As has happened in earlier centuries, new movements arise to challenge what they view as the stultifying of the call to radical Christian discipleship. Also as in earlier centuries, such movements stir controversy. Opus Dei in particular, but by no means alone, is the object of regular attack in books and articles. There is a whole genre of literature generated by people who claim to have been connected to these movements and then for one reason or another, to become bitterly disillusioned. Some of this literature is sober criticism, and some of it comparable to classic anti-Catholic polemics such as Maria Monk’s Awful Disclosures of the Hotel Dieu Nunnery of Montreal, first published in 1836 and still being reprinted today.
There no surprise in the fact that some people have been hurt and disillusioned-in part because movements that demand radical commitment attract also the psychologically and spiritually unstable; in part because the failure to meet the standards set by the community can be grievous disappointment; in part because members and leaders of renewal movements, like all of us, are sinners and sometimes treat people shabbily.
Opus Dei and other groups are frequently accused of being, interalia, authoritarian, sexist secretive, and elite. Judged by the dominant standards of a largely secularized culture, they are beyond reasonable doubt guilty as charge. A society that cannot distinguish between authoritarianism and the acknowledgment of what is authoritative is scandalized by people who understand the whole of their lives in terms of obedience to the lordship of Christ in accord with the rules of a community of obedience. The recognition of difference and complementarily between male and female is likewise deeply offensive to prevailing cultural canons. And there is almost unavoidably a tone of secretiveness that attends a powerful group identity, a sense of belonging to “us” as distinct from “them” – a sense greatly intensified by the hostility of “them.” As of elitism, what is the point of paying such a steep to belong to a group unless one believes it is the best?
All that being said, I am impressed that those whom I know in these movements are, for the most part, keenly aware of the conventional criticisms and are eager to counter them. Against the charge of authoritarianism, they accent the freedom of life in response to commanding truth. From being sexist, they strive to demonstrate mutual respect between men and women who know they are wondrously different. Against secretiveness, they enjoin upon the members an openness and invitational eagerness to share what they have found. Against elitism, they espouse a humility that underscores the truth that, whatever they have found and whatever they have achieved, it is the grace of God from the beginning to end. They seek, they survive, they enjoin, they espouse, and they often fail. It is a wonder that anybody should be surprise at that.
In some cases, there is the undeniable hurt felt by parents and families; in others, inexpressible gratitude that sons or daughters have found the purpose for which they were born. As a priest, I have encountered both reactions. For families, and especially for parents, there is a painful “letting go” of someone who has been claimed by greater devotion, much as Mary proved her discipleship in releasing Jesus to his mission. In what are called the culture wars of our time, Christians frequently declare themselves to be “pro-family”, but true Christianity sharply relativizes the natural bond of the family. The gospels are replete with the invitations of Jesus to leave all and follow him. “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and land, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life” (Mark 10:29 – 30).
“With persecutions” is a nice touch. Through the centuries there has also been family resistance to those who respond to the call to radical discipleship. Francis of Assisi, Thomas Aquinas, Ignatius of Loyola, and innumerable others had to overcome the vigorous opposition of their families. Youthful passion is perceived as madness, and zeal of a vision of what might be possible is derided as fanaticism. Not for nothing are so many movements of renewal built around young people; not for nothing did Jesus say we must become as little children, or end up living and partly living lives that have displaced the possible with the practical. Movements that do not demand do not attract; movements that are incapable of scandalizing are incapable of renewing. They become, as Jesus said, salt that has lost its savor, good for nothing.
And I think again of Ratzinger’s words in Salt of the Earth:
In our time the reforms will definitely not come from forums and synods, though these have their legitimacy, sometimes even their necessity. Reforms will come from convincing personalities whom we may call saints... If society in its totality is no longer a Christian environment, just as it was not in the first four or five centuries, the Church herself must form cells in which mutual support and a common journey, and thus the great vital milieu of the Church in miniature, can be experienced and put into practice.
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