By CHRISTOPHER MANION
In the 1980s, a globe-trotting philanthropist from Palm Beach told me about life in Argentina. She had married two Argentinos (one at a time), so she had what we might call a less than sanguine view. Naturally, she had a lot of stories about Argentine men. One Argentine friend of hers, a socially prominent woman who lived in a palatial home, had a problem: Her husband had acquired a mistress. Apparently the paramour had virtually taken up residence on the third floor, availing herself of a separate entrance to come and go.
Of course our prominent matriarch was the last to know, but when she found out that the hussy had virtually moved in, she confronted her husband. He responded by agreeing that his dalliances with his new beloved would henceforth take place in another wing of the home that had a separate entrance, which his mistress would now make her permanent abode.
They both know what the harridan on the third floor wants. Let them fight — she just wants to keep the party going. Let the sleaze tell his wife that she just has to move on with her life, pursuing her interests, the arts, and other camouflage for her desperation. And that’s what he did.
My millionaire acquaintance wasn’t Catholic, but the Argentine couple was. And the woman confronted with such a matter-or-fact mandate from her low-life spouse found herself in a familiar situation. My favorite version is the dinner party, where one fellow in particular indulged in particularly boorish behavior for the better part of the evening.
A woman seated next to the boor’s wife leans over and says to her, “Haven’t you ever thought of divorcing that slob?”
“Divorce? Never,” the wife replies. “Murder, yes.”
And so things stood in Argentina as the years went on, the generous, thrice-divorced donor told me. This Catholic woman, who suffered anew every single day, had nowhere to go.
All this comes to mind as I ponder, how do things stand with American Catholics?
Strong Feelings, Weak Men
“I know that strong feelings of revulsion may lead some to walk away,” said Bishop Mark Brennan during his installation Mass as bishop of Wheeling-Charleston on the Feast of the Queenship of Mary. Bishop Brennan assumes the post vacated a year ago by Bishop Michael Bransfield, who is officially accused “of sexual harassment of adults and of financial improprieties.” The eagle-eyed Phil Lawler notes that “the Vatican’s disciplinary action was announced in the afternoon of Friday, July 19” — a classic PR stunt designed to bury the news.
A lot of news is being buried, that’s for sure. And what can’t be buried is being ignored. That’s why Bishop Brennan is right about the “revulsion.” Because Bishop Bransfield’s departure is an anomaly.
Last week was also the first anniversary of the bombshell delivered by Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, the former papal nuncio to the United States. Viganò charged that former cardinal McCarrick sat at the center of a vast web of sodomites and “gay-friendly” prelates who have infested the Church’s hierarchy. The archbishop alleged that the network extends all the way to the top in the Vatican, and he called on Pope Francis to resign.
And nothing has happened.
When The Wanderer began reporting decades ago on the homosexual infestation of the clergy and the hierarchy, most people didn’t know about it. Undoubtedly, so we thought, once the facts were known, the good guys in Rome would investigate it, stop it, and cleanse the institutions in which the Sodomite Syndicate was thriving.
Well, today, everybody knows, and the “good guys in Rome” are doing nothing.
Now from this, we can draw one possible conclusion. Perhaps telling the truth about this vile cancer will simply have no curative effect. In fact, it has a deleterious effect on those who dare tell the truth: Today the Sodomite Syndicate is much broader than the Catholic Church, and, alas, much more powerful in our culture. In fact, the members of the syndicate inside the clergy and the hierarchy rely on their fellow sodomites in the broader culture to preserve their positions and power while they revile, scorn, and harass the truth-tellers.
We already have the testimony of countless observers of goodwill identifying the sodomites. They have described their networks, their members, and their methods of self-promotion. Today anyone who wants to know the breadth and depth of this problem can find out without much undue perspiration. Yet the sodomites not only stay in power, they’re on the verge of redefining Catholic magisterial truths to confer upon themselves the imprimatur of Church teaching. If the same scenario prevails in the clergy as has successfully triumphed in the broader secular society, sodomites in the Catholic priesthood will soon be praised and revered as braver, more honest, and generally superior to those who have given up the possibility of marriage and a family to serve the Church as ordained priests.
We have also learned that key figures in the hierarchy can attempt to change Catholic truth, but they are not subject to Catholic justice . . . or even the most elementary notion of justice. When the USCCB promulgated the “Charter for the Protection Of Children and Young People” in June 2002, well over a hundred of those bishops gathered had covered up for abusers. Precious few of the guilty have resigned. And only one has been laicized.
No, the downfall of Mr. Theodore McCarrick is a unique case, and the hierarchy is committed to making sure that it will remain unique. Repercussions for the widespread network of cooperators and criminals who are part of the McCarrick machine are out of the question.
“Lord, Save Us: We Perish!”
By now it’s clear that countless guilty prelates are simply waiting for us to give up, to move on, to get a life. They are sending the message loud and clear — even to those among their own number who have dared raise their voice — to “forget about it. We’re not going anywhere.” And that is a rather daunting prospect. After all, they’re probably right.
So. Are we in the position of that mistreated wife in Argentina? Who was Catholic, who did not believe in divorce, and had no economic means with which to support herself, if she even believed in separation from her family at all?
Well, that’s her problem. The virago upstairs isn’t going anywhere either.
As for us, “Lord, to whom shall we go?”
Many people are asking, if the Church is breaking up, as many trustworthy prelates have warned, to what safe seats in the balcony can we go to wait out the turmoil? Do we still have to put up with the termagant on the third floor, who passes by daily to take her treasured paseo in the parks of Buenos Aires? Or can we just show the shrew the door, and brace ourselves for the consequences?
Ah, but who owns title to the home? And who gets to defenestrate whom? Perhaps we had better just hunker down, enjoy our family and our routine, and wait. But wait for what? Will the revulsion go away? Will the squatter on the third floor?
Perhaps our shepherds have other things on their mind. New York has suspended the statute of limitations on child abuse for one year, and thousands of abuse lawsuits are expected against dioceses and alleged abusers. A similar suspension in New Jersey goes into effect on December first. And there are 48 states to go.
“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”
And pray.
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