I have an article in the latest issue of Our Sunday Visitor Newsweekly (subscription required) on not letting anger overtake our spiritual peace during times of scandal and persecution.
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I am the Director of Evangelization for the Diocese of Venice in Florida.
I began my study of the Catholic faith in 1991 as an Evangelical Protestant, converting to the Catholic Church in 1993.
I regularly speak to parish groups and other organizations on a variety of topics - contact me to schedule a talk for your group.
You can email me at eric@ericsammons.com.
[...] mentioned the other day that I have an article in the May 16th edition of OSV Newsweekly and that it was only [...]
Pingback by OSV article now available online « Divine Life – A Blog by Eric Sammons — May 7, 2010 @ 9:40 amMr. Sammons:
I read the aforementioned article in OSV and I must challenge your sense of justice. While I appreciate your effort to impart much needed hope to Catholics amid this grievous scandal in our Church, I am deeply saddened by your failure to recognize and affirm the pain inflicted on the real victims of this scandal. Yes, much of the media reports are inaccurate. Yes, the Church is taking a beating. For sure, some amount of injustice lies herein. But the greatest injustice was done to the victims. And this injustice is perpetuated by articles like yours which focus mostly on how our Church is being hurt by others instead of on how parts of our Church hurt others. To you, and to any other Catholic who has the responsibility of writing in these various media forums, I say: Never forget the children that were abused. They are the real victims here. They were innocent, powerless, precious children. Instead of solely bemoaning how our Church is being hurt, perhaps you might also consider offering an apology to the victims, who are now adults and perhaps reading your article, hoping for an ounce of compassion. Let us never be deluded about the workings of evil and, in the words of St. Paul, let us avoid EVERY appearance of evil. Effectuating rule #9 in your Rules of Engagement for Catholics on the Internet would be prudent. God indeed resists the proud AND humility cannot be undone.
To the victims I say: I am so sorry. I will keep you in my prayers. Stay close to Christ- Innocent Victim, Great High Priest, risen Lord.
To fellow Catholics: Let us journey through this crisis with humility and offer ourselves as living sacrifices. Let us do penance for our Church, and offer our Eucharist for the healing of the victims.
May God’s mercy & grace be with all of us.
J. Morgano,
I agree with you that the victims in the Scandal must come first, and that we must do all we can to help them in their pain and sorrow. But there are many aspects to the Scandal, and my article only addresses one of them; specifically, how to handle the anger Catholics feel when they see how terribly some of their priests and bishops have failed to live the Faith. In an article of that length, it is not possible to address every aspect of the Scandal fully.
If you look at all my writings on this topic, you will note that I do not blame the media for the Church’s problems (in fact, I have a post titled The Media is not the problem). Furthermore, I have promoted Pope Benedict’s call for penance as the proper response to the Scandal. So I echo your desire for us to focus on the victims, do penance, and have humility in the face of such evil.