Chaput Goes to Philadelphia: My Reflections

Colleen has done a great posting over at Enlightened Catholicism about the Chaput appointment to replace Rigali in Philadelphia.  The Commonweal crowd have been kicking ideas around about the appointment in the last day or so, too.

A Report on the Cloyne Report: Tommorow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow--Ongoing Cover-Up in the Catholic Church (2)

As my initial posting yesterday indicated, in the subsequent sections of my commentary on the Cloyne report, I want to provide readers with excerpts from the report.  My goal is to point to the heart of what the Cloyne investigation found, so that readers without sufficient time to read the entire report will have a brief summary of its most salient findings—in the words of the Cloyne report itself.  And for those who do intend to read the entire report, this set of excerpts may also provide a valuable framework for viewing the whole, when those readers have the opportunity to wade through the entire document. 

A Report on the Cloyne Report: Tommorow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow--Ongoing Cover-Up in the Catholic Church

I have now read the Cloyne report.  At one level, I feel ambivalence in writing about it.  The ambivalence stems from the strong sense of déja vu anyone who has followed the abuse crisis for some years now will undoubtedly feel in reading the report.  The same elements—seemingly perennial and intractable ones that appear in each new breaking story about the ongoing abuse crisis in the Catholic church and its cover-up—are there.  This is Philadelphia is Kansas City is Boston is Belgium is Munich, etc., ad nauseam.

Frances Kissling on Catholic Sexual Abuse Crisis: Abuse of Power No Surprise

Frances Kissling from The Revealer's series on the John Jay report, in an essay entitled "Abuse of Power Comes As No Surprise":

Amanda Marcotte on Catholic Sexual Abuse Crisis: The Link Between Sex and Dominance in Patriarchal Cultures

Sisters of Charity Gathering, 2008

Another significant passage from The Revealer's series on the John Jay study: Amanda Marcotte writing about ""Keeping the Patriarchy: Sex as Dominance in the Roman Catholic Church":

Herman Cain: Permitting Muslims to Build Mosque Infringes My Religious Freedom

As 2011 began, I noted that I had begun to see a new subject-changing rhetorical ploy on the part of Catholic church leaders and the religious (and political) right in general: this is the argument (which Pope Benedict developed in his 2011 World Peace Day statement) that religious freedom is the most fundamental human right of all, and that the religious freedom of believers trumps the alleged rights of anyone who illicitly claims rights that a religious body refuses to recognize on the grounds of its faith claims.

Mary Valle on the Men-Only Power Club of Catholicism (and the Men in Dresses Inside the Club)

Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, Papal Secretary of State

I've just discovered a new website where I can already see I'll be spending quite a bit of time in days to come.  It's The Revealer.  I can't quite retrace my steps to the referring site that brought me here, but I do know that the series I'd bookmarked at the site several days ago is a set of essays by "journalists, activists, academics and theologians" commenting on the John Jay study.