c. 1997 Religion News Service

NEW YORK _ The Common Ground Project, an effort launched by the late Cardinal Joseph L. Bernardin of Chicago to promote dialogue and overcome divisions on sensitive pastoral and theological issues within the Roman Catholic Church, has been criticized by conservatives since its inception.

Now, some of those critics are saying they have won concessions from Archbishop Oscar Lipscomb of Mobile, Ala., the new leader of the project, to keep some of the most volatile issues _ women’s ordination and homosexuality, for example _ off the table.

Lipscomb, however, says he hasn’t ruled anybody out of the discussions.

Hudson Deal, editor of the independent, conservative magazine Crisis said that Lipscomb, in a forthcoming interview with the magazine, says issues such as women’s ordination, married priests, gays and abortion”will not be elements of the discussion … and were never on the table.””Those areas which do not rest securely on the authentic teachings of the Magisterium (the teaching authority of the church), the teachings based on Scripture and tradition, do not share in the Common Ground project,”Deal quoted Lipscomb as saying in the interview.

Deal, making his comments at a New York symposium on the initiative sponsored by the liberal, lay-edited independent magazine Commonweal, suggested the project might wither if hot-button issues are not subject to discussion.

But Lipscomb, in an interview with Religion News Service after the symposium, said such controversial issues”could easily enter into these discussions. I’m not going to throw anyone out.” The Common Ground project, unveiled by Bernardin and others last summer, is based on the statement”Called to Be Catholic: Church in Time of Peril”that lists in broad and general terms a number of issues confronting the church that have resulted in division and polarization.

Conservatives, including some bishops, view the initiative as a backdoor means to promote discussion of some issues, such as women’s ordination, that the Vatican has ruled out of order, or to legitimize liberal dissent on such issues as married priests, abortion and homosexuality.

Lipscomb acknowledged that people on both sides of the ideological spectrum might use the forum provided by the project to advance their own views rather than search for common ground.”Some hunt for trouble and are trying to advance their own views,”he said, but added that when their views are contrary to church teaching, they will be answered.

At the same time, Lipscomb said, such issues as married priests and homosexuality may find more room for discussion and debate among participants in the Common Ground project than the issue of women’s ordination, for example, because they are matters of church”discipline”rather than”doctrine.”He noted that a form of gay rights is supported by the church even though it defines homosexuality as a”disorder.” Deal said there is”no excitement”among”orthodox”and conservative Catholics for the initiative and they fear it might promote ambiguity on Catholic teaching and the authority of the pope.

But James Kelly, a professor of sociology at Fordham University and secretary of the Common Ground coordinating committee, said that Hudson has too narrow a view of dissent and discussion.”There’s no room for questions,”he said of the conservatives’ stance.”It’s not easily apparent what dissent means,”Kelly added.”There are pastoral elements that have to be taken into consideration. … There has to be a place where these issues can be talked about if the church is to be a lively community.”

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