Recently on the History channel there was a series on failed dams in the United States; I was particularly interested in a Los Angeles project that collapsed sometime in the 60's. The erosion offered me insight into what has been happening in the Roman Catholic Church. The huge basin like L.A. dam was eaten out not at its wall but from undercore, its supporting rock and soil eroding as high pressure water was pumped into nearby oil wells. The Roman Church has been eroding from inside; the clerical sexual scandals are surface evidence of a deep problem.

The San Francisco Chronicle recently editorialized about a wounded church. A church under siege.

I prefer the image of a civil war, with systems pitted against each other in a terrible death struggle. The opposed internal systems are the secretive authoritarian clerical institution and communitarian believers in Jesus, his way, and Spirit. Each finds its God in a different way, the clergy sacramentally automatic and the community in relationships; the institution worships a concept whereas the community lives the divine experience. At times they appear liturgically to cross.

For me awareness of this civil war began in my first years of priesthood when an arrogant hierarchy defended and protected pathologically ill pastors while leaving the people unprotected; clerics assumed the role of God, becoming power brokers with the sacred. The welfare of the people was secondary to protecting the image of the clergy. Salvation was an after death experience and the clergy managed the hoops through which the people would dance.

For me the institution was bankrupt relationally and its leaders had lost genuine contact and spiritual credibility with the people. An exposure of this erosion of faith in the institutional system has been underway since John the 23rd and Vatican Two ( 1960's ); like the L.A. dam the outward appearance of living church is crumbling from within. Notice that the clergy scandals reported now daily are crimes of 30 to 40 years ago; couple this with the mass exodus of 23,500 priests who have left institutional ministry, many to marry. Something deep and big is happening!

Most bishops must forfeit priestly brotherhood to climb the episcopal power ladder. Vatican Two's call for reform was an ax laid to the root of the rotting tree of a clericalism and power that distanced the institution from the people. Before WW2 Europe was already experiencing the death of a 15th century clergy and the institution was attractive in ceremonial way, much like the royal pageantry of England.

Ordained in 1954 I promoted community building for 26 years in parish work; the institution touched lightly into the lives of the people, its building blocks being baptism, confirmation, confession and communion. These were faith experiences built on shallow mounds of shifting sand. I performed 3000 infant baptisms, which Richard Rohr recently called "pretty blessings". I "gave" communion to 1000's of little girls dressed in virginal white costumes, they unaware of the basic meaning of the eucharist. Not all would enter the convent and many would flounder on the rocks of difficulties of adult human sexuality.

I coached hundreds of grade school children and teens as they went before a Bishop Guilfolye to hear a silly poem recited and a smug of oil confirming them in their rote ignorance of "adult " Christianity. Much was facade. The keel of the bark (ship) of Peter was worm eaten in the shipyard; the waves of real life crumbled the faith boat for the majority of young who underwent the automatic sacramental system.

Where are the young in the Roman system of today? Pastors were contented to keep records.

Damage control is on the front burners of the bishops' church today. The hierarchy meets to cover up and hurry along the reconstruction of the severely damaged !

Ordained Captain Queggs with their pathological sexuality are being hauled into court, leaving the ship to inexperienced clergy, who unknowing of history attempt to rebuild over the earthquake faults. The power brokers demonize those of us who felt the massive spiritual earthquakes of 40 years ago and who departed the institution for faith communities of dialogue and trust; they kill the messengers who bear news they wish not to hear.

Faith people are faced with the reality they must take charge to salvage what is the best of Jesus; a dying clergy could gracefully empower them.

Berkeley therapist Stanley Keleman theorizes that all new life follows death, the infant dies to become a toddler, the teen to become a young man, the followers of Jesus forage a path in modern society, etc. I sit on the side lines of a dying familiar institution; I have a Christian sense of resurrection; the emerging product will not be like the old that is dying .

I live and formulate a theology of marriage and relationships, non-existent in my church of old .I humbly accept my place among the marvels of creations, the thin veil behind which the Mystery of God hides. I was born in human way; ordination did not superhumanize me. I give thanks for the earthquake called John the 23rd, a human who clarified for me the human path of Jesus. Along with Iraneus ( 300 ce ) I rejoice that I am human, man becoming...in the process of the fullness of life."
 
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