Leadership! Leadership! Leadership! The Chair of Peter! Isn't this the reason people have begun to use protests that are challenging the leadership conditions in so many foreign lands as well as in the United States as well? It is not only leadership in civil governance that is beneath the microscope. The men who were appointed by Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI to be (arch)diocesan leaders are also confronted by their once faithful following. Throughout the world the men who done the mitred-look are facing scrutiny in area never before challenged by the people of God.
Today our Church, wounded in so many different parts of the world, is confronted by what feels like a tsunami to the pastors, priests and laity who have dedicated their lives to the mission of the gospels, Never before has any scandal sent so many fissures in the very foundations Peter and his successors labored to create for our Church. To read that an American Cardinal notified the Pope, following a visitation to Ireland where pedophilia has so damaged the Catholic Church, that the Irish Catholic Church in Ireland could collapse in another ten years!
Today we celebrate the authority God has entrusted to Peter. It is the same authority and leadership expected and demanded of Bishops and other clergy persons. Unfortunately, we see in more than just a few local Churches, the spiritual and personal power has seemingly failed. As a result many Catholics have begun to question their faith or the leadership in what we used to call "Holy Mother Church," a descriptive phrase that seems to have evaporated in the steamy climate of Catholic jargon today.
As we recall the leadership entrusted to one man who was called into a group that was to change the world, we must recognize how different the challenges today are compared to today's expectations for bishops and other church leaders. On this special days, the truly faithful are called to pray to God that the leaders to whom the care of the Church has been entrusted today may know the abundance of his graces in challenging times.
