The headline used by the ABC affiliate in Australia summarized the media reaction, "American editor first Papal casualty."

One wonders if Father Reese isn't better described as a casualty of the Jesuit order.

The reaction on the Catholic left was outrage. The editors of Commonweal opined, "What really gives scandal to people in the pews, however, is the arbitrary and self-serving exercise of ecclesiastical authority. What the CDF [Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith] has done to Thomas Reese and America is the scandal."

I doubt if the "people in the pews" share the consternation of liberal elites like Commonweal.

Commonweal, The National Catholic Reporter, and America make up the media vanguard of the Catholic left. All three are regularly honored for their editorial excellence by the Catholic Press Association. More often than not, these three publications receive the majority of awards at the annual CPA meeting.

America, in fact, won seven awards at the 2004 CPA convention.

Thus it came as no surprise that the leadership of CPA sought to pass a resolution condemning the resignation of Father Reese. Interestingly, those in attendance at the CPA convention in Orlando defeated the resolution by a 48-28 vote, and the issue was tossed to an ad hoc committee for study.

I suppose the rank and file of the CPA expected that action would eventually be taken against Catholic publications which consistently dissent from the authority of the Church on important matters.

Rather than pointing the finger at Benedict XVI for the resignation, it's more interesting to ask why the superior general of the Jesuits, Father Peter-Hans Kolvenbach, seemingly caved in to Vatican pressure.

Under Pope John Paul II, Father Kolvenbach consistently ignored complaints about Jesuit practices. But no one seems outraged that Father Kolvenbach allowed the leading Jesuit spokesman for the Church in the U.S. to leave his position.

The National Catholic Reporter provided the explanation that Father Kolvenbach received a letter from CDF in the middle of March demanding Reese's resignation. According to NCR, Father Kolvenbach "had concluded that fighting it would do no good."

The real news from this chain of events is the fact that the superior general of the Jesuits has decided to stop "fighting" the imposition of Vatican authority.

Father Reese appears, to me at least, as a victim of Jesuit culture finally being brought to task. This view seems corroborated by the resignation ten days earlier of a lay employee of the Jesuit Conference. Erik Meder, the conference's outreach coordinator for the Office of Social and International Ministries, published an article on homosexual clergy in the National Jesuit News. More than calling for dialogue, Meder wrote, "Perhaps it's time the Gospel of homosexual clergy be proclaimed."

But why would such a strong leader as Father Kolvenbach, who has defended the leftward direction of his order, allow these resignations to happen now?

Some have speculated it was the threat of a board of censors. But, whatever it was, in allowing Father Reese to resign Father Kolvenbach created the perfect opportunity for the media, both Catholic and secular, to generate negative buzz over the selection of Benedict XVI.

As shocked as the left and the media were at the outpouring of love for the deceased John Paul II, they were even more astonished at the selection of Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger as the new pope.

When major media polling revealed that over 80 percent of U.S. Catholics welcomed the selection, they must have hung their heads in despair.

The Reese resignation confirmed their worst fears and gave them an early opportunity to make a public case against the former Prefect of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith - John Paul II's doctrinal "enforcer."

Father Reese is an extremely kind and likable fellow, someone with whom you could have a difference of opinion without its turning the conversation into a verbal fistfight. I have found myself in agreement with him many times on a variety of issues.

But, as Russell Shaw argued in his recent Wall Street Journal op-ed, there are specific responsibilities when a Catholic priest is an editor of a magazine published by a religious order.

"America isn't like most other magazines. Catholic priests are public officials of the Church, with a duty to reflect its teachings and policies in word and deed. This duty may seem archaic now, after several decades in which numerous clerics and others affiliated with the Church have routinely questioned the Magisterium of the pope and bishops. Yet, the traditional model remains the norm."

Lay editors and independent Catholic publications, Shaw suggests, are not held to the same standard of doctrinal fidelity.

Not everyone agrees.

Leon Suprenat, president of Catholics United for the Faith, thinks an entire species of "Catholic journalism" may be in danger. "Such 'Catholic journalism' hijacks and misapplies expressions such as 'openness to dialogue,' 'honest discussion,' and 'faithful dissent' to justify treating Church teaching as just one opinion among many, and often not the preferred one."

The editorial content of America consistently challenges the Church's teaching on issues like condoms, homosexuality and, most important of all, salvation through Jesus Christ.

For example, the September 2000 issue of America contained articles critical of the document Dominus Iesus published that year by the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith. The writers took issue with the Congregation's insistence that Catholics should believe that salvation is given only through Jesus Christ and His Church.

Independent, lay-edited publications who challenge Catholic teaching would have to be disciplined by the local ordinary, which is unlikely to happen. But this new level of doctrinal scrutiny may well be applied to other institutions.

According to Father Giles Dimock, O.P., professor of Liturgy and Sacramental Theology at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington, D.C., Reese's resignation also sends a message to Catholic colleges, universities, and seminaries. The message is, "If you are Catholic, you need to hold what the Church teaches, whether it's a university or a hospital -- any entity that touts itself Catholic needs to hold what the Church teaches."

No doubt even more nervous than leftwing Catholic publications are the U. S. Catholic seminaries. In the near future they are to be inspected by a team of 75 bishops and 100 priests coordinated by Archbishop O'Brien, the present military vicar and former rector of the North American College in Rome.

The outcry over Father Reese is not likely to deter Vatican determination to bring doctrinal fidelity to Catholic institutions that shape the future of the Church. The 46 Catholic seminaries, not a handful of Catholic magazines, will be the real staging area for the initiatives of Benedict XVI.

P.S. I am working on a Window about the surprising choice of Archbishop Levada to replace Benedict XVI at the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith.

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