The Catholic Church suffered
a double whammy during the summer with the resignation of 88-year old Cardinal
Theodore McCarrick because of credible
accusations of sexual abuse with an altar boy in the 1970's and later with
numerous seminarians. This was followed by a voluminous grand jury report in
Pennsylvania detailing many lurid stories describing the abuse of more than a
thousand children by three hundred priests over seventy years - with more to
follow.
These shocking events must be
viewed as part of the shameful revelations of sexual abuse by priests and
brothers, monks, friars, bishops and nuns in dioceses all over the world.
No wonder that the Catholic
Church is in crisis. The sexual abuse of children involves such awful and
reprehensible acts of terror by trusted
adults against innocent children that trying to come to terms with this
widespread abominable behavior has sapped the spirit of Catholics everywhere.
Instead of pride in their church community, many are deeply ashamed of their
membership in what they see as a corrupt and decaying institution.
A recent metaphor that
describes the Catholic Church as a walking corpse, an aimless specter, trudging
around in the dark as it recedes into oblivion is only a slight exaggeration. No organization that abuses its young can
hold its head up high. No group that allowed and then covered up the depraved
ruination of so many children's lives can claim any kind of Christian mandate.
All the undoubted good work performed by so many fine people cannot cover or
even mitigate the damnable acts against children by shameless and unhinged
predators wearing clerical robes.
Sex abuse of minors is only one dimension -
albeit a very potent one - of the life-or-death crisis in the church.
The Catholic Church is demonstrably a
misogynistic organization. This shows clearly in its structures which diminish and
demean women at every turn.
The Vatican published a
document on the importance of family life that was prepared over two years in
2014 and 2015. Many of the recommendations were voted on by 279 members of a
commission that, under the pope, prepared the final document. Not even one
woman had a vote on these crucial family issues.
It must be obvious to all thinking people -
and especially to women - that only a church which is completely out of touch
with modern realities would promulgate a document dealing with important family
matters without even one female signature.
The Second Vatican Council was established in the 1960's by the last great
pope, John XX111. His goal was to move the church away from a medieval mindset
which mostly described human behavior in terms of evil and sinfulness, and to
focus instead on a more positive culture, open to the
goodness and graciousness of followers of all religions.
The documents of that Council
stressed the importance of consultation with the laity in the evolution of
doctrine and religious practices in the church.
The idea that faithful Catholics
everywhere should provide a significant contribution to the development of
church beliefs is spoken of approvingly by theologians as constituting the sensus fidelium. This "sense of the
faithful" involves a kind of solemn commitment by Rome to listen to the opinions
of Catholics worldwide before pronouncing about
matters of church dogma or morality.
Unfortunately, the experts in
the Vatican act as an elite within the church. They know best when they make
ecclesial pronouncements, and the sensus
fidelium is honored in Shakespeare's words "far more in the breach
than in the observance."
Would the church have lost so
much credibility if it paid any heed to the views of its members? Surely
predator priests would have been shown the road by concerned parents far
quicker than by aging celibates whose priority always seemed to be avoiding
scandal and protecting fellow-clerics.
If there was any heed paid to
the church membership would women still be excluded from all the important
leadership positions, including preaching and administering the Eucharist?
Clericalism rules! Men with clear conservative credentials, selected for
appointment to the bishoprics and the
magisterium in Rome, rule the roost.
These men say that public discussion of the
pros and cons of women's ordination may not take place in any forum in a church-owned
building. Tough luck on the majority of
believers in Western countries who support this basic change in church
discipline. So much for the value placed in the Vatican on the sensus fidelium!
Rome's fallacious arguments
for preventing female ordination were succinctly rebuffed by former Irish president, Mary
McAleese, as "codology dressed up as theology." Francis' response
when questioned about this matter referred to a statement by John Paul 11
twenty years earlier that categorically ruled out any discussion of change.
Case closed!!
In 1968, Pope Paul V1
published the encyclical Humanae Vitae, which prescribed that Catholics -
married or unmarried - were banned from using contraceptives of any kind to
limit the size of their families. A
clear majority of the group of international experts appointed by Rome to counsel the pope on these crucial
issues advised that married couples should be allowed to regulate the size of their
families by using contraceptives. Their thoughtful counsel was disregarded in
favor of a minority of traditionalists who argued that the pope had to follow
the teaching of Pius X1 from forty years earlier.
Humanae Vitae still
incorporates the official beliefs of the Catholic church, and the pope who
disregarded his advisors and took a hard line on the use of contraceptives is on his way to canonization. Some
progressive commentators view his likely promotion to sainthood as payback for
following strict traditional teaching in his controversial encyclical.
Imagine defending the Vatican teaching that a married couple using a
condom to prevent pregnancy is engaged in sinful behavior. Do you know any
Catholic who believes that untenable moral
position?
With professional sampling
techniques, the Vatican could discern the movement of the Spirit by consulting
with the people on various important issues. Stop the hypocrisy of pretending
that somehow the pope and his magisterium possess special deep insights into
moral issues because they have shown repeatedly over the centuries that they
don't. They excel mostly in justifying traditional beliefs and practices.
Try a democratic approach,
consulting the people about what they believe the magnanimous Christ of the
gospels would be teaching today. Would he, for example, be referring to gay
people as "disordered" and supporting laws that prohibit women from
leading the celebration of the Eucharist?
In the unlikely event that
Catholic leaders in Rome will listen to
the people about, for instance, priestly celibacy or the ordination of women or
a new role for the laity or the treatment of gays, then we could be into the
kind of major changes that are urgently called for in this serious crisis in
the Catholic Church.
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