The Day After Another Supposed Pope Benedict Scandal Clarity

As I said yesterday one just had to love the timing of AP release of the document yesterday. On a Friday as the Holy See was closing down. It now appears we have some clarity as to the events of the Oakland Case in which the NYT headline today says the Pope Failed to Punish the Priest .

Which is a odd headline because the opposite is happening as we shall see.

First in the National Catholic Register there is a article that address my ever reoccurring burning question!!

Why is everyone so damned concerned about the issue of "defrocking" (a term I hate) and how quick a Priest is laicized.

I did not understand it in the Wisconsin Case. For all the yelling that the Church was afraid of scandal it seems really that this to laicize a Priest is in some ways passing the buck.

Regardless it is generally last on the priority list of issues in dealing with a Clergy Member that sexually abuses . Well at least till recently for obvious reasons that to be honest seem more PR related.

See Why Is the Press Hyperventilating about *This*?

I totally agree with this author. I think the confusion is based on both bad information (like the Vatican can remove what some call "Priestly powers" by signing a document and or bad intent of the media.

Now as to the New York Times headline that the Pope was hesitant to "Punish the Priest".

One would think that headline is odd since the Priest himself wanted a Dispensation from his Priestly obligations. The word Dispensation is important here and it appears the media is not getting it. As the Vatican noted in frustration late last night there seems to an inability for the Press to recognize the difference between removing a Priest from Public Ministry (which was done in this case) and putting someone in the formal lay state.

That is important on different levels .

Now there are two important articles here that need to to be read together that shed light on this. See Once More Unto the Breach and a very important one here Let's Get the Story Straight: Defrocking and Divorce Fr. Joseph Fessio, S.J.

Now what is ironic is this.

Why did the Priest want this dispensation. Well it is impossible to of course to get into his mind and of course into a wack jobs mind it is even more hard.

However we know two things. He was removed from Public Ministry doing Priest stuff (that seems to be clear)

H himself e wanted Dispensations from his Priestly obligations.

The two Priestly Obligations at issue here for a Diocesan Priest is OBEDIENCE to the Bishop and His Vow of Celibacy.

Needless to say a Priest that has been removed from the Public Ministry cannot marry (at least in the Catholic Church) if this vow has not been released. And Low and behold after 1987 guess what he got married!! Great lets hope he had no kids.

The Headline could have read. Pope Benedict refused to Pass the Buck to allow Priest to do what he wants and Maybe Marry!!!

In a sense the Church is being criticized for not acting in a fast manner to lift the only constraints they have on the man.

When the Bishop in a internal memo is quoted as worrying the Vatican is just going to wait till he gets older (that is 40) what he is really worrying about is OH GEEZ can't we just get rid of this guy in case he does something on my watch.

That is at least the papers would have to to call him a EX PRIEST because he had formally been declared to be in the LAY state.

Hey I understand that and I would be doing the same thing,

Now the Papal letter is in Latin (CUE OOH AHH WHAT IS THE VATICAN HIDING)

Of course with Latin we get a sense of the intent of the words. The Pope talks about paternal care of the Priest. A Father to a son. A father has many duties. Including the duty to punish and watch over him. As the above link says

your Excellency must not fail to provide the petitioner with as much paternal care as possible". This has been rightly interpreted by some to mean that Ratzinger was saying that the bishop should keep a watchful eye on the priest. The original Latin makes that even clearer: "paterna...cura sequi" which means "to follow with paternal care". We get the word "persecute" from the Latin "per-sequi". "Sequi" is much stronger then "provide".

Of course that is being missed. So what do we know.

We know the Bishop had removed the Priest from Priestly Ministry .

We know the Vatican knows this

We know the Bishop and Priest (for different reasons no doubt) want the Priest to have a dispensation from his vows.

We know the Vatican seemed less concern about "scandal" (at least we can have the Papers say ex Priest if he re offends).

We know that Ratzinger was aware of the potential of scandal here if the Priest that had been removed from public ministry re offended He said "being asked about to be of grave importance".

In the end Ratzinger took the route ( Well it appears though too be honest according to some reports it appears the Congregation LOST the file or misplaced it and had to get everything sent back to them again) that in balancing the unofficial 40 year old rule and the other grave matters that the allowing this Priest to be dispensed from his obligation of celibacy so he can go out and get married in the future that the former won.

Now of course from a PR standpoint one could see a disaster in the making. In fact the rules were aggressively changed in 2001. Though that had to deal mostly with cases that of Priests that were fighting tooth and nail not to be put in the Lay state and which means they would be removed from active Ministry which again they were fighting.

However as we see this case is different .