Hey, Andy: It’s not “what this Pope has wrought”.

Andrew Sullivan is obviously an intelligent man, but when it comes to two subjects that are apparently quite dear to him — (1) sex and (2) the Catholic faith — he tends to take his brains out of gear before writing. What he might put into gear instead, I will leave to your own speculations.

A very brief post, The Pope Draws a Line, May 3, is a fine example:

He won’t say categorically that priests who are child molesters cannot be forgiven. He can forgive the man who attempted to murder him. But remarried divorcees and gays and lesbians in committed relationships are barred from absolution. What a perfect example of what the Catholic Church now stands for, and what this Pope has wrought.

This is one of those cases in which it is difficult to know where to begin. Let’s take it one sentence at a time:

He won’t say categorically that priests who are child molesters cannot be forgiven.

I don’t know that “he” (Pope John Paul II) has or has not done so. If what he has said about it can be summed up as Anybody can repent of any sin and receive forgiveness, even the egregious abuse of youngsters entrusted to his care, I can hardly imagine that any serious Christian of the past 2,000 years could disagree with that. Why “blame” this pope for the grace and mercy of God?

He can forgive the man who attempted to murder him.

Wonderful! (I assume Sullivan would not disagree with me.)

But remarried divorcees and gays and lesbians in committed relationships are barred from absolution.

And why is that? Does Sullivan know? Does he care? If he doesn’t know or care, why is he spouting off about it? Just to show us that he doesn’t know or care?

According to the Catholic Church, remarried divorcees are (if you don’t mind what may be thought of as a quaint phrase) living in sin. And so are homosexuals and lesbians who engage in sexual activity. According to the Catholic Church, absolution requires, first, that one admit that one is committing the sin and, second, that one have a firm resolve not to commit the sin any more.

Is this so hard to understand?

What a perfect example of what the Catholic Church now stands for, and what this Pope has wrought.

What a hoot!

The situation Sullivan tries to conjure for us — the facets of which he seems to find irreconcilable, and the whole of which he seems to judge as damning — is what the Catholic Church has always stood for: forgiveness is available to all who repent of their sins, and repentance implies the resolve to reform one’s life and sin no more. As shown by my very brief explanation above — which is about all that should be needed for understanding — it is all quite consistent.

This brief outburst from Sullivan is one little bit of evidence about what I have written of already: thousands, maybe millions, of Catholics have been hoodwinked into thinking that the “liberating” approval of divorce and remarriage, and artificial contraception, and homosexuality (and pedophilia?), and priestesses is just around the corner for the Catholic Church. Yippee! The only thing standing in the way of such momentous progress is that selfish, medieval, reactionary Pope John Paul II.

Wait until the next pope, and the next, and the next, does nothing but confirm Catholic doctrine as it is always has been: if you think Sullivan is writing with other than his brains now, I’ll bet you ain’t seen nothing yet.

P.S. After further reading, I think now that Sullivan’s outburst must have been elicited by the promulgation, May 2, of the Apostolic Letter Misericordia Dei — “The Mercy of God”.