Dialogue can be slow and difficult, but ultimately, it is the way to build both unity and community within the Catholic Church, said Bishop Michael Warfel of the Diocese of Great Falls/Billings, Mont. Bishop Warfel offered the annual Murnion Lecture June 4 at the 2010 Bernadin Conference of the Catholic Common Ground Initiative, which moved last year to the Bernardin Center at Catholic Theological Union. “The initiative provides a way for people of faith and good will to gather for candid and honest dialogue on difficult issues facing God’s people in the Catholic Church,” Bishop Warfel said near the conclusion of his lecture at the Renaissance Chicago O’Hare Hotel. “And there are many! The church will be served well by the dialogue, certainly better than rancor and resentment.” Presume of good faith But for the dialogue to be useful, participants must enter into it with the presumption that all participants are acting in good faith, resisting any impulse to “spiritual arrogance” or labeling other participants as “liberal” or “conservative.” Such labeling sets up a “them vs. us” dynamic,” Bishop Warfel said, which is more conducive to debate than to constructive dialogue. “What we believe and why we believe what we believe, in addition to grace, has been influenced by thousands of factors, some of which we are quite likely to be unaware,” the bishop said. “There are multiple influences that color our perspectives on what we believe and why. Listening to another in a dialogue becomes very much like peeling off the thin skin of an onion layer by layer. “It is not the same as in a debate in which there is a winner and a loser. The objective in dialogue is win-win. To enter a dialogue with an intent to beat up an opponent with a ‘club of belief’ is counter productive and contrary to the spirit of dialogue, even though what we believe may be true.” Critics’ target The Catholic Common Ground Initiative was founded in 1996 by Cardinal Joseph Bernardin to promote dialogue within the church on a variety of theological and social issues. From its inception, it has been the target of critics, with statements such as “authoritative teachings of the church can not be dialogued away” and “truth and dissent from truth are not equal partners in ecclesial dialogue,” Bishop Warfel noted. The dialogue is aimed not at changing the settled teaching of the church, but better understanding critical issues and the people who hold different perspectives on them. “The initiative is not about undermining the church and its teachings but providing a vehicle where people with diverse perspectives, including some who may have disagreed with elements of church teaching or discipline, can talk in a constructive way,” the bishop said. That means that participants should look for “the positive and strongest elements in another’s perspective,” he said. “Immediately to look for the negative or more vulnerable elements of a participant’s perspective betrays a desire to win the debate rather than seek understanding. “Now, I believe there is a definite place for debate and winning people over, but the objective of dialogue is not to win a competition, but to work toward communion. And, in many ways, dialogue can bring disparate partners much farther along than can a debate in which someone needs to lose.” Take it further Neither Lisa Sowell Cahill, a theology professor at Boston College, nor Peter Casarella, a professor of Catholic Studies at DePaul University and the director of the Center for World Catholicism and Intellectual Theology, found much to disagree with in Bishop Warfel’s remarks. Sowell echoed Bishop Warfel’s call for finding unity from diverse perspectives by looking to how the four evangelists, each with a distinct perspective, come together to create a coherent image of Jesus. Casarella expanded the call for dialogue to find common ground among Catholics beyond the borders of the United States, noting that many U.S. Catholics were raised in or come from families raised in other parts of the world.