Stephen P. White

As the Church takes a hard look at ways to correct for widespread failures in the clergy, and especially the episcopate, she will have to take care to delineate what sorts of changes are theologically and sacramentally permissible and which are not.

It’s worth remembering that reporting mechanisms and systems of accountability, while important, do nothing to address the root of the crisis in the Church, which is fundamentally a crisis of fidelity.

Last week’s summit in Rome focused on protecting minors from sexual abuse. It was a start. But it was, in many ways, very far from the end.

In one sense, laicization would bring Theodore McCarrick’s part in the saga of the clerical sex-abuse crisis in the Catholic Church to a deservedly ignominious end. But of course, the bitter fruits of his sins are still ripening to harvest.

While the failings of priests and bishops are an obvious place to start for dealing with the current crisis, the way toward genuine reform will require careful thinking and a broader perspective, including the laity’s place in the life, governance, and mission of the Church.

Pope Francis clearly understands that there is a crisis of credibility in the American episcopate. It is less clear that he understands why.

Care for due process and the rule of law is as important within the Church as without. Without a clear, well-defined, and carefully executed canonical framework for handling abuse allegations, the Church is left with an ad hoc, almost haphazard, legal approach.

The case of a Los Angeles bishop charged with sexual misconduct is a textbook example of the need for independent, lay involvement in the review of allegations against bishops.

Advent – especially this Advent, when reform is so much on our minds – is a good time to remember that everything we do depends on a God who thought shepherds round an infant lying swaddled in a Bethlehem manger would be just the thing.

The way to head off the worst strains of nationalism is to pre-empt them with more humane appeals to legitimate concerns for national identity.

If Rome thinks delaying action by American bishops or weakening conference leadership is in the best interests of American Catholics, then they are gravely mistaken. The last thing American Catholics need right now is to be treated as pawns in an ecclesiastical power struggle.

There is one question that cuts to the heart of the outrage and anger felt by millions of Catholic faithful: What kind of father, what kind of man, responds to the abuse of his own children the way so many of our bishops have responded to the abuse of their own?