Thanks, but no thanks

I love nuns! I am overwhelmed when I think of how completely they have given themselves to Christ. I have a couple of orders on my monthly charity donations list. In my work with pro-life advocacy and bioethics I run into these holy women regularly. I often will send a donation to the order of a sister with whom I have just worked. Take a look at this post by the Anchoress. She has a beautiful round up of nun news.

However, not all orders have stayed true to their charism. That is why there now two groups of nuns in the United States. There are orders who belong to the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR). They have shunned tradition, are very concerned with feminism, fight the Magisterium, support women's ordination, and are often into New Age nature worship. These are also the orders with very few new vocations. Then you have the Council of Major Superiors of Women Religious.(CMSWR) They are faithful to the Magisterium, love the Church, and are supportive of tradition. These are the orders that are growing by leaps and bounds.

This week I received a solicitation for a charitable donation to the Sisters of St. Francis of Assisi in Wisconsin. They sent me a lovely set of Christmas cards. Now I don't send money to everyone who offers me greeting cards or address labels. I went to their web site to see who these sisters are. Are they vintage 1970's feminists or are they true brides of Christ? Take a look for yourself and you will easily see the answer. What bothered me was they had no "corporate stand" on the sanctity of human life. In fact, they explicitly state that human life cannot be placed above "Earth" and the "Cosmos". Take a look at their "corporate stand" on the "web of life":

All of creation, from the initial creative event to the arrival of humans, is a single, interconnected and interdependent whole. Over billions of years hydrogen and helium unfurl the shimmering stars and galaxies, the basic elements emerge, and eventually our solar system and life unfold. Each aspect of the creative process is necessary and essential since each mode of being depends on the interactions and transformations that both precede and follow it. This web of relationships makes it impossible to rank or separate creation in a hierarchical or dualistic manner.

Perhaps even more disturbing is they avoid speaking of God and prefer to talk about the "Creator Spirit"

We believe we are to relate to Earth, to one another, and indeed to the Cosmos, in mutually sustaining ways and that all of our systems of learning, technology, healing, economics, governance, politics, and religion, including our Christian faith and Franciscan charism, must be in harmony with the basic ecology and laws of the Universe.

TODAY THE CREATOR SPIRIT STILL MOVES OVER THE EARTH WAITING TO ASSIST US . . .

In spite of their lovely and very traditional Christmas cards, I will be offering my charitable donation elsewhere.