A WORD OF COUNSEL TO THE USCCB MEMBERS: OWN IT!

On Aug. 16, Cardinal Daniel DiNardo made U.S. Catholics a promise.

The Cardinal, President of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), wrote that a summer of scandal had revealed a spiritual crisis in the Church, through which “scores of beloved children of God were abandoned to face an abuse of power alone.”

“This is a moral catastrophe,” he wrote, while acknowledging that “one root cause is the failure of episcopal leadership.”

“We firmly resolve,” he wrote, “with the help of God’s grace, never to repeat it.”

This promise will never be fulfilled unless the Bishops, not collectively, but individual Bishops who have been shown to have covered up the scandals and perpetuated the homosexual predation of young males by Catholic Clergy admit their failures and take responsibility for their malfeasance by submitting their resignations to the Holy See.   

In other words, if the Bishops truly want to begin the healing of the critical wounds they themselves have caused to the Body of Christ, they must own their moral misdeeds and accept the consequences.

To date, not a single Bishop has done so.

To date, confidence in the Bishops overall has plummeted among the faithful.

Unless their is a public admission of responsibility and a public expression of sorrow by relieving themselves of the office which they have sullied, no one will listen to (let alone believe or trust) any promise they make or policy they put in place.

I cannot stress enough the fact that everyone is aware that it was the secular press that revealed the horror stories of abuse, it was law enforcement officials who painstakingly made the effort to investigate the charges, not the Bishops.

The very people the Catholic faithful would have expected to have been forthcoming and committed to the protection of their children, the Bishops, were the ones who failed them the worst.

The faithful have shown an heroic tenacity to the Church, but they are not stupid or mindless followers.  They expect their Bishops to be honest men of virtue and their expectations have been dashed to piece by the lack of supernatural faith and virtue which the Episcopal office demands and which has been so lacking among those who presently hold that office.

Unless this gathering of the USCCB results in public presentations of resignations by those Bishops who have been shown to have failed in their responsibility to protect those entrusted to their care, the fruits of this gathering will be withered and spoiled, worthy to be trodden underfoot.

The faithful expect no less than the rendering of an account.  They are owed that much.