When Pope Benedict issued his motu proprio liberalizing the use of the Extraordinary Form of the Mass, he hoped that much of the richness of the old Mass would influence how the new Mass was celebrated. I don’t think this is what he had in mind, though

Cardinal Ratzinger asked to resign in 1997, become Vatican librarian

Recently I ran across this profound and insightful statement by Joseph Ratzinger, written in 1977:

[In] the very structure of modern society the corporate life of the family is increasingly displaced by the logic of production and the specializations which it has developed. As a result, the family home frequently seems no more than a sleeping-bag. In the daytime it effectively dematerializes. No more can it be that sheltering space which brings human beings together in birth and living, in sickness and dying. (Eschatology, pp. 69-70, emphasis added)

Two hundred years ago in this country, the vast majority of families had all their members stay close to home throughout the day. The mother stayed at home to tend the house and raise the kids, and the father either worked the farm or at a local shop nearby. Family life revolved around the house, making it a “sheltering space,” as the future Pope Benedict noted. Today, however, nothing could be further from reality. As Ratzinger writes, during the daytime, our homes “dematerialize.”

It is amazing how my own neighborhood becomes a virtual ghost town during the day, even during the summer. Although plenty of families have young children, you never see any during working hours, as they are all away at day care or summer camp (at night, it is little better, as yards are still empty and most homes seem to have a TV-blue glow emanating from their homes). The days of children playing with their siblings and the neighborhood children are long gone, as are many of the deep bonds that unite a family together and to their community.

It would be easy to point the finger at individuals and blame them for this epidemic. But, as Ratzinger points out, such a situation is due to the very structure of modern society. Everything about our modern economy and society pushes families to become two-income households, and drives families to live farther and farther away from work-centers, thus adding to the total time away from the home. And the process is self-perpetuating: as more families become dual-income, their total income rises, thus rising the cost of homes, which in turn pushes more families to become dual-income and to live farther from work-centers. The devil has done a wonderful job in modern times in preventing homes from becoming “sheltering spaces” as long commute times and mothers having to work outside the home are destroying any sense of the family home being anything more than a “sleeping-bag.”

All of these factors make me more and more appreciative of stay-at-home mothers. I understand that there are situations in which a mother must work outside the home, but I still cannot but praise those families who make the great sacrifices necessary to have the mother stay at home with their children. I am very grateful to my parents for many things, but one of things I’m most thankful for is that my own mother stayed at home throughout my childhood years. By doing so, she made my home a “sheltering space.” Without exception, there is no job I admire more than mothers who stay at home with their children. This feeling of admiration even is greater than the one I have for priests, of whom I have great admiration. In my estimation, stay-at-home moms have an even more noble – and thankless – task. As grace builds on nature, so too does the work of the priest build on the work of the mother, the first educator in the school of love for any child. A loving mother does more to help a priest in his work to sanctify souls than any other person.

The greatest human person who ever lived – the Blessed Virgin Mary – was a stay-at-home mom, and her task was a humble one, although it was also the most important one given to a human person in the history of mankind: to raise the God-man, Jesus Christ. In the fifth glorious mystery, we contemplate the coronation of Mary as Queen of Heaven and Earth: here is a simple stay-at-home mom made the Queen of men and angels! I often think that there will be countless other unknown stay-at-home mothers who will one day be glorified in heaven because of their work to make their homes sheltering spaces and not just sleeping-bags.

Our Lady, Mother of God, pray for us!

It looks like we will have to wait a bit longer to read the 2nd volume of Pope Benedict’s Jesus of Nazareth series:

In May, Pope Benedict finished writing the second volume of his work, “Jesus of Nazareth,” and the text went to a Vatican translating team.

The translators are being careful. So careful, in fact, that the book isn’t expected to be published before Lent of 2011, according to Vatican sources I spoke with this week.

It seems the first volume of “Jesus of Nazareth” has some discrepancies in the various language versions. To make sure that doesn’t happen this time, the translators are doing a lot of cross-checking.

The Vatican wants the book to be released simultaneously in major languages. Lent would be an appropriate time to launch Volume 2, which treats Christ’s Passion and the Resurrection. The first volume of the work, which ran more than 400 pages, was published in the spring of 2007 and covered Jesus’ life from his baptism to his transfiguration.

Meanwhile, it’s rumored in the Vatican that Pope Benedict is already making plans for a third volume on the life of Jesus, this one focusing on his infancy and childhood years. He’ll have time to work on it at his summer villa in Castel Gandolfo, where he’s headed today and will remain for most of the next three months.

I can’t think of a better read during Lent than this pope’s reflections on Christ’s Passion and Resurrection. What a treat!

I always love stories about God working outside what we might consider the “normal” way of things. Here is a great example:

Back in 1920, a 43 year old German man was getting desperate that he had not met the right woman, so he placed an advert in the newspapers. Although a policeman, he worded the ad as follows:

Middle-ranking civil servant, single, Catholic, 43, immaculate past,from the country, is looking for a good Catholic, pure girl who can cook well, tackle all household chores, with a talent for sewing and homemaking with a view to marriage as soon as possible. Fortune desirable but not a precondition.

A woman named Maria Peintner answered the ad. She was 36 years old, a trained cook, and had been born “out of wedlock”. While carrying her, her mother, whom it is suggested was also born out of wedlock, spent some time in a home for pregnant girls. She later married a baker named Rieger with whom she had five more daughters. Maria did not have a fortune, but even so, they married four months later. In spite of their somewhat advanced years they had three children – two boys and a girl. The youngest child recieved the same name as his father : Joseph Ratzinger. He is better known today as Pope Benedict XVI.

After his election, someone dug up the “wife wanted” ad and showed it to the new Pope who, of course, smiled. His parents really loved both one another and their three children. Pope Benedict often speaks about that love. In fact, his first encyclical is entitled, “God is Love”, and it describes marriage as the preeminient figure of God’s love for us.

Meanwhile isn’t it worth reflecting on the fact that the mother of Pope Benedict was “illegitimate”. At the time, her conception and birth were possibly the source of scandal and condemnation, but she was to become the mother of the present Pope.

God is good!

Since 2002, Catholics have been hit with the sexual abuse crisis in the Church. First it was uncovered in the United States, then revelations of abuse and cover-ups spread to other countries, reaching a crescendo this past Spring with many media outlets trying to tag Pope Benedict with accusations of misconduct. One of the problems with this slow drip, drip of sordid revelations is that it is hard to get a “big picture” perspective of the problem and the Church’s response to it. Instead, it just appears as if nothing is changing and nothing is being addressed. News story after news story just seem to repeat the same allegations over and over.

Because of this, Greg Erlandson and Matthew Bunson have done Catholics a great service by writing the book “Pope Benedict XVI and the Sexual Abuse Crisis” (full disclosure: Erlandson is the President and Publisher of Our Sunday Visitor, which is publishing my book this Fall). In this book, the authors do two things: recount the details of the crisis and note what the Church – and particularly Pope Benedict – has done to respond to it. They are not afraid to criticize church officials when they need to be criticized, but they also note the leading role Pope Benedict has taken to rid the Church of sexual predators, dating back to his days as a Cardinal.

This book is split into two parts: the first is the analysis of Erlandson and Bunson, and then the second part includes a large number of official writings and documents from the Pope and other church officials related to the crisis. This second section serves the same purpose as the first: to gather together in one place a “big picture” of what church officials have been doing since 2002 to address abuse within the Church.

I do wish that the book addressed critically the results of some of the U.S. bishops’ actions since 2002 to protect children. There seems to be no question that predator priests are becoming more and more rare because of the bishops’ actions since 2002, but there is legitimate concern that some of the actions taken (such as mandatory and possibly inappropriate “Safe Environment” training in Catholic schools) can have long-term negative consequences. But frankly, that is not really a criticism of this book, as that was not a topic Erlandson and Bunson were covering. I do hope someday that someone does study those issues and writes a comprehensive book about it.

However, if you want to get a great overview of the abuse crisis in the Church and the Church’s – and Pope’s – response to it, I would recommend buying a copy of Pope Benedict XVI and the Sexual Abuse Crisis. And for those particularly interested in this topic, OSV has set up a blog associated with this book and the issues surrounding it.

Those familiar with the churches of the East know that many Orthodox churches have an Eastern Catholic counterpart. This usually occurred because at some point in history a segment of that particular Orthodox Church decided to enter into communion with Rome and thus broke away from the larger Orthodox church of which they belonged. These Eastern Catholic churches are quite controversial among many Orthodox, who believe that they are “Trojan horse” churches attempting to lure Orthodox believers into the Catholic fold (in fact, their existence at one point caused the disruption of Catholic-Orthodox ecumenical talks).

But there is an Eastern Catholic church which has no Orthodox counterpart, because it never left communion with Rome: the Maronite Catholic Church. The history of the Lebanese Maronites is a fascinating one. They trace their church to St. Maron, a monk who lived in the 4th century. They vigorously supported the teachings of the Council of Chalcedon at a time when many in the East rejected it and formed their own communions, but due to a variety of reasons, the Maronites ended up going into seclusion in the mountains of Lebanon in the 8th century.

Then, in the 12th century, Latin Crusaders encountered them. Amazingly, they immediately declared that they were in communion with Rome and always had been! Since that time, they have been faithful Catholics, never wavering from their support of the Pope.

This past week while in Cyprus, the current Pope offered them his greetings and his blessing:

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,

I am very pleased to make this visit to the Cathedral of Our Lady of Graces. I thank Archbishop Youssef Soueif for his kind words of welcome on behalf of the Maronite community in Cyprus, and I cordially greet all of you with the words of the Apostle: “Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Cor 1:3)!

As I visit this building, in my heart I make a spiritual pilgrimage to every Maronite church of the island. Be assured that, moved by a father’s care, I am close to all the faithful of those ancient communities.

This Cathedral church in some way represents the very long and rich – and sometimes turbulent – history of the Maronite community in Cyprus. Maronites came to these shores at various times throughout the centuries and were often hard-pressed to remain faithful to their distinct Christian heritage. Nevertheless, in spite of their faith being tested like gold in a fire (cf. 1 Pet 1:7), they remained constant in the faith of their fathers, a faith which has now been passed on to you, the Maronite Cypriots of today. I urge you to treasure this great inheritance, this precious gift.

This Cathedral building also reminds us of an important spiritual truth. Saint Peter tells us that we Christians are the living stones which are being “built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ” (1 Pet 2:4-5). Together with Christians throughout the world, we are part of that great temple which is the Mystical Body of Christ. Our spiritual worship, offered in many tongues, in many places and in a beautiful variety of liturgies, is an expression of the one voice of the People of God, united in praise and thanksgiving to him and in enduring communion with each other. This communion, which we hold so dear, impels us to carry the Good News of our new life in Christ to all mankind.

This is the charge I leave with you today: I pray that your Church, in union with all your pastors and with the Bishop of Rome, may grow in holiness, in fidelity to the Gospel and in love for the Lord and for one another.

Commending you and your families, and especially your beloved children to the intercession of Saint Maron, I willingly impart to all of you my Apostolic Blessing.

The Maronites are a beautiful witness to the Church breathing with both lungs – may they continue to grow and prosper!

Update: I have been informed that the Italo-Albanian church has also never broken communion with Rome. They have a somewhat confusing history, so I was under the impression that they did have a period in which they were out of communion with Rome, but I was mistaken. My apologies!

Living in the post-Vatican II ecumenical world we Catholics can sometimes get a bit ahead of ourselves when it comes to the potential for unity between Christian churches. This is especially true for our relations with the Orthodox Churches, whose beliefs and practices appear so close to ours (and in many ways are very close to ours). When I mentioned last week that it might take 500 years for Catholic-Orthodox unity to occur, I had a number of people scoff at such pessimism. But the fact remains that unity cannot occur without grassroots support for it, and in many parts of the Eastern Christian world, such support is limited and even nonexistent.

The latest example of this occurred this week as Pope Benedict travels to Cyprus, a majority-Orthodox country. The head of the Orthodox Church in Cyprus had to threaten a number of his fellow bishops with sanctions in order to keep them from boycotting a welcoming ceremony for Pope Benedict. These bishops have labeled the Pope a “heretic,” and their views are not uncommon in Cyprus, where last year protests greeted a Catholic-Orthodox ecumenical gathering.

None of this should discourage us from pursuing reunion with our Orthodox brothers and sisters, however. In fact, it should remind us that reunion will only be an action of the Holy Spirit, because if left in our hands, we will only have a continuation of the division of Babel. We should therefore work and pray (and pray some more!) that all parties might be docile to the Holy Spirit and allow Him to reunite us into one Body in Christ.

I have written before about the new direction that Pope Benedict is taking the ecumenical movement. Gone are the days (so common in the 1970’s and 1980’s) of dialogue for dialogue’s sake. Now the Pope is directing the Church to take concrete steps to make Christ’s prayer that we might be one come true in our world. Fr. Andrew Apostoli notes this as well:

The Pontiff’s thoughts and prayers became expressed in actions. Like Pope John Paul before him, Pope Benedict has stressed the importance of charity in ecumenical dialogue for Christian unity. With the Orthodox, Pope Benedict made great strides. He met with the Patriarch of the Greek Orthodox when he visited Istanbul (Constantinople). He has also had very favorable relations with the new Russian Patriarch of Moscow, whom the Pope knew when he was a cardinal.

A great step in the Orthodox-Catholic dialogue was the so-called “Ravenna Document” issued by an international commission of Catholic and Orthodox theologians in October 2007. It reaffirmed the blessings we have in common, such as the holy Eucharist, the sacraments, and an ordained hierarchical priesthood. It also acknowledged some of the problems that needed to be dealt with, particularly viewing the Church on the universal level, where the primacy of the Pope will be a crucial question.

Pope Benedict XVI, responding to those Anglicans who desired full communion with the Roman Catholic Church, while preserving aspects of their Anglican spiritual and liturgical heritage, issued a new apostolic constitution that would allow the Anglicans to have “personal ordinariates,” like personal dioceses, which would allow them to be in full communion with the Catholic Church while maintaining elements of their Anglican identity.

So favorable was the Pope’s constitution that many Anglicans are considering rejoining the Catholic Church after nearly 500 years of separation! Pope Benedict has also met with the Anglican archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams.

The Holy Father has reached out to still other groups in attempts to draw them into the ecumenical dialogue and, God willing, eventually reunion in the one Church Christ founded. They include the Lutherans, the Methodists, the Reformed Churches as well as the World Council of Churches.

His efforts at reunion for other groups that have separated from the Catholic Church over time included lifting the excommunication of four bishops from the Society of St. Pius X who were ordained without proper papal permission by the late Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre.

There are no sheep that our German Shepherd does not want united within the visible flock of the Church. Let us pray that his efforts to unite all Christians might be fruitful!

Pope asks Bloggers to Give Internet a Soul

Every Catholic on the Internet needs to be a witness for Christ in a land filled with rudeness, anger and pornography. A few tips on how to follow the Pope’s request can be found here.

One of the unheralded aspects of Pope Benedict’s papacy (as well as his legacy before becoming pope) is his emphasis on Scripture. Yet those who follow him closely have seen how much he desires to bring Scripture to the forefront of Catholic theology as well as daily Catholic life. His committment to making the inspired Word of God a central focus of our Faith and a sure means of drawing closer to the incarnate Word of God was a main inspiration for my book Who is Jesus Christ? Unlocking the Mystery in the Gospel of Matthew. And I am not the only one who has noticed this emphasis of our Holy Father. Scott Hahn writes,

As I write this, I’m looking at the cover of one of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger’s books, now reissued under his papal name. The book is titled God’s Word, and the cover shows a photograph of the Holy Father.

He’s slightly off-center because he’s holding up the book of the Gospels — covering himself, as it were, with the word of God.

For me, that cover is emblematic of his pontificate thus far. His hallmark is the centrality of the word of God. That’s where he has kept our focus — not on fads or scandals or the world’s alarms. Christ, the Word Incarnate, is the solution to every world crisis. Pope Benedict has invited us, insistently and consistently, to encounter Christ in the word inspired, the sacred Scriptures.

And he has done this through some very large labors.

In 2008 he summoned the world’s bishops to a Synod on “The Word of God in the Life and Mission of the Church.”

From that synod, a post-synodal apostolic exhortation on the Scriptures will soon be published — a major act of the Pope’s teaching office.

In 2007, he declared a Year of St. Paul, in which he dedicated himself and the Church to intensive study of the great apostle. But even before that, he had devoted his weekly audiences to close-up studies of the individual men and women of the New Testament. Afterward, he went on to the Church Fathers and the medieval teachers, considering them especially as biblical interpreters.

Meanwhile, he has spent every moment of his “spare time” writing his multivolume study Jesus of Nazareth.

These acts of Benedict’s papacy are certainly continuous with the labors of his pre-papal lifetime. It’s as if God’s grace has brought his life’s work as a theologian to a kind of completion, or perfection, with the gift of Petrine authority.

As a theologian, Joseph Ratzinger had proposed some astonishing and radical ways of looking at Scripture. He said “Catholic dogma … derives all its content from Scripture,” and “Dogma is by definition nothing other than an interpretation of Scripture.”

He taught that the “normative theologians” are not the tenured faculty at any Catholic institution, but rather “the authors of holy Scripture.”

One of the greatest gifts God has given the Church is the Holy Bible, and He wants us to use it to draw into a deeper relationship with His Son. Follow the Pope’s lead and spend some time today with the Sacred Scriptures.

This month marks the fifth anniversary of Pope Benedict’s election, as well as his 83rd birthday. He has been in the news a lot lately, and this has given me an opportunity to reflect on how much I admire our current Holy Father. As Catholics we are required to follow our popes, but we are not required to like them. In fact, there have been many popes throughout history who have been thoroughly unlikable fellows. Just because someone is the pope doesn’t mean that he is particularly intelligent, engaging, or even that he is not among the ranks of the scoundrels. But we are blessed that our current Holy Father is a brilliant theologian and sensitive pastor of souls.

I remember when I first was exposed to the writings of Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger. I was taking a class at Franciscan University in the mid-90’s on Vatican II and we were required to read The Ratzinger Report, which is an book-length interview of Cardinal Ratzinger by Vittorio Messori. As a recent convert, I was unfamiliar with Cardinal Ratzinger, but after reading this book I immediately recognized that this man had a brilliant, incisive mind. He appeared able to analyze issues in the Church – even ones he was intimately involved in – from an objective viewpoint that took in all of the Catholic Tradition and Scripture and applied them to our modern problems.

After that first exposure I then began to read as much Ratzinger as I could. Dr. Hahn assigned a few of the Cardinal’s texts for a class I was taking, and I devoured them. Again, I was struck by his ability to integrate Catholic Tradition, Scripture and the needs of the modern world into a synthesis which enabled him to address our most pressing problems in a uniquely Catholic way.  He did not fall into any post-Vatican II “camp,” but instead pulled from past the greatest insights of our Tradition and applied them to our modern age. Those who have read Cardinal Ratzinger extensively know what a joke it is when the mainstream media calls him a “conservative” or a “traditionalist.” Likewise with the silly title of “God’s Rottweiler.” He is a man who is faithful to the Church, not to any particular subsection of it.

Over the years I have also been struck by Cardinal Ratzinger’s character. It recently came to light that he was one of the few Vatican officials who point-blank refused the bribes of the Legion of Christ, and frankly, this didn’t surprise me at all. And although he didn’t do much in regards to the abuse crisis before 2002, once the severity of the Scandal came to light he was the first curial official to really “get it” and he has been the most aggressive at combating it. Pope John Paul II, who was a mystic with his eyes pointed to heaven, sometimes could be criticized for not having his feet on the ground. The same cannot be said of Pope Benedict. True to his Augustinian leanings, he recognizes clearly the power of Original Sin and is therefore very cognizant of the danger of sin even in the highest levels of the Church.

Our age, like every age, has its own unique problems and difficulties to overcome in order to reach the world for Christ. I thank God every day that He has given us Pope Benedict XVI as our supreme pastor during this time, and I ask that God grant him many, many more years. May his reign be long and fruitful!

For those in the DC area, there will be a Pontifical Solemn Mass (Extraordinary Form) at the Basilica of the National Shrine tomorrow in honor of Pope Benedict’s 5th anniversary. Bishop Slattery of Tulsa will be celebrating. It should be amazing!

More details at www.pontificalmass.org.

Friday has always been a day of penance in the Church. Even during this glorious season of Easter, Friday is still a day we should reflect on our Lord’s passion and death and do some penance in reparation for our sins and the sins of the whole world. A traditional penance for Fridays is to abstain from meat, but, at least in the United States, we are free to choose our Friday penance. When we perform a penance, we should offer an intention with it so that we might follow Paul’s advice and offer up our sufferings “on behalf of his body, which is the church” (Col. 1:24).

Pope Benedict, in his letter to the Catholics of Ireland, asked that their Friday penances over the next year (from now until Easter 2011) be offered for healing and renewal for Ireland in the face of the scandals that have rocked the Irish church. And just this past week, Benedict stated that penance is necessary as a response to the attacks of the world.

Thus, I don’t think I am going out on a limb to suggest that the Pope would love it if every Catholic worldwide were to offer their Friday penances for the next year for healing and renewal in the universal Church. Today is the first Friday we can make this intention (last Friday was part of the Octave of Easter and therefore not a day of penance), so please consider offering your penance today – and every Friday in the coming year – for healing and renewal in the Church as she battles against great evil, from both inside and outside the Church.

Today is also Pope Benedict’s birthday, so consider this year-long Friday practice a perfect birthday gift for him!

The Scandal has erupted again, this time in Europe, and the media is of course having a feeding frenzy. This is the “perfect storm” of stories for them: scandalous behavior by religious people, including sexual misbehavior, reaching possibly to the highest levels of the Church. They are like kids at Christmas.

Understandably, many Catholics are angry at the media for their attacks. The media clearly has an anti-Church agenda, and it is frustrating to many faithful Catholics to see our Holy Father maligned in such a way. But the media is not the problem. I remember when the media first broke the story about Fr. Maciel in the late 1990’s and about abuse in Boston in 2002, I quickly blamed the media. But since then I have realized that the media did not create these problems, they just exploit them. The real problem is the sins of members of the Church, not the media. To complain about the media, in my opinion, is like a kid who complains when he is called in on a summer day because it is now dark. For the media to attack the Church at every possible opportunity is a force of (fallen) nature: we cannot expect anything different.

The problem, instead, has been self-inflicted: going back at least to the 1950’s (and probably before that), there has been widespread abuse by clerics and cover-ups by bishops. To say that the rate of abuse is no worse than society as a whole is no defense, either: we are the Body of Christ, our standards are not to be “no worse than the world”, our standard is Christ, who is perfect. Even one case of abuse and cover-up is a scandal which cries out to heaven for justice. But it has been far more than one case, as it is clear that the sexual problems which have afflicted society as a whole have run rampant throughout the Church as well.

And the real scandal, I believe, is the response of the hierarchy over the years. There are three possible responses that a bishop could make to a case of sexual abuse by one of his clerics:

1) Effectively ignore the problem, cover it up, and transfer the priest to another location where he can abuse again.

2) Keep the problem quiet, send the priest to treatment and then move the priest to somewhere he cannot abuse again.

3) Aggressively handle the situation by removing the priest from the ministry and doing anything possible to bring about reparation and healing to the victim(s).

Obviously, the first possibility is sinful and scandalous, the second not ideal but not necessarily sinful, and the third the ideal. But unfortunately, until earlier this decade, the best we could hope for from our bishops would have been the 2nd response, and many bishops seemed to be engaged in the tactics of response (1). There is no evidence that any bishop was handling these cases aggressively and with a mind to the healing of the victims before this decade.

Because of this, it would be naïve to think that anyone who has been a bishop for any length of time from the 1950’s until this decade would not have cases in their past in which their response would be seen as inadequate at best. So it should not be a surprise that a pope who had previously been a bishop of a large diocese and a long-time Vatican official which handled some of these cases would have some cases in his past. And from what we know so far, it appears that although then-archbishop and Cardinal Ratzinger did not handle the cases aggressively by today’s standards, he also was not engaged in shuffling abusive priests to situations in which they could abuse again.

In other words, in defending the Pope against the attacks he is undergoing, let us not pretend he was a crusader against priestly abuse either. Until this decade, he was not. Because of the lack of response by Church officials over the decades to the abuse crisis, there is a wide open hole for enemies of the Church to exploit. But the irony here is that Cardinal Ratzinger eventually was one of the first Vatican officials to see the scope of the problem and work to deal with it decisively, both as head of the CDF and as Pope, as John Allen’s excellent article shows. So those calling for his head do not seem to have the health of the Church or the protection of the innocent in mind, as he is the best friend of abuse victims the Church has today.

In many ways, the Pope has had all the sins of the past decades placed on his shoulders. As the Pope, he is truly where the “buck stops” and therefore all the sins of bishops and priests for the past 60 years are his responsibility. As Catholics, we must pray fervently for our Holy Father this Holy Week that the attacks against him and his sufferings might be used in a way to bring healing and salvation to all those victims of abuse over the years, as well as to those who would attack him today.