Anatomy of an Episcopal Dressing Down and Clericalism. A Prince of the Catholic Church and an Ecclesial Irritant

Polemic Paper from the year 2020 in the subject Theology - Practical Theology, grade: 1.0, Kwame Nkrumah University, course: Pastoral Theology, language: English, abstract: This article aims at presenting a theological difference of opinion between a bishop and a lay theologian brought about by the recent alleged papal endorsement of same-sex unions presented in a new documentary Francesco. The surprising thing was that while the lay person was on the side of the Pope and arguing that there was no change in the perennial teaching of the Church, he ended up at the receiving end of an episcopal dressing down for misleading those 'differently abled intellectuals who may not be as highly gifted' than he was. The author argues that the real issue was clericalism and as long as he wore the ID 'ex-priest' he had lost his place at the theological high table. The episcopal dressing down was a rude reminder that clericalism was alive and well and keeping the Catholic Church in the Stone Age. In his default position, he would have told the bishop to get on his bike but thanked him for clearing the air where he stood in the theological pecking order and to take his place under the table.

Tarcisius Mukuka [Dipl. Pastoral Theol & Counselling, Dipl. Phil. & Rel. Studies, STB, SSL, PhD] is a biblical exegete by training. He holds a Licentiate in Biblical Exegesis from the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Rome and a doctorate in Biblical Hermeneutics from the University of Surrey in the United Kingdom. His doctoral dissertation was entitled "Orality as Casualty: Contextual and Postcolonial Analysis of Biblical Hermeneutics in Bembaland" (2014). He is currently a lecturer in Religious Studies Education at Kwame Nkrumah University in Kabwe. His research interests include postcolonialism and the Bible, gender and the Bible, religion, politics and power. He is the author of "Spoken Voice/Written Word: Negotiating How We Hear/Read the Bible" (2016) published by Lambert Academic Publishing and "In the Eye of a Very Catholic Storm" (forthcoming), by Crown Arts Publishers