The Situation?
Since Rod is repeating his point
I will repeat my obsessopoint.
But this was even funnier... to me, that is.
Oh, yeah... call me a geek, but I googled the word "obsessostalker", just to see if Ronco had trademarked it yet.
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As funny as this is, you should read the following post by Mr. Dreher
ReplyDelete"Sure, that's a danger. But my battle with the Catholic Church ended when I left it. I could more clearly see the good in the Church once I felt no more responsibility for addressing the scandal. I didn't leave Rome in anger, but in sorrow, fear and trembling."
How he can say this with a straight face after the way he treated anyone who did not adhere blindly to his views is beyond me. There is more spinning on that blog than at the local laundry mat!
Whaaaat? Actually.... wow... "my battle with the Catholic church...." Not "my deep struggles with the filioque clause & papal supremacy."
ReplyDeleteReally this is why people like Carpenter and I are "obsessed" with this guy's stuff, it's too much. RD could stand to read this to remind him that he is still kicking and screaming. I should point out that that particular incident preceded my keeping track of the number of Catholic bashes.
The post I'm parodying has some really good comments here. Here are a few:
Aimee writes: "I also think that his mindset has remained fundamentally Protestant, in that he is seeking a perfect church on earth, where he can be happy, which is typical of Protestants and why Protestants hop around so much. No denomination on earth is sinless, and real happiness is not on earth, but in heaven: beatitude, the unveiled vision of God."
James Maliszewski: "I will only venture that I often feel that Mr. Dreher has never really transcended his 'uncommitted mainline Protestant' background. I do not mean to cast aspersions on converts from such backgrounds -- far from it! It's clear Mr. Dreher is asking the right questions and looking in the right places and, yet, something prevents him from finding what he is seeking. I fear that he's retained the worst of his Protestant upbringing rather than the best.
His heart is definitely in the right place, but I can't say the same about his head a lot of the time...."
Cajetan: "I have read Rod for some years now and came to believe that every second priest was a pervert.... Contrary to the scandals, from our experience, most priests are celibate, dedicated, pious and holy men.... Rod focused to much on the negative and little on the good. There are inconsistencies in some of his writings."
Then kentuckyliz said something which made me laugh, but was honestly harsher than anything I would ever say; I, who have been criticized for the mildest parody, poking fun at his food & wine fetishes and pointing out his penchant for bashing the Catlick Church. Does she get away with it because she's a female? I don't know... ever hear of Kathleen & Diane?
MoM quotes St. Francis De Sales: "While those who give scandal are guilty of the spiritual equivalent of murder, those who take scandal -- who allow scandals to destroy their faith -- are guilty of spiritual suicide." This is a powerful truth, delivered by a Doctor of the Catholic Church. Don't we have a responsibility to cultivate fortitude, to toughen up a bit? Listen, it doesn't mean excusing the scandal! If I'm really, truly humble I can say "But for the grace of God, I would be a child molester."
That be the kind of grace I want, baby. That's what keeps you going when everything seems to be falling apart. That's what keeps me in the Church. I don't know... maybe that keep me from killing kittens in the woods too....
Mark Shea deleted all my comments, but--bwahahahaha!!--I kept 'em. Is it OK if I post 'em here, Pauli? I'd also like to optimize 'em for the keyphrase "Rod Dreher." I'm getting pretty good at that optimization stuff.... :)
ReplyDeleteDiane
But my battle with the Catholic Church ended when I left it.
ReplyDeleteThis would be hilarious if it were not so delusioanl that it's finally rather sad.
OK, it's still hilarious.
I could more clearly see the good in the Church once I felt no more responsibility for addressing the scandal.
HellOOOOOO, Rod Dreher. There are scandals galore in your own newly adopted communion, including a doozy in your own jurisdiction. How come you feel no compelling "responsibility" to address these scandals? Is scandal only scandal--and is it only worthy of being addressed--when it's Catholic scandal? What gives here, Rod Dreher? Eh?
I didn't leave Rome in anger, but in sorrow, fear and trembling.
Right, Rod Dreher. No anger. All those post-Doxing posts about "Mahony the Big Fat Liar," priests in Barney suits, Our Lady of Pizza Hut--no snarky anger there. None whatsoever.
Delusional, Rod Dreher. Simply delusional.
Diane
Kentucky Liz's comment was hysterical, BTW. That lady rocks!
ReplyDeleteDiane
Heres' one of my deleted posts, suitably optimized:
ReplyDeleteAs I explained to Bob [an Orthodox commenter], I have no beef with the OCA. Of course it contains sinners, including some in high places. What collection of human beings doesn't? This is the human condition: "All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God." There are serious sinners in the RCC, OCA, GOA, PCA, TEC, SBC, and every other group under Heaven, including the Two Seed in the Spirit Hyper-Calvinist Primitive Baptists (if I'm getting the name right), who I believe have approximately 100 members total. Get two Christians together, and you get two sinners. That's simply the way the human race ticks.
That is why Rod Dreher's seeming inability or refusal to "let go" is so troubling. I am far from the only person who has noticed that Rod Dreher seems fixated on Catholic sins---as though he has convinced himself that Catholics have cornered the market on sin. As you say, [fellow commenter], he impedes his own healing by clinging to this fixation. He also gives scandal (through slander and detraction) -- especially when he picks at the Catholic Church for some trifling thing (like the new Dallas bishop's praise of his [the bishop's] episcopal mentors) while remaining inconsistently silent re much more serious Orthodox lapses transpiring right under his [Rod's] nose.
Several months ago, a former student at St. Vladimir's (OCA) Seminary committed suicide in his despair over the years of sexual abuse he had endured at the hands of an EO St. Vlad's professor. Who among us seriously doubts that if this student had been a Catholic seminarian abused by a Catholic priest, Rod Dreher would never have let us hear the end of it? Yet we did not hear one syllable from Rod about the Saint Vlad's student...not one peep. I know I am far from the only person struck by this glaring double standard.
The double standard is especially inexcusable, IMHO, because Rod Dreher is a journalist, for goodness sakes. Journalists are supposed to aim for fairness, balance, and objectivity. Is it too much to expect Rod to strive for the ideals of his own profession? I think not.
Rod Dreher is welcome to his heirloom tomatoes and arts-and-crafts bungalows, with my compliments; I have no beef with his Crunchy pretensions. All I ask is that he refrain from unfairly and incessantly bashing and trashing my Church. Period.
And, again, I am very, very far from being the only person who feels this way. If we dissenters didn't routinely get our posts deleted, I bet we'd be seen as comprising a veritable army.
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End of comment re Rod Dreher. More to come, if ees OK with Pauli :)
Diane
Yeah, it is ok with me, because Mark Shea has proven that he has a problem with really good criticism of Rod Dreher. While I agree with Kentuckyliz, I think it's telling that her comment stands when more substantive things that Diane and I say gets wiped.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Pauli. I could not agree more.
ReplyDeleteMore to come. :)
Diane
OK, here goes...another deleted comment or two from the infamous Shea Thread. Please note thatr my references to the OCA are not intended as slams; they merely serve to illustrate Rod Dreher's sick-making double standard.
ReplyDeleteWe are all sinners, in all communions. The OCA hasn't cornered the market on sin and scandal, but then, neither has the RCC...and that's the whole point, the point Rod Dreher somehow cannot seem to get.
Here goes (suitably optimized for keyphrase "Rod Dreher"):
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Meanwhile, Rod Dreher's new communion brims with the very problems he supposedly left Catholicism over. His own jurisdiction (the Orthodox Church in America) is currently in meltdown mode because of pervasive clerical / hierarchical corruption and scandal. His own OCA diocese, the Diocese of the South, has been accused of "cult-like" intimidation and silencing tactics. And his own "Gandalfian" archbishop, Abp. Dmitri Royster, is apparently involved up to his eyebrows in the leadership's attempt to silence, suppress, and stonewall. (See the latest at ocanews.org for full details. Pay special attention to the readers' comments under "Share Your Comments." It is eye-opening reading indeed. Also check out orthodoxreform.org for a Greek Orthodox perspective on EO sex-abuse scandals--including one particularly egregious one that has been unfolding right under Rod Dreher's nose in Dallas.)
I'm not interested in schadenfreude. I'm not an unrealistic purist who expects her fellow church members to be impossibly perfect...so I certainly do not expect the Orthodox Church to be free of sinners, including flagrant ones. I do not fault the Orthodox for being sinners like the rest of us. But I do fault Rod Dreher for incessantly harping on Catholic sins while remaining almost silent re Orthodox sins, evn those right under his nose. After a while, such an egregious double standard gets old.
Diane
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Then I posted this:
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Aimee, thou hast touched it with a needle. It is Protestant purism to the nth degree. It is why so many of my dear Protestant friends church-hop like hyperactive bunny rabbits. (One Pentecostal friend has been through three tiny churches--and counting--in the past year or so.) It is also why Protestant converts to Orthodoxy so often end up hop-hopping somewhere else in the end. Reportedly many evangelical converts to Orthodoxy last about five years before the glamour wears off, and the problematic elements start getting to them. I know a few such casualties myself. I would not be surprised if Rod Dreher also turned out to be one. He is setting himself up for disappointment, no matter where he goes, because his expectations are so unrealistic.
Speaking of which: Doesn't it seem as if Rod Dreher forever harps on other people's sins but almost never on his own? In terms of classic Christian spirituality, this is precisely bass-ackwards.
If we pay more attention to fixing what's wrong with us, spiritually and morally, then we have less time (or energy) to spend noticing and critiquing everyone else's faults. So, we're less likely to jump ship every time our companions on the journey fail to live up to our exacting standards.
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OK, so I got a tad sanctimonious there at the end--LOL. :)
God bless,
Diane