NEW POPE
& CATHOLIC CHURCH TO FACE CHALLENGES
Lightning strikes St. Peter’s Basilica at The
Vatican in Rome Italy
Monday night
after Pope Benedict XVI announced resignation.
(Tuesday, February 12,
2013. Vatican City, Rome, Italy) For the first time in six centuries a
reigning Pope will resign from that exalted position as the leader of the one
billion members of the Roman Catholic Church.
Pope Benedict XVI announced his plan to resign in Latin here yesterday
while speaking at a routine meeting of cardinals. In his brief unemotional statement he
informed the cardinals that his resignation would be effective on February 28
of this year. The 85 year old Pontiff cited health issues as his reason for
abdicating his seat as “the direct descendant of St. Peter”. While the Pope does have a cardiac pacemaker
implanted in his chest he has maintained a relatively public life and travel
schedule although he has, at times shown signs of fatigue. Vatican officials reacted with surprise
although there has been some indication that Benedict XVI may have made his
decision as long as a year ago. Upon his
resignation a meeting of the College of Cardinals will convene to select a
successor.
In a Church that historically
has held its secrets close and its cherished rituals virtually unchanged
throughout the ages, the process of selecting a new Pope is the most highly
guarded secretive and private Vatican function.
Steeped in tradition and shrouded in mystery the machinations of the
College of Cardinals have never been fully revealed. In keeping with the
centuries old tradition, once a new Pope is selected white smoke is released
from a fireplace in the Vatican signaling the end of the process.
To many Catholics and
non-Catholics the heavy cloak of ceremony, rites and rituals is an arcane,
antiquated weight on the Church that has been rocked by sordid scandals over
the last two decades. Aside from the
scandals many Catholics feel that the Church has simply not “kept up with the
times” and has lost relevance in their lives.
The Catholic Church has long been on the “wrong” side of many social and
cultural issues and seems to see no reasons to change. American Catholics in particular have drifted
away or simply left the Church in large numbers since The Vatican II Council of
1966. Much of what came out of Vatican
II was intended to “modernize” the Church or at least make it less restrictive
on certain matters such as fasting before receiving the Sacrament of Holy
Communion and conducting Mass in English as opposed to Latin.
The Roman Catholic Church has
made minor changes that amount to little more than cosmetics; the bedrock
tenets and teachings of the Catholic Catechism remains unyielding over the
issues that matter most to American Catholics such as the matter of priests
maintaining the Vow of Celibacy and the ban on women priests. The Vow of Celibacy has been most under fire
in light of the revelations of widespread sexual abuse by priests on young
boys. Thousands of sexual abuse victims,
now adults, have come forward in recent years, formed support groups and sought
legal recourse through the Courts. The
Church has made huge financial settlements to some of the victims; these
settlements have left many parishes and dioceses bankrupt. These scandals have taken on an even more
sinister aspect as it has come to light that many senior priests and parish
leaders, high ranking Monsignors, Bishops and Cardinals were aware that clergy
members under their domain had repeatedly over the course of many years
sexually abused children. These
Monsignors, Bishops and Cardinals often covered up for and went as far as
actively protecting some predator priests.
A CROSS TO BEAR
Being a Catholic, an actually
full time practicing Catholic has never been easy. After all, for centuries Catholicism was
considered an unholy unwanted cult forcing the early followers to worship in
secret. It took many years and much
blood before Catholicism could come out of the shadows and catacombs of Europe and
flourish in the light of day. But as
interesting as that dark era was for Catholics it is ancient history. It has been centuries since Catholics were
persecuted and fed to Roman lions yet even here in the United States Catholicism
remained poorly understood and not “acceptable” well into the 20th
century. With the election of the first
Catholic president of the United States, John F. Kennedy in 1960, Catholicism
began to gain wider understanding and acceptance. It certainly was a strong and growing
denomination up until that point.
Kennedy addressed his religion in a speech while campaigning for office
in which he clearly stated that he would not be “beholden” to the Pope or his
own personal religious beliefs. It seems
that the concept of the Pope has always been a troubling component of the RC
Church. No other denomination, sect or congregation
has a similarly singular “Holy Authority” or a counterpart to the Roman
Catholic Pope. Many non-Catholics and
arguably a near majority of self-described Catholics find the office of Pope to
be a Byzantine remnant that has no place in modern times. There is also no other religion that has a
parcel of land that has “near country sovereignty” as does the RC Church and
The Vatican. They even have a non-voting
seat at the United Nations General Assembly; they certainly have come a long,
long way since their days of accused heathens and blasphemers.
It still remains challenging
to be a practicing Catholic. No one is
being flogged or fed to wild animals but there exists a level of commitment,
discipline, sacrifice, and unquestioning adherence to the tenets and teachings
of the Church that many find too onerous to abide by.
CAFETERIA CATHOLICS
Many who grew up in the Roman
Catholic Church or who have congenital Catholicism feel estranged from the
Church of their youth. Some have had
traumatic experiences in Confession or counseling with old-time hard core priests
refusing to grant Absolution for certain “sins”. There are countless tales of Catholics being “excommunicated”
by some priest in the dark confines of the old Confessionals. The Church still teaches that divorce is a
sin, pre and extra marital sex are sins, the use of birth control (aside from
the “Rhythm Method”) is sinful as are abortion, adultery, and an impressive
list of other behaviors, behaviors that other religious denominations do not ostracize
their members for.
As American Catholics became increasingly
restive with the Church they were raised in, the phenomenon of “Cafeteria
Catholics’ emerged in the late 1980’s. These
are Catholics who pick and choose what doctrine they will and will not adhere
to making their choices cafeteria style.
Some attend Mass and receive the Sacrament of Communion despite being
sexual active, divorced, or not fully observant of all the Catholic Church
expects of her flock. Most members of
the RC clergy and certainly the hierarchy all the way to The Vatican do not
accept such cafeteria style worshippers as true Catholics. This has kept ever more Catholics away from
their Church and been a real hindrance to the American flock growing.
The largest growth of
Catholics is taking place primarily in Third World countries. In Central and South America, The Philippines
and some African nations Catholicism is on the rise despite the hardships that
come along with it. In these very same
countries prenatal and postnatal care is often nonexistent, infant mortality
rates are alarmingly high yet the RC Church’s absolute ban on birth control
prohibits millions of women from exercising control over their bodies and the
destiny of their families. Every time
the World Health Organization (WHO) seeks to fund family planning initiatives
in these emerging Catholic countries, The Vatican adamantly opposes their
efforts and threatens to sever funding of other services to help meet the needs
of those people. It is this level of hypocrisy
that has driven so many American Catholics out of the Church of their
faith. It is difficult to justify the
Vatican’s dictates and reality.
THE POPE’S SCOPE
To say the Roman Catholic
Church is at a crossroads is to set a new standard for understatement. The Church has been so damaged by the sex
scandals, the cover ups, and its failure to give any ground and adopt a more
progressive dogma that it is shrinking fast in America. There are fewer parochial schools because so
many dioceses have been bankrupted by the enormous – and just – financial settlements
made to the surviving victims of predatory priests. The priesthood itself is severely diminished
as a vocation and the shortage of priests, brothers and nuns reflects the
church’s loss of stature and arguably relevance in the eyes of so many who
would like to call themselves Catholics but in good conscience they cannot.
Now with the resignation of
Benedict XVI looming large on the horizon once again the argument about the
role of The Pope is seeing renewed life.
The Papacy as it has stood for the last thousand years is ostensibly
unchanged. There is a strong current of
thought among some catholic theologians and secular scholars that the Office of
the Pope has outlived its utility and supposed divinity. This is of course open to debate as well it
should be. Unfortunately the Catholic
Church is not receptive to debate and it will not tolerate a debate of such
profound significance.
No doubt there will be a new
Pope appointed probably by Easter Sunday and it is not reasonable to think that
the new pope will be any different from the last one or any of the other 220
plus predecessors. That is a sad
statement and a sad state of affairs from an institution that once had a real place
in the lives of American Catholics.
TAGS: POPE
BENEDICT XVI RESIGNATION, THE PAPACY, THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH, CATHOLICS IN
AMERICA, CATHOLIC CATECHISM, PREDATOR PRIEST SEX SCANDALS, CHURCH’S RELEVANCE
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