Who Is Responsible to See To It that Priests Teach With the Church?

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Greg_McPherran

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I am having faith problems. I am having problems because although I have embraced the faith and joyously received what the Church teaches, I have been shocked and disappointed that so many priests (I live in Massachussetts) don’t seem to stand with the Church and are so liberal. I can’t imagine how the very people that are supposed to uphold Church teachings seem to oppose the Church.

For example, I don’t think I have ever heard ONE SINGLE SERMON condemning contraception. The Catechism calls it a grave sin and yet priests seem to hardly even care. Yet, everyone knows that many “Catholics” use contraception. I am finding it hard to take the faith seriously.

I am upset that the clergy has this authority structure (which I welcome) but then they don’t even uphold the Church teachings. It just seems pathetic to me and it is very damaging to my faith.

Then I start to think maybe some priests don’t want to alienate people so they’ll keep the few left who do give money on Sunday. Then I hear about all this molestation. If you have faith, you’re not supposed to worry about who you alienate, correct?

I am just starting to doubt whether all this talk about holiness is just to sound good while in the day to day reality many priests are not upholding Church teaching. I am just starting not to buy it anymore.

I fully support Church teachings and I can’t hear a confession or consecrate the host. However, someone who spews anti-Catholic venom in sermons or harms young children has the authority to consecrate a host and hear confessions? I just don’t accept it. I think there’s something seriously wrong with that set up.

I’m not trying to be rude - I just think something is seriously wrong here.

Then I have to ask. Well, who’s in charge of all this? Is it not the Pope and the Bishops who must see to it that all priests teach the truth? Then I start to wonder what’s going on at that level if priests can get away with serious dissent. Then I start to wonder how an organization of God Himself can have this many problems where it’s not just a failure of one or two but widespread rebellion and dissent. How is a Catholic supposed to take Catholicism seriously? It’s very painful.
 
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Greg_McPherran:
I am just starting to doubt whether all this talk about holiness is just to sound good while in the day to day reality many priests are not upholding Church teaching. I am just starting not to buy it anymore.
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Greg, please don’t let a few individuals destroy your beliefs. Priests are people too.

Your faith should not be about whether or not you like what priest says or does. It should not be whether or not you like your parrish or not.

Your faith has to be about the relationship between you and Jesus.

You are right, you should not have to put up with it, use the chain of command, push your grievance up to the next level and keep pushing until you get resolve. Go all the way to the Vatican if you have to. You will not agree with everything, but hopefully you will find some common ground with the Church leadership.
 
I’ve writtent letters - nothing changed.

I’m not letting the few ruin my faith. Read the full message. I am saying that the clergy largely does not even function properly. I understand many associated with Catholic Answers and EWTN are fine but I don’t have that version of the Catholic church in my area.

I understand human sin and failure including among priests. But I don’t accept the authority structure when they don’t even stand with Church teachings. I respectfully hold the Pope and Bishops accountable for this. As a Catholic I have right to hear the truth especially if it’s a structure of authority whereby the priest is supposed to represent God Himself. You can’t have an authority structure then the members of the structure don’t uphold the teachings. It just doesn’t work. This problem has to be solved before we expect people to become Catholic. As it is I am starting to question because I’m not sure I trust.

It’s not a few. I don’t think I have heard ONE SERMON against contraception. How can I take it seriously? I hear about molesting. I see marriages annulled. I send letters and emails, nothing seems to happen. I am weary.

I praise those priests that stand firmly with the Church, But that’s not what I’m often getting in confession. Where is this Catholic Church that I read about? The Church where the families are models of holiness and contraception wouldn’t even be dreamed of because it is so indecent? The Church where voting for abortion to be legal would be unheard of. I live in Massachusetts with a very high percentage of “Catholics”. We are about the most Democratic in the nation!!!

What I see is Catholicism is largely a consumer religion but few really seem to practice all the things that the Catechism considers very serious.

I see that we really don’t seem to uphold our standards and I don’t know like to be part of a group that does not uphold its standards.
 
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Greg_McPherran:
Then I have to ask. Well, who’s in charge of all this? Is it not the Pope and the Bishops who must see to it that all priests teach the truth?
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Each Bishop is responsible for the clerical actions of the priests within his diocese. If you have a problem with a priest in his clerical role, take it to the bishop. Then go to the apostolic nuncio to inform the Vatican if you feel the bishop is not doing anything about it.
 
I could see occasionally having to go to a Bishop but this is ridiculous it’s so widespread. Plus they have to investigate and verify what I am saying.

If I tell a Bishop, that my priest thinks contraception is OK, do you think he’ll be shocked. He’ll probably think “so what else is new.”

Why aren’t the Bishops doing their job to begin with?

The problem runs much deeper. It has to do with the reality of the operation of the Church.
 
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Greg_McPherran:
Why aren’t the Bishops doing their job to begin with?
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A number of bishops are doing their job well.

Some however either do not understand their role or lack the courage to stand for the truth. Pray for them.
:gopray2: May God grant his bishop N the courage to stand for the Truth the regardless of the price, the wisdom to truly understand the problems, and the love to deal with it as Christ would. :gopray2:
 
Hello Father,

Thank you. We have Archbishop O’Malley. I think he is helping. What I am concerned about is that the Bishops need to set up systems so that priests can’t get away with dissent. These systems need to be in place.

For you and other priests, I am most grateful. I am mainly upset because I don’t think part of a Catholics job should be to have to shop around for a Church where they stand firmly with all the teachings of the Catechism. This is what I’ve had to do.
 
See for example, the web site at my parish. This is just a sample not to mention things I’ve heard in sermons!

They have VOTF:
ourladyofsorrows.net/voiceof.htm

Check out the “Feminist Theology Group”:
ourladyofsorrows.net/PastorsPage.htm

I heard a priest at mass say the Church will surely have women priests.

See the Deacon’s thoughts on our Church:
ourladyofsorrows.net/DeaconsPage.htm

Note the discussion of the laity “power”:
ourladyofsorrows.net/tfexhibit7.htm

Again, this is just a sample.
 
Fr. McBrien on the 20/20 show about the DaVinci code is an example of what I mean. Will his Bishop do anything about it? I would tolerate it from a non-Catholic, but a priest? I am having a real problem with this and I’m not fully enjoying being Catholic because of this kind of nonsense. Bishops do something about this!
 
I totally sympathize with your frustration, Greg, but the Truth remains the Truth regardless of how horribly the clergy in charge of safeguarding it may act it out. I personally believe that the total breakdown in discipline is the result of fear. Priests and bishops are afraid that “Catholics” confronted with the Truth will stop coming to Mass, thus losing the benefit of sacramental graces as well as whatever modicum of teaching may be conveyed during Mass. So as a pastoral strategy, they hold back. The bishops are also scared of attacking dissent because there is a chance that their authority will be ignored. Working with an already eroded authority after scandals and such, they are afraid to completely lose their, for lack of a better term, street cred. This would mean a loss of their ability to speak on issues such as abortion, etc. That explanation is not meant to be a defense. This strategy of the bishops has been a resounding failure which needs corrected immediately. I just hope that this might show how the problem could (and I hope it is) be one of clerics acting out of misguided good intentions, as opposed to most of the American hierarchy actively fostering dissent.
 
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Greg_McPherran:
Hello Father,
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I am not a priest, a married man in the Secular Franciscan Order, an order for lay people.
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Greg_McPherran:
We have Archbishop O’Malley.
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That puts you in the Archdiocese of Boston, one of the worst areas of dissent in the World. Archbishop O’Malley has a lot of work he needs to do, transforming the archdiocese to what it should be. Lots of problems both in the clergy and with the laity. He needs all the help he can get.

If you can find a number of like-minded people in the area, form a new group, called Servants of Truth (to counter the dissident Voice of the Faithful) and put yourselves fully at the service of the Archbishop as he sees fit.

Everyone needs to pray for Archbishop O’Malley and his archdiocese.

:gopray2: Dear God, You have placed a good man, Archbishop O’Malley, in the Archdiocese of Boston to bring it back to the Truth of the Gospels. Blessed him with abundant graces and grant him the energy, the courage, the faith, the perseverence, the integrity, and the love to do what needs to be done. Bless all those in the diocese, that the abuses of many different types many not lead people away from the Church, that individuals may have their faith and knowledge of the truth strengthen, and that they openly listen and obey Archbishop O’Malley. :gopray2:
 
One of the preceding posts advises to write to the apostolic nuncio. I just did that myself.

But, in a different thread, a post says his letters to the nuncio were simply forwarded to the local bishop. The nuncio responded to a letter of mine a couple years ago, but said I should take up the matter with the local bishop – well, duh, that was the problem!

And, another man I know got a letter from the bishop to stop writing him with problems, because he wasn’t going to answer anymore.

I am an orthodox Catholic, but “in escrow”. I’ll start going to Church again when the orthodox faith rolls into town again. Until then I have my Catechism and Bible, and I’m waiting for Jesus!

Baloney, I’m not attending or having anything to do with make-believe Catholic churches. The heck with them.
 
I consider that by perservering and tolerating the problems Jesus may consider this and be “extra” merciful for my own sins.

Also, the Church in Foxboro, MA is decent so I go there. I haven’t heard anything shocking in sermons.
 
If you have a great passion for a given virtue, frustration that it is not more heavily stressed is understandable. If you read the Gospels, though, you do notice that Jesus also did not spend a great deal of His time preaching about sexual sins. He didn’t deny that they were sins, but it would seem He had bigger fish to fry. Even the woman caught in the act of adultery… she practically got a slap on the wrist, compared to everyone else in the story.

So, of the great virtues and sins that Jesus talked most about, the ones that are actually in each week’s Gospel reading, which ones aren’t being preached in your parish? You might ask yourself: if the Gospels themselves aren’t spending a whole lot of time on sexual sins, what right does your homilist have to go steering off into that direction? He is supposed to expound on the Liturgy of the Word, after all, not just any topic of his own choosing. Besides, it may just be that taking care of other areas of the spiritual life must happen before getting the sexual life in order has much hope of success. The goal is whole-person transformation, after all.

I’m not saying you have no reason to be frustrated, or that these topics will not naturally come up a few times over the course of a given liturgical year, or that they should not be heard more, only that your crusade on behalf of the virtues may have narrowed more than you are aware. Just a thought.
 
:confused: Greg,
*I have only come to the church 4 years ago, and I have a hard time with understanding why people go from parrish to parrish as if you were shopping around. I know that the Lord put me in the parrish I am in to help promote that unity that we all want to feel when we go to have supper with the family. This is my neighborhood, this is my parrish, and I can do nothing in some other neighborhood or some other parrish but here I can help to change those things that bother me by being more involved with the goings on of the parrish. I pray that the Holy Spirit show you a way to get involved with a parrish suited to you and make a stand and pray for guidance. We are the body of the church . God Bless *
 
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BayCityRickL:
One of the preceding posts advises to write to the apostolic nuncio. I just did that myself.

But, in a different thread, a post says his letters to the nuncio were simply forwarded to the local bishop. The nuncio responded to a letter of mine a couple years ago, but said I should take up the matter with the local bishop – well, duh, that was the problem!

And, another man I know got a letter from the bishop to stop writing him with problems, because he wasn’t going to answer anymore.

I am an orthodox Catholic, but “in escrow”. I’ll start going to Church again when the orthodox faith rolls into town again. Until then I have my Catechism and Bible, and I’m waiting for Jesus!

Baloney, I’m not attending or having anything to do with make-believe Catholic churches. The heck with them.
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How sad for you…
Whatever you think…you are missing out on the Eurchrist. The Mass is the Mass .
 
Greetings all,

I’m not sure what has enervated the Bishops except that they have been chosen from among the population of priests over the past 30 years, and for various reasons there have been noted “quality control” problems among the Fathers 🙂

There are, however, several reasons to maintain hope.

My parish (Sacred Heart, Norfolk, VA) is absolutely horrible. It’s in an affluent and liberal section of Norfolk, and while they have got all kinds of social justice stuff going, the homilies are absolute fluff and they are abusing the sacraments.

However, the Archdiocese has just recieved a new Bishop who is already putting his foot down. I take this as a good sign.

Keep the faith,

B.C.
 
Mike C:
Its all about the $$$
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Oh, please, I am so sick of hearing that sorry excuse for hostility towards the Church. Believe it or not, some priests and bishops are actually not motivated by money. They may handle some things badly, but welcome to the human race. The priests that Greg McPherran referred to may have some doctrinal problems, and the bishop may not be handling things as quickly as most would like, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they are money-grubbing. They could be very sincere in their actions-- wrong, maybe disobedient, but sincere.

None of this changes the Truth, which is immutable, unchanging, and incorruptible.
 
First of all, the priest are going to be held responsible for what they did or didn’t preach. After that the Bishops have a responsibility to make sure that their priests are teaching the Truth.
 
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