Free Republic

Archbishop McCarrick’s predatory career would not have been possible without the culpable silence or active complicity of men at the highest levels of the Church. Revelations of his abuse have therefore gravely damaged the credibility of the whole Catholic hierarchy. Here a group of young Catholics speaks with one voice about the need for a cleansing fire. Their statement is non-partisan, assuming nothing but the eternal validity of the Church’s teaching. They call for an independent investigation of who knew what and when, a new intolerance of clerical abuse and sexual sin, and public acts of penance by Catholic bishops....

It was the made-for-TV ending to a weeks-long saga of fame and faith: Alberto Cutié, the telegenic priest embroiled in a magazine-photo scandal, would leave the Roman Catholic Church to become an Episcopalian - and would marry his girlfriend of two years. But when Cutié's new bishop, the Right Rev. Leo Frade, stood inside Miami's Trinity Cathedral to announce the news to dozens of international reporters, he created his own waves. The "Inquisition is over,'' Frade said in widely broadcast remarks after Catholic Archbishop John C. Favalora admonished him for a disrespectful "public display.'' The style is typical of Frade's...

JOHN SHELBY SPONG, whose books have sold more than a million copies, was Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Newark for 24 years. His admirers acclaim him as a teaching bishop who makes contemporary theology accessible to the ordinary layperson. A longtime champion of progressive Christianit y, Spong is a visionary voice in the religious communit y, calling people to step beyond boundaries of tribe, prejudice, gender and even religion to create a new humanit y. He is a committed Christian who has spent a lifetime studying the Bible and whose life has been deeply shaped by it. Now he...