Hope...

...it exists here (sword/tip: Sancte Pater):

The Fraternity of St. Peter - Our Lady of Guadalupe Seminary



Part II of III
Part III of III


I just wish I could audit the classes... what an education...

23 Reasons a Priest Should Wear His Collar

Photo Credit: USML.edu

By Msgr. Charles M. Mangan & Father Gerald E. Murray (s/t: Link - Roman Catholic Vocations)

1. The Roman collar is a sign of priestly consecration to the Lord. As a wedding ring distinguishes husband and wife and symbolizes the union they enjoy, so the Roman collar identifies bishops and priests (and often deacons and seminarians) and manifests their proximity to the Divine Master by virtue of their free consent to the ordained ministry to which they have been (or may be) called.

2. By wearing clerical clothing and not possessing excess clothes, the priest demonstrates adherence to the Lord’s example of material poverty. The priest does not choose his clothes – the Church has, thanks to her accumulated wisdom over the past two millennia. Humble acceptance of the Church’s desire that the priest wear the Roman collar illustrates a healthy submission to authority and conformity to the will of Christ as expressed through his Church.

3. Church Law requires clerics to wear clerical clothing. We have cited above number 66 of the Directory for priests, which itself quotes canon 284.

4. The wearing of the Roman collar is the repeated, ardent desire of Pope John Paul II. The Holy Father’s wish in this regard cannot be summarily dismissed; he speaks with a special charism. He frequently reminds priests of the value of wearing the Roman collar.In a September 8, 1982 letter to Ugo Cardinal Poletti, his Vicar for the Diocese of Rome, instructing him to promulgate norms concerning the use of the Roman collar and religious habit, the Pontiff observed that clerical dress is valuable “not only because it contributes to the propriety of the priest in his external behavior or in the exercise of his ministry, but above all because it gives evidence within the ecclesiastical community of the public witness that each priest is held to give of his own identity and special belonging to God.”In a homily on November 8, 1982 the Pope addressed a group of transitional deacons whom he was about to ordain to the priesthood. He said that if they tried to be just like everyone else in their “style of life” and “manner of dress,” then their mission as priests of Jesus Christ would not be fully realized.

5. The Roman collar prevents “mixed messages”; other people will recognize the priest’s intentions when he finds himself in what might appear to be compromising circumstances. Let’s suppose that a priest is required to make pastoral visits to different apartment houses in an area where drug dealing or prostitution is prevalent. The Roman collar sends a clear message to everyone that the priest has come to minister to the sick and needy in Christ’s name. Idle speculation might be triggered by a priest known to neighborhood residents visiting various apartment houses dressed as a layman.

6. The Roman collar inspires others to avoid immodesty in dress, words and actions and reminds them of the need for public decorum. A cheerful but diligent and serious priest can compel others to take stock of the manner in which they conduct themselves. The Roman collar serves as a necessary challenge to an age drowning in impurity, exhibited by suggestive dress, blasphemous speech and scandalous actions.

7. The Roman collar is a protection for one’s vocation when dealing with young, attractive women. A priest out of his collar (and, naturally, not wearing a wedding ring) can appear to be an attractive target for the affections of an unmarried woman looking for a husband, or for a married woman tempted to infidelity.

8. The Roman collar offers a kind of “safeguard “for oneself. The Roman collar provides a reminder to the priest himself of his mission and identity: to witness to Jesus Christ, the Great High Priest, as one of his brother-priests.

9. A priest in a Roman collar is an inspiration to others who think: “Here is a modern disciple of Jesus.” The Roman collar speaks of the possibility of making a sincere, lasting commitment to God. Believers of diverse ages, nationalities and temperaments will note the virtuous, other-centered life of the man who gladly and proudly wears the garb of a Catholic priest, and perhaps will realize that they too can consecrate themselves anew, or for the first time, to the loving Good Shepherd.

10. The Roman collar is a source of beneficial intrigue to non-Catholics. Most non- Catholics do not have experience with ministers who wear clerical garb. Therefore, Catholic priests by virtue of their dress can cause them to reflect – even if only a cursory fashion – on the Church and what she entails.

11. A priest dressed as the Church wants is a reminder of God and of the sacred. The prevailing secular morass is not kind to images which connote the Almighty, the Church, etc. When one wears the Roman collar, the hearts and minds of others are refreshingly raised to the “Higher Being” who is usually relegated to a tiny footnote in the agenda of contemporary culture.

12. The Roman collar is also a reminder to the priest that he is “never not a priest.” With so much confusion prevalent today, the Roman collar can help the priest avoid internal doubt as to who he is. Two wardrobes can easily lead – and often does – to two lifestyles, or even two personalities.

13. A priest in a Roman collar is a walking vocation message. The sight of a cheerful, happy priest confidently walking down the street can be a magnet drawing young men to consider the possibility that God is calling them to the priesthood. God does the calling; the priest is simply a visible sign God will use to draw men unto himself.

14. The Roman collar makes the priest available for the Sacraments, especially Confession and the Anointing of the Sick, and for crisis situations. Because the Roman collar gives instant recognition, priests who wear it make themselves more apt to be approached, particularly when seriously needed. The authors can testify to being asked for the Sacraments and summoned for assistance in airports, crowded cities and isolated villages because they were immediately recognized as Catholic priests.

15. The Roman collar is a sign that the priest is striving to become holy by living out his vocation always. It is a sacrifice to make oneself constantly available to souls by being publicly identifiable as a priest, but a sacrifice pleasing to Our Divine Lord. We are reminded of how the people came to him, and how he never turned them away. There are so many people who will benefit by our sacrifice of striving to be holy priests without interruption.

16. The Roman collar serves as a reminder to “alienated” Catholics not to forget their irregular situation and their responsibilities to the Lord. The priest is a witness – for good or ill – to Christ and his Holy Church. When a “fallen-away” sees a priest, he is encouraged to recall that the Church continues to exist. A cheerful priest provides a salutary reminder of the Church.

17. The wearing of clerical clothing is a sacrifice at times, especially in hot weather. The best mortifications are the ones we do not look for. Putting up with the discomforts of heat and humidity can be a wonderful reparation for our own sins, and a means of obtaining graces for our parishioners.

18. The Roman collar serves as a “sign of contradiction” to a world lost in sin and rebellion against the Creator. The Roman collar makes a powerful statement: the priest as an alter Christus has accepted the Redeemer’s mandate to take the Gospel into the public square, regardless of personal cost.

19. The Roman collar helps priests to avoid the on duty/off duty mentality of priestly service. The numbers 24 and 7 should be our special numbers: we are priests 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. We are priests, not men who engage in the “priest profession.” On or off duty, we should be available to whomever God may send our way. The “lost sheep” do not make appointments.

20. The “officers” in Christ’s army should be identifiable as such. Traditionally, we have remarked that those who receive the Sacrament of Confirmation become “soldiers” of Christ, adult Catholics ready and willing to defend his name and his Church. Those who are ordained as deacons, priests and bishops must also be prepared – whatever the stakes – to shepherd the flock of the Lord. Those priests who wear the Roman collar show forth their role unmistakably as leaders in the Church.

21. The saints have never approved of a lackadaisical approach concerning priestly vesture. For example, Saint Alphonsus Liguori (1696-1787), Patron Saint of Moral Theologians and Confessors, in his esteemed treatise The Dignity and Duties of the Priest, urges the wearing of the appropriate clerical dress, asserting that the Roman collar helps both priest and faithful to recall the sublime splendor of the sacerdotal state instituted by the God-Man.

22. Most Catholics expect their priests to dress accordingly. Priests have long provided a great measure of comfort and security to their people. As youths, Catholics are taught that the priest is God’s representative – someone they can trust. Hence, the People of God want to know who these representatives are and what they stand for. The cherished custom of wearing distinguishable dress has been for centuries sanctioned by the Church; it is not an arbitrary imposition. Catholics expect their priests to dress as priests and to behave in harmony with Church teaching and practice. As we have painfully observed over the last few years, the faithful are especially bothered and harmed when priests defy the legitimate authority of the Church, and teach and act in inappropriate and even sinful ways.

23. Your life is not your own; you belong to God in a special way, you are sent out to serve him with your life. When we wake each morning, we should turn our thoughts to our loving God, and ask for the grace to serve him well that day. We remind ourselves of our status as His chosen servants by putting on the attire that proclaims for all to see that God is still working in this world through the ministry of poor and sinful men.
Msgr. Charles M. Mangan & Father Gerald E. Murray. “Why a priest should wear his Roman collar.” Homiletic & Pastoral Review (June, 1995).

Founded over one hundred years ago, Homiletic & Pastoral Review is one of the most well-respected pastoral magazines in the world. HPR features solid articles on every aspect of pastoral life and eloquent weekly sermons that illuminate through exposition of Scripture. Subscribe to HPR here.

THE AUTHORS
Msgr. Charles M. Mangan has been appointed by His Holiness, Pope John Paul II, to a position serving the Vatican’s Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life. Ordained in 1989, Msgr. Mangan formerly served the Diocese of Sioux Falls in several parishes.

Father Gerald E. Murray is a priest of the Archdiocese of New York. He is a graduate of Dartmouth College and was ordained in 1984 after completing studies at St. Joseph’s Seminary in Dunwoodie, N. Y. Currently he is studying canon law at the Gregorian University in Rome.

What an ordination should look like...

We have been blogging a lot about ordinations, consecration, and other various sorts of religious vocational events. So as I was strolling through my blog feeder today, I came upon a picture that visually says what we have been trying to convey through our posting.

It comes from The New Liturgical Movement and is a picture of an ordination in the usus antiquior.

Enjoy...

Fishers of Men

Belinda's Brain [click it please and give her a little DUIB love] posted three awesome AONy (Archdiocese of New York) vocation videos. The ones that I posted below are the full versions (videos 1 & 2) of something called "Fishers of Men." You should watch them below... and remember to give Belinda a click.

The fourth video, is an alternate version of one of the videos, set to a Thrice song called, "Image of the Invisible." I suggest watching that one too.

The Ordinary become extraordinary

The Crescat has posted one of the most concise and important posts that I have read in a long time. She covers vocations, the importance of the Mass to our faith, and the necessity for our clergy  and the Church to interact with children in a real and personal way. She explains how this interaction cannot be watered down and aloof. It must be authentic and real; the interaction must convey the normalcy and happiness that accompanies the religious life. Never has this message been more important than now, in a time when we as a Church face so much adversity and pervasive evil.

I hope other blogs link to this. I just found it and imagine it will sweep the Catholog-os-phere like wildfire... and if it doesn't the bloggers are slacking in their duty:

... I blog what I know and observe. I am no expert on the mass in the extraordinary form. I can not provide deep theological pontifications from a scholarly perspective. I also can not give you details of who was in attendance, those Catholic celebrities... I am terrible with names. This isn't that type of blog, and jokes aside, I am really not that type of Catholic. I'm from a simpler sort, and this post is from an even simpler perspective... that of a child.

The blog coverage of the Pontifical Solemn High Mass has been vast, with commentary and extraordinary photos. I took a few myself with my cell phone but the quality was poor. I wish I snapped a few shots of the children though. I regret that.

More so than all the beauty that surrounded me at that mass, within the liturgy and the church itself, was the beauty and looks of absolute wonder on the children's faces. I guess because I am mom I notice these things.

I noticed two little boys in some matching traditional Asian dress who kept peeking around the pews. They would get up and cautiously walk up as close as they could to see what was going on. The babies in their parents arms would raise their sleepy heads and look around at the sound of the chorus, as if angels had called their names. Toddlers sat in stunned awe and craned their necks to look at the ceiling mosaics or stand on their tip toes to look over the seated heads.

It was a mass that enveloped their entire senses; sight, sound and smell. I know it will leave a lasting impression. I still remember the first time I went to a Catholic mass as an unchurched child and the mark it left on me unbeknownst at the time but resurfacing almost two decades later.

It was a mass that fosters vocations... as I believe any reverently celebrated mass has the opportunity to be. Any time a child witnesses something so out of ordinary [hence "extraordinary" form] it burns itself into their memory.

It is why I am so adamantly opposed to the removal of sacred art from churches, or congregational centered worship. If we can think of it in terms of our children, our future, then we owe it to our faith to keep our churches beautiful and our masses solemn. The look of wide eyed wonder on their faces said it all.

Afterward I took my son to the blognic... yes, The Boy was in bar. Parental fail, I know. Let me justify, I would never miss a chance to have The Boy interact with clergy and seminarians. I think it is important for him to see that they are men. Normal men. Men who like to be sociable and love to laugh over a few beers enjoying the camaraderie. Too often when people think of the vocation of the priesthood the first thought is of all the things you must give up. Worldly things. Like material possessions and sex. My son needs to see that being a priest doesn't mean giving up your love of life and your desire for joy and fun. He sees them as intelligent and charismatic. Role models. Good role models. Men who are genuinely happy.

I have one rule for my family... they must never bash The Church or say anything negative about a priest or other member of a religious community in front of my son. So far they have respected my wishes. Whether my son becomes a priest or religious is between him and Christ, but I will do my damndest in the meantime to not persuade his opinion in a negative direction.

I wish I had thought to thank the seminarians and priests who talked with my son. They treated him with respect, talked to him not as a child but really conversed with him. And even now, he was still talking about the chicken fingers Fr. Z bought him and the Roy Rogers he got to drink at the bar with the young man in a cassock who was wearing glasses... I wish I could remember his name. He told The Boy he knew he wanted to be a priest when he was only nine years old.

I can't imagine the grace involved in that. I am almost 35 and still haven't decided what I want to be when I grow up.

I apologize, I ramble. I just felt like it needed to be said. I love our priests, I support our seminarians. Thank you gentlemen.

The Church is SUPPOSED TO BE Counter-Cultural - Fr. Corapi

I was watching Father Corapi yesterday and he said something interesting. He said:

"The Church is counter cultural, and it is supposed to be that way."

He continued explaining that Priests are PREACHERS. Explaining that when a priest gives a homily, talk, or simply is in conversation with you they should be "On Fire with the Spirit." If they aren't they aren't living out their vocation. He said that:

"a weak PREACHER is wounded creature."

He explained that he loves all priests and prays for them, but "will not go to Hell for them."

This got me thinking; when a parish tries to tie culture and modernistic ideas into their sacred life, are they not wounding the Priest and the Parish? Are they not doing exactly what Father Corapi states is the problem? If the Church is supposed to be Counter-Cultural, why then do we bring in secular music, secular musical instruments, ideas, clothing, dance, art, etc? If Church Culture becomes part of everyday life that is one thing, but to do the reverse? Are we not then simply wounding our Church and hurting our Faith?

I want to expand on this idea more... but need to think about it a bit. It was interesting the way he explained the Church as Counter-Cultural to the fact that a priest should be brave enough to espouse such ideas, without fear of alienating his congregation.

Fr. Thomas Brundage - Former Judicial Vicar of Milwaukee: Setting the record straight about Fr. Murphy

***UPDATE***:
Father Brundage issues clarifying statement

Editor’s note: Below is a statement by Father Thomas Brundage, correcting part of his column, which was published March 29 at CatholicAnchor.org, the official newspaper Web site of the Anchorage Archdiocese. Father Brundage was the ecclesial judge in the church trial against Father Lawrence Murphy, the priest accused of sexually abusing deaf students at St. John’s School of the Deaf in Milwaukee. The first paragraph below is the incorrect portion of the column by Father Brundage. His corrections, in italics, follow.


Original paragraph: “Additionally, in the documentation in a letter from Archbishop Weakland to then-secretary of the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith Archbishop Tarcisio Bertone on August 19, 1998, Archbishop Weakland stated that he had instructed me to abate the proceedings against Father Murphy. Father Murphy, however, died two days later and the fact is that on the day that Father Murphy died, he was still the defendant in a church criminal trial. No one seems to be aware of this. Had I been asked to abate this trial, I most certainly would have insisted that an appeal be made to the supreme court of the church, or Pope John Paul II if necessary. That process would have taken months if not longer.”

Correction: In service to the truth, it is important for one to admit when they make a factual error as I did in the above paragraph. On Good Friday (April 2, 2010) I received an e-mail from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter Annysa Johnson with some documents that clearly show I was aware of then-Milwaukee Archbishop Rembert Weakland’s intention to have the Father Lawrence Murphy case abated. Since I do not have access to the Father Murphy file, last week as I worked on my column, I downloaded the case files that were on the Journal-Sentinel’s website. Those were the documents I had to reconstruct the events of 12-14 years ago.

However, in the file e-mailed to me by reporter Johnson was a August 15, 1998 draft of a letter that I wrote and Archbishop Weakland slightly edited. This draft letter became the text of the August 19, 1998 letter from Archbishop Weakland to then-secretary of the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith Archbishop Tarcisio Bertone in which Archbishop Weakland declared that he had instructed me to formally abate the case. This letter was not part of the file that I had access to and I had not seen that letter in nearly 12 years.

In all honesty, I do not remember this memo but I do admit to being wrong on this issue and I apologize for my mistake. Father Murphy’s death 2 days after Archbishop Weakland’s August 19, 1998 letter made the matter moot as de-facto death permanently abated the case.

I again, am sorry for my mistake and for making a very complicated and painful case even more complicated and painful.

Father Thomas Brundage wrote the following article for the CatholicAnchor.org. The Anchor is the Archdiocesan paper for Anchorage. The publisher is Archbishop Schwietz; Archbishop of Anchorage. I know that this article is already making the rounds in the Catholic Blog world, but since this blog is half Alaskan, and I am living in Alaska, it is more than relevant.

It is long, but it is worth the read. I chose not to cut it... in fear of my editorial skills assuming that one part is more important than another. I also am not commenting on this, because well, it is above my pay grade to do so on an article of this nature.

As a final note... Father Brundage has a stellar reputation in the diocese, especially amongst the more orthodox groups. He is one of two priests that says Mass in the usus antiquior. He is very well respected, and it is obvious by his article the amount of trust the Archbishop has in him. His words are worth reading and understanding.

Setting the record straight in the case of abusive Milwaukee priest Father Lawrence Murphy 

Then-presiding judge for the Archdiocese of Milwaukee gives first-person account of church trial

By Fr. THOMAS BRUNDAGE, JLC

For CatholicAnchor.org

To provide context to this article, I was the Judicial Vicar for the Archdiocese of Milwaukee from 1995-2003. During those years, I presided over four canonical criminal cases, one of which involved Father Lawrence Murphy. Two of the four men died during the process. God alone will judge these men.


To put some parameters on the following remarks, I am writing this article with the express knowledge and consent of Archbishop Roger Schwietz, OMI, the Archbishop of Anchorage, where I currently serve. Archbishop Schwietz is also the publisher of the Catholic Anchor newspaper.


I will limit my comments, because of judicial oaths I have taken as a canon lawyer and as an ecclesiastical judge. However, since my name and comments in the matter of the Father Murphy case have been liberally and often inaccurately quoted in the New York Times and in more than 100 other newspapers and on-line periodicals, I feel a freedom to tell part of the story of Father Murphy’s trial from ground zero.


As I have found that the reporting on this issue has been inaccurate and poor in terms of the facts, I am also writing out of a sense of duty to the truth.


The fact that I presided over this trial and have never once been contacted by any news organization for comment speaks for itself.


My intent in the following paragraphs is to accomplish the following:


To tell the back-story of what actually happened in the Father Murphy case on the local level;


To outline the sloppy and inaccurate reporting on the Father Murphy case by the New York Times and other media outlets;


To assert that Pope Benedict XVI has done more than any other pope or bishop in history to rid the Catholic Church of the scourge of child sexual abuse and provide for those who have been injured;


To set the record straight with regards to the efforts made by the church to heal the wounds caused by clergy sexual misconduct. The Catholic Church is probably the safest place for children at this point in history.


Before proceeding, it is important to point out the scourge that child sexual abuse has been — not only for the church but for society as well. Few actions can distort a child’s life more than sexual abuse. It is a form of emotional and spiritual homicide and it starts a trajectory toward a skewed sense of sexuality. When committed by a person in authority, it creates a distrust of almost anyone, anywhere.


As a volunteer prison chaplain in Alaska, I have found a corollary between those who have been incarcerated for child sexual abuse and the priests who have committed such grievous actions. They tend to be very smart and manipulative. They tend to be well liked and charming. They tend to have one aim in life — to satisfy their hunger. Most are highly narcissistic and do not see the harm that they have caused. They view the children they have abused not as people but as objects. They rarely show remorse and moreover, sometimes portray themselves as the victims. They are, in short, dangerous people and should never be trusted again. Most will recommit their crimes if given a chance.


As for the numerous reports about the case of Father Murphy, the back-story has not been reported as of yet.


In 1996, I was introduced to the story of Father Murphy, formerly the principal of St. John’s School for the Deaf in Milwaukee. It had been common knowledge for decades that during Father Murphy’s tenure at the school (1950-1974) there had been a scandal at St. John’s involving him and some deaf children. The details, however, were sketchy at best.


Courageous advocacy on behalf of the victims (and often their wives), led the Archdiocese of Milwaukee to revisit the matter in 1996. In internal discussions of the curia for the Archdiocese of Milwaukee, it became obvious that we needed to take strong and swift action with regard to the wrongs of several decades ago. With the consent of then-Milwaukee Archbishop Rembert Weakland, we began an investigation into the allegations of child sexual abuse as well as the violation of the crime of solicitation within the confessional by Father Murphy.


We proceeded to start a trial against Father Murphy. I was the presiding judge in this matter and informed Father Murphy that criminal charges were going to be levied against him with regard to child sexual abuse and solicitation in the confessional.


In my interactions with Father Murphy, I got the impression I was dealing with a man who simply did not get it. He was defensive and threatening.


Between 1996 and August, 1998, I interviewed, with the help of a qualified interpreter, about a dozen victims of Father Murphy. These were gut-wrenching interviews. In one instance the victim had become a perpetrator himself and had served time in prison for his crimes. I realized that this disease is virulent and was easily transmitted to others. I heard stories of distorted lives, sexualities diminished or expunged. These were the darkest days of my own priesthood, having been ordained less than 10 years at the time. Grace-filled spiritual direction has been a Godsend.


I also met with a community board of deaf Catholics. They insisted that Father Murphy should be removed from the priesthood and highly important to them was their request that he be buried not as a priest but as a layperson. I indicated that a judge, I could not guarantee the first request and could only make a recommendation to the latter request.


In the summer of 1998, I ordered Father Murphy to be present at a deposition at the chancery in Milwaukee. I received, soon after, a letter from his doctor that he was in frail health and could travel not more than 20 miles (Boulder Junction to Milwaukee would be about 276 miles). A week later, Father Murphy died of natural causes in a location about 100 miles from his home


With regard to the inaccurate reporting on behalf of the New York Times, the Associated Press, and those that utilized these resources, first of all, I was never contacted by any of these news agencies but they felt free to quote me. Almost all of my quotes are from a document that can be found online with the correspondence between the Holy See and the Archdiocese of Milwaukee. In an October 31, 1997 handwritten document, I am quoted as saying ‘odds are that this situation may very well be the most horrendous, number wise, and especially because these are physically challenged , vulnerable people. “ Also quoted is this: “Children were approached within the confessional where the question of circumcision began the solicitation.”


The problem with these statements attributed to me is that they were handwritten. The documents were not written by me and do not resemble my handwriting. The syntax is similar to what I might have said but I have no idea who wrote these statements, yet I am credited as stating them. As a college freshman at the Marquette University School of Journalism, we were told to check, recheck, and triple check our quotes if necessary. I was never contacted by anyone on this document, written by an unknown source to me. Discerning truth takes time and it is apparent that the New York Times, the Associated Press and others did not take the time to get the facts correct.


Additionally, in the documentation in a letter from Archbishop Weakland to then-secretary of the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith Archbishop Tarcisio Bertone on August 19, 1998, Archbishop Weakland stated that he had instructed me to abate the proceedings against Father Murphy. Father Murphy, however, died two days later and the fact is that on the day that Father Murphy died, he was still the defendant in a church criminal trial. No one seems to be aware of this. Had I been asked to abate this trial, I most certainly would have insisted that an appeal be made to the supreme court of the church, or Pope John Paul II if necessary. That process would have taken months if not longer.


Second, with regard to the role of then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict XVI), in this matter, I have no reason to believe that he was involved at all. Placing this matter at his doorstep is a huge leap of logic and information.


Third, the competency to hear cases of sexual abuse of minors shifted from the Roman Rota to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith headed by Cardinal Ratzinger in 2001. Until that time, most appeal cases went to the Rota and it was our experience that cases could languish for years in this court. When the competency was changed to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, in my observation as well as many of my canonical colleagues, sexual abuse cases were handled expeditiously, fairly, and with due regard to the rights of all the parties involved. I have no doubt that this was the work of then Cardinal Ratzinger.


Fourth, Pope Benedict has repeatedly apologized for the shame of the sexual abuse of children in various venues and to a worldwide audience. This has never happened before. He has met with victims. He has reigned in entire conferences of bishops on this matter, the Catholic Bishops of Ireland being the most recent. He has been most reactive and proactive of any international church official in history with regard to the scourge of clergy sexual abuse of minors. Instead of blaming him for inaction on these matters, he has truly been a strong and effective leader on these issues.


Finally, over the last 25 years, vigorous action has taken place within the church to avoid harm to children. Potential seminarians receive extensive sexual-psychological evaluation prior to admission. Virtually all seminaries concentrate their efforts on the safe environment for children. There have been very few cases of recent sexual abuse of children by clergy during the last decade or more.


Catholic dioceses all across the country have taken extraordinary steps to ensure the safety of children and vulnerable adults. As one example, which is by no means unique, is in the Archdiocese of Anchorage, where I currently work. Here, virtually every public bathroom in parishes has a sign asking if a person has been abuse by anyone in the church. A phone number is given to report the abuse and almost all church workers in the archdiocese are required to take yearly formation sessions in safe environment classes. I am not sure what more the church can do.


To conclude, the events during the 1960’s and 1970’s of the sexual abuse of minors and solicitation in the confessional by Father Lawrence Murphy are unmitigated and gruesome crimes. On behalf of the church, I am deeply sorry and ashamed for the wrongs that have been done by my brother priests but realize my sorrow is probably of little importance 40 years after the fact. The only thing that we can do at this time is to learn the truth, beg for forgiveness, and do whatever is humanly possible to heal the wounds. The rest, I am grateful, is in God’s hands.


Father Thomas T. Brundage, JCL

Editor’s note: Father Brundage can be contacted at brundaget@archmil.org or by phone at (907) 745-3229 X 11.