Rabbi Larry Mahrer invited me to speak after Shabbat Service on Friday, Feb. 15th. Victoria Siegel, a member of CRC in St Louis (Rabbi Susan Talve's Congregation) flew to Sarasota from St. Louis for a brief holiday. We shared a meal and drove up to Temple Beth El in Bradenton.
At the conclusion of Shabbat Service, I spoke about Roman Catholic Womenpriests as an initiative of reform and renewal within the Roman Catholic Church. I shared that RCWP is reclaiming our ancient heritage that women were ordained for the first twelve hundred years of the church's history. I stressed our common bonds with the people we serve. We are all one people of God and that we are trying to transform the clerical structures and have a more open, accountable, transparent church. I cited the three branches of Judaism Reform, Conservative, Orthodox as a possible model for the church of the future. I spoke for about 15 minutes and then opened up to questions and had a dialogue around the issues that the Jewish congregation wanted to discuss. They gave me/our movement a warm welcome and conveyed that they would pray for us. Several of the couples who talked with me afterwards were Jewish-Catholic. Some talked about the prejudice of Catholics against Jews not only in the pre-Vatian 11 church, but in one case, in a text that is used by some home-school Catholic programs which reflect a negative stance toward the Jewish people as causing Jesus' wounds on the cross. I thought that brand of anti-semitism was long gone. Sad to say it is still around. I believe that RCWP has an opportunity to foster closer relationships with people from different faith traditions. Tonight I felt that an ember from the fire of the Spirit that we experienced in the St. Louis ordinations had ignited in Florida. I was deeply honored to participate in a forum of respectful dialogue with a community of believers from the Reform tradition of Judaism. It was quite a positive, energizing experience!
Shalom peace,
Bridget Mary Meehan
At the conclusion of Shabbat Service, I spoke about Roman Catholic Womenpriests as an initiative of reform and renewal within the Roman Catholic Church. I shared that RCWP is reclaiming our ancient heritage that women were ordained for the first twelve hundred years of the church's history. I stressed our common bonds with the people we serve. We are all one people of God and that we are trying to transform the clerical structures and have a more open, accountable, transparent church. I cited the three branches of Judaism Reform, Conservative, Orthodox as a possible model for the church of the future. I spoke for about 15 minutes and then opened up to questions and had a dialogue around the issues that the Jewish congregation wanted to discuss. They gave me/our movement a warm welcome and conveyed that they would pray for us. Several of the couples who talked with me afterwards were Jewish-Catholic. Some talked about the prejudice of Catholics against Jews not only in the pre-Vatian 11 church, but in one case, in a text that is used by some home-school Catholic programs which reflect a negative stance toward the Jewish people as causing Jesus' wounds on the cross. I thought that brand of anti-semitism was long gone. Sad to say it is still around. I believe that RCWP has an opportunity to foster closer relationships with people from different faith traditions. Tonight I felt that an ember from the fire of the Spirit that we experienced in the St. Louis ordinations had ignited in Florida. I was deeply honored to participate in a forum of respectful dialogue with a community of believers from the Reform tradition of Judaism. It was quite a positive, energizing experience!
Shalom peace,
Bridget Mary Meehan
4 comments:
Open letter to friends and family:
As you probably know, I was in Florida last week to visit with my former rabbi (Larry Mahrer) and Bridget Mary Meehan (the media spokesperson for the Roman Catholic Womenpriests – RCWP -- movement). Amidst all the pros and cons bandied about of Central Reform Congregation's (CRC) role in the ordination of two women this past November, some people worried that it would hurt inter-religious relationships. Well, I suppose only time will tell but I thought I’d share with you what I experienced this past weekend.
But before that, just some background information:
At the ordination in November I had the opportunity to talk extensively with Bridget. She and I immediately clicked. She’s intelligent, bright, enthusiastic, and a real joy to be with. When she mentioned that she spent the winters in Sarasota, I told her my former rabbi was down there and that maybe they could meet to do some joint inter-religious programming. He had been inviting me to visit for many years so finally, after many e-mails back-and-forth to Bridget and him, we coordinated schedules so that she could be a guest speaker at his synagogue. For me personally, not only did I get to finally visit my former teacher, but I also got to see Bridget again and participated in a wonderful event.
I arrived on Wednesday evening. On Thursday evening, Rabbi Larry dropped me off at Bridget’s home where I spent six delightful hours with her and her father -- rabbi had other plans he had previously made so Bridget was in charge of keeping me entertained :). She and I gabbed non-stop the whole time. We talked about everything from our families to religion to the role of women in organized religions to the outrageousness of Archbishop Burke (more on him in a bit).
Larry and Bridget met that night for the first time when he dropped me off and picked me up. Then on Friday, we picked up Bridget and went to dinner before attending his Sabbath services at his synagogue where she was the special guest speaker.
At dinner I was fortunate enough to enjoy the company of a rabbi and a priest (I know that sounds like the beginning of a bad joke) and I listened intently while they discussed the history of the Reform Judaism movement (it began in the 1800s in Germany) and Bridget’s hopes for the RCWP movement. She and the rabbi seemed to agree that RCWP is parallel to the Reform movement. He shared with her the obstacles the founders of Reform Judaism faced and what she can look forward to (except the powers of Rome are much stronger than those of a small group of Orthodox rabbis). In her case, aside from confronting a powerful central church, the RCWP movement has history on its side...up until the 12th century, women were priests and male priests could marry and have families. And while she agrees that she won’t see it in her lifetime, RCWP just wants to restore the religion to its original traditions.
At services that night, Bridget was warmly received by the congregation and they had lots of questions for her after she spoke. Everyone seemed genuinely interested in what she and the others are trying to do. She spoke quite honestly about the failings of the Catholic Church from the sex abuse scandals to the exclusion of homosexuals and divorced Catholics to its various anti-Semitic actions. She also spoke quite passionately about her love for her church and her desire to see it in a good light. Her warmth and friendliness came through and the attendees responded in kind.
Many of the folks at the synagogue exchanged cards with Bridget in order to keep in touch and possibly do some joint programming. It was amazing that the sparks from a ceremony in St. Louis landed all the way in a small synagogue in Bradenton, Florida where they ignited into inter-religious dialogue and understanding. Who knows where this exchange will lead?
As for her words about St. Louis’ “beloved” Archbishop Burke, she expressed a concern about the Roman Catholic Church in general and fears it is moving in the direction of Opus Dei...very far to the right. She suspects that Burke is a trial balloon and Rome wants to see how far people can be pushed. He’s certainly doing their bidding by doing some major pushing around here (Sheryl Crow, St. Stanislaus, Coach Majerus, refusing communion to pro-choice supporters, and so on). It’ll be interesting to watch what he does next and what happens down the road.
I hope you enjoyed this story and that maybe you’ll experience some of the wonderful inter-religious spirit that was present this past weekend,
Victoria
article from Rabbi Larry Mahrer
Temple Beth El, Bradenton, Flordia
Hi Every One !
Thanks much for your responses to the 'extra' Shabbat Message I sent out yesterday about sharing your time with me. I appreciated your comments.
As I told you last week, we had a Roman Catholic Womanpriest - yes, that's one word - speak at our Service Friday night. We had exchanged lots of emails and spoken on the phone a few time, but I had never met her until Thursday evening for just a few minutes. Then we had dinner together before Service on Friday. She was dynamic, attractive, very thoughtful and filled with ideas for ways to improve her, and all other, religious communities. It was a real kick to be with her at the dinner table for an hour or so.
She was very well received at our synagogue and we had a very large turnout - large for us. During her talk, which was brief, the attention was riveting. The Q & A session which followed was also very important. At the Oneg Shabbat following the Service, she never had a chance to relax as someone was always at her side exchanging ideas. I'm not at all certain that she had anything to eat. Her basic message was that the present Church was not being true to its past history. She said that in the early days, women had served as priests and deacons, and that the church should get back to that older tradition. Women, she said, frequently had a different perspective and/or approach to things spiritual which added a new dimension to spirituality. In Reform Judaism, we certainly are aware that our female rabbis do add significantly to our awareness of many issues.
She also spoke of an openness to 'others' which her Church does not always exemplify - in addition to women, she mentioned gays and lesbians, people of color, folks with intellectual disabilities and many other groupings. Openness also meant sharing with and learning from other religious communities through regular contact and dialogue. We all get better as human as we expand our horizons, she suggested.
Needless to say, I was very pleased to have her in our sanctuary. I hope that her message took hold with some of our folks. She sure would have fit in with the adult education experiences in which Pastor Joe Johnson and I were involved in Dothan for so many years. Oh, how I miss that!
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