The Liberal Protestant Future
of Catholic Dissent
by Tom Piatak
One of the many memorable scenes in David Lean’s Doctor Zhivago features Zhivago’s family fleeing the ugliness and brutality of Moscow after the Bolshevik Revolution for the tranquility of the family’s country estate in Varykino. Upon reaching the estate after an arduous journey, Zhivago’s father-in-law, Alexander Gromeko, finds the main house boarded up, with a notice affixed to the door. After reading the notice, he cannot contain his exasperation: “A body, styling itself the Yuriatin Committee of Revolutionary Justice, has expropriated my house. In the name of the people. Very well. I’m one of the people, too!”
I know how Gromeko felt. I recently attended a lecture at the Cleveland City Club by Helmut Schuller, a dissident Austrian priest who just finished touring the United States to promote his plan to dramatically refashion the Catholic Church so that it is more in line with Schuller’s opinions. Schuller claims to be acting in the name of “the People of God,” a phrase he repeated many times in Cleveland. As a baptized Catholic, I’m one of the People of God, too. But I no more gave Schuller authority to speak in my name than Gromeko gave the Bolsheviks authority to steal his house. And despite fawning coverage from such venues as The New York Times, NPR, Reuters, and the National Catholic Reporter, most of Schuller’s speeches were attended by crowds of no more than a few hundred, or less than the number who attend Mass each Sunday at a typical suburban parish.
It is clear why the media is so excited about Schuller. His talk featured nothing indicating that Schuller believes that the Church is right about anything of importance or that it has anything to teach the world. Instead, Schuller said the Church should learn from the world, and he repeatedly stated that the Church needs to conform to the opinions of “the people of our time.”
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