Without cost have you received; without cost shall you give (MT 10:8)

I must offer a deep respectful bow in the direction of Opus Dei Cardinal Juan Luis Cipriani Thorne, archbishop of Lima, Peru.  The best I can tell, he unabashedly stands for what the Roman Catholic hierarchy is all about…money.

Last week I visited Lima and tried unsuccessfully to visit its cathedral.  Here’s a recap of my effort.

Cashier: (As I tried to just walk in the church door.)  Excuse me, you must buy a ticket.

Me: A ticket?  For a church?  I’ve visited many of the greatest cathedrals in the world and never paid. 

Cashier: You have to pay to visit the Religious Art Museum.

Me: We don’t want to visit the Religious Art Museum.  We want to visit the Cathedral.

Cashier: The cathedral is only a church when there are services.   The rest of the time it is a museum.  It’s free only when there are services.

Me: (Thinking any cathedral I’ve visited has oodles of services) Well, when is the next service?

Cashier: Saturday (This was Monday, by the way.)

 Me: Saturday?  When does the cathedral have services?

Cashier:  Saturday and Sunday mornings only. 

Canon 1221 states, “Entry to a church at the hours of sacred functions is to be open and free of charge.”  This leaves the option to charge for things like sacred music concerts offered in a church.  One probably assumes a cathedral for an active bishop has many hours of sacred function.  But Cardinal Cipriani has whittled his cathedral’s sacred function times down to 2 Masses: Saturday at 9 a.m. and Sunday at 11 a.m. He even schedules confessions to occur during Sunday Mass, conveniently minimizing those pesky hours of sacred function which interfere with making money.

To put this in perspective, in all my travels visiting Cathedrals and famous Catholic Churches throughout the world, the only times I have ever paid an entrance fee to visit a functioning Catholic Church were my visits to the Vatican museum which included stops at the Pope’s private Sistine Chapel.  St. Peter’s Basilica, St. John Lateran, St Peter in Chains, St Paul, St Mary Major, St. Paul in Rome?  Free, free, free, free, free and free.  Holy Cross, Santa Maria del Fiore, and Holy Spirit in Florence?  Free, free, and free.  Notre Dame and Sacre Coeur in Paris?  Free and free.  St. Patrick in New York?  Free. 

Perhaps I have successfully visited all these other Catholic Churches without price because, primarily functioning as churches, they all frequently offer Masses and other services every day.  However, at 2 Masses per week, each of which at a generous estimate might account for 4 hours, it seems Cipriani’s cathedral functions as a church, at most, 8 out of the 168 hours in a week.  That’s less than 2% of the time.  I suspect he takes advantage of tax breaks given to churches 100% of the time, though.

Who knew that when reading about the Cathedral and the Religious Art Museum, I was actually reading about the exact same building which miraculously varies identity and function relative to day and time.  Through some never previously revealed building transubstantiation process, it seems his cathedral can agilely flip its functional character back and forth.  As much as Cardinal Cipriani blusters against moral relativity, he seems to support building function relativity enthusiastically.   

Though Cipriani supports building functional relativity, I’m not sure Canon Law does.  According to Book IV, Title I, Caput I of Canon Law, cathedrals must be dedicated as sacred spaces and undergo an even more elaborate process to turn them from sacred spaces to ones for profane usages like that of a museum.  Yet, somehow the Cardinal manages to do this on a weekly if not daily basis with his cathedral.  Maybe the cathedral’s two Masses begin with a dedication service and end with a decommissioning one? 

Does that mean that since his chair of authority (cathedra) spends most of its time in a museum it is an historical artifact versus a functioning cathedra?  Does he speak and teach with authority only during the two Masses per week in which the building housing his cathedra actually functions as a church, 2% of the week?  Does that make him a cardinal only 2% of the time and a museum piece 98% of the time?

Cipriani’s focus on money does not stop with turning his cathedral into a revenue-generating museum.  He holds personal and diocesan shares in Yanacocha, a controversial mining company with a gold mine in the poorest province of Peru that poisoned about 900 people in 2000 via a mercury spill and introduced high levels of cyanide into the local water supply amongst a population mostly lacking funds to purchase bottled water.  Cardinal, by any chance, do you wear a “WWJP” bracelet?  “Who would Jesus Poison?”

Maybe in comparison to his gold mining stock, the $10 USD admission to enter his church seems like kittens’ play.  However, with a $118 USD average weekly Peruvian wage, $10 USD is not a small amount. 

Cipriani, a critic of moral relativity while exhibiting morally questionable behavior, regularly writes and says sexist things, has been barred from contributing to certain periodicals after he was caught plagiarizing two popes’ writings, has his hands dirty in not properly addressing clergy sex abuse, and denounces homosexuality, social movements and environmental activists.  So, maybe he falls short in most clergy requirement areas like advocacy for the poor, compassion, decency, honesty, protecting children, etc… But, baby, he is rock solid in the profiteering category!  He gets an A+ there, for sure.

As much as we suspect so many hierarchy members are all about money, they at least give a good show of effort by having things like daily Masses. That might fool some people into thinking they actually care about God’s people.  Not this guy!  He lays it right out there.  “Show me the money!” 

In fairness, the guy has his positive points.  It costs money to erect and illuminate the huge Jesus statue and cross, both of which can be seen for miles around Lima, especially at night.  Also, for $10 USD, you can get a combo ticket and tour his palace as well as the cathedral…such a bargain! Maybe, deep down, he really is sensitive to people’s economic concerns.

At this point the Pope Francis fans might be wondering, “Yes, but what does Pope Francis think of all this profiteering at the expense of the environment and poor people’s health?  What does he think about a guy who operates a 2% cathedral/98% museum?”  In 2014 Pope Francis appointed Cipriani to his newly formed Papal Council on Economic Affairs.  Evidently, Pope Francis thinks this guy is just a little bit of alright…actually someone to lead the way on how to handle money in the church.

So, hats off to Cipriani for openly operating as a money grabbing cleric.  His honesty demonstrating the primal importance of money amongst the hierarchy is refreshing…albeit contrary to the gospel and in no way reminiscent of Christ.

Living a myth...

I vividly remember “the talk” with my mom.  You know, “the talk…”   My older sister, tired of defending my unwavering belief in Santa, bullied me into asking the big question, “Is Santa real?”  My mom’s gentle explanation combined with my fervent desire to believe initially produced the opposite effect my sister intended.  Words are weak instruments to describe her reaction when I returned from that little chat triumphantly proclaiming, “I knew it!  Santa is real!”  However, I do remember her reaction did include grabbing my hand and dragging me back to our mom protesting, “Mom!  What did you tell her?!  She still believes!” 

My mom had taken me to a mirror and said, “Yes, Santa is real but he is not a fat, jolly guy in a red suit.  He can look just like the girl in the mirror when she gives a gift at the giving tree.”  I so much wanted to believe in the entirety of the Santa myth that I filtered out all words except “Santa is real.”  I’m happy to report that we did achieve mutual clarity within the span of about 15 minutes.  I was 8 years old and it was time to live with a different understanding of the myth.   My sister felt for her and my own physical and mental well-being, it was well past time but that’s a debate for another day.

I find myself reflecting upon that fervent desire to believe in a myth after watching the movie “Spotlight.”  This movie chronicles the Boston Globe’s investigative journalism that led to its January 6, 2002 bombshell story about the Catholic Church knowingly leaving numerous pedophile priests in active ministry for decades.  Though individual sex abuse stories had been published throughout previous decades, this story altered the conversation because it demonstrated that a sick, systemic culture involving hierarchy and laypeople enabled and helped perpetuate widespread abuse.  It revealed a culture pretending each abuse case was simply an individual, isolated, “whoopsie there” incident so as to perpetuate the myth of a perfect church.  People turned their heads for a myriad of reasons all stemming from scandal avoidance desires: “priests are good guys”, “just doing my job”, “the church does such good work in other places”, “my fellow parishioners bully whistle-blowers”, “Cardinal/bishop so-and-so says it is the best thing for the church”, etc… 

Why did the church hierarchy obsess on avoiding scandal?  Because it feared scandal would shake people’s faith and possibly inspire them to leave the church.  Yet, Holy Mother Church’s fervent desire to avoid scandal became a monumental, self-destructive scandal in itself.  Instead of Holy Mother Church, it’s more like Our Lady of Macbeth - externally presenting the mythical image of perfect hostess while plotting and scheming to manipulate and neutralize people seen as interfering with this burning ambition…eventually resulting in the opposite effect from the ambition. 

The church so desperately wanted to perpetuate a scandal-free myth that it caused huge, unimaginable scandal.  The movie’s ending flashing four multi-columned pages naming over a hundred Catholic dioceses where major clergy abuse scandals  and their even more scandalous cover-ups have been exposed to-date punctuates the scandal-based damage that arises when an entire system prioritizes myth perpetuation over truth and people’s lives.  With over 100 dioceses, over 100,000 abuse victims, and about 75% of Catholics leaving the church, it is well past time for the church to live with a different understanding of the myth.  Our mental and physical well-being requires it.

I believe the exodus occurred because too many still want so desperately to believe in the myth that they only begrudgingly implement superficial changes to address the issue and bully those who wish to live with a more mature understanding of the myth that includes real systemic change.  For example, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, in anticipation of the movie’s release, prepared dioceses with talking points aimed at portraying the topic as a thing of the past – as if it’s all different now.  Yet, even the reports about filming the movie illuminate that it’s not all different now.  The New York Yankees declined being filmed for a scene at Fenway Park because they felt it wasn’t a topic with which the team should be associated and believed that the Red Sox shouldn’t be either.  Why would a sports organization that profits from attracting fans, many of whom are children, think it inappropriate to be associated with a movie about protecting children?  Do we smell New York Roman Catholic Cardinal Dolan’s breath in that statement?  The same old pattern certainly is there.

Yes, some things have changed since the Globe story broke yet much remains the same.  Because thousands of priests raped children, I had to be finger-printed and watch movies about protecting children.  It is as Mitchell Garabedian says in the movie, “If it takes a village to raise a child, it takes a village to abuse them.”  Therefore, we must educate the village.  However, one constant is the existence of lay and ordained staunch defenders of the church who treat truthful criticism as an attack to which they must wage a counter-assault.  This attitude contributed to creating a penalty-free environment for abusive clergy and irresponsible bishops.  Until that fear-induced arrogant rejection of constructive criticism is replaced by humble sincere truth-seeking, there is no marked difference in the culture.   One need look no further than the sheep-like unquestioning obedience to Mass language changes to see that those in the pews largely still operate with a “Father knows best” deference to men wearing Roman collars.

Unfortunately, the staunch defenders actually have changed in that they have doubled-down on irrational defense of the church’s indefensible.  They have doubled-down on squeezing their eyes shut and stuffing their ears with earplugs to shut out reality.  They want the myth of a perfect church and will stop at nothing to retain living in their myth.  They are happy to chase away anyone who tries to bring them to a more mature understanding of the myth.

It is impossible for the vast majority of humans to consider the Catholic Church the penultimate “truth team” when its Canon Law and culture consider fact-based criticism to be “the enemy.”  Thus, it’s no surprise that active Catholics represent merely 4% of the world population.  (7 billion people, 1.2 billion Catholics, of whom only about 25% are active.)

If people truly love the church, they must welcome criticism of the organization.  Since sports form an informal pillar of the Catholic faith, I’ll try a sports analogy to describe the detrimental impact of ignoring institutional shortcomings.  It’s like a basketball team which commits many turnovers declaring this statistic as anti-them and refusing to work on turnovers.  It’s like the team and fans bullying anyone who mentions the statistic and asking them to leave the game and never come to another one.  It’s like a team with the highest turnover rate blaming the ball for its stubborn unwillingness to remain with the team.   

The turnover metaphor only speaks to the abuse scandal’s collateral damage - people's mass exodus from the church.  The most profound damage occurred to the 100,000s of people molested by priests.  I can only think of a parenting analogy for this.  It’s like a parent entrusting their children to a known pedophile as babysitter, and then when the child reports the abuse, recommending the pedophile babysitter to friends and neighbors.  Would you trust such a parent?  No, I wouldn’t either.  Not even after they said they were sorry or enacted a Dallas Charter creating great bureaucracy to guide them since they demonstrated a collective lack of common sense to do the decent thing.   Such a parent would be declared unfit.  The same is true for all bishops who shuffled abusive priests.

Is it time to behave like my unrelenting older sister, grasping hands of staunch believers in the myth and insisting they adopt a more mature understanding of the myth?  Don’t we owe the survivors at least this much?

Reflections on the Pope's visit to the U.S.

My last night in China, I stayed up well past bedtime to watch Pope Francis address the U.S. Congress.  I noted both what he said and what he didn’t say.  He explicitly called for a global end to the death penalty and arms sales.  He explicitly called for welcoming immigrants, tending the environment and caring for the poor.  He explicitly spoke of the perils of child abuse.  He never uttered the words, “abortion,” “birth control,” “Obamacare,” “Planned Parenthood,” or “gay marriage.” 

I had to settle for reading the transcript of his homily to U.S. bishops in D.C. in which he congratulated and thanked the bishops for their actions around the clergy sex abuse scandals without offering any encouragement to abuse survivors.  Yet, most abuse survivors and many lay people find the bishops’ individual and collective actions on this topic to span between cowardly and dastardly…not even close to the “courageous” description ascribed by Francis.

It seemed the connection between Francis’ child abuse comments to Congress and the lifelong wounds arising from clergy-inflicted child sexual abuse eluded Francis.  In declaring the bishops’ response “courageous” and speaking of the issue as though concluded while so many abuse survivors still constantly battle abuse ramifications, Francis displayed appalling insensitivity.  He evaded institutional responsibility to walk in healing restitution with survivors every day, every step of their lives.

While reading that homily I was also struck by Francis’ seeming assumption that the bishops and clergy are penultimate experts on and purveyors of gospel messages – and that they just tirelessly need to be gentle until the (clueless, sad, miserable) sheep finally catch on to their wonderful messages.  This, would bring about healing in the church, he seemed to say.  That and the clergy abuse comments made me wonder about Francis’ institutional self-awareness. 

Lots of laypeople have a stronger understanding of gospel messages than the bishops, and better and more joyfully imitate Jesus than them.  Many very faith-filled people cannot bring themselves to follow the bishops because they find the bishops worshipping a god too weak to call women to priesthood, too weak to allow re-examination of human sexuality teachings based upon millennia-old flawed science, too weak to require admission and correction of the church’s collective institutional sins, and in general too weak to allow rethinking anything about which the hierarchy have declared themselves to be “absolutely correct.”  Actually, it seems sometimes they mistake themselves for God and worship themselves and their utterances – and this many people mightily and rightly reject.  Consequently, many people do not follow the bishops – not because these people reject the gospel - but because they think the bishops do.  

A very powerful example rests in this week's gospel reading (Mark 9:38-40), which denudes the bishops' Canon Law demonizing women priests.  "John said to him, 'Teacher, we saw someone driving out demons in your name, and we tried to prevent him because he does not follow us.' Jesus replied, 'Do not prevent him. There is no one who performs a mighty deed in my name who can at the same time speak ill of me. For whoever is not against us is for us.'"  That gospel passage makes it impossible to denounce people of either gender who work to spread God's love.  If the bishops do, they merely repeat the apostles' mistakes from centuries ago.

The combination of my international travel during Francis’ U.S. visit, just generally not allowing the pope to occupy idol status in my life, and his remarks starting to sound highly repetitious account for me oscillating between watching or listening live and relying upon catching clips or reading transcripts of his remarks and homilies.  Therefore, I know I’ve not heard every word he’s said.

However, what I did read was him telling the bishops to dialogue and not fear dialogue.  He repeated this theme when speaking to Congress.  I also heard him say at Independence Hall, “…it is imperative that the followers of the various religions join their voices in calling for peace, tolerance and respect for the dignity and rights of others.”  

Therefore, Francis, following your instructions I must join the many voices – those of the majority of Catholics, many of whom could only reconcile their consciences by leaving the flock – calling for the end to Catholic church injustices. 

In the name of ending church injustices against clergy abuse survivors, I call for removal of every bishop who harbored abusive priests.  I call for Canon Law to classify such bishops as committing a grave delict.  I call for your regular dialogue with abuse survivors - towards curing insensitivity.  I insist monies hidden to avoid paying restitution be recovered and distributed to survivors to aid in their healing process.

In the name of ending church injustices against women, I call for the de-classification of women’s ordination as a grave delict.  I insist you actively dialogue on women’s ordination, birth control, and all church human sexuality teachings that are based upon false science.  I call for cessation of the church grooming girls to fill gender stereotyped roles.   

Also, in the name of ending injustices against women caused by extreme religious fundamentalism, I call for the U.S. bishops to stop blocking female Catholic institution employees’ access to menstrual cycle regulating medications.  These tools which have helped countless women conceive, which have helped countless women avoid chronic excruciating pain, which have prevented countless hysterectomies; which have saved countless women’s lives must not be demonized nor should those who use them.

Still in the name of ending injustices against women, I insist that the U.S. bishops stop this bullying tactic towards controlling women’s bodies – the one braying this nonsensical “religious liberty” slogan.  The bishops must stop portraying themselves as persecuted American Christians - because they just aren’t.  One-third of this country’s federal legislators are Catholic; the Secretary of State is Catholic; multiple Speakers of the House have been Catholic; the vice-president is Catholic; two-thirds of the Supreme Court is Catholic, and the worldwide leader of the Catholic Church addressed the U.S. Congress!  Furthermore, the worldwide Catholic leader is enjoying celebrity status, meeting with the President, having parades thrown in his honor, costing taxpayers millions of dollars to host, and receiving almost non-stop and overwhelmingly positive press coverage!  What does “religious tolerance” look like if not this?  Must the bishops have full tyrannical control before they stop claiming “religious persecution?”

Well, I again find myself staying up past my bedtime but this time partially inspired by the pope’s visit and partially attributable to jetlag.  I hope Pope Francis has enjoyed visiting my country – very free from any persecution.  I thank him for consistently repeating messages advocating for the environment, peace, immigrants and the poor.  And, I hope he recovers faster from his jetlag than I am from mine.

However, I anxiously await him following his own advice to end religion-based injustices, especially against clergy abuse survivors and women.  He can begin by having regular dialogues with abuse survivors and women.  He can reinstate people excommunicated for supporting women’s ordination and redistribute hidden funds to abuse survivors.  He can re-establish the ordination of women as deacons and discuss ordaining women priests.  He can drop the absolute ban on birth control.  He can announce a concerted effort re-working Catholic teachings on human sexuality that rest upon foundations of false science.  Finally, he can remove bishops who harbored abusive clergy and in their places appoint bishops who show true courage engaging in sincere, meaningful dialogue versus sanctioning those with whom they disagree. 

The Church’s glaring, painful wounds, which in turn contribute to global ills, will not heal without fostering dialogue and recognizing rights within the organization.  Loving people requires knowing them.  Knowing them requires talking to them.  Knowing and loving them precludes denying them rights. None of these can occur from a rigid hierarchical perch but can only emerge from a position of humility and equality. 

Have we become comfortably numb?

I arrived at Dublin airport only a few hours ago but in time to attend Sunday Mass at a nearby neighborhood church.  Mass began with the deacon reading Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin’s pastoral reflections about Ireland’s upcoming constitutional referendum on marriage equality.  Spoiler alert: he’s against it.

For those unfamiliar with this Friday’s referendum in Ireland, the proposed constitutional amendment would insert the following text in a new subsection to Article 41 of the Irish Constitution.  “Marriage may be contracted in accordance with law by two persons without distinction as to their sex.”

Anyway, I was the first person to arrive for Mass – the very first - though I arrived about 10 minutes prior to Mass.  The parking lot had but one vehicle as well so I began to question the accuracy of the Mass time posted on the internet.  No worries, a priest greeted me at the door and reassured me that a Mass actually would start in a few minutes; I was just early, said he.  Despite his reassurances, as I opened the door to the empty sanctuary the lyrics from Pink Floyd’s “Comfortably Numb” popped into my head…“Hello, hello, hello, is there anybody in there?”

I thought, “O.K., the stampeding herds here must slide into their pews just before Mass…kind of like Ty Cobb sliding into home base on a steal.”  I sat awaiting the rush. 

Well, if the teeming masses came to this Mass, they were invisible because what I saw was barely more people in the pews than on the altar. We had two priests, a deacon, a lector, an altar server and an old guy whose role never became clear to me – all to attend to just a few dozen mass goers.  The PPP (priest per person) ratio was pretty high today, enough so to cause me to doubt lamentations about priest shortages.

As the deacon read the Archbishop’s statement, I found myself musing about what must be going through his mind as he reads this pastoral reflection practically to himself.  I again heard Pink Floyd playing in my head, ”just nod if you can hear me…is there anyone at home?”

The Archbishop’s reflections included advising people to reflect carefully upon same sex marriage’s implications for the family and parenthood.  He also admitted, “…the severity with which the Irish Church treated gay and lesbian people in the past – and in some cases still today – makes it difficult for some to understand the Church’s position…” on homosexuality and same sex marriage.

Yes, witnessing the mistreatment of homosexuals does make it difficult for many Irish to understand the Church’s teachings on homosexuality.  Adding to their confusion, in this part of the world many people recall Scotland’s Cardinal Keith O’Brien’s resignation on March 3, 2013, in which he said "I ... admit that there have been times that my sexual conduct has fallen below the standards expected of me as a priest, archbishop and cardinal." 

His sexual conduct that had “fallen below the standards” expected of him?  He repeatedly made homosexual advances towards seminarians and young priests.  You see, like many clergy, Cardinal O’Brien is gay…yet he preached about the perils of homosexuality all while living a closet homosexual’s life.  Unlike many gay clergy, Cardinal O’Brien’s sexual orientation is no longer hidden in the closet.  But his expression of truth meant he couldn’t hang with the homosexual clergy deniers club any longer.  I can only imagine what kind of self-loathing occurs when a person preaches as indisputable truth that one’s very self is “intrinsically disordered.”

Since gays are people’s beloved children, relatives, friends, co-workers and neighbors, I can also imagine people – were they in attendance – responding to the Archbishop’s reflections by borrowing from Pink Floyd, “You are receding - a distant ship smoke on the horizon…”  My dear bishops… your relevance and credibility seem to be fading like the distant ship smoke on the horizon.  This sentiment echoed in today’s cavernous empty church.

I’m uncertain which statements by the Archbishop most inspired my mouth to hang agape – the “We’ve historically treated homosexuals like crap but, trust us; we’re the experts on what’s best for them...” or the ones about family and parenting.  I thought it took a special kind of gall for the dear Archbishop in a country more severely and recently damaged from the Church’s vast clergy sexual child molestation and cover-up scandal than the U.S. to think people might actually care what the Church had to say about children’s well-being.  Granted, Archbishop Diarmuid Martin personally has been more of an advocate for victims than most bishops, but he still represents an institution that has repeatedly botched handling sexually abusive clergy and shown deplorable insensitivity towards sexual abuse survivors. 

I wonder how many people view the hierarchy’s advice about marriage, family and parenting as being akin to Pink Floyd's lyric, “Your lips move but I can’t hear what you’re saying…”

I spent a lot of time meditating upon the church’s vast emptiness today.  I think the majority of laypeople feel the bishops have become comfortably numb – to their concerns and contributions.  And still the bishops preach…to increasingly empty pews...assuming the laity are who have become comfortably numb.  

Have you become comfortably numb? Is numbness to an organization that has become comfortably numb to children, homosexuals and women a bad thing?

“Hello, hello, hello….is there anybody in there?  Just nod if you can hear me… Is there anyone at home?” 

Side note to my Irish followers.  I am in Dublin for about a week.