Today at 2:00PM we will no longer say, “Benedict our pope .
. .” at the Mass. I tried practicing
that part of the Mass today skipping that part and blew it right away. (One would think it would be so, so easy.) I said, “together with Richard our pope . . .”
who is our bishop. Glad I made the goof
now instead of at the weekend Masses.
I told the 400-some-odd children at the Mass today that this
is a historic moment. They were
attending the last Mass at this parish in which Benedict’s name would be
mentioned as pope (unless the next pope takes the same name of course) and that
after such time, the Church will be without a pope until the next one is
elected. It has been so long since a pope retired
(around 6 centuries) that nobody even remembers what to do. This will be a remarkable thing
for the history books for some time if not forever and we were alive to see it.
Of course the pope cannot just retire – at least not in the
United States. I spent much of yesterday
driving around in the car and listening to various NPR stations. Half of the reports I heard of Benedict’s retirement
were absolutely salacious. At some
points stunning in their viciousness and outright misleading statements (from
stations that claim to present the unvarnished truth for educated people by
educated people) to other stories that were quite good in which the person
interviewed would equally tell of Benedict’s great achievements, acknowledge
that at which he was not particularly talented, and refusing to give in to the
interviewer’s obvious desire for unsubstantiated dirt.
In any event, one interviewer stated that the media had an
obligation to speculate on motivations of the pope when information is not
available. Funny how it invariably has
to be negative. The most obvious
motivation – he wants to retire – is never one of them.
In a way it is kind of a back handed compliment. They are paying attention even if it is, in
many cases, in a negative fashion. Is
there leader besides the president of the United States that gets this much
attention in the U.S.? (Possibly English
royalty on a really good day.)
Today was meant to be a fond fair well post for the
pope. I am afraid I got sidetracked by
paying too much attention to the news.
Actually, today there was a lot of decent and balanced coverage. Thank you Pope (for a few more hours.) I hope your first day after your prayers you
have a good glass of wine, play the piano, and take a nice long nap.
IN OTHER NEWS:
I couldn’t let this one go though. Yesterday in the Beacon Journal, they found
it timely and necessary to run an op ed piece about priestly celibacy from the
New York Times by Frank Bruni. The crux
of the article is that the next pope should rethink the whole priestly celibacy
thing. Fine. After all it is only a discipline, not a
dogmatic teaching essential to the priesthood.
I think it would be a mistake to get rid
of it (I know, shock) but the Church would not end if that teaching changed.
However, the reasoning that he used is not tenable and uses
poor science and reasoning to draw his conclusions. Take the following points:
“The church’s (sic) leaders preach a purity that its own
clerics can’t maintain.”
This is partly true.
It is a bit sensational to make it sound as though every single priest
in the world fails at this, but it is very true that there are dramatic
failures – and even many of them. So by
his reasoning, we should stop teaching about charity (love the Lord your God
with all your heart, your neighbor as yourself, and your enemies) because if we
can’t live it, it must be done away with.
He also maintains that it keeps too many men out of the
priesthood who would fill dwindling ranks.
“It renders the priesthood less attractive, contributing to the shortage
of priests.” It is similar to the
possibility of getting shot by going to war.
First, we want men who are willing to sacrifice to serve. Second, if this would really be a solution,
then mainstream non-Catholic Churches that have married, male ministers/priests
should have PLENTY of men willing to serve.
Such is not the case.
Bruni also alleges that all sexual misdeeds in the Church
can be attributed to the unnatural state of a sexless existence. I am glad he cleared this up for us! Now all we have to do is let all priests get
married and have sex and there will be no more cheating on spouses, no child
abuse, no divorce, no remarriage . . . wait . . . then . . . why doesn’t that sound true? Maybe we should stop preaching about marriage
and fidelity too. (Touch of sarcasm
there.)
Now what might be true is that some men go into the priesthood
to get away from sexual desires that they (and society) consider impure. Bruni may be right about this. On the other hand, even if priests are
allowed to be married it would revert to the ancient customs where by celibacy is
optional, not done away with. There
would still be a celibate tradition in the Church and these men of whom Bruni
is afraid would still be there. Further,
a marriage would have to take place before ordination, the man would be barred
from the episcopate, and he would not be able to remarry.
The rest of the article is full of antidotal evidence,
conjectures, and “people have told me,” type writing that if it were turned in
as a paper for a high school class, it would receive an “F” for failure to make
an informed opinion that could be backed up with actual evidence. The lesson to take away here is to remember to
think critically when an “expert” is being presented to you.