To be against clericalism is not the same as being anticlerical. The latter signifies strong secular resistance to the Catholic Church’s social and political power. Clericalism is about an excessive emphasis on the role of the clergy in the Church’s internal affairs. It implies clerical elitism, the superiority of the priesthood over the laity. Anticlericalism, as a concept in Continental European politics, is some way past its sell-by date. But clericalism is very much still in currency as a key concept in analysing the cultural factors that gave rise to the clerical sex-abuse scandal inside the Catholic Church. It has almost become de rigueur for church leaders to say they are against clericalism in this context.
Clericalism was dealt a heavy blow by the emphasis in the teaching of Vatican II on the priesthood of all believers and on common baptism. But there is evidence of a clericalist backlash among some of those undergoing training for the priesthood or recently ordained….
THe Tablet is so predictable and sad. It peddles a liberal line on almost everything, attacks the holy father and leads only to the dire mess that the poor Anglican church finds itself mired in today.
I have no prior experience of “The Tablet,” but from the whole tone of this brief piece, I assume it is a revisionist RC publication, oppossed to the good work of Pope Benedict XVI. The reforms initiated under his pontificate will naturally be oppossed by those who wish to undermine the witness of the Church of Rome and its institutions.