AmericanPapist Comments
I'm struck by the lack of historical perspective here...Priests and religious accused of sexual misconduct in their own lifetimes? Try St. Teresa of Avila, St. Ignatius Loyola, and a certain Redemptorist saint ("disciplined" by his Superior, St. Alphonsus Liguori as a consequence). Religious censured? Try St. Alphonsus himself (kicked out of his own congregation, as is the case with many holy founders), St. Philip Neri (censured in his own lifetime by Pope St. Pius V), and St. (Padre) Pio of Pietrelcina. And this is all just for starters.
I've known Fr. Maciel personally for years. A more "anti-gay lifestyle" man is imnpossible to find.
According to Diogenes the LC take a vow to "never to make outward verbal criticism, written or otherwise, of any act of governance or of the person of any rector or superior of the Congregation, and to inform forthwith the immediate superior of the member who has made such a criticism." This demand makes one suspicious of the founder; it is excessive and unreasonable - there will be necessarily be occasions when it is right to criticise acts of governance of superiors, something that moral theolgians have always recognized - and looks like a means for securing impunity for the superiors of the society.
I keep hearing about all these saints who were accused of scandalous behavior during their lifetime. Have there also been any scoundrals who were accused of scandalous behavior during their lifetime?
Some more details came out last night.
This is apparently the canonical equivalent of D.A. saying, "We're not going through with a trial." So, Father Maciel has not even been indicted, much less "convicted." The principle also holds in canon law, as it does in our Common Law, that there is a presumption of innocence unless someone is, in fact, convicted.
It's also canonical procedure to temporarily suspend a priest's public activity once he's been accused of this until he can be tried canonically. But as noted the Vatican refuses to go to trial. That leaves Father Maciel in a kind of permanent limbo, which he is accepting obediently, while serenely maintaining his innocence.
I'm certain the new CDF chief is a worthy man. But the first diocese he headed has now been bankrupted by lawsuits over such charges, and a prominent neighbor of his to the direct south hasn't had it much better. This, one suspects, colored his decision to prevail upon the Holy Father to do something symbolic.
Especially since it seems the real target for the past 10 years has been the papacy itself. The idea was to make the pope (starting with John Paul) look like the "primary culprit" in the press, because he was setting bad example by protecting a "predator."
Splitting the difference in this manner was a way to get the media and would-be accusers to "back off" and stop consuming the CDF's time, without convicting Fr. Maciel.
Just don't expect to read all this in the New York Times.
Ah, and I left a few people out of my "innocents accused" list: St. Catherine of Siena (accused of fornication in her lifetime); Blessed Damien de Veuster of Molokai (the same accusations held up his beatification forever); and last but not least Fr. Maciel's own uncle and mentor, Blessed Rafael Guiza y Valencia, who had to abandon his foundation of the Sisters of Our Lady of Hope over similar accusations -- I witnessed his beatification myself in St. Peter's Basilica in January 1994.
So Father Maciel knows the drill.
"Some more details came out last night."
*ahem* - what is your source on that? Is this private information?!
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