Lines I wish I’d written: a poster named frère charles du désert OSB OBLAT, responding to a poster named Presbyter simplex in a discussion of John Allen’s recent NCR puff piece about Charles Chaput as a “21st-century bishop”:
Simplex writes: “Right on, John Allen -- and Archbishop Chaput! Will the Church have the imagination to put aside ecclesiastical politics for once and make him Coadjutor Archbishop of Los Angeles? I pay that this may be.”
And frère charles responds: “and apparently many others also pay that this may be, and in the brave new 21st century church as in the middle ages it is who pays who wins, not the people of God.”
Indeed. Many have paid throughout history, and in the church of the 21st century, it continues to be entirely likely that those who have the gold will rule. And those who have the gold definitely love Charles Chaput.