MINNESOTA
Canonical Consultation

07/11/2015

Jennifer Haselberger

Since yesterday afternoon, when various media outlets began to publish the first person-to-person interviews with Archbishop Bernard Hebda, the new Apostolic Administrator of the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis, several people have contacted me to express their disappointment in what was said- and wasn’t said- by the Archbishop. Faithful and clergy who were anxious for transparency and a clear break from previous media-spin were obviously disappointed, as well as others who were looking for an indication of more concrete policy changes.

For my part, I wasn’t at all surprised. It is unlikely that the message will change as long as those who are crafting the messages remain the same. At the same time, I was disappointed with some statements that appeared to be a little too carefully crafted to be representative of the type of ‘transparency’ that many of the faithful feel…