The scandal of giving bad examples to the young people of today
Many people have commented (some few in disagreement) with the protests that Cardinal George and Cardinal DiNardo and other bishops have made about the decision of the President of the University of Notre Dame who invited President Obama to give the commencement address and to receive an honorary Doctorate of Law Degree at Notre Dame in May.
Certainly we must respect the Office of the President of the United States, and this President in particular. He has distinguished himself in that he does not seem to be a liar. The anti-life measures he has imposed upon our government after his inauguration are measures he clearly said as a presidential candidate, long before his election, that he would undertake. This puts him in a class with President Washington, President Polk, President Lincoln and President Reagan, as a truth teller.
I have been a Catholic all my life; a priest for over 47 years and a bishop for 15 years. I believe that the Church teaches infallibly what we must believe and do to be saved, and that the Church is correct when She tells us that it is unlawful to kill any innocent human being without the due process of the law. Therefore, I oppose these policies of President Obama.
You might ask why I oppose President Jenkins’ actions in inviting President Obama to Notre Dame. The reason is simple, and I do not blush to explain to you: President Jenkins is an ordained priest. After over half a century of service as a seminarian and as a member of the clergy, I consider that one of the very worst, grave, mortal sins that a priest can commit is giving bad example to Catholic people. In my judgment, that is exactly what President Jenkins has done, and on more than one occasion, over and over, at Notre Dame. He has sanctioned the presentation of an obscene play to the students of the University.
I am not a great fan of plays; I am now so old that I go to sleep when I watch them for more than an hour. Personally I do not attach much cultural significance to them, but others do. Be that as it may and whatever you may think about the value of stage production in general and pornographic plays in particular, I do not think there is any reason under Heaven why a Catholic priest should show obscene productions to Catholic young people. Why on earth would any priest do that, given the temptations to which young people are subject to every day of their lives?
There are many people who are convinced of the value of the movement toward all powerful government which the majority of people in this country have chosen, but even a totalitarian government does not have power over life and death — that is the constant teaching of the Catholic Church, and it is wrong for any priest, by any action, to recommend by his decisions such a course of action.
Jesus talked about bad example when he said, “Woe to the world for temptations to sin! For it is necessary that temptations come, but woe to the man by whom the temptation comes! It would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened round his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea.” (Mt. 18:6-7) What Jesus said about all of us is all the more true about the priests of His church. All of us have been scandalized and shamed, with a shame that many of us will carry to the grave, over the immense scandal given by those priests who in violation of their trust, molested children and young adults. Apart from the terrible damage done to these young people, damage which can affect them for their whole lives long, there is the larger question of the terrible betrayal of trust committed by these priests. Priests, I know, live in dread of inadvertently or unconsciously giving by their conduct scandal to the faithful. We trust that Christ the High Priest will forgive these inadvertent failings. But knowingly and willingly to mislead our Catholic people to insinuate, how so ever good the justification may be, that what the Church teaches is somehow insignificant — each such act is taking the lance from the Praetorian Guard’s hand and lancing the side of Christ ourselves. It is beneath contempt.
One of the things pious writers tell us made Jesus sweat blood in the Garden of Olives, was that he saw laid out before him by the Devil all the sins of all of us. Standing out above and before those of others must be the sins of priests, other Christs, who by their terrible example betray the High Priest, Son of God, who gave His life to expiate all our sins.