Scandals within the Catholic Church have been all over the media and people everywhere are repulsed. I cannot even begin to imagine what goes through the mind of a non-Catholic looking on from the outside. So, what gives? Why is this happening and, perhaps more importantly, why are Catholics, clergy and laity alike, hush-hush and seeming to jump at any chance to run away from this gigantic elephant in the room?
First of all, what is a scandal at least in the moral/theological sense? A scandal occurs when someone is tempted to sin as a result of an action (or omission) of another person. According to St. Thomas (II-II:43:1) scandal is a word or action evil in itself, which occasions another’s spiritual ruin. For example, if an ordained Catholic priest were to engage in an act of fornication and it becomes public knowledge, that evil act would be an occasion to possibly cause others to fall into sin themselves, e.g. forfeiting their faith. Not only do public scandals persuade Christians to leave the Church, but they also keep people from ever wanting to enter. So, why in God’s ineffable wisdom would He permit such atrocities to occur?
Let us go back 2,000 years. When Jesus Christ personally chose His 12 disciples He selected one whom He knew would eventually betray Him, i.e. Judas Iscariot. Judas willfully betrayed Our Blessed Lord that would lead to the worst public scandal in human history: the crucifixion of God-incarnate. Should Judas’ betrayal have implicated the other 11 disciples who remained faithful? Also, as a majority of Our Lord’s followers were scandalized at His explicit, ‘hard teaching’ on the eating and drinking of His flesh and blood in the Eucharist (cf. John 6:52-71), ultimately leaving Him, does this give outsiders a legitimate reason to believe that those who stayed are culpable of what they believed to be sacrilegious: the forbidden practice of drinking blood (cf. Lev. 17:10-12). In other words, is it fair for those within and outside to make hasty generalizations regarding the Catholic Church as a whole based upon the impurity and scandalous nature of a select few? Does one Judas make eleven others? Likewise, do few ordained clergymen who engage in licentious acts make all ordained clergymen unchaste?
Just as Satan entered Judas (cf. Luke 22:3), who was personally chosen by Jesus Christ, he will also enter other chosen clergymen until the parousia. It should not be astonishing that Satan desires the fall of the Church Jesus Christ Himself founded; what better way to sift His chosen priests like wheat than to tempt them unceasingly, more so than laity and Religious, perhaps, to fall into sin that would cause others to leave the Church and deter many from ever desiring to enter? What more tactful method for the Evil One of causing those disciples in the Church to leave and those outside of Her never wanting to enter, than to penetrate the minds and hearts of priests of Jesus Christ, urging them to act on those temptations that he allures them with?
The ultimate and pressing question remains. Why would God permit such evil to invade and permeate His Church to the degree that it does and with the effects that result? Not only does God permit this to happen but Our Blessed Lord even prophesied this unfortunate reality 2,000 years ago:
“And [Jesus] said to his disciples: It is impossible that scandals should not come: but woe to him through whom they come.” Luke 17:1
The very One who makes the impossible, possible, emphatically declares that it is impossible that scandals should not come. But, why?
“The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field; but while men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and went away. So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared also. And the servants of the householder came and said to him, Sir, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then has it weeds?’ He said to them, ‘An enemy has done this.’ The servants said to him, ‘Then do you want us to go and gather them?’ But he said, ‘No; lest in gathering the weeds you root up the wheat along with them. Let both grow together until the harvest.” – Matthew 13:24-30
This parable is a contemporary illustration of the current reality within the Catholic Church. Our Blessed Lord not only prophesied the inevitability of these scandals, but He goes so far as to allow the ‘enemy’ to plant weeds right in the midst of His Church, i.e. ‘your field’. How many times have I, or other devout Catholics, been scoffed at or ridiculed for ‘belonging to a church of pedophiles’? “If your church was founded by Jesus Christ, these sex-scandals would not be happening”, retorts the contemptuous non-Catholic.
The Catholic Church is full of sinners; ‘She is not a hotel for Saints, but a hospital for the spiritually sick’. Moreover, the Evil One will do anything he can to paint a caricature of the Church as a whole by infiltrating Her with ferocious wolves, i.e. ‘his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and went away’. The Devil wants you to think that the Church Jesus Christ founded, the ark of salvation, is corrupt and intrinsically evil. He wants you to be convicted that She is the ‘whore of Babylon’ full of fornicating priests and bishops at the disposal of serving the ‘antichrist’. Just as the Pharisees and Scribes claimed Our Blessed Lord of being demon-possessed, how much more will people claim His Church of being the same?!
“If they have called the master of the house Be-el′zebul, how much more will they malign those of his household.” Matthew 10:25
Why does God permit this seeming paradox of scandalizing to occur and reoccur throughout the history of His Church, considering the number of souls at stake? Simply, it is to test the fidelity of Jesus Christ’s individual followers. If you claim that you will follow Our Lord even to your death, will you not follow Him through the scandals of his household that are impossible to avoid? Will you remain steadfast through the unavoidable slander and persecutions from those non-Catholics looking at every opportunity to undermine the sanctity of Christ’s espoused Virgin, His Church? Will you allow your faith to be tested and tried by the immoral actions of others, seeming to implicate you just by being surnamed Catholic? Just as many persons chose to follow Our Lord during his earthly ministry, most of those followers also left him at the public scandal of his ‘hard teachings’ and the betrayal of Judas. Not only has this been the course of the tenure of the Church since, but it will continue and even get worse nearing the return of the Bridegroom to forever bring His Bride to the eternal nuptials of the wedding feast.
So, I personally will not leave the only Church Jesus Christ founded over Judas’ infidelity! I will surely not leave Her because of wolves and weeds entering in and being planted by the enemy! And, I will definitely not apostatize from the only means to salvation by being verbally slandered and maligned by those who misunderstand the woes of the Church and why they must come. You also, whether Catholic or otherwise, should take care so as to not fall away from the inheritance of eternal happiness because of the snares and stumbling blocks placed before you by the enemy. Pick up your cross, bear the sins of others, and use these scandals to your advantage by reforming yourselves to shine ever more brightly when it seems that sole darkness is all around us and the light of salvation dimmed.