In the United States, the Church has taken a page straight from Mel Brooks. " We've flattened their fingers, we've branded their buns, nothing is working...send in the nuns." In stark opposition to the U.S. Conference of Bishops, Catholic nuns have sent a letter to Congress supporting the current healthcare legislation. The letter includes signatures from 50 Women's Orders including The Leadership Conference of Women Religious which professes to represent 90% of America's 59,000 nuns. That's enough habitted firepower to shrivel the manhood of the entire Roman Curia.
Unlike the bishops who sit in the chancery and get most of their news from Glenn Beck and Bill O'Reilly, the nuns actually work in hospitals and schools and get to see first hand the suffering brought about by the lack of healthcare. They also apparently read the bill and can't find the elusive abortion language Bart Stupak and America's bishops swear is in there. The nuns I remember could spot a slouching seventh grader in Church from 50 yards away. I'm confident they could detect sneaky abortion funding even if it were hiding in 2,000 pages of legislation.
Rome has been strangely silent on this issue. Not wishing to garner further abuse from Maureen Dowd and others regarding the Church's disgraceful treatment of women, the cardinals in the Vatican appear content to let America's bishops sort out America's squabbles. Smart play. Anyone who has tried to go toe-to-toe with even one nun knows how intimidating they can be. I watched Meryl Streep in "Doubt" and was afraid to chew gum for a month.
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Rome has also maintained a guarded posture amid continuing allegations of 50 years of protecting pedophile priests in Germany and Ireland. The details of these accusations are as familiar as they are disturbing. Catholic bishops, including a certain Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger of Munich, aka, Benedict XVI, continually shielded clergymen accused of abusing children. These pedophiles were never referred to civil authorities or even disciplined by their superiors. Instead they were reassigned to new parishes where the abuse continued.
Sean Cardinal Brady, a top-ranking cleric in Ireland used part of his St. Patrick's Day homily to apologize for his role in perpetuating the abuse of children in his diocese. That's a start but hardly a cure. The Catholic Church in Ireland is the most heinous modern example of what happens when religion gains civil authority. Anyone appalled by the treatment of women in Afghanistan would be incensed by how children, especially girls, were systematically tortured in Ireland. If the RCC in Ireland is mystified by empty pews and dwindling collections, it need look no further than the Murphy Report of November, 2009.
The Vatican took time out from praying that the whole sordid mess would disappear to accuse the German government of persecuting the Church. In a statement worthy of the worst corporate weasel, the RCC has expressed shock and dismay that anyone would accuse Mother Church of harboring felons. They assert that the incidence of pedophilia within the ranks of the clergy is no worse than the population at large. Well that's comforting. Unfortunately, we don't usually invest the population at large with a presumption of holiness. We don't hand out Roman collars to just any citizen. We maintain a healthy skepticism of men who appear too eager to be scout masters and swim coaches until they wear rosary beads.
A priest is presumed to represent his church. Men with the power to administer the sacraments must adhere to a higher standard of moral conduct because of the damage done to both the flock and the institution. We don't expect priest to be saints but we should expect a slightly elevated degree of morality. They're priests for God sakes. They hear confessions, dole out advice, pray over the dead. They may be ordinary men but we imbue them with extraordinary respect and responsibility. If we wanted average people to act as our clergy we would be married by our grocer and confess our sins to our barber.
Besides, the issue isn't that priests are as flawed as the rest of us. The issue is that once those flaws are discovered, some responsible action should be taken. That action should not include cover-ups, denials and suborning repeated felonies. Not only did the Church systematically conceal these crimes from the police and the populace, they transferred the offenders to other parishes where, big surprise, similar crimes occurred. As long as Rome responds to these charges by appearing wounded and defensive, the congregation will continue to view them as just another sanctimonious corporation with a knee-jerk PR department and no moral fiber.
Please, Benedict, get out in front of this for once. Don't call the law firm of Duck, Dodge and Hyde. Call a press conference and promise to expose every bad apple in the ecclesiastical barrel. Act like the Vicar of Christ not the CEO of Lehman Bros after the crash. Then give yourself five Our Fathers and five Hail Mary's and go and sin no more.
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