All of which means we need a consultancy firm to do an overhaul of our whole management culture . . .

I think our disagreements stem from your ongoing critique of Catholic tradition. I would agree that an the clerical culture has a problem, but I do not believe that a corporate model is the answer.

That is the model currently in use anyway and our chanceries have become in many ways bureaucratic in the worst sense of the word. The best kind of accountability is paternal. That is what the priesthood is. There is no way around it. Conversion is in order.

There were two tragedies in this matter…the pervs and the facilitators ie clerical management which was the arrested culture I was referring to …monsignors-auxiliary Bishops-Bishops and Cardinals.
Indeed Boston Diocesan correspondence with the Vatican showed at court that the Vatican knew of and had an audio tape of Fr. Shanley in 1979 (he spoke in praise of man-boy relations at the “Man Boy Love Association??? inter alia) and the Vatican wrote Boston as to what they were doing about him. The Diocesan office wrote back that in general they were taking care of such matters. In 1984 or 85, five years after the Vatican had the audio tape of Shanley and wrote Boston….Shanley was promoted to pastor and placed near children. All of which means we need a consultancy firm to do an overhaul of our whole management culture which in this case had no follow up by the Vatican and promiscuous permissiveness by Boston Diocese who later tried sending Shanley to two other Dioceses while lying about his being trouble free. San Bernadino Diocese fell for the lie and Manhattan (NY Diocese) did not. Disability checks were sent from the Boston Diocese to Shanley in San Bernadino where he and another gay priest bought a notorious gay hotel. So Boston Catholic laity were paying for this monster’s lifestyle thanks to the Boston Diocese.

“Arrested culture???? Perhaps a depraved culture assimilated by churchmen instead of evangelized by the them.

My point is that the child abuse scandal was the result of clerical culture going the way of the world, not of the culture of the Catholic priest being something archaic or arrested.

When clerical culture turns into a boys club culture, and then, when it is further polluted by the culture of pornography and indulgence, instead of being uplifted by the culture of prayer and penance, celibacy for the sake of the kingdom cannot stand.

“Arrested culture”? Perhaps a depraved culture assimilated by churchmen instead of evangelized by the them.

There is more to the question of dissent than canon 749-3 as we have discussed before.

Perhaps you will take the time to read the prolix analyses of Rahner’s prolixity when the book is released, then, I am sure you will have much more fun, parsing much longer passages.

The fact remains that Rome does and should bring heresy charges when de fide dogmas are at stake or infallible statements are at stake that pass muster under canon 749-3….. and yet for 40 years, Rome has not done so against Rahner and yet lower level clergy and Catholic self defined staunch laity have called him dangerous and seem to have a habit of not quoting Rahner himself who wrote in German and whose writing style makes lengthy quotes necessary in many cases so as to see the qualifications that he himself is making on what he states. He is verbose and intricate and prolix …such that short quotes often are an editing of his total statement. But one reads critical articles of him that do not even cite short quotes let alone the length that should be quoted for a self qualifying prolix author.

You misconstrue me entirely. MY quote exactly:

Neither John Paul II or Pope Benedict have discouraged theological pluralism on matters such as the value of theologians who have toyed with ideas like transignification. The Church is not a police state, as I am sure you would agree.

Catholics may dissent from a theologian’s opinion and criticize him for publishing such opinions when that opinion, such as transfiguration, even ambiguously held, is at odds with Church doctrine. Rahner is not a saint or a doctor, or a bishop or in any other way a representative of the magisterium. The Church is not a police state because it does not force us to accept or leave without criticism men’s opinions that are clearly debatable.

Neither is the Church a police state when it disciplines one who has been given a mandate and responsibility to teach in its name, when that person incorrigibly holds doctrines that are contrary to divinely revealed truths.

Bill, with all due respect, I think you are just plain argumentative. 🙂

Rahner is open to criticism, and theologians are free to assess the relative importance or danger of any particular theological opinions, especially one’s that are inherently controversial. Rahner has not been canonized or made a doctor of the Church, nor has there been any official pronouncement on the orthodoxy of his writings.

Neither John Paul II or Pope Benedict have discouraged theological pluralism on matters such as the value of theologians who have toyed with ideas like transignification. The Church is not a police state, as I am sure you would agree.

Your comparison between doctors of the Church on matters of the relationship of the sexes, and Rahner challenging long held beliefs is apples and oranges.

I think converts who are interested in the Church are looking for clarity of doctrine and are not looking for an explanation on why one who toyed with new fangled interpretations of doctrine is to be considered orthodox.

You are free to engage in apologetics in whatever way you see fit. As I have mentioned to you before, I think it is you who have the penchant for pointing out discontinuity of doctrine and tradition in the Church.

Augustine:
“ I don’t see what sort of help woman was created to provide man with, if one excludes the purpose of procreation. If woman is not given to man for help in bearing children, for what help could she be? To till the earth together? If help were needed for that, man would have been a better help for man. The same goes for comfort in solitude. How much pleasure is it for life and conversation when two friends live together than when a man and woman cohabitate.??? De Genesi ad litteram 9,5-9 Augustine.

Aquinas, ST, Pt. I. Q.98, art.2
Moreover, we are told that woman was made to be a help to man. But she was not fitted to be a help to man except in generation, because another man would have proved a more effective help in anything else. (On the contrary..section).
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Now I’m sure Augustine and Aquinas said saner things about women at other moments in their lives. I have a book of sane Rahner quotes here that could supply the same balance to Rahner.

And you avoided commenting on how it was that Pope John Paul II did not see him as dangerous yet Rahner hunting is habitual on the internet. Which is it? Rahner was dangerous and Pope John Paul II did nothing about that danger….or…..Pope John Paul II did nothing because Rahner was not dangerous. It has to be one or the other. The CDF did not prosecute him either as a heretic. Were they also negligent? If you really think they were all negligent concerning Rahner then state it openly.
Imagine a distant intelligent potential convert reading the internet version of Catholicism. He reads that the foremost Catholic theologian of the 20th century was dangerous to faith in the eyes of various internet religious and he reads nothing of the entire magisterium doing anything about it. Yet he never sees the critical religious draw the logical conclusion: that they have seen a danger that no magisterial ruler saw or did anything about.
Will that potential convert proceed closer to the Church or will he draw back until such contradictions within the clergy are solved.