It Seems Impossible the Catholic Church Can Correct It's Ills



It's only possible to know only a tiny bit of what goes on inside the secret world-wide bureaucracy of the Catholic Church. From what is visible it looks discouraging.

Pope Francis came into office with the intent of getting the vast bureaucracy under control. Some say the Cardinals who elected him gave him a mandate to do so. I would guess there were many different agendas in the many minds of those Cardinals. It does appear, however, Francis wanted to shape things up.

He started by appointing a Council of Cardinals. This also goes under the names "C8" and "C9". The mandate given them was to consolidate power to under the reform minded Pope. He needed this to clean up sloppy finances and end child abuse by priests. What has happened during the past five years is fascinating to review.

On the one had, there has been some consolidation of power. On the other hand events seem to have spun further out of control and the church is becoming a federation of factions. Scandals involving some of the Cardinals on the very Council of Cardinals which was to stop scandals have put that entire effort under a cloud. As has been pointed out, the scandals that first were thought to involve only rogue priests. Now the scandals are in the Cardinals.

It's becoming obvious there are substantial communities, apparently widely known, of gay priests and Bishops within the vast organization. This would not be a problem were it not for the church's dogmatic rules about sin. As a practical matter it will be all but impossible to ever name and condemn all clergy engaged in gay relationships.

The church in Germany is so wealthy it endorses church positions different that those of Rome. It does so with impunity. I think I'm safe in predicting this will continue until German needs money from Rome instead of the opposite.

There is a solution to all of this. It is to admit the Catholic Church is not an organization passed down directly from Jesus. It is, instead, an a group of humans who reflect various cultures and political factions. It is like, if not identical to, our political parties.

(On Nov. 1st the Forum will open a new blog page. I'm am already putting blogs on that site, Skrive. Be watching the Forum for news about the site.)

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