Pope Francis of the Catholic Church has been outspoken on matters of climate change and other initiatives that made him a favorite amongst the liberal community over the past few years.

To some, The Catholic Church finally awoke out of its archaic slumber. Here was somebody at the Vatican that was hip to current buzz words like “inclusivity” and “tolerance” and believed that climate change was real.

Back in September of 2013, Pope Francis condemned the “small-mindedness” of The Catholic Church:

“We have to find a new balance; otherwise even the moral edifice of the church is likely to fall like a house of cards, losing the freshness and fragrance of the Gospel.”-Pope Francis, America

And, like a house of cards, it seems as if The Catholic Church lost its balance once again. A former Vatican ambassador to the U.S. said yesterday that he told Pope Francis in 2013 about allegations of sexual abuse against a prominent priest — and that Francis took no action. Carlo Maria Viganò, Titular Archbishop of Ulpiana Apostolic Nuncio, created an 11-page testimony, calling for Francis to resign from his post:

“To restore the beauty of holiness to the face of the Bride of Christ which is terribly disfigured by so many abonimable crimes, and if we truly we truly want to free the Church from the fetid swamp into which she has fallen, we must have the courage to tear down the culture of secrecy and publicly confess the truths we have kept hidden. We must tear down
the conspiracy of silence with which bishops and priests have protected themselves at the expense of their faithful, a conspiracy of silence that in the eyes of the world riskd making the Church look like a sect, a conspiracy of silence not so dissimilar from the one that prevails in the mafia. “Whatever you have said in the dark … shall be proclaimed from the housetops”
(Luke, 12:3).

Within the testimony, Viganò names names. Lots of names affiliated with events that lead up to the resignation of Cardinal Theodore McCarrick. And, some interactions with Pope Francis:

Immediately after, the Pope asked me in a deceitful way: “What is Cardinal McCarrick like?” I answered him with complete frankness and, if you want, with great naivete: ‘Holy Father, I don’t know if you know Cardinal McCarrick, but if you ask the Congregation for Bishops there is a dossier this thick about him. He corrupted generations of seminarians and priests and Pope Benedict ordered him withdraw to a life of prayer and penance.’ The Pope did not make the slightest comment about those very grave words of mine and did not show any expression of surprise on his face, as if he had already known the matter for some time, and he immediately changed the subject.”

More:

“It was also clear that, from the time of Pope Francis’s election, McCarrick, now free from all constraints,
had felt free to travel continuously, to give lectures and interviews. In a team effort with
Cardinal Rodriguez Maradiaga, he had become the kingmaker for appointments in the Curia and the United
States, and the most listened to advisor in the Vatican for relations with the Obama administration.”

Viganò wrote on to detail his interactions with Pope Francis, who asked him, in the same fashion, what he thought about Cardinal Donald Wuerl, whose diocese he led for 18 years before coming to Washington in 2006, and who had more accused priests than any of the other dioceses included in the report.

This testimony comes on the heels of the results of a two-year investigation in Pennsylvania, where children were abused for decades by more than 300 men described as “predator priests.” It relays the accounts of more than 1,000 children, but said there are likely thousands of other victims. McCarrick still stands by his his “innocence”, Wuerl, now the archbishop of Washington, requested that his name be removed from Cardinal Wuerl North Catholic High School in Pittsburgh, with claims to be “acting in the interest of the students, faculty and families of the school”.

In Knock, Ireland, according to the Associated Press, in a “homophobic manifesto”, (as they called it), Pope Francis has since declined to confirm or deny Viganò’s claims. AP goes on to say that Pope Francis says “parents of gay children should not condemn them and give them space to express themselves” and that a tribunal for those in the Catholic Church convicted of sex crimes against children “wasn’t viable or convenient because of the different cultures of the bishops who must be judged.” Instead, he said the ad-hoc jury system “works better”. What “works better” for these families, Pope Francis?

I may offend some Catholics here but I am willing to take this risk. I was raised Roman Catholic because my parents were raised Roman Catholic. As a grandchild of Italian immigrants, this is all we knew. I went to church every Sunday, participated in the choir, entered the confessional every month, and went to mass every morning before class during Lent. As a teen, I was reprimanded for my eyeliner, for my cussing, my less-than-poster-parishioner parents and for telling Father Peter (when I was 13) that I saw no point in confession when I could just grab the direct line and confess my sins to God. I never understood the guilt, the repetition, the sheer robotic nature of this means of having a relationship with a Father who loves us all. The last straws came when they refused to marry my husband and I because he went through a prior divorce. I also did not understand that while my young son (and husband) were able to participate in Communion at one church, they were unworthy and unable to do it in another. I have since left the Catholic church. As a practicing Christian today, I kept my eyeliner, my punk-rock exterior and slap my wrists after the occasional cuss word leaves my lips but I know that I can grab the direct line to God and be in relationship with Him without a mortal man telling me to confess my sins. And after this scandal, I feel none of them have any business asking me to do so.

It can be argued that every church in every denomination has some level of corruption. There are sexual abuse stories that plague congregations. We hear the stories about money-grubbing evangelicals taking luxury vacations and jet-setting around the word on the congregation’s tithing dollars. We see pastors wanting to amass “in the name of Jesus” but attendees question, “Is all of this really in the name of Jesus”? Here we have men of high positions in The Catholic Church clearly knew about the abuse of these innocent children. The highest of the high, Pope Francis, knew about these atrocities. He knew and yet he did nothing. Corruption runs deep. God may be perfect but man is far from this.

stirring image from yesterday as Pope Francis wraps up his two-day trip to Dublin, Ireland. (Photo: Matt Dunham/AP) pic.twitter.com/nXduq2xaKz

— J.D. Durkin (@jiveDurkey) August 26, 2018

Pope Francis: “Read the statement carefully and make your own judgment. I will not say a single word on this.”

Interpretation: Media, bail me out of this one!

— Man of Catholicism (@CatholicismGuy) August 26, 2018

As all of this darkness comes to light, I question, were these innocent kids given the freedom to “express themselves”? Was this what these sick perverts were trying to facilitate? Did these kids get “prayer, dialogue and understanding”? What about their families? And, what about the cases we know absolutely nothing about that have not been brought to the light?

And do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but instead even expose them;for it is disgraceful even to speak of the things which are done by them in secret. But all things become visible when they are exposed by the light, for everything that becomes visible is light.-Ephesians 5:11-13

The Catholic Church will continue to listen to your sins once a month. Say a few “Hail Marys” and you’re good, man. They’ll continue to say the divorced are sullied and not fit to marry in their church unless the parties involved take classes and shell out a bunch of money to forgive your past mistakes. Unmarried men will continue to advise people on what makes a good marriage while covering up for their unmarried, pedophile colleagues. Meanwhile, the Pope will remain as silent as they come. I used to think it was because he was clueless but all of the above dispels this theory for me. Is the “beauty of holiness” gone in the Catholic Church? I’ll say it is. There is nothing holy or beautiful about pedophilia and harming the physical and emotional well-being of a child. Nothing. Even if it is covered up with “forgiveness”, a cassock, a pectoral cross, the correct political agenda and a gentle papal demeanor.