This is the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart

I am increasingly convinced that everything we're watching on the world scene right now is part of the unfolding of the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart.

Consider: The current, unfolding crisis engulfing the Church is beyond imagining.

That's not just a convenient phrase. It is really and truly beyond imagining--that is to say, this sort of ecclesial meltdown is practically unprecedented in the recent history of the Church. This is bizarre. This is not the way things work. This is improbable, though not impossible.

Oh, yes, cynical non-Catholics and wounded ex-Catholics will claim they knew all along, all of it was foreseeable, of course they are this corrupt, etc., etc., ad infinitam.

You're not seeing what I'm saying.

This sort of institutional meltdown is unexpected. We had 2002. Why on earth would McCarrick's crimes and sins hit so hard? We knew already that a parade of horrors had taken place throughout the last century. Why does the PA grand jury report hit so hard now? Why are we suddenly seeing calls for accountability, and a groundswell of rage from the laity that the hierarchy is scrambling to stay ahead of?

And pull back the lens. McCarrick's malfeasance was reportedly an open secret throughout much of his ecclesial career. Journalists such as Rod Dreher and Julia Duin have both emerged in the wake of the June outing of several of his misdeeds to announce that. So good people as well as corrupt people knew.

The abuse of kids was something of an open secret among the professional Catholics of Boston, as the movie Spotlight shows so well. Why did 2002 make such a difference?

We'd seen the litigation and been reading the stories since 2002. But the PA grand jury report hit like a rock through a cracked window, shattering it.

Why did it all make a difference now?

As I said, this is all beyond imagining because all too many victims of abuse had been conditioned by their experiences, both of abuse and their attempts to report that abuse, to expect cover up; to expect to be attacked; to expect not to be believed; to expect for nothing to happen.

There have been three great eruptions in the sex abuse scandal: 1992, documented by Philip Jenkins in Pedophiles and Priests; 2002, the "Long Lent," thanks (and I do mean thanks) to the Boston Globe's Spotlight team; and now 2018.

And I'd say there is no Abuse Crisis of 2018 in the Catholic Church without the #metoo movement, the fall of Harvey Weinstein, and especially the fall of Kevin Spacey.

There's a ton that could and should be said about all of that, but I want to focus on one particular oddity that most people might not notice, but that resonates for someone whose work tends to involve both Fatima and Divine Mercy.

The Weinstein scandal broke on October 5, 2017.

That matters because:

• Oct. 5 is the feast of St. Faustina, the secretary and apostle of the Divine Mercy, a Polish nun and mystic whose visions of Jesus are the source for the Divine Mercy message and devotion, transmitted through her Diary. Experts say her revelations are the fulfillment and culmination of the Sacred Heart devotion.
• October 2017 is the 100th anniversary of the Miracle of the Sun at Fatima, which took place on Oct. 13, 1917.

Weinstein had been known by some of the richest, most powerful, most famous, most influential people in the world to be malfeasant when it came to sex. Some knew more; some knew less; and his victims included some of the elite of Hollywood.

Why did the stories matter in 2017 when they hadn't risen above the level of rumor, innuendo, and Oscar jokes until then?

Why did #metoo launch in the 100th anniversary of Fatima on the feast of St. Faustina?

I'd say because any Triumph of Our Lady is going to look like the Magnificat. Give it a read:

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord,
my spirit rejoices in God my Savior
for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant.
From this day all generations will call me blessed:
the Almighty has done great things for me,
and holy is his Name.

He has mercy on those who fear him
in every generation.
He has shown the strength of his arm,
he has scattered the proud in their conceit.

He has cast down the mighty from their thrones,
and has lifted up the lowly.
He has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty.

He has come to the help of his servant Israel
for he remembered his promise of mercy,
the promise he made to our fathers,
to Abraham and his children forever. (Lk 1:46-55)

She will vindicate her children. She will vindicate the innocent victims. And she will not stop until this is all purged.

That is why, today, we see this bombshell of coverage of abuse in Catholic orphanages in the U.S., and this call for a grand jury to be empaneled in every state in the U.S., and significantly, this indication of who knew what and when about Cardinal McCarrick.

This is the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart.

Here is the source of my present hope for the next years of the Church:

... You have seen hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved and there will be peace. The war is going to end: but if people do not cease offending God, a worse one will break out during the Pontificate of Pius XI. When you see a night illumined by an unknown light, know that this is the great sign given you by God that he is about to punish the world for its crimes, by means of war, famine, and persecutions of the Church and of the Holy Father. To prevent this, I shall come to ask for the consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart, and the Communion of reparation on the First Saturdays. If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted, and there will be peace; if not, she will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions of the Church. The good will be martyred; the Holy Father will have much to suffer; various nations will be annihilated. In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph. The Holy Father will consecrate Russia to me, and she shall be converted, and a period of peace will be granted to the world”. ...

So the answer to present circumstances is quite clear:

• Pray the Rosary daily for peace in the world.
• Make the First Saturdays of reparation.
• Be devoted to the Immaculate Heart, especially through total consecration to Jesus through Mary.
• Spread the devotions to the Sacred and Immaculate Hearts, as well as to the Divine Mercy.

Note: The Triumph is a lot bigger than just this one purging of the Church--but I bet you it's part of it.

Bring on the Mothers of Mercy!

So I've been pondering the role of women in the Church for some time. One oddity I've noticed: There is no role for women in the Church on earth that quite fits the Gospel portrayals of Mary and the women disciples of the early Church. So I've come up with a few possible ways to rectify that.

Note: I submit absolutely to the Church on all matters of faith and morals. This is speculation only. I am ready and willing to stand corrected. But given present circumstances, it seemed like this might be worth sharing.

There are two main ways I think women might play broader roles in the Church: in the workings of the processes of the canon law system, and in handling the finances of the Church.

The Mother of Mercy
If you read any of the excellent works of apologetics that have come out in the past couple of decades, seeking to explain and defend the role of Mary in the Catholic faith, you will probably have encountered the title of gebirah, referring to the role of the Queen Mother in the Davidic Kingdom. That role meant she served as an advocate, as a one-woman court of appeals, for the poor and the weak of the kingdom. And ordinarily, she would not be denied whatever she asked.

It is the understanding of the Church that Our Lady, the Advocate (so named, at least in part, because she is joined in a special and unique way to the Holy Spirit, Sanctifier and Advocate), continues to exercise the role of Advocate from Heaven. Indeed, in the writings of great saints such as Alphonsus Liguori (The Glories of Mary) and in near death experiences right down to the present day, we read again and again of Our Lady interceding for souls as they are judged by Jesus. We hear of souls who are condemned to hell, only for that sentence to be overturned at the request of Our Lady, who says to her Son that she wants that soul. That soul offered some small act of love or devotion to the Blessed Virgin in life; now, she wants them in Heaven with her in death.

She is not denied.


There is no comparable role for women in the Church on earth. Oh, sure, everyone knows of the church ladies, the indispensable women without whom nothing would run. Everyone's aware of the parish secretaries who see to the needs of the parish, of the religious women who teach, nurse, and serve in any and every capacity under the sun. There are more and more roles for wise women, theologians and lawyers, accountants and chancellors, sure. But there are no women with gebirah-like roles, and given that Israel and the Church have recognized female judges and queens in the past, there seems no reason to assume that there cannot be women with gebirah-like roles in the future.

Women cannot be ordained priests, that is for certain. But why would we assume that women could not constitute a sort of court of appeals in the canonical structure of the Church? Call them the Mothers of Mercy, to be established at the diocesan and the Roman levels. Perhaps they would constitute a religious order, or perhaps they would be something akin to the modern movements, open to qualified lay women and women religious of unimpeachable integrity, orthodoxy, and skill. All the women would be trained and professionally prepared canon lawyers and/or theologians, empowered to serve both as counsel and as judges in canonical cases. Canonical sentences could be appealed with the Mothers of Mercy. The rulings of the Mothers of Mercy would be like the rulings of Our Lady--requests made of her Son, phrased as requests, but never denied.

Further, some of the Mothers could perhaps also serve as advocates, as defense counsel to the poor and the weak, to those who would not otherwise have canonical representation--abuse victims; students; religious who are challenging their communities, or laity who do not have resources, but who need redress of liturgical, theological, or other issues.

Perhaps there could even be Mothers of Mercy with investigative powers when they were called upon to advocate for those with no other advocate, with no other recourse in the ordinary structure of the Church, or after the usual avenues were exhausted, who could look into financial, theological, liturgical, or other issues raised by laity, priests, seminarians, or others who would not normally have clout or power in the structure of the Church. They would have the ability to see whatever documentation they sought, speak to whoever they needed to speak to, all bound by the rights guaranteed by canon law, but otherwise, plenipotentiary.

And at the international level, why not have either a sort of supreme appeals court of Mothers of Mercy or a Mother of Mercy at the top? A last court of appeal, who could even, in certain cases, request and obtain clemency or even overturn certain juridical rulings of the Holy Father? And at the Roman level, an investigative service, prepared to come to the assistance of local Mothers who were confronted by cases of such size or with so many victims in need as to make broader assistance necessary.

Again--this would simply match the structure of the Church on earth to that of the Church Triumphant, of Our Lady's role in the Kingdom of God. She is Advocate for all; the Refuge of Sinners; the Mother of Mercy; the hope of the oppressed. She is the Queen Mother, the gebirah, the voice of the voiceless, the defender of the defenseless. She can efficaciously plead clemency for even the guilty, for those who would otherwise be damned, be condemned by the fairest, most just court in existence. And she vindicates the powerless, the innocent, the oppressed. She comes to the aid of those under attack, as Fr. Donald Calloway, MIC, makes abundantly clear in his Champions of the Rosary. Why shouldn't some of her daughters here on earth serve in the same way?

I leave it to the canon lawyers to determine what is feasible here and what is not. There would certainly be limits on the powers of the Mothers, as there are limits on the powers of the Holy Father and the bishops. All would be bound by ex cathedra teaching, by infallible teaching, by Scripture and Tradition. I do not propose the impossible. But given the role of the Blessed Virgin in the Church, I see no reason to say that the sort of system I lay out here is impossible or unthinkable.

The Money
Simply: The rich women supported Jesus and the disciples, and were faithful to Calvary and the tomb. Judas held the purse; Satan entered in; Judas betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. There may be something charismatic or vocational, then, about women in the Church being the best and most reliable hands in which to place the Church's money.

Why not prioritize having women handle the money as CFOs or stewards or whatever other such role there may be in dioceses or perhaps even parishes? Hire qualified female accountants.

Of course, women may fall just as men have fallen in the past. This is no guarantee against criminality or corruption. But one of the great successes of the American experiment in governance has been the division of powers into a number of different hands, of checks and balances. Given recent experience of what happens when all power is gathered into one set of hands, into the hands of the hierarchy, and that hierarchy loses its way, perhaps it's time to take a very serious look at what sort of division of power may be appropriate and possible, given the witness of Scripture, Tradition, and the nature of the Church. Putting the finances into female, lay hands is one relatively easy and painless form of division of power, one that does no harm to anything fundamental about the Church.

It's Just an Idea
Again: I put this out there as a proposal. It will need nuance and thought by those whose competence is the canon law of the Church. But it seemed worth sharing, given the present crisis.

Where was the (canon) law?: McCarrick and Pennsylvania

We're back in the heart of darkness, back in the midst of the abuse scandal.

First, we hear about the credible accusations against the former Cardinal McCarrick. That same day, we learn of the settlements made by dioceses in New Jersey over misconduct with adults. Shortly thereafter, bloggers and religion journalists announce that all this and much, much more was an open secret.

So that was bad enough, and led toward some sort of reckoning, especially coming as it all did at the same time as the Honduras, Chile, India, and African #metoo moments in the Church.

And then the Pennsylvania grand jury report was released.

Others have been and continue to comment well on all of this. I doubt I have anything of any originality or interest to add, save one thing. One question keeps coming to mind: Where was the canon law system? Where were the ecclesiastical courts and forms of oversight?

Don't we have in the Church a system that guarantees justice for all, laity as well as clergy? Then how come, time after time, did abusive priests end up with a lifetime system of benefits, silence from the Church about their crimes, and, it seems, a fair amount of protection from accountability to the civil courts or their victims? Canon law seems to have protected the clerics quite nicely. What of the rest of the Church?

I suspect the law is far better than the facts of the last 70 years would suggest. I suspect that post-conciliar anti-nominianism (a repugnance to law) that became quite common in the Church opened the door to this situation, to ineffective application of canon law. There have been, after all, a cavalcade of theological, liturgical, and other abuses over the course of the decades since the Council. At least on the front of canon law, the refusal of the Church to police herself, to consistently apply her own law has contributed to and exacerbated the sex abuse crisis, as well as every other form of crisis that we've been confronting.

Law can be abused by the powerful to oppress, it is true. But the failure to enforce the law can also be a means of oppression. Equal treatment before the law is the last safeguard of the weak against the strong. If it goes away,we get exactly the sort of behavior that's evidenced in the grand jury report, in McCarrick's career, and in all too many Catholic institutions of higher learning.

There's been a serious shortage of ease of reporting canonical crimes or violations of the Church's law by those in the hierarchy; a serious shortage of investigative follow through; and a serious failure to consistently, fairly, and publicly apply that law. Imagine how much different the Church's present situation would be if there'd been a full, rigorous, fair use of the Church's canonical remedies for the many and varied ways in which her law had been broken since the Council!

So among the many other questions and investigations going on right now, I would hope there would be someone asking what happened to the Church's law, and its application.