Posted on 04/05/2002 8:45:54 PM PST by Brian Kopp DPM
Versus 47,000 who aren't.
I understand how you people feel and believe about the priesthood. The truth is that being a priest is that for many it is a thankless, lonely job. Besides they don't have the "hands-on" experience and knowledge of what it is like to be married and have a family. Some of them are ashamed to go out in public wearing their collars because of the scandals. They constantly have to put up with bickering and bitching about petty things. People go behind their backs and complain about them to the bishop.
Lots of them try to get into situations where they can pursue their interests and stay out of parish life anyway. There are tons of priests running things that don't have anything to do with parishes.
It is selfish for people to expect them to forego what they are unwilling to give up themselves. They want father to be something no person is equipped to be. Perfect.
Jesus will get his 144,000 who are undefiled with women without all priests having to take vows of celibacy. It is an unattainable ideal in this life for most. Even if you miraculously preserve your virtue, you have no idea of the pain some of them go through in the process. Leaving is probably unthinkable for many because they would feel a deep sense of failure and inadequacy. Do you really want and expect them to suffer like that for God?
Is that what you want? Plenty of them in the rest of the world don't keep their vows anyway.
I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. Every branch of mine that bears no fruit, He takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit He prunes, that it may bear more fruit." John 15:1-2
The Catholic Church is being pruned. Alleluia!!!
I hope they will. How can the media print it's harmful to the boys if the homosexual is a priest but not if he's in another career? When the Church throws these men out, they will seek other jobs like teaching and they'll do the same thing ---if they hurt boys as priests, they'll hurt them when they're not priests. There can't be some special right to sue only if the homosexual that fondled you is a priest but that you don't get a single dime if he is a teacher or boy scout leader. I think these lawsuits will set some kind of precedent ---that institutions are responsible to the children who are in their care and that allowing homosexuals to be around children is a big financial risk.
When God gives someone a true vocation, He gives them all the graces to do whatever it is He wants them to do. Believing otherwise is not giving God credit for helping those trying to do His will. God does not ask the impossible, and gives one the graces necessary to do His will.
The only problem with that is watching Mass on TV does not fulfill the Sunday obligation (or Holy Days of obligation).
But I agree it's better to have good priests than to worry about cutting the number in half.
That's probably the way it is supposed to be, was intended to be. In practice, there have always been terrible scandals which were more easily covered over in the past.
The press actually believes that and will print the homosexual gospel in the name of the god of tolerance.
As I see it!
Based on previous things in the secular community and media, how can you believe this is eye opening?
Just the other day we had the press covering 2000 Palestinians in New York protesting and there were plenty of press there siding with them and pushing the theme that Israel = Nazi.
If these people saw God come down in a chariot of fire and proclaim homosexuality as an abomination (AGAIN), the headlines would read :
RELIGIOUS ACTIVIST POLUTES SKY AND CAUSES A FIRE HAZARD WHILE PREACHING INTOLERANCE!
The press is full of mostly lost souls. Don't hold your breath waiting for them to change their spots.
And the problem with that ---in these lawsuits, the victims aren't claiming it was religion that harmed them but that it was homosexual predators that harmed them. It was being lured into homosexuality that caused them their grief.
Has anyone in the mainstream media mentioned this?
Not to mention the whole Juanita Broaddrick scandal with Clinton.
Prof. Dershowitz began screaming about "sexual McCarthyism"
when it was a liberal politician who was the focus of attention
in sex crime investigations. So Clinton and Michael Jackson get free passes?
The only people who find the "job" as thankless and lonely are the men who have, unfortunately been poorly spiritually formed. But the priesthood was not designed to be a job, it was designed by God to be a special calling. The only lonely priests I've ever known were ones who were not actively working on their spiritual lives. More chances than not, they were not fully spiritually-formed when they were ordained, usually through no fault of their own.
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