Seattle Catholic is not affiliated with the Archdiocese of Seattle

A Journal of Catholic News and Views

23 Aug 2002

It should be noted here that in our addressing the great turmoil currently engulfing the American Catholic Church and applying the term "crisis," I am specifically referencing the public scandal that is being aired from multitudinous media forms and sources from all across our country today. The spotlight, of course, being centered on extensive sexual abuse imposed upon children and adolescents in the form of sodomy that has been inflicted by ordained Catholic clergy and by certain bishops as well. The greater scandal being the exposed cover-up, which has been employed by an alarming number of bishops¹ that enabled this criminal clergy² to further their sexual and spiritual havoc on innocent souls.

The secular media, who are for the most part antagonistic to much of the Church's moral teachings, have focused on individual and notoriously perverted clergymen whose exposed debauchery serves to bring great scandal to the American church. Scandal that they are most happy to disseminate. Ironically, the level of depravity granted public acceptance by this same media is scarcely of less revulsion than that which they are presently decrying.

To the knowledgeable and conscientious Catholic, however, the more horrendous and ominous development that is being revealed, and daily publicized, rests not as much with the depraved clergymen as with the enablers of these disgusting perverts. Namely, the American bishops and hierarchy itself.

Compounding this disgrace are the public utterances of high churchmen denying personal culpability for acts that the Church holds their very office as being responsible for. Accompanying these denials we find all too often statements that are either untruthful or, if not that, revelations of culpable negligence amounting to dereliction of office. All of which is apparently expected to be accepted with no questions asked. This in turn leads to the vital question: Are the bishops fully cognizant of just what the Church expects, of what they have given a sacred oath to fulfill, in their obligations as a Catholic bishop? We shall here list just 3 of 18 bishops responsibilities as published by Fr. Paul Mankowski, S.J.:

"1. The task of a bishop is to protect from damnation the souls of those confided to his pastoral care. All other episcopal responsibilities are trivial beside this. Indeed, he has no other responsibilities that are not wholly subordinated to this end. A bishop who does not accept this description of his job should resign...

2. The gravity of his responsibility means that a bishop is at much greater risk of damnation than non-bishops. His salvation is contingent not only on his own metanoia and regeneration, but on the spiritual life of other persons, his flock.

3. A bishop can do no greater disservice to his flock than to lie; lying is immeasurably more destructive than scandal given by sexual turpitude, jobbery, or peculation. Any lie, regardless of gravity or occasion, gives his hearers reason to believe that the apostles lied about Christ and that the Church is lying when she claims to be a reliable transmitter of divine teaching..."

The moral degeneracy of American catholicism has been manifestly apparent for some years now. Every measure of its vital signs bears this out.³ Furthermore, there can be no further denial that those first responsible before God for this deadly deterioration are the bishops themselves. This truth must be clearly understood. It is not the temporal world that has wrought this devastation, it is the bishop who has come to embrace the world and thus to lead his flock by compromising to the worlds values.

Every generation in the history of the Church has had its contingent of evildoers and bitter enemies of the Church. It is only where the bishops failed their sacred office that evil was able to take hold in the local church, however.

Now it stands to reason and justice, of course, that if a bishop is held to such a formidable responsibility and accounting, then it would be necessary that he be afforded special powers and counsel. Precisely! And Christ and His Church provide the bishop of a diocese with just such powers and counsel. There is only one of higher authority in the governing of a bishop in his own diocese and that is the Holy Father himself. No one has the power to remove a bishop other than the Holy Father. This is only proper. In those things a bishop is to be held totally accountable (faith and morals) he must be the only one empowered to make the decisions. In turn, the Church provides the bishop unerring counsel in the form of its immutable Dogma/Doctrines, the Magisterium, etc., assuring the bishop right teaching and guidance in his governance. Adherence to this holy counsel assures the bishop peace in his diocese and the drawing of souls to Christ.

This recognition of the unique authority afforded to the diocesan Ordinary even carries over to the temporal government in that he is Juridically registered and accepted as "Corporation Sole" over his Church assigned diocese. No question here, then, where the "buck stops."

Strangely (at first observation), however, the American bishops over recent decades have proceeded with policies, procedures and words designed to convey the message that their governance shall conform to the wisdom of the world. The Church's holy and immutable laws are rendered silent and it is made known that counsel and leadership is sought from mans world of committees, commissions, behavioral ideologues (shrinks), experts (so-called), consultants, panels, etc. All of this of the world, the same world of which the Church announces itself as being in contradiction to. Should we wonder then why these bishops are caught up in the errors and moral corruption that this world has as its fare? I don't think so.

Reflection reveals there is something inconsistent in this scenario of the bishops governing by consensus, however. We find that the consensus/consultant scheme only comes into play when the venture involves deployment into advocacies involving faith and morals heretofore forbidden by the Church.

We thus have the chameleon affect whereby the bishop exercises his considerable personal authority instantly in restraining his faithful petitioning for orthodoxy and union with Rome while at the same time deferring restraint on those engaged in dissent with the Churches teachings whilst mouthing the tired canards: "We have it under advisement; Many theologians are now of the belief... The USCC experts are looking at it: We are awaiting word from the NCCB Bishops Committee, etc., none of which have any juridical authority over the diocese whatsoever. Under such lights, the game plan becomes quite obvious.

The true picture emerging, then, is that those bishops employing these so-called "collegial" machinations are, in reality, closet modernists (dissenters). These consultations with the world's "experts" are no more than tools employed for slitting the tent in order to provide openings for the "camels nose." Pretexts to take cover behind should the need arise (ala Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen). Moreover, the proper relationships are entirely reversed. The bishop's solemn responsibility, before God and His faithful, is the guardianship and furtherance of the Churches teachings on faith and morals. It is the world's "experts" who should be seeking the consultation of the bishop on such matters, not the other way around. If the bishop is not qualified to fulfill such a leadership role, then he is decidedly unqualified for his office and he should resign.

The charge that these "collegial" bishops are really modernist (of the world) ideologues is further established in the revealing of those they gravitate to for counsel on moral issues. They ignore the Church of which they have given solemn oath to uphold and which possesses the truth on such vital matters. Their "itching ears" ⁵ draw them to the world whose idols are those opening doors to the deadly pleasures of sensual licentiousness and autonomy from God and His laws.

Are these irresponsible and libelous charges? Absolutely not! You need but read the daily newspaper or suffer through any one-hour of TV news and commentary. Catholic bishops and cardinals publicly exposed as being the enablers of sexual assault on children and youth by their continuing reassignments of criminal perverts in their clergy and those very same bishops and cardinals claiming blamelessness by the fact they were simply following the counsel of the worlds experts. This would be totally laughable if it wasn't true, and consequently tragic beyond belief.

Let us briefly take a hard look at this traitorous pathway taken by what documentation is now revealing that a majority of the American episcopate has selected. The first reality that strikes you is the amazing inroads that evil can gain without general awareness through the medium of incrementalism (stealth by small steps) in a relatively short span of time. Take, for an alarming example, the following. If you would compare the public record of the teaching material and acts of the American Episcopate on human sexuality forty years ago (prior to Vatican II) and compare that with the current teaching material and acts of the same Episcopate, you would have to come to the conclusion that the two were not of the same faith. That, even though the Church's legitimate teachings on human sexuality has not changed one iota!

Now if the record shows that the Church's specified parameters on human sexuality has not changed but that many of today's bishops publicly espouse, or have initiated policies or programs that question or violate the Church's official pronouncements on human sexuality, what is that telling us? With such bishops it quite obviously tells us you no longer have a shepherd in his person.

Under such a reality, the subject now demands an immediate wakeup call. Just how far off the reservation have these many pretentious prelates ventured? The answer to this is found at the root. What is the validity and integrity of the causes we have behind the conflicting ideologies we have before us here? The answer provides considerable embarrassment to any of us who have allowed such a diabolic charade to be pulled off in our church right before our eyes, and it should instill no little shame in those bishops who have allowed themselves to be taken up by the world whose prince is none other than the "father of lies."

We have before us in the Episcopate, now in the open, thanks be to God, two schools of teaching on the subject of human sexuality. There is no legitimate plea to gray areas in this matter. On the one side you have the bishop who adheres faithfully to the Church's teaching and on the other we have many "hirelings" ⁶ claiming the office of shepherd, who lead their sheep on a path that is in conflict with the Church's teaching. It is as simple as that!

Moreover we see concerted efforts expended at exposing even young children to sex instruction and erotica in their child latency ages in a manner, which in and of itself constitutes institutionalized child abuse.

Now we separate the sheep from the goats. Every cause has its movers. What are we looking at as the substantial essence of these movers? What is the source, the legitimacy, the historical integrity and the authority aligned in the confirming of these two entities: 1) The Church's teaching. 2) Those invoking illicit liberties with Church teaching.

1) Those bishops adhering faithfully to the Church's teaching are assured that the first source of the teaching is from God; that its legitimacy has as its credentials the divinity; that its historical integrity has never been faulted in the entire history of mankind and finally, its teaching has the authority of the omnipotent God. Coming down from there the Churches teaching has the authority and integrity of the Fathers of the Church, the Doctors, the Saints, the Holy Father, Tradition and the Magisterium of the Church. One cannot but take note of the divine/supernatural overlaying of the whole of the Church's teaching.

2) Those bishops invoking illicit liberties with Church teachings have as their sources so-called experts; the legitimacy of their teaching is solely that of personal ideological opinion; the historical integrity of their works is empirically recorded as fraught with error, and finally, their authority is drawn entirely from the human estate. The world is its author!

The above truths should be more than sufficient to decisively end the discussion right there. The extent of the corruption and desolation of right reason that has been employed by many bishops and thrust upon the faithful calls for a closing deliberation, however.

The scandal in all the headlines before us today addressing the American catholic church is overwhelmingly that related to sodomite⁷ activity involving ordained clergy. This including certain bishops as well as priests. As was pointed out earlier, the greater scandal lies with the bishops who have acted as enablers for the sodomite perverts. And to who do the bishops loudly proclaim as being responsible for their horrendous and destructive decisions?

Almost to a man, it is laid at the feet of the professions of psychiatry and psychology. Two of the most publicly fickle and erratic crafts operating in the social system today. Moreover, this is well known to anyone who has eyes to see and ears to hear.

We see regularly the spectacle in the courts of the land employing these so-called doctors to give expert testimony on issues whereas the other side will have just as qualified individuals of the same profession giving exactly the opposite conviction. One has as much cogency as the other for the simple reason that both are dealing in hypothesis (conjecture). True science does not bestow certification upon speculations. It would be more appropriate to consider these professions as crafts or techniques, but certainly not verifiable and substantiated science. This lack of certifiable verification obviously also lends itself to the caprice of expediency (self-interest).

It is a matter of record that the professional American Psychiatric Association and the American Psychological Association have a significant sodomite membership and that it was their internal political machinations that brought about the changes in their diagnostic manuals normalizing disorders such as sadism, bestiality, masochism, pedophilia, as well as sodomy unless "the agents suffer anxiety." Their credibility is a joke and the testimony of their own writings would be sufficient to enlist the rejection of any churchmen possessing the slightest knowledge of Christian moral teaching.

None of this is a mystery in that it has been in the public arena for years for all to see. For the bishops to collectively avow that they have been totally unaware of the public hypocrisy and immoral testimony put forth by the Psychiatric and Psychological professions on the moral issues of human sexuality is to insult the intelligence of any rational Christian. To apply the counsel of such individuals where its consequences could allow for the sexual abuse of innocents amounts to culpable criminality.

No, the bishops were fully aware of the moral irrationality of these professionals. It so happened, however, that there were those of these professionals that were saying that which was in conformity with the bishops own dissident ideology and they thus were conveniently incorporated as "collegial" tools giving support to their personal dissensions. -------------- This time it caught up with them!

Erven Park
Toledo, WA
8/23/2002