THE CHURCH'S FAIRY PRINCES

Weakland faces the press

We have reached a point in the history of the Church where Cardinals, Princes of the Church, have openly called for the legitimization of unnatural vice.  It is true and we can no longer turn our heads away and say this is impossible in the Church of Christ.  As low a point as that is in Catholicism's history it is I fear only a harbinger of things to come.


When men such as these feel comfortable about speaking their minds on this subject it is a sure sign that a festering problem is going to get far more serious before any healing can begin.  And it shows that they sense if not a kindred spirit at least a weakling in Peter's Chair who will not oppose them.  The following article sums up this new situation concisely:

 http://chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it/articolo/1350534?eng=y

Recall that we are not talking about disgraced homosexuals like Rembert Weakland, or un-"outed" ones like Bernardin (and God knows who else), who are no longer in power.  We are speaking about Cardinals who are heading major dioceses, like Schonborn.  Their prestige will undoubtedly embolden other prelates, who will come forward with their own declarations of "tolerance" toward this unspeakable perversion.  With a perceived weakling in the papacy such expressions of sympathy and support for sodomy are likely to increase.

Whether it is bravado, stupidity, cunning or an overly trustful humility that animates the current Pope's views on this subject he seems not at all troubled by appointing to high positions people who have no trouble looking the other way when it comes to sex perversion.  It cannot be naivete, not at this late date.  Can it be bravado?  Does the Holy Father believe that he has the situation well under control and that he has the capability to handle it nicely, and that we in the pew should not trouble ourselves over it?  Is it simple stupidity: that he doesn't think it is really that big of a deal?  Surely not.  Can it be cunning?  That he is willfully protecting these men?  One doesn't even like to think that that could be true.

Is he so simple, so "overly trustful" in the goodness of mankind that he believes his smiles and his leniency will wash away all this evil?  I truly hope not.  He did promise to "look into it".  Still waiting......

Where does that leave us?

We do know that some in high positions in Rome have adopted the preposterous current view that sex deviates are "born that way".  That being the case we should not be surprised if soon we hear that felons, adulterers, wife beaters and bank robbers are also born that way.  Since there is no longer any sin in the world, let alone mortal sin, all these things must somehow be seen as merely different ways of living.  We must, to use Vaticanese, "accept" and "love" them....and never suggest that perhaps a visit to the confessional might be a good idea in the long run.

This is the twisted thinking that now has found a home in the minds of certain prelates in the Catholic Church.

That some of these Cardinals are secret homosexuals there seems little doubt.

Then there is the thorny but very real problem of blackmail.  Throughout recent political history homosexual blackmail has been a very effective tool used by villains to get things done.  The British spy scandals of decades ago gives us a clear picture of how this works.  Homosexual blackmail was effectively used by Soviet Russia to gain information from buggering government workers who had access to classified information.  It is being used today by Israelis.  And I have no doubt whatever that the USA, thanks to the capabilities of the NSA, is engaging in it too.  We must therefore assume that it is being used in certain circles of the Church.  For example, the fact that Rembert Weakland enjoys a fairly peaceful and comfortable retirement instead of being exiled to a monastery in Sudan is probably indicative of the fact that he knows a few things that might embarrass some higher-ups in Rome.  If someone else has an explanation for why this man was never canonically dealt with - and instead enjoyed the "acceptance" at their Episcopal installations by such men as Timothy Dolan and Jerome Listecki - I would like to hear it.  Why are men like Vincent Nichols and Donald Wuerl promoted far above not only their Catholicity but their competence?  It would be, I believe, quite naive to attribute there elevated status merely to normal Vatican protocol.

Hilaire Belloc once famously wrote:

"We sit by and watch the Barbarian, we tolerate him; in the long stretches of peace we are not afraid. We are tickled by his irreverence, his comic inversion of our old certitudes and our fixed creeds refreshes us; we laugh. But as we laugh we are watched by large and awful faces from beyond: and on these faces there is no smile". 

He might as well have been talking about those who watch South Park as well as our current Princes of the Church who also delightedly revel in their inversion of our old certitudes.  But those prelates who engage in these inversions might wish to take especial note of Mr Belloc's last words in this quotation: those watching from above are not amused.    

What do we do?  Other than heartfelt and consistent prayer, and emulating Saints like St Anthony who held his Bishop's feet to the fire ("And now you, O mitred one!"), and demanding with our voices and our blogs that Bishops start acting like Bishops of the Catholic Church, I have no clue.

But one thing seems clear enough.  God wants us to do something about this.