Failed Experiment

In Shakespearean terms, comedy refers to a play that ends in a marriage.

What this current abuse scandal has taught me is how much the world and the Church need each other like two bent (but not broken) lovers. I can only hope this strife ends in a marriage between the two.

Alice Owens says it all in her column, “From a #MeToo Catholic Woman, a Message to Seminarians, Priests and Bishops” (NCRegister.com, Aug. 31).

She points out that, in our secular world, we are currently treating victims of abuse in a more loving and just way than the leaders of our Church are.

When I think of all of the good things the #MeToo movement has done to uphold the dignity of the human person, bringing awareness and anger about sex abuse into the secular square, I cannot help but realize that the secular world has done a better job of upholding the dignity of the human person than countless Church leaders have done.

I wonder if, without the presence of the #MeToo movement, the secrecy of abuse in our Church would have continued for years.

I am facing the undeniable fact that our secular world is helping our Church to reform and grow deeper in holiness.

I also think that the Church has something to teach our secular world in this scandal.

As in a marriage, where both spouses help each other to grow, so, too, our Church in her current brokenness can help our secular world grow in truth and holiness.

Our world is currently in the midst of a social experiment.

The experiment claims that an active homosexual lifestyle is healthy for the individuals involved and for society.

The experiment claims that the more we approve of this active lifestyle, the better off those who identify as homosexuals will be in terms of mental health.

Hence, we have legalized “gay marriage” and brought a baker before the Supreme Court.

What this abuse scandal has revealed is that in the very Church that teaches the healthiest path for those with same-sex attraction is chastity, active homosexual lifestyles among ordained men have been given the stamp of approval for decades.

Prelates within our Church have been living the social experiment far longer than our society. What is the long-term result of this experiment?

The Church can already tell us: not just through her teaching, but through her scandal.

         Catherine Kober

         Sleepy Eye, Minnesota

 

Oath of Fidelity

Here are a couple of actions I believe will help to solve the current horrendous problems now plaguing the Church.

As Catholics, we believe in transubstantiation; therefore, the Church needs to organize the faithful by contacting well-known and established organizations of the laity to step up, administer and require that the entire clergy, from the Pope on down to the newest seminarian, take a sacred, public oath with both hands placed on vessels of both species of the consecrated Blessed Sacrament, swearing no personal involvement in deviant acts and/or no effort to cover up or protect the deviant acts of others.

The faithful will administer the oath.

If a clergyman or seminarian will not take the oath, then comes immediate defrocking and dismissal.

Hopefully, whoever honestly takes the oath will be trusted by the laity and will help to reorganize the Church and lead the faithful onward.

The trusted clergy will then bolster training for those clergy interested in performing the Rite of Exorcism.

Perform the Rite of Exorcism on the entire Church, starting with the Vatican and extending to each and every diocese in the world.

Please help to organize the Catholic faithful to solve the current horrendous problems now plaguing the Catholic Church.

         John Bulanowski

         Phoenix, Arizona