BOSTON (MA)
Catholic Culture
January 9, 2019
By Phil Lawler
Yesterday was “one of those days”—a day that found me hating my work, wishing I had some other sort of job.
The first blow, and by far the worst, came with the news, released by the Washington Post Monday evening, that an old friend, Father C. J. McCloskey, had been disciplined for sexual misconduct involving a married woman, and that Opus Dei, of which I was once a member, had (not to put too fine a point on it) botched the handling of his case.
Father McCloskey has done great things for the Catholic Church, drawing many converts to the faith and encouraging many cradle Catholics like myself to deepen their spiritual lives. The charges against him, however, reinforce my fear that every “celebrity priest” is vulnerable to special temptations, and just one misstep away from scandal.
It’s painful to see a friend exposed to public obloquoy. It’s painful, too, to watch the Washington Post—which has shown only a tepid interest in the charges raised by Archbishop Vigano—in headlong pursuit of a priest who never wielded a fraction of McCarrick’s influence. But long ago I resolved that I want to hear all the truth, good and bad. It will be a painful process, exposing all the rot within our Church. But it’s the only way to begin the necessary process of reform.
Then I happened across several more news stories about the two US Senators (Senators Kamala Harris of California and Mazie Hirono of Hawaii) who cross-examined a judicial nominee about his membership in the Knights of Columbus.
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