Posted on 12/02/2013 10:15:58 AM PST by Dr. Thorne
A year after arriving in Los Angeles, the youngest archbishop in the U.S. Catholic Church had a schedule and an agenda befitting a presidential candidate. Roger Mahony raced around the city in a chauffeured sedan, exhorting labor leaders to support immigrant rights and rallying hundreds against a proposed prison in Boyle Heights.
(Excerpt) Read more at graphics.latimes.com ...
Utter corruption - morally, financially, legally. All this from those who claim they are the one true church.
False doctrine leads to a corrupt church.
All Cardinal Mahoney had to do when a report of misconduct came to his attention: Report it immediately to local law enforcement authorities. That would have saved a ton of trouble,legal fees, and hundreds of millions in settlement dollars.
You'll get no defense of Mahony from FReeper Catholics. But the LA Times was always buddy-buddy with him when he was in power, because he's a liberal and they're liberals, so it's all okay. Now that he's out of power, they can hang him out to dry and pretend to be the righteous press, crusading against injustice. Hypocrites!
Therein, the first 58 pages describe that bishop, and then (following quote is from page 59)"... a man travelling on foot entered the little town of Digne."
The Bishop of Digne, played by Colm Wilkenson, was the ONLY good thing about the MOVIE of les Miz.
I loved the Book, The various non-musical movies, and the STAGE Musical, but the 2012 movie stunk out loud.
Yes indeedy that IS one honkin' big money quote. You'd think, if they put any trust in it, that Catholic bishops would have expressed dependence on God's Word for help and instruction. Catholics claim to have written it, for cryin' out loud!
Well, report the cases that warranted prosecution. We have come from a place where no priest could be held accountable to where every priest is presumed guilty. At bottom, the problem is clericalism, the notion that priests form a privileged class in the Church. Which, ironically, is why priests remain celibate, to make sure that the presbyterate not become hereditary. or an actual caste.
Worse than that. They took the word of psychiatrists that these priests were "cured," instead of demanding that they admit their sins and do appropriate penance. Makes you wonder just how much these bishops actually believed the Faith they were supposed to be defending.
You are right: The policy mandated clerical celibacy was put into place during the Middle Ages to combat corruption and nepotism and to make sure Church property was not inherited.
In today’s world, that policy should be revisited. The policy seems to have contributed the pedophilia scandal. There is nothing in the Bible, the Old Testament or the New Testament, or anything in the Gospels or the teachings of Jesus which mandate a celibate priesthood.
In fact in the early Church, popes, bishops, and priests were married, the majority of them were married until the 11th and 12th centuries.
Just ‘cause the wrote it doesn’t mean they follow it..
Celibacy, in my opinion, was not a cause of the corruption. It was the corruption of standards, where the practice, which has always existed, came to be tolerated more than previously.
Bingo! Now that is the money quote. Thanks for expressing it so clearly.
For those puzzled by the exclusive focus on Catholic sex abuse cases to the complete exclusion of all others, you have the reason right there in that single sentence.
The argument being pushed here is that if sin and scandal within the Catholic Church can be shown to rise to some arbitrary, self-defined level, this voids the Catholic Church's claim to be whom She says she is; the Bride of Christ.
That's it.
Historical facts, tradition, etc, all become irrelevant to the question. All that's necessary is to show sin and scandal on a wide scale. A line of reasoning which is lazy, illogical and for the bereft.
If only the pitiful naysayers who cheer this scandal knew that the exposure of these wolves is strenghtening and purifying the Church, rather than weaking it.
I would agree that it would be a stretch to claim that celibacy all by itself triggered the pedophile priest scandal. There was obviously a severe break down in standards, recruitment practices, and discipline. However, when you create an all male environment, where men are prohibited from having relations with opposite sex or permitted to marry....well I think you have created an atmosphere which allowed the scandal to fester and expand to the levels that it did.
Perhaps he should have had a schedule and an agenda focused on saving souls and managing the diocese. Just sayin'.
It does indeed.
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