Churches I have known

Catholic New Times, May 9, 2004 by Phil Kelly

Farrellton, Que. in the thirties and forties was the community of origin of this now-aging friar. I am one of nine children of a household in which the church played a pivotal role. We went to Mass and Lenten Stations of the Cross by horse, and sleigh. What the pastor said was law. Being an altar boy marked me forever. The singing of "O Holy Night" is still the highlight of my Christmas celebration.

I was only vaguely aware of a wider church. I remember having to sit through the reading of papal encyclicals. I also remember getting in trouble with the pastor, an autocrat, about our differences in opinion regarding the Asbestos Miners' Strike in the late 1940s.

Some Sisters came to our town the year I began high school and shortly afterwards, I dropped out of school at age sixteen. I drifted for years, aware of the church, but in many ways quite similar to the drifting of young women and men of today. I continued to go to church occasionally, but it was Cap-de-Madeline and Trois Rivieres that changed my life.

One year I brought my brother Carl, an Oblate priest, to 'the Cape.' The pietism and the overwhelmingly traditional Quebec church sickened me. There was a contest that year to select the largest family in Quebec, and the Tremblays from Lac St Jean won with their 23 children.

Then, on the way out of town, I stopped at a small Franciscan shrine. I was overwhelmed by the simplicity and poverty of St. Francis. Within two months I had quit my job and left my girlfriend and was a candidate in the Franciscan seminary in Watertown, New York.

This was the era of Thomas Merton; there were 16 of us as candidates, eight Canadians and eight Americans. The formation was insular, the rules were almost laughable. At age twenty-seven, I had had wider experiences than the candidates or even the friars in charge of our formation. No one actually talked about Saint Francis.

John XXIII was elected pope in 1958 and rumors of change began to circulate, especially in the Major Seminary where my next assignment took me.

The civil rights era had begun. I heard Martin Luther King's "I have a dream" speech and was shocked to over hear one friar describe it as "trying to stir up the n -- s, that damned Communist."

I went to teach in Costa Rica. We were isolated from the local church, except for our anxiety about rumored changes. The encyclical Mater et Magistra had a great influence on us and I began to teach a course on 'social orientation', in whiche we discussed the issues of wealth and poverty worldwide.

The church however, was oriented toward keeping the favour of the "haves" and friars teaching otherwise raised eyebrows. When I had to return to the U.S. because of illness, the national newspaper wrote of me as being "un communista con sutana'".

Life in inner-city Camden, New Jersey was an eye-opener for me. I experienced the slums, the sixties, anti-war activities, racial riots and a condemnatory bishop all at once. They were hectic years. I was indicted by a grand jury for my activities. "What are you doing there without your outfit?" was the only comment from my bishop. He was very glad to see me leave.

Chicago was a different scene. The church there had had a long history of social involvement; it was the spawning ground for the Saul Alinski Institute, that I attended. As well, the nearby churches in Milwaukee were involved in justice work and always supportive. Because bishops set the scene for the local church, hostility shuts things down, whereas episcopal encouragement makes for a lively, engaged church.

Anti-Vietnam-war activity exploded, and the sexual revolution arrived. At the same time, while profound changes in the Church, animated by Vatican II were taking place, huge numbers of priests and religious were leaving orders. Humanae Vitae, the famous birth control encyclical of 1968 had a negative effect on all. It was a teaching never accepted by the faithful.

Then I returned to Quebec to a different world. Bishop Jean-Marie Coderre was an enthusiastic supporter of the Council; he challenged me to seek out the poor and marginalized, and loved to spend time with unwed mothers, ex-prisoners, and recent immigrants. His successor, Bernard Hubert, was even more involved, and in my position, I became the envy of every social justice co-coordinator in Canada.

I then moved to Ontario, where I found a much more quiescent, inwardly focused church. During my time in treatment in Southdown and subsequent staff appointment there, I met people from the entire spectrum of concern, and it was this cohort with whom I was to spend the next fifteen years. In working with priests and religious suffering from a variety of addictions, I met a variety of churches.

It is always difficult to separate the local church from the leadership it is receiving. I met bishops and major superiors who acted as brother or sister to their colleagues. I met others who blanched at the descriptions of the all-too-human behaviors of the patient, some even getting up and storming out of the room.