Is demonstrated in this story<\/a>. \u00a0The story, carried by Reuters, showcases Catholics who are outraged that Cardinal Mahony, who in some ways has come to\u00a0exemplify everything bad about the abuse scandal in the Church, will be part of the\u00a0conclave\u00a0to elect the next Pope. \u00a0I know, it\u2019s easy to be critical, judgmental, self-righteous. \u00a0We don\u2019t need to wish him ill, pain, suffering, or the fires of hell. \u00a0And yet, there is such a thing as justice. \u00a0There is such a thing as the wrong shall fail, the right prevail. \u00a0One of the basic reasons as Christians we rejoice is because God is a just God as well as a merciful God. \u00a0Sin must be accounted for, it must be dealt with. \u00a0There is a book of life, which\u00a0suggests\u00a0strongly a book that is not the book of life, or being absent from the book of life means something. \u00a0And yet God is also a merciful God, and sends His Son to die on our behalf, so that those who believe on Him shall not perish but have everlasting life.<\/p>\nTake away the justice, the idea that wrong needs reckoned with, that there is punishment or basic accounting for wrong deeds, and the idea we are saved takes a hit. \u00a0Ask anyone in a mainline Protestant denomination that has long abandoned such archaic notions as hell or punishment for sins. \u00a0Like it or not, when that happens the Faith itself lacks punch. \u00a0After all, God so loved the world He gave His only Son for what? \u00a0To save us from what? \u00a0So that we might have what\u00a0apparently\u00a0we\u00a0would\u00a0have anyway? <\/p>\n
And if there are\u00a0eternal\u00a0results of our sins, there are also\u00a0temporal\u00a0consequences as well. \u00a0I don\u2019t know the details about Cardinal Mahony. \u00a0Almost everything that\u2019s been published suggests he was part of the grand cover up and obstruction of justice that has been the major hit to the Catholic Church. \u00a0As I\u2019ve said before, no fair minded person would slam the Church\u00a0because\u00a0priests raped or abused young people. \u00a0That happens when you deal with humans, some do horrible things. \u00a0But it\u2019s the systemic cover up, the wide and sweeping use and abuse of Church positions of authority that have given the\u00a0Church\u00a0the major black eye. \u00a0That cover up, that wide ranging attempt to sweep things under the carpet, feeds into the stereotype that the\u00a0Church\u00a0is, and always has been, a lumbering\u00a0bureaucracy\u00a0of corruption and decadence, where warped individuals abuse and use the power of the ecclesiastical\u00a0hierarchy\u00a0to crush the masses while being drunk on the wine of influence and domination. <\/p>\n
It also plays into the notion that the Catholic\u00a0Church\u00a0is a modern\u00a0Pharisaical\u00a0movement that believes man was made for the Canon Law, not Canon Law for man. \u00a0It suggests that while kids having the hell raped out of them by priests while bishops and other officials use the power of their office to crush all\u00a0inquirers\u00a0is a bad thing, the really important thing is Canon Law 12391298.HSEIF12038940123 that says\u00a0technically\u00a0we still should keep the guilty on because otherwise, etc.,etc.,etc. <\/p>\n
IMHO, it would be best if Mahony stepped out. \u00a0For sheer public relations and to make a point that the Scandal was more than a big mess of an\u00a0inconvenience\u00a0to business as usual. \u00a0If he doesn\u2019t, it would be a feather in\u00a0the\u00a0cap of the Church to\u00a0lovingly\u00a0set him aside, explain that there is no malice in the decision, and it prays for all involved, or something. \u00a0But the idea that he could be within the decision making process of the next Pope\u00a0poll-vaults\u00a0beyond the reality that all Cardinals are sinners. \u00a0It pushes the idea that all sin is an\u00a0affront\u00a0to God the wrong direction. \u00a0 We don\u2019t say that to get people off the hook. \u00a0We say that to be humble ourselves, and realize that who are we to judge? \u00a0But we don\u2019t say it to take away our ability to call evil or even wrong what it is. \u00a0Nor do we use it to say a person who may well have been responsible for one of the most scandalous\u00a0affronts\u00a0to the Christian faith in generations is no worse off than the person who stole a towel from a hotel. \u00a0Keeping things in perspective, standing on justice as well as mercy, and acting as if there are things worth being saved from, will go a long way toward\u00a0repairing\u00a0the reputation of the Church in the minds of fair minded people, as well as reminding us all that there are in fact consequences of our actions, hence the praise we give to God for saving us through Christ Jesus.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Is demonstrated in this story. \u00a0The story, carried by Reuters, showcases Catholics who are outraged that Cardinal Mahony, who in some ways has come to\u00a0exemplify everything bad about the abuse scandal in the Church, will be part of the\u00a0conclave\u00a0to elect the next Pope. \u00a0I know, it\u2019s easy to be critical, judgmental, self-righteous. \u00a0We don\u2019t need […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2805,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2037","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
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