An apology about the LCWR and NCR – my mistake!

I have received a couple notes chiding me for picking on the LCWR and the NCR (aka Fishwrap) and taking me to task for suggesting that they were connected.  I had written in one entry:

The group [LCWR] sent an email Thursday to the heads of each of the congregations it represents, explaining how the group became aware of the news.

That email, obtained by NCR, [“obtained”  Great!  I’ll bet LCWR’s office just cc’s everything to NCR.] says LCWR leadership ….

[…]

I really apologize.  Really, I do.  I acknowledge that there is no formal connection of the LCWR and Fishwrap.

In the meantime, I found this on the site of the LCWR about their upcoming 2012 Assembly to be held in St. Louis.

LCWR Assembly 2012

Tuesday, August 7, 2012 to Saturday, August 11, 2012
St. Louis, Missouri
Mystery Unfolding: Leading in the Evolutionary Now [?]
Keynote speaker: Barbara Marx Hubbard
Panelists: Tom Fox; [NCR editor] Jennifer Gordan, SCL; and Jamie Manson[NCR columnist]


Registration materials for LCWR members and associates are available in the Members area of this website.

Every August, LCWR holds a national assembly of its members. This gathering provides members with opportunities for education, reflection on issues pertinent to religious life leadership, networking, prayer and celebration. The assembly also provides time for the members to vote for officers and on resolutions.

The assemblies are open to members who may participate fully in all aspects of the assembly, associates who participate without vote, and guests invited by the conference. [Oddly, I have not been invited.]

The assembly is moved to various sites around the country.

But remember!  There is no formal connection between the LCWR and NCR.

Moreover, you might want to check out their scheduled keynote speaker this year (my emphases):

Barbara Marx Hubbard has been called “the voice for conscious evolution of our time” by Deepak Chopra and is the subject of Neale Donald Walsch’s new book “The Mother of Invention.” A prolific author, visionary, social innovator, evolutionary thinker and educator, she is co-founder and chairperson of the Foundation for Conscious Evolution. She is the producer and narrator of the award-winning documentary series entitled Humanity Ascending: A New Way through Together and has recently partnered with The Shift Network as a global ambassador for the conscious evolution movement; a shift from evolution by chance towards evolution by choice. Along with Stephen Dinan, she has launched the “Agents of Conscious Evolution” training and is forming a global team to co-produce a global multi-media event entitled, “Birth 2012: Co-Creating a Planetary Shift in Time” on Dec. 22, 2012 (www.birth2012.com) — a historic, turning-point event; awakening the social, spiritual, scientific, and technological potential of humanity.

In 1984 her name was placed in nomination for the Vice Presidency of the United States on the Democratic ticket, [They chose Geraldine Ferraro, if you recall.] calling for a “Peace Room” to scan for, map, connect and communicate what is working in America and the world. Barbara also co-chaired a number of Soviet-American Citizen Summits, introducing a new concept called “SYNCON to foster synergistic convergence with opposing groups. [Hey!  Maybe she could help the LCWR get along better with the CDF!  … Nah.]  She developed SYNCON conferences to bring together opposing forces to discover the positive benefit of a long range earth-space development program [with or without the use of spaceships] where she worked with builders of the Space Shuttle and continued her passion for an expanded and peace generating space program.

She is a Fellow of The Club of Budapest, and has received an honorary PhD in Conscious Evolution from the Giordano Bruno GlobalShift University. [WHAT?  He is a darling martyr for anti-Catholics. Here.] She has established a Chair in Conscious Evolution at Wisdom University and is member of many progressive organizations, including Evolutionary Leaders Group, Global New Thought (AGNT), as well as, The World Future Society.

This reminds me of the web of bizarre groups in The Father’s Tale.

The CDF would never have any problems with the LCWR receiving spiritual formation from her.  Nooooo.

 

 

About Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Fr. Z is the guy who runs this blog. o{]:¬)
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52 Comments

  1. catholicmidwest says:

    So-called “evolutionary Christianity” is the latest fad in religious life. Imagine Teilhard de Chardin’s most controversial book on steriods and you have a pretty good idea of what it’s like.

  2. Justin Martyr says:

    As has been mentioned so many times.. Not one single mention of the following terms in their announcement of the 2012 assembly:

    God
    Jesus Christ
    Eucharist
    Catholic Church
    Obedience
    Humility
    Truth
    Sacraments
    Sacrifice
    Confession
    etc

    How can they (or their sympathetic defenders including otherwise more middle of the road types like Fr James Martin, Rocco Palmo and others) seriously wonder why these investigations are taking place and why so many Catholic bishops, priests and the faithful are so concerned.

    The LCWR might as well be a Buddhist or secular or atheist organization given their worldview, topics at their convention, and usual keynote speakers. Nothing about them gives any clue they have committed their lives to a 2,000 year old faith and a 2,000 year old Church.

    Amazing….simply amazing.

  3. NoTambourines says:

    “Conscious Evolution”
    “Humanity Ascending”
    “a Planetary Shift”
    “Synergistic convergence”
    “GlobalShift”

    My buzzword bingo card is full. I don’t want to know what I win, though.

  4. LCWR: the gift that keeps on giving.

  5. brotherfee says:

    [Oddly, I have not been invited.]

    I wish Fr. Z was a guest speaker, then I would enjoy attending the Assembly. I would like a lively discussion instead of some new age evolution talk.

  6. digdigby says:

    Justin Martyr-
    I was going to say the same thing. SO true. Not even the mention of Jesus Christ. They dare not speak the name of Jesus Christ, the best they can do is bring up…. Deepak Chopra. I was rather surprised to see vile Teilhardism coming back with such malignant and unspent force.

  7. JimGB says:

    Were it not (sadly) accurate, this could be a parody. Maybe they are trying to stall the CDF until after December 21, 2012 in case they Mayans were right! Fortunately their keynote speaker seems to have a Plan B!

  8. acardnal says:

    Right on, Father Z! Shedding light on the truth. Well done.

  9. lawoski says:

    Please don’t be too hard on yourself, Father. It’s a mistake any reasonable person could have made. After all, birds of a feather ……

  10. Pingback: Definition: Synergistic Convergence « Unholy Nation

  11. Lastsupperbusboy says:

    Utterly gobsmacked…aside from koolaid, the catering staff is going to have a task with the obvious strict dietary needs of the empowered, politically correct, evolutionary concious guests. The pity I have for their spiritual blindness, look at the lengths they go to try and fill what is lacking. They’re paying someone to spout this bovine scatology to them. If this is a leadership conference, they should be focused on Christ’s two word definition of leadership “follow me”.

  12. EXCHIEF says:

    For a limrick on this issue see http://philotheaonphire.blogspot.com/

  13. Suburbanbanshee says:

    Let me get this straight. They’re holding a conference, and they invite someone who is both crazy and a snooze to be their headliner.

    Obviously the LCWR leadership plans on working out their Purgatory here on Earth.

  14. Dismas says:

    I can’t help but wonder if John Lennon’s Imagine will be the theme song playing in the back round at their assemblies?

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5ykDJchVBs

  15. BaedaBenedictus says:

    This is Twilight Zone-class gobbledygook. What on Earth (or Mars oops! Venus) is Ms. Marx raving about?

    Modernism is one freaky hallucinogenic drug! Another example: Recently I came across this course description at the Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Mass.:

    T3150 Queer Incarnation
    The incarnation is sometimes presented as an arithmetic problem: What do you get when you add some divinity to a human body? But thinking about incarnation has to start much further back, in the realization that accounts of Jesus show us how little we understand about either divinity or bodies, much less about how bodies can show, act, and become divine. Just here and theology of the incarnation can learn from works of queer theory and the writings of queer thinkers. The body of Jesus – despised, de-sexed, and yet miraculously distributed – invites us to an exchange of bodies along the margins of human power and its certainties. We will think about the queerness of Jesus’ body with the help of some traditional texts on incarnation and passion (Athanasius, Bonaventure, Aquinas, Julian) and much more recent work on gender performance, bodily transition or transformation, and the rituals of camp.

    If I HAD to choose, I suppose I would go with Queering Jesus and “Rituals of Camp” over Ms. Marx’s snooze-worthy “Conscious Evolution”.

  16. Martin17773 says:

    I can’t believe the bio. of that woman. The LCWR are off the freeking planet. Dignified human beings making themselves into ridiculous spectacles. God have mercy.

  17. AnAmericanMother says:

    Speaking as a lawyer who has been reading senseless gobbledygook churned out by incompetent jackleg practitioners for over 30 years, this “writing” plumbs hitherto unknown depths of murky impenetrability. I frankly haven’t the slightest idea what she is trying to say, and I have a sawbuck that says she doesn’t either.

  18. Mamma B says:

    I read her definition of Conscious Evolution and I am more confused than before. I think she needs a good old-fashioned exorcism.

  19. Mamma B says:

    oops here is the link to her definition

    http://www.barbaramarxhubbard.com/site/node/45

  20. Captain Peabody says:

    Dear Waru! I honestly had no idea the LCWR leadership was that…uh…bad? Loopy? Un-Christian? Completely insane?

    I was kind of giving them the benefit of the doubt and assuming that they were just standard secularist-feminist Christians, like Episcopalians in pantsuits. But that’s legitimately…uh…well…Deepak Chopra. What else is there to say?

  21. Kathleen10 says:

    Crikey, what blather. I’d rather have a tooth filled than listen to that. Just reading it was painful and my mind wandered.

  22. Indulgentiam says:

    Barbara Marx Hubbard is an EXCELLENT example of how sin darkens the intellect. Just reading her stuff gave me vertigo Yikes! I’d read maybe a paragraph when i started hearing some of the lyrics to “windmills of my mind” specifically;
    “Like a tunnel that you follow
    To a tunnel of it’s own
    Down a hollow to a cavern
    Where the sun has never shone
    Like a door that keeps revolving
    In a half-forgotten dream
    Like the ripples from a pebble
    Someone tosses in a stream
    Like the circles that you find
    In the windmills of your mind” Scary and strangely nauseating

  23. Baylor_convert says:

    Just when you think you can’t possibly come across anything stranger, you read this paragraph, Hubbard’s description of the resurrection:

    “Although we may never know what really happened, we do know that the story told in the Gospels is that Jesus’ resurrection was a first demonstration of what I call the post-human universal person. We are told that he did not die. He made his transition, released his animal body, and reappeared in a new body at the next level of physicality to tell all of us that we would do what he did. The new person that he became had continuity of consciousness with his life as Jesus of Nazareth, an earthly life in which he had become fully human and fully divine. Jesus’ life stands as a model of the transition from Homo sapiens to Homo universalis.”

    Crazy.

  24. discerningguy says:

    Perhaps Archbishop Sartain should nix all of those speakers and have some FSSP priests come give some talks and do workshops, while His Excellency personally attends the event. I’m pretty sure he has the power to now!

  25. Clinton R. says:

    The LCWR and the NCR are about as far from Catholicism as you can get. It’s like they invent their nonsense by the day. It’s just sad, really. To have so much contempt for Christ and His Church that they feel no compunction to mock Him and scourge Him all over again. Again, prayers for them that they come back to the Truth and leave their diabolical machinations behind.

  26. Tradster says:

    Amazing. I didn’t think there was any woman on the planet who could make Joan Chittister’s ramblings sound comprehensible in comparison.

  27. Pingback: vatican cdf lcwr crackdown nuns sisters catholic church | ThePulp.it

  28. JonPatrick says:

    Wow, that course description by @BaedaBenedictus, I mean it is hard to tell if it is real or a parody. Considering the source – the EDS is far left even by Episcopal Church standards which is saying a lot.

    Concerning the keynote speaker – I always thought the “historic turning point event” for Catholics happened about 2000 years ago, guess I was wrong!

  29. tioedong says:

    I linked to you from my blog, with a joke saying that it looked like the nuns were now into Art Bell territory (i.e. the midnight conspiracy radio show Coast to coast)…

    then I decided to google, and you know what? Hubbard has been on that show…most recently last August …

    Heresy is bad enough, but now they seem to be going delusional…

  30. mysticalrose says:

    Ok, the question mark after the title had me ROFL! And just for the record: I think Barbara Marx Hubbard is a SYNCON-artist. Seriously — people really believe this stuff??

  31. Bryan Boyle says:

    Some people were really inhaling a bit too deeply back in the day and never let it out. Wow. Just plain wow.

    Like the old saying, I guess…”if you can’t impress them with knowledge, baffle them with bovine droppings”. I’m sure, if anyone is awake during these presentations, there will be a lot of serious-looking, head nodding ‘contemplation’ going on. Not that they will understand, of course, but, like most self-reverential gatherings, everyone will be careful to NOT offend others, even if their expositions sound like bad Klingon translations of Vogon poetry. :)

  32. JimmyA says:

    It’s amazing. I just managed to shut my eyes, clench my buttocks and…nnnnrgg…consciously evolve into a human being who is entirely immune to the sort of bs spouted by this woman and her cronies. Now that’s done I’ll get myself off to Mass.

    Sheesh, even Sister Act has more “nun credibility” than this bunch.

  33. dominic1955 says:

    Mystery Unfolding: Leading in the Evolutionary Now

    Nothing makes me want to go to some stoner den and drop ‘shrooms more than reading the kind of utterly nonsensical titles NewAger femi-fascist “sisters” come up with for their whatnot gatherings.

    I can hear color…..whoaaaaaa……

  34. Random Friar says:

    Fr. P. Teilhard de Chardin’s thought is going to take a while to snuff itself out, I’m afraid. He lends himself far too easily to “weasel words,” fitting whatever simplistic theology one wants to use.

  35. kelleyb says:

    “Conscious Evolution” “Humanity Ascending” “a Planetary Shift” “Synergistic convergence”
    “GlobalShift” I have no idea what these phrases even mean, if they in fact have meaning.

  36. Blaise says:

    I am trying to work out what “Conscious Evolution” might actually involve in practice. Some people have referred to “evolutionary Christianity” but I don’t think what she is talking about necssarily purports to have anything to do with Christianity.
    If it does, bearing in mind the quoted comments about the resurrection, maybe she is just encouraging everyone to die so that they can “evolve” into the redeemed man. I don’t think that would be in line with the Church’s teaching.
    Alternatively, if Conscious Evolution is not Christian, it seems most likely to be achieved through eugenics: I can imagine her advocating a combination of selective abortion and genetic modification.
    But then again it is all such gobbledegook that perhaps she does think that she can evolve herself by some kind of mental effort. Perhaps she thinks that if God can by an act of will create a world and guide it to the point that animals evolve as they have done, she can by an act of will evolve herself.
    Who knows? What I don’t understand is what benefit anyone would think a discussion of such a topic would have for an organisation to support religious sisters in their mission within Holy Mother Church.

    Final thought. If only what she really meant by “conscious evolution” was striving to live according to the teaching of Our Lord as handed down in the deposit of faith and according to the virtues so that we might thereby become salt of the earth and channels for God’s grace; that would be actively becoming “better” or “higher” to the extent that we can. … If only.

  37. JohnE says:

    http://birth2012.com/learn/birth-2012-book-2/
    Exactly what I pictured of someone involved in this.
    Sad to see so many near the end of their lives being led astray, with the help of the LCWR at that.

  38. Suburbanbanshee says:

    discerningguy —

    Yup, the report explicitly said that the bishops on the commission would now have to sign off on speakers at LCWR meetings. Which in this case is both a corporal and spiritual act of mercy, because asking sisters to listen to this Docetist gibberer Hubbard is way too cruel a practice of mortification.

  39. wmeyer says:

    From the Wikipedia article on BMH: “Born a Jewish agnostic…”

    Huh? I wonder how, precisely, one is born an agnostic…. no doubt this was edited by a friend or fan.

  40. ContraMundum says:

    Well, as Chesterton pointed out, “agnostic” is of Greek roots, and the corresponding word with Latin roots would be “ignorant”. I suppose we are all born ignorant! :-)

  41. ContraMundum says:

    has received an honorary PhD in Conscious Evolution

    Shouldn’t that have rather gone to “the Octomom”? If we’re stuck at the level of Darwinism, a celibate nun is consciously an evolutionary dead end.

  42. Kypapist says:

    Well she looks a little like Harpo…maybe she’ll just blow her horn.

  43. irishgirl says:

    What the heck is all that? These so-called ‘intellectuals’ have cholesterol on the brain!
    @ discerningguy: Ooooo, I’d like to see Archbishop Sartain and some FSSP priests show up at this event….absolutely! And with St. Michael the Archangel at the good clerics’ backs!

  44. Adam Welp says:

    @irishgirl, let’s take it one step further. Once the Good Bishop and FSSP priests enter, lock the doors behind them and let the EF mass begin! Followed by hours of constant rosary recitation and manditory individual confession with absolution all said in LATIN! And if there is time, an exorcism or two.

  45. Joseph-Mary says:

    Well, at least the keynote speaker is getting old! (not many more years of speeches left) And no one will be able to make sense of what she has to say about her evolutionary way anyway. But, on the other hand, no one will be in the least bit of all this junk, no one will be edified and at the very least it will be a complete waste of time and will help no one on their spiritual journey. Sad.

  46. Agapified says:

    Her bio on the ‘Wisdom University’ site says she got her PhD at the ‘Emerson Institute’, where you can go to become a bona fide Animal Chaplain…

    http://www.emersoninstitute.edu/

  47. Seumas says:

    JohnE, good point. These loopy folks are all toward the ends of their lives, which on the one hand means they wont be leading souls astray much longer, but on the other hand means their own souls are in serious danger, and they don’t have much time left to convert. Therefore they are in dire need of our prayers and acts of penance and reparation.

    As for Archbishop Sartain showing up with FSSP priests, I would not hold my breath. While not a heretic, I don’t exactly see him as a defender of the Faith either. Certainly not any kind of traditionalist. He is basically a “moderate.” Some have said that this appointment indicates that the Church intends to tread lightly and not make serious changes. From what I know of my Archbishop, I’d have to agree with that assessment.

  48. LaudemGloriae says:

    This article reads like a lost chapter from O’Brien’s “Father Elijah” WOW … sent a chill up my spine, truly.

  49. catholicmidwest says:

    Yeah, well, if you’re not Christian, you have no scruples and you don’t mind lying like a rug to make a lot of money, you can always be a new age motivational speaker and get yourself onto a speaker bureau’s list. That’s how this stuff happens.

    There are speaker bureaus that specialize in religious conventions. It’s a plague.

  50. adcola says:

    1. Clearly the Vatican obtained the LCWR conference agenda.

    2. “…[with or without the use of spaceships]…” The acronym ‘LOL’ hardly expresses the unbridled joy which my dutifully Liberal-persecuted soul experienced as I read your commentary on this and on the WaPo post. Thank you Father. Thank you!!! Poor lewd Jonathan (Stewart) can’t hold a candle (from any denomination) to your sense of good clean humor. Are you channeling Milton, Henny, or a mouth-washed Lenny these days? ;-)

    2. “Chair in Conscious Evolution at Wisdom University” nearly brought me to tears! It’s so wonderfully, joyously inane. How can it be other than His plan to allow such stupendous merriment; to make it so incredibly easy for the Church to address such whimsy as it hastens the coming of His Kingdom; to provide us—who try so hard to live by (yet often fall short), defend (and often become angry and frustrated), and transmit (failing to use the best words) the truths of Magisterial teaching—such salvific glee?

    3. No wonder the SSPX is having reservations about the schism: are their offices equipped to deal with global shifts and the World Future Society? The Evolutionary Leaders Group sounds like something Adolf Eichmann would want to have led.

    4. Someday, Dr. Barbara’s honest attempt to synthesize/synchronize/synergistically converge the thoughts of both Karl & L. Ron will be seen to have been instrumental in helping the CDF free us from their absurd ideologies! The sin!! The grace!!!

    5. He has Risen!

    I pray that I am following Cardinal Burke’s admonitions (http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/1201600.htm).

    Deus, Hic Sum…

    Matthew C. Masotti
    West Windsor, New Jersey

  51. irishgirl says:

    @ Adam Welp: Yeah, I like ‘one step’ far better!

  52. Charles E Flynn says:

    Exhibit A for Explaining the LCWR Report, by Thomas L. McDonald (linked from The Curt Jester).

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