CatholicCulture.org reports that Cardinal O'Malley of Boston has forbidden a dissident Austrian priest to speak at a parish in his diocese. Good going, Cardinal. That shepherd's crook you've got is not just to nudge the sheep gently, but to take a mighty whack at the wolves trying to get into the sheepfold. Encore!
To repeat a metaphor I've used many times before: If a Chevy dealer asked to use a local Ford showroom to make a sales presentation, what Ford dealer in his or her right mind would let them? No real Chevy dealer would even have the chutzpah to ask. But for some reason, people who want to tear down the Catholic Church, and remake its practices closer to their hearts' desire, never seem to lack for it.
In 1867, Matthew Arnold wrote "Dover Beach", a haunting poem evoking the "melancholy, long, withdrawing roar" of the Sea of Faith. As a boomer who finished Catholic elementary school in 1964 and then watched my Church falter, I've found the roar all too audible. So here I wait, listening for the whispers of that Sea's invincible return.
