Open Letter to Theodore McCarrick
Don’t know where to send this. But here it is…
—
Dear Father in God and brother priest,
I stood holding the processional cross, right next to you, when you pressed the crucifix to your lips at the door of St. Matthew’s Cathedral. Then we all marched down the aisle, and you took possession of the episcopal throne, on January 3, 2001.
You had no right.
On behalf of the priests you ordained, I say to you: You had no right. You had no right to be the one to whom we made our promises. You had no right to be the one to lay your hands on us to consecrate us.
You had no right to be the one to give us our first assignments. You had no right to give us advice.
You had no right to make any of us Washington priests do Forward in Faith. You had no right to ask us to hold up your tired arms, like Aaron and Hur held up Moses’ arms. You had no right to take advantage of our good will, and our faith in God and His Church.
On behalf of the young people you confirmed, I say to you: You had no right. You had no right to be the one to confirm any of them.
On the day you put the crucifix to your lips at the door of St. Matthew’s, you should have been where you are now. You should have come clean long, long ago. You did not belong in the tv lights. Your name does not belong on any buildings. Your name belongs in an ignominious footnote in the history of the Holy Church in the USA.
That’s where it belonged on January 3, 2001. But you wouldn’t live in the truth. Instead, you inflicted upon us this excruciating wound–the eviscerating fact of our Archbishop’s utter hypocrisy. We have to bear that wound now.
You had no right. But we will get over it.
Come clean now. Admit every detail of the truth. To God, and then to everyone you have hurt.
Admit the truth. Live in it. And be free.
Your son and your brother, Mark White
[from his blog https://frmarkdwhite.wordpress.com/ ]
“You had no right”
Nevertheless we need to look at ourselves because we refused to live in the Truth also.
Extracts from an article see the link below, Titled:
What About the Rest of It?
“The disgrace of Theodore Cardinal McCarrick, credibly accused of having for many years groomed and abused teenage boys, seminarians, and priests, sometimes with a measure of consent and sometimes without any consent at all, gives us a rare opportunity to survey the whole miserable scene as regards both the Church and what, for want of an accurate term, we with a helpless sigh call our culture”
We are pigs in a sty, complaining that the boar stinks.
“We may also ask how it is that a man like McCarrick rose to the status of chief boar in the bog. What signal accomplishments of the intellect, what conspicuous acts of holiness, or what merely worldly successes in building up institutions qualified him to rise so high? Anyone who has ever worked in a bureaucratic setting, whether in private industry, in education, or in government, will be able to provide the answer. You rise by giving the “right” people what they want. It is another neat trick. You draw down the capital of your institution, whether it is monetary, cultural, or intellectual, in order to reward a certain group of people, often the most worldly and vocal and ambitious, rather than others—the old-fashioned, that is, the people who want mainly that things be sane and decent. Thus do you harm the institution itself while firming up your position in it. You rise by means of the right kind of managed failure”
“We may have worse bishops than we deserved, but not much worse; we certainly have not deserved good and wise and holy bishops, because we have not been a good and wise and obedient flock. It is time to see to our own corners of the bog. McCarrick was not only the cause of misery. He was a product of it and a symptom of it. For someone who contributed his or her share to the cause, look in the mirror”
https://www.crisismagazine.com/2018/what-about-the-rest-of-it
Yes Mark “Admit the truth. Live in it. And be free”.
My Post in response can be found under Comments: Click sort by “Oldest”
kevin your brother
In Christ
Many Web Sites and newspaper article are proclaiming that Pederasty, within the Priesthood is a serious problem, augmented presently by Cardinal McCarrick, as here we see the corruption of young men, who presumably entered the Priesthood, intending to live the celibate life. Some of whom may have acknowledged having homosexual tendencies, especially via the secrecy of the Sacrament of Confession, easy prey to be groomed/ensnared/corrupted by the likes of Cardinal McCarrick, who possibly was ensnared also as a young seminar, many years ago.
It is fair to say what we are now seeing is only the tip of the iceberg, as these onward flourishing manifestations of evil, emanate from a large mass of spiritual corruption, and this corruption is Satanic in nature. It is clearly evident that this evil is held together by a spider’s (Controlling Mind) web of spiritual corruption, hiding in a corner, while playing with gusto ‘black and white’ keys (Rhythms of life) upon a piano. A two fingered puppeteer and voyeur of actors/characters, covertly mocking God, with blasphemies (The smoke of Satan).
Understandably many are calling with varying degrees of intensity, for a cleansing of the church, which is creating an atmosphere of fear/anger/hatred, if this continues unabated it will grow, creating a culture of fear, manifest as intolerance/bigotry towards all with homosexuals tendencies (practicing or not)resulting in, throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
The essence of Love is ‘Truth’ and the gates of Hell cannot prevail/ overcome/ stop it, as it enters (blows where it pleases) and “sets the captive free”. Those who in humility “(Openly)” will bend their knee, God’s mercy is greater than any sin; humility/Truth is the ‘Key’ as from the spider’s web, we can break free.
“It could be said that the present system of the Sacrament of Reconciliation in some way divides us, because it permits us to avoid revealing our individual vulnerabilities, and in doing so, to some degree many retain the status quo (Continue as before)
The problem of the credibility of the Priesthood to-day can only be resolved by an onward manifestation of priestly transparency in all things. A possible way forward, James 5:6 “tell your sins to one and other”… as in, reveal your selves (Confessing) to one and other in brotherly love, led by the Bishop been ‘open’, in unity, with all his priests (Once a year) as truth is the mortar that holds His house together, in this way accountability for anything that might bring the Church into disrepute, is shared/confronted. This would create an accountable, humble priesthood, one that serves/leads in humility, before God and His people. Trust would be restored as they/we endeavour to create a culture of transparency/humility”
kevin your brother
In Christ
What’s done is done. The stable door and the bolted horse! So what now?
People at different levels of authority have duties to fulfil in moments of setback. In one sense all Catholics operate in the same circumstance – the battle between good and evil. Blessed Paul VI reminded the faithful that Satan’s greatest victory is his convincing the world that he does not exist. Flannery O’Connor put it more poetically: “My subject in fiction is the action of grace in territory largely held by the devil.” (Quoted from Lorraine V. Murray)
Given the nature of the Church every Catholic is bound by the purpose of amendment in times of setback for the preaching of the Kingdom. As implied by Kevin Walters the pointing finger has to have a certain quality of bidirectionality. All are called to repentance and reparation. With the help of Divine grace each has control of his/her responsibility to utilise the twin opportunities of obeying Church teaching and partaking of the Sacraments, especially that of Confession. Faith and good works, driven by many motives but in the awareness articulated by Flannery O’Connor.
In the words of Yeats one may feel that “Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold.” Yeats may well be correct in that “Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world” by the sexual revolution. But due to the “action of grace” (O’Connor) Yeat’s “the best” do not lack “all” conviction.
If Catholics are facing another Gethsemane episode, then is it not a matter of “Aise …” or perhaps “On our marks, set, seek faithfulness.” “Let the dead bury the dead.” (Matt 8:22)