10-2. "This hapless bench of bishops" – Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz of Lincoln, Nebraska, referring to the U.S. bishops
Hapless is defined as = unfortunate, causing misfortune, disastrous, regrettable, deplorable.
“O My children, speak to your pastors, speak to the bishops, the hierarchy, and let them know that their Mother is weeping for them. They do not know what they are doing, or they do not care of the consequences because they have lost their faith and no longer have they received graces to keep them from the abyss.”
– The Bayside Prophecies
Our Lady of the Roses, May 28, 1983
In a June 15, 2002 email post by National Review Online’s Rod Dreher:
This "hapless bench of bishops," as Bp. Bruskewitz called them tonight, couldn't even agree that the role of dissent and homosexuality in this catastrophe was worth studying. The conclusion is obvious: if reform is to come, it's not going to come from the bishops.
The REAL response of the U.S. bishops, in review
Getting past all their eloquent words and showmanship by the U.S. bishops, let’s see what the bishops have actually done in response to this crisis:
The bishops’ charter on dealing with clerical sex abuse makes no mention of homosexuality (even though 90% of the abuse cases were committed against boys and men);
The bishops’ charter makes no mention of cleansing their seminaries;
The bishops’ charter makes no mention of petitioning the Holy Father to defrock bishops and seminary rectors who have ordained unfit men and given safe haven to predatory homosexual priests;
The bishops’ charter makes no mention of the Vatican’s February 1961 document forbidding ordination of those afflicted with evil tendencies to homosexuality and pederasty (the bishops’ failure to obey this document has allowed homosexuals and pederasts to be ordained, a position more easily allowing them prey on the youth. This crisis could have been avoided if the American bishops had obeyed)
2/3 of the U.S. bishops have let accused priests continue to work in ministry
The U.S. Papal Nuncio refused to release a copy of the Vatican’s February 1961 document that states: "Advancement to religious vows and ordination should be barred to those who are afflicted with evil tendencies to homosexuality or pederasty, since for them the common life and the priestly ministry would constitute serious dangers” (no condemnation of the U.S. Papal Nuncio by the American bishops has been forthcoming)
Bishop Wilton Gregory, head of the NCCB, publicly disagreed with the Vatican’s February 1961 policy forbidding ordination of homosexuals on Meet the Press (June 16, 2002), when asked by Tim Russert: “Can a homosexual be a healthy, happy priest?” Bishop Gregory replied: “I think we have some who are. I think we have men who have embraced the promise of celibacy irregardless of their sexual orientation, and they have lived it with integrity.” [note: 90% of the sexual abuse cases were by homosexual priests who BROKE their vow of celibacy];
Tim Russert then asked Bishop Gregory: “The Pope’s spokesman, Navarro-Valls, had this to say: ‘Pope John Paul’s spokesman, Joaquin Navarro-Valls, questioned whether ordination of gays were even valid. ‘People with these inclinations just cannot be ordained.’ [New York Times, March 3, 2002] Do you agree with that?” Bishop Gregory’s response: “I believe that that statement was perhaps more expansive than the tradition of the Church. It seems to me that the Church has spoken about living a holy integral life in a much broader context than that.”
Tim Russert continued: “But the fact that 90% of the abused children in the Church were teenage boys. Does that trouble you that there may be a disproportionate level of behavior by homosexual men towards teenage boys?” Bishop Gregory responded: “It certainly troubles me. But the fact that any of our kids are harmed troubles me. The percentages are startling, but the total issue is a cause for great sorrow.”
Helen Hull Hitchcock, leader of the orthodox Women for Faith and Family, asked the bishops in an afternoon press conference what it meant that as many as 90 percent of these publicly known abuse cases involve priests having sex with teenage boys. She did not get a straight answer;
The Catholic lay group, Roman Catholic Faithful, who fought for years to get the American bishops to do something about predatory priests and bishops, has been ignored and was also refused permission to address the American bishops during their three-day meeting.
It is primarily Catholic lay groups and the secular media who have drawn attention to the above, and exposed this scandal in the first place.
Responding to the bishops’ charter document, SNAP founder (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests) Barbara Blaine said, “I just am so saddened and feel as though, in many ways, that we as victims have been betrayed. We are just amazed and so sad that the Church leaders would actually say that they are going to leave child molesters within the ranks of the priesthood. We just can’t understand why they would do that.”
Mark Serrano, a survivor network leader who is now 38, held up a picture of himself at age 12 and told of his rape by a priest. "Listening comes easy. Talk comes cheap. Moral action is priceless," he said. Serrano insisted that cardinals and bishops should be "fired or defrocked" if they failed to protect youths.
Mary Eberstadt points out in the June 17, 2002 Weekly Standard that a big part of the problem is the complicity of many bishops with "the lavender takeover" of numerous U.S. seminaries.
The U.S. bishops at the Dallas meeting even refused, by voice vote, a motion to study the role of dissent in the present scandalous developments.
This is how interested the U.S. bishops are at getting to the root of the problem.
"Yes, My children, as time goes on in these closing days, you will watch those of evil intent become brazen in their approach. They no longer know the meaning of shame or modesty. Like the brazen serpent they come forward and flaunt themselves before you. And why? Because your leaders have enacted rules, regulations, and laws that hold no water, have no discipline and no purpose. They are too busy compromising.
"It is the easy way to compromise, My children. It casts the responsibility onto another, so that you may not be bothered. But I say unto you, pastors and laymen, you must accept this responsibility to protect your Faith, to restore My House to its former glory, to chase out the rodents in mitres that are burrowing like rats into the foundation of My Church."
- The Bayside Prophecies
Jesus, March 18, 1977
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