Never Attack a Priest
The Pieta Prayerbook contains this admonition:
CRITICISM OF PRIESTS
Our Lord's revelations to Mutter Vogel
"One should NEVER attack a priest, even when he's in error, rather one should pray and do penance that I'll grant him My grace again. He alone fully represents Me, even when he doesn't live after My example!" (page 29, Mutter Vogel's Worldwide Love, St. Grignion Publishing House, Altoting, South Germany (29. 6. 1929)
When a Priest falls we should extend him a helping hand THROUGH PRAYER AND NOT THROUGH ATTACKS! I myself will be his judge, NO ONE BUT I!" "Whoever voices judgment over a priest has voiced it over me; child, never let a Priest be attacked, take up his defense." (Feast of Christ the King 1937) "Child, Never judge your confessor, rather pray much for him and offer every Thursday, through the hands of My blessed Mother, Holy Communion (for Him) (18.6. 1939) "Never again accept an out-of-the-way word about a Priest, and speak no unkind word (about them) EVEN IF IT WERE TRUE! Every Priest is My Vicar and My heart will be sickened and insulted because of it! If you hear a judgment (against a Priest) pray a Hail Mary." (28. 6. 1939)
"If you see a Priest who celebrates the Holy Mass unworthily then say nothing about him, rather tell it to Me alone! I stand beside Him on the altar!" "Oh pray much for my priests, that they'll love purity above all, that they'll celebrate the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass with pure hands and heart. Certainly the Holy Sacrifice is one and the same even when it's celebrated by an unworthy priest, but the graces called down upon the people is not the same!" (28.2. 1938)
Mary, Queen of the Clergy, pray for them.
Most of the folks carrying around the Pieta Prayerbook are pretty serious Catholics. Some are trads, but some are the good salt of the earth folks that work behind the scenes to make everything happen at a parish from fish fries to singing in the choir.
My introduction to it came through Vince. He credited his survival of a heart attack to the prayer book being in his breast pocket. He told me "Don't listen to these people who say the Mass has to be in Latin. The first Mass was celebrated by Our Lord and he did the whole thing in Yiddish." Close enough; point made.
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The Pieta Prayerbook does contain borderline stuff as Diane said, and there is plenty of "private revelation" in it's pages which technically doesn't bind the faithful. I cited this, however, to remind people that there is a fairly long-standing Catholic tradition of simply refraining from attacking the clergy and praying and doing penance instead.
ReplyDeleteThe "top management" is supposed to take care of the errant priests, and they often do without sounding a chorus of trumpets about it. When they don't, God sends someone from the "internal affairs" department, like St. Francis or St. Catherine. Do you know anyone in the So-Called Catholic blogosphere (SCCB) whose humility and holiness can be compared to St. Catherine? (I do know ONE; he NEVER attacks the clergy, by the way.) Remember she wrote letters to Cardinals and had a direct audience with the Pope to encourage him to be more manly and get out of France.
I don't think she was the one pounding 95 complaints on the church door (or 95 blog posts on the internet) about her issues with the behavior of the clergy in her time. She was actually effective, too; her actions, accompanied by her prayers, had the intended good results.
I realize that most likely Rod Dreher and the other members of the SCCB make many calls and write many letters to the Bishops, Cardinals and Priests whom they have issues, alerting them that they are planning to expose their sins and corruption in newspapers and on blogs unless they repent. Come on, even the prophets of old gave the kings and people many chances and adequate time to repent. Likewise, Rod and the rest of the SCCB probably at least called the Knights of Malta about the T. McA thing before lambasting "church leadership". At least that's the charitable assumption we should make.
Back to the Pieta Post; I'd suggest that it's obvious that the word "NEVER" has to be taken in context; if you were a Catholic prosecutor you might have to "attack" a priest, i.e., bring charges against him in a secular court. Or a lay Catholic might have to take the witness stand against a priest or bishop if he was seen doing something illegal.
But I think the normative attitude should miror that of the two sons of Noah, Shem and Japheth, who "covered up his nakedness" in Genesis 9:20-27 when he got drunk instead of simply "telling on him" like Ham did. This is the attitude of many traditional Catholics and a valid one. That there might be other attitudes toward this among traditional Catholics I have no doubt. But I'll take the humility and holiness of Shem, Japheth and St. Francis over the attitude of all the Hams of this world.
Pun intended.