Can Anything Good Come Out of Rome?

Frank Bruni, noted New York Times theologian, is doing his best to remind the public of the lamentable fact that the Catholic Church still exists:

I’ve been monitoring and occasionally writing about the church’s child sex-abuse crisis since 1992, and most of church leaders’ apologies and instances of constructive outreach have come about reluctantly, belatedly or with a palpable sense from many bishops and cardinals that they were the aggrieved, victimized ones . . . The Catholic hierarchy, meanwhile, keeps giving American Catholics fresh reasons for rebellion. For the church ever to grouse that critics make too much of this, let alone to retaliate against victims and accusers, is galling. But it helps explain the breach between the hierarchy — invested in its own survival, resistant to serious discussions about the celibate culture’s role in child sexual abuse — and everyday Catholics. They’re left to wonder where they fit into their church and how it fits into the modern world.

The title of the piece is “ Many Kinds of Catholic ,” and Bruni makes sure we haven’t forgotten that the Church is against birth control, abortion, and other convenient remedies to avoiding financial burdens in the form of children. Meanwhile, it is tainted by a past filled with sexual perversion caused by the odd practice of celibacy, and the breach between the hierarchy and its members continues to grow.

For more on why the Catholic Church is doing nothing good for the world, read here .