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Liturgies[3] as Pope Francis was accustomed to perform as cardinal would be a if it becomes merely man-centered philanthropy, then the Church is no longer.
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Thus, they are centered on themselves and their activities, preoccupied with the human results of their ministry. They do not find time for God, because they have lost the sense of God. God has no more place in their life. My dear friends, I am convinced that at the heart of the crisis of the Church is a crisis of the priesthood, a crisis of priests.

Letters to Pope Francis: Rebuilding a Church with Justice and Compassion

If the cathedral is collapsing, it is because priestly identity has collapsed first. We have made them think they must be businessmen, efficient workers, active and present everywhere at every minute. But the priest is fundamentally a continuation among us of the presence of Christ. He must not be defined by what he does but by what he is. He is ipse Christus , Christ himself. The discovery of many cases of sexual abuse against minors reveals a profound spiritual crisis, a grave, deep, and tragic rupture between the priest and Christ.

But we must have the courage to go further. As Benedict XVI said recently, the roots of this crisis are spiritual. The ultimate reason for abuse or for a moral life incompatible with priestly celibacy is the concrete absence of God in the life of priests. We have witnessed for a long time now the spread of a priestly life that is no longer determined by the faith.

Now if there is any life that must be entirely and absolutely determined by the faith, it is the priestly life. In the final analysis, the reason for abuse is the absence of God. Only where faith no longer determines the actions of man are such offenses possible. As Benedict XVI has reminded us:. The center of our life must really be the daily celebration of the Holy Eucharist. I have dedicated this book to the priests of the whole world because I know that they are suffering.

Many of them feel abandoned. We, the bishops, bear a large share of responsibility for the crisis of the priesthood. Have we been fathers to them? Have we listened to them, understood and guided them? Have we given them an example? Too often dioceses are transformed into administrative structures. There are so many meetings. The bishop should be the model for the priesthood.

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But we ourselves are far from being the ones most ready to pray in silence, or to chant the Office in our cathedrals. I fear that we lose ourselves in secondary, profane responsibilities. When he celebrates Mass, he is at the source of his whole life, which is the Cross. Celibacy is one of the concrete ways that allows us to live this mystery of the Cross in our lives.

Celibacy inscribes the Cross on our flesh. That is why celibacy is intolerable for the modern world. Priestly celibacy is a scandal for moderns, because the Cross is a scandal.

In this book, I wish to encourage priests. I want to tell them: love your priesthood! Be proud to be crucified with Christ! I wish to show my affection as a father and brother for the priests of the whole world! I want to express, before you and with you, my profound affection for all faithful priests in the world! I want before you and wish you to render them homage! Dear friends, love your priests! Do not thank them for what they do but for what they are!

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Dear friends, do not be troubled by the tendentious investigations that portray the disastrous situation of irresponsible clergy, whose interior lives are diseased, who are even at the very centre of government of the Church. Stay serene and confidant like the Virgin and St. John at the foot of the Cross.

Immoral priests, bishops, and cardinals cannot tarnish the bright testimony of more than four-hundred thousand priests across the world who serve the Lord every day with faith, holiness, joy, and humility!

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We must be realistic and concrete. Yes, there are sinners. Yes, there are unfaithful priests, bishops, and even cardinals who fail to observe chastity. But also, and this is also very grave, they fail to hold fast to true doctrine! Sin should not surprise us. On the other hand, we must have the courage to call it by name. We must not be afraid to rediscover the methods of spiritual combat: prayer, penance, and fasting.

We must have the clear-sightedness to punish unfaithfulness. We must find the concrete means to prevent it. I believe that without a common prayer life, without a minimum of common fraternal life between priests, fidelity is an illusion. We must look to the model of the Acts of the Apostles.

I want to repeat to you priests and religious who are hidden and forgotten, you whom society often despises, you who are faithful to the promises of your ordination, you make the powers of this world tremble! You remind them that nothing can resist the force present in the gift of your life for the truth. You remind them of the vital and indispensable presence of God for the future of humanity.

Your presence is intolerable to the prince of lies. Without you, dear brother priests and consecrated people, humanity would be less great, less radiant, and less beautiful! Without you our cathedrals would be useless buildings without life!

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You are the living rampart of the truth because you have resolved to love even to the point of the Cross. Dear brother priests, dear religious brothers and sisters, the experience of the Cross is the experience of the truth of our life! The man or cleric who proclaims the truth of God inevitably climbs upon the Cross. He will experience the passion, crucifixion, and death of the Cross. All Christians, and priests in particular, are constantly on the Cross so that through their witness the truth may shien forth and lies be destroyed. In an extraordinary way, we carry around always and everywhere on our bodies the sufferings and death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may be manifested in our bodies see 2 Cor I often hear it said that priestly celibacy is only a question of historical discipline.

I firmly believe that this is false. As we said above, celibacy reveals the very essence of Christian priesthood, namely the perfect configuration and total identification of the priest with Christ, High Priest of the New Covenant and of the good things to come Heb In this sense, the priest is not only an alter Christus , another Christ, he is truly ipse Christus , Christ himself. And because Christ and the Apostles lived in perfect chastity and celibacy as a sign of their total and absolute gift to the Father, it is thus fundamental today as well to see celibacy as a vital necessity for the Church.

To speak of it as a secondary reality is hurtful to all the priests of the world! I am deeply persuaded that the relativization of the law of priestly celibacy will reduce the priesthood to a simple function. But priesthood is not a function but a state. To be a priest is not first and foremost to do something, but to be something. It is to be Christ; it is to be the extension of the presence of Christ among men. The priest for his part gives himself as Christ was given for the whole Church. Celibacy manifests this gift, and is its concrete and vital sign. Celibacy is the seal of the Cross on our priestly life!

It is the cry of the priestly soul proclaiming its love for the Father and its total gift of self to the Church! The desire to relativize celibacy leads to scorning this radical gift that so many faithful priests have lived since the day of their ordination.

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I want to shout with so many of my fellow priests my profound suffering in the face of this scorn for priestly celibacy! Of course, there can be weakness in this domain. But he who falls rises immediately and pursues his way following Christ with more fidelity and determination. And then, dear friends, what else does our cathedral need? It needs solid pillars to support the vaults. What are these pillars? What foundation is needed to support the graceful slenderness of the Gothic rib-vaults?


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The Catholic doctrine we have received from the apostles is the only solid foundation we can find. If everyone defends his own opinion, theological hypotheses, novelties, or a pastoral approach that contradicts the demands of the Gospel and the perennial Magisterium of the Church, then division will spread everywhere. I am wounded when I see so many pastors selling off Catholic doctrine and sowing division among the faithful.