WASHINGTON -- As the nation's Catholic bishops and groups protesting their policies left the nation's capital Thursday, key leaders in both groups looked optimistically toward the future.
Detroit Auxiliary Bishop Allen Vigneron won cautious approval from his colleagues to proceed with plans for what could become a historic plenary council attended by Catholics from across the country to shore up traditional church teachings.
Meanwhile, three gay Catholics arrested after a protest on Tuesday were released from jail Wednesday night. Michigan native Kara Speltz, one of those arrested, said Thursday she hoped their demonstration helped move some bishops toward greater sensitivity toward gay parishioners.
But no bishops, except Detroit Auxiliary Bishop Thomas Gumbleton, expressed a need for greater compassion. Most bishops declined to discuss homosexuality or the protesters.
Despite the optimism on both sides, a gulf clearly remained between the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and the half-dozen protest groups that rallied outside the meetings all week.
And the move toward a plenary council signaled a retrenchment for the church.
On Wednesday, the bishops voted overwhelmingly to proceed with two further national meetings to consider whether to hold the first U.S. Catholic plenary council since 1884. That early council led to the creation of the Baltimore Catechism, a traditional guide to teaching the faith that shaped the church for many decades.
Organizing a plenary council would be such a huge step that holding planning sessions in June 2003 and June 2004 for all U.S. bishops is a wise first step, Vigneron said.
"We'll be talking about the need in our church for a universal call to holiness and whether a plenary council might help us with that," Vigneron said.
Vigneron was a leader among eight bishops who drafted a private letter to their colleagues earlier this year, proposing a plenary council. By Wednesday, 106 bishops had endorsed the letter, and the conference agreed to the planning meetings.
Hours after that vote, gay-rights activists outside the bishops conference at the Hyatt on Capitol Hill cheered the release of the three protesters. They are: Mike Perez of Seattle; Ken Einhaus, a 1989 graduate of the University of Michigan now living in Arlington, Va., and Speltz, who was born in Detroit, graduated from St. Mary's High School in Mt. Clemens in 1955 and now is a eucharistic minister in her Berkeley, Calif., parish.
"It's not over. We have to return next week for a court hearing," Speltz said Thursday before she left Washington.
The protest was triggered by the trio's denial of communion Monday evening. During a public mass celebrated by the bishops, Msgr. Michael Bugarin, a Detroit priest who now heads the John Paul II Cultural Center in Washington, D.C., refused to serve communion to Speltz, Perez and Einhaus.
By Tuesday afternoon, Bugarin had apologized and said he mistakenly believed the three were part of a gay-rights group that planned to disrupt the mass. Two of the three wore ceramic crosses with rainbows. By then, the three had been arrested for appearing at the bishops conference and demanding to be served communion.
They were charged with misdemeanor counts of unlawful entry to the Hyatt, pleaded not guilty and have a Nov. 21 hearing, when a trial date may be set.
"If people aren't going to be allowed to take communion because they're wearing a rainbow, then this indicates something very sad and very sick within the church," said the Rev. Mel White, founder of Soulforce of Laguna Beach, Calif. White's nonprofit gay-rights group brought Speltz, Perez, Einhaus and more than 50 other activists to Washington. All week, they stood in a silent vigil outside the conference, calling for greater compassion for gays.
"I can see that these bishops are really terrified to even talk about this issue," White said Thursday. "But I hope we've created the start of an ongoing discussion this week about the way our people are treated in the Catholic Church."