Agreed. So what is your point?
It emphasizes the point that we should pray for our bishops and that God will avenge and God will gather his people together.
Look, the point I was getting at INITIALLY with my FIRST post on this thread was that much of what is attributed to “the bishops” (as a whole) is not actually canonically from “the bishops”, but is rather from “a bishop” or “a USCCB staffer.” In other words, despite how the issue is covered in the media, it has no more authority than that. And it shouldn’t be taken with any more gravity than such a pronouncement warrants. I provided chapter and verse in case you (or somebody else) wanted to authoritatively challenge another individual who asserted that such a statement was authoritative.
Then I was harshly critical of you after reading you making a broad-brush attack against the bishops:
For decades, many of our shepherds who fled when they saw the wolf coming have been hiding behind this or that Conference subcommittee. That wasn’t the point I was getting at in any way, shape, or form.
The problem is actually that
the media reports that a statement from a subcommittee or a staffer has the entire weight of the US Catholic hierarchy behind it (when it actually has very little authority behind it at all). Then Catholics start taking those statements as if they are actually dogmatic. I have a really classic example, but will hold off discussing it until later on, so the train of thought doesn’t get disrupted.
The point I was initially trying to get at was, rather than sniping at the US bishops as a whole, when such a misstatement is made in the media (and repeated by Catholics), we who consider ourselves orthodox should take it upon ourselves to fraternally correct the error: “No, the US bishops did NOT say (fill in the blank). Cardinal Wuerl (Archbishop Dolan, some little USCCB staffer) said (fill in the blank). And (fill in the blank) does NOT carry the weight of the entire hierarchy. Canon 455 says that such a statement can only be made for the US bishops as a whole if there is a unanimous vote for it.”
If a bunch of us, who consider ourselves orthodox, actually made a concerted effort to correct misstatements like this (in the Catholic media alone), what kind of a difference would that make? When CNA or EWTN News or the National Catholic Register made the misstatement about the “US BISHOPS SAY…” and they got several letters for each article that pointed out Canon 455 or Ap. Suos 22 / 23…they might eventually get sick of the letters and change their style guide to reflect the authority of the statement more accurately. And then, who knows, maybe they could influence (journalist to journalist) the style guide used by the MSM?
Now don’t get me wrong, I am not suggesting that any of us stop pointing out specific errors made by specific bishops. But there is a world of difference between saying “Cardinal Mahoney was utterly uncharitable when he compared illegal alien opponents to nazis” “In fact, the Church teaches ________” and a broad brush statement, “the bishops are nothing but a bunch of so-and-sos when it comes to illegal aliens.”
Or, more importantly (using the example above), have you actually attempted to communicate to Cardinal Mahoney about how deeply he hurt you with his statement? Or have you contacted Bishop _____ about the concerns you have with _____?
That is where the Can. 212 reference comes into play:
According to the knowledge, competence, and prestige which they possess, they have the right and even at times the duty to manifest to the sacred pastors their opinion on matters which pertain to the good of the Church and to make their opinion known to the rest of the Christian faithful, without prejudice to the integrity of faith and morals, with reverence toward their pastors, and attentive to common advantage and the dignity of persons.
- Yes, you have the right and duty to make your opinion known to the pastor in question.
- Yes, you have the right and duty to make your opinion known to the rest of the Christian Faithful
- BUT, that needs to be done with appropriate reverence toward your pastors (a/k/a the bishops)
BUT once that opinion has been made manifest, the bottom line is that we are still in a hierarchical Church, not a democratic one. And the bottom line is that the bishops are the successors of the Apostles, not the lay faithful. The bishops have been given the grace and the severe duty (as you pointed out by citing Jer. 23) of teaching and ruling.
Can. 375 §1. Bishops, who by divine institution succeed to the place of the Apostles through the Holy Spirit who has been given to them, are constituted pastors in the Church, so that they are teachers of doctrine, priests of sacred worship, and ministers of governance.
Can. 381 §1. A diocesan bishop in the diocese entrusted to him has all ordinary, proper, and immediate power which is required for the exercise of his pastoral function except for cases which the law or a decree of the Supreme Pontiff reserves to the supreme authority or to another ecclesiastical authority.
In other words, these things are the bishops’ call. Sure, we can make our opinion known…and if a bishop actually teaches something that runs counter to the Faith or decrees something that is a violation of Canon Law we should bring it to him and, ultimately, we do have the right to appeal to the Holy See, but the truth of the matter is that they are the rulers and we are the ruled. Christ did not set up the Republic of Heaven or the Democracy of Heaven, He set up the Kingdom of Heaven.
And so, in the final analysis, the thing we need to do is to pray that God sends us good shepherds and, in the case of faithless ones, that He see fit to depose of them properly, But we have to have faith that it is God who, ultimately, puts these people where they are.
Sorry for the delay, we were travelling.
Best answer, as always.
