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Catholic World News News Feature

JOKER'S RUSE EMBARRASSES ENGLISH CATHOLIC FEMINISTS December 04, 1996

EWTN News December 4, 1996

(550 words)

Joanna Bogle, an English Catholic journalist who has made her reputation as a critic of liberals within the Church, has left a prominent group of English feminists with red faces by revealing that she is the author of an article recently published in a feminist journal. Bogle wrote the article as a parody; the Catholic Women's Network treated it as a serious contribution.

The story began when Bogle, a regular columnist for the Catholic Times, read an issue of Network, the publication of the Catholic Women's Network. The summer issue of that publication contained a wholesale revision of the Book of Genesis, and a description of an Easter celebration organized by the feminist group. "There were intimate moments when poetry was shared, women were held, and our bodies rocked together in dance," the story began.

"I had a good laugh about this," Bogle told the Daily Telegraph; "but afterwards I thought really anybody can write this sort of stuff. So I did." Enlisting the help of a friend who lives in Australia, she penned her parody under the name "Carmel Lenehan," and had it sent from Australia to the Catholic Women's Network.

The story by "Carmel Lenehan," like the story which first sparked Bogle's imagination, purported to be a description of a feminist ritual, which she called a "Circle Weekend." The article was packed with overblown language and outrageous images. One passage, for instance, ran: "We began with a foot massage and then, in a circle, we each in turn spoke, saying, 'I matter. I affirm self. What I am, I have a right to be, and then some affirming/growth statement, such as The loving and caring in me reaches out to you, and you, and you. It was really moving. Over avocado and salads, we shared music."

The article also include some heavy-handed appeals to liberal Catholic sentiments, particularly on the question of ordination for women. "And there was talk about the Church and the way it/he oppresses us and how we can change it," she wrote. And again: "...prayer means nothing-- it just means hurt-- if you can't be up there at the altar but only anonymous in the pew..."

Having enjoyed the experience of writing the parody, Bogle admitted that it might be a bit too obvious. "I thought they would never fall for this," she said. "But they did-- hook, line, and sinker."

When the Bogle/Lenehan article was published in the latest issue of Network, Bogle's barb struck home. The editors had apparently not recognized the parody for what is was. And when she was informed that her magazine had been the target of a successful lampooning, editor Alison Gelder could only say, "Goodness me."

The serious point behind the Bogle parody is that the Catholic Women's Network, which has now amply demonstrated its distance from Catholic orthodoxy, remains formally affiliated with groups which are endorsed by the English bishops, such as the National Board of Catholic Women.

When she was not chuckling over her comic coup, Joanna Bogle was driving home the point she had thereby proven: the Catholic Women's Network is so thoroughly extreme, and so much out of sympathy with the Catholic Church that it is impossible to distinguish between its real editorial offerings and a conservative columnist's parody.