Just how tone deaf is the National Schismatic Reporter (aka Fishwrap)?
Classly as ever, on the eve the conclave they suggest:
[…]
No matter from what part of the world he hails, no matter what his theological or ecclesiastical pedigree, the best thing the new pope could do is to reclaim the Petrine ministry for what it is: [And now, ladies and gentlemen, the NSR is going to tell you what the Petrine ministry is.] Let him be the bishop of Rome, the first among equals. [Does that sound Catholic to you? Okay, that was a trick question.] Our pick for new pope would be the man who embraces the Vatican II call for collegiality and acts on it. [I direct the editors of the NSR back to Vatican II’s document Lumen gentium, which pretty much blows their bizarre notions of who the Bishop of Rome is out of the waters of history and back into the loopy mind of Richard McBrien where they came from.] The new pope should re-empower national bishops’ conferences, decentralize power, and allow national conferences to develop local agendas tailored to local needs. [I direct the editors to the document Apostolis suos which… oh forget it. They don’t read over there.]
Finally, the new pope should empower and use the greatest untapped resource the church has: laity. Never in the history of the church has it had a better educated and professionally trained laity. Why don’t we put them to work? [I guess that, since the staff of NSR lives in Kansas City,across the river from the SSPX hub of the USA, they must be going only to SSPX parishes. Where, pray tell, in the world have they been? Go to any parish in the USA and you see lay people everywhere doing everything. Come to think of it, the SSPX has a healthier view of the laity, because it hasn’t fallen into the pernicious, arrogant, condescending clericalism that the NSR embraces. When you start saying that lay people have to do what clerics do, you insult the vocation of the laity and lay people themselves, as if they don’t have dignity of their own without clerics giving them more. PAH!] Through the use of regularly held local, national and international synods, laypeople could have a true say in the life of the church, including electing pastors and bishops. [They aren’t Catholic.]
You have to ask yourself: Why don’t they just go join some congregationalist group, or maybe unitarian. At best, it is time for the Anglican Church to issue Romanorum coetibus.
Poor John Allen. Would that there were some Catholic weekly out there who could offer him what he would need to make the jump.
BTW… people are starting to notice the little snake. Heh heh.
