The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, originally known as the Supreme Sacred Congregation of the Roman and Universal Inquisition, has found former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick guilty of serial homosexual abuse.
According to a Vatican statement, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) issued a “decree finding Theodore Edgar McCarrick, archbishop emeritus of Washington, D.C., guilty of the following delicts while a cleric: solicitation in the Sacrament of Confession, and sins against the Sixth Commandment with minors and with adults, with the aggravating factor of the abuse of power.”
The decree was issued on January 11 at the conclusion of a penal process, the Vatican said, imposing on him “the penalty of dismissal from the clerical state.”
Having examined McCarrick’s defense, the CDF confirmed the prior decree and notified McCarrick of the decision on February 15, 2019.
Pope Francis has recognized the “definitive nature” of this decision, the Vatican statement added, meaning that no further appeals will be admitted.
Better late than never. Pope Francis should have defrocked McCarrick upon learning of his crimes back in 2013, but at least the Catholic Church has an office with the judicial authority, moral weight, and centuries-old pedigree of the Inquisition. Even the most Modernizing, anti-traditional pope would think twice before outright ignoring their verdicts.
It’s encouraging to see that Holy Church is finally taking steps to purify the corrupt among her hierarchy. The CDF should open inquisitions in every country worldwide to smoke out the abuse-committing and concealing rats before turning their attention to rooting out Modernist heresy.
Lay Catholics can’t just sit back and expect the hierarchy to do all the heavy lifting themselves. Consecrating the world to Christ is our job. We must find the courage to stand up and speak out for right doctrine and proper worship.
Don’t entertain any illusions. There will be social and perhaps even economic costs to standing up for the truth. I’m not asking you to do anything I haven’t done myself. I’ve incurred the wrath of the self-important and spiritually indifferent HR ladies who all too often run the Church’s nominal institutions while bishops cower. But as is becoming increasingly clear, the rabid death cult now in power in the West is first and foremost bent on destroying the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.
The enemy knows better than many of us that the Church is the sole living pillar of Western civilization capable of defeating their diabolical war on truth, life, and beauty. Because that pillar is the mere tip of an inverted iceberg descending from heaven to touch the earth. The enemy cannot, in the end, succeed, but the question left for us to answer is: How long do we wish our posterity to toil in the ruins before the ember of civilization kindles once more into a blazing light unto the world?
For an award-winning science fiction author’s vision of what such a future might look like, read my highly praised martial thriller Combat Frame XSeed. To support independent authors who refuse to bow the knee to the death cult propagandists in New York publishing, back the sequel today.
Brian
A great call to arms.
Cardinal Vigano is rather pessimistic about the upcoming Rome meeting but still holds out hope.
Ok so how do we laity really pressure the squishops to do their duty and what do we need to do to fulfill our competency?
xavier
Send emails. Make phone calls. Write letters. Speak with prelates in person if possible.
As a previous commenter said, if we want soundly taught doctrine and solemn liturgy back, we have to fight for it.
Brian,
Thanks. Practical recommenstion the laity can carry out.
xavier
This is an odd ruling. McCarrick was accused of raping a 12 year old, James Grein – who did 2 interviews with Dr Marshall on YouTube which everyone should watch – which according to Cannon Law is punishable by death, hence all of the nonsense about the death penalty being immoral or out of date. All of that was about McCarrick.
Your quote says he was found guilty of sins against the 6th commandment with minors, the punishment for that is death not just defrocking.
I'm not a canon lawyer, but my understanding was that, while the Church reserves the right to issue temporal–including corporal–punishments for sin, she has always delegated administration of capital punishment to secular authorities.
This is correct. The old euphemism was that the condemned were "relaxed to the secular arm" for punishment. There is no Western power that would enact a penalty of death even for pederasty, but by defrocking him, I believe he loses the cover of the ecclesiastical courts (such as they are today) and becomes solely a matter for secular justice. Like you said, better late than never.
Thank you for clarifying.
This is a nice start. Next I'd like to see Pope Francis resign immediately and live a life of quiet penance.
But we all know that'll never happen.
Bibliophile
Look up Ed Peters.He's a canon lawyer He has a blog (www.canonlaw.wordpress.com as well as a Twitter account.
I highly recommend him on the subject of canon law.
xavier
Seconding the Ed Peters recommendation. He's solid.
Papa Angelicus, fictional pope in Robert Benson's Lord of the World:
"Then he had restored Capital Punishment, with as much serene gravity as that with which he had made himself the derision of the civilised world in other matters, saying that though human life was holy, human virtue was more holy still; and he had added to the crime of murder, the crimes of adultery, idolatry and apostasy, for which this punishment was theoretically sanctioned."
B16's favorite novel, if memory serves.
Every Christian institution needs to clean house vigorously, thoroughly, and with hymns of praise on their lips.
Hear, hear and amen.
I look forward to the day when such sanctions are carried out via orbital bombardment…