Over at the HMS, Kevin Miller gives a rebuttal to my post below about the Dreher column and the overwrought responses it has garnered.
Part of the dispute comes from the suggestion that maybe nobody at NR is “a sincere Catholic”. Now, I don’t happen to read that magazine these days, but to me, that’s a serious charge: yet Kevin openly defends it.
I take “sincere” to mean such things as “honest”, “unfeigned”, “heartfelt”, “genuine in feeling” — and to call someone “insincere” is tantamount to calling him a hypocrite. Our Lord was entitled to do that, or maybe a reader of souls like Padre St. Pio, but for you or me, or Kevin or Victor to do that strikes me as somewhere between imprudent and impudent. It’s an accusation about the person’s inner intentions, so there’s a pretty high burden of proof. On the other hand, if they want to say that this or that fellow Catholic (Dreher or Fr. Schall or whoever) is in error, or is inconsistent, that would be fine with me.
Kevin defends Greg Popcak’s analysis (on the Pope’s role vis-à-vis bishops) as based on sound theology, but I think it’s hard to tell, because Greg uses some vague language to express his thoughts. He writes:
Likewise, the Pope cannot “unmake” a bishop at his will, he may, however, ask a bishop to resign if he is SURE that it is God’s will that he do so.
There are a couple of ambiguities here.
First, no one, not even God, can “unmake” a bishop, in the sense of undoing the sacramental character of ordination, so the terminology here is confused.
As for the talk about being “SURE” of God’s will, what is Greg’s basis for writing this? A bishop can either be deprived of office or be asked to resign. Either way, the grounds are relatively objective and stated in church law, not based on anybody’s discernment of God’s will.
I don’t think this is such clear theology.