From the AP via USA Today:
Pope Benedict XVI's decision to promote a pastor who called Hurricane Katrina divine punishment for sin in New Orleans was criticized by Austrian priests and church groups on Sunday.
The Vatican announced Saturday that the Pope has tapped the Rev. Gerhard Maria Wagner, 54, to be auxiliary bishop in Linz, the capital of Upper Austria province. Wagner caused a stir in 2005 when he was quoted as saying that he was convinced that the death and destruction of Hurricane Katrina earlier that year was "divine retribution" for tolerance of homosexuals and laid-back sexual attitudes in New Orleans.
There you go, people in New Orleans, you brought Katrina and the federal flood on yourselves with your wicked ways. Nightclubs, brothels, and abortion clinics were destroyed. That proves beyond a doubt the truth of Fr.Wagner's statements, right? Too bad about all the good folks who died, lost their families, their homes, their livelihoods, and their businesses, but retribution is retribution, and sometimes the good must suffer with the bad.
Upper Austrian priest and church dean Franz Wild said he was "appalled" by the decision and that he found it astonishing that someone with such extreme positions could be appointed to a post that was meant to unify.
"I hope it's clear to the church that we're living in the 21st century and that it also has to live there," the newspaper quoted Wild as saying on its website.
....
"The conditions of immorality in this city are indescribable," Wagner was quoted as saying.
I wonder what kind of pure land Fr. Wagner inhabits. If he put his mind to it, I'll wager he could manage a description of the indescribale. People want to know.
I continue to attempt to give Pope Benedict XVI the benefit of the doubt in his policies, but it gets more and more difficult to discover a benign motive behind several of his recent decisions.
Good lord. I thought that kind of wacky talk was limited to American televangelists.
ReplyDeleteI feel sorry for the RCs who want to live in the 21st century and wish their pope was willing to also.
ReplyDeleteThud. Thud. Thud.
ReplyDelete(Sound of me banging my head on my desk.)
New Orleans to Gerhard Maria Wagner and La Tedescha:
ReplyDelete"No jambalaya for you!"
Well, if New Orleans suffered a hurricane because of tolerance for gays, I suppose a Bishop named Wagner is appropriate punishment for Adolph Hitler's home town. It is a "pure land" indeed, that good old burg. It's the one Hitler thought would one day become the shining light and Aryan metropolis, the Kulturstadt of a new world.
ReplyDeleteHas Benedict forgotten his early lessons in the HJ? Or maybe he's remembered...
Or maybe he's remembered...
ReplyDeleteTobias, I'm having great difficulty avoiding the f-word, and I don't mean the four-letter Anglo-Saxon expletive. Lenz even had its very own concentration camp.
No jambalaya for you Wagner and La Tedescha! Thank you for that, Counterlight. You made me smile.
Mi-mi!
ReplyDeleteYou beat me to this post. I've copied my version to a future post-ravaganza I'm doing to vent on the complicity of my former Roman home in the exacerbation of social discourse worldwide.
Sadly, I heard these same sentiments repeated by many self-professed Christianists with some regularity, especially in SW LA until Rita struck.
Tell Grandpère to get prepared: I'm probably going to ask you to my prom this spring.
Crapaud, so you're a renegade from Rome, too?
ReplyDeleteI'm probably going to ask you to my prom this spring.
GP is pretty broadminded, but I hope that the prom is not in late March, because I'll be in England, meeting my boy friends and girl friends "over there".
' I'll be in England, meeting my boy friends and girl friends "over there".' Ah, GM's inner tart is in good form these days. My outer tart is languishing this weekend (way too much good behavior).
ReplyDeleteAny lad would be lucky to have you for a prom date, Mimi. I look forward to dancing with you in May.
Meanwhile, I have never cut B16 a millimeter of slack. Everything I knew about him before he became pope told me he was bad news. A smart cookie, but bad news nonetheless. One step forward and several miles backward seems to be the method.
It just goes from bad to worse to even worse.
ReplyDeleteI wrote a post about how it is a crap ass week to be a Catholic and that was before this. Now it is worse.
Paul, indeed! Why I am surprised? Academics in the Catholic universities and progressive bishops dreaded his visits. He was The Enforcer, and Ratzi, the Rottweiler, waaay back when, as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
ReplyDelete(((((Fran!)))))
I hated to do another post on il Papa because of you, but this is New Orleans that Fr. Wag speaks of, and I couldn't let it pass.
I saved the link to this article on the then Cardinal Ratzinger in the National Catholic Reporter. The piece was written in 1999.
ReplyDeleteAnd if NOLA was so wicked, why did the Quarter come through relatively unscathed? Hmmm? It's as if God really likes the queers and strip joints and bars while devastating poor folk. Somehow it just doesn't add up, but then crap theology never does.
ReplyDeleteAnd Fran, we sympathize with you and all our Catholic siblings. And we know how to distinguish between y'all and the pope just as we hoped the world could distinguish between citizens of the US and Bush (which is even harder to do because Yanks could vote for president and only a few old men get to vote for pope). Hang in there, love.
And let's not forget the rest of Louisiana and Mississipi. I mean, the state that has Mr. Barbour for a governor must be a den of iniquity, musn't it? (Well, actually, there is an argument to be made that the answer is yes--but not for the reasons Fr. Wagner would think of.)
ReplyDeleteMimi, I was a Catholic briefly--for about six months or so--and it was as a Catholic that I was baptised and confirmed--before the authoritarianism inherent in it got me so disgusted I went looking for a new place to worship and found it in the Episcopal chapel down the street. (Of course, the veneration of Eucharists and relics set off a few warning bells; it's hard for a Jew not to think of it as idolatry when it's done to the extreme the Catholic church does it.)
But I knew there would be trouble the moment I learned that the former head of the Inquisition had become pope...
Paul, as Fr. Wag says, some things are indescribable - uh - make that inexplicable.
ReplyDeleteHa! He's the Wag in the tail of the Rottweiler.
But I knew there would be trouble the moment I learned that the former head of the Inquisition had become pope...
ReplyDeleteKishnevi, indeed! When he became pope, he already had a long record. It's not as if the cardinals didn't know what they were getting when they voted him in.
Please, let's not blame sweet Rottweiler friends for the Pope and his ilk! (JCF has a sweet spot for Rottis)
ReplyDeletePssst! RCs! Look at the Road to Iniquity that Mimi and Kishnevi took! You can, too! ;-)
JCF, I know that I insult the breed, but I didn't assign the name to the pope. I'm just quoting others.
ReplyDeleteI never try to lure people away from their church. That's a very personal decision that I would not want to influence unduly.
The anti Modern coalition Rome/Geneva taken to new hights!
ReplyDelete"... because I'll be in England, meeting my boy friends and girl friends "over there"."
ReplyDeleteAnd - you know what - I'll be there too!
'Coz God behaves like that. Everyone knows that!
ReplyDeleteOh goodness, I was still fuming from the Lefebvre bishops being welcomed back. My church is angering me at every turn these days.
ReplyDeleteFather Wagner, meet Ray Nagin, our wacky mayor. He believes the same thing.
ReplyDeleteWhat amazes me is that the Supreme Pontiff can elevate a person with this kind of theological mind-set to the episcopate. I mean, if he were president of Oral Roberts U, or a minor C of E diocese, or some such, I'd not raise an eyebrow. But for a European Roman Catholic Bishop to espouse such a "God-sits-around punishing-the-wicked and rewarding-the-righteous by means of weather control" theodicy is appalling.
ReplyDeleteI'm reminded of an incident from some years ago, concerning another hurricane. I forget its name, but it was particularly devastating in Honduras. The local press asked the various religious leaders, "Why did this happen?" The leading Evangelical said, "God is punishing the people for their wickedness." The Roman Catholic bishop said, "God is testing the faith of his people." The Episcopal bishop (Leo Frade) said, "It's hurricane season." The real question regarding Katrina isn't so much, 'Why was there such a terrible storm?' but 'Why was our government so inept in dealing with it' In the long run we can do little about the weather, but we can do something about our governments and how they respond. And, of course, government policies do, in the long run, have some effect upon the weather, through influence on global climate change. Much of the bad effect of Katrina can be traced back to human failings -- not God's wrath.
O, how I long for a robust theology that stops putting all the blame on God!
Göran, will you truly be at our gathering? Wonderful. I'm looking forward to it.
ReplyDeleteCatherine, hugs to you, too. My heart breaks for all faithful Christian Catholics who are appalled by this announcement.
O, how I long for a robust theology that stops putting all the blame on God!
Tobias, amen!
And, Paul, I'm not forgetting that you owe me a dance in May.
Grand'mère, you are so sweet!
ReplyDelete(I have already payed by the intertubes... Irish Air Pirates - very cheep)
That's great, Göran. See you in March.
ReplyDeleteLet's see if I have the score right, Papally speaking:
ReplyDeleteGays: definitely the bad guys, "intrinsically disordered", "intrinsic moral evil", AND responsible for Hurricane Katrina. Okay to criminilize, imprison and execute (inferred by Vatican's unwillingness to support UN resolution opposed to criminalization of gays). Probably responsible for everything from bad breath to cholera.
Conservatives: Definitely in. Anti-semitism not required, but can be over-looked. Ditto anti-Islam comments. Opposition to Vatican II and the laity preferred.
Is that about right>
IT, that's about it. Y'all are powerful, but dangerous people. Whoa! I'm glad I'm on your side.
ReplyDeleteShould't that read "that you are on my side"
ReplyDelete;=)
Göran, leave it to a Swede to teach us Americans proper English. Yes, that would be a better way to put it.
ReplyDeleteI'm of the opinion that Benedict and the Curia have been "cursed" with stupidity, and not just poor P.R.; for their on-going reprehensible handling of the clergy sexual abuse scandal(s).
ReplyDeleteGays are insulted, women priests excommunicated, SSPX'ers rehabilitated, and on and on ... yet, coy, malingering, and deceptive bishops who covered over the abuse of innocents and vulnerable adults merit barely a finger-wagging. So sad that these bishops are the cross that faithful Catholics must bear. Yet, some schismatic Anglicans are breaking down the door to 'return' to holy mother Church. I don't get it.
John, it goes far deeper than bad PR.
ReplyDeleteWhen I read this sort of thing, I'm reminded of the infamous Cardinal Law, formerly of Boston, who presided over one of the greatest of the cover-ups here in the US, who is now ensconced in his basilica in Rome under the personal protection of the pope.
As for the Anglicans, let them go. Godspeed.
I don't understand this pope at all. If he continues these policies, I foresee massive hemorrhaging from the ranks. Of course, I could be wrong.
'I don't understand this pope at all. If he continues these policies, I foresee massive hemorrhaging from the ranks. Of course, I could be wrong.'
ReplyDeleteB16 is well known for his desire for a purer, leaner, more doctrinaire Roman church, winnowing out the chaff.
IF he chooses to create a prelate for the Anglican schismatics, as is the rumor, the relationship with Canterbury becomes problematic, and oddly, it will inevitably inflame the Eastern Orthodox. While the Orthodox are nearly as condescending towards Anglican communion as the Romans, this type of "uniatism" makes them see red. As a former Orthodox, by the way, their record on clergy sexual abuse is nearly as bad as is Rome's, they've just been able to fly under the radar of public scrutiny, unlike Rome. Sorry for the tangent.
Sorry for the tangent.
ReplyDeleteJohn, you needn't be sorry. I'm glad to have your input. I'm a former Roman Catholic, ensconced in the Episcopal Church for the past 14 years. After a long uneasy alliance with Rome, I left after the story of our child abuse scandal in the hinterlands here in south Louisiana came into the light. Our story broke several years before the big national scandal in the US. The national press paid little attention, because, to them, we are a backwater.
It wasn't so much the scandal, which was horrific enough, but the cover-up, hush money, abusive priests allowed to continue in ministry, that finally pushed me over the edge and out.
Dear Grandmère Mimi,
ReplyDeleteOf course, I've read of Fr. Gilbert Gauthé and the heartache he left throughout French Louisiana.
Many of us, whether affected communally, familially or personally by clergy sexual abuse have been driven from our respective churches by the sins of our spiritual fathers.
St. John Chrysostom, Patriarch of Constantinople, himself, has been attributed with the following warning:
'The Road to Hell is paved with the bones of priests and monks, and the skulls of bishops are the lamp posts that light the path'.
If I may, I will email you offline.
John I.
John, my email address is below my picture.
ReplyDelete