I couldn’t be happier with the news that Archbishop Chaput is coming to Philadelphia. Maybe this news will bring some much needed sunshine and put an end to the storm clouds that have lingered over this area for the past few years.
There’s tons of stories out there concerning this amazing bit of news. For a good look at many of them, check out New Advent.
It’s funny that this awesome news marks a day where I agree with both Fr. Thomas Reese and George Weigel.
Reese was quoted saying:
“I think that with Chaput you will see a much more politically active archbishop than we saw with Cardinal Rigali,” said the Rev. Thomas Reese, former editor of the Jesuit magazine America and author of numerous books on the Catholic hierarchy.
Reese described Chaput as an “in-your-face” leader who is “going to be a real pain in the neck for the Democratic Party.”
George Weigel called Chaput a “great pastor” and predicted he would be a “real jolt of evangelical energy for the archdiocese.”
I agree with both. (Although I think Reese meant it as a bad thing, I don’t.) But the archbishop’s job is not a political one. Right now, so many Catholics are dispirited. Many Catholics have wondered aloud to me if they’re putting money in the collection basket just to pay off lawsuits or pay for lawyers. I’ve heard of seminarians leaving, mainly due to the scandals and the sometimes seemingly wrongful heavy handedness of lumping the innocent in with the guilty.
In my parish just outside Philadelphia it’s impossible not to understand that Catholics feel disillusioned by the Archdiocese. They don’t understand how the mess got this bad. They wonder if anything’s been learned. And they wonder if the Archdiocese will ever be the same.
I honestly believe Philadelphia needs Archbishop Chaput right now.
I don’t think Rocco Palma is overstating it when he says of Abp. Chaput:
“He is brash, outspoken and fearless — energetic, colorful, cultured… indeed, even hard-core….
And if multiple indications from near and far have it right, he stands set to bring the most revolutionary change American Catholicism’s most traditional major outpost has known in at least a century, to begin its rebuilding from the ashes of the darkest hour in its long, storied history.
We should all pray for quick and long sustained success here for Abp. Chaput.
Just hearing about this appointment has put a spring in my step.
July 19, 2011 at 9:50 pm
It is very interesting to me how many people who like myself "prefer" the Latin Mass was in the past and still now in the Pope's own words treated like "lepers" to be avoided at all costs in not just "tolerated". Obviously the Pope has pointed out that these are 2 forms of the one Roman Rite. But I also heard a few months ago that in 50 years according to a Cardinal "there will be no more Novus Ordo Mass" It is just a fact that while it is valid and used there are just too many ways for abuses to creep in. Besides Vatican II DID NOT CALL FOR WHOLE NEW MASS at all. It called for small organic changes to the Latin Mass.
July 20, 2011 at 1:07 am
I'm praying that USCCB that includes Archbishop Gomez and Archbishop Chaput will stop working with the marxist/liberation theology group La Raza. La Raza is organization who has close ties with the Muslim brotherhood.La Raza wants to reconquest the western part of the
United States. Do the research yourself. It is disgusting and a scandal that many Bishops in this country are working with this organization who's intent is to destroy this country's soverignty. Socialism going stealth is what these bishops are doing. Too bad most Catholics have their heads buried in the dirt. Communists have infiltrated the Church and have spread their doctrines to the masses.
July 20, 2011 at 1:16 am
I get teary eyed just thinking about him leaving Denver. I've disagreed with him on several social and political issues, but there is no doubt that he is a faithful servant of Christ who will shepherd the people of Philadelphia with love and discipline of a true father.
July 20, 2011 at 4:32 am
Beauty is as beauty does
July 20, 2011 at 5:56 am
@ mrflibbleisvryx
No need to apologize, I like your zeal and I can tell from the fact that you are willing to defend the Faith with tooth and nail that you are a new convert. That is exactly how I felt when I reverted a few years back and still do. So again my brother there is no reason to apologize if anything it is my fault. I should have been more clear, even as I posted my comment I did wonder if it was going to be clear.
Having said that I love this appointment. Archbishop Chaput is Orthodox and has priestly character that in end is all I care about.
My opinion on the Liturgy are no secret, I love the TLM and yes I do go to a local FSSP Church. After being raised with the NO strictly and having come back to the Church in my mid 20s also NO I later discovered the TLM and fell in love with the Church in a way that I had never known before. I learned so much about my Faith that looking at the years of my youth I can only say that scales were covering my eyes at the beauty of God's Church.
However that is not to say that the NO can not be as reverent as any TLM however I think that many Bishops and clergy that are in love with a certain idea of what the NO is suppose to look like (facing the people, dancing, entertainment) have a hard time letting go of the 60s.
Look if you want to see a truly well done NO Mass go you tube and look for Father Rodriguez of El Paso of San Juan Bautista Church. truly beautiful and orthodox. The man is a living Saint.
July 20, 2011 at 12:57 pm
The reason there are so many lawsuits against the Catholic Church for clerical abuse of children is that the plaintiffs do not have to prove their case. The crime is being tried in bankruptcy court and civil court rather than criminal court. In Iraq, if a Muslim wants your property and you are a Christian, the Muslim does not have to prove his charge against you.
Bishop Francis Malooly spoke out against abortion and Joseph Biden before Biden was elected. The work was printed in The Dialog of the Diocese of Wilmington and in the News Journal of Delaware.
July 20, 2011 at 2:31 pm
Anon at 7:57 Well a Bishop has important reasons in terms of his responsibility towards the faithful, apart from an election, for contrasting the empowered and popular mythology behind choice and abortion on demand and as sexual convenience with the truth of the Church's teachings which reflect the will of God, namely that life is sacred and precious in God's sight. Apart from an election or a vote of course we may all become jaded, scandalized, abused and worn down by the culture of death and tend to see in our neighbor expedience and be tempted to see in them a means for our own selfish exploitation in the way the culture of death has framed humanity in our time. With so many even in the Church who say they are for choice it is important that Bishops even when an election seems heading one way or another still speak out, not for the benefit of press or vote but for the benefit of the salvation of souls. Those who see in the Church utility for political machinations as the point are myopic.
July 20, 2011 at 2:41 pm
Why should people feel it is their job to question a Bishop's responsibility to teach the faith? Who else could we expect to teach that God wills life and not destruction of it? The media? The politicians? While it would be nice if they would cover both sides of various issues obviously moral teaching is not their role. Nor do they especially care whether a given individual have salvation and eternal life. That they answer to moneyed interests first seems another reason why the Church's voice in contrast needs to be heard no matter the media or popular mentality or reception of the message.
After all what has big abortion done for us lately. Nothing, as far as I can see. It consumes and leaves death and destruction for generations in its wake. And the sexuality envisioned as a result is quite unhealthy for people on many levels. If a party wants destruction of the poor then clearly it does not care for the poor, that's obvious. There is always ample freedom for updating and refreshing the platform. But the notion that the Church's Bishops must now bow down to the culture of death for the purpose of protecting one political party's moneyed and empowered interests is pathetic.
July 20, 2011 at 3:17 pm
I am very excited for the Philadelphia diocese, my daughter, her husband and their tiny baby are moving to that diocese next month.
I am also hopeful that we in the Erie diocese will get a similar shepherd as our new bishop as Bishop Trautman retires.
July 21, 2011 at 2:59 am
In fairness Jesuit Thomas Reese's media commentary offerings have to be qualified that his comments seethe with bitterness towards those who had the unsavory task of having to ask him to leave the Jesuit magazine America, and when he says Mass publicly he changes the words of consecration to whatever pleases him and is unrecognizable as the prayer of the priest at the Mass. At some point the Jesuits themselves will need to reign him in as a loose cannon as his statements supposedly on Church matters are not helpful to him, the order or to anyone.