Reply to Cardinal McCarrick removed from ministry by the Pope

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[quote=Anonymous]Dear God! Reading some of these posts is painful.  Some people worship at the altar of a “progressive” god, whatever that is, and other people worship at the altar of a god of genital fixation, looking to re-affirm their obsessive opposition to homosexuality.  Other people revel in the machinations of the hierarchy, as if it’s a 2000-year-old PBS miniseries, and still others see the scandal as a platform to vent their deep-rooted problems with their parents, or authority, or celibacy.

What strikes me is the manifest fear of discussing what truly is at play here: evil.  What happened here is evil on so many different levels.  It is evil to abuse anyone, especially the innocent and defenseless.  It is evil to abuse the authority, with which, one is entrusted.  It is evil for one not to act when obliged to act.  This discussion is critical because it goes to the Church’s role in the universal struggle between good and evil until the end of time.

What better way to strike at the heart of the Church than through the priesthood.  The priesthood draws its lineage through apostolic succession.  The priesthood is the channel, though which, a human being, acting in the person of Christ, changes bread and wine into the actual body and blood of Christ, establishing our physical connection with the Divine.  Destroy the priesthood, and you destroy Catholic anthropology, Catholic heritage.  Destroy the priesthood, and you destroy the means to achieve the Real Presence of God on earth.  (I know, there are a lot of people, some with an axe to grind, that go crazy over such beliefs.  This discussion is not going to satisfy you, but it’s not intended to satisfy you.  It’s intended for those of us who believe it and who are pained greatly with a sense of betrayal and abandonment by these sinful, sinful men.). Until we address the fundamental evil involved here, we will be recycling scandal after scandal because we are not dealing with angels; we’re dealing with flawed human beings.

What is needed is boldness, and let’s hope that the “don’t let the door hit you in the ass” acceptance of Mr. McCarrick’s resignation by Pope Francis is only a first step. I, for one, hope the Church defines, as a matter of law, medieval-like punishment, coupled with intense prayer for the victims and the forgiveness, for these offenders in exchange for their continued relationship with, and support from, the Church, perhaps restrictions, like hard labor, lack of access to media and creature comforts, restriction to a facility, basic nutrition, public censure, and surrender of all assets for the benefit of their victims (I’m sure there are even better punishments; I’m not that creative).

Then, let the jackals who still may be in hiding in plain sight understand what awaits them, while some form of universal inquest is undertaken.  Such an inquest is in order because, although certain aspects of the Church are universal, like faith and morals, each diocese is its own jurisdiction, and its is not clear that they all operate pursuant to the same administrative rules.  For instance, we hear that DC didn’t know of the settlements in NJ. Well, do settlements have to be disclosed?  If not, shouldn’t transmission of that information be mandatory?  Wouldn’t such transmission have mitigated the quandary people find themselves in seeing someone with a history, like McCarrick’s, elevated in the hierarchy?  Also, critical issues need to be explored, no matter how uncomfortable.  Does abstaining from sex cause child abuse (if it does, a good number of marriages would be filled with abusers)?  Is homosexuality is a factor here, not because homosexuals are pre-ordained to abuse, but, perhaps because we don’t discuss the complexities of sexuality, leaving some to feel the erroneous need to “validate” themselves through ordination?  Does admitting women and/or married men to priestly ordination “diversify” the ranks and mitigate the ability for abusers to hide in plain sight, and if so, is there theology to support such ordination?

The point is, meaningful action must be undertaken to restore faith in the human aspects of the institution.  What will not be helpful is the proliferation of discussion tangents and plain crazy statements that always seems to occur when these scandals break. We’re seeing some of those tangents and that craziness here.[/quote]

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