Culture: August 2011 Archives

I was reading Fr Tim Finigan's blog today, The hermeneutic of continuity, and was startled to read his post "Fr Z under attack." Apparently Dr. Phyllis Zagano, professor of Religion at Hofstra University, doesn't care for Fr Z's ecclesiology and liturgical theology. Actually, it's not Fr Z she has the problem with, it is the Church. But since she's can't get at that in manageable ways, she's going after a prominent priest-writer. Why does she really care about Fr Z???

The controversy is based on ruffled feathers: Dr Zagano and much of the NC Reporter crowd doesn't like to be scrutinized by those "who think with the Church." It seems to me that this is another example of the mentality where "authority (and obedience) is for other people"; remember, this way of judging things isn't really Catholic. The same doesn't accept fraternal correction or live in a spirit of obedience to the Holy Mother the Church (who might just know more than a mere individual expositor of religion). Clearly, this is a case of scratch a liberal find a fascist. In world where adults are expected to be mature, trying to dig up dirt so as incite scandal among the faithful has no place in the Church. Perhaps, it seems to me, that Dr Zagano has not really learned much from all the work she's done with the central spiritualities of the Church.