The Church in Scandal

The most important admonition in the Canons of Church law is the prohibition against causing scandal. In fact, Christ himself warned his Apostles against anyone who would cause one of these little ones to loose their faith. For some time now I have been contemplating the scandal and its impact on the Church and on my vocation. In the context of vocations I think it is important to revisit this issue because the scandal has impacted and will continue to impact young Christian women and men as they discern vocations to religious life and/or the priesthood for some time to come.I recently took a one day private retreat. During the retreat I read a fictional novel as a spiritual reading. Though the book was 600 pages it was so engaging that I read it in just a few hours. The book was Michael O’Brien’s Apocalypse entitled “Fr. Elijah,” a book which I whole-heartedly recommend to you. O’Brien presents a fairly accurate view of the Church as it might look in the end times, suffering and isolated. Moreover he presents an excellent eschatologically oriented view of the Church. Of particular note are the chapters that he dedicates to the penance of a warped deviant materialist old man at the end of his life and to his theology of the Papacy. The latter he conveys by means of a conversation between an ailing but saintly Pontiff and a renegade Cardinal, who suggest that the aging pope ought to retire ostentatiously, so that the Cardinal can assume the seat of Peter and fix the Church, which Christ promised would never falter. This book has helped me to understand the true scandal in a much more profound way.As the Church in America overcomes the recent scandal’s it is important to look at what is the true cause of the scandal. Of course in part it is sexual abuse; I don’t mean to minimalize this part of the scandal. I find it greatly disturbing that priests of God, men who were ordained by the Church to serve the people of God in persona Christi Capitus, in the person of Christ the Head, could attack and brutalize the weakest and most pure of God’s flock.However, I would like to suggest that this horrible act isn’t really at the heart of the Scandal, but rather an effect of it. Rather, the true root of the scandal is not that priests could sin, violently against the weakest most precious members of the society, the true scandal is the scandal, which reaches back further than these attacks. In my thinking it is the scandal which allowed these assaults to take place. My discernment process is one that has been marked by scandal, gratefully not my own!! During the years in which I prayed about my vocation, well before the sexual abuse scandal broke out in earnest, I was scandalized by what I believe is the true root of the scandal. The scandal that allowed priest to attack children is the same one, I think, that allows Catholics to leave the Church in flocks. It’s the scandal that has kept protestant’s, Muslims, and atheists from the Church for decades. The true scandal is poor education about what the Church truly is–and by extension poor education about what the priesthood truly is; by this I mean:–The Church is not a human institution although it is governed on some levels by humans–Belief in the Church is not a matter of an arbitrary choice between religions - but an acceptance of the one true church–The church is not in the rule-making, social work, or entertainment business but in the salvation of souls business...and–The Priesthood is not just a job although priests have jobs to performWhat do I mean by saying that these things are at the root of the scandal? If you believe in your heart that Church is a Sacrament–that it is a gift from Christ which gives grace–then you could not possibly leave the Church even if one (or many) of the Church’s shepherds failed in some horrible way. Similarly, as a priest if you truly believe that the purpose of the Church–and your purpose by virtue of the indelible mark of ordination–is to save souls, then as a believer fear of the lord alone should make this sort of abuse impossible!! The true scandal in the Church is an eccelesiology that thinks of the church as a human institution. It is scandalous because it leads you away from the truth of the faith because ultimately it denies that Christ founded the Church, as the gospel teaches in Matthew chapters 16 and 18 where he gives Peter, and later the twelve, the power to bind and to loose. When you deny the Church’s unique role as the only God given earthly government–you implicitly deny the Church’s awesome role in the economy of salvation, you lessen what the Church has to offer humanity, what it means to be a Catholic (that is a priest, prophet, and king after the example of Christ), and what it means to be an ordained Priest, an alter Christi.Growing up I was taught about Jesus, the Ten Commandments, the Beatitudes but I was never taught about the Church’s singular role in God’s plan for human salvation. For this reason, even though I had felt a strong call to the priesthood as early as five, by the time I was in high school I was shopping for “a church.” If all churches are the same then all that matters in choosing a church is a personal preference. One of the first things that turned the tide of my thinking though was, ironically, the creed that the Episcopalians say at their services. While attending the funeral service for one of my friend’s father, I noticed that the Episcopalians use essentially the same creed that we Catholics use, a creed which includes the four notes of the Church: one, holy, Catholic, and Apostolic. I never truly left the Church but like many of my formerly protestant friends my heart fully returned to the Church after deep contemplation of these four marks, which have been central to Christianity since the council of Nicea. –Only the Catholic Church is truly ONE, bound together by the seat of Peter.–Only the Catholic Church is truly HOLY created by Christ and not by a man. –Only the Catholic Church is universal, or CATHOLIC, made up from diverse cultures and traditions from around the world.–And only the Catholic Church is APOSTOLIC, that is able to trace its origins back by a direct line of succession to Peter, Paul, and the other Apostles. All other Christian sects are missing one or all of these marks, even the orthodox. As a priest friend of mine, who is a convert from Episcopalianism, recently put it, the truth of the Church is manifested by the fact that it is the only Church that is truly concerned with the salvation of all Christians and in Christian unity. As I began to learn during my years at Catholic University and on a number of trips and pilgrimages to Europe, the Church is not one among many “options” but unique in its role in history. I learnt that as the old saying goes, “Extra Eccelsia Nulla Salus,” outside the Church there is no salvation. This saying has fallen out of favor in many circles because it is not considered ecumenical but I think it’s meaning is at the root of true Christian ecumenism. It means that, as the scriptures teach, God wills that all men be saved and to this end he gave us his only son; all hope of salvation comes from Christ through the Church he founded and through the sacraments, which his Church is the steward of. It does not mean that all non-Catholics are un-savable, to say this would be blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. While no man can pay his own debt to God, “Extra Eccelsia Nulla Salus,” means that: –a protestant Christian’s salvation comes through his Baptism into, the one true Church of, Christ –that our older brothers in faith the Jews can achieve salvation through Christ’s sacrifice for them which the Church re-“presents” at the sacrifice of the altar –that a Pagan’s salvation comes from the prayers and sacrifices offered for their soul–and that the fullness of truth subsists in the Church, which has a duty to spread the Gospel to these other people who are not in full union with Christ’s Church.This saying is central to what it means to be truly Catholic, or universal. Its central to the invitation of the Church to unity in Christ, unity in the Truth, and central to the vocation of all Catholics to bring the good news to all people.Much of the confusion about this teaching stems directly from an improper reading of Dignitatis Humanis, the Second Vatican Council’s document on human freedom and religious freedom. This document taught that a person can not be coerced into faith, as the church has taught since the middle ages. It also taught that since arriving at the truth about religion is so important, important to the salvation of your soul, states which are not competent authorities on matters of religion should ensure and protect a person’s religious liberty. It in no way suggests that all religions are true, but rather it demands that states allow for religious freedom so that the church can do its duty to spread the good news about Christ and his church to all people. I believe that correcting this modern error in thinking about the Church, through a re-evangelization and re-catechisis, is the only thing that will get to the root of the abuse scandal and at the same time to stem the tide of Catholics abandoning the Church. I am also convinced that it is the only thing that will help young people graciously consider their vocation in a proper light of the true faith faith.