Pope Francis, Innocent until proven guilty?

[petra22]

I heard that 96 percent of priests and religious DID NOT abuse children and seminarians, or break their vows… only 4 percent… If this is a correct statistic, should we leave the church and dismantle it for 4 percent of evil?

 

[cathapolo]

Actually we never have a basis for leaving the Church. If we grasp our faith correctly we can put everything in its proper theological context.

As Christ put it “And blessed is he that shall not be scandalized in me.” - Matthew 11:6

 

[phil19034]

LifesiteNews isn’t credible to most people.

LifeSiteNews doesn’t lie. Yes, they have a bias, but they do not lie.

The article posted is rather neutral and is mostly sticking to the facts.

 

[commenter]

commenter:

I would interpret his response as a denial.

I think his silence is odd and makes me suspicious.

First, I am a conservative who thinks this papacy has been a disaster for reasons unrelated to sex abuse. But we are bound by the of Charity, yes even to popes. In the Church now, clergy are guilty until proven innocent.

People are trying to nail the current bishop because previous ones were negligent. Catholics are willing, no eager, to believe the worst.

There’s a good chance Francis can’t exonerate himself because the documents might hurt some innocent party, or slander either of his predecessors, or people will claim the Vatican fabricated the evidence anyway.

Do we really want a whole Church full of National Enquirer minds? Philosophically I am closer to Vigano than to Francis. But this flimsy letter, and overwhelming response, set a precedent that will hamper every future Pope and bishop.

 

[EricF]

The Holy Father’s biggest problem is his unruly children.

 

[7_Sorrows]

I don’t think things in the Church would have gotten to the state they are, if the current Pope were not tacitly supporting it. He has been well aware of the situation. That is the point why so many clergy are now fed up.

A recent sermon on this point by Fr. Robert Altier expounds well on this point.
https://s3.amazonaws.com/spm-straph-parish-wp/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/20084333/208.mp3

Thanks for sharing. That was powerful!
Look how long he lived with what he saw in the seminary in the 1980’s! Why has everyone remained silent for so long?
I admire him for coming forth with all of this, but all of this should have been
revealed at least 30 years ago. I hope more will continue to speak out.

 

[commenter]

The conservatives in the Church, and outside it, are using accumulated anger about decades of neglect by prior Church officials, to press the liberal Pope to resign. The Right is united, and loudly pushing demands for “clarification”, they avoid using the word resign, but that’s what it’s about.

The Left is ambiguous. They want to keep a liberal in office. But they don’t want to appear soft on sex abuse. So they are letting him go down

Keep in mind all the long knives and tactics the Right is using now will be used against future, conservative church officials.

 

[RosalieM]

Or perhaps we always were back stabbing…reminds me of the vicious office politics of a corporate law office.

 

[RosalieM]

I think he might be silent because there are things he cannot say without compromising either his own ethics or those of someone else. It’s protecting, not avoiding. The Pope is a holy man.

 

[RosalieM]

Good one! Thank you!

 

[commenter]

I think he might be silent because there are things he cannot say without compromising either his own ethics or those of someone else. It’s protecting, not avoiding. The Pope is a holy man.

I agree. That being said, there might be other GOOD reasons why he might resign. I don’t think him culpable in any way on sex abuse. I do think the Church needs a pope who can unite us, who is able to listen to liberals and conservatives, who does not isolate those who have different points of view.

Francis is holy, but is not the man for the job.

 

[RosalieM]

I kind of liked Pope Benedict’s way of doing things, altho sometimes he was way over my head. Francis is more simple. I wish the Church would shine some attention on the good things about celibacy and being single and stop playing up marriage so much. I’m guessing about half of us aren’t married and are left out of most homilies. I think perhaps many of the offenders may have felt deprived instead of blessed. (my opinion).

 

[commenter]

I kind of liked Pope Benedict’s way of doing things, altho sometimes he was way over my head. Francis is more simple. I wish the Church would shine some attention on the good things about celibacy and being single and stop playing up marriage so much. I’m guessing about half of us aren’t married and are left out of most homilies. I think perhaps many of the offenders may have felt deprived instead of blessed. (my opinion).

Pope Benedict had rowdy liberals and conservatives, but he kept them at the same table. He kept the extreme opinion people from going off too far in any one direction. He kept them from holding press conferences and shooting at each other through various internet battle stations.

We see the value of that pope now, in hindsight.

 

[Ghosty1981]

I agree with most of what you say, though I don’t agree that the letter is flimsy; it has so far been corroborated in certain details multiple times, and hasn’t yet been contradicted.

As I’ve said elsewhere, however, I think it would be a bad thing if the Pope resigns over what we’ve heard so far. In fact there is very little that the Pope could do that would make me want him to resign.

I too think Pope Francis has been bad for the Church, and I believe it will take decades to clean up the mess he’s made of theology and the Church’s teaching authority (and no, I don’t think he is a heretic; also, I tend to agree with the Pope on most matters, I just think he has done an exceptionally poor job at expressing and reinforcing unchanging Church teaching, which is his primary role). If Pope’s can be pushed to resign at the first appearance of a scandal, however, then we aren’t far from the days of poisoning Popes to replace them.

If the Pope is guilty of what he has been accused of, I’d personally be happy with public exposure and changes being made in the way the Vatican operates. We would see the Pope for what he is as a leader, and give him only the regard due to his position. If the accusations are not true then he deserves to be publically exonerated, but hopefully changes in the Vatican could still be made.

 

[MichelleGeorge]

I agree… as we all would wish if it were us.

 

[Usagi]

I was pleasantly surprised by Pope Benedict’s relatively gentle and scholarly manner as Pope, after hearing so much (possibly exaggerated) about him as the ultra-conservative CDF head.

However, I have personally encountered people who despise him as much as some (different) people despise Pope Francis, so I am unable to agree that he was some kind of unifier. The dark joke, of course, is that he and Pope Francis are nearly indistinguishable in their actual positions and teachings, but their respective fans and haters treat them like polar opposites.

Even the seemingly universally beloved Pope St. John Paul II had detractors on both the right and left. There is probably no pope that has ever been universally beloved by Catholics — even St. Peter, we know from Acts and Galatians, was caught in the middle of a “liberal vs. conservative” theological struggle between factions centered on St. Paul and St. James.

 

[Roseeurekacross]

Yep, all those speaking ill of and calling for resignations in the church

 

[Peaceable]

That would make sense to me too. I just don’t think one can discount his entire character, demonstrated over his lifetime, and assume without more information that he’s hiding something to evade something for purely personal reasons.

 

[RosalieM]

I immediately missed Benedict’s homilies. I think people would rather reach up than be underestimated. I also miss the more elaborate vestments. I see nothing wrong using earthly beauty to express divinity.
I might have to stay away from these discussions (and daily news). I find myself not wanting to return to choir for the new season. They have us facing the pews. Heaven knows the facial expressions and sparse attendance were discouraging enough before this. Now the choir director is sending out emails like nothing happened. I can’t…I just can’t.

 

[MountCarmel]

If Pope Francis ‘resigns’, it will almost certainly not be solely because of public opinion, but mostly because of internal Vatican and Curia balances of power - I’m struggling to phrase things clearly and at the same time ‘gently’. Save to say the biggest issues are ‘internal’.

p.s. Just because fallible human controlled courts can’t prove someone guilty beyond reasonable doubt does not mean that they are in reality not guilty, totally or in part. p.p.s. If years of reports of ‘errant’ clerics have been sent to the Vatican, and untoward goings on actually committed within Vatican walls, then if any Pope stays genuinely totally unaware, then something is also gravely amiss within the secretariat, and indeed that Pope’s shepherding and overseeing technique.