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.
BAWAHAHAHA!
So it's the Protestants fault that Roman Bishops didn't discipline Roman pedophiles?
FK is right. All these rationalizations are classic Clintonian machinations.
I think I know the origin of "I'm With Stupid" t-shirts. Is there is gift shop in Rome?
Protestants do not grasp the concept of Catholics being both free and obedient at the same time because they use a completely different theological dictionary and reference point.
Protestant obedience has its roots in Islam and the parallels to the teachings of Calvin and Mohammad are frightening. Both demand complete submission as the functioning definition of obedience. Further, both preach predestination which negates the need for freedom.
The Catholic Church defines obey (from the Latin ob-audire, to "hear or listen to") in faith is to submit freely to the word that has been heard, because its truth is guaranteed by God, who is Truth itself. Abraham is the model of such obedience offered us by Sacred Scripture. The Virgin Mary is its most perfect embodiment.
The Church affirms that God created us in freedom and with it obliges us with consequences exercise it. Freedom is the power to act or not to act, and so to perform deliberate acts of one's own. Freedom attains perfection in its acts when directed toward God, the sovereign Good. Freedom characterizes properly human acts. It makes the human being responsible for acts of which he is the voluntary agent. His deliberate acts properly belong to him.
Alone among all animate beings, man can boast of having been counted worthy to receive a law from God: as an animal endowed with reason, capable of understanding and discernment, he is to govern his conduct by using his freedom and reason, in obedience to the One who has entrusted everything to him. The right to the exercise of freedom, especially in religious and moral matters, is an inalienable requirement of the dignity of man. But the exercise of freedom does not entail the putative right to say or do anything.
Within this context it is obvious why those who have rejected Christ's Church in the name of repressors who call themselves reformers just don't get it.
Unfortunately, many of your coreligionists on this forum are infected with a form of political correctness thinking that manifests itself like dispatches from Move-On.
LOL!
The useful idiots sure eat up the manure from the NY Slimes don’t they? Their fetish gets the best of them.
HMMMM
Lots of gold. Lots of pictures of popes. Lots of rosaries.
I didn’t see any Bibles in those photos, however.
This explanation seems to me to ignore the process by which a bishop becomes a bishop. While my reading indicated a somewhat complicated process, two key elements were that approval was required by the appropriate congregation of the Roman Curia (Vatican) and that the actual appointment was made directly by the Pope. The Vatican cannot simply install these people and then wash its hands of everything they do or don't do.
The attitude I seem to be getting from apologists is that the Vatican/Pope chooses the bishops (who then choose the priests) but after that all bets are off and the Vatican/Pope then bears no responsibility for what happens later. For example, you said:
That the Pope is ultimately in charge of this matters is half the truth. He mostly works through delegation to bishops who are sovereign in their dioceses. While he can in principle dismiss a bishop, it is a highly unusual thing to do, and we Catholics don’t like innovation.
It's not a half truth if the Pope CHOSE the bishop in the first place! :) Of course the Pope is ultimately in charge because he chose the bishop, has FULL authority over him, and the at-will right of removal. Given the scope of the scandal I find the rarity of removal to be damning rather than exculpatory. It gives all the appearance of the Pope not wanting to admit a mistake and doubling-down on a wrong choice made.
Ah welllll.
I don’t think pics of rubber ‘Bibles’ would impress me anyway.
good points.
“Liberals know that Pope Benedict is a good man and can effectively reform the Church in the way it is supposed to be reformed ... with solid Catholic Christian values, which is the last thing they want. They want those “progressive” Catholics.”
Bingo.
This is completely wrong. No new Dogmas or Doctrines were declared in Vatican II. The Council was Pastoral, not Doctrinal. Some people choose to act as though anything any Catholic authority, Pope or otherwise, says or writes at any time is considered infallible but that is certainly not the case. At best, a document coming out of a pastoral council can be seen as an extension of The Magisterium in some of its points and not others. Certainly, any kind of wild post facto interpretation such as used to makes changes in liturgy are anything but infallible.
Its not just the liberals that worry and work to hinder the works of BXVI. The greatest perceived threat to the Protestant denominations is the glory of the Catholic Church. By definition their identities and existence are predicated upon their opposition to and differentiation from the Catholic Church.
All efforts to remove the tarnish will be met with scorn and derision. He will continue to be personally attacked for circumstances of his birth, for problems that preceded him, for being an all powerful tyrant and for being powerless.
In the end the Church will prevail as it always has and the so-called reformers will be relegated to the ash heap of heresies with so many others.
Amen.
Ghoulish.
Those poster go to every dang religeous thread and spread lies.
I would encourage all Christians here at FR to ignore them.
If this forum had a hide post feature I would block out the whole bunch of demons.
The only decent threads I have found is the ones Nyer/Salvation label as caucus.
“Not to mention the useful idiots who would otherwise disregard anything the NYT writes.”
Deep inside, they loathe Christ. It eats them up inside.
You can sense their anger and maliciousness, outwardly toward the Catholic Church but also toward Jesus Christ himself.
“Feeding the vocal anti-Catholic lower classes who frequent FR is only a windfall.”
Indeed they are. I’m sorry to say the reading stereotypes are true.
How fast does light travel in your universe?
I'm curious, because there are apparently vast differences between where you're from and the current reality the rest of us inhabit.
I have news for you, friend. "Protestants", or Evangelicals if you'd like to use a more accurate term, don't think about the Roman Catholic church any more than they think about Mormonism or any other lost cult awash in dead rituals and manufactured theology.
And as for the "glory" of the Catholic church, I guess the rest of us sorta missed it, what with all the pedophilia, earthly power-mongering, and a Hitler Youth pontiff blocking our view.
When you've got the Holy Spirit guiding your life, Jesus paying for all your sins once and for all regardless of any works on your part, and the Father welcoming you as if you were his own perfect child without any earthly intercession, the RC organization just isn't important enough to care about. Sorry.
We're just not that into you.
Fail... on knowledge of the Catholic faith and general logic.
C- for reading comprehension.
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