It Was Us Against Them: Does Mahony Want A Priestless Church?

Los Angeles Lay Catholic Mission ^ | March, 2001 | Robert Kumpel

[american colleen]

While Father Z isn't sure about Mahony's plans for a priestless Church, he believes the archdiocesan hostility to traditional Catholicism has taken its toll on vocations. "I do know that a lot of priests have left. The cardinal likes a certain kind of priest. You can tell that they don't want vocations, because they do nothing to inspire vocations. He's purposely put a very liberal, feminist Sister (Kathy Bryant) as the vocations person.

"I think if we got a reasonable archbishop of Los Angeles, all of a sudden things would just switch. There's such a small minority of the real liberals and 'protestantized' Catholics that things would switch right away."

If Father Z's assessment of Mahony seems to contradict his gentle public image, Father Z is not alone in his view. Both Father Y and Father Z are firghtened of Mahony and spoke only on assurance of anonymity. "The cardinal is a tough man," one explained. "He will just crush you. He won't stop. I know of a priest who spoke out against something the cardinal was behind and he would not back off until the priest resigned. He even threatened to withdraw financial support. He has a lot of power because Los Angeles is one of the richest dioceses in the world and money is power. That's one of the biggest ways he throws his weight around.

"I pray for a real conversion (for Mahony). If he were to convert he would just be a powerhouse for the Church. He is a very engaging person. When he's in your presence, he really wins you over. He has a way of gauging you and he holds all his cards to his chest. He lets you break the ground and, once that happens, he's very agreeable to whatever you say. Everyone walks away from him saying, 'what a wonderful man!' When you're with him one on one, he really does fool you. It's when you find out what he's done later that you realize what you're dealing with, and it's not gentle. I know a lot of priests who have suffered under him. If you want holy priests, you need a holy bishop."

I attempted several times to reach Sister Kathy Bryant for response. She did not return my phone calls before this article went to press.

[american colleen]

It is so sad. I think we need a leader, like history_matters or siobhan, or father elijah. It always seemed to me that one poster in particular always set the tone, and the leadership was just something that flowed from them. Polycarp is busy with other things and he was always getting it from "outside" anyway...

[american colleen]

Oh! I was talking about FR and the CC being rudderless! I've never felt the Church was rudderless, just that a lot of the members are deaf.

[american colleen]

I was home today and I had EWTN on as I went about my business. I saw quite a few Cardinals speak at different Masses, and I had the feeling I was waiting for them to do something... recapture? regroup? I don't know, I can't explain it. But they seem kind of lost or maybe it is that they've lost something, I don't know. I'm not that perceptive and even if I could figure out what it is that is missing, I don't think I could verbalize it.

[american colleen]

I just like to cut through the words and get to the bottom of stuff. Too many words mess me up, that's all.

[Polycarp]

Oh, good!

One thing I've been mulling over though is that the fact we are all guests here and there is no "leader" means that no one individual can impose an agenda on the rest of the Catholic Caucus. While personal websites and even larger internet apostolates can succumb to one individual's agenda or myopia or cult of personality, that simply cannot happen here.

The Catholic Caucus therefore has ended up being a challenge to all to learn, and embrace, and spread robust orthodoxy.

The only measuring stick against which any of us measure up is that of Roman Catholic orthodoxy, and adherence to the Teachings of the Pope and the Magisterium with him.

Yes, it leaves us rudderless to a certain degree but that also imposes a certain discipline of its own, and given the knowledge, zeal, and effort of most of the Catholic Caucus, peer pressure here forges ahead towards orthodoxy.

Besides, the most outspoken posters are usually Type A personalities in the first place, all "leaders' in their own right.

If there were a crowned "leader" there would also eventually be mutinies.

I like the way FR exists at present in relation to the Catholic Caucus. The problem lies in interrelations here.

[sitetest]

Dear Colleen,

"You have to just assume that the person has good intentions,..."

I agree.


sitetest

[Askel5]

After making the hike up the hill to the castle, I blew off the tour (as is my usual practice) and kept climbing the trail into the trees to look down at it and his parent's place in the distance. Reading your comments, I'm now confident I did the right thing. =)

[Polycarp]

That's just what I was thinking as I typed that. Saint Faustina, pray for us!

"Stretch out your hand toward heaven, and let darkness, darkness so thick that it can be felt cover the land." (Ex. 10:21)

"The day of wrath is coming to root out the sinners from the earth. On that day, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give her light." (Is.13:10)

"...before the final day of justice arrives: all the light of the heavens will be totally extinguished. There will be a great darkness over the whole earth. Then a great sign of the cross will appear in the sky."  (Our Lord to Blessed Faustina)

"Immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give her light. The sign of the son of man will appear in the heavens." (Matt. 24:30)

"It will be a day dark with cloud, the end of an epoch for the nations." (Ezek.30:3)

"That day will be sprung on you suddenly, like a trap! It will come down on everyone living on the face of the earth!" (Luke 21:35)

"Take some of the blood of the lamb, and put it above the lintel of your doorway's. This shall serve to mark your houses. When I see the blood, I will pass over you, and you shall escape the plague when I strike the land." (Ex. 12: 7 & 14)

"Happy is the one who shall dwell under the shelter of these rays, for the just hand of God shall not lay hold of him. The two rays symbolize the blood and water which poured forth from the depths of my mercy when my agonized heart was pierced by a lance on the cross.  " (Our Lord to Blessed Faustina)

[american colleen]

I agree with everything you posted.

But I don't mean an appointed leader at all. There always just seemed to be one poster (at least I think so, but this is just my perception) who seemed to post common sense orthodox posts without causing any great ruckus. And most of the CC seemed to gravitate to that person and what follwed was mostly discussion, some debate, not much controversy. History_matters was like that. Father_Elijah was, too. Siobhan as well, but off and on since she has always been off and on FR. Oddly, I think the scandal also united us for a while. I hope that the unity hasn't faded because we are letting the scandal fall aside a bit... all the work is ahead of us and not behind us. In my own case, I've gotten the courage to say things and act on things (outside of FR, I mean) because of the CC - I know I am not alone here in orthodoxville. Like last week, I had a question on Tabernacle placement (and a couple of other things) that is very pertinent for me at the moment. All of you came to my aid with either documentation or stories of how to deal with it.

[Askel5]

"This guy was a flaming fairy."

Not loudly? That's a pity.

We had a woman running for a bench in Juvenile court in the offices yesterday. As a CASA who has spent much time in the courtroom of her opponent (a jar-head haircut butch black woman for whom the average wait is 45 minutes to an hour and a half and who BERATES people on issues dear to her heart but having NOTHING to do with the case), I was interested in some of the chit chat after the prepared comments. One of our attorneys -- an extremely mild-mannered, perfectly polite and always excruciatingly prepared young man -- commented that he'd been raked over the coals by the judge in question and couldn't for the life of him understand why.

"You are a white male," I said.

Folks were shocked ... particularly some of our more PC women attorneys. It was delicious.

Another moment that comes to mind is once upon a time at the Barnes and Noble on the Plaza in KC where there is a railed open atrium alongside one edge of which the escalators run. My sister on the first floor spotted me on the third and gave me an exasperated "Can we Puleeeeeze Leave now?" look.

I leaned over the rail and called to her ... "JUST A SECOND ... I CAN'T FIND THE HETEROSEXUAL SECTION!!" You could have heard a pin drop. =)

[american colleen]

"You are a white male," I said.

Wish I was there! I get in trouble for saying stuff like that all the time!

The Barnes and Noble story was great. Now, I'm not quick enough to come up with something like that. Wish I coulda heard it though. Did the latte drinking customers spit the latte all over themselves in indignation?

[american colleen]

Just wanted to let you know that you've been a leader on and off, too. But you always have these snipers taking potshots at you from the building across the street, so your posts can get heated and somewhat off topic!

[Askel5]

What complete and utter BS. Anyone who refuses to associate with a hypocrite is a heretic? Why even bother posting here anymore? It seems there is an Inquisition live and well here which seeks out anyone who refuses to blind themselves and fall in line. Disgusting.

Well ... you post here so that folks like Smedley can provide you the scholarship and point you in the right direction for answers to your questions.

The Donatist heresy is a new one on me as well.

My loyalty is to God, God's servants and God's Word, not to agents of the dark side or fallen human beings who are well entrenched in our Church. Open your eyes.

I am not Calvinist who believes God creates evil or purposefully uses evil (like a pragmatist) knowing he's got the ability to pull Good like a rabbit out of his hat by the end of the show.

That said, I see no reason Christ would be constrained by the sins of a single man who -- although bent and possibly evil himself -- still has the dispensation to celebrate Mass.

I think Tolkein has a really interesting quote that -- while not centered exactly on the priest -- is possible an excellent exercise for all of us who cringe at the ignorant and non-traditional Catholic (of whose number I was myself not so very long ago).

Out of the darkness of my life, so much frustrated, I put before you the one great thing to love on earth: the Blessed Sacrament …. There you will find romance, glory, honor, fidelity, and the true way of all your loves upon earth, and more than that: Death: by the divine paradox, that which ends all life, and demands the surrender of all, and yet by the taste of which alone can what you seek in your earthly relationships be maintained, or take on that complexion of reality, of eternal endurance, which every man's heart desires …

The only cure for sagging or fainting faith is Communion.

Though always itself, perfect and complete and inviolate, the Blessed Sacrament does not operate completely and once for all in any of us. Like the act of faith, it must be continuous and grow by exercise. Frequency is of the highest effect. Seven times a week is more nourishing than seven times at intervals.

Also, I can recommend this as an exercise: make your Communion in circumstances that affront your taste. Choose a snuffling or gabbling priest or a proud and vulgar friar; and a church full of the usual bourgeois crowd, ill-behaved children - from those who yell to the products of Catholic schools who the moment the tabernacle is opened sit back and yawn - open necked and dirty youths, women in trousers and often with hair both unkempt and uncovered.

Go to Communion with them (and pray for them). It will be just the same as a Mass said beautifully by a visibly holy man, and shared by a few devout and decorous people. (It could not be worse than the mess of the feeding of the Five Thousand - after which our Lord propounded the feeding that was to come.)

[Askel5]

You don't know the slightest thing about me and have completely misinterpreted what I said.

Wow ... some firebrand posts, there, Goldengirl.

As a matter of fact, use of "BS" and assorted sailor lingo in a theological discussion as well as personal attacks (to include the linking of Smedley to Mahoney somehow) don't leave much room for misinterpretation and does tell the objective bystander quite a lot about you, I'm afraid.

[Polycarp]

There always just seemed to be one poster (at least I think so, but this is just my perception) who seemed to post common sense orthodox posts without causing any great ruckus. And most of the CC seemed to gravitate to that person and what follwed was mostly discussion, some debate, not much controversy. History_matters was like that. Father_Elijah was, too. Siobhan as well, but off and on since she has always been off and on FR.

Seems so long ago. Sad how quickly/how much our world changed in the last year.

Oddly, I think the scandal also united us for a while.

I have my own theory about that...

We were united while we saw hope that orthodox Catholic apologetics and activism like that engaged in here by the Catholic Caucus could help make a difference, hold the hierarchy's feet to the fire, and get them to address the real crisis in the Church, i.e., heterodoxy in moral theology and its corrolary, laxity in liturgy.

Dallas came and went, lots of headlines promised heads would roll and reforms would come and the underlying crisis that gave birth to the sex scandals would be rooted out and replaced by orthodoxy.

Then the headlines fell off the radar screen, the bishops puffed up their chests and promised great things in front of cameras knowing damn well they had no intent to change, and Rome...seemingly said, "You made your bed, now sleep in it."

False hope of Light and roses and springtimes of the faith just around the corner have given way to the still dawning reality that not a damn thing has been done, nothing has changed, and the messengers and prophets of God, such as Michael Rose and Bruskiewics, have been either ignored (the latter) or pulled down off the city walls and mugged (the former.)

If possible, things are actually worse now than prior to the hierarchy's Rome meeting and Dallas meeting.

Now the liberals know nothing of substance has or will come out of the crisis, the secular media colluded with them in once again putting the homosexual infiltration of the priesthood back into the closet, and they are even more emboldened than before the homopederast crisis broke early this year.

On the heels of Dallas we see not a plan to rid our Church of its sexual immorality but plans to quit evangelizing non-Catholics, and committees telling Catholics they may no longer kneel to receive the Real Presence in Holy Communion.

In other words, the problems here right now are merely reflecting the reality sinking into the subconscious of many Catholics.

We've been had, but we cannot put our finger on it.

Our anger from the revelations of the homoperast crisis has not been vented in seeing real progress. Instead we've been punched in the teeth and told to shut up, and that our anger is simply peasant bigotry and uppityness.

I'm still mad. But its now rolling over into sheer frustration and verging on...not despair...but resignation that NOTHING will change now short of Divine Intervention, and the Church my children will inherit will be one where this crisis is still only beginning to be addressed.

Maybe I'm projecting. Maybe not.

The whole Church turned a corner after Dallas. It turned the wrong corner, and its dawning on us and troubling us and leading to these outbursts and fights even between orthodox Catholics.

[Askel5]

You are ignorant and your faith is shallow and perhaps even nonexistent. You can think whatever you want but ask that priest after Mass next Sunday about the efficacy of the Sacraments being dependent upon the worthiness of the priest. Once he answers call him a pea brain too, you cretin.

Clearly, I missed some kind of knock-down drag out here to which I probably shouldn't have gotten involved.

I see no reason to respond in kind. Particularly where ignorance and emotion are the problem (and especially where someone's using filthy language and malicious attacks), probably better just to let the links lie.

Royalist cleaned my clock a time or two but never called me a cretin. Besides, he knew I was genuinely interested in being set in the fire, beaten flat, plunged into the water ... whatever it took to temper me.