George Weigel (CR, July 1) wants us to believe that he has all the answers and is qualified to make statements that mistakes of Vatican II have contributed to a “crisis of fidelity that was at the root of clerical sexual abuse and episcopal misgovernance.” I think that Vatican II was awesome in what it has accomplished. It has made us better Catholics, as well as kept many Catholics in the church. What Weigel proposes will reduce our ranks even more so. His separation into “real” Catholics is also very divisive.
What he lacks most is medical knowledge about the physiology of drives that will forever be a problem to priests. The Vatican crisis is upon us, not behind us. We need to find ways to come together to unite and ignite the world with the message of the Gospels. The poor is where we will find Christ, ourselves, our mission and the action to be taken, that we may all be One.in Christ.
Bahr is a parishioner of St. Vincent de Paul, Baltimore.