That was not my intention, as I was commenting on the article. Thank you for the added information. He does sound like he is, at heart, a good man. I will take your advise to pray that he gets his own bishopric.
However, it still does not alleviate my concerns. How does a Bishop have the time to train for and play hockey, and to go to Rome and Greece to participate in marathons? We are talking about a significant amount of time taken away from his duties. Are the duties of a Bishop an 8 to 5 job? What happens when there is a conflict between his duties and a hockey game? Does he get someone to substitute for him as the Bishop or as the goalie? (I am giving him the benefit of the doubt that his duties as Bishop would come first, but it is a legimate question.)
Yes, I am cynical. Far too often I have either seen or heard reports of priests who are unavailable to their parishoners because they have tickets to the big game or the opera, or it's their day off, or their weekly get together with other priests for dinner. "I can't come to the funeral home to pray the Rosary, I have tickets to the playoffs. I'll send Sister Mary instead." or "I can't come to the hospital today, its my day off. I'll send an EEM, but if you need a priest, I sure Father Joe, (who is 30 miles away) will be happy to make the trip."
So, what kind of role model is this Bishop, or any Bishop, for his priests? Why should his priests be expected to be available to take care of their parishioners' needs while any Bishop has plenty of time to engage in his outside interests? Thus my comment about dereliction of duty. We Catholics deserve, and should demand, that our Bishops and priests be wholly dedicated to Our Lord and His Church.
Give me a break. You respond relying on hearsay and appearance (the slant given by the writer, Tom Sheridan) rather than either doing your own research or giving some credence to those of us who have known the man for a decade.
He runs to stay in shape. Reasonable recreation and taking care of one's body are not just options but requirements for a Christian. He put on a hocky suit and spent an afternoon with the Chicago Blackhawks. Bishops routinely as part of their duties attend dinners and other events in civic society of their town. We expect them to do that. He played floor hockey for years and took up ice hockey for recreation. You have no evidence that he does any of these things to excess. If he does them for recreation how is that different from any other bishop who does other things for recreation? His recreations have the advantage of keeping him healthy. Is that wrong? Then what do you do with the young bishop Karol Wojtyla in Krakow? By your standards he was a bad bishop.
That he cares more about marathons or hockey than his duties as bishop is entirely your inference, as you yourself acknowledge. That's called rash judgment. We are required as Catholics to put a good construction on people's actions unless we have evidence to the contrary. I gave you evidence against your inference but you stick stubbornly with your inference based on hearsay about other priests and the tone of the writer for the Chicago archdiocesan newspaper. (Note that I have not endorsed the latter--I'll leave it at that.)
While he was still merely Fr. Paprocki, he celebrated the Novus Ordo in Latin every month at St. John Cantius. That was not part of his assigned duties as vice-chancellor! He took some of his non-office time to celebrate the Latin Mass at the premier parish for Latin liturgy in the archdiocese. He went further than that. At a time when few others in the diocese were supporting the Tridentine rite, under Cardinal Bernardin (who to his credit approved the indult but otherwise remained at armslength, Bernardin's vice-chancellor went way out on a limb with enthusiastic support. His support is remembered with gratitude by the Latin Mass community in Chicago to this day, even though he had to stop regularly celebrating at St. John Cantius when he became a pastor and then bishop. He is still greeted fondly whenever he appears at the parish. His reform of the reform homily is legendary lore.
He put some of his "free time" into founding and maintaining a free legal clinic for the poor in one of Chicago's neighborhoods. I could go on. He's an energetic man. He gets more done than a lot of men his age, perhaps because he runs and stays in shape! Did it ever occur to you that proper care of one's body pays dividends in how much work one gets done otherwise?
Lay off his case until you have real evidence that he's a wastrel bishop. Your initial response was unintended. I withdraw my claim that you calumniated him initially. I now suggest that you calumniate him by rashly and stubbornly holding to your initial unwittingly unjust inferences after we have presented evidence to the contrary. Now you do owe him an apology.
... besides, running is also prayer time for a lot of people. Although the bible doesn't say so explicitly, I am also certain St. Paul was a long distance runner. I never understood his running metaphors as deeply as I did after I took up running.
By the way, one could ask you if you don't have something better to do than Freep. Come to t hink of it, I do... G'nite