Spaghetti Summons

Ten years ago, and before I moved to South Carolina, I taught in the theology department of an all-girls’ Catholic high school in Rhode Island.

 

And I was summoned to the Bishop’s Office.

 

One night, as I was stirring spaghetti at my kitchen stove, I received a phone call from a reporter for The Providence Journal. She was doing a story on the lack of vocations in the Diocese. At the time, there were only four men in seminary, but quite a few more than four older priests who were scheduled for retirement. One of the angles in her story, was to point out that there were women who had the “charism,” who were trained (the MDiv degree is the “ordination degree”), and who were ready and waiting in the wings to have their hands consecrated in Holy Orders. She had been given my name and phone number by Annie (about whom I wrote in a previous blog entry). So she interviewed me over the phone as I cooked my spaghetti. Her interview questions were of a personal nature, not a theological one. She didn’t ask me to argue for the ordination of women. She didn’t ask me to critique the Church’s practice of barring women from Holy Orders. She did ask me if I had ever thought about ordination. I answered by saying, “As a child I always wanted to be a priest and yes, I have considered ordination elsewhere.”

 

The morning that this Providence Journal edition hit the news stands, I was teaching my class when the school’s principal appeared at the window of my classroom’s back door. I caught her eye and she made that motion with a crooked finger that means, “Come here.” I pointed to my chest and mouthed, “Me?” She said, “Yes. You.” I excused myself from my class and joined her in the corridor. She told me that she had received a phone call from the Chancery and evidently all morning since the story broke, the phone was ringing off the hook at the Bishop’s Office. Diocesan priests and other concerned Catholics had been calling all morning to ask, “What kind of people do we have teaching in our theology departments in our schools?” Unknown to me, the reporter had mentioned in the article that I taught in Bay-View’s theology department. Great. My school’s administration now had to engage in what can only be called damage control.

 

You see, the problem was that even though I had steered clear of outwardly criticizing the Church, simply by saying that, “I had considered ordination elsewhere,” I had implied that the Church’s teaching on the non-ordination of women might not be “truth.” And so I was summoned to the Bishop’s Office to apologize for, and explain my heresy.

 

I didn’t actually have to appear before the Bishop. My interview was conducted with the Vicar for Education (who is now a Bishop). Before I even walked into his office, I had determined what I was prepared to say and what I was not prepared to say. I would NOT apologize for expressing what had been the truth of my life. As I sat before him, I could see the misogyny in his eyes. He hated me. And he hated me simply because I was a woman who dared to challenge. He sat there with his $600 black suit and his gold cuff links and craftily attempted to get an apology out of me. When he would not relent I finally said, “I regret that what I said in the Providence Journal interview was interpreted in such a way as to reflect badly on Bay View Academy, its faculty, or its administration.” In other words, I was sorry that what I had said was received with Catholic paranoia and fear. He realized at some point that this was all he was going to get from me and I was “dismissed.” The incident still appearson my permanent Diocesan record.

 

Actually it is a good thing that the Diocese of Providence does not keep a “Most Wanted Feminists” list, because just a few years before I had been a member of a radical group of Rhode Island Catholic feminists who staged numerous protests right in front of the Cathedral in Providence. If they kept such a list, I would have been in the Top Ten Most Wanted and never would have been hired at the school in the first place!

 

There was a young woman who was a student at Bay-View whose name is Erin. I was her teacher for several courses throughout her high school years. The first class was a tenth grade ethics course. And even then I taught feminist theory; the tenth grade version. Erin was my most vocal objector. She fought me every step of the way. One day in her frustration and I suspect, in the midst of her tenth-grade epistemological leap, she cried in class. She was wrestling and struggling with a Catholic upbringing that she loved but she was intelligent enough to understand the feminist critique. In many ways, she was the first to teach me the power of this message and of the gentleness with which I must deliver it.

 

A few years ago I received an email from Erin informing me that she had been named to the National Organization for Women’s first Young Women’s Task Force. She was one of only 20 young women chosen nationally. At the time she was teaching (ironically enough), in a Catholic elementary school in Rhode Island. One day I called the school’s secretary and found out when Erin would be in the faculty lounge. I called the faculty lounge phone to congratulate her. She was very surprised. We spent a few moments remembering those days at Bay-View.  

 

Last week, I received another missive from her which included photos of her attendance at a Mass celebrated by one of the 60 or so women in the world who have been ordained Catholic priests. She told me that now she was living in Washington, DC and working full-time on the staff of NOW.

 

I don’t take credit for Erin and the direction of her life. I never would presume to do so. But I like to think that as she sat in my classroom, front seat, third row from the left, that I helped to plant a seed that would contribute in some small way to the young woman she is today, and the work that she does. I am so proud of you Erin… Goddess-speed.