progressive Catholic Voice, May 10, 2011).
The American Catholic Conference – A Place Where No Roman Catholic is Allowed to Go – Colleen Kochivar-Baker (Enlightened Catholicism, June 7, 2011).
Catholics Speak Out in Nationwide Listening Sessions – ACC via The Progressive Catholic Voice (May 15, 2011).
American Catholic Council to Convene in Detroit in June – Jerry Filteau (National Catholic Reporter via The Progressive Catholic Voice, May 2, 2011).
Reflections on an Ordination Golden Anniversary – Eric Hodgens (The Swag via The Progressive Catholic Voice, April 13, 2011).
Launching a Council of the Baptized in St. Paul and Minneapolis – CCCR (The Progressive Catholic Voice, March 30, 2011).
Listening Sessions Underway in the St. Paul-Minneapolis Local Church – The Progressive Catholic Voice (March 17, 2011).

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
Hans Küng: Still Speaking from the Heart of the Church
"We Are Facing a Structural Problem . . ."
Staying on Board
No Patriarchal Hierarchy, No Rigid Conformity

No Patriarchal Hierarchy, No Rigid Conformity

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I appreciate the following excerpt from Women in Christianity by Hans Küng as it serves to remind us not only of Jesus’ understanding of community (no patriarchal hierarchy), but that a rigid, absolute uniformity was never and should never be the goal of the Church.

Indeed, some of our Catholic bishops (especially here in the U.S.) would do well to acquaint themselves with the reality that, as Küng notes, “the earliest Jerusalem community in which, according to Luke, people were of ‘one heart and one soul,’ showed individuals opposed to one another, a variety of positions, differentiated functions, and provisional structures.” As theologian Mary Hunt says: “‘Oneness’ need not look alike in how we are Catholic. Our oneness is in our intention and practice to be in communion with one another.”

_____________________________________

That Jesus himself relativized the “fathers” and their traditions, called women, too, into his group of disciples, and even expressed his high esteem for children, shows that patriarchal hierarchies cannot have appealed to him. Nor did he make, for example, celibacy a condition of discipleship. The church of the Jewish-Christian paradigm could have been called democratic in the best sense of the world (at any rate it was not aristocratic or monarchical): a community in freedom, equality, and brotherhood and sisterhood. For the church was:

– not a powerful institution, not a Grand Inquisition, but a community of free people;

– not a church of classes, races, castes, or ministries, but a community of those who in principle were equal;

– not an empire under patriarchal rule with a cult of persons, but a community of brothers and sisters.

However, we should note here that although all members of the early church in principle had an equal status, and in principle had the same rights and duties, this did not mean a uniform egalitarianism, a co-ordination and uniformity which leveled out the multiplicity of gifts and ministries. On the contrary: the earliest Jerusalem community in which, according to Luke, people were of “one heart and one soul,” showed individuals opposed to one another, a variety of positions, differentiated functions, and provisional structures.


For more of Hans Küng at The Wild Reed, see:
Hans Küng: Still Speaking from the Heart of the Church
Casanova-Inspired Reflections on Papal Power – at 30,000 Ft
In Search of a “Global Ethic”
An Intriguing Thought
“We Are Facing a Structural Problem”
Staying on Board

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
What It Means to Be Catholic
The Holarchical Church: Not a Pyramid but a Web of Relationships
Many Voices, One Church
“Something Exciting and Joyful”
Revealing a Hidden History
Why the Bishops are Being Ignored
The “Complex Reality” of Catholicism

Image: “Yesus Memberkati Anak-anak” by Komang Wahyu. (Oil on canvas – 78cm x 88cm. Den Paser, Bali, Indonesia.)

Says Wahyu: “I was most impressed to read in Matthew 19 that Jesus said: ‘Let the children come to me, do not hinder them for the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to such as them.’ Adults often want to constrain children, Jesus wants to welcome them, to talk to them, to bless them. This inspired me to put it down on canvas, using a decorative style. The colours I have chosen are bright to reflect the bright and colourful mood when Jesus called the children. The aim was to represent the happy loving mood of Jesus when he was blessing the children who were witnessing to their parents and the disciples. Jesus has been placed symmetrically in the centre to become the focus. The message is that the love and grace of Jesus is for all people, from babies to old people, and that those who are disciples must regularly rethink their attitudes that Jesus is selective.”

Staying on Board

Earlier this evening I attended a meeting of the Catholic Coalition for Church Reform at the home of my friends Bernie and Eileen Rodel. They, myself, and a number of others are on the committee that’s planning this Saturday’s prayer breakfast that will not only launch a series of “synods of the baptized” but will feature Voice of the Faithful vice-president Janet Hauter as keynote speaker.

Looking through Bernie’s great collection of books on theology I came across Hans Küng’s Reforming the Church Today: Keeping Hope Alive (Crossroads, 1990). And since I’m being very intentional this week in highlighting and sharing thoughts and writings of hope I thought I’d share an excerpt from this book (with thanks to Bernie for loaning it to me so as to do just that!).

I find it interesting that Küng employs the metaphor of a floundering ship to describe the current state of the Church as this is exactly how I’ve been recently thinking of the Church! I’m not planning, however, on heading to the lifeboats – though I certainly don’t think any less of those who do. Indeed, if necessary, I’m happy to direct and help folks to them. But personally, I’m committed to staying on board and doing what I can so as to, in the words of Mary Hunt, “re-think the basis and repair the damage.” And besides, I’ve always loved a good and challenging adventure!

And so, it seems, does Hans Küng, as the following excerpt from his hopeful book, Reforming the Church Today, attests.

_____________________________________

Why am I staying in the Church? Because, in critical loyalty, there is so much in this community and its history that I can affirm, so much in this community from which, like so many others, I draw life. I am staying in the Church because, along with the other members of this community of faith, we are the Church. (One should not confuse the Church with its apparatus or administrators; nor leave it to them alone to mold the community.) I am staying in the Church because, with all the strong objections against it, here I am at home. Here all the great questions are asked: where and whence, the why and how of human beings and our world. I could not think of turning my back on the Church any more than, in the political sphere, I could turn my back on democracy, which, in its own way no less than the Church, is being misused and abused.

Of course, there is also the other possibility. And I have good friends who have chosen it. In the light of its decline, some have broken with the Church for the sake of higher values, maybe even for the sake of being more genuinely Christian. There are individual Christians outside the institutional Church, perhaps, in short-lived boundary-situations, groups of Christians as well. I respect such a decision and even understand it. During the present depression in the Catholic Church – following upon the conciliar euphoria under John XXIII – I understand more than ever why people leave.




I could certainly give as many reasons for leaving as those who have left. Jumping ship for some may be an act of honesty, courage, protest, necessity, or simply the inability to take any more. For me personally, though, it would be an act of weakness, failure, capitulation. I helped sail it in better days; should I give up the ship in a storm? Should I leave it to others, with whom I have sailed, to stem the wind, to bail out the water, even to struggle ultimately for survival? I have received too much from this community to be able to leave so easily. I have been too involved in Church reform and renewal to be willing to disappoint those who have been involved with me. To those opposed to renewal, I do not want to give the pleasure of my leaving; to the partisans of renewal, I do not want to give the pain.

Every day, every hour, the work of Jesus is in truth being accomplished by the witness of ordinary Christians who are making the Church present in the world. And so this would be my decisive answer: I am staying in the Church because I have been convinced by Jesus Christ and all that he stands for, and because the Church-community, despite all its failures, pleads the cause of Jesus Christ and must continue to do so.


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• A Brave Hope
• Choosing to Stay
• One Catholic Gay Parent Who Isn’t Leaving the Church
• Rome Falling
• Clearing Away the Debris
• Something We Dare Call Hope

For more of Hans Küng at The Wild Reed, see:
• Hans Küng: Still Speaking from the Heart of the Church
• In Search of a “Global Ethic”
• An Intriguing Thought
• “We Are Facing a Structural Problem”

Images 1 and 3: Christian Stenfelt.
Image 2: Charles J. DeLacy.

"We Are Facing a Structural Problem . . ."

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Theologian Hans Küng reflects upon Pope Benedict XVI
and the state of the Roman Catholic Church.

NOTE: The following quotes by Hans Küng (pictured at right) are taken from two European newspapers (Le Monde, February 24, 2009, and La Stampa, February 25, 2009). They were first published in the format below by Joseph O’Leary on his weblog (and under the heading “Church or Sect?”).

________________________________

Benedict XVI has always lived in an ecclesiastical ambience. He has traveled very little. He has always remained shut up in the Vatican – which is rather similar to the Kremlin of one time - where he is sheltered from criticisms. . . . The Secretary of State, Tarcisio Bertone, who could be a counter-weight, was a subordinate of his at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith; he is a man of doctrine, completely submissive to Benedict XVI. We are facing a structural problem. There is no democratic element in this system, no corrective. The Pope was elected by the conservatives and today it is he who nominates the conservatives. . . .

He is faithful to the Council, in his way. Like John Paul II, he always insists on continuity with “tradition.” For him, this tradition goes back to the medieval and hellenistic periods. Above all he does not want to admit that Vatican II has brought about a rupture, for example as regards the recognition of religious freedom, opposed by all the Popes before the Council. . . . Basically Benedict XVI has an ambiguous position on the texts of the Council, because he is not at ease with modernity and reform. . . .

I think that he defends the idea of the “little flock.” It is a little along the line of the integrists, who think that even if the Church loses a lot of its members, there will remain in the end an elitist Church, made up of “real” Catholics. It is an illusion to think that one can go on like this, without priests or vocations. This evolution is clearly a restoration, which is manifested in the liturgy, but also in acts and gestures, such as telling the Protestants that the Catholic Church is the only true Church. . . . The Church risks becoming a sect. Many Catholics no longer expect anything of this Pope.

When he received me in 2005, it was a courageous act and I really believed he would find the path to reform, even if slowly. But in four years he has proved the contrary. Today I wonder if he is capable of doing anything courageous. For a start he would have to recognize that the Catholic Church is traversing a deep crisis.


Recommended Off-site Link:
Hans Küng’s Papal Criticism Draws Vatican Ire - John Thavis (National Catholic Reporter, February 26, 2009).

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
“The Real Battle”
Benedict’s Understanding of Church
Clearing Away the Debris
Here Comes Everybody! - Robert McClory Discusses Putting Democracy and Catholicism Together, As It Was In the Beginning
An Intriguing Thought
Of Mustard Seeds and Walled Gardens
The Shrinking Catholic Tent
Beyond Papalism
Hans Küng: Still Speaking from the Heart of the Church
Genuine Authority
A Declaration of Reform and Renewal

An Intriguing Thought

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Hans Küng reflects on what would happen
if the Pope were to act in the spirit of Obama

Joseph O’Leary has posted an article by renowned Catholic theologian and author Hans Küng (pictured at right). It’s an article that has the intriguing title, “If Obama Were Pope.” I’m not sure were this article was originally published, but it can be read in its entirety, here, on Joseph’s site.

Following is an excerpt:

Whereas President Obama, with the support of the whole world, is looking forwards and is open to people and to the future, [Pope Benedict XVI] is orientating himself above all backwards, inspired by the ideal of the mediaeval church, skeptical about the Reformation, ambiguous about modern rights of freedom.

Whereas President Obama is concerned for new cooperation with partners and allies Pope Benedict XVI, like George W. Bush, is trapped in thinking in terms of friend and foe. He snubs fellow Christians in the Protestant churches by refusing to recognize these communities as churches. The dialogue with Muslims has not got beyond a lip confession of ‘dialogue’. Relations with Judaism must be said to have been deeply damaged.

Whereas President Obama radiates hope, promotes civic activities and calls for a new ‘era of responsibility’, Pope Benedict is imprisoned in his fears and wants to limit human freedom as far as possible, in order to establish an ‘age of restoration’.

Whereas President Obama is going on the offensive by using the constitution and the great tradition of his country as the basis for bold steps in reform, Pope Benedict is interpreting the decrees of the 1962 Reform Council in a backward direction, looking towards the conservative Council of 1870.

Thankfully, Küng just doesn’t highlight what he sees as the negative aspects of Benedict’s papacy (one that he compares to the disastrous presidency of George W. Bush), but also offers a number of proactive measures that the pope, acting in “the spirit of Obama,” could take in order to adopt a much needed “change of course.”

To read Hans Küng’s “If Obama Were Pope” in its entirety, click here.


Recommended Off-site Link:
“It’s Up to the Pope to Apologize” - An Interview with Hans Küng - SwissInfo.ch, February 6, 2009.

For more of Hans Küng at The Wild Reed, see:
Hans Küng: Still Speaking from the Heart of the Church
In Search of a “Global Ethic”
Casanova-inspired Reflections on Papal Power – at 30,000 Ft.
Thoughts on Ordination, Intellectual Dishonesty, and the Holy Spirit of which the Prophet Joel Speaks

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
Benedict’s Understanding of the Church
“A Cultic, Fundamentalist Hue”
“The Real Battle”
The Pope’s “Scandalous” Stance on Homosexuality
Beyond Papalism
Thoughts on Authority and Fidelity
It’s Time We Evolved Beyond Theological Imperialism
“Uncle Vince” Is At It Again!
Beyond a PC Pope
Genuine Authority
A Catholic’s Prayer for His Fellow Pilgrim, Benedict XVI

Hans Matheson in "The Tudors"

Earlier this evening I watched the first part of the second series of The Tudors.

I’m talking, of course, about Showtime’s hit series that stars Jonathan Rhys Meyers as King Henry VIII, Jeremy Northam as Thomas More, Natalie Dormer as Anne Boleyn, Maria Doyle Kennedy as Katherine of Aragon, and Peter O’Toole as Pope Paul III.

To be honest, I watched it solely because one my favorite actors, Hans Matheson, plays Thomas Cranmer, the Archbishop of Canterbury.

Shallow or what?

Anyway, here’s how Wikipedia describes Thomas Cranmer:

[As Archbishop of Canterbury] during the reigns of the English kings Henry VIII and Edward VI, [Cranmer] was an influential theologian who, with Richard Hooker and Matthew Parker, was a co-founder of Anglican theological thought.

He helped build a favorable case for Henry’s divorce from Katherine of Aragon and guided the English Reformation, which denied papal authority over the English Church, during its earliest days. Following Henry’s death, Cranmer became a key figure in Edward’s regency government.

Scholars credit Cranmer with writing and compiling the first two Books of Common Prayer, which established the basic structure of Anglican liturgy for more than four centuries.

. . . Cranmer was executed in 1556 for heresy after Queen Mary I reunited the Church of England with the Roman Catholic Church. Anglican culture, particularly the literature of John Foxe, later celebrated Cranmer as a martyr. His impact on religion in the United Kingdom was profound and lasting.

. . . [Nevertheless] the subservience with which Cranmer met Henry’s uncontrolled demands, as well as the timorousness which made him sell out his friends and be complicit in acts of intolerance and religious violence, are scars on his legacy. Nevertheless, it was largely due to Cranmer that the Church of England emerged from the English Reformation retaining the ancient Christian faith and the Apostolic Succession, which had largely been lost by continental Protestants. Cranmer is commemorated by the Church of England on March 21. The Episcopal Church in the United States of America commemorates him with the other Oxford martyrs on October 16.

In The Catholic Church: A Short History, Hans Küng notes the following about the English Reformation and the role of Thomas Cranmer:

Henry VIII’s Reformation in England was quite certainly not just a matter of a divorce, as the Catholic side often describes it, nor was it a popular movement as in Protestant Germany. Above all it was a decision of Parliament, carried through by the king. Instead of the pope, the king (and under him the Archbishop of Canterbury) was now the supreme head of the Church of England. That meant a break with Rome, but not with the Catholic faith.

Moreover the Anglican state church did not become Protestant in its life and constitution, after the German model. Only after Henry’s death did the learned archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer carry through what no bishop in Germany had succeeded in doing: a Reformation which maintained the Episcopal constitution.

Specifically, says Küng:

• There was a simplified and concentrated liturgy in the spirit of the Bible and the early church (Book of Common Prayer, 1549).

• There was a traditional confession of faith with an evangelical doctrine of justification and a Calvinist doctrine of the Eucharist (which was later toned down) (Forty-Two Articles, 1552).

• There was a reform of discipline, but without giving up the traditional structures of ministry.

Concludes Küng:

After the years of the bloody Catholic reaction of Mary Tudor (Archbishop Cranmer, too, went to the stake), under Mary’s half-sister, Elizabeth I (1558-1603), a definitive form of that reformed Catholicism was achieved which in a typically English way combined the medieval and the Reformation paradigms of Christianity. Liturgy and church customs were reformed, but teaching and practice remained Catholic (as laid down in the Thirty-Nine Articles). Hence to the present day the Anglican Church regards itself as the middle way between the extremes of Rome and Geneva.

As perhaps could be expected from a flashy mini-series aimed at the American market, The Tudors plays hard and fast with the facts. Liberties are taken with character names, relationships, physical appearances, and the timing of events.

With regards to papal history, for example, Wikipedia notes the following about the first series:

The papal politics depicted in the first several episodes of the series . . . have no clear relation to actual events. A Pope Alexander is depicted as on his death bed at the time of the Field of the Cloth of Gold meeting between Henry and Francis I of France (in 1520), whereas the actual pope at that time, Leo X, died suddenly at the very end of 1521, and there had not been a pope named Alexander since 1503, before the beginning of Henry’s reign. A Cardinal Orsini is depicted as being elected following the death of the fictional Alexander, which, again, does not correspond to actual history, when the Emperor’s tutor Adrian of Utrecht was elected to succeed Leo, and, following his death just a year later, Cardinal Medici, who as Clement VII would refuse to permit Henry’s divorce, was elected to the papal throne.

I’m sure the second series – the one I’ve just started watching – is also filled with similar historical inaccuracies.

Oh, well, The Tudors mini-series certainly looks good. And Hans Matheson’s performance is, as always, excellent - if frustratingly brief in the installment I watched tonight.

Oh, and by the way, don’t let those smoldering good looks distract you. The man is a very talented actor. True, he’s not what you would call an “A-list” actor, but that’s definitely part of his appeal to me. Refreshingly, he’s not driven to be a celebrity actor, but rather is dedicated to developing his acting skills through interesting and challenging roles - more often than not in projects that are far from being Hollywood blockbusters.

And as you’ll see from many of the images in the following retrospective, long before his portrayal of Thomas Cranmer in The Tudors, Hans Matheson has been portraying various characters from the past – both real and fictitious.




Above: Han’s latest feature film is Bathory. Directed by Juraj Jakubisko, the film tells the story of Countess Elizabeth Bathory, played by Anna Friel. Hans plays the role of Caravaggio, who in this version is rumored to have been Bathory’s lover.

Now, where do you think I could get an outfit like the one Hans is wearing? It’s so cool!



Above: Whereas this outfit I could probably do without: Hans as Mordred in the 2001 TV mini-series, The Mists of Avalon.

When questioned in an interview about whether he thought Mordred was an inherently evil character, Hans responded:

He’s been rejected and abandoned, and that’s what is behind the evil he does. I think that is the case for a lot of people who have been hurt in their lives. Their pain ends up coming out in an indirect way.

Above: Hans in his first major film role: as the heroin addict Eddie in director Coky Giedroyć's 1996 film Stella Does Tricks.

Above and right: Hans as the would-be rock 'n' roll star 'Silver Johnny' in the 1997 film Mojo.

In an article in the July 1998 issue of The Face magazine, it's noted that:

[Hans] first played pubescent Fifties rocker Silver Johnny in the original stage production of Mojo, and has now climbed back into the glittery trousers and junior sized quiff for the film version, in which paedophile gangsters chop each other up just to get their paws on this spring chicken with Elvis hips. The film's writer-director, Jez Butterworth (who has called Matheson "his very own Harvey Keitel") has said that he wrote the part for Hans and the actor concedes to some similarities.

"Like Johnny, I've been through a lot of bad stuff." he says enigmatically. "And we both share that trait which you find in creative people, which is to be continually searching for answers and meanings. I'm not as desperate as I was when I first played him - I used to beat myself up over the slightest mistake. There have been times when I didn't know if I would last. I've done the drugs thing. I've been through all that. I'm not gonna preach just because I'm clean, but I don't think it's good for the soul. I couldn't go back to that now. This is the happiest I've ever been."

Above and left: Hans as Marius Pontmercy in the Bille August-directed 1998 film adaptation of Victor Hugo's 1862 novel Les Misérables. The film also features Liam Neeson, Geoffrey Rush, Uma Thurman, and Claire Danes.

Les Misérables received a 74% "Certified Fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes; the consensus states, "This intelligent, handsomely crafted adaptation of Victor Hugo's classic novel condenses the story's developments without blunting its emotional impact."

Above: Hans as the young guitarist Luke Shand in the 1998 film Still Crazy.

Above: Hans as violinist Jeno Varga in the 2000 film Canone Inverso – Making Love.

Above: Hans as Private Jack Hawkstone in the 2002 British horror film Deathwatch.

Above: Hans as the Roman emperor Nero in the 2004 Italian TV mini-series, Imperium: Nero.



Above and below: Hans as the Earl of Essex in the 2005 British TV mini-series, The Virgin Queen. Anne-Marie Duff starred as Queen Elizabeth I.





Above: Hans with Demi Moore in the 2006 feature film (that went straight to DVD in most markets), Half Light, in which he plays lighthouse keeper Angus McCullough. (I wrote about Hans and this particular film in one of my very first Wild Reed posts in May of 2006.)




Above: Hans as Jake in the 2004 British TV movie, Comfortably Numb. This made-for-TV film boldly explores the addiction and rehabilitation process as it follows Jake in his battle to overcome his addiction to alcohol in a specialized treatment center called Promis.

As The Guardian of London notes:

Comfortably Numb is potent and raw, and about more than full-blown addicts. It is about the deceptions, delusions and diversions we create to fool ourselves and other people, our sneaky strategies and devious designs. It is based on stories told by members of the supporting cast, none of whom were professional actors and all of whom were counselors and trainee counselors – and therefore recovering addicts – at the real Promis clinic.

Above: Hans as Tomas the stable boy in the 2002 Swedish-Norwegian-Danish film, I Am Dina.

Directed by Ole Bornedal and based on the 1989 book, Dinas bok (Dina’s Book) by Herbjørg Wassmo, the film is reputedly one of the most high-profile in Norwegian movie history.

Above and left: Hans as Yuri Zhivago in the 2003 TV mini-series, Doctor Zhivago, based on the novel by Boris Pasternak.

It was this mini-series, shown on PBS, that first introduced me to Hans Matheson. It’s a decent enough production, although I feel that Keira Knightley is hopelessly miscast as Lara.

In a November 16, 2002 interview with Karen Hockney of The Scotsman Online, Hans remarked:

I found [Pasternak’s] book incredibly poetic and detailed – I could relate to it. I hadn’t seen [David Lean’s 1965 film version] before I auditioned, but when I read the script I saw a fantastic love story. Then I watched the film and thought it was very good. Omar Sharif was fantastic and so was Julie Christie, but it was a completely different story to the book.

[Lean’s] film was groundbreaking in its time but cinema has become more daring in the last ten years. I think [Lean’s] film was limited emotionally and I hope that [with this new version] we are breaking new ground in terms of the emotional barriers. Yury [Zhivago] is a man of great integrity and I feel very strongly about the love he has for Lara and his wife Tonya.

In terms of future projects, Hans will play Alec D’Urberville in the forthcoming BBC production of Thomas Hardy’s novel, Tess of the d’Urbervilles. Gemma Arterton takes the title role of Tess, with filming commencing this month in England.


For more of Hans Matheson at The Wild Reed, see:
To the Lighthouse . . .
A Devilish Turn



Recommended Off-site Link:
Hans Matheson Online