New York Times on Pope's Comments About Bishop Barros in Chile: They Instill Doubt About Pope's Commitment to Protecting Abuse Victims

Pascal Bonnefoy reports for New York Times yesterday on the video about which I appended a note to Brittie Perez's great essay, which was shot by an Argentine tourist in St. Peter's Square last May, and released Friday. As I noted, it shows Pope Francis blaming "leftists" for the uproar that ensued when he appointed Juan Barros bishop of Osorno, Chile, and stigmatizing the people of Osorno as dumb.

Ezra Klein on How New Online Media Technologies Shift U.S. Political Conversation: Implications for "Pope Messiahs" and Centrist Catholic Media Gatekeepers

This is what I mean when I keep saying repeatedly that new media made possible by online technology, as well as the tools of social networking, are changing the game for the centrists who have long sought to control public political and religious discourse in the U.S.: Ezra Klein explains what, in his view, is going on with the rapidly shifting terrain of American politics:

Martin Luther King, Jr.'s, Legacy: Celebrating the Power of Ordinary People Acting Together to Bring About Effective Change

I have long thought that Martin Luther King, Jr., was put to death by the powers that be when he began to make the connections (a nod to Beverly Wildung Harrison as I use that phrase) between American militarism, the exploitation of working-class Americans of all colors and creeds by unbridled capitalism, and racism. As long as he confined his activist organizing to civil rights for people of color, the powers that be let King be, while keeping a close watch on him through his odious nemesis J. Edgar Hoover.

Sister Teresa Forcades on the Necessity of Dreaming of Revolution in the Catholic Church — Especially re: Clericalism and Misogyny

Joel 2:28, NIV Translation

In the Catalan journal El Critic, Irene Ramentol asks Benedictine Sister Teresa Forcades whether the idea of any kind of revolution in the Catholic church is just a dream (Rebel Girl has provided an English translation at Iglesia Descalza). Sister Teresa replies:

Mid-Week News Snippets: Teresa Forcades on Gay Love, Cordileone and NOM, Religious Right and GOP, and Catholics and Gays

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At Gay Mystic, Jayden Cameron uses the occasion of the publication of Sister Teresa Forcades's new book És a les nostres mans to remind his readers of the interview she did earlier this year with Pikara magazine (English translation at Iglesia Descalza), in which she says, 

Iraq Situation, the Media, and the "Festival of the Undead Wrong" (with Application to Recent U.S. Catholic Bishops' Meeting)

To call the following a meme among commentators looking at American news and mainstream media in the last three days would be a vast understatement (there are many similar statements I could cite, too):

New Book by Sister Teresa Forcades, És a les nostres mans: Democracy Possible Only When Predatory Capitalism Is Overcome

At Iglesia Descalza, Rebel Girl offers a translation of an article at the website of the Spanish daily ABC announcing the publication of Sister Teresa Forcades's new book, És a les nostres mans (It's in Our Hands). The book was published by DAU of Barcelona, and is, I believe, available at present only in Catalan and Spanish editions. 

Seeing Visions and Dreaming Dreams: Impending Socioeconomic and Ecological Crisis and Religious Theories of Change

In a two-part interview with Xavier Casanovas, Oscar Mateos, Santi Torres, and Nani Vall-llossera in Cristianisme i Justícia (via Iglesia Descalza, here and here), Benedictine Sister Teresa Forcades continues to insist that all viable, effective change in both church and society happens from the bottom to the top, not vice-versa: when the interviewers ask her about the euphoria surrounding Pope Francis and his papacy, she replies, 

In Catholic News: Austin Ruse's Call for Violence, Censorship of Sister Teresa Forcades (and of Me, Again, by NCR)

As Sister Joan Chittister says in her recent stellar statement now running at the National Catholic Reporter website (to which I pointed yesterday), it behooves none of us to be complacent about legislation (like the recent anti-gay bill in Arizona) targeting a scapegoated minority group, because we ourselves may be the next group to be targeted. Nonetheless, both in response to Sister Joan's article and throughout the Catholic blogosphere, there are, in fact, scads of Catholic voices calling quite precisely for the targeting of this or that segment of the human community--uppity women, gays and lesbians, even university professors.

Sister Teresa Forcades on the Incarnation and Holy Family: "To Appear in the World, God Didn't Need a Heterosexual Couple"

Benedictine Sister Teresa Forcades, in an interview with Joana Grenzner for Pikara Magazine, by way of Iglesia Descalza:

Sister Teresa Forcades Receiving Increased Attention as Leading European Public Intellectual (as Pope Francis Meets with Gustavo Gutiérrez)

I've been writing about the Catalan Benedictine nun Teresa Forcades for some time now, since I discovered her last year via Rebel Girl's Iglesia Descalza site and Terry Weldon's Queering the Church blog. As I noted this past April, I find great hope in the fact that Catholic religious women like Forcades in Europe or the nuns on the bus in the U.S. have claimed strong public voices in the face of repressive movements in the culture at large, often backed by the Catholic hierarchy, to return women to positions of mute servitude.

Reforming the Catholic Church Today: Three Perspectives

Steve's surgery seems to have gone well, and he has spent the day sleeping. Thank you, all who have asked about this and have told us you'll be praying. We both appreciate it very much.

Teresa Forcades's Challenge to Austerity Regimes Receives Notice

And speaking of smart Catholic women saying smart things that old boys' clubs both inside and outside the Catholic church would be well advised to hear: I'm pleased to see that Spanish Benedictine nun Teresa Forcades, whose commentary I've featured here a number of times (click her name on the tag below) is now receiving wide notice at news-analysis sites online. Last Friday, Common Dreams focused on her collaboration with Arcadi Oliveres to launch a political manifesto challenging the austerity model that has come to be seen as sacrosanct by many European and American politicians.

Change Begins with the Feet and Not the Head: Theologians Responding to Pope Francis

Two complementary statements this morning from theologians reflecting on the significance of the new papal style:

The Vatican Hurls Down Answers, Catholic Women Keep Asking Questions: Give Me the Questions

The Vatican can tell powerful Catholic women theologians and spiritual thinkers (e.g., Margaret Farley and Elizabeth Johnson)* to shut up, listen, and obey. But you can't stop powerful Catholic women theologians and spiritual thinkers from asking important unsettling questions:

From the Blogs: The Grace of Queer Theory and Queer Theology

Sr. Teresa Forcades, OSB

At his Queering the Church blog, Terry Weldon presents excerpts from an interview at Iglesia Descalza with Catalan Benedictine sister Teresa Forcades, who observes,