A friend and well-known commentator everyone knows, Al Kresta,  President of Ave Maria Radio, sent me this today. I said it captured a lot of Catholic’s sentiment and asked if I could share it. He said YES!  I think his comments reflect the heart of all of us good Catholics in America struggling to understand the situation.
Let’s be very clear Al and I are good friends and we love the Catholic Church. We are not discouraged or disheartened and we are ready to fight.
***********************
Holy Father, we have been silent,
We have been team players.
We have been in prayer and fasting.
We trusted our shepherds.
We have been mild. We have not been noisy.
We have been docile and open to the Holy Spirit and most reluctant to do anything to cast a shadow upon the Catholic Church because we have had the extraordinary privilege of leading many into full communion with her. We love her and our love is not less because we lack ministerial ordination. Our whole posture has been to defend that which we have asked others to join.
  • When we had no evidence of wrongdoing on your part we didn’t imagine there was a problem.
  • When the evidence was ambiguous we gave you and our bishops the benefit of the doubt.
  • When the evidence pointed your way, we asked for you to explain.
 But you ignored the bleating of the sheep.
You ignored that we have all along been praying and can maintain a discipline of silence as well as most of the ordained.
You ignored that we were all along team players and reluctant to publicly complain.
You ignored that we have been all along giving the benefit of the doubt through:
  • Maciel,
  • the scandal of the mid 80s,
  • early 90s,
  • 2002 and
  • even now with McCarrick and Viganó’s revelations
We asked for an investigation, not a rebellion. We have for almost all of our Catholic lives stretched our moral imaginations to think the best, not the worst of you and our bishops.
Your response has been to stonewall rather than to pastor. You asked us to ignore the evidence of our senses and the conclusions of our reason.
In short, you have asked us to divide ourselves, to split our conscience from our devotion. This is not the counsel of Jesus, who comes to make us whole.
The devil works hard tempting us to be doubleminded and to split our head and our hearts, our beliefs from our behavior, our knowledge of painful realities from our determination to avoid denial and get on with healthy problem-solving.
You, like the Devil, are asking us to sit on our hands in a shit storm and to think we are pious souls for doing so.
From where I sit that is not Catholic spirituality and I am still trying to imagine that your advice is due to ignorance of our plight rather than motivated by something baser.
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This Post Has 19 Comments

  1. Gail

    Amen! Now this is a petition I can get behind and sign!

  2. Michelle VanWey

    Holy Father, please remember us, who everyday defend our faith and our Church from the slings and arrows of the Mediaand other Denominations. We will keep the faith, but please, give us something to have a handhold of through these trials. God is counting on You, and all of us. May God Bless you.

  3. Tom Govern

    Don’t know what to make of this situation. Our leader seems to be dodging the issue. Perhaps the Pope is formulating a plan and direction for action. We need to pray for our Church and our leadership especially Pope Francis. The Church will survive and hopefully with better leadership.

  4. Anthony Caporaso

    Faithful Catholics gave the church hierarchy the benefit of the doubt in 2002 and fully trusted that the corruption and filth would be completely rooted out. Now shame on us if we remain silent as faithful Catholics in 2018 and don’t demand that this entrenched evil be entirely excised from Christ’s Bride. It is clear from certain bishops responses (or non-responses) to the allegations in the Vigano testimony that they are part of the problem. How can good men remain silent, or worse deflect in the face of such flagrant evil?

  5. ann

    when st. peter has done something wrong, st. paul corrected him (galatians 2:14)
    the current pope, is acting really guilty, what can catholics do? who will be paul in our time?

    the one who can start an investigation is the one being accused of… so, all we can do is wait for him?

  6. Peter Eagleton

    Hi Steve greetings from Australia.

    This is a distressing time for Catholics . Here in Australia we have our own scandal of sexual abuse. We have just had the Australian Catholic bishops response to our national government investigation into it. Its been sobering . Some good recommendations mostly accepted by the Australin church. Some miss the point such as requiring priests hearing confesion reporting sexual abuse to authorities and clergy having the option of being married . These things could not be changed without the Vaticans approval. Some of our srate governments have allready passed laws that require priests to report sexual abuse information in the confesional . The Australia bishops have said they will not . Its still early days on this issue.

    I agree with the above sentiments. As part of Catholic laity (sheep) I will be bleating pretty loudly to the local shepards to put pressure to the big shepard in Rome to clean the Temple.

    You are doing a great job Ray with your promting education about Christanity from a Catholic perspective and your pilgrimages. I had the great privilege to do a pilgrimage of Israel and Italy in 2015 with a group of South African Catholics led by Archbishop Slatery of Pretoria . It was motivated by the Turin Shroud being exhibited . As a scientist (geophycist) I have loked at the collective data and believe it is the burial shroud of Yeshua. Are you aware of the Suderium of Oviedo ?. I believe it is the face cloth mentioned in the Gospel of John. It matches the Turin Shroud extremely well.

    God Bless from the land of Oz (Australia)
    Peter Eagleton

  7. Magdalene

    Does anyone still think that the present pontiff cares about you? A million rosaries or a million signatures do not move him one bit. He has an agenda. He will not do the right thing unless there is no choice. We do not have a holy “father”! He might claim the title and perhaps he is the one we deserve for our sins but I have no confidence that he and his ” god of surprises” will be moved by this or any other plea.

  8. sandi

    Here is an article that is an eye opener regarding Pope Francis. My patience with him is waning, and I fear that his motives are not in our interest at all. He is not being a shepherd; he is trying to change the church to go along with the times. He is ignoring the teachings of Jesus and the Magisterium of the Catholic Church in so many things.
    https://www.lifesitenews.com/blogs/the-abcs-of-our-concerns-with-pope-francis

  9. Kathryn Faherty

    Silence on the Pope’s part looks a lot more like taking the fifth than anything Jesus did,

  10. Judy Leonard

    I see the whole hierarchy, including Pope Francis, just waiting this out, figuring sooner or later it will go away. Who has the power to expunge these disgraceful demons from Holy Mother Church except Our Blessed Mother? “Money is the root of all evil” – so perhaps the sheep need to stop the donations. “Money talks……..BS walks”.

  11. Julia

    Great article, great ideas, great initiative. But I would not hold my breath while waiting for a response.

    All I can think is, as Catholics we have ignored the last three Popes, now God has given us a Pope who ignores us. We are getting a dose of our own medicine.

    We can only pray, read scripture, keep the Ten Commandments; if anyone remembers what they are and wait for this Pope to be called home to meet his maker. Outside my scope to judge.

    Maybe, just maybe the next Pope will be a Holy Father to guide us back on course based on the extraordinary mountain of prayer this Pope has extracted from our fear of what he is up to.

  12. NICHOLAS A KLESZCZEWSKI

    Thank you for the letter, but, perhaps I'm a little Puritan-ish here, but when did the s-word become allowable to be used in polite company?

    STEVE RAY HERE: I posted the letter as Al wrote it. The s word is strong here, but I think warranted. Sorry, I am not too puritanical.

  13. Maria Smith

    These recent events have truly rocked my faith… not my faith in Christ, but my faith in our Church. I would rather die than leave the Eucharist. I stumbled across this amazing investigation and encourage everyone to view it. Full of facts. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBoUBVJEnCQ

  14. Jim

    STEVE RAY HERE: Couldn’t disagree more, but allowing this post for the sake of discussion. Thanks for your kind words though Jim.

    Jim writes:

    I'm one of the best fans of Steve Ray's apologetics and still am. But i feel this letter has gone overboard and is a grave mistake that foments division within the Church.

    We can request or seek clarification but we must never question/accuse the vicar of Christ. Let's be mindful that pride is creeping into our hearts when we demand and accuse. And Pride and the lack of humility is the root of all evil.

    The pope is wise to keep silent. Silence does not mean he is admitting guilt or prefers to do nothing if ther is indeed crime committed. He knows that men's pride has already made the judgement and sentencing even before he says anything. Therefore whatever he says will only fuel more accusations and puff up more pride. People wants to hear something in order to reinforce their judgement, not actually to hear the truth – regardless of what he says. Just as Christ prefer to be silent when he was accused by Pilate, i believe the pope's silence is guided by the Holy Spirit.

    We are not the judge of anyone's sins. Why be so excited about other people's sins. Let the police and criminal justice take care of them if they are guilty.

    i agree with Steve that the letter he shared is inspired. it is inspired by the Devil. it is a letter of hatred and pride and judgement and accusation in the guise of love and seeking for the truth.

    if you dissect the letter, you will find the tone is primarily focused on the "self". the author talks about how loyal and obedient he is and how he fights for the Church. It is of self-praise and self-importance and seeking admiration for its self-sacrifice, but there is no hint of seeking unity, forgiveness, humility and love.

    From the tone of letter, the author demanding an explanation/ investigation from the pope suggests that he thinks of himself as to be accountable for by the pope….This does not sound like the tone of one seeking unity and love but the tone of the Accuser and the Evil one. It is also typical of a lie, where the liar first starts and preempts being accused by denying his act/ letter as 'rebellion', when in fact, rebellion is the intent. The denial already accused himself of his intent.

    Further, it is a rebellion no different from rebellion of lucifer and rebellion of the protestants. The devil is happy to see pride puff up within the laity and accusations abounding. it is a lack of trust in God's wisdom and guidance(promised guidance to the vicar of Christ) accusing the pope of inaction and incompetence. any form of accusation is an act of the evil one and when we accuse our brothers, even moreso the vicar of christ, we are following the footsteps of him who is the accuser.

    worse, the author of that letter refers to the pope as "like the Devil". this is again a lie that projects one's being (the Devil) onto the accused in order to avoid the label.

    it is the Devil speaking in that letter, the father of all lies.

  15. David

    Steve, You’re a Bellwether. Thank you.

  16. Johann du Toit

    Amen. Could not have put it better myself.

  17. Al Vargesko

    I can no longer refer to Pope Francis as our “Holy Father”. My wife and I were in Rome last October
    and saw him on a Wednesday Papal Audience. At the time we were so happy and proud we made the trip. Now, we are deeply saddened at the response of this Pope to this crisis. Prayer and Silence is an unacceptable response from him. We will never leave the Catholic Church (where would we go?). But we are deeply worried.

  18. Maria MacConnie

    Dear Holy Father,
    I pray each day for you & all our clergy. If for some reason you are unable to lead the flock of Jesus Christ, please take Pope Benedict’s example when he realized he could not fulfill the rigorous demands of his holy office.
    May God bless you now & always.

  19. Jim

    STEVE RAY HERE: Couldn’t disagree with Jim more, but I am allowing this comment for the sake of discussion.

    Jim writes:

    What is happening now is a revivalism of the protestant rebellion in the guise of love for the Church. This is attack from within. From you guys who are supposed to be the greatest defender of the church.
    This letter needs to be taken down as it is fomenting hatred to the papacy. Please take it down for the love of the Church.

    You guys have done a great good to the church through your apologetics but in my personal opinion, you have fallen to the sin of pride in this case. You demand and accuse the Pope. …this is rebellion is not an act of humility and love but seeking self glory and admiration for your works. Do not seek glory here but wait for your reward in the next.

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