. . . [T]he current critical reaction to the Vatican in places like deeply Catholic Ireland [may well be] a manifestation of a longstanding and very powerful desire among faithful Catholics to see the papacy finally do what it’s meant to do, according to the gospels. And that’s to serve. Not to dominate. Not to rule. Not to issue orders and condemnations.
To serve. To serve as Jesus served. To serve the unity of the body of Christ with a papacy embodying the ideal of service that Jesus bequeathed as the supreme ideal for those who seek to exercise leadership in the Christian community: to be the servus servorum Christi.
Maybe the “sharks” circling in the water aren’t smelling blood. And maybe they’re not sharks at all. Maybe they’re actually faithful Catholics who are delighted to see the imperial structures of a papacy modeled more on the values of Caesar than those of Christ crumbling before our eyes.
Crumbling because it has behaved in imperial ways rather than embodying Christ’s ideal of service. . . .
– William D. Lindsey
"John Allen on Vatican Critics as Sharks Out for Blood:
That’s One Way of Looking at It"
The Open Tabernacle
July 31, 2011
"John Allen on Vatican Critics as Sharks Out for Blood:
That’s One Way of Looking at It"
The Open Tabernacle
July 31, 2011
Recommended Off-site Link:
Vatican II Themes: The Church as Servant – Richard McBrien (National Catholic Reporter, August 1, 2011).
Bishop Gumbleton: A Priesthood Set Apart and Above Others is Not the Way of Jesus – The Wild Reed (September 28, 2009).
Image: Ford Madox Brown.
Yes, it's true! Good text!
ReplyDeleteMeanwhile, people have some hope that the next Pope will be better than this one... So, problems things will likely be as they are now... And they will improve, perharps to a big schism, if a reactionary Pope appears in the next conclave... Good evening!...