As an ashamed former Catholic, I hope these nuts succeed in completely destroying the Catholic Church once and for all:
In an episode called “Catholic Tea Party,” Voris said: “Catholics need to be aware and studied and knowledgeable enough about the faith to recognize a heretical nun or a traitorous priest or bishop when they see one — not so they can vote them out of office, but so they can pray for them, one, and alert as many other Catholics as possible to their treachery, two.”
The blog “Bryan Hehir Exposed” is aimed at a top adviser to Boston Cardinal Sean O’Malley, the Rev. J. Bryan Hehir, who is the former head of national Catholic Charities and a professor at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government. Among the bloggers’ claims is that Hehir is a Marxist sympathizer who undermines Catholic teaching on abortion and marriage.
There are still a lot of good people who go to mass, a lot of good people who work in the church in one capacity or another. That’s a shame, given that increasingly the Church functions as a front for right-wing extremism…and that’s when it’s not busy covering up sex crimes. It would be much better if the Church consisted of the small portion of the population that agrees with Vatican hierarchy lunacy and if everyone else took their business elsewhere.
fourlegsgood
That’s one of the more fucked up things I’ve read this week.
R-Jud
I’m pretty sure Benny 16 and his closest minions would agree with you on that one.
Martin
They came first for the heretical nuns and traitorous priests,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Marxist sympathizer…
jacy
My poor devout Catholic husband keeps waiting for the day when the Catholic church break up and an American Catholic church springs up that doesn’t follow the Vatican and Pope Crazypants. He swears it’s coming. (Even his mom hates the Pope, and that’s saying something).
I myself am not holding my breath.
Which all makes me glad that my parents made sure I never had a religion I would have to eventually abandon.
ETA: what’s the over/under on how long this thread takes to devolve into a slapfight?
Sasha
As a practicing Catholic (because I’m still not any good at it), I prefer the reverse, wherein the small portion of the population that slavishly agrees with Vatican hierarchy lunacy takes their business elsewhere (see Sedevacantism).
Michael
I still blame Ronald Reagan and that asshole JPII.
eemom
we can haz religion flame war?
El Cid
See? It’s the same on both sides!
Citizen Alan
Could be worse — you could be a lapsed Baptist. My mother, now 75-years-old, was one of the first female line technicians ever hired by AT&T in Mississippi. She had to drive 2 hours each way for the privilege of performing what was previously considered a man’s job, during a time when my father was unemployed. And now, every year, I accompany her to her Southern Baptist Church on Mother’s Day and sit next to her as a jackass in a bad comb-over lectures her and every woman in the place about how Jesus wants them to stay at home and submit to their husbands.
As far as I’m concerned, the purpose of religion — any religion — is to enslave the minds of its worshipers and render them submissive to authority figures. Why should I be surprised that one of the more conservative and autocratic religious bodies is in the process of purging itself of those who engage in wrongthink. Believe what you want to, but be honest enough to admit that, in whichever religion you follow, the first rule is “do what you’re told” and the second is “the preacher gets 10%.”
DougJ
@jacy:
That’s what bothers me so much about the contemporary Catholic Church. All these kids grow up in it, think that by participating in it, they can help the world. And then…look at what it really is now.
geg6
My youngest sister, the lone remaining practicing Catholic among six siblings, is pretty much done. She is talking seriously with her husband about joining the Episcopal Church.
If you are still a Catholic, that would be what I recommend. I think all religions are bunk, but if you are one who feels the need for such things, you can’t do much better than the Episcopalians.
DougJ
@Sasha:
Yeah, I do too. But I think it’s less likely to happen.
I just don’t you guys to be tainted by all their craziness.
Zifnab
@jacy: Well, the nice thing about the Pope is that you can always get a new one.
That said, it seems like the first and foremost obligation of the head of the Catholic Church is to run cover for pedophiles. I miss Pope John Paul II, but not so much that I’d want to see him back again. The Catholic hierarchy needs to get better than JP2, and it looks like they’re getting more insular and more dogmatic and… generally… worse.
Michael
I’ll add that I think this is awesome – in an era when American suburban parishes are folding up shop on a large scale and entire European countries have gone secular, making one’s faith even less appealing to the public at large is a sure winner.
And it isn’t as if those parishioners are going elsewhere – they’re now opting to stay at home, eat breakfast, surf porn and prepare to watch a full schedule of pro football. It isn’t as if the Church has anything to offer in terms of emotional support that people can’t do for themselves.
Martin
@geg6: Episcopalians are worthless. Join U/U so you can jihad like the best of them.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@jacy: Sorry, but we already are the Holy British Empire. The next line in history is our collapse and the rise if the Chinastine Empire.
Bubblegum Tate
Maybe if he rubbed up on some altar boys he’d find his way into Joey Ratz’s good graces.
What a fucked-up insitution….
John PM
Well, it’s good to see that some of the laiety is involved in something important, rather than in those time-wasters of “feeding the poor” and “clothing the naked.”
DougJ
@Zifnab:
I blame most of this on JPII, personally. He’s the one who made the Vatican hierarchy uniformly far right.
Ash Can
@Sasha:
THIS.
Why the hell should we have to GTFO?
John Arbuthnot Fisher
I recently graduated from Boston College, one of the world’s fine and upstanding Catholic institutions. Prior to enrollment, I presumed, based on recruiters’ emphasis on the optionality of religion, as well as BC’s size and geographic profile, that the school was not truly Catholic.
WRONG. Those motherfuckers were completely bought and paid for by the all-male, all-white Class of ’49 (you get the idea). Actually, until the 90s, the fight song was actually “where here men are men/and our hearts are true” – they changed it to “where here all are one/and our hearts are true.”
More importantly, pro-choice speakers are banned on campus, and you can’t use your Eagle Card to buy condoms at participating off-campus stores, even though these stores are OFF CAMPUS and the Eagle Card is funded BY YOUR OWN MONEY. I don’t even mean that your tuition funds the card – you literally put money on the card directly from your bank account, like a Visa gift card.
When the one approved LGBT group on campus attempted to schedule an event called “A Celebration of Gay History” the administration literally refused to allow them to call it a “Celebration” but rather preferred “Observation.” So fucking petty and infuriating.
Not only that, the Republicans brought the full crazy to campus, and I mean full crazy – Jesse Lee Peterson of Hannity fame ring a bell to anyone? Not to pimp myself or anything, but here’s something I wrote in my brief tenure as a columnist for The Heights during my sophomore year, after Peterson’s appearance:
http://www.bcheights.com/2.6172/an-open-letter-to-father-leahy-1.909562
feebog
However, I’m sure these folks can expalin away this guy:
Mickey7
I just received a ‘Voter’s Guide for Serious Catholics’ in my mailbox from the Minnesota Catholic Voters Org (no doubt tax-exempt). The postcard purports to have been developed for ‘no candidate or ballot question.’ On the flip side, the three MN gubernatorial candidates are shown with a series of issues and check boxes underneath each. Only one, Tom Emmer ( the guy whose economic plan for the state is ‘cut the minimum wage for overpaid wait staff at restaurants’ and problem solved!) the despicable far right Republican, got three check marks and his picture highlighted in this totally ‘non-partisan’ guide for ‘serious’ Catholics. As a registered Dem and a non-Catholic, not sure why they wasted their money on sending this to me, but I did check their website which indicated they are ‘resolved to speak the truth’ (http://www.minnesotacatholicvote.org/about/).
So here was my suggestion in that regard:
“If you are truly ‘resolved to speak the truth’ you might want to start with your offensively disingenuous ‘Election Guide,’ which, while purporting to have been ‘not prepared on behalf of any candidate or ballot question’ is clearly a Tom Emmer propaganda piece. Your ham-fisted effort to deceive voters will not, of course, fool the only judge who matters and given this blatant untruth and your willingness to lie to advance a political agenda, it’s clear you are not really in a position to judge who counts as a ‘serious Catholic.’
Please remove me from your mailing list immediately.”
Walker
I used to work at a conservative Catholic university. No one does ideological purity like the Catholics.
Omnes Omnibus
@Michael: There is a beautiful, Gothic ex-church in downtown Maastricht that has been turned into a bookstore.
Brighton
The Catholic church had its own Shar’iah law at one time – the Canon law. It led to the Spanish Inquisition. Church and state. Gotta keep em separated. Read here
Walker
@John Arbuthnot Fisher:
Does Boston College allow a Young Democrats organization on campus at all? Because if they do, they are not conservative Catholic.
/snark
I had to put up with Rick Santorum as our graduation speaker one year. He got a standing ovation from the parents.
El Cruzado
@jacy: Didn’t Henry VIII do that already?
As an aside, according to my wife the historian the problem, other than economic and political issues between the English monarchy and the Catholic church, was that Henry wouldn’t do as all kings were expected to back then and keep a lady or several on the side, but he’d rather actually marry the one he fancied.
catclub
@Zifnab:
“I miss Pope John Paul II, but…”
I have a very small mind. The line this lights up for me is:
“I miss my wife, but my aim is improving!”
liberal
@Citizen Alan:
Heh.
Citizen_X
Nice: comparing your political opponents to fucking cancer.
It’s not like anything like that has ever turned out badly in history, or anything.
catclub
@Citizen_X:
The usual trope is vermin and exterminating, but maybe Catholic enemies rate slightly higher than the Joos.
DougJ
@John Arbuthnot Fisher:
That’s a shame. I have a lot of family who went there (including a few “double eagles”) back in the day. They lived off campus though.
Tom65
Shit like this is why I became an Episcopal.
Barb (formerly gex)
@Ash Can: You shouldn’t have to, of course. It does seem however that the laity can do nothing about the leadership. And the large numbers of professed Catholics unfortunately give the Catholic brand a lot of power that the Vatican wields for right wing purposes. You don’t have to leave, and you shouldn’t have to leave. But you should know that your membership is a way of granting them power whether you agree with what they are doing or not.
Rosalita
Traitorous bad, pedophiles we’ll just move around like chess pieces on the parish gameboard…m’kay
As an aside, I remember as kid listening (yeah, I know) during mass about how we were the “one true faith” and pretty much everyone else was going to hell. Scary shit to tell children.
geg6
@Martin:
If you are a former Catholic, there is no more familiar and welcoming place than an Episcopal church. I’ve tried them all in my time of religious exploration (conducted before rejecting every single one of them as too fantasist for me, as is any notion of a “god”). And the only one that has the feel of a Catholic church is the Episcopalian.
Cat Lady
Every time I read one of these purity purging stories I think of this, and am very very glad I’m a godless heathen.
DPirate
Well, according to Malachy, it may just happen.
Archangel
So? They’re just going back to their Inquisition roots. Identify, torture, and kill the heretics, to make examples of them.
Funkhauser
May I just mention that Bryan Hehir is awesome and one heck of a great professor?
Matt C.
@Mickey7:
I didn’t see the mailing, but I’m guessing those “checkmarks” next to Emmer’s name related to Culture War issues, right?
The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis just announced it’s closing 20 churches (http://www.startribune.com/lifestyle/faith/105086499.html). There was a guy on the local news bemoning that “young people just don’t go to church anymore,” and I’m thinking to myself, “Yeah, and who’s fault is that?” The bishops have decided that focusing on Culture War divisions is more important than real-world issues facing the average lay person. They’re out-of-touch, and now we’re seeing the fruits of their labor — empty pews and empty collection baskets.
joe from Lowell
Nope, I’m going to stay and fight.
Splitter.
geg6
@Ash Can:
Getting the fuck out doesn’t even help.
Fuckers still insist that I’m Catholic, even though I sent a very sternly worded letter to the diocese to take me off their rolls. In the Catholic Church, you can’t resign. They have to agree with your resignation. If they don’t, you’re still a Catholic as far as they are concerned and they will count you as one against your will.
Needless to say, I never received an answer to my letter. So I am still a congregrant of the Pittsburgh Diocese. I want the fucking notation next to the record of my baptism, but these fuckers refuse to give it to me.
DougJ
@joe from Lowell:
If you’re willing to fight, then more power to you!
Mnemosyne
@jacy:
Actually, there already is a breakaway American Catholic Church — they appear to have formed in 1999. Post-Vatican II and leaves a lot of stuff to your conscience.
Finding one within 100 miles would probably be tough, though.
WyldPirate
@Citizen Alan:
Tru dat.
MAJeff
@John Arbuthnot Fisher:
I also graduated from BC, but with my PhD. It was my first experience with a non-state school. I hope to never set foot on a Catholic campus again.
When the one approved LGBT group on campus attempted to schedule an event called “A Celebration of Gay History” the administration literally refused to allow them to call it a “Celebration” but rather preferred “Observation.” So fucking petty and infuriating.
How about the time a few years ago when the gay students tried to hold a dance. First go-round, the admin said no because having the gay kids sponsor it would make it exclusive. So, they got the College Democrats and Hillel, to co-sponsor. Then the admin said no because a gay dance wasn’t in keeping with Catholic teaching. (But having a Hillel is sooooooo Catholic.)
JoePo
Basically, they’re super-pious hipsters who got so over the scene once it became accessible to the masses.
I’m grateful for my Jesuit education, but I have to suppress the urge to give a caustic laugh whenever someone refers to their personal relationship with the invisible and his many rules for us. I think the day I lost my faith completely was when we dedicated an entire class to a theological discussion on the selfishness of children. I know, there’s a philosophical framework to it, but it felt like bringing an elaborate set of instructions to figure out how to work an on-off switch.
Mnemosyne
@El Cruzado:
The original divorce from Katherine of Aragon was going to happen regardless, because she wasn’t able to produce sons, but most of his later problems were caused by the fact that he insisted that he could only marry a woman he could fall in love with and wouldn’t make a marriage of convenience, which led to not-bad consequences for Anne of Cleves and really bad consequences for Catherine Howard.
cs
@Citizen Alan:
My mum was and is a Southern Baptist as well, but she’s quite feminist in her own way. She was a science teacher, had a masters degree, and was always intellectually curious, and never really let any man tell her she couldn’t do something.
After my father died, she raised me on her own and it was just the two of us after that. The pastor we had at the time would often expound from the pulpit about how women shouldn’t work, how men should take care of them, and how women wearing slacks was a sign of the coming collapse of America.
Mum would take that in stride during the Sunday services, even if she’d grumble afterwards. But he said this again during a Wednesday night service, when audience discussion was encouraged. At that point, she raised her hand and said “Brother Johnny, when can we move in with you? Is tomorrow too soon to start bringing our stuff into your house?”
Pastor Johnny was understandably confused and said so. And she continued with “If I can’t work, the boy and I can’t eat. But you’re a man and you’ll take care of us, right?” Which led to a lot of hemming and hawing and saying that of course it was alright that Mum worked. And he never again attacked women for the sin of working.
Sasha
@joe from Lowell:
Amen, brother.
kommrade reproductive vigor
As Catholic I am shocked and offended by this post! See, you made me clutch my rosary so hard it broke!!
Yeah, call me a cynic but I suspect item two is 10,000 times more important than item one. The only reason you would think a guy in San Diego needs to know about the perfidy of a priest in D.C. is … you’re a dickhead.
But hey, I’m sure he’d be all right with a surviors’ group designed to warn people about baby raping priests, provided they also prayed for the brps.
Ha ha ha ha! Wooo. Sorry. Couldn’t say that with a straight face.
catclub
@Citizen Alan:
“As far as I’m concerned, the purpose of religion—any religion—is to enslave the minds of its worshipers and render them submissive to authority figures.”
I think the Quakers and the Buddhists might be doing it wrong, then. That SCLC and MLK also fell down on the job a bit.
As a matter of fact, the old RC missed bit with Martin Luther.
LongHairedWeirdo
I think this is necessary and long overdue. I sympathize – I come from a family of many good-hearted Catholics, some liberal, some conservative, but all compassionate, and more likely to vote against war than against abortion.
But the Catholic Church has come to a situation in which it has to define its identity. It’s been building for a long time.
toujoursdan
@Mnemosyne:
Henry never divorced Catherine. Once he and (Reformationist minded) Archbishop Thomas Cramner had been excommunicated from the Catholic Church, he annulled the marriage with her.
It’s a distinction without much difference.
toujoursdan
@catclub:
So are the Episcopalians. The Bishops may wear the best dresses, but it’s the laity that ultimately hold the power.
Tom Q
I was raised Catholic but more or less dropped it during college — decades ago — and never really missed it. I’m not one of those who insists anyone who practices a religion is some kind of inferior being, but it’s not for me. (And I resent all the remnants of guilt that cling to me to this day, making me forever a recovering Catholic)
I’ve thought for some time that, given the push from the “my way or no way” right-wing elements of the church, we might find the word “schism” — a concept one would have hoped long-buried — becoming contemporary again.
New Yorker
I took my business elsewhere a long time ago. Actually, one the good things about atheism is that it isn’t a “business” at all. I don’t have to make a tithe to anyone to avoid burning in hell.
And I never even knew until after I became an atheist that I was supposed to believe the bread and wine literally became the body and blood. I don’t know if I ever could have believed that.
HumboldtBlue
Doug, I too was reared in the Catholic faith, what gets me is why on earth are you ashamed of being an ex-Catholic? You didn’t choose to attend mass while a child; you didn’t choose to observe Lent or to spend the hours of noon-3pm each Good Friday in quiet contemplation of the torturous death of an ancient Jew.
I feel no shame for the Catholic church, it’s an evil, backwards authoritarian organization who has about as much business lecturing anyone anywhere on any subject other than how to protect the child rapists.
Fuck the church and fuck all those who still participate and support its actions. It’s a cancer on society, always has been always will be. Church leaders have no shame, it boggles me that you would.
Origuy
@toujoursdan:
Henry would have gotten his annulment from Catherine, except that she was the aunt of the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V. He had most of the Continent under his control, including the Papal States; the Pope wasn’t about to go against Charles’ wishes.
Catherine may have also been related to the Pope, Clement VII, but I’m not sure how. Clement was a Medici, though, and they got around.
DougJ
@HumboldtBlue:
I’m not ashamed of myself, I’m ashamed of what the Church has become. I probably shouldn’t even write about it without having a drink or something first, it really upsets me.
Mnemosyne
@toujoursdan:
You’ve gotta admit, it’s quite a racket — when you can’t get your annulment granted by the church that solemnized the marriage, you just form your own church and annul it there.
IIRC, Henry did divorce Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard prior to executing them.
ETA: And he annulled Anne of Cleves because she was smart enough to take the money and run when he offered it.
liberty60
@Tom65:
Exactly what this former Catholic has done.
In my new Episcopal church where I attend classes for new members, 6 of the 8 new members are former Catholics.
I got tired of the Church functioning as “Republicans at prayer.”
R-Jud
@New Yorker:
The whole meaning of transubstantiation didn’t sink in for me until I was preparing for Confirmation, when I was 13. I had a big crisis about it and told my parents I couldn’t actually believe that. They explained that they didn’t believe it either, and that there were a lot of other things the Church taught that they didn’t believe.
“Why be Catholic at all, then?” I said.
About six months later, they weren’t, anymore.
Catsy
I always feel a little funny when I have to defend Islam against the current tide of bigotry sweeping this country, because I think most religions in general are pretty toxic, and Islam and Catholocism in particular are probably two of the most malignant of the world’s religions in terms of the psychological and material damage they inflict on the world and on the unfortunate children who don’t have any choice about the crap with which they’re indoctrinated. But at the same time, I think it’s essential to distinguish between Muslims and Catholics as individuals on the one hand–who by and large are perfectly decent people once you strip away the insane things they believe–and the institutional sides of their religions, which have no redeeming value that outweighs the damage done in their name.
The Catholic church has survived more than a thousand years of the worst this world has to offer, and its continued existence relies on human ignorance, a substance not exactly in short supply–so I don’t really have any confidence that it’s going to implode anytime soon. But if it ceased to exist as an institution tomorrow, I would view it as nothing short of a blessing.
stannate
@liberty60:
Another approach that also attracts ex-Catholics is the Orthodox route. There’s something to be said for getting marriage and child-rearing advice from Orthodox priests, as they can live what they preach as opposed to the theoretical approach of celibate, childless Catholic priests.
nodakfarmboy
@catclub:
The Catholic Church may have missed with Luther, but Luther himself was all about rendering people “submissive to authority figures.” During the German Peasants’ War, he openly sided with the powers that be, urging the aristocracy to crush the peasants.
Luther may have been a rebel against the established order of things inside the power structures of the Catholic Church, but when it came to subservience to temporal power, he was all about cozying up to the rich and powerful to keep “the rabble” in their place. Luther’s willingness to do so was probably part of the reason that some of the existing power structure was willing to throw their support behind him.
The princes and aristocrats who supported Luther were able to get out from under the thumb of the Catholic Church, while backing a new religion that didn’t challenge their right to power, and kept the peasants in line. They saw it as a win-win.
Meet the new boss, same as the old boss…
John Bird
“Agrees with Vatican hierarchy”?
That’s just flat wrong, Doug.
These people are notable for how far outside the hierarchy they are.
They are actually advocating that American Catholics witch-hunt bishops outside of the Church’s established structures for discipline.
American Catholic leaders have gone rogue repeatedly in the last couple decades, following the trails blazed by evangelicals. These guys aren’t any closer to the catechism than Billy Graham was.
Fax Paladin
I was quite surprised to learn on a family trip last week that my lifelong Catholic mother and sister aren’t anymore — they’ve switched to a closer-in nondenominational church.
The proximate cause was local rather than political — my sister, a tea-party type, took umbrage at the fact that no one at their Catholic church inquired after Mom when she stopped attending Mass because of a protracted illness — but both Mom and my sister noted with pleasure that the sermons at the new church were less fire-and-brimstone sermonistic and more practical discussion of coping with everyday life. Also, they pray each week for a different church — not to let them see the error of their ways, but for things like financial problems, damaged buildings and ill pastors. The main alarm bell for me is that it seems, between what I’ve heard from the family and seen from their billboard, to be a sort of chain megachurch (megachurch flavor with several locations).
As for myself, I started to go off organized religion after the high-school debate (explaining that one would be a long post in itself) and pretty much stopped going to church except for family visits/funerals/weddings in college. When I’m not feeling completely atheist (I unbelieve, o FSM; help thou my belief), I tend to not believe any God worthy of the name could be so petty as to care which words get used to pray to Him/Her/It. How I feel about the current Vatican regime (“We can’t actually make you go back to saying Mass in Latin — yet — but we’re doing the next best thing”) would be another very, very long post.
John Bird
@JoePo:
If you are listening to people talk about their “personal relationship” with Jesus Christ in any sense other than committed communion with the Roman Catholic Church, you’re listening to new-school Protestants, not Catholics – or, at best, Catholics who depart heavily from the Church as an official body.
John Bird
@Fax Paladin:
Pretty much every sermon I attended at the Catholic Church in the town where I was raised involved practical discussion of coping with everyday life. I don’t really remember ANY fire and brimstone, for that matter.
The gap between American Catholic services and American Protestant services is largely in formula, not in approach to Scripture. Fire-and-brimstone is the decision of the pastor, not the Church.
John Bird
I really hate to look like a nitpicker. I am an ex-Catholic and an atheist.
But the Catholic Church and nutsos like Donohue and Voris are not synonymous. Nor is the Church a bastion of Republicanism in membership or in creed.
The Church’s decision to tolerate questionable American elements is troublesome and a fair point of criticism, one with a lot of nasty history.
But the Church is also pro-Palestine, pro-organized-labor, anti-death-penalty, and affords no privilege to capitalism or the free market. The idea that natural right leads to market capitalism is abhorrent to the Church.
In my state, the Church was the biggest fighter in an uphill battle for the most basic standards of living for immigrant farmworkers under Mt. Olive. The priest who baptized me protested the death penalty weekly outside Central Prison for as long as he could stand and walk. He got a lot of bull from Republicans in our congregation but he didn’t let it stop him.
The complexity of the Church and its work in the world isn’t defined by an emphasis on abortion or homosexuality, two issues where the Church’s position and acts are, themselves, hateful and terrible.
And because of this, Democrats cannot cede a split American Catholic population to the Republicans because the loudest American Catholics are Republicans. It’s like abandoning the South. It’s practically dumb and it’s morally wrong.
Fax Paladin
@John Bird: No true
ScotsmanCatholic. Yeah, whatever. That part wasn’t really intended as generalization anyway, just as a difference between two specific local churches that my mom and sister commented upon — but as far as that goes, are you seriously going to tell me that Catholic doctrine doesn’t hold that if you’re not Catholic, you’re going to hell? Or that Benedict and before him John Paul II haven’t made a particular point of renouncing ecumenism?EDIT: OK, that reply that came up while I was writing that shows some of my assumptions to be wrong, but still: Especially with a church that emphasizes central organization… rats, running out of edit time…
Mnemosyne
@John Bird:
It’s probably my snobbery talking (as usual) but it really seems like the Catholic Church is working hard to adopt the worst traits of Protestant churches and discard all of the best traits of the Catholic tradition (like Dorothy Day-style social justice movements).
Like, why am I supposed to hold hands with anyone during the Lord’s Prayer, and what’s with all of us having to raise our hands during the “kingdom power and glory” part? That only seems to have shown up in the last decade or so.
Fax Paladin
@John Bird: OK, no countdown timer to keep me from finishing a sentence now…
I could buy your argument a bit more if the Vatican were denouncing Voris or Donohue, or otherwise making it clear that they don’t speak for it; also I could buy the argument more if what they see as heresy didn’t align so closely with what the current Vatican regime sees as heresy — if the people Voris and Donohue want purged weren’t more or less the same sort of people Benedict and JPII have been purging. They may not be part of the official Catholic hierarchy, but they’re pursuing the same political ends, which is why they’re (as I understand you to note) tolerated.
The church you and I grew up with — the church that had notional room for my favorite fictional priest growing up, Andrew Greeley’s Fr./Msgr./Bishop John Blackwood “Blackie” Ryan, one of the reasons I remained Catholic for longer than I might otherwise have — no longer exists. Greeley’s later Bishop Ryan mysteries fall into the unintentional fantasy category for me because there’s no way someone with Blackie Ryan’s basic philosophy (half the time he speaks of the “Lady Goddess”!) would have been elevated to bishop by John Paul II, even with Sean Cardinal Cronin batting for him (Cronin himself would have been among those liberals purged from papal voting by the age limit).
I’m digressing again. The discussion has probably gone on ten miles at least while I’ve been composing this, and I’m no longer sure what the hell point I’m trying to make — except perhaps that much of the complexity you speak of is something JPII and Benedict have been working to reduce; that I’m not sure all the good the Church does is sufficient to outweigh the harm it does, which is increasing by the hard work and definite intention of the last two pontiffs (notwithstanding that they don’t see it as harm); that the distinctions you cite I see as being largely without difference.