UNITED STATES
Catholic Life Ministries
by Robert Fontana
Popes John Paul II and Benedict VXI have been calling Catholic Christians to what they describe as a “New Evangelization:” the proclaiming of the Gospel to those people and nations who have a long history of Christianity, but have now rejected its doctrinal tenets and moral demands. The popes have in mind the people and nations of the so-called West—Europe, The United States, Canada, and Australia. They know the stories of the two Testaments, they know the outline of Christian doctrine, but for a variety of reasons, they simply no longer have faith in God.
I think the call for a New Evangelization is spot-on! It’s what I have been doing my entire adult life as a minister in the church, and it is the fundamental goal of Catholic Life Ministries: to awaken faith among men and women who have been raised within the church but live lives of practical agnosticism. Practical agnostics are people who might say they believe in God but do not participate in a faith community, do not pray, and are not guided by a desire to do God’s will. They have not entrusted their lives to the care and providence of a loving God, and for all practical purposes, they are agnostic. These are the people that the New Evangelization is meant to transform.
However, the New Evangelization is being de-railed, knocked off track, by what I call “Ecclesial Deceit.” These are the lies that the institutional church tells, and the people believe, in order to protect the status quo—and they totally contradict the integrity of the Catholic Christian witness. Cardinal Roger Mahoney of Los Angeles is guilty of “Ecclesial Deceit” on such a grand scale that his successor has suspended him from active ministry. Mahoney ought to be in jail and kicked out of the priesthood, but instead his lies are being perpetuated by the Vatican, where at the recent conclave he was a potential, however unlikely, candidate for the papacy.
How can anyone take seriously the Church’s proclamation that the Kingdom of God and of Christ is breaking into human history through the life and ministry of the Church when not one bishop who has protected pedophiles and sexual predators has been disciplined? I could get excommunicated for advocating the ordination of women to the priesthood, but if I am a Cardinal, and I protect sexual predators who have traumatized hundreds of minors and vulnerable adults and cost the church literally billions in legal fees and payouts, I get to be a candidate for the papacy, keep my pension, and participate in the Sacraments.
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