An Inside Look at Voice of the Faithful

As I pulled into the high school parking lot of the affluent Long Island suburb of Manhasset one July evening, I passed a BMW with a Voice of the Faithful (VOTF) window decal. Clearly, this was the place. I entered the building, passing a number of elderly people standing behind tables covered with pamphlets. A very pleasant grandmother handed me four or five leaflets, including a printout of the Nicene Creed, a flier for the group’s September “Faith Convention” and some other VOTF reading material.

Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Paul Lakeland-the liberation theologian from Fairfield University-who was the guest speaker for that evening’meeting. I’d never actually seen Lakeland before, but I did read several of his essays and his book Can Women Be Priests? (You can guess his answer.) Lakeland stood in the school’vestibule, surrounded by a small group of elderly and middle-aged women. They crowded around the man, who-dressed sharply in a blue blazer-looked more like a celebrity than a college professor.

My initial thought was a question: Why did VOTF-a self-proclaimed non-ideological group-invite a liberation theologian to address and instruct its members?

I maneuvered my way through the growing crowd and found a seat close to one of the mounted wall speakers at the front-left side of the auditorium. I was surprised, a few minutes later, when Lakeland sat down directly in front of me. At the time, I hadn’t realized I was sitting where the board of directors for the Long Island branch of VOTF (LI-VOTF) usually sits during each meeting. In the months that followed, I would be seeing a lot more of them. Not only was I a member of LI-VOTF, but I would soon become cochair of its Communications Committee.

The LI-VOTF had about 1,600 members as of September 2003 (out of 1.5 million Catholics living in the Diocese of Rockville Centre). Cochair and branch founder Dan Bartley noted, “We do not ‘represent,’ in an elected capacity, any Catholic. We do believe that we represent, through our mission and goals, what many Catholics would like to see happen in our Church.”

Many LI-VOTF board and general members are part of the current Catholic educational system. As one observer of the group put it, “They are the backbone of the Church. Many of them teach CCD, religion, and are [pillars] of their parishes.” Bartley himself is a theology student at the local diocesan seminary.

And he’not the only one. Other LI-VOTF board members have passed through the doors of the diocesan seminary or the Pastoral Formation Institute or have some formal religious training. At least two have Master of Theology degrees from the local seminary. Many of them are active in one way or another with their local parishes as eucharistic ministers and religion teachers. Bartley is an instructor for marriage preparation in his parish and was a coordinator for RENEW 2000. Another board member was the lay chaplain at a local community college who attended the Marist Institute of Theology; his brother is a deacon. Still another former board member is married to a deacon. At least three of the 15 are lawyers.

The larger organizational structure of VOTF is a shadow of the Roman Catholic system, with headquarters in Boston instead of Rome. Like the leaders of LI-VOTF, the national leaders tend to be heavily involved in their local parishes as eucharistic ministers, lectors, and religious educators.

The national VOTF has regional chapters, which correlate to dioceses. Then come the Parish Voices, which function as chapters for each parish. The group stresses the importance of the grassroots level. It believes change will occur from the bottom up (similar to the Faith-Based Communities in Latin America under liberation theology).

Patricia Zirkel, another leader in LI-VOTF, said, “Remember the old Sixties slogan, ‘Power to the People’? Parish Voices are empowerment.... Meaningful change will occur first at the parish level.... Parish Voices are the means to this change. Parish by parish, step by step, brick by brick.”

But exactly what that change involves is a matter of some debate. Critics (like Crisis) have charged that the organization acts as a front group for Catholic dissenters-a kind of wolf in sheep’ clothing. The group’leadership, on the other hand, denies this vigorously, saying it’merely an organization of mainstream, church-going Catholics. They claim they do not challenge Church teaching and-at least according to LI-VOTF’ Web site-”accept the teaching authority of our Church, including the traditional role of the bishops and the Pope.”

For my own part, I’d read the claims of both sides. I also visited VOTF’national Web site and read its declarations and goals carefully. When I joined the organization, I believed that at least some of the criticisms leveled against it might have been based on faulty information (everyone has critics, after all). Indeed, I had no bias against the group and was genuinely interested in its mission.

If It Looks Like a Duck “

The leadership of VOTF denies that it’an ideological group and goes to great lengths to avoid the label “liberal.” One revealing example of this effort was the LI-VOTF’ board of directors’ April 28, 2002, letter to Bishop William Murphy, the head of the Diocese of Rockville Centre. In the letter, describing the differences and ideologies that comprise LI-VOTF, the board wrote, “Long Island Voice of the Faithful is, not unlike most groups or organizations, made up of people working toward a common purpose. Some are optimistic, some are pessimistic, some are reactionary, and some are conservative “.” Conspicuously missing from this list is the term “liberal” or any acknowledgment that some in LI-VOTF are left-leaning. (No one, after all, has ever accused VOTF of being “conservative” or “reactionary.”)

Given all of VOTF’fervent denials, what basis do the critics have for claiming the group is made up of dissenters?

The criticisms can be boiled down to three points: (1) The leadership of VOTF is composed almost entirely of dissenters; (2) VOTF gravitates toward dissenters as advisers and speakers at its events; and (3) Its goals are ambiguous enough to hide just about any kind of agenda.

Despite the objections of VOTF leaders, during my time in the organization, I found truth in each of the three charges. The July meeting with Lakeland bore this out.

After the group recited the Nicene Creed and then meditated with eyes closed to some New Agey-sounding music, Lakeland delivered a talk titled, “Empowering the Laity.” Like many other theologians who speak at VOTF meetings, Lakeland is a member of the Catholic Theological Society of America. Predictably, he supports women’ordination and rejects most Catholic moral teachings related to human sexuality. For his 20-minute talk, he received a $300 stipend. (When some VOTF members criticized the invitation of Lakeland to the July meeting, they were met with jeers from the others, including some LI-VOTF board members.)

While at the podium, Lakeland compared LI-VOTF members to Holocaust concentration camp survivors. He observed that both Holocaust survivors and LI-VOTFers have the ability to “take an attitude” when they experience oppression. Although Lakeland admitted that “we do not go in fear of our lives”he did reinforce his analogy by adding, “But we nevertheless suffer from a more insidious form of oppression, that of the structural oppression of the laity. Here, the villains are “structures.”

The “oppressive structure” rhetoric is the same language that the Catholic extreme left has employed for more than 30 years. Liberation, feminist, womanist, and Latin American mujerista theologians had been making the “oppressive structure” argument long before VOTF formed.

Expectedly, Lakeland was a big hit among the VOTF crowd. But there were others. During the October regional meeting, Svea Fraser, who holds a Master of Divinity degree and was one of the founding members of VOTF in Boston, was the guest speaker. Fraser, a full-time VOTF employee, joked that a gathering of bishops in Washington, D.C., looked like Ku Klux Klansmen with their white robes and “pointy hats.” The audience roared. She told the crowd wistfully how her pastor allowed her to preach from the pulpit when she was a graduate student. Again, the audience loved it.

While VOTF leadership repeatedly states that speakers are invited to express their own views and do not necessarily reflect the organization, the speakers are nevertheless chosen and invited by the board. And frankly, despite claims to the contrary, it’a fairly easy thing to detect the leftist slant of VOTF and most of its members. One need only attend one of the conferences where a largely liberal audience listens raptly to a liberal speaker. Applause is a sure thing whenever one of the speakers says something contrary to Catholic teaching.

And this observation is hardly confined to “conservatives.” Dr. Paul Ginnety from St. Joseph’College on Long Island, complimented VOTF as being a “fairly liberal” group of older Catholics who “cut their teeth” during the protest era of the 1960s in a Newsday op-ed published in July 2002. In the article, Ginnety went on to ridicule younger Catholics who agree with what the Catholic Church teaches, calling them nostalgic. Ginnety, an occasional contributor to Newsday’s editorial pages, also spoke during LI-VOTF’s September Faith Convention’s “working lunch.”

For faithful Catholics, perhaps no single person better represents the face of dissent than Rev. Richard McBrien of Notre Dame. From promoting women’ordination to condemning the Church’ban on contraception, McBrien is a reliable fixture of the Catholic far-left. And he was also the primary speaker at the September Faith Convention.

Patricia Zirkel, who holds a Ph.D. in theology and is a former associate professor at St. John’University, gave the priest a rousing introduction. After reminiscing about reading McBrien’book Catholicism as a graduate student, she explained McBrien’relationship with VOTF: “Very pertinent to us today, Father McBrien advised [VOTF cofounder] Jim Muller in the formation stages of VOTF. They had many conversations about what VOTF should address itself to, and our mission statement and goals. A very simple mission statement and “three goals came out of those conversations to a great extent.”

McBrien spoke about his role and influence in the present Catholic education establishment. Referring to the increase of Catholic laity getting involved in religious instruction since Vatican II, McBrien boasted, “One of the most satisfying elements in my time as a theologian was the time I served as the director of the Institute of Religious Education and Pastoral Ministry at Boston College-I think still the largest and I think the most vibrant program training those who are in the ministries of religious education around the country “. Many of these graduates-of places like Boston College’ Institute of Religious Education and Pastoral Ministry-now serve as parish directors of religious education “and as directors of liturgy or as religion teachers in Catholic high schools “.”

For anyone who has read McBrien’writings, the speech had a familiar ring. Much of it was a mixture of previously published columns with some sections from his popular books, Catholicism and Lives of the Popes, spliced in. For example:

In what sense, if any, can Jesus be called the founder of the Church? The answer is that Jesus is not the founder of the Church if by the word “found”we mean some direct, explicit, deliberate act by which he established a new religious movement, organization or community, complete with a set of ready-made structures and institutional practices “. But Jesus is the founder of the Church if by the word “found” we mean that he laid the foundations for the Church in various indirect ways-mainly, through his gathering of disciples and the establishment of a memorial meal, “Do this in memory of me”by which his disciples would remain together after his death.

After dismissing both the ban on women’ordination and the concept of apostolic succession, McBrien asked, “What specifically in the Church can we attribute to the will of Jesus himself, so that these structures and practices can be said to be of divine law and therefore not subject to change by the Church? The answer is, structurally, almost nothing.”

Referring to VOTF as a “progressive group” McBrien followed Ginnety in describing younger Catholics “to the right” of him as being nostalgic. This was followed by approving laughter from the 650 attendees.

Indeed, throughout McBrien’speech, the audience was captivated. They laughed at his jokes, applauded his points, leaned forward when McBrien’tone became serious, and gave him an enthusiastic standing ovation at the end. Responding to an audience request to make his amalgamated speech available, McBrien said, “I don’t circulate my unpublished papers because I keep changing them and I don’t want them out as if they’re finished products.”

Why would a non-ideological group-as VOTF claims to be-ask the most recognizable Catholic dissenter in America to speak to its members? Bartley told me he invited McBrien “because I read some of his material as recommended reading at the seminary. I found his books-particularly his book Catholicism—to be very well written. He is a good speaker, well-known, and highly respected.” McBrien received “about $2,000” for his time.

After the talk, the still-buzzing crowd was shepherded to a working lunch, where prefabricated questions were provided to the crowd so they could “participate” in shaping the direction of the organization. Each table picked a secretary and a spokesperson who approached the podium to present the conclusions of their respective tables. Among the calls for Bishop Murphy’resignation, more lay involvement, financial openness, and complaints about homilies, one spokesperson fired up the crowd by saying, “We also feel very strongly at one point, to sue for ownership of our church facilities in a court of the United States of America.” She was given loud applause. Once it died down, she helpfully gave out the name of a person in the New York State assembly for LI-VOTF members to contact.

Behind Closed Doors

If dissent was on display during the conferences, it was no different in the private meetings of the board. As cochair of the Communications Committee, I updated the LI-VOTF’ Web site and even proposed a redesign of the site (for which I received positive feedback from some of the board members). During a Communications Committee meeting, one member started complaining about how the Church discriminates against married people and women, and how before Vatican II, the Church taught that the body was evil. He pulled out Gary Wills’book, Papal Sin, to prove his point. As this board member is an intelligent man, I was puzzled to see how readily he accepted the embittered Wills as an authority on Church history. But he certainly wasn’t alone. According to LI-VOTF’minutes, the invited guest speaker to the November 2002 regional meeting was the Jesuit writer Rev. Raymond Schroth, who also praised Wills during his talk.

Another popular author among some LI-VOTF members is Dr. Phyllis Zagano. Shortly after my e-mail address was listed on LI-VOTF’Web site, I received a promotion for a lecture she was giving at Hofstra University. The presentation, “Catholic Women Deacons: Present Tense” also plugged her book, Holy Saturday: An Argument for the Restoration of the Female Diaconate in the Catholic Church.

Another popular author among some LI-VOTF members is Dr. Phyllis Zagano.

Last year, I ran her name by Bruce Sabalaskey at OurLadysWarriors web site. She teeters on the brink of heretical but hasn't jumped off yet, so she doesn't even qualify for honorable mention on his list of dissenting speakers.

This should raise some eyebrows!

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This article was in this month's "Crisis" magazine as well. It matches up to everything I've seen - the "big players" are also hooked up with CORPUS, CTA, etc., except that publicly VOTFers do not take stands on any issues.

Interestingly, there was just a very well publicized national VOTF vote on officers. Out of supposedly 30,000 VOTF members, 1,100 actually bothered to cast a ballot - and all you had to do was access the Internet to vote.

I think this group is DOA and will end up like CTA, etc. once the newsmedia gets tired of them and moves on to greener pastures. Tough to do since Jim Post likes the cameras and makes sure his face is in one as often as possible.

I think this group is DOA

Bettinelli agrees with you! Let's hope you are both right. It's enough to deal with this type of politics at the diocesan level; we don't need more of it from disgruntled laity. If they don't like catholic doctrine - leave! It's just that simple.

I often wonder what the heck they think they do believe.

They refuse to believe what the Church proposes for their belief.

They don't believe in their own ideas with enough conviction to walk out and form the institution they say they want.

It seems like a lot of silly posturing with no conviction.

At least Calvin and the rest had the courage to act on their stated beliefs.

Apparently they think the majority of Catholics are simple minded and will follow any whim of doctrine if they just make enough noise. Except they aren't making much noise, they are just talking to each other.

Working against them is the age of the membership. Fact is that few people in our society beyond the age of 70 are taken seriously in our society. Ihave reason to think that Rome is waiting for them to die. On the other hand. this generation has done such harm that we can only hope for a real counterreformation.

This should raise some eyebrows!

I haven't gotten to the excerpted part yet, but I think the contents of some stomachs will also be on the rise.

I often wonder what the heck they think they do believe.

Good point! While reading the question lingered: "these people think they're Catholic, exactly how?" Brought to mind Fulton Sheen's point about war protesters [socialists] who are "against something without being for anything".

These heresiarchs are a group of cadaverous gray haired people who never grew up. They still complain about the drama of their youth as if living before VII was like being in a nazi concentration camp.

It really is a shame. On the other hand they have a lot of nerve calling themselves faithful and claiming to represent my interests. They should be read the riot act, but like much else of the past 4 decades all we get is compromise and luke warmness.

Who was it who said the when the guily are not punished the innocent suffer?

Rather than trying to restructure the Catholic why don't they leave and start their own church with their own rules..

No prestige.

No property.

They would lose their mantle of legitimacy. These busy bodies want to be in charge of something and they want to be in a church of cheap grace where they can do as they wish and not feeel guilty.

And the only way to make the Catholic Church a church of cheap grace where they can do as they wish and not feeel guilty is to completely change its every doctrine, which they are trying to do. Your theory does explain the observed facts...

Brought to mind Fulton Sheen's point about war protesters [socialists] who are "against something without being for anything".

Excellent point! God bless that holy man. May his cause finally make it to beatification. I cut my cuspids, listening to Sheen.

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