"How much filth there is in the church."
It is very troubling, wounding. I see no cause for rejoicing or piling on condemnations.
For me it is more akin to what the discovery of the abomination of desolation in the sanctuary will be like - or at least a foreshadowing of it.
In meditations written for the Way of the Cross at the Rome Colosseum on Good Friday, March 25, 2005, Cardinal Ratzinger said too many Catholics continue to scorn and scourge Jesus in his church."The soiled garments and face of your church throw us into confusion. Yet it is we ourselves who have soiled them! It is we who betray you time and time again."
"Christ suffers in his own church," he said. He described "the falling of many Christians away from Christ and into a godless secularism," but also the fall of those Catholics who abuse the sacraments or their positions in the church.
"How much filth there is in the church, and even among those who, in the priesthood, ought to belong entirely to him," he wrote. He said the church often seems like "a boat about to sink, a boat taking in water on every side."
"The soiled garments and face of your church throw us into confusion. Yet it is we ourselves who have soiled them! It is we who betray you time and time again," he wrote.
"Have mercy on your church," he prayed. "When we fall, we drag you down to earth, and Satan laughs, for he hopes that you will not be able to rise from that fall; he hopes that being dragged down in the fall of your church, you will remain prostrate and overpowered." - CNS
Make it stop.
we are making some progress, the Archdiocese of Detriot got Mike Voris to remove the 'Real Catholic' name from his website. I'm relieved now...
ReplyDeleteIt's awful, Terry.
ReplyDeleteAlmost as awful is the crowing from the Catholic Taliban that one of their archenemies is disgraced.
I'm tired of the religious bullshit, too.
In the words of the old spiritual, just "give me Jesus."
Thom, you mean the whole "see! We knew Mahoney was dirty!" and the rejoicing that comes with being "proven right", being "vindicated"?
DeleteHow right you are - it's disgusting on all sides, isn't it?
Absolutely. They hated him for lots of reasons-- his liturgy, his concern for immigration....
Delete"I see no cause for rejoicing or piling on condemnations."
ReplyDeleteexcept when it's a faithful catholic. you lousy bum.
Mercury - you are absolutely correct.
ReplyDeleteSteven why don't you go back to your Real Catholic neighborhood? What are you doing slumming around here?
ReplyDeleteFr Mark Kirby wrote about this "Catholic Schadenfreude" recently:
ReplyDeletehttp://vultus.stblogs.org/2013/01/sitting-on-the-basket.html
I saw that Patrick - it helped me understand that this is not an occasion for rejoicing but rather sadness and repentance.
ReplyDelete"The soiled garments and face of your church throw us into confusion." ... Hits the nail on the head. The Face of Jesus spit on again and again. The novena to The Holy Face begins Feb. 3rd and ends on The Feast of The Holy Face, Shrove Tuesday(Mardi Gras). I'll be making reparation to His Face. I can't see what else there is in my power to do to make up for this stuff. I am heartsick.
ReplyDeleteWhat bothers me is that there should have been a Council called so as to examine the Catholic administrative system that made four decades of this possible with Catholic professional management consultants in attendance at such a Council. I saw a figure that c.4.5% of priests did the crimes over four decades but c.66% of hierarchy dealt ineffectively with the problem. That latter figure is an untreated gash in the body which will repeat in other ways if left unexamined and unchanged. No Pope, no Cardinal, no Bishop stands out for four decades as a hero who fought zealously against this. In other words our system prevents the emergence of "Christ with a whip" within an hierarchical member..even a Pope. Everything was glacial canonical procedure...no hero....no Christ driving out the money changers. Our system and its desire for perfect image made an aspect of Christ...the one who made a whip....impossible as to appearing in the spirit of any Church official.
ReplyDelete