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“Rebel Nun” and other accounts of the late, great Anita Caspary
What’s up with the news coverage of Anita Caspary?
Caspary, a luminary in religious life died at age 95 on October 5. She was a great woman, scholar, and leader. Her faithfulness to the call of the Second Vatican Council and her love of the gospel are impressive. Anita Caspary had integrity. Too bad that some of the recent news articles about her don’t.
The headlines give the first clue. Here’s the headline from a recent New York Times article: “Anita Caspary, Nun Who Led Breakaway From Church, Dies at 95.” A similar headline appears in the Washington Post: “‘Rebel nun’ Anita Caspary, leader of breakaway Los Angeles order, dies at 95.”
Breakaway? From the church? Really? In the 1960s, Caspary served in leadership for the Immaculate Heart of Mary sisters in Los Angeles. The congregation took seriously the Vatican II call for the renewal of religious life. They began to make changes accordingly – in daily prayer times, in religious dress, in their types and locations of ministry, etc. (And they weren’t the only ones. Sisters across the U.S. were moving in similar directions.) But the archbishop of Los Angeles objected to the changes. And when the sisters didn’t stop, he retaliated.
Ultimately, Caspary and about 300 other sisters chose to leave the congregation and begin a new, non-canonical community. To my way of thinking, they didn’t “breakaway.” There wasn’t a “schism,” as the NYT article characterized it. The sisters left an oppressive, unfair situation. They did so after much deliberation and prayer. And their departure wasn’t from “the church” but from an abuse of power by some in formal roles of authority in the church.
Compare those headlines with this one, from the National Catholic Reporter: “Anita Caspary, religious visionary, dies in Los Angeles: ‘Integrity’ moved her community to sever canonical ties to church.” A great headline and a good article.
As I read the articles, I gave thanks for Caspary. I celebrate her life and her legacy to religious, the church and the world.
May you rest in peace, Anita Caspary.
Anita Caspary published a book in 2003, Witness to Integrity, that describes the events that took place during her time in leadership in the 1960s. It’s an interesting and informative account!
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{ 16 comments }
Thank you for posting this. I hadn’t heard of her until recently, and I’m glad to learn more about who she really was. Sounds as though she was an amazing woman. May she rest in peace and rise in glory.
Might want to check out Caspary’s book Witness to Integrity. Very compelling. And well written (she was a professor of English).
Thank you for pointing me towards this! I’ll go look it up. Much appreciated.
i only saw the ncr article; only radically right catholics today might see her as “breakaway,” but, then, they think vatican ii was not a “real” council anyway. glad you posted the facts.
There are also journalistic issues re the choice of words such as “breakaway.” On the listserv “SisterL,” there are insightful comments about how the use of particular terms in news stories about Caspary reflects an inadequate understanding of the deeper issues in religious life and Catholicism in the 1960s. There are also comments about how reporters of religion, even at major newspapers, may not be specialists in a topic that is incredibly complex.
boy, max, you said it all with that last sentence. even when journalists act like journalists and do their homework and research, very few people outside of the church get things like this. it’s almost like having a good grasp of grammar. one just really either gets it or doesn’t. if a person hasn’t been along for the ride, living the history, it is darned near impossible to understand the tiny details that make such a huge difference in any instance of church history.
I had the privilege of meeting Anita, who was a wonderful woman–profoundly spiritual, gifted, and also someone with a delightful sense of humor. She was one of the few people who, upon meeting them, I immediately felt “I am in the presence of a holy one.” But she was also someone of unshakable integrity and grit. As I said, it was a privilege to have known her, even slightly.
On the subject of Anita, I would recommend that you read her wonderful book, “Witness to Integrity.” As Maxine said, it’s very well-written and, importantly, it contains many of the primary-source documents that enable the reader to make up her/his own mind about things. I join you in offering a prayer for Anita, and I also pray in thanksgiving for her life.
I’m glad to have found this article, although I have to admit I have never heard of her but I would love to read her book and learn of her history. I’m not sure what non-canonical community means though. I plan on doing a post about her on my website when I have a better understanding of her situation. Thanks for sharing.
For many years Sr Anita and the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary were wonderful role models and phenomenal teachers. I was blessed to attend Immaculate Heart High School and graduated in 1969. The ‘revolution’ took place around us, the BBC filmed our teachers and classes, and we continued to learn and we respected our teachers.
The world has lost a spiritual giant and wonderful role model!
It must have been a wonderful experience, Betty! The sisters there were known across the U.S. as excellent teachers and women of deep faith and zeal.
I believe a community is non-canonical if it is run independently – and not under the direct supervision of the hierarchy. Doesn’t mean it is non-Catholic. There are lots of Catholic groups that are non-canonical – surely more than there are canonical. But that means they are not governed by canon law (I think).
When Cardinal McIntyre came into conflict with the Immaculate Heart sisters, he gave them a choice of abandoning their course which had been a response to the call of the larger church via Vatican II or being dispensed from their vows and no longer accepted as a canonical order. That is what they did. They accepted his decision, but chose to remain a community outside that framework.
According to the Code of Canon Law, in order for an organization to be considered Catholic, it must have the approval of a bishop, usually the local bishop/ordinary in the area in which the organization is based. As an example, in order for a college to be Catholic, it must have the approval of the local bishop.
If, at any time, the bishop, in consultation with his advisers, has come to the conclusion that the organization has ceased to fulfill the obligations for an authentically Catholic organization, he has the right to notify the organization of his position and give them suggestions and a time frame for them to either correct their ways or do away with their Catholic title.
If they organization does not respond to the negative or positive but continues in its actions that would cause scandal with the faithful, etc., the bishop has every right to take away the Catholic title from an institution or organization. This is done to protect the faithful from undue scandal and to delineate what makes a Catholic organization and what does not.
The bishop, as (in most cases) the local ordinary of the area, has every right to do this since he is responsible to the Holy See for all of the Catholic institutions in his see/diocese. This fulfills his duty as a shepherd of souls and as administrator of the see put under his guidance.
There is a canonical process of appeals but I do not know quite how that works just yet.
If I find that canon/s, I shall be sure to qualify my post. It’s just a bit early in the morning for me to crack open my Code and Commentary.
This is all to the best of my knowledge but I think that I have been pretty accurate/precise with the general information. But in summation: the bishop can do it, it’s his canonical right and duty.
The laws in regard to this matter are very complex, especially in regard to institutes of pontifical rite. Also, in regard to the California sisters, at issue wasn’t necessarily the canonical rights of the bishop, but the abuse of power. It may be helpful to consult a canon lawyer, Allison, who can help interpret the law in light of the situation of the California sisters.
Yeah, because my alma mater in its early years had a bit of a butting of heads with the local bishop because the sisters were members of a congregation of pontifical right as opposed to diocesan right therefore they reported to the Pope rather than the local bishop. Luckily, they were able to find a compromise in choosing who would lead the college through the early years, a diocesan priest, who was very loved by students, staff, and everyone. The chapel is even named after him.
I must admit, the Cardinal’s actions were rather heavy-handed but one of the contributors to that was probably (and I am not justifying it) the reaction to what was happening in the Church at that point. There was some drive to cling to some sense of order when things had become so chaotic.
This is a tangent, but it reminded me of a question I’ve had kicking around for a while, about what exactly consecrated religious life IS. It can take all these different forms, but what IS it that is taking different forms? As distinct from lay apostolates that do a lot of the same things. I’m thinking particularly of movements such as Catholic Worker, or L’Arche, or Catherine Doherty’s Madonna House, that clearly come out of a lot of the same impulses that have given rise to religious life over the centuries, but have no interest in official canonical status. That doesn’t mean they’re “renegades” — I was a “hanger-on” for a while at a Catholic Worker house where they had Mass at the house on the first Friday of each month, and once a year the Bishop came to celebrate Mass. So it’s clearly within the “good graces” of the hierarchy, but it’s still a different category. But at least for the more Catholic of the Catholic Worker houses, one would be hard pressed to say “that isn’t a Catholic ministry.”
(And if I understand all this canonical stuff, which I surely don’t, the Los Angeles IHMs became an organization much like a Catholic Worker community, doing what they did but without official canonical status.)
You talk a lot about religious life being centered on prayer and ministry and doing that together as part of a community. That would certainly be the case for those in Catholic Worker, or L’Arche, or Madonna House. What is distinct about religious consecration, per se? Is it that people are called to different communities and some are called to be Franciscans and some Dominicans and some IHMs and some Catholic Workers — or is there something of “Sisterhood” that binds together the Franciscans and Dominicans and IHMs and things like Catholic Worker or L’Arche or Madonna House are great in their way but fundamentally different from religious life?
That was WAY too long and confused but if you could piece out what I was trying to get at, I’d love to hear thoughts on it!
I wonder what Jesus thinks of all these Canon Laws anyway? From what I can tell from the Gospels, his harshest words went not to the Roman oppressors but to His own religious faith community with all their rules and regulations. Now the Catholic Church has over 2000 similar laws – Hmmmm. I know very little about Canon Law but I’ve seen the effect some of those laws have had on good people who didn’t happen to fit the perfect Catholic mold. Jesus told us two things most of all: Be not afraid and Love one another. Good for those who have the courage to follow those commands even if that means breaking some of the “rules” that may have nothing to do with what Jesus Christ would truly want for us in the first place. Sr. Anita – rest in peace after a job well done.