Question: What Would It Take for You to Start Taking the U.S. Bishops Seriously?

11/11/02 | A. McGowan

[Arthur McGowan]

Assuming that, like me, you currently believe that the bishops of the U.S., on the whole, are corrupt, crypto-pro-abortion, more loyal to the Demo Party than to the Catholic Faith, etc.: What would the bishops have to do, in large numbers, or unanimously, for you to begin to believe that they are, on the whole, Catholics?

[Arthur McGowan]

My first answer is: Excommunicate all nominally Catholic political office holders whose votes and statements show a consistent pattern of support for the "legal" status of abortion. This would include votes to fund abortion, votes to deter or destroy the Rescue Movement and other pro-live activism, and statements that access to abortion is a "right," that it should be legal, that judges who might overturn Roe (et al.) are not acceptable, and similar votes and statements. My second answer: Excommunicate all nominally Catholic commentators whose writings show explicit support for the "legality" of abortion, and for other policies supported by pro-abortion politicians. Suspend pastors and other priests in charge of insitutions that have, during the past thirty years, shown adulation and formal honor to pro-abortion politicians and other pro-abortion public figures, such as speaking engagements (except to debate a pro-life speaker), honorary degrees, etc. Withdraw all canonical recognition as "Catholic" from institutions which purport to be Catholic, but consistently demonstrate support and adulation of "Catholic" pro-abortion politicians, commentators, theologians, etc. Clean out of the USCCB bureaucracy, and all chanceries, those bureaucrats whose resumes show past employment on the staff of a pro-abortion politician.

[malakhi]

Can you work your ping list magic?

[Endeavor]

Their resignations?

[Dark Seraph]

This reminds me of a great conversation between Q and Worf in ST: TNG...

Q: "What must I do to convince you people?"

Worf: "Die."

[B-Chan]

It'd take someone with a whip of small cords to get them to do that. May Christ cleanse His temple soon.

[Redbob]

What he said.

[pgkdan]

What would the bishops have to do, in large numbers, or unanimously, for you to begin to believe that they are, on the whole, Catholics?

Resign en-masse.

[Polycarp]

Happy to, Angelo. Pinging...(as usual, if you would like to be added to or deleted from my Catholic ping list, just Freepmail me.)

[thedilg]

I believe that the seminaries must be reestablished as Christian. The orthodox young men should be welcomeed. The homosexual not welcome.

They must insure that the teachers/professors in the seminaries teach with fidelity to orthodox beliefs.

Godspeed, The Dilg

[Cicero]

I think we need some new bishops. But certainly the very first step should be to clean out their chanceries, seminary staffs, liturgists, catechists, and most of the NCCB bureaucracy, which are crammed full of dissidents, heretics, pagan feminists, married ex-priests and ex-nuns, all with their liberal hands firmly grasping the levers of power.

An awful lot of the damage is done not by the bishops themselves but by the corrupt traitors they have surrounded themselves with. The Church doesn't owe jobs to heretics.

[Defend the Second]

If they actually took their vows seriously they would turn out all the homosexuals, rather than simultaneously placing them in positions of trust and temptation. However, after almost 40 years of permissiveness, the homosexuals are definitely high up in the hierarchy now. To do the right thing would require that they cut their own throats. Ain't gonna happen, therfore this Catholic has no place left in the corrupted Church. I am not happy about it.

[B Knotts]

Yep. You summed it up pretty well. At minimum:

• Instruct all U.S. priests to refuse communion to known pro-abortion politicians/activists.
• Catholicize the "Catholic" colleges, high schools, grade schools, etc.

[Temple Drake]

Agree w. all of the above but FIRST all the good guys need to make sure to OUT the bad guys: start with that awful little fag Roger(hah!)Mahoney and all the other Bernardin secret-sissy crowd. Expose them THOROUGHLY -- no more private payoffs to "recant" accusations. Make it so they only job they could get is coatcheck boy in a Key West bathhouse. Next, clean out all the feminazi homo-enabler "nuns" -- ship em all to Stevens Point, Wisconsin (they'll enjoy that)and bar them from Mass with a flaming brand, if necessary. Finally, all the palsied old chicken-hearts who've gone along to get along -- OUT! OUT! Go live out your years in a hermit's cave, and reflect on the damage you've done to innocent souls.

[Desdemona]

Excommunication for at least a few would be nice - but, really, I'd settle for public censure and the across the board refusal to give Communion to these people. At least until they publicly repent and go to Confession.

If they would straighten out the seminaries. The one in my archdiocese is on it's way, but some others need to be worked on. Homosexuals and unstable heterosexuals should not be admitted under any circumstances and all protestant theology should be banned.

It would be nice if they would "out" the more liberal among them and request that Rome remove them as they are obstructing Canon Law.

Hard and fast application of the Mass Rubrics in the Roman Missal. Oh, and improvement in the quality of music at Mass.

True restoration of the churches themselves - Communion Rails, Saints' statues, devotional candles, screens in the confessionals...just the "little things" that make a Catholic Church Catholic.

Once that's done, we'll talk about religious education....

[Chancellor Palpatine]

Um, I hate to burst your bubble, but that would pretty much guarantee that no Catholic would ever get elected to office in the US or Canada again, and would be a new focus for mockery derision and scorn.

What about putting at the top of your excommunication list those priests and hierarchs who molested or covered up the molestation of teens? It would occur to me that excommunicating those who are directly responsible for the problem is more important than going after laymen who are simply obeying the law on an issue unrelated to the scandal.

[SoothingDave]

You said a lot. I agree. I was gonna add say, besides the obvious, enforce the ex corde ecclesia mandatum on Catholic theologians. But you've gone stronger in that, in refusing the recognition of "Catholic" institutions that are not.

Get all the feminists out of the chanceries. Get the dissidents out of their positions, in schools, universities, etc.

Maybe the Church will lose "support" and shrink in size. Maybe it will have to sell off assets to survive. But maybe it will be a True Church again.

Oh, and banish every profesional "liturgical design consultant" to some other place far, far away. Put the kneelers back where they were ripped out and return the Tabernacle to its place front and center, Then start an effort to re-build the liturgy they have destroyed, by re-introducing Latin as a frequent option for the ordinary parts of Mass.

SD

[patent]

As soon as they excommunicate you I'll take notice. The litmus test of Catholicity is hardly whether its Bishops do what you like, it is whether you are in union with the Bishops in union with the Pope. So, while I may not like our current crop of future paving stones in hell, I do not see how it is my place, nor yours, to make determinations on when they are or are not Catholic.

To presume the ability to do this is the height of arrogance, no matter how well the Bishops have mastered the height of cowardice.

[Petronski]

Question: What Would It Take for You to Start Taking the U.S. Bishops Seriously?

I'd like them to convert to Roman Catholicism. </DissidentMode>

[Polycarp]

What would the bishops have to do, in large numbers, or unanimously, for you to begin to believe that they are, on the whole, Catholics?

1)Admit the current crisis is homosexual in nature, then throw out the active homos, especially in their own ranks.

2)Admit their error in their wholesale rejection of Humanae Vitae, like the Philipino hierarchy did a few years ago in the mid 1990's, and return to teaching orthodox Catholic moral theology.

3)Eliminate the wholescale Liturgical abuses foisted on the masses (both meanings) "in the name of VII."

4) Petition Rome to change Canon Law so that any politician voting to legalize abortion or make it more wodespread, or to legalize homosexual marriage or adoption, is authomatically (latae sententiae) excommunicated.

Well, its a lot to ask, I admit, but its a start I'd like to see...

[Desdemona]

But certainly the very first step should be to clean out their chanceries, seminary staffs, liturgists, catechists, and most of the NCCB bureaucracy, which are crammed full of dissidents, heretics, pagan feminists, married ex-priests and ex-nuns, all with their liberal hands firmly grasping the levers of power.

Amen. Worth repeating.