+ To be a support group for men and women and their partners who have left the active ministry, or religious life.
+ To offer a safe haven for men and women who are considering change.
+ To be a support for others closely involved with the priest's or religious' decision.
+ To work for change in the Church and its ministry
Advent Group - Supporting Priests & Religious since 1969
The nun and the monk who fell in love and married
Written by: Aleem Maqbool
Twenty-four years after becoming a nun, it was a brief touch of the sleeve of a monk in the parlour of the convent in Preston, Lancashire, that changed everything for Sister Mary Elizabeth.
The prioress of the order had taken her to meet the friar Robert, who was visiting from a priory in Oxford, to see if he wanted anything to eat. But Sister Mary Elizabeth's superior was called away to take a phone call, so the two were left alone.
"It was our first time in a room together. We sat at a table as he ate, and the prioress didn't come back so I had to let him out."
Sister Mary Elizabeth had lived a devout, austere and mostly silent life as a nun, spending most of her days in her "cell". As she let Robert out of the door, she brushed his sleeve and says she felt something of a jolt.
"I just felt a chemistry there, something, and I was a bit embarrassed. And I thought, gosh, did he feel that too. And as I let him out the door it was quite awkward."
She recalls that it was about a week later that she received Robert's message asking if she would leave to marry him.
The current synod, whose title may seem abstruse — a "Synod on Synodality" —, is perhaps best expressed by the three words that follow its title: "Communion, Participation and Mission".
I want to emphasize the call to mission. This is indeed what the Lord asks for in the final lines of the Gospels, including that of Saint Matthew.
We suffer when we see that there are people in the Church who are obstacles to the encounter with God.The urgency of a more faithful Church was received with such force that the synodal consultation began at the same time as France's Independent Commission on Sexual Abuse in the Church (CIASE) published its report was published.
As for the whole of society, the difficulty lies in the exercise of authority.The Church is suspected of abuse, of not respecting minorities and even of covering up abuse, and Pope Francis has expressed this well by pointing out that the three types of abuse – abuse of power, as well as spiritual and sexual abuse – often feed off each other.Many words, or writings, conclude that the cause of all this is the specificity of priests and bishops, meaning both their lifestyle, including celibacy, and the authority they exercise in the Church.They say that changing both would be the remedy for the excesses that have produced so many offenses and crimes.
Many congratulations to Vincent Doyle, founder of Coping International, who features regularly in The Tablet. A BBC radio documentary on the thousands of children fathered by catholic priests has won this year’s journalism prize at the Sandford St Martin Trust awards.
Of course, there are those in the Church who have become disillusioned, not least among the overstretched clergy; and it’s clear why some might feel defeated by the demands of their role, as the age profile of the clerical workforce creeps up, their numbers fall and yet the demands increase, simply in order to keep the system going – however unsustainable it may be.
But alongside the question of clergy morale there is this. I would wager that there’s scarcely a Catholic parent in the country who would take the initiative to encourage their son to become a priest, any more than they would encourage their daughter to join a religious order, even if in time they might become supportive of their child’s choice.
