The short answer is, Yes.
You got that right.
Something interesting the article touched on was the fact that many tiny, symbolic things that used to give Catholics a sense of being "different" --- abstaining from meat on Fridays, fasting (real fasting) during Lent and Advent, etc. --- seemingly small in themselves, but they built up a sense of Catholic "identity" in the midst of a secular culture.
When these little identity-markers were dropped, the sense (as anyone will remember who was a twentysomething in the 70's) was that "well, all that's gone, we've been invited to be just like everybody else and hey, that's OK."
There was this general sense of looseness and slippage, as if the whole religious structure had been dipped in a Universal Solvent and nothing had to "stick" anymore because we were re-inventing the Faith, re-inventing Morals, re-inventing everything.
B16 is clearly calling Catholics back to the "distinctives," our One And Only Church peculiarities. A sense of the unchanging and the sacred. Chastity for real. And not a moment too soon.
I agree with SuzyQ and Mrs Don O...
But....
“The more interesting question, though, is whether or not the church herself, and particularly the priests and bishops, should be held to a moral standard that is higher than that of the general populace...”
The short answer is, Yes.
I don’t agree with that...Where in the U.S. Constitution does it say that the Catholic Curch is to be held to a higher standard ?..To do so is discrimination against the Catholic Church and i have been harping on this for quite awhile now...Also- for nearly every crime there is a Statute of Limitations...But for the Catholic Church and the crime of sexual abuse there is no such Statute ?..Again—that’s discrimination...Now in a nation of 50 million Catholics, NO ONE has figured that out ?..That shows the decency of Catholics...we accept our fate- and we try and hold ourselves up to a higher standard as it should be according to our religion. But all humans are weak,and fall, but at least there should be a resolve to bring fairness to this whole matter...why are just a few of us saying this ?..The Bishops and Cardinals of the US should be asking for fairness..Dr MLK fought unfairness, why can’t our Church leaders ?....