Fr. Barron comments on the wise words from Pope Benedict XVI

Another part of a video series from Wordonfire.org. Father Barron will be commenting on subjects from modern day culture. For more visit http://www.wordonfire.org/

Category:

People & Blogs

Tags:

• Fr. Robert Barron
• Word On Fire
• Catholicism
• Christianity
• spirituality
• faith
• church
• God
• Jesus
• vatican
• Pope Benedict
• sex abuse
• priest

[thepomegranate]

Fr. B, I admire u greatly, but I think you are way off base here. The scandal is NOT just about the abuse, but HOW THE ABUSE WAS HANDLED BY THOSE IN AUTHORITY. Yes, abuse is pervasive in the world. The question for critics is - why was it addressed so much worse in CC? Why the chronic patterns of concealing, handling internally, and transferring abusers? Why was church image put above protection of children? THOSE are distinctly Catholic mistakes and have nothing to do with the wider culture.

[wordonfirevideo]

@thepomegranate Friend, I'm not denying any of that and neither is the Pope! That was the whole point of his using the image of the church with the dirty face. No one knows this darkness better than Pope Benedict. He's not proposing an either/or of church or culture. He's placing the real abuse of the church within the context of a wider cultural problem.

[sooperfukker]

I'm not making any connections between the abuse scandal and the celebacy, but I do think, as I always thought, that the catholic celebacy is not appropriate and not justified. I'm not relating to any Zeitgeist, but keeping people away from marriage and family is generally a bad thing.

[wordonfirevideo]

@sooperfukker Then how do you explain the celibacy of Paul--and of Jesus? Didn't Jesus say that those who are willing and able to become "eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom" should do so?

[itslifeisall]

@wordonfirevideo

Wow. I thought the Church only required celibacy. I didn't realize it included castration.

As for Paul and Jesus, I'm not aware of any requirement imposed on them, so the example is really not relevant to the topic at hand.

[wordonfirevideo]

@itslifeisall Ummm... I think the Lord was speaking figuratively, friend. And Jesus and Paul willingly embraced the ideal of celibacy--as do Catholic priests today. Their example is altogether relevant to the topic at hand!

[sooperfukker]

@MrViobattie Since the englightment process, we automatically compare our actions against Kant's categorical imperative and it's blindingly obvious that celebacy isn't fit to surive that test.

The urge to procreate is given to any living being, It's the reason why -you and me- are alive and it's the reason why there will be living beings tomorrow.

As much as I understand why the celebacy was instated (historically), it should be understood as outdated.

[MrViobattie]

@ParanoidAndroid86 Oh I suppose we should ignore the countless priests and nuns who lived heroic lives becuase of their faith in Jesus through the Church? The Church has countless heroes and it will produce countless more and be a force of Good becuase it built western civilization! It is a disgrace you are right that its people make mistakes but it does nothing to destroy the message it keeps and mission it pursues. The Church will exist REGARDLESS of anything!

[MrViobattie]

@sooperfukker and furthermore why instill this notion that having "sex" regardless of procreation, is how a man are measured by? Priests become celibate out of their own choice. I admire Catholic Celebacy becuase many people went above and beyond their sexual desires and challenged this notion that sex is the centre of our lives. Also their are equal temptation of being married. Devoting your sexuality to just one person is no different than giving it up to God.

[ParanoidAndroid86]

@wordonfirevideo nobody is saying that the catholic church invented the sexual abuse of children...but for an orgaization that proclaims that it is the ONE true church founded by Jesus Christ (the so called "son of GOD") it is ESPECIALLY a more grave disgrace ...REGARDLESS if such abuse is apparent in the surrounding culture

[ParanoidAndroid86]

@wordonfirevideo childporn is getting more acceptable??!? SOSO!....from a man (pope benedict) who just the person most likely to have his finger on the pulse of culture....o_O

[roryscanlon]

off topic but, isn't Blessed Hildegaard great! The extraordinary, universe-embracing visions; the intense poetry and keenly pure harmony of her own music; founding a nunnery in a misogynist time; and her own works on the science of healing, herbs, and philosophy... What a life!

And of course all these gifts came from God. ...such a life gives me hope.

and whoever appropriates her work like the Pope did here will do an immense service for the church!

[austenbosten]

I had to come back to this vid after I read a report about the Pope condemning the persecution of Coptic Christians in Egypt only to see a slew of anti-Catholic rants in the comments section (some coming from self-proclaimed Catholics) about the sex abuse crisis. Fr. Barron puts it well, instead of blaming the CC, people need to look beyond the church to see that child abuse is more prevalent in our culture and hence this is a bigger, cultural problem.

[MobiusCoin]

Okay, here's what I don't understand. How does the moral relativism of the secular world have anything to do with the clergy?

[thepomegranate]

@wordonfirevideo - But, respectfully, how is the wider cultural problem relevant to the failures within the *leadership* of our church? Especially when the wider culture was slightly better at responding to sexual abuse than our church was? And when it was scrutiny from the wider culture that forced the CC to address our abuse more aggressively. I have enormous respect for you, Benedict, and the church, but, in this particular issue, I think our scrutiny has to stay inward.