New York Times caricature of Pope Benedict:
The inept reporter Laurie Goodstein and her cohorts at the anti-Catholic and prejudicial New York Times have another hatchet job on Pope Benedict and the hierarchy on the front page of this morning's paper. They really hate him because he is a threat to America's and Europe's spiral toward godless socialist secularism especially in the areas of "reproductive rights" and marriage One godless secularist socialist refers to "staunch ethical traditionalism" as the soul of true Catholicism to be feared, mocked and undermined so as to keep the Church and her laity from being resurgent in the areas of traditional Catholic belief in those places where Catholics are a clear majority.
You can read the story from the New York Times HERE.
With her 20/20 hindsight reporting, I wonder when Laurie and the New York Times will apply the same technique to those who promoted abortion, perform abortions, had abortions, and said nothing in the face of the slaughter of millions of children? This non-responsibility is not seen now, but it could be seen in 20 years. Who should go to prison when the criminalization of abortion becomes retroactive in 2020?
Who at the New York Times should lose their job, be banned from reporting and even go to jail? And of course the statute of limitations should be eliminated retroactively.
With her 20/20 hindsight reporting, did Laurie and cohorts even bother to study the sociology of the Church that Cardinal Ratzinger inherited when he came into office and the freight train towards liberalism that the Catholic Church was riding? The key word for the Church in that period was subsidiarity,meaning that almost everything from priestly discipline, even optional celibacy, female priests and the elimination of the permanence of vows and promises be made on the local and lowest level, which would be Bishops' Conferences in various countries as well as local bishops of each diocese. The Church was in the midst a decentralization of authority that Pope John Paul and Cardinal Ratzinger slowly began to turn around but with much, much resistance in Europe, especially Germany, Holland, Austria and Belgium not to mention the USA.
This has ramifications for allowing bishops to handle their priests, discipline them, set up policy and the like on the local not universal level. The spirit of the time was to do it anyway even if canon law had not caught up.
Laurie and her cohorts fail in their 20/20 hindsight reporting to acknowledge that of all religious institution, Catholic, Protestant, Jewish and others, only the Catholic Church in the 1970's until 2002 actually attempted to deal with the sex abuse scandal, albeit in-house. They sent priests for residential psychiatric care and tried to rehabilitate and reintegrate these priests which was the philosophy of liberal American in terms of criminals, incarceration and reintegration. With 20/20 hindsight, we know how wrongheaded this was, but not at the time, it was seen as very modern and progressive.
In terms of reporting priests to the civil authorities, while that works in some countries the Church must be cautious in countries where the government is outright hostile towards the Church, for example in Nazi Germany, Communist China and elsewhere. Anti-Catholic godless, secularist, socialistic governments today are not to be trusted.
Finally, even Laurie Goodstein knows that liberal, progressive Catholicism hates when the hierarchy initiates any type of investigation of Church procedures and religious orders. Who are the ones within the communities of religious women today (religious orders) who scream, rant and rave about the Vatican investigating them and making policy for them? This, thank God, is not as vociferous as it was in the early 1970's, but it is still there and it is the Church that Cardinal Ratzinger inherited and which he has tried to steer in a new direction albeit too slowly for the New York Times in one area and too fast for the New York Times in other areas. They can't have it both ways. The fact that Laurie Goodstein has not yet been fired and barred from ever reporting again speaks volumes not so much about Laurie but about the New York Time's spiral toward ridiculousness, eventual bankruptcy and being purchased by the The Wanderer.
4 comments:
I will not click that link to a NYT website. If there is a remote possibility that they will profit even 1 cent from my click on their web pages I will not do it. The world will be a better place when Hell's Bible is out of business.
Nobody reads that fish wrapper (regularly) except for a few idiot libs and academics (sorry, another redundancy).
Not sure where I fall in that short spectrum, pinan525, as I read that story this morning.
It is obviously a propaganda/education piece as Father says. However, as with all lies of this sort there is a tiny grain of truth. It relates to the other post on this blog concerning transparency. The struggle The Holy Father and the hierarchy had with the sex abuse crisis seemed focused on how to deal with the horror in a Christ-like manner. As a result they appeared at least weak, if not altogether conspiratorial. What is missing, or at least not obvious, is them dealing with the gut reaction to beat the offending clergy to a pulp. The public forgiveness and lawyer-like missives seem to place the concerns for the offender above the offended. This is certainly not true, but it is an omission that ignores that struggle in the hearts of the laymen.
The model for their actions comes from Christ himself, perhaps in the garden as he pleaded "Take this cup from me." I will not project any pop theology on that glorious event, but I have to wonder what strength Christ sought? The guts to go through with it? Or the strength to stay his hand that could, with the merest thought, erase the Roman Empire from existence? Perhaps we see Him as we want rather than as he is.
rcg
Putting aside the content of any article, a portrait like that of the Holy Father for millions and millions of people is at the very least hurtful to those of us who love out Faith. A resident of Queens, NY I will never pick up the Times again. It has been sliding for years but this puts the icing on the cake. Articles can be printed without graphic displays of hate like this. In the age of iternet news, blogs from real people who have no agenda or "paycheck" to earn I hope the world turns to this as the source of real information, from real people. Maybe Laurie will be out of a job if the paper goes under. Maybe the Vatican has a position as a graphic artist.
Post a Comment