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Reason for Secrecy. More often than not, underground churches are as clandestine as spy rings, have neither a name nor a formal organization, limit membership to a trusted few. In this sense, at least, they resemble the cells of the zealous Catholic lay organization Opus Dei (TIME, May 12). A major reason for so much secrecy is that the interfaith membership includes renewal-minded priests and nuns who fear the wrath of their bishops for taking part in illegal services.* Nonetheless, many of these clerics regard the services at underground churches as far more meaningful than Catholicism's official liturgy. Says one nun who belongs to an underground cell in California: "When one member looked up from prayer one evening and said, 'We're all friends,' I knew we had something new and very rich in community here."
Sociologist Caporale, who reports that similar underground churches are rising in Europe and Latin America, argues that a major weakness of the movement is its introverted quality: unless the cells maintain some connection with the official church, they may turn into inbred holiness clubs. Publisher Donald Thorman of the National Catholic Reporter, however, is convinced that the movement will not soon disappear, largely because so many clerics have become involved. "There have been innumerable unofficial movements within the church before," he says, "but they came and went rapidly because they lacked the unifying factor of a priesthood and a liturgy of their own." He suggests that the underground cell might well become an attractive middle road between unacceptable institutionalized traditionalism and abandonment of the faith.
*Last week, Patrick Cardinal O'Boyle, Archbishop of Washington, D.C., cracked down on an underground cell called "The People" for celebrating informal worship services without ecclesiastical supervision.