Catholic Clergy: Making Themselves Irrelevant From the Pope to the Parish Priest

The beliefs of the Catholic Church are defined by two thousand years of careful writings and a slow process of understanding the revealed truths. This has brought us our Catechism, our Creed, encyclicals such as Humanae Vitae, and other solid references which provide a foundation for living well, especially in stressful times. One role of the clergy is to guide us Catholics in these teachings.

The Church is not defined by whatever a priest in Paducah happens to say on Tuesday, and its faithful are under no obligation to take direction from misguided clergy. But how do we determine when to ignore? For Catholics using their rational minds and their God-given free will, it’s been happening for centuries. Some (unfortunately) leave the church altogether, some walk to the next parish over, and some simply ignore the bad advice and view their priest as just a delivery vehicle for the sacraments. Sadly, what we’re seeing now is an unprecedented amount of incompetence, and it exists at all levels of the church.

Let’s start at the top. Pope Francis continues to astound the Catholic faithful with his ridiculous, fact-denying comments, from global warming as the world’s most pressing problem, to his undying support of soul-deadening socialism/communism, to his purge of pro-life advocates within the Vatican, to his intentionally nebulous writings on serious matters of faith, to his most recent act of squelching the U.S. bishops in their efforts to address the child abuse problem within their ranks. Some could argue we’re expecting too much from this man, given the stellar theological minds which occupied his position the prior 30 years. But I disagree -- we’re simply asking for several logical statements, based on fact, not feelings, which can hold up to the scrutiny of an intelligent high-school senior.

2) New York’s Timothy Cardinal Dolan who, by proudly claiming excommunication shouldn’t be used as a punishment, has kept in good Church standing a man who is blatantly promoting murder. The unswerving intents and actions of Gov. Andrew Cuomo have been known for years, and the good cardinal seems to care not, laughing it up with him and currying favor whenever possible, evidently with the childish expectation that being a good pal will win him over. Selectively citing prior canon lawyers on loosely related cases shows an astounding lack of the circumspect behavior required of his post.

3) Some of our bishops are not much better. The most recent are the two Kentucky bishops chiming in on the Covington controversy. Displaying an astounding lack of maturity for a man in his position, Bishop Roger Foys ignored his responsibility to spend a few hours looking for facts, and instead immediately groveled before the mob, throwing the students under the bus. Armed with the same lack of facts, Bishop John Stowe from a neighboring diocese concurred, with the ridiculous statement that the students were obviously guilty of something, and simply wearing MAGA hats was an affront to the pro-life movement (not exactly a Thomist or Augustinian advancement of Catholic theology).

Subsequent apologies may earn them forgiveness, but in their pathetic claims of “being bullied,” these fully-grown men have shown their character. Clearly, leadership and rational thought aren’t in the quiver. They, too, will be ignored the next time they speak.

4) At the parish priest level, we often see a profound lack of will to stand in the pulpit and talk directly about an important moral issue. I’ve had one priest tell me, in a patronizing tone: “We don’t like to discuss controversial issues -- it disturbs some of the parishioners.” Sometimes, after mass, we are handed a letter which provides a paragraph with conventional church teaching on a topic, but that is invariably followed by another paragraph saying that there are many other factors, and decisions are always complex, so perhaps it’s safest to say there’s no solid Catholic viewpoint. Really? We are way more intelligent than our clergy credits us, and we are seeing right through their invisible cassocks.

Faithful Catholics retain hope but sadly there are fewer faithful Catholics.
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Faithful Catholics may be found in any parish that has a Tridentine Latin Mass community. They are remnant of Catholics who understand that the Second Vatican Council (1962-65) was called for the purpose of destroying orthodox Roman Catholicism. Archbishop Bugnini, reputed to have been a Mason, and his cohorts were very successful in achieving their goal. To see how successful, have a look below at the relevant statistical analyses that was released back in 2007. Read it and weep, if you find it disheartening.

https://www.olrl.org/misc/jones_stats.shtml

Faithful Catholics retain hope but sadly there are fewer faithful Catholics.
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IMHO the real Catholic Church is now comprised of a basically invisible remnant of priests and laity scattered around the world practicing the true faith without any allegiance or connection whatever to the present Roman hierarchy. Meanwhile millions of practicing Catholics today are blissfully unaware that they are actually Protestants because their churches no longer teach, govern, and sanctify in accordance with the doctrines of the Catholic faith.

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