"Michael Rose is trucking with pope-bashers and marketing his books through them,..."
Oh my! How dreadful! Mr. Rose permits his book to be sold by people to whom Mr. Hand takes exception. Well, I see his point! Anyone who publishes a book ought to be very careful about whom he permits to sell it! And we who purchase books, likely ought to be very careful not to buy books that are sold through people to whom Mr. Hand takes exception.
Oh dear. I was just looking at books available at Angelus Press (associated with SSPX). It seems that they're selling the St. Joseph First Communion Catechism AND the St. Joseph Baltimore Catechism! We have been using these two books for homeschool catechism for our son! NOW what should I do? My pastor approved these! Perhaps he is an evil "off the rails" sort of traditionalist! I hadn't known! He gives no evidence of it! He never speaks out against the pope! He uniformly celebrates the Mass of Pope Paul VI! I'm not sure he even knows any Latin!
And... worse yet... Angelus Press is selling... St. Thomas Aquinas' Summa Theologica! I have a copy at home! Perhaps I should go home and burn it! One doesn't want to be associated with those awful SSPXers by buying books that one might be able to buy at their site. Likewise, Mr. Rose really ought not permit his own works to be sold by folks with whom Mr. Hand has a problem.
Mr. Hand is long on assertions and accusations, but short on logically-sound arguments and specifics. That Mr. Rose's book is promoted at The Diocese Report or The Wanderer or The Remnant or some other place with which Mr. Hand has a problem is little more than guilt by association.
At church, I know and love many Catholics who are, let's say, not entirely orthodox. They are dissenters. You know a bunch, I know a bunch, everyone here knows a bunch. If topics come up related to Church teaching, I have no problem letting 'em know where they aren't quite in sync with the Magisterium. Gently. With charity. But firmly.
Nonetheless, I GO TO CHURCH with these people. I eat with them. Sometimes, I play with them. We do church activities together. Some of them are in my Knights of Columbus Council with me. We give away Tootsie Rolls together, collecting money for the mentally-handicapped. We do things for our local crisis pregnancy center together. We hold parties for the kids of the parish, we take care of the needs of families when someone dies. We visit the sick, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and yes, some of us even care for those who are in prison.
I suppose that by my association with these people, with whom I am not in agreement about the status of Church teaching, I'm just as "off the rails" as they are.
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Or let's take those who think our Holy Father shouldn't have held the event at Assisi. It's true that one can get carried away and move from reasonable criticism to unreasonable attack. But to say that our Holy Father was wrong to hold the event at Assisi, as Campion has pointed out, isn't to attack the pope. I have a more benign view of what occured at Assisi, but many of the folks who view it dimly are not attacking the pope.
I think that the key sentence in Mr. Hand's effort here is this:
"When, earlier, I saw my old friends moving toward the cliffs of schism, well beyond constructive criticism, when they refused to hear the warnings, I knew it was time to bail."
As he watched his old friends move toward schism, he was certainly right to speak his mind to them. He was certainly right to take a stand apart from what it was they were doing, thinking, and believing. To "bail" on schism is a really good thing to do. But, apparently, he also bailed on his friends, themselves. It may have been necessary. It may be that the only way he could escape being swallowed up in their schismatic views (if, indeed, his friends really were schismatics) was to leave them. Okay.
Not everyone who works with, or is friends with, or who has business dealings with or through, a "schismatic" is also a schismatic. Not everyone who associates with people who are imperfectly orthodox is called to disassociate with them. Perhaps the less orthodox might be positively influenced by the more orthodox with whom they have associations. Perhaps that's what God wants.
Mr. Hand should be careful in applying the lessons of his own life broadly to the lives of others. They may not fit other people's lives quite as well.
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