Guest Post Part I: Pope Francis Fiddles while Faithful Burn with Anger!

Cupich, the great showman, will be running the
summit. Will it be the "greatest show on earth?"

Editor's comment: As the meeting on the sex abuse of minors begins today in Rome, consider the state of the Church and the loss of credibility among our clerical leaders. There are several troubling facts about the summit. Limiting the focus of the meeting to the abuse of minors is only half the story allowing the continued pretense that the issue is "pedophilia," the abuse of pre-pubescent children. It has ALWAYS been about pederasty, i.e., homosexual abuse. Blase Cupich has already announced that ONLY the abuse of minors will be discussed. So seminarian abuse and "age appropriate" sodomy between clerics is not on the table. Sadly, the Vatican seems to have no intention of addressing or cleaning up the real problem. The most obvious signal is that those organizing and running this meeting are, in fact, the problem. To have Blase Cupich, a champion of homosexuality, and others of his ilk in charge is surely an illustration of the saying, "The fox is guarding the hen house." The timeline of events described by today's guest illustrates exactly how much smoke emanates from the Vatican spin machine. Consider Cupich's "rabbit hole" comment. These men are clueless about the anger, the "burning mad" anger, of the laity, a righteous anger that calls out to heaven for justice!

POPE FRANCIS FIDDLES

WHILE THE ROMAN CHURCH IS BURNING…BURNING MAD

by James M. Thunder

    Polish author Henryk Sienkiewicz (1846-1916) won the 1905 Nobel Prize for Literature. He had authored the novel Quo Vadis: A Narrative of the Time of Nero in 1895. That book was made into more than one movie, notably a version in 1951 that was nominated for eight Academy Awards.

            There is a church in Rome called the Church of Domine Quo Vadis (Latin for “Lord, where are You going?”). It is situated on the spot where, like the novel and the apocryphal Acts of Peter described, a meeting between St. Peter and Jesus occurred. Peter was fleeing Rome and Nero’s persecution. On his way, Peter saw Jesus walking in the opposite direction. Peter asked, Jesus, “Domine, quo vadis?” and Jesus responded, “I am going to Rome to be crucified again.” Shamed, Peter returned to Rome and was crucified, upside down.

            I suggest that Pope Francis, too, has abandoned his post…except he hasn’t left Rome. Instead, he has dawdled, fiddled. He needs to take up his cross and address his own failings and sins. (He is capable of doing this. He did so in an April 2018 letter tothe bishops of Chile. He must address Archbishop Viganò’s allegations about his personal conduct. And then he must take up the sins of the victims and the perpetrators, and, with the help of bishops, priests, religious, and laity, clean house -- as Jesus cleansed the Temple. Let “zeal for His house consume” him. (Ps. 69:9; John 2:17)

            I write this in two parts. The first part is about the Roman Catholic Church burning, and making good bishops, priests, religious, and laity livid. The second part describes the Pope’s abandonment of his post, his fiddling, while Rome burns, making the good bishops, priests, religious, and laity even more livid with each passing day. The Catholic Church in this country – never mind Chile, Australia, Ireland, Germany, the Netherlands, and more--has witnessed nearly daily, just since June, one scandal after another, one cover-up after another, one lie after another, one failure after another to address all this.

Part 1: The Roman Catholic Church Is Burning

            The following is a brief chronological review of where we are. I omit anything before June 20 of 2018, and I omit events abroad (in such countries as Chile, Australia, Ireland, Germany, the Netherlands), and the initiation of grand juries in several states of the United States. The media reports of abuse and cover-up are too numerous to list.

June 20: Pope Francis removes Cardinal McCarrick, the retired archbishop of Washington, D.C., from ministry following a report from the Archdiocese of New York.

July 27: Pope Francis accepts Cardinal McCarrick’s resignation from the College of Cardinals.

Aug. 14: Pennsylvania grand jury issues its report.

Aug. 15: Cardinal O’Malley of Boston announces that he will not attend the “World Meeting of Families” in Dublin Ireland (Aug. 21-26) – in order to review allegations of sexual misconduct at the Archdiocesan seminary. 

Aug. 16: Cardinal DiNardo, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, asks Pope Francis to initiate an investigation on how Cardinal McCarrick was able to rise in the Church.  

Aug. 18: Cardinal Wuerl withdraws as keynote speaker for the “World Meeting of Families” the following week in Dublin.

Aug. 20: Pope Frances sends a 2,000-word letter “to thePeople of God” on the sex abuse scandal. 

Aug. 22: Following a petition by the laity, the bishop of Pittsburgh approves the removal of Cardinal Wuerl’s name from an area high school.

Archbishop Vigano -- Will he be heard?

Aug. 25: Archbishop Viganò, former papal nuncio to the United States, releases his “testimony” (his word) and goes into hiding. 

Aug. 26: Pope Francis, on board a plane returning from Dublin says to journalists, regarding Archbishop Viganò’s allegations: “I will not say a single word on this. I think this statement speaks for itself, and you have the sufficient journalistic capacity to draw conclusions. When some time passes and you have your conclusions, maybe I will speak. But I would like that your professional maturity carries out this task.”

Aug. 28: Cardinal Cupich of Chicago states, in response to Archbishop Viganò’s allegations, that Pope Francis will not go down that “rabbit hole” but has more important things to do with the issues of climate change and migration. He then argued that his statement had been corrupted by the press. The entirety of theparagraph in which Cupich referenced a “rabbit hole” was not, however, of any help to him: “The entirety of the paragraph in which Cupich referenced a “rabbit hole” is as follows: “But for the Holy Father, I think to get into each and every one of those aspects, in some way is inappropriate and secondly, the pope has a bigger agenda. He’s gotta get on with other things of talking about the environment and protecting migrants and carrying on the work of the Church. We’re not going to go down a rabbit hole on this.” One source explains the idiomatic expression “going down the rabbit hole”: “To enter into a situation or begin a process or journey that is particularly strange, problematic, difficult, complex, or chaotic, especially one that becomes increasingly so as it develops or unfolds. (An allusion to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll.)”

Aug 30: Cardinal Wuerl meets with Pope Francis in Rome. The Pope suggests that he consult his priests. The Cardinal writes a letter to his priests.

Aug. 30: Archbishop Chaput of Philadelphia announces he has asked the Pope to cancel the October A more ironic, and more difficult, confluence of bad facts at a bad time for the meeting can hardly be imagined.”)

How much does Pope Francis know about
gay orgies at the Vatican?

Synod on “Youth and Faith and Vocational Discernment” because the Church has no credibility and should convene a synod on the life of bishops. Dallas’ bishop did the same. (On Sept. 29, Archbishop Chaput writes, “

Sept. 3 (Labor Day): On a holiday on which Cardinal Wuerl traditionally hosts a picnic, he meets with his priests in a parish church.

Sept. 10-12: The nine-member Council of Cardinals meets in Rome. The Council makes final adjustments to the draft of a new apostolic constitution, revising the 1988 Pastor bonus, regulating the government of the Roman Curia. Three of the Cardinals end their membership. Two of the three are under a cloud concerning abuse but the Vatican cites only their advanced age.

Sept 12: Pope Francis’ morning homily: “In these times, it seems like the Great Accuser has been unchained and is attacking bishops. True, we are all sinners, we bishops. He tries to uncover the sins, so they are visible in order to scandalize the people.” (Yes, sins scandalize people, but, sorry, uncovering sins among bishops is not the work of the devil.)

Sept 12: Pope Francis calls a summit for Feb. 21-24 of all the presidents of the Catholic bishops’ conferences of the world (over 100 people) to discuss the issue of sexual abuse of children. (Will it consider the abuse of seminarians? Will it consider how the likes of McCarrick was promoted? Will it consider how bishops, priests, the laity, may hold bishops to account rather than being fully dependent on a pope?)

Sept. 13: Pope Francis suggests to U.S. bishops that they conduct a retreat for themselves.

Sept. 17: Cardinal Wuerl arrives in Rome, his second trip to Rome in 14 days, reportedly to resign.

Sept. 21: Four days after arriving in Rome, Cardinal Wuerl submits a new resignation (in addition to the one he rendered in the ordinary course when he turned 75). He remains in Rome several days.

Sept. 21: Cardinal Tobin of Newark announces he cannot attend the Youth Synod -- because he could not be absent from his archdiocese for several weeks due to revelations concerning sex abuse in his archdiocese.

Sept. 27, 2018, Archbishop Viganò releases a second letter (dated Sept. 29).

Oct. 1: Cardinal Wuerl does not attend the annual Red Mass at his cathedral.

Oct. 3-28: The 15^th Ordinary General Assembly of Bishops meets in Rome on the theme “Young People, Faith, and Vocational Discernment.” (This is the “October Youth Synod.”)

Oct. 6: Three and one-half months after Pope Francis ordered McCarrick out of public ministry, and
two months after Cardinal DiNardo had made his request, Pope Francis authorizes the Vatican archives to examine how McCarrick had risen in the hierarchy. (Slow as molasses.)

Oct. 7: CardinalOuellet replies to Viganò in a public letter. 

Oct. 12: By letter, Pope Francis accepts Wuerl’sresignation, submitted 21 days earlier (slow as molasses), as Archbishop of Washington, but appoints him Apostolic Administrator, that is, an interim archbishop, until a new archbishop is named, and praised him. There is never any deadline for a pope to name a successor, so Wuerl’s position as Apostolic Administrator is indefinite. Wuerl remains a Cardinal, allowing him to vote in a papal conclave and, remains active with the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith that, as it happens, supervises sex abuse allegations.

Oct. 19: Archbishop Viganò releases a third letter and responds to Cardinal Ouellet. 

Nov. 11: By letter delivered by Cardinal Cupich, Pope Francis cancels the agenda of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops meeting the next day in Baltimore. On the agenda: voting on particular action items (actions, not words) concerning the role of bishops and sex abuse of minors and seminarians.

Nov. 12-14: Cardinal Wuerl attends the meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in Baltimore.

Nov. 23: Pope Francis appoints Cardinal Cupich to organize the February summit. (No doubt giving confidence to American and world-wide bishops, priests and laity.)

Dec. 21: Pope Francis delivers a 4,000-word address to theCuria on the upcoming February summit.

Jan. 2-9: The U.S. bishops attend a retreat at the seminary in Mundelein, Illinois.

Jan. 3: Pope Francis sends a 3600-word letter to the U.S.bishops on retreat.

Jan. 4: The Vatican acknowledges allegations of perversion and financial misconduct of Argentinian Bishop Zanchetta, implicitly implicating Pope Francis of enabling it.

Jan. 11: The Washington Post reports that Cardinal Wuerl is in Rome consulting with the Congregation of Bishops about his successor. (No doubt giving confidence to American bishops, priests and laity in any successor.)

Feb. 16: The canonical investigation against former Cardinal McCarrick is concluded and he is defrocked.