What Can The Church Change?

by Chris Bodenner

Anthony Stevens-Arroyo digs into the history of the Catholic church to find clues about its future:

Where was the church during the Arab Spring of 2011? Who in Israel or Palestine heeds the pope’s formula for peace? In vain, did the pope implore the European Union to recognize its legacy to Christianity. At home, the same-sex marriage legislation in majority Catholic states like New York and Rhode Island rebuffed episcopal threats. We now face threats of world hunger, says Pope Benedict, brought on partly by climate change and partly by greed of capitalist speculators. So is Catholicism relegated to after-the-fact speeches or can the church instead actively change society?

A close look at church history shows that Catholic voices are initially on both sides of any issue and only later does one stance prevail. The conservative response, it might be said, is on one side of the coin while an adaptive approach is on the other.