Cardinal McCarrick and the Catholic Church's Continued Dark Night

I still remember the whirlwind of my mid-summer arrival after I was sent to study in Rome back in 2004. Another seminarian and I had flown there early for an Italian immersion program in preparation for fall classes. Exiting Fiumicino, we made it to the Pontifical North American College in time for the large mid-day meal that the Italians call pranzo. Unaware that the college's dress code is quite relaxed during the summer, I remember that we changed into cassocks before finding our way to the large, formal refectory. We were a little red-faced, I think, to be the only ones dressed like that!

We ended up sitting down to dinner with a diminutive, elderly man who was wearing the tab collar and a faded black suitcoat of a priest. He was friendly and engaging, asking us where we were from and where we would be studying Italian. Only halfway through the meal did I get it through my travel-fogged brain that we were speaking with Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, at that time the powerful and highly influential archbishop of Washington, D.C.

Cardinal McCarrick greeting Admiral Fallon after a Sept. 11 Memorial Mass. Image from Wikipedia Commons.

This is the same Cardinal McCarrick, now 87 years-old and living in a nursing home, who last week was removed from public ministry by the Vatican due to credible accusations that he had sexually abused a teen-aged boy more than 50 years ago. Word is also coming out that journalists have been sitting on a story since the early 2000s about the cardinal's sexual exploitation of seminarians. Journalist Rod Dreher writes that he couldn't get any priests to risk their priesthood by speaking out at the time. He also notes that the story almost went to press in The New York Times magazine in 2012 but was shelved for some mysterious reason at the last minute. Now folks are asking why the press kept quiet, especially after the Archdiocese of Newark disclosed late this week that there had been three allegations against the cardinal there and in the Diocese of Metuchen, and that two of them had led to settlements.

What does all of this mean to me? Well, for starters, I'm still processing things. One thing I'm trying to square is the scandalous account from Dreher and the friendly, engaging priest-figure I met back then. A few years later, after having left the seminary, I attended Mass at the University of Notre Dame, and Cardinal McCarrick happened to be the celebrant and homilist. He gave a powerful homily. I told him so when I shook his hand afterward. He smiled warmly but of course didn't recognize me.

How could I have been so oblivious to all of this? Obviously I'm not talking mainly about McCarrick, whom I hardly knew. I'm rather thinking of the the whole priest sex abuse scandal and the whole "gay network" that the journalism of Dreher and others continues to expose. I was in Rome, of course, just after the height of the sex abuse revelations. Boston's Cardinal Bernard Law had already been exiled to Santa Maria Maggiore. He actually instituted my seminary class into the lectorate in 2005. I remember that year that there was also an apostolic visitation of the North American College, and that an American archbishop was sent to interview each of us seminarians separately. I won't mention his name in case it is under some kind of seal, but I do remember telling the archbishop that I hadn't seen a thing. I told him that my real concern was the potential for alcoholism among some men who were soon to be ordained. It seemed to me that many seminarians drank heavily on a regular basis, perhaps as a cure for the loneliness that resulted from celibacy or, for those of us studying in Rome, the distance from the familiar things of home.

Again, how could I have been so oblivious? Well, I'm thankful that I was, because frankly I don't know if my faith at the time could have withstood knowing more than I did. I treasure my time in Rome, and I cherish the friendships I made with many of my classmates, some of whom are today faithful priests serving throughout the United States and others of whom, like myself, left the seminary to pursue the calling of marriage and family life.

And what of my faith today? I would say that I am serene in my faith. I have learned not to put my faith in princes, for "they are but men, they have no power to save" (Psalm 145:3). That goes for Princes of the Church like Cardinal McCarrick as well. So I will pray for the cardinal in his own dark night, that the truth may set him, and the entire Church, free from this terrible scandal. And I thank God for all the priests and bishops who continue humbly to serve Christ and His Church, both those who are holy and those who, like me, are best described as works in progress. Semper reformans, semper reformanda.

Sacristan's Corner-- On veils and and seeing 'through a glass, darkly'

Here I've combined the fourth and fifth of the bulletin blurbs I've been writing, since both are on the topic of veils, the last focusing on the veiling of the statues for Passiontide. 

You probably remember that the Veil of the Temple was torn in two at the very moment of Jesus' death. But maybe you wonder what this mysterious veil was. Its origins are in the Book of Exodus, where the Lord instructed that the Holy of Holies containing the Ark of the Covenant and God's Mercy Seat be shielded from people's eyes. 

Veils, in other words, were important for the Jews to separate what is sacred from what is of the world. For the same reason, the tradition of veiling holy things has entered into Christian practice. 

The General Instruction of the Roman Missal says that it is “very fitting,” for example, that the chalice be covered with a veil. You may have also noticed that there is now a veil over the tabernacle, which is our own true Holy of Holies, and that there is even a veil over the ciborium which the priest takes from the tabernacle before distributing Holy Communion. 

In short, these veils are beautiful reminders from our Catholic tradition that we ourselves are constantly striving to become less of the world, so that one day we may pass through the veil of this world into God's direct, unveiled presence in life everlasting. As St. Paul beautifully puts it, we see the Lord in the midst of the struggles of this life “through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known” (1 Corinthians 13:12). 

Today you've probably noticed that all the statues and crosses are now also veiled. These last two weeks of Lent are traditionally known as “Passiontide” because during the 5th week of Lent the Preface of the Lord's Passion is used and then, on Palm Sunday, the Passion account is read. 

Passiontide marks an intensification of our Lenten prayer, fasting, and almsgiving. In Medieval Germany a large purple cloth known as the hungertuch, or “hunger cloth,” would be stretched across the entire sanctuary throughout Lent to Good Friday, a dramatic precursor to our current practice of veiling the statues. The idea is that we should hunger for the comforting visuals—the familiar statues, images, and artwork that ordinarily aid our prayer and contemplation. 

We will get them back, of course. First the Crucifix will be unveiled for our veneration on Good Friday. Then all the Passiontide veils will come off at the Easter Vigil, for the Risen Lord “satisfieth the longing soul, and filleth the hungry soul with goodness” (Psalm 107:9).

Blurb 1 (The Crotalus), Blurb 2 (Benedictine Arrangement), Blurb 3 (Benedictine Arrangement, Part 2)

We are all set for Passiontide at St. Peter's, Middle Ridge, Wis.

Sacristan's Corner-- Benedictine Arrangement, Part 2

The third in a series of bulletin blurbs I'm writing...

Last week I wrote about the “Benedictine” arrangement and specifically about the altar crucifix. But you've probably also noticed the six candles placed on the altar for weekend Masses. Why six? Simply because this is the traditional number of candles for Sundays and high holy days. 

Actually, seven candles are used when a bishop presides! In churches like St. James in La Crosse, where the original high altar is again being used, three candles are placed on one side of the tabernacle and three on the other side. 

Here at St. Peter's, our own altar crucifix, a gift from Msgr. Hundt, is from the chapel of the nuns who taught at the parish many years ago. I'm told that the candlesticks are from St. Peter's own high altar. 

What a beautiful sense of continuity there is, therefore, in returning these candlesticks to use. After all, the forebears of so many here at St. Peter's built this church. 

Now they could walk into church and recognize the altar arrangement that they knew, and that their own parents and grandparents and great-grandparents knew, and that even the early Christians knew in their own celebrations of Holy Mass by candlelight in the catacombs.

Blurb 1 (The Crotalus), Blurb 2 (Benedictine Arrangement)

Our Benedictine altar arrangement at St. Peter's Parish, Middle Ridge, Wis., during the Christmas season.

Sacristan's Corner-- The Benedictine Arrangement

The second in a series of bulletin blurbs I'm writing... 

Some are wondering, what's up with the cross and candles on the altar? It's called the “Benedictine” arrangement because it was inspired by Pope Benedict XVI, who suggested it in The Spirit of the Liturgy, published a few years before he became pope. 

Benedict wrote about how, after the Second Vatican Council, priests in many parishes began facing the congregation during the Eucharistic prayer in order to foster a greater sense of community. Fostering community is a laudable goal, Benedict wrote, but “moving the altar cross to the side to give an uninterrupted view of the priest is something I regard as one of the truly absurd phenomena of recent decades. Is the cross disruptive during Mass? Is the priest more important than Our Lord?” 

The idea is that the altar cross, with the corpus facing the priest, permits the priest to gaze upon the Crucified Christ during the Eucharistic prayer, just as the large crucifix suspended above the tabernacle permits of the congregation. After all, that's exactly what the Mass is: the unbloodly renewal of Our Lord's sacrifice on the cross. 

When Benedict became pope in 2005, he implemented the “Benedictine” arrangement for all of his liturgies, and Pope Francis has continued this practice since becoming pope in 2013. Also in the last decade, large cathedral parishes and little country parishes alike all throughout the world have followed the example of Pope Benedict and Pope Francis—including, most recently, St. Peter's Parish, Middle Ridge!

Blurb 1 (The Crotalus)

Our Benedictine altar arrangement during the Christmas season.

Sacristan's Corner-- The Crotalus

Over at our little country parish, where I reign gloriously as sacristan, I've been making some small, incremental liturgical changes à la "reform of the reform." While I haven't encountered resistance, exactly, folks generally like things the way they're used to them, and so it's been suggested to me that  I write brief weekly bulletin blurbs to explain things. So here's my first little blurb--about the crotalus. Enjoy!

Clack, clack, clack. Maybe you noticed the strange sound that has replaced the bells. That's the crotalus, which shares its name with a genus of snakes who make a clacking, or rattling, with their tails when frightened. The scientific name of the rattlesnake is crotalus cerastes! 

The use of the crotalus at Lenten Masses dates back more than a thousand years. Some old churches in Spain and Latin America actually have a giant crotalus in the bell tower, since even the church bells can't be rung during the Triduum. 

So, why use the crotalus during Lent? Similarly, why deprive ourselves of good things, like desserts and meat, during Lent? Perhaps the answer is found in the song “Again We Keep This Solemn Fast” where one verse reads, “Our speech, our laughter, every sense,/ learn peace through holy penitence.” 

We yearn for the beauty of the bells just as we yearn for the things we've given up. The bells will ring again briefly on Holy Thursday during the Gloria, and then, after the sacred silence of the Triduum, they'll return to their place of honor at the Easter Vigil. 

Until then, their absence is a reminder, together the sanctuary bereft of flowers and the omnipresent, somber color of violet, that we're preparing for something far more beautiful than bells or any other worldly thing: the joy of the Lord's Resurrection.

Those who have wives should act as not having them and other Pauline paradoxes

A phrase from Mass today really struck me: St. Paul's counsel that those "using the world" do so as "not using it fully." Maybe it's having seriously considered clerical celibacy and the detached, itinerant lifestyle of a diocesan priest that has always given me a degree of discomfort with this balancing act. The question is: How much is too much? Obviously I've settled in comfortably despite my discomfort: I have 40 acres in God's country to call my own, a wife who loves me, and children who love me and depend on me for everything. So, for all my discomfiture, I'm a man of the world, with daily labor that I thoroughly enjoy. I have practical concerns that occupy my time and energy, and interests in agriculture and animal husbandry, in political ideals, in practical entertainment and all the little enjoyments of life.

In short, there is as little of the ethereal to my everyday life as there is to that of the next person. And so, St. Paul's words rightly make me uncomfortable whenever I hear them, and they have me asking yet again today: How much is too much?

There is a great deal of truth to the argument that things are inherently good, and that we come to know God through our proper, measured embrace of them. Food, drink, and a comfortable chair all, in the pleasure they give after a hard day's work, provide a foretaste of the enjoyments of heaven and an opportunity to give thanks to the God who is the source of all good things. More seriously, I've made a real investment of myself in terms of my daily labor and my commitment to the ideals of organic farming and the noble cause of small-scale, sustainable agriculture. So we also come closer to God through our commitment to justice, to truth, and to the common good. In each example, there is a balance: There is such a thing as too much food and drink detracting from one's health, too much labor detracting from one's family life, etc.

But let me also broach the most radical example St. Paul brings up: that "those having wives act as not having them." Is St. Paul saying that there is also such a thing as too much commitment to one's family, to one's wife and children? A cynic might say that this is just Paul being Paul, the life-long celibate who just a little earlier had advised that a man only resort to marriage if he can't control his passions (cf. 1 Cor 7:9). Easy for Paul-the-bachelor to say, but what of a married man such as myself? And what of St. Paul himself elsewhere, who inspires me with his challenging words that husbands ought to love their wives as Christ loves the Church (Eph 5:25)? After all, Christ turned the water into wine at Cana, blessing marriage and making it holy, a sacrament. Through the unshakable embrace of one's spouse, for better or for worse, in the indissoluble bond of holy matrimony, one is supposed to be drawn closer to Christ. One is united to God, in other words, by a determined, single-minded embrace of  the worldly, very human, very real bond of marriage. So, what of those who have wives acting as if they don't? How can these matters be squared? Can there really be too much?

I was led to consider Abraham's willingness to sacrifice Isaac. I imagine that there was little in the world that Abraham was more invested in or loved more dearly than his son. Actually, that's how God refers to Isaac when he commands Abraham to sacrifice him: "Take your son Isaac, your only one, whom you love..." (Gen 22:2). It was through caring for Isaac, providing for his basic needs, giving him an example to follow, and raising him into a God-fearing man that Abraham himself came to know God better. Fatherhood was his vocation, and yet, when God asked him to sacrifice his own son, Abraham willingly and unhesitatingly raised hand to perform the deed.

Obviously there are New Testament ramifications in this Genesis passage to God the Father, who so loved the world that he sent his beloved, only-begotten Son into the world to die on the cross. But I found myself asking what I would do if I were Abraham, if I had to choose between God and the gifts he has given me. Ultimately that's what this is all about: Are you so invested in the world that you would be unwilling to give it all up if circumstances demanded? I'm reminded of the single-mindedness St. Louis de Montfort's motto, Deiu seul, God alone. How much is too much? How much can one love the things of this world before giving it all up would cause us to hesitate or to experience pangs of regret?

It's not that radical a question if you look back at history. It's interesting, for example, to look at the history of England under Oliver Cromwell, where most Catholics were broken through the exorbitant taxes levied against them for non-attendance at the official Protestant parishes. What if I was threatened with the loss of my own farm unless I rejected my faith? My stolid answer, of course, is that I'd accept the loss of all my material possessions rather than reject my faith. Some days I think I'd even be strong enough to die a martyr, like the early Christians who were torn apart by lions in the arena rather than carry out sacrifice to the pagan gods. That said, I can identify with the annoying child-protagonist of Flannery O'Connor's short story, "The Temple of the Holy Ghost," who "thought she could be a martyr if they killed her quick."

But the real examples are cleverer than that. What if my wife or one of my children were to be shot and killed unless I trampled on Consecrated Hosts spilled from the tabernacle? What if all I had to do was spit on the Bible, or proclaim aloud just once that I don't believe in God, in order to save them? The problem is that we don't want to put the people we love in the same category as other worldly things. This, I think, is why St. Paul counsels against marriage. It's not that one can't love Christ through marriage and family; rather, it's that, despite the travails, suffering, and imperfections of our human relationships, there is nothing else in the world that more closely resembles the loving embrace of God. Therefore, there is also nothing that would be harder to give up.

So, I remain as discomfited by St. Paul and his very true, very relevant counsel as ever. There is something of a paradox here. Because God is transcendent, totally other, the imperfect love we experience in our human relationships is the only way we can come to understand and experience his love for us. So we need to embrace and love fully, not in part. We need to believe, and to love, and to sacrifice without reserve, for those who are ours in order to understand and come to know the unreserved, unconditional love of the God whose we are. Yet somehow we must also come to recognize that the things we love here on earth, even the ones we love most here are earth, are but fleeting shadows, foretastes of the love that is to come.

Of life and death; or, first lessons from a still young kidding season

Kidding season is now in full swing here on the farm. We bred the goats last summer for mid-winter babies. Although this leaves the birthing process to the coldest months of the year, in a few years when our herd is bigger this timing will yield young goats ready for commercial sales around the time of the Easter holiday, when goat meat is at its highest demand.



At present, though, everything is small and still an experiment. We have only five Boer and Kiko meat goat mothers-to-be, in addition to two bred mothers from our registered Nigerian dwarf goat herd. We had a few more promising does that we brought with us from North Carolina, but we struggled with parasite issues on the new pasture the first summer here in Wisconsin and lost a few very promising does--but that's a subject for another post.

For now, my post revolves around kidding season, which is now fully underway. It began with one of the dwarf goats last weekend. Little Milcah, a second freshener, went into labor Saturday evening as the temperature dipped a few degrees below zero fahrenheit. As much as we've read of successful kidding in sub-zero weather, honestly, Rosemary and I were--and are--quite apprehensive about births in the extreme cold. On the internet, one can read advice about making sure to dry the ears fully so that they don't get frostbitten, and of difficult cases in Canada, for example, where at twenty or thirty below there is even the possibility that wet hooves can freeze. In our own limited experience, I think that once in North Carolina we had a kidding in the upper thirties (above zero, that is!).

Suffice it to say, we were ready with a hair dryer and plenty of rags. We had warm molasses water for Milcah to drink during and after labor, and sure enough the first kidding went off without a hitch. Around 10 p.m., she gave birth to a beautiful, healthy buckling. His coloring is perfect, and the blue eyes he inherited from his father are a desirable trait that, together with other promising qualities, have us asking whether he might be a future herd sire. In fact, we may retain him ourselves since a few of our other dwarf goats are entirely unrelated to the high quality Sinai Thunder lines this little buckling possesses from both his sire and his dam.

Okay, enough inside baseball talk. But it was gratifying to watch vigorous new life make such a confident entrance into the world in such harsh conditions this weekend. Milcah birthed unassisted, with Rosemary interposing only to rub the little buckling off and run the hair dryer up and down his sides to eliminate any moisture and ensure that he didn't become chilled. My job was mainly flipping the breaker back on as a single electrical outlet struggled to support the load of multiple heated water buckets, a worklight, and, now, a hair dryer. Okay, I did take over a little later on, helping the buckling latch on to his mother and get some colostrum, ensuring that his belly would be full and warm on that first cold winter night outside the womb. But Rosemary really is amazing with the birthing process. She's had plenty of practice these last few years, even a few particularly difficult births back in North Carolina.

Speaking of difficult births, yesterday brought more mixed results. Since she was up to nurse Cornelius anyway, at around 4 a.m. Rosemary made a trip down to the barn to check on the goats. Sure enough, Mango, one of our first freshener Boer goats, was in early labor. This was concerning, as she had not yet developed an udder at all and was probably the goat we least expected to go next. Rosemary gave me a call, and I came down to the barn and took over, keeping watch until, finally, I had to leave for La Crosse, where I am teaching classes at Providence Academy part time this semester. Thank God for being closer to family--Rose's mother was able to come over right away to watch the boys.

Alas, I was off to the big city dressed in suit-and-tie, and it turns out that I left Rosemary to deal with a difficult situation here on the farm. Mango, it seems, must have been hit in the side by another goat sometime recently. Her single doeling had died in utero, and Rosemary had to pull it out. Although I won't go into extreme detail about how hard a task this is, you can probably guess that it's not a great deal of fun. For obvious reasons, it is also emotionally draining. Suffice it to say, yesterday was a long day in the Klein household. The doeling was beautifully formed, with traditional Boer markings. Even today, Mango is hearing the other babies and calling out for her own baby. She may also have a retained placenta, and we're working creatively with herbal remedies as we look to stave off infection without resorting to the use of antibiotics. Farming is not always so fun.

The lesson from all of this, I suppose, is the lesson of Job:

"We accept good things from God; and should we not accept evil?"

I've always struggled a little with Job's comment, though. It's not that evil comes directly from God, that he wishes ill for us, or for our livestock for that matter. But the adversities of life certainly do encourage us to cling more closely and gratefully to what we have. Part of what makes life so precious is the knowledge of how fleeting it is, and how tenuous is our grasp on it.

Just another lesson from life on the farm, where the mysterious intertwining of life and death isn't hidden behind the facade of euphemisms and antiseptic hospital rooms. What made yesterday worth it, even for Rosemary, who had to deal with the worst of it, was that another Boer first-freshener, Curry, went into labor shortly after Mango and easily delivered a beautiful, vigorous doeling. She's chocolate brown like her father, with a cute white star on her forehead. Curry and her daughter are doing well, and kidding season continues apace. Thank God for that, and thank God for the higher temps that the coming week's forecast promises.

"Thus the Lord blessed the latter days of Job more than his earlier ones. For he had fourteen thousand sheep, six thousand camels, a thousand yoke of oxen, and a thousand she-asses. And he had seven sons and three daughters, of whom he called the first Jemima, the second Cassia, and the third Ceren-happuch. In all the land no other women were as beautiful as the daughters of Job; and their father gave them an inheritance among their brethren. After this, Job lived a hundred and forty years; and he saw his children, his grandchildren, and even his great-grandchildren. Then Job died, old and full of years."