Religion: The Nun vs. the Archbishop

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Sister Agnes Mansour supervises Medicaid abortions

She is one of Michigan's most respected Roman Catholic nuns. She is also head of the state's department of social services, which spends more than $5 million a year on Medicaid abortions. Obedient to the teachings of her church, Sister Agnes Mary Mansour believes abortion is sinful. She also recognizes that others disagree, and feels that poor women are entitled to have publicly funded abortions so long as they are legal.

Archbishop Edmund Szoka of Detroit insists that a nun in such a public post must, as a minimum, declare her opposition to public financing of an operation that the Second Vatican Council deemed an "unspeakable crime." The resulting test of wills between nun and Archbishop is embarrassing Governor James Blanchard, dividing the state's Catholics, and seems destined to land at the Vatican for final judgment.

Blanchard, a Unitarian who is pro-choice on abortion, had good reason to choose Mansour to run the state's biggest agency. Her order, the Sisters of Mercy of the Union, runs 21 hospitals as well as other public service agencies in Michigan. Sister Agnes, who has a doctorate in biochemistry from Georgetown University, is an adept administrator who boosted both enrollment and endowments during the past decade as president of Detroit's Mercy College.*

Sister Agnes and Archbishop Szoka first clashed last year when she ran unsuccessfully in a Democratic congressional primary. The Pope clearly indicated that priests and nuns should not hold public office, and those who do so should, according to current canon law, first get permission from their bishop. Mansour did not request permission, and says she did not know this was necessary. During the primary she tartly dismissed canon law as an "old set of rules that are invoked when somebody wants to invoke them, and ignored when someone wants to ignore them."

When Governor-elect Blanchard selected Mansour in December to be director of the public services department, she asked both her order and Archbishop Szoka for permission to serve. The order readily approved. So did Szoka, but he states that he gave his support only on condition that Mansour would clarify her position on abortion so that it was in line with church teaching. Szoka noted that the nun "cannot control the laws of the state," and added: "To make a big issue of this one thing seems a bit sensational."

Mansour did not shift her position, contending that it was acceptable under church doctrine. Szoka came under increasing pressure from conservative Catholics and right-to-lifers for being too tolerant. On Feb. 23, Szoka ordered Mansour to resign. Several hundred nuns, as well as some priests, attacked his stand; there was even opposition to the Archbishop on Detroit's pastoral council, made up of priests, members of religious orders and laymen.