Bishops Seek to Heal Rift Among French Catholics

Two months ago, the French Bishops’ Conference surprised many of the country’s 42 million Catholics when for the first time it appeared to reverse church policy by endorsing the use of condoms to prevent the spread of AIDS.

Progressives welcomed the decision as a step toward liberalizing church rules on birth control. Traditionalists charged that the change did not reverse or alter prohibitions against artificial contraception.

In a sense, both sides were correct. The narrow decree endorsed the rights of doctors to counsel the use of condoms only when “necessary” to slow the spread of AIDS. But it reiterated that the church does not condone their use and said clergy must continue to oppose artificial contraception.

“There was a lot of social pressure on them to take a stand on this issue,” said Dominique Mange, staff director of the Catholic Movement for Women. “But if you look at the text, it isn’t that radical. It basically supports what the church has long supported--abstinence. Taken together, it is a narrow decision.”

While the decree addressed only condom use, many observers from both the progressive and conservative wings of the French Catholic Church surmise the bishops had a larger goal: to bridge what appears to be a growing division between those who think the church is out of touch with modern social realities and those who believe it must reinforce traditional dogma.

The growing dissent among French Catholics--who make up 70% of the country’s population--has not produced referendums like the kind in Austria, Germany, the Netherlands and Ireland that part with Catholic orthodoxy. But the strains are evident here in the bishops’ recent declaration, the removal of a liberal bishop from his diocese and in the declining participation among rank-and-file Catholics in the church.

Claude Bressolette, chairman of the theology department at the Catholic Institute of Paris, puts it this way: “We have the traditionalists on one side and the progressives on the other. They are confident of their paths.”

The two men agree on the problem, but like many Catholics, they differ over the solution.

De La Brosse said that in keeping with the conservative views of Pope John Paul II, the church must demand more, not less, of its followers.

But Bressolette and others say Catholics cannot be herded “like sheep” into action that the church deems appropriate. “They want to be heard,” he said. “And a lot of them are saying they can be good Catholics and still favor contraception and abortion and the ordination of women.”

European Catholics have become increasingly vocal in their views of how the church should be governed.

For example, overwhelmingly Catholic Ireland has approved a referendum upending a ban on divorce. Several Irish bishops have called on the church to examine its ban against a married clergy.