These videos are in no particular order. I enjoyed hearing from Catholics in other locales, who were specialists or lifelong Catholics making observations that we in the Canadian churches need to hear.
(1) Mary McAleese and Voices of Faith
The Time is Now for Change in the Catholic Church
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9Q9VqkrfCw
The observation that stuck out for me was that one part of the Church (ordained men) spends most of its time keeping the other part (women) down. As of October, 2025, things are changing. Although personally, as a Canadian, I’m progressive on the equal roles of men and women, I’m pretty committed to the idea of a global Church (institution as well as Body of Christ) that moves slowly in order to gently accommodate everyone through processes, consultations, synods.
(2) St Phoebe Centre for the Deaconess
Why Are Deaconesses Needed in the Church today?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lNwd3jWjAs
All the reasons why the renewal of the female diaconate are here. From this panel discussion I came to understand how the renewal of the female diaconate is distinct from Holy Orders. It’s important in online spaces to continually make clear that bringing back female deacons is not a step towards women priests. There are some unexpected benefits to Dioceses having female deacons; adult women get an initiation appropriate to their needs. Second, priests and Bishops can deflect sensitive conversations to (trained) female ministers who have been ordained by the will of the community they serve, and carry the grace of the Holy Spirit in a way that lay ministers do not. Third, female deacons serve an entire Diocese, unlike male deacons (and spouse) who serve a parish, and can be conduits of information (eyes and ears) for a Bishop, and between priests and parishes. It’s hard to choose which of these potential benefits is the most important – they are all important.
Vocations to religious life are changing. I wonder if the renewal of the female diaconate ~ in Canada ~ might be a new direction for women called to spiritual service. In the same way that an Ordinary has to discern Traditional Latin Mass communities, he and Vocation Directors ought to be aware of and open to those vocations.
(3) Awake Milwaukee
Erased from the Narrative: The Role of Racism in the Abuse Crisis
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c51r4ZM6Tdg
The speaker in the screenshot is a theologian who said the hard part out loud – that structures in the Church can be a threat to life! I know this to be true. Abuses of power and trust can ruin lay lives, and, equally, conflict with priests can lead to the ruin of their career. I’ve repeatedly said that interpersonal mediation could prevent small sparks of interpersonal from becoming raging forest fires (people give up on the faith, leave the church, get fired, get reported, get sanctioned, get arrested), get laicized) but Canadian churches were still ‘circling the wagons’ prior to the Papal Apology. Now we are supposed to be in a healing stage, with a ‘Todos Todos Todos’ approach rather than ‘us vs them’ clannish, secretive, fortress mentality.
My hope for the Synod is that the structural problems that are a threat to life are dismantled.
(Related Article) Awake Community’s Courageous Conversations: Hans Zollner, SJ, Weighs in on Abuse in the Church
https://awakecommunity.squarespace.com/blog/courageous-conversation-in-discussion-led-by-survivors-vatican-advisor-hans-zollner-sj-weighs-in-on-abuse-in-the-church
This discussion opened up the lack of Church teachings on the interplay between sexual abuse and abuse of power by ordained men. “Zollner acknowledged that the power imbalance in the Church has indeed been a “frequent means of abusing others,” in a range of ways, from sexual abuse to cases of supervisor-employee harassment. Zollner added that despite being “a central human reality,” the topic of power has received little attention in the Church, and he believes the Church could benefit from being more open and transparent about how power operates. “What does Church power look like, what should its exercise lead to, and how can we avoid the abuse of power especially within the Church?” Zollner asked.
The conferral of sacred power at ordination can give rise to a mentality that priests are holier than others and can do whatever they wish. “It’s just astounding, for example, that we have no spirituality of power in the Church,” he said, which could provide guidance to both clergy and laity. “How can powerful people like priests, bishops, and provincials give up that type of omnipotent demeanor,” he asked, and receive direction regarding the exercise of power and authority?” Note: When I first read this article, I believe it said “there is no theology of power in the Church.”
(4) D.W. Lafferty for Future Church
TalkUp Tuesday: Residential Schools and the Catholic Church in Canada
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6gGPAQfBsc
There are two parts of this talk that interest me. First, Canadian theologian David Lafferty shares how the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops didn’t want a Papal Apology and had been saying no to the federal government for years, and suddenly the Kamloops Mass Graves story was on the news in May 2021, which lead to the Papal Apology in July 2022, and ~ significantly ~ the use of the word genocide. Second, he talks about conspiracy thinking in religious spaces and his words rang true when I consider my experience with parish communities, gossip, whisper campaigns, spiritual and psychological abuse, group dynamics, psychological manipulation, religious imaginations run amok.
(5) RSA ANIMATE & Steven Pinker
Language as a Window into Human Nature
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-son3EJTrU
This talk, although not Catholic, presents insights that explain how the misuse and abuse of language and communication in clerical situations and groups functions to effectively control meaning and the evolution of narrative. Abuse is covered up, people can be isolated from the flock and silenced, especially women. The priest’s narrative can take on a life of its own, completely independent of the actual facts of a conversation, a Sacrament, a meeting, a decision. In this video, at the 8 minute mark, view Pinker’s diagrams about individual knowledge vs mutual knowledge i.e. when A knows that B knows, and B knows that A knows that B knows knows, then it’s out there in the community and it becomes real. Priests maintain control of reputations by cutting women out of the narrative, out of any opportunities to co-create meaning or have mutual knowledge, or compare notes with other parish members.
By stonewalling a target, often for years ~ while keeping a smile on his face and behaving well towards others ~ a priest can make his target look obsessive or aggressive or dishonest, simply by persisting in making sure all avenues to have her voice heard are CLOSED. I’m a convert to the Catholic Church, and it blows my mind that modern Canadian men and women allow this dynamic to persist in parishes. This idea of mutual knowledge explains why priests isolate victims quickly, and cut us off from the flow of information within a community. We’re not participating in ‘mutual knowledge’ anymore – our stories get more and more outside ‘what
everyone else knows’.
(6) Sherry Weddell from the Catherine of Sienna Institute
Forming Intentional Disciples (Part 1 of 2)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RF9Amil5YVE
I thought this talk was brilliant, and I shared it with a priest. I had just been baptised (with no preparation, no follow up, no opportunity to talk to a believer about coming to faith – nothing) and so Weddells insights hit home. She talks about how people don’t know or don’t believe one can have a relationship with God. She specifically mentioned that she had spoken to lay leaders in Canada who seemed to be in need of catechesis.
(7) Canon Lawyer Thomas Doyle
What’s Next? Canon Law and Lay Involvement in Church Governance
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7BgYPXiY3o
Victim advocate and canon lawyer Tom Doyle makes the case that the institution can’t be fixed. Religion isn’t going away any time soon, so it will certainly adapt to new circumstances.
(8) Dr. Janet Smith and the Coalition for Cancelled Priests
A House United
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NxGZ6V1Zu3Q
I appreciated Dr Smith’s candor about her shock at the corruption at the Bishop level. From there, I think back to the Jeremy Cruz’s candor in the panel discussion and racism and sexual abuse in the Church (above) about how “church structures are a threat to life.” Dr Smith also asserts that corruption at the Bishop level has also lead to good priests being cancelled. Hmm.If it can be named, it can be fixed. If Bishops don’t want it named, then Catholic lay people have evidence Bishops don’t want it fixed. Where that’s true, lay Catholics have an avenue to force compliance with the help of non-Church authorities. “Clean up your house, or it will be cleaned up for you.” Perhaps Big Religion needs to undergo the same focused attention as rogue Big Tech CEOs are experiencing. And are vocations to the priesthood and religious life down because of corruption and poor leadership? We could use a renewal in a voluntary workforce that values simple living, study/work and service at the margins.
(9) Alexandre Havard for CAPP Canada
Magnanimity: A Virtue for Polarized Times
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8UAm7NzO83c
Catholics have been taught humility in a way that leads to timidity or pusillanimity. Havard suggests a different understanding of humility, which leads to a sense magnanimity i.e. a willingness to do great things and share that with the world. I had magnanimity when I began the process of coming into the Church but I was told by the crone who served as my Spiritual Companion that I needed to learn to wash feet. What happened afterwards reminds of the story Karen Armstrong tells in her book Spiral Staircase about a superior who wanted her to fail her exams on purpose in a show of humility so that other sisters wouldn’t feel jealous or insecure. Thankfully, another superior saved Karen’s potential by saying the first advice had been misguided and playing small did not serve God nor please God nor, as they say, ‘give glory to God’.