Summary
Title: The Pope's Armada: Unlocking the Secrets of Mysterious and Powerful New Sects in the Church
Author: Gordon Urquhart
Publisher: Prometheus Books
ISBN: 157392699X
Pro:
• Many original quotes
• Exploration of the people and culture
• Clear connections drawn
Con:
• None
Description:
• Covers three major ultratraditionalist movements
• Explains history and goals of these movements
• Explains potential problems and conflicts
Book Review
On the surface, Urquhart's book is about three popular "lay" movements in the Catholic Church: Focolare, Neocatechumenate, and Communion and Liberation. But behind his investigation of them is the important question of just what impact they will have on Catholicism. First, though, it is important to explain what they are, because most poeople have never heard of them.
Focolare was started right after WWII by Chiara Lubich, who formulated the central tenets of her "unique spiritual vision" of a world united regardless of their differences. Urquhart was himself among the 80,000 members of Focolare for nine years, and the group can be found today in over 180 countries.
Communion and Liberation (C&L) was founded by Monsignor Luigi Giussani and functioned as a conservative reaction to the student revolts that swept Italy in 1968. Members have been called "Stalinists of God," the "Pope’s Rambos" and "Wojtlya's Monks" because of their "fervent devotion to papal authority."
Neocatechumenate was founded and led by Spanish painter Francisco Argüello (known as Kiko) and Carmen Hernandez in the mid-1960s. There are about a million members in more than a hundred countries, and the group can be found some in 800 dioceses and 5,000 parishes.
Urquhart's central thesis is that these three groups are little better than the sorts of unusual cults which people often condemn:
- "...fanatical personality cults surrounding charismatic leaders; demands of blind obedience on members; a rigid and highly secretive internal hierarchy; the use of mind-control techniques and unscrupulous methods of recruitment; bizarre and possibly heretical secret teachings strictly hidden from outsiders and sometimes even from adepts; heavy financial demands on members; and an emphasis on ego-destruction, causing depression and mental breakdown on an alarming scale."
According to Francis Stafford, former archbishop of Denver and currently the head of the Pontifical Council for the Laity, these groups represent a significant aspect of the future of the Catholic Church:
The Pope's Armada: Unlocking the Secrets of Mysterious, Powerful Sects
- "Whether the parish as we know it in the United States will continue to sustain its traditional form and pattern is problematic. My judgment is that the international spiritual movements will assist the parish and assist the Catholics of the United States in making the transition in the role of the parishes - now basically assimilative to American culture - to a new and different role. That role is basically the evangelisation of culture today. That is a more demanding, aggressive role than the assimilative role of the past."
We can see here, first, that not only is American culture itself condemned, but also American parishes for assimilating to that culture; and second, that these ultraconservative lay movements are regarded within the Vatican as being a primary tool for reshaping the face and nature of Catholicism in the future.
