Posted on 03/20/2012 3:57:30 AM PDT by Bon mots
You don’t want to know. But it’s the worst sacrilege you can imagine.
Law got a cushy Job in Rome.
Away from the many families he helped ruin.
Justice would dictate that he be excommunicated in my view.
You call this reform?
I call it a disgrace that could be remedied with the stroke of a pen.
Thank you, sir.
Whenever I come across a “Catholic” thread of note, I always am interested in hearing your thoughts and opinion on the subject.
You can be relied on to cut through the nonsense and provide sound insight and commentary.
Why? Because "the Church" did no such thing; and it's no fun putting the blame on psychiatrists.
The fact is that more than a few psychiatrists of the late 19th and through most of the 20th centuries, acting on elaborate eugenicist and behaviorist beliefs, committed systematic aggressions upon people with persistent sexual and other disorders; homosexuals were among their victims, though not the only ones.
It was the Catholic Church's doctrines which were then, and are now, the main bulwarks of resistance against eugenicist and behaviorist "therapetic abuse" of medically dependent persons.
If this indeed happened (and we know it happened because of unnamed sources 60 years later?) it would be because that institution, even if calling itself "Catholic," was staffed by people promoting and acting upon the secular psychiatric ideologies of the day, and not the doctrines of the Catholic Church.
(BTW, psychiatrists and their associated surgeons still castrate boys: but now it's done to cure [accommodate, adjust, restructure] transsexuals, and not homosexuals. And it's presented as humane, enlightened, and progressive: a right, not a mutilation.)
These Dutch psychiatrists: it's a little late to say "hang 'em" 60 years later, but God knows they may all presently be in hell.
If there were solid evidence of crime on the part of Cardinal Law, nothing in US and International law would have shielded from extradition or indictment. Certainly not the mere fact that he is now resident in Rome. (He could be picked up by the Italian police any day as he traveled to and from Sta. Maria Maggiore, which is on Italian, not Vatican City, territory.)
The fact is that, regrettably as it may seem to many, criminal charges have never been ledged against Law, and nobody has requested his extradition. If you've got actionable facts that the prosecutors don't have, why don't you forward it to the prosecutors and make sure charges are pursued? I, for one, am all for the criminal indictiment of anyone, laity or clergy, againt whom there is credible evidence and probable cause.
Then on the basis of successful criminal prosecution, you can talk about ecclesiastical penalties. The fact that the Vatican removed Bernard Law from leadership of a powerful Archdiocese, and put him in charge of managing Sta Maria Maggiore with no pastoral authority,tells you what they think of his pastoral competence.
My facts here are what I can remember from ten years ago. If any of this has changed, I will be grateful to be corrected.
Cardinal Law was fully investigated by the state attorney general and the district attorneys in the 5 counties of the Archdiocese. He gave evidence before two grand juries. The state attorney general, after several years of horrible press and intense scrutiny, concluded that Law had not tried to evade investigation and had not broken any laws.
Upon turning 80 last November, Law became ineligible to participate in any papal conclave or to hold any Curial memberships, and was replaced as archpriest of Sta Maria Maggiore by Archbishop Santos Abril y Castelló
'K?
It is not OK.
Cardinal Law presided over the shuttling around of known predatory homosexual pederast priests. He enabled, or allowed others under his authority to place these priests in positions where they could and did commit further attacks on boys.
Lives were ruined, families were devastated, and the faith in the Church of untold numbers of Catholics was diminished.
I believe all of the above is uncontested fact.
Criminal law/prosecution is irrelevant.
How can anyone claim reform while this behavior is accepted in the highest offices of the Church?
He should have been expelled from the Church, not given *any* job in Rome, no matter how small you portray it to be.
Very astute observations. Thanks for the follow up post and ping.
Concluding that there was no criminal action or intent (which the state did, after intense investigation) and in view of Law's repentance of his pastoral failure, the Church did the right thing in depriving him of pastoral office.
Some seem scandalized by the fact that, while being barred from any pastoral role, Law he was given the opportunity of doing some good in his remaining years. Repentant sinners are not excommunicated, it's true. If that's what you prefer, there are other, better ways to think about it.
Thanks, Mrs. Don-o.
“However if there were no charges at any time of criminal abuse or neglect, nor of actionable negligence, all the Vatican had to go on was pastoral failure (in the sense of ongoing grave errors of judgment” -MD
Nope, the Vatican had all the facts. They knew exactly what happened, criminal charges or not.
You act as though he failed to maintain a proper curriculum for CCD. He presided over an evil attack on the faithful.
I didn't say that Law's pastoral failure was comparable to, say, fumbling the CCD curriculum. It was either a crime, or it was a pastoral failure involving grave errors of judgment. The former was ruled out by criminal investigation; so I conclude it was the latter. And because of this grave<;b> failure, his pastoral role was rightly ended.
If you are really convinced there was crime on his part, despite aggressive, repeated law-enforcement investigations which found none, you don't need to convince me; you need to take it up with the DA's.
In any event, there were not grounds in Canon Law for excommunicatios. That's an entirely different thing, and it's not my field of competence, nor, apparently, yours either.
That's it, I'm through.
How many times do I have to say criminal charges against law are irrelevant?
I still think it is a travesty that the Church associates with him at all.
Yes, we are done.
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