I once witnessed a guy stopped at a stop sign where his girl passenger got out and they engaged in an argument. The guy got out, went around and was dragging her toward the door. I stopped my car, rolled down my window and yelled at him to leave her alone. He let her go and she walked away. Really, isn't that a natural reaction to witnessing a bigger person physically manhandling a younger or weaker one?
Mark Steyn points out the tragedy of our culture today where grown men act like babies:
Here surely is an almost too perfect snapshot of a culture that simultaneously destroys childhood and infantilizes adulthood. The "child" in this vignette ought to be the 10-year-old boy, "hands up against the wall," but, instead, the "man" appropriates the child role for himself: Why, the graduate assistant is so "distraught" that he has to leave and telephone his father. He is pushing 30, an age when previous generations would have had little boys of their own. But today, confronted by a grade-schooler being sodomized before his eyes, the poor distraught child-man approaching early middle-age seeks out some fatherly advice, like one of Fred MacMurray's "My Three Sons" might have done had he seen the boy next door swiping a can of soda pop from the lunch counter.Read the entire article for yourself. It will make you want to weep. God have mercy on us. No wonder women ask where all the good men have gone. They sure aren't graduate assistants at Penn State!
The graduate assistant, Mike McQueary, is now pushing 40, and is sufficiently grown-up to realize that the portrait of him that emerges from the indictment is not to his credit and to attempt, privately, to modify it. "No one can imagine my thoughts or wants to be in my shoes for those 30-45 seconds," he emailed a friend a few days ago. "Trust me."
"Trust me"? Maybe the 10-year-old boy did. And then watched Mr. McQueary leave the building. Perhaps the child-man should try "imagining" the 10-year-old's thoughts or being in his shoes. Oh, wait. He wasn't wearing any.
I wonder--is this about the character of men today or about what people believe about the need to "take one for the team"--literally? Perhaps McQueary thought he was looking out for the greater good in not exposing his school and team to scandal. I don't mean to be a cynic but I want to know--do we really believe this kind of thing is unique to Penn State? Haven't we all heard stories about professional athletes' exploits on the road? For the average person, I think the answer is to pay less attention to all of the people the media idolizes. Perhaps if the potential fallout hadn't loomed large in his mind, McQueary would have made a different choice.
ReplyDeleteAll I know really is that a lot of people are paying the price for his cowardice--the kids and their families but also everyone tainted by association with this scandal including innocent grads holding a Penn State diploma. So unfair.
That's exactly what I thought when I read that and wondered why didn't he rescue the boy? I would have yelled, thrown something, anything to stop it. Where are our heroes today? Where is someone like in the John Wayne movies when we need him? Where are the real men with morals who fear God that will protect children and give them someone to look up to for guidance?
ReplyDeleteWe we have a culture of idolatry (for what else is the obsession with sports in this country?) we create a society where the "gods" are not held accountable. It's not just Penn State.
ReplyDeleteActually in his book on the priest sex abuse scandal, Sacrilege, Leon Podles describes some scenes that are eerily similar. In one case, a pastor walked in, saw his associate raping a child, and walked out again.
ReplyDeleteIt's interesting that the homosexual natrue of the abuse, just as in the priest sex abuse scandals, is being swept under the rug.
What happened at Penn State should bring into question homosexual adoption, but don't hold your breath waiting for it to happen.
It seems that McQueary's first instinct was to protect his job...too bad for the little boy. "Hang in there, kid, I've got to call my Dad."
ReplyDeleteIn a sort of ghastly simplicity we remove the organ and demand the function. We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honor and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful. -- C.S. Lewis
ReplyDeleteVirtue is no longer honored. Indeed we find increasingly that we are living in an age where virtue is ridiculed and laughed at.
A 10 year old is a child that should of had trust and love given to him;
ReplyDeleteinstead a, grown man raped a child?
A "man" saw a grown man rape a child
? the "man" ran away!
I dont know who is the
bigger monster
The only way that that would of been acceptable
is if the man ran to grab an instrument to castrate; rapist
The world sickens me.
ReplyDeleteI have lived too long.
How much longer will Our Lord put up with such a perverse and faithless world before His Hand of Justice strikes us? I'd rather have the three days of darkness than have to live in this ongoing cesspool of a world.
How much longer will you continue to support a church where this goes on every day? You can read all the sites about "bad bishops" and yet only Ireland has kicked the Vatican out. It is a joke that you sponsor Bishop Loverde where is Father Healey blog and yet you continue to frequent a church headed by Bishop Loverde -- at least Penn State fired these people. At least the GRAD ASSISTANT who went to his "Father" for advice did speak up (like Peter). Why don't one of you at your next Mass stand up and ask out loud "WHERE IS FATHER HEALEY?" Why don't you go to Bishop Loverde and ask him to his face? How many years is it going to be before you get up your courage? Is Fr. Healey dead? How many boys have been abused and bought off w/your contribution to the poor while he is banished for speaking out? Did any of his congregation make a sound? Who came to Healey's defense? Who remembers him now? It's easy to make fun of a grad asst, like someone made fun of the seminarian being sexually harrassed by Bishop now Cardinal McCarrick - but how many other priests has this Cardinal preyed upon, how many other payoffs have there been and yet the same man who makes fun of the seminarian goes to mass where Cardinal McCarrick pollutes the sanctuary and says not a word. Who is going to go against a high ranking church official? The Cardinal(and his church) would attack the credibility of that person and destroy their career and buy off the ten year old w/charitable contributions and all the Catholic faithful would say who knows who is telling the truth? Surely Cardinals McCarrick and Bernardin are holy men--they'
ReplyDeleteve always been good to me. Does Fr. Pavone have any Catholic friends?
Surprise...there are bad men (and women) everywhere -- even the Church. That doesn't make the Church wrong or evil. Judas was among the apostles. There are plenty of betrayers still. And Bishop Loverde does not "head the Church." Jesus Christ does. Anne Roche Muggeridge, a Canadian, was once tempted to leave until a friend said, "Don't let the bastards drive you out." So I stay and fight for the truth. If we abandoned every institution that has bad men, we would all have to live as hermits.
ReplyDeleteAt Penn State the grad student DID tell the coach who told his bosses and Sandusky was removed. Of course they covered it up as much as possible to avoid staining their institution w/scandal. 10 years later when the scandal comes out, the President of the University, the Coach of the football team and 2 other guys lose their job. Now, you all want to pick on the 20 year old graduate student who probably has his little job because Daddy is a big donor - but your question is - why didn't he do more?
ReplyDeleteNow look at your diocese: a priest blows the whistle on three priests. What happened to those priests? What happened to the whistle blower priest? According to you: YOUR BISHOP LOVERDE has disappeared this whistle blower priest. Do you know it was not a criminal act - like the disappearance of the prosecutor in 2005 investigating Sandusky? What just happened to Rigali when he turned over priests for prosecution like the bishops said they would? Has anyone in the blogosphere defended Rigali? No, like Frs. Healey, Pavone, D'Arcy & Martino the good Catholics like the friends of Job don't want to know you once you lose POWER. Meanwhile they dance around the holder of POWER and claim it is because they believe a perverted, corrupt child abuser holds the key to their salvation!
Get this straight in your head: GOD did NOT disappear Fr. Healey. "Bishop" Loverde disappeared Fr. Healey with the assent of all the Catholics who continue to go to the Sunday football games and "pray" with the perverts and abusers and get their bread that proclaims they are ONE BODY with SINNERS and EVIL DOERS - and that these wicked, evil people are the Body of Christ. Just like St. Paul assented to the murder of Stephen this congregation has assented to the crimes and continues to cover up. Now St. Paul repented and spent the rest of his life making atonement - but you people don't even realize the sin is on you because of your complicity and refusal to deal with the sin and wickedness in your midst. It's not so bad - not bad enough for you to separate yourself - but GOD says always and everywhere to separate yourself from sin. There is sin in the camnp and it's time for Catholics to do something about it. If you don't you will be judged.
Anonymous, you're starting to sound like a broken record. As you point out, I've been exposing the problems in our diocese. As for the faithful separating themselves from the Church because of evil men, where would you suggest they go? To a protestant church that has the same problems?
ReplyDeleteJesus knew exactly who was going to betray him but kept the betrayer in His midst. So, by your logic, God Himself would be condemned. The Church has no blemish or spot of sin. Some of her leaders, however, are Judases. The Bible tells us the wheat and the tares will grow together until the last days. In the meantime, we fight for the true, the good, and the beautiful.
A final comment: It appears to me that you are simply anti-Catholic and are using this discussion to express your bigotry.
The grad student is still employed at Penn State. The child abuser is gone. The whistle blowers in the Catholic Church are gone. The pornography viewing priests, the predatory homosexuals and the pedophiles are still there. Have you reported the disappearance of Fr. Healey to the police? Why not?
ReplyDeleteYou should ask God where you should go to worship Him since your temple is corrupt - He is the only one who can answer that question for you. But if you read Psalm 1 you will know that you cannot worship in spirit and in truth in the company of those devoted to sexual immorality or to covering up or tolerant of that immorality: "I do not sit in the company of sinners."
Bread and circuses (i.e. clown masses and unusual msgr. nuncios) come from Rome (sometimes via Notre Dame, IN). Are you SURE you want to be counted in that number when the saints go marching into heaven?
Visiting Scholars
Charles Brown (in Rome)
http://theology.nd.edu/people/areas/
First of all, the "whistleblower priest" is Fr. James HALEY, not Healey. James Healey was a gay activist priest who came out in the Washington Post shortly before he died from AIDS.
ReplyDeleteRe the sex abuse scandal, the gay priests represented about 1% of Catholic priests in the Church. And there is no church without sinners in its ranks so, by your rationale, one can't worship in any "temple" as you put it.
If you don't sit in the "company of sinners" you probably sit alone a lot. But then you sit in the company of one because no one is sinless. And Jesus certainly sat frequently in the company of sinners and got a lot of criticism for it.
The Catholic Church recognizes that we are all sinners which is why we have the Sacrament of Confession. I go frequently. I recommend it. It's especially go for fighting pride and self-righteousness.
This is my last response to your posts, because it's clear to me you are anti-Catholic and not really concerned about the matter except to use any rod to beat up on Christ's Church. Or, as they say in internet jargon, go trolling elsewhere.