Posted on 07/02/2010 6:56:08 PM PDT by Desdemona
Today’s New York Times, with another front-page attack on Pope Benedict XVI, erases any possible doubt that America’s most influential newspaper has declared an editorial jihad against this pontificate. Abandoning any sense of editorial balance, journalistic integrity, or even elementary logic, the Times looses a 4,000-word barrage against the Pope: an indictment that is not supported even by the content of this appalling story. Apparently the editors are relying on sheer volume of words, and repetition of ugly details, to substitute for logical argumentation.
The thrust of the argument presented by the Times is that prior to his election as Pontiff, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger did not take decisive action to punish priests who abused children. Despite its exhaustive length, the story does not present a single new case to support that argument. The authors claim, at several points in their presentation, that as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), Cardinal Ratzinger had the authority to take action. But then, again and again, they quote knowledgeable Church officials saying precisely the opposite.
The confusion over lines of authority at the Vatican was so acute, the Times reports, that in the year 2000 a group of bishops met in Rome to present their concerns. That meeting led eventually to the change in policy announced by Pope John Paul II the following year, giving the CDF sole authority over disciplinary action against priests involved in sexual abuse. By general consensus the 2001 policy represented an important step forward in the Vatican’s handling of the problem, and it was Cardinal Ratzinger who pressed for that policy change. How does that sequence of events justify criticism of the future Pope? It doesn’t. But the facts do not deter the Times.
The Times writers show their bias with their flippant observation that when he might have been fighting sexual abuse, during the 1980s and 1990s Cardinal Ratzinger was more prominent in his pursuit of doctrinal orthodoxy. But then, while until 2001 it was not clear which Vatican office was primarily responsible for sexual abuse, it was clear that the CDF was responsible for doctrinal orthodoxy. Cardinal Ratzinger’s primary focus was on his primary job.
After laying out the general argument against the Vatican’s inaction—and implying that Cardinal Ratzinger was responsible for that inaction, disregarding the ample evidence that other prelates stalled his efforts—the Times makes the simply astonishing argument that local diocesan bishops were more effective in their handling of sex-abuse problems. That argument is merely wrong; it is comically absurd.
During the 1980s and 1990s, as some bishops were complaining about the confusion at the Vatican, bishops in the US and Ireland, Germany and Austria, Canada and Italy were systematically covering up evidence of sexual abuse, and transferring predator-priests to new parish assignments to hide them from scrutiny. The revelations of the past decade have shown a gross dereliction of duty on the part of diocesan bishops. Indeed the ugly track record has shown that a number of diocesan bishops were themselves abusing children during those years.
So how does the Times have the temerity to suggest that the diocesan bishops needed to educate the Vatican on the proper handling of this issue? The lead witness for the Times story is Bishop Geoffrey Robinson: a former auxiliary of the Sydney, Australia archdiocese, who was hustled into premature retirement in 2004 at the age of 66 because his professed desire to change the teachings of the Catholic Church put him so clearly at odds with his fellow Australian bishops and with Catholic orthodoxy. This obscure Australian bishop, the main source of support for the absurd argument advanced by the Times, is the author of a book on Christianity that has been described as advancing “the most radical changes since Martin Luther started the 16th-century Reformation.” His work has drawn an extraordinary caution from the Australian episcopal conference, which warned that Robinson was at odds with Catholic teaching on “among other things, the nature of Tradition, the inspiration of the Holy Scripture, the infallibility of the Councils and the Pope, the authority of the Creeds, the nature of the ministerial priesthood and central elements of the Church’s moral teaching." Bishop Robinson is so extreme in his theological views that Cardinal Roger Mahony (who is not ordinarily known as a stickler for orthodoxy) barred him from speaking in the Los Angeles archdiocese in 2008. This, again, is the authority on which the Times hangs its argument against the Vatican.
And even the Times story itself, a mess of contradictions, acknowledges:
Bishops had a variety of disciplinary tools at their disposal — including the power to remove accused priests from contact with children and to suspend them from ministry altogether — that they could use without the Vatican’s direct approval.
It is not clear, then, why the Vatican bears the bulk of the responsibility for the sex-abuse scandal. Still less clear is why the main focus of that responsibility should be Pope Benedict. On that score, too, the Times blatantly contradicts its own argument. Buried in the Times story—on the 3rd page in the print edition, in the 46th paragraph of the article—is a report on one Vatican official who stood out at that 2000 meeting in Rome, calling for more effective action on sexual abuse.
An exception to the prevailing attitude, several participants recalled, was Cardinal Ratzinger. He attended the sessions only intermittently and seldom spoke up. But in his only extended remarks, he made clear that he saw things differently from others in the Curia.
That testimony is seconded by a more reliable prelate, Archbishop Philip Wilson of Adelaide:
“The speech he gave was an analysis of the situation, the horrible nature of the crime, and that it had to be responded to promptly,” recalled Archbishop Wilson of Australia, who was at the meeting in 2000. “I felt, this guy gets it, he’s understanding the situation we’re facing. At long last, we’ll be able to move forward.”
The Times story, despite its flagrant bias and distortion, actually contains the evidence to dismiss the complaint. Unfortunately, the damage has already done before the truth comes out: that even a decade ago the future Pope Benedict was the solution, not part of the problem.
And let us not forget that if it was not for the Calvinist colonies imposing their own version of Calvinism upon their jurisdictions and engaging in religious warfare with their (other) Calvinist neighbours and persecuting the Baptists (and others) among them, we would not have the 1st Amendment to the Constitution.
....we should not be surprised to find that the Calvinists took a very important part in American Revolution. Calvin emphasized that the sovereignty of God, when applied to the affairs of government proved to be crucial, because God as the Supreme Ruler had all ultimate authority vested in Him, and all other authority flowed from God, as it pleased Him to bestow it.The Scriptures, God's special revelation of Himself to mankind, were taken as the final authority for all of life, as containing eternal principles, which were for all ages, and all peoples. Calvin based his views on these very Scriptures. As we read earlier, in Paul's letter to the Romans, God's Word declares the state to be a divinely established institution.
History is eloquent in declaring that the American republican democracy was born of Christianity and that form of Christianity was Calvinism. The great revolutionary conflict which resulted in the founding of this nation was carried out mainly by Calvinists--many of whom had been trained in the rigidly Presbyterian college of Princeton....
....In fact, most of the early American culture was Reformed or tied strongly to it (just read the New England Primer). Von Kuehnelt-Leddihn, a Roman Catholic intellectual and National Review contributor, asserts: “If we call the American statesmen of the late eighteenth century the Founding Fathers of the United States, then the Pilgrims and Puritans were the grandfathers and Calvin the great-grandfather…”
-- from the thread John Calvin: Religious liberty and Political liberty
Related threads:
John Calvin, Calvinism, and the founding of America
Calvin's 500th Birthday Celebrated: Critics and Supporters Agree He was America's Founding Father
AMERICA AND JOHN CALVIN
America's debt to John Calvin
Lessons to be learned from Reformation
Theocracy: the Origin of American Democracy
American Government and Christianity - America's Christian Roots
The Faith of the Founders, How Christian Were They
John Calvin: Religious liberty and Political liberty
Abraham Kuyper on American Liberty
The Man Who Founded America
The Puritans and the founding of America
Perhaps Puritans weren't all that bad
Who were the Puritans?
Bible Battles: King James vs. the Puritans
The Heirs of Puritanism: That's Us!
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In Praise of a Puritan America
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Foundations of Faith [Harvard's "Memorial Church" and the university's Puritan roots]
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The Pilgrims and the founding of America
Thanking the Puritans on Thanksgiving: Pilgrims' politics and American virtue
New World, New Ideas: What the Pilgrims and Puritans believed, about God and man and giving thanks
Pilgrims in Providence
A time for thanks
Judge reminds: Faith ‘permeated our culture’ since the Pilgrims
In its 400th year, Jamestown aspires to Plymouth's prominence [huzzah for the Pilgrims!]
Rock of Ages and the rebel pilgrims [understanding the times re Augustus Toplady's famous hymn]
The Protestant Reformation, the "Presbyterian Rebellion", and the Founding of America
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MarkBsnr: And let us not forget that if it was not for the Calvinist Colonies imposing their own version of Calvinism upon their jurisdictions and engaging in religious warfare with their (other) Calvinist neighbours and persecuting the Baptists (and others) among them, we would not have the 1st Amendment to the Constitution.
"There was never a Calvinist influence, but the pervasive Calvinist influence was so bad, they got rid of it"
ROTFL! So which is it?
I will not try to make a claim that Calvinists contributed nothing to the formation of a uniquely American identity and form of government, but I will also not say that the American identity and form of government is uniquely Calvinistic. Like so much of America it is a hybrid, taking the best from the old world and the peoples that came here and rejecting the worst. That included the many Catholics whose names are not as prominant in the history of the revolution as those of the Protestants who, unlike the Catholics, enjoyed the right to vote, hold office, and enter into certain commercial contracts that was forbidden the Catholics.
The notion that our rights spring directly from God and not from a sovereign person or body predates Geneva by many hundreds of years. Aristotle and the Stoics wrote at length of the natural law and the Roman Cicero first defined it in modern terms when he wrote in his De Legibus that "both justice and law derive their origin from God".
The Catholic Church clearly articulated this concept in the writings of Augustine of Hippo, Gratian, and Thomas Aquinas. And do not forget that it was the institution of the Catholic Church that was a constant reminder that there was always a power greater than the state that all men must answer to for their deeds.
PLEASE ASSURE ME . . .
I mean . . . that assertion is sooooooooooooooooooooooooo
unmitigatedly !WRONG! AND UNTRUE TO REALITY
as to leave many of us thinking that
y’all must have been living at the far end of Carlsbad Caverns lo these many decades . . . without a shred of input from the outside world.
About the time I think an RC assertion of thoroughly rank falsehood can’t be any lower or MORE UNTRUE . . . someone lowers the bar.
INDEED TO THE MAX.
That's a given but it's so much bigger than that.
INDEED.
WELL DONE.
WELL PUT.
However, as we have seen relentlessly hereon,
a huge chunk of RC’s and all their rabid cliques seem to have absolutely no respect for nor interest in
true facts or THE TRUTH . . . about much of anything.
INDEED.
When one expects the government, be it political or religious, to shoulder their personal responsibility that person will ultimately deny any culpability.
So despite all their rhetoric about free will it is actually a concept that scares them to death such that they are willing to submit to the bondage of some greater human authority.
However, when one believes that they were saved from the beginning of time and that no deed, misdeed, or inaction will change that of what importance is culpability?
I hope your prosperity gospel is working out ok for you!
.
When one expects the government, be it political or religious, to shoulder their personal responsibility that person will ultimately deny any culpability.
So despite all their rhetoric about free will it is actually a concept that scares them to death such that they are willing to submit to the bondage of some greater human authority.
WELL PUT...THX.
So true...
And we wouldn't even try to produce good works; so we avoid the Catholic Faith at all cost...And that's because we know that any good works that we, or you guys produce are as filthy rags to God...
Eph 3:20 Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us,
Any good works that we do travel from God to us...Any good works that travel from us to God belong and end up in the dung heap...
If that person understands his/her condition that in all facets of their life their default reflex is to rebel against God and yet God in his grace substituted his own son for them, and they trust that fact, then that person will be prone to react with gratitude toward God of which one of the responses will be to acknowledge their culpability.
So despite all their rhetoric about free will it is actually a concept that scares them to death such that they are willing to submit to the bondage of some greater human authority.
It is a sublime irony, isn't it?
The Roman Catholic champions free will and then turns over his will and God-given conscience to a fallible magisterium.
The Calvinist believes in God's sovereign predestination of all things, and so he willingly and joyfully trusts in the Lord for all things.
All things.
"For who maketh thee to differ from another? and what hast thou that thou didst not receive?" -- 1 Corinthians 4:7
"For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, and by him all things consist." -- Colossians 1:16-17 And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose." -- Romans 8:28
INDEED.
That's a given but it's so much bigger than that.
Wow. What a barren and ungrateful perspective. Look at what you've just said. "Bigger" than Jesus Christ being with us now and every day of our lives until the end of time???
What in creation could possibly be "bigger" than that?!?
Wonder what counter-Reformer thought to sign up for that name?
I'm not surprised most of the RC's run off to their caucus threads when I see comments about things being bigger than Jesus Christ being with us forever.
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