Still Running Off at the Keyboard

DEVOLVING AMERICAN CATHOLICISM

I had an occasion the other day to dig out the Fall/Winter 2003 issue of "Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam," the newsletter of Roman Catholic Faithful. Glancing through it, I saw some things I'd forgotten about, like Stephen Brady's editorial in which he says:

No help from Rome -- According to a report that appeared in the July 25, 2003 issue of The Tidings, (the diocesan newspaper for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles), titled "Cardinals concelebrate historic Mass..." Cardinal Francis Arinze (A Vatican official) made it clear that the faithful would receive no help from Rome and that Vatican authorities would not confront or discipline errant bishops; He "cautioned that, as a Vatican official, neither he nor 'the Vatican' can simply step in 'like a firefighter' to resolve problems within a particular parish or diocese. 'For me to lecture the bishops...on what to do about a particular situation is not appropriate.' 'It is much better if you yourselves approach your priests and bishops.'"

Ah yes. Dump it on the faithful. As though we had some sort of power over errant bishops. Tell me again why it is that we need the hierarchy? Well, the headlines continue to demonstrate how well this is working.

Brady makes a thought-provoking observation:

If a priest makes known his homosexual inclination, you can be sure he is promoting an agenda contrary to Church teaching. A celibate, orthodox priest, would have absolutely no reason whatsoever to make his sexual inclinations known to anyone. On the other hand, a priest or bishop who is guilty of unrepentant sexual sin would have the motive to (in order to ease his conscience) water down or deny Catholic moral teaching, downplay the need for confession, remove the crucifix, hide the tabernacle, and take liberties with the Mass. All this he will counter with a strong emphasis on so-called social justice.

Does your pastor fit the mold?

Fr. James McLucas takes the bishops to task in the Spring 2006 issue of "Latin Mass Magazine" which unfortunately is not online. He writes:

It's been five months since Pope Benedict's Congregation for Education issued its "instruction Concerning the Criteria of Vocational Discernment Regarding Persons with Homosexual Tendencies." Not since Humane Vitae have we seen such division and dissimulation over the meaning of a Vatican document.

The Holy See certainly is aware of the cacophony of contradictory interpretations over some very specific phrases within the document. ...

But as Stephen Brady has already pointed out, no help is coming from Rome.

Fr. McLucas asks, "how does the Holy See expect this decree to be implemented?" Implied is the assumption that the Holy See expects implementation. Can we make that assumption? Surely Rome is not ignorant of the American situation.

According to Fr. McLucas:

Make no mistake: homosexualism can be categorized as the deeply embedded untouchable "third rail" of the Catholic Church. But this directive from Rome has dared to touch it -- and any serious attempt at extricating it may well result in a challenge to her authority the likes of which she hasn't seen since the Protestant Revolt. The political alliance of the radical feminists and homosexuals, flush with money and influence within all categories of media, has muscled the West into a collective genuflection before its agenda. (What I've just written could get me arrested for a hate crime in certain countries that once constituted Christendom). This alliance has been replicated within the Catholic Church.

Fr. McLucas closes his editorial with:

The Holy See cannot permit the "Instruction" on homosexuality in the priesthood to be given the same treatment that greeted Humane Vitae: i.e. "dead on arrival." The effects upon Holy Church, because She is in a far weaker state than She was in 1968, this time will threaten Her very survival among whole nations.

Since the laity has been given the job of cleaning up the mess, just what size mess are we dealing with? The numbers might surprise even a Catholic blogger.

Matt C. Abbott's article at MichNews.com offers some numbers. Abbott is quoting Catholic attorney Sharon Bourassa regarding the Archdiocese of Miami:

"According to a group of priests who remain faithful to Rome, 90 percent of our priests in the Miami archdiocese are non-celibate gays who steal and who own luxury properties. They are known to the hierarchy, and they are bringing their agenda into all levels of the archdiocese. The number seems extremely high, but over and over again, the underground of heterosexual priests say the figure is accurate. ...

One priest told us if the non-celibate gays were removed, we would have only ten Catholic churches in union with Rome....The good priests who keep in contact with me say that 70 percent of the U.S. bishops are homosexual. Five of the South Florida bishops are homosexual. This is very difficult for the heterosexual priests in the archdiocese."

Is Miami just an abberation, or is it the norm?

Just how are the laity supposed to clean this up?

This is the point at which an Orthodox schism or a Protestant Reformation begins to look appealing! Let's take the 30 percent of bishops and the 10 percent of priests and form a Catholic Church loyal to Rome, and see if we can recapture our Catholic heritage. Do we really need the dioceses, when they are the dioceses we've got?

Over at Spirit Daily, Michael Brown has taken note of the growing trend to demand the ouster of the bishops. He writes:

Thus far, only a relative handful have joined such protests -- in [the Chicago - ct] archdiocese of 2.4 million. But the bitterness hurled in the direction of bishops -- who before the abuse crisis commanded all but total respect from the laity -- is disturbing and also shows itself in e-mails sent to this website.

As never before, laymen want bishops to forsake what they see as a bureaucratic style for one of more openness, greater devotion, and strict obedience to Rome -- which is seen as strongly opposing homosexuals in the priesthood.

Before now, such discord was limited to highly unusual cases as in Boston, where the scandal was first brought to light in a major way. But it has now spread to virtually every region of the country.

Most of the complaints: that despite the scandal, bishops are allowing the homosexual element to remain entrenched in seminaries, rectories, or chanceries, and are even "persecuting" orthodox priests who speak against it. ...

"The Pope has come out and said that homosexual men are not to go to seminaries, but a whole bunch of American priests don't care what the Pope says and keep ordaining them," said [a] priest who resigned in Pennsylvania. "The underlying problem is that bishops disobeyed the Church, and seminaries became filled with homosexual men. Now these men are in their sixties and are Church leaders. They have brought ruin and chaos."...

Meanwhile, until the American bishops speak out against homosexuality as strongly as has the Pope, there is the chance that allegations against prelates themselves will increase, and public protests with it. The public criticism of Church hierarchy has been considered a slippery slope for all involved.

"We are at war!" wrote one viewer. "I write to you with a broken heart about the current state of our beautiful Church.

"Discord." "Chaos." Familiar phrases to anyone who has researched the occult. A sort of Modus Operandi.

If the seminaries are filled with homosexuals, and heterosexual priests hide underground, what hope have we even if new bishops are appointed? We gain nothing by trading in one homosexual bishop for another one. All we are going to get is business as usual.

The only avenue the laity has is to defund the chanceries and the social justice programs the bishops enact. That would likely result in an episcopal "tax" on the parish collection plate. In Cleveland we already have one.

The other alternative is schism. Detach the parish from the offending bishop and attach it to an orthodox bishop if one can be found, and if the parish can agree on such a strategy, and if no canon lawyer is willing to make a case against the leaders of such a movement. A lot of "ifs"...

There is heavenly intervention as a last resort. Perhaps if we pray enough and care enough and sacrifice enough God will intervene. Perhaps. Or perhaps the Catholic Church in America must die before it can be resurrected.

I try to imagine how life is to be lived without Church or sacraments.

Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us!