Adventures in Catholic cognitive dissonance: Sainted Pope J2P2 in 2001 gave the red hat to McCarrick, now charged with sex crimes from the '70s

Ex-Cardinal McCarrick charged with sexually assaulting teen

 

Two things are true here.

 

Pope John Paul II indeed made mistakes in these matters. He "covered up" predatory homosexuality in the Roman Catholic Church, and he elevated monsters like McCarrick.

 

Pope Francis, who defrocked McCarrick in 2019, is also out to sully the reputation of the traditionalism and conservatism J2P2 resurrected in the church in response to the liberalism of Vatican II, which Francis supports, most recently shown by his re-imposition of restrictions on the Latin Mass. 

 

The biggest problem for Catholics in our time has been the clash between the sexual revolution and the asceticism required of clergy, which, however, has been a problem since it became required over a thousand years ago.

 

Tradition which ignores the font of it is worthless, and ultimately destructive. The church needs priests who make love to women instead of who fake love with little boys.

 

Do we not have the right to the company of a believing wife, like the other apostles and the Lord's brothers and Cephas?

  

-- I Corinthians 9:5

National Catholic Reporter attacks its conservative luminaries and First Things, denies Catholic abuse scandal is primarily homosexual in origin

This snooty editorial demanding deep self-examination is itself blind to the sin of homosexuality which has metastisized in the Catholic priesthood. The church's view that God has created people homosexual is the little leaven that has leavened the whole lump.

Here:

Those who worked so ardently in the past to enable you — the faithful, so betrayed, who just couldn't believe you would engage in such a deliberate cover up; the likes of George Weigel and his blind, uncritical hagiography of Pope John Paul II; Dr. Mary Ann Glendon and the late Fr. Richard John Neuhaus and their naive celebration and defense of Maciel; the rest of the chorus at First Things and like publications; the telling silence of so many other Catholic outlets; the absurdity of charlatan William Donohue and his silly "Catholic" League — they helped sustain your weak narrative as many of them denigrated those who raised the tough questions and pursued the truth.

It's over.

None of them any longer has a persuasive case to make. Some of them now try to blame the crisis on gay priests. You might be tempted to latch onto that diversion, but it will only prolong the already intolerably long agony.

Gay priests and bishops are certainly among us — probably a greater percentage of gays in the Catholic clergy, if anecdotal evidence and the private chatter of seminary rectors and heads of orders is to be believed, than one would find in the general population. ...

Unless the preponderance of credible experts has suddenly flipped its understanding of things, however, sexual orientation is not one of the topics that match with sexual abuse.

Why The Papal Resignation Was Unwise

J2P2

Joseph Bottum, here:

"In other words, the modern world doesn’t really need to see in the pope a model of competent administration, nice as that would be. It does need, however, a public reminder that we are not incapacitated as human beings when we age and prepare to die. We are not to be tucked away or compelled by moral pressure to remove our lives and deaths from public view. The older vision of life is the more complete one, and in today’s world, perhaps uniquely, we are in special need of remembering that."