Send in the Clones

By Vinnie Nauheimer
Minnesota SNAP
February 20, 2013

http://mnsnap.wordpress.com/vinnie/




Suppose you had a guaranteed lifetime job, long flowing red robes, more bling than you could wear, servants, secretaries (handsome ones at that), hundreds of millions of people believing that you are the spiritual descendants of the apostles and were an intermediary between them and God! Would you give that up to become more Christ like? Not a chance! Therein lies the cardinal lack of motivation to elect anyone other than a clone to fill Benedict’s Prada shoes.

Baptized in the River of Denial, delusional, self-absorbed, uttering snippets to the press about the pressing issues of the poor and third world countries, the cardinals gather, feast sumptuously and strategize about who will be the next Vicar of Christ on Earth and what they will wear for the new pope’s, if not their own, inauguration. It’s the Vatican’s version of America’s Red Carpet Club. Yet, these same men, the cardinals, are the first to condemn the evils of materialism while totally oblivious to the fact that they are the polar opposites of their founder.

So why would anyone in their right mind harbor the slightest inkling that things will change?

Jesus said his church would last forever is one answer!

Who is to say that this is his church anymore? It was written in Thomas’ Gospel that the church lives in those who keep Jesus in their heart. Did Jesus drive around in a golden chariot? Did he spend lavishly on hats and shoes? Did either he or his apostles wear fourteen to twenty foot silk capes known as Cappa Magnum? Or, did Jesus chastise the rich and their lavish life styles saying it was harder for them to get into heaven than to get a camel through the eye of a needle? What’s that you say, “Bishops and cardinals have no money of their own; it is church money freely given?” Eating lavishly at the trough filled by the labor of others is the bigger disgrace!

Well what about the Holy Spirit! Surely he will reinvigorate and bless the conclave?

No, the Holy Spirit is too busy keeping the spark of justice alive in the thousands of abuse survivors. The Spirit has imbued survivors and their supporters with the tremendous strength and unwavering courage needed to take on a universally corrupt institution with global tentacles. Only the Holy Spirit could have sustained the survivors of clergy sexual abuse while they bore and still bear the brunt and full measure of a mega monolithic church attempting to crush them. Please pause here to remember those who didn’t survive, those whose spirits were willing to come forward, but whose minds were not able to withstand the intense pain brought on by the onslaught of a ruthless church, its high powered lawyers, and their high pressure tactics. No, the Holy Spirit is too busy tending to the suffering and giving them the courage to speak about the unspeakable atrocities committed on their bodies. The Spirit doesn’t have the time for those who have co-opted Christ’s church.

You speak of hierarchy as though they are incorrigible. Do you truly believe that?

Those that are not criminals themselves have opted to keep silent about the ones who are. There is nothing else to say. If they haven’t committed crimes of commission, they have committed crimes of omission. As Jesus said, “Bad trees don’t produce good fruit!” Which cardinal who has himself committed a crime is going to vote to have himself removed? Which cardinal who sat by silently will now publicly rebuke his red-hatted brothers? Bring in the clones!

Look at the headlines currently surrounding any number of cardinals. They include but are not limited to money laundering, fronting for the mob, perjury, failure to report sex crimes to civil authorities, failure to remove sexually abusing priests, interfering with judicial processes and those are only the ones we know about.  Would the Jesus in the Gospels have men like Bernard Law, Roger Mahony, Edward Egan, Donald Wuerl, Francis George, George Pell, Sean Brady as apostles? Jesus would more than likely have fitted them for millstones for turning children away from Him as three of the four Synoptic Gospels tell us.

What incentive is there to change the way business is done in the Vatican? None!

Send in the clones; it’s business as usual!