The Abuse Crisis in the Catholic Church, horrible as it is, is simply the flip side of the Neglect Crisis in the Catholic Church.

What do I mean?

I mean that Neglect is a form of Abuse, and for the past fifty years, bishops, priests and lay Catholics have been neglecting the Faith, and the Vatican has accommodated this by neglecting the Neglect.  A predominantly homosexual clergy, covering and enabling a large number of child molesters, is simply one symptom of this Neglect.

Things are really as bad as Anonymous at First Things describes it, as he paints a picture of a real suburban parish that he leaves unnamed.  I would call it St. Somewhere, a Portrait of Neglect …

Fr. Dave knows better than to suggest to his flock how to live as Catholics. He does not speak of sin. Ever. He does not discuss the saints, devotions, the rosary or prayer of any kind, marriage, death, the sacraments, Catholic family life, the Devil, the poor, the sick, the elderly, the young, mercy, forgiveness, or any other aspect of the Catholic faith that might be useful to a layperson. His homilies are the worst sort of lukewarm application of the day’s Gospel reading—shopworn sermons that sound very much like they were copied word for word from a book of Gospel reflections published in 1975. No one in the pews ever discusses his homilies as far as I can tell.

Rod Dreher quotes a reader of his who explains why this is so …

An opposite case than Father Dave in the article. In Holy Family Parish in St. Albert, Alberta a wonderful Polish priest showed up two years ago. He began preaching solid Catholic homilies. He spoke of sin and how it separates us from God. He spoke of the machinations of the devil. He spoke of (gasp) marriage being between one man and one woman. He spoke against contraception and abortion. He moved the blessed sacrament behind the altar and he replaced a resurecifix with a crucifix. This was too much. Members of the parish council complained to the Archdiocese of Edmonton and had a sympathetic ear from parasitic bureaucrats there with no fondness for the faith. A year ago he was removed from the parish. The message is clear. Priests are not expected to challenge parishioners with the powerful and sometimes uncomfortable teachings of the faith but give lukewarm therapeutic feel good sermons. They are expected to operate just like Father Dave. Live a celibate life and perform weddings and funerals for people who never attend church and provide base sacraments without substance. Not a surprise that there is no surplus of men interested in this deal. 

Except such functionaries are not expected to live a celibate life.  Certainly not by their bishops or fellow priests.  Gay cruising, use of pornography, even affairs with married parishioners are common and either winked at or encouraged by the folks in charge.

Meanwhile, at the First Things article, the comments are typical, which is to say most of them applaud the author for describing the horror of St. Somewhere in detail, but many give the kind of reactions I get here and see elsewhere, such as …

  • Things may be that bad where you are, but my parish is great!!!!!
  • Oh, so Mr. Holier-than-Thou Catholic talks about how bad things are at his parish when he should be busy praying and keeping his mouth shut!  The fact that he notices how bad things are around him tells you that he’s not a good Catholic by any means!!!
  • Just love the Eucharist and pray some devotions, say a novena, and everything will be just fine!!!!  Mejugordje!  Yay!
But, of course, the point is that things are this bad and far worse.  Yes, there are good parishes and good Catholics here and there, but the Church in America is indistinguishable from the shopping mall down the street – except there are fewer gays running the shopping mall and the music is better.  At the very least the salt has lost its savor.  
And I could add an even sadder chapter to the First Things article featuring a few observations about the odd Catholics here and there that I have met who do care and who do try to be devout, but who either end up trapped in a cult like Regnum Christi because Rome is Neglectful about curtailing cults within the Church, or they end up throwing themselves into Catholicism-as-Entertainment (Matt Kelly on a headset / Christopher West on a loud speaker), not being able to distinguish Understanding (which is a gift of the Spirit) from mere emotion or excitement, or they end up heretical themselves, not realizing that the Faith is more than a fashion, and that Christ wants transformation not factionalism, or they become proud of their seriousness about the Faith when all around them are trivializing it, or (most commonly), they pray devotions and go to Mass frequently, but they don’t let grace penetrate into their personal lives, nor do they let Christ approach their hidden treasure and cure their clutching Dragon Sickness because, for one thing, no one’s shown them how and since the Faith seems so Unreal around them, they have no model for discovering its true Reality, as they (like their suburban brethren) are suffering terribly from decades of Neglect.
Meanwhile, on a dark and still night very long ago, a child was born in bitter cold, neglected by the world.  And so we share with Him a suffering that He somehow redeems.