The McCarrick Affair

Transcription

1 Do not grieve the Holy Spirit -- second reading The McCarrick Affair Let s talk about the elephant in the sanctuary. This past week we priests received a private heartfelt letter from the bishop. Here in part is what he wrote: My dear brother priests: These past few weeks have brought forward some ugly and discouraging revelations in our Church, reaching to its highest levels. I ve wanted to reach out to you but, to be honest, I have been feeling so sickened and depressed by it all, I just didn t know what to say. Although I have been asked to do so, I don t see the point or value of adding to the cacophony out there by making some kind of official statement. Who is going to believe a bishop anyway at the moment? Yesterday, saddened, I drove to my home parish to get away from it all and just to sit in my childhood church and pray. I am not sure if you are getting much chatter in your parishes but we are getting some fairly unpleasant traffic in the Chancery. The reported sexual abuse of minors coupled with the harassment and sexual assault of seminarians and young priests by Cardinal McCarrick is pretty unpleasant stuff in itself. The outrage is certainly understandable and warranted. I wouldn t make any excuses for the cardinal or anybody in his situation. He has wounded his victims and the Church and the faithful and all of us priests deeply and in ways that will stay with us for a long time Our faithful people will be asking us hard questions for which there are no really good answers. Hopefully time and contrition and resolve and prayer will help the healing. Let s pray for one another in these days as we try to minister to others, especially those who have been harmed or feel betrayed. Let s also not forget to minister to one another. Bishop O Connell I feel for him, for my fellow priests -- for you. What McCarrick did is awful. Criminal is the name for the silence of the hierarchy and others who knew. How in the world did he not get tagged? Here is a man with two legal settlements for sexual misconduct against him who was allowed to remain a cardinal for almost two decades. It cries to heaven. The revelations about Cardinal McCarrick are bad. The revelations of clergy abusing seminarians in Chile is beyond disgusting. The lurid and systemic revelations of the massive abuse in the dioceses of Pennsylvania are beyond human decency. There are other accusations in the wings. These and much too many others have spotlighted the shame, embarrassment, anger and Judas-like betrayal by the Catholic Church that have raised again the oft-asked questions: How could you ever trust the Church again? Why would you even stay in a corrupt Church like that? 1

2 I remember the last time some man asked me that last question, I inquired, What is your profession? He replied, A lawyer and what startled me is that he said it with a straight face. You know the old saying concerning lawyers, It s the 90% that give the other 10% a bad name! I don t mean to be hard on you lawyers out there, just to point out that every trusted formerly trusted -- profession politicians, doctors, TV anchors, teachers, coaches, CEOs have their share of scandals. But that doesn t excuse for a moment the horrific global in-depth scandal in the Catholic Church from which we expected more. So we come back to our question: In the light of such scandals, why stay? Why do you stay? Why do I stay? I don t know about you but let me try to answer that in several ways. I stay because of a story my mother told me. She came over from the old country as a small child and brought many old sayings and stories that served as moral lessons for us. One day my brother, sister and I said something critical about our pastor nothing nasty, just a comment. Mom overheard, pulled us aside and sat us down and told us this story, this parable. One time when the weather was boiling hot and the humidity was suffocating, the apostles, who were walking along with Jesus, were complaining to him. Lord, it s terrible! It s so hot! We re dying of thirst! Can t you do something about it? Just then, suddenly, from around the corner on the road where they were, flowed a stream of the most beautiful, clean, cool, clear blue water. The apostles went berserk. They bent over, splashed the water on their faces and drank till their hearts content. O, Lord, how cool! How refreshing! Then they got up, walked a bit and turned the corner. Imagine their utter shock when they saw that the cool clean, refreshing water was coming from the mouth of a dead dog! Ewe! What a story! It took us a while a couple of years to get the point of the story and it is this: Grace does not depend on the agent, the source. Jesus is the center. He is the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. Jesus and his message can be constricted but not extinguished by his followers, or by his ministers. He can and will still send forth living waters no matter the source, good or bad. I stay because that very shocking story played out at the very beginning of the Church, before it even got off the ground. Don t you remember? There was scandal, big time, right at its foundation. We know this because, although the temptation was to cover up and slide over some terrible deeds, the early Church eventually let them hang out in public. And it started immediately with the chief honcho, the big man, the appointed leader of the apostolic band. We are so used to it that we have lost the ability to recoil from what a scandalous, hurtful, cowardly act this was: to deny Jesus, and to deny him not once but three times at that. I know not the man! he spat out, and then there was that awful cock crow. The deed was done and Peter, the leader, slunk away scarlet-lettered forever. 2

3 And the remaining eleven? One of them sold Jesus out for money, another would not believe in him, and two boasted they would always be at his right and left but did not show up at Calvary where Jesus had to settle for two thieves in their place. Three of them snored in the garden when they should have been his support and comfort, and all of them, every one of them, fled and left Jesus in the dreadful lurch when he needed them most. What scandal! All this dirty laundry the early Church hung out for all to see, and we don t know what the reactions were, whether people taunted Thomas for his weak faith or called the others cowards or whether some vulgar clod stood outside Peter s house at night and made cock crow sounds and thought it was funny. What we do know is that the failure, sin, and scandal did not stop them in their tracks. Shamed and repented they regrouped and eventually, from their dead dog mouths, these twelve failures left us a stunning legacy of second chances, forgiveness, unfathomable charity and a long, long heritage of saints, heroes, monasteries, education, art, theatre, hospitals, leprosaria, universities, missions, Vincent de Paul societies and other life-giving institutions that endure to this day. They didn t and couldn t undo the scandal, the sin, the memory, the weakness, or the public failures. They couldn t wipe the slate clean. They couldn t erase the blot, but they could renew their love for Jesus and spread his gospel. And they did, literally to the death. They did gloriously so. I have hopes we can pull it off again because I see every day that grace is still amazing, that renewal is larger than sin and faith is more life-giving than scandal is death-dealing. I stay because I realize that Jesus is simply too strong, too risen, too present, to be undone by a new set of Peters, Thomases and Judases. I stay because I cling to St. Paul s words, -- he who persecuted the church, was accessory to Stephen s murder and companion to the Terrible Twelve -- and still mired in those scandalous times he wrote: We are afflicted in every way but not constrained, perplexed but not driven to despair, persecuted but not abandoned, struck down but not destroyed. I stay because while studies tell us that anywhere between 3 to 7 percent of priests are part of the problem a huge number -- the number of priests, bishops, nuns, religious, popes and laity who want to be a part of the solution is even bigger. Yes, the laity. I stay because of you -- did you know that? -- because although afflicted, perplexed, persecuted and struck down you still come here to worship, receive Jesus sacraments, learn from the scripture, break the bread, share the cup and try to make a difference. 3

4 You give me hope because you are the shapers, of the future, the remnant who will rebuild, the sparkling water of renewal. As such I invite you to join me as we rub shoulders with Peter and Paul and the rest of the Dirty Dozen and go forward as Church So.. all this is why I stay. I don t know if you agree with what I ve said but, whether you do or not, I do most humbly thank you for being here and for letting me make my case. God bless you. Rev. William J. Bausch Adapted from his book of homilies, From No to Yes,

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