Vatican

An archbishop who tussled with singer Sheryl Crow, college basketball coach Rick Majerus, and 2004 Democratic presidential candidate John F. Kerry over their support for abortion rights has been named to lead the Vatican supreme court. Archbishop Raymond Burke, an expert in church law and perhaps the most outspoken of conservative U.S. bishops, will probably be made a cardinal. The supreme court is traditionally headed by a cardinal. Burke's disputes with public figures drew attention to the archdiocese in his 4 1/2 years in St. Louis.

Jeremy Irons stars as the ruthless Rodrigo Borgia, who became Pope Alexander VI, in Showtime's period drama"The Borgias," now in its second season. You really seem like you're having fun with this role. I'm glad about that. I've always believed that in the theater or movies, whatever, the audience's enjoyment is increased if the actors seem to be enjoying what they're doing. What's fun about the Borgia pope? The great thing about doing series television is you have time.

Catholic liberals in the United States are making much of an interesting juxtaposition in Vatican initiatives. This week the Holy See lashed out at American nuns for insufficient fidelity to church teachings while making encouraging sounds about welcoming back a right-wing breakaway movement called the Society of St. Pius X. As one commenter on the National Catholic Reporter website put it: "The timing of it all is nothing less than stunning!...

Sister Simone Campbell doesn't wear a habit. A nun for more than 40 years and an attorney for 35, the executive director of a Roman Catholic social justice lobby called Network doesn't feel she should wear one. Her voice mail refers to her simply as "Simone," and she hasn't worn the long, gray dress habit since her early days as a nun. Such an approach doesn't sit well with some Catholics. "Love the traditional nun ... I really would like to see the habit back," Patricia Earp, a Catholic, said on Twitter.

In Philadelphia last week, a child sexual abuse trial involving Catholic clergy led to a bombshell - a bishop from West Virginia was accused of abuse. In Kansas City, a Catholic bishop goes on trial in September, accused of failing to report suspected child abuse. Last year church officials paid $144 million to settle abuse allegations and cover legal bills, and although many of the cases went back decades, church auditors have warned of "growing complacency" about protecting children today.

The Vatican has ordered an overhaul of the most important group of nuns in the United States after an investigation found what Roman Catholic Church officials called "radical feminist themes" that questioned official positions on homosexuality and the ordination of women. In a bluntly worded report, the Vatican's watchdog of orthodoxy, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, found what it called "serious doctrinal problems" with some of the comments and actions by the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, based in Silver Spring, Md. The Vatican on Wednesday named Archbishop Peter Sartain of Seattle to oversee changes in the group, a process that could take up to five years.

The ongoing debate over whether religion and science comfortably coexist got more ammunition this month, and on both sides of the argument. This ammunition took thought-provoking forms -- a foundation dedicated to exploring provocative questions, a letter written in 1954 by Albert Einstein and a Vatican astronomer who said it's OK to believe in space aliens. Let's start with Einstein. The letter was sold at auction in London on May 15 for $404,000. Einstein, writing a year before his death to philosopher Eric Gutkind, said, "The word God is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honorable but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish."

When he was the church's chief enforcer of doctrine 25 years ago, Pope Benedict XVI declined to immediately defrock a California priest who admitted to child sexual abuse, saying he needed more time to consider the impact of the case on "the good of the Universal Church," according to a letter released Friday. The 1985 letter to Bishop John Cummins of Oakland is the latest document to shed light on Benedict's handling of the sexual abuse crisis in his earlier career, when he was known as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger and headed the Vatican office that ultimately assumed full responsibility for such cases.

During a showdown with the Catholic Church in the late 1960s, Anita Caspary and the Los Angeles order she led, the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, were cast as "rebel nuns" for progressive reforms that included abandoning the nun's habit and suspending a fixed time for prayer. Although the moves were made in response to a call from the Vatican to modernize, conservative Cardinal James Francis McIntyre of the Los Angeles Archdiocese barred the sisters from teaching in the Catholic schools he oversaw.

POPE JOHN PAUL II called the Gulf War unworthy of humanity and said any idea of it being a holy war is absurd. "We pray that God brings us peace very soon, that he shows those responsible that they should abandon immediately this war which is so unworthy of humanity," the Pope said. "May the infinite love of the Creator help all to understand the absurdity of a war in his name." More than 1,000 Jews demonstrated during the papal Sunday blessing in ST.

Responding to letters to the editor on the dust-up between the Vatican and a group of American nuns, reader Joseph S. David of Brea wrote: "Is it liberal bias that The Times had one columnist and four letter writers castigate the Vatican for its recent call to liberal American nuns to reform, but no one to defend it? "In truth, defense is unnecessary for the offense that is the liberal nuns: flaunting of Roman Catholic doctrines, unfaithfulness to religious vows and a misinterpretation of Vatican II. They forget that when the church's Magisterium (its teaching office)

Re "Sisters of mercy and dismay," Column, April 22 Steve Lopez got it right. It's all about the Vatican letting those nuns know who's in charge - and it's not Jesus. I was a member of the Immaculate Heart Community of Los Angeles in the 1960s during the Vatican Council's call for renewal of religious life. We studied the documents and voted on the direction the community should go. All the while, Cardinal James Francis McIntyre, L.A.'s archbishop at the time, used every power he had to crush the community's efforts.

Taking sides Re "Vatican says nuns' group must reform," April 20 Thousands of women who have given up marriage and money to work tirelessly to help the poor, the sick and the needy - just as Jesus asked them to - are being blasted for doing so. Just because they show Scriptural leadership and love rather than meekly pushing someone else's political agenda, they are being vilified by male Roman Catholic Church leaders. Throughout the Old and New Testaments, we see remarkable, devout female leaders - Deborah, Miriam, Esther, Mary, Martha, Lydia and many more come to mind.

In Philadelphia last week, a child sexual abuse trial involving Catholic clergy led to a bombshell - a bishop from West Virginia was accused of abuse. In Kansas City, a Catholic bishop goes on trial in September, accused of failing to report suspected child abuse. Last year church officials paid $144 million to settle abuse allegations and cover legal bills, and although many of the cases went back decades, church auditors have warned of "growing complacency" about protecting children today.

Catholic liberals in the United States are making much of an interesting juxtaposition in Vatican initiatives. This week the Holy See lashed out at American nuns for insufficient fidelity to church teachings while making encouraging sounds about welcoming back a right-wing breakaway movement called the Society of St. Pius X. As one commenter on the National Catholic Reporter website put it: "The timing of it all is nothing less than stunning!...

The Vatican has ordered an overhaul of the most important group of nuns in the United States after an investigation found what Roman Catholic Church officials called "radical feminist themes" that questioned official positions on homosexuality and the ordination of women. In a bluntly worded report, the Vatican's watchdog of orthodoxy, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, found what it called "serious doctrinal problems" with some of the comments and actions by the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, based in Silver Spring, Md. The Vatican on Wednesday named Archbishop Peter Sartain of Seattle to oversee changes in the group, a process that could take up to five years.

Jeremy Irons stars as the ruthless Rodrigo Borgia, who became Pope Alexander VI, in Showtime's period drama"The Borgias," now in its second season. You really seem like you're having fun with this role. I'm glad about that. I've always believed that in the theater or movies, whatever, the audience's enjoyment is increased if the actors seem to be enjoying what they're doing. What's fun about the Borgia pope? The great thing about doing series television is you have time.

The Vatican has begun the search for a successor to Cardinal Roger Mahony of Los Angeles, who is expected to step down early next year as head of the nation's largest Roman Catholic archdiocese. The archdiocese distributed a memo to priests and lay leaders this week confirming that the search is underway and asking parishes to join in a prayer enlisting God's help in finding "a shepherd who will be an example of goodness to your people and who will fill our hearts and minds with the truth of the Gospel."

A group that represents the majority of Roman Catholic nuns in the United States has been chastised by the Vatican for deviating from church doctrine and promoting what the Holy See called "radical feminist themes. " The Leadership Conference of Women Religious said Thursday it would consult with its members to decide on a course of action after the church's three-year investigation resulted in the harsh assessment of its activities and a call for reform. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith - the enforcer of orthodoxy - criticized the group for "protesting the Holy See's actions regarding the question of women's ordination and of a correct pastoral approach to ministry to homosexual persons.

When groups of ethnic Polish, Slovene, Slovak and Hungarian Catholics in Cleveland began protesting orders by their local bishop that closed their churches, they were given little chance of reversing the decision. The churches were shuttered in a massive retrenchment of Cleveland's urban core in 2010, striking at the Slavic and other ethnic European congregations that were founded by waves of immigrants from the wars and humanitarian catastrophes over the last century. The parishes said that Bishop Richard Lennon, head of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Cleveland, had begun an attack on the ethnic churches.