Piety vs Spirituality

I want to follow up on yesterday’s posting and the subject of the lack of spirituality and direction for the spiritual journey in our parishes today.  Are people even aware of our rich Catholic tradition of prayer?  A priest friend of mine told me that a “super-Catholic” parishioner of his complained that he never spoke about spirituality in his homilies.  He claimed that all he spoke of was spirituality.  The problem was two very different understandings of spirituality.  “Agnes of God” (his pet nickname for this particular lady) meant that he should talk more about saying the rosary and doing holy hours.  She arrived at church every morning at 7 am (an hour and a half before the morning Mass) to say the Stations of the Cross (“In Agnes’ religion, Jesus always ends up in the tomb, even on Easter morning,” Father noted), say her rosary, and work her way through a pile of novena pamphlets.  After Mass she would remain to lead fellow parishioners in a second rosary.  All this is well and good, he pointed out, but it constitutes “piety” rather than “spirituality.”  When the parish priest spoke to her about various other forms of prayer that wefre being offered in the parish, forms such as Lectio Divina she was uninterested, or Christian Meditation, she dismissed it as “Christian Buddhism”.  This limited understanding of prayer is not only common among the laity.  I have a cousin who is an up and coming prelate and was on the Vatican appointed team that “investigated” American seminaries about eight years ago.  He told me that when they visited a Carmelite monastery where the young friars were studying for the priesthood he and other team members were surprised to find that there were no scheduled holy hours as in diocesan seminaries, that visits to the Blessed Sacrament were not actively encouraged by the formation team, and that the rosary was never said in common.  When these and other suggestions for change were made, the formation team was adamant that there would be no such additions to the community schedule.  The friars celebrated the Liturgy of the Hours in common every day, had daily Mass together, and were required to do two hours of meditation in their “cells.”  In addition they met once a week for “lectio divina” in common.   While individuals were free to pursue other forms of prayer and encouraged in private piety, there would be no change to the common schedule.  Within a month of the visit, the team received a letter from the Carmelite headquarters in Rome informing them that the Order stood behind the formation team.  Carmelite Spirituality is, they were informed., very “bare bones” and the Order resisted innovations that would dilute their tradition by adding “foreign” elements to the spirituality that had guided Carmelites for eight centuries.  The traditional spirituality which guided Saint Teresa and Saint John of the Cross, is “to meditate night and day on the Law of the Lord” and “to keep vigil in prayer” in their individual cells as the Rule of their Order has called them to do for eight centuries.
      A similar story comes from a friend of mine who is a priest of the Ukrainian Rite.  A century and more ago when Eastern Rite Catholics were immigrating to America, many “Latin” customs were introduced into the Rite such as Stations of the Cross, the rosary, and Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament in order to make these Eastern Rite Christians look more “Catholic,” as if Catholic meant “Roman.” . But now there is a strong effort to purge the Eastern Rites of these Western practices and restore the traditional devotions and prayer-life of the East.  
      For those whose spiritual life is comprised only of pious exercises, the abandonment or absence of these devotions makes it appear that there is no spirituality when in fact various Churches or Monastic communities are returning to the more ancient forms of prayer that are properly theirs.       Does this mean that there should be no room for piety?  By no means.  We all begin the spiritual journey with pious prayers and most of us still revert to the pieties of our youth at times of stress or distraction and we still find not only comfort but grace in traditional devotions.  But we also know that “active” prayer or “vocal prayer” is the initial steps of a spiritual journey that takes us deeper and deeper into the heart of God.  For those who are willing to let go of their attachments to active prayer forms and trust God to lead them, there is a possibility of moving into the “Prayer of Quiet” and then beyond into the deeper forms of contemplative prayer.  One does not then abandon devotional or active prayer, but one does become less dependent on it.  
       As one matures in prayer one becomes more and more conformed to the will of God and the fruits of this spiritual maturing can be recognized.  These fruits are not visions and extraordinary gifts.  While grace may sometimes be manifested in such phenomena, extraordinary occurances are no sure assurance of spiritual maturity. Indeed, as John of the Cross warns us such “gifts” can offer greater peril to the soul than grace as these gifts are not necessarily from God.  In fact, according to Teresa of Avila, speaking of such things as visions or locutions, as Father Haley was inclined to do, is one of the signs that these visions are not from God but are manifestations of a lack of humility.   The only true sign of authentic spiritual maturity is the conversion of the human heart to God and in particular the increase of charity.  As the soul journeys further and further in God, it becomes more and more like God.  The soul learns to see the world through the eyes of God and the fruits of this are most clearly a depth of wisdom and of compassion that reflects the divine attributes.      I wonder how such a soul would have handled the dilemma that Marcel Guarnizo faced when Barbara Johnson stood before him for communion at her mother’s funeral.  Somehow, neither compassion nor wisdom come to mind. 

Genuine Spiritual Hungers and Pious Charletans

How is it that a Marcel Guranizo or a James Haley can have such devoted followers who swear to their “holiness” while at the same time Church authorities see it necessary to remove them temporarily (Guarnizo) or permanently (Haley) from ministry?   Now granted there are dozens of stories in the history of the Church where good men—and women—fell afoul of the Institution and paid the price for their integrity.  This past week I related the story of Margaret Anna Cusack, the foundress of the Sisters of Saint Joseph of Peace, whose persecution by Archbishop Corrigan led her not only to leave the Sisterhood she had founded but to return to the Anglican Communion in which she had been baptized and raised.  Saint John of the Cross was persecuted by his fellow Carmelites and even imprisoned for nine months in a monastic prison for his “disobedience” to his religious superiors when all he was trying to do was encourage reform among his brothers.  Saint Mary MacKillop, Australian foundress of the Sisters of Saint Joseph of the Sacred Heart, was excommunicated because she wouldn’t buckle under to the local bishop’s demands to control her religious order.  But even as they say that being paranoid doesn’t mean that people aren’t out to get you, so too persecution is no sure sign that one is a saint.   
       I have never met either James Haley or Marcel Guarnizo, but their ecclesiastical status is troubling vis a vis the perceived sanctity about which their defenders are loud and long.   There are degrees of censure.  “Administrative Leave”—the status of Father Guarnizo is probably the lightest form of censure under which he could be put.   It is not, I believe, even a canonical category.  As I explained in an earlier blog (April 25)  it seems that it is just removing him from the public eye while circumstances totally unrelated to his refusal of communion to Barbara Johnson are investigated to make sure that in his involvement with Aid to the Church in Russia and the Educational Initiative for Central and Easter Europe he has done nothing illegal or that would otherwise “embarrass” the Church.  His administrative leave only affects his ministerial status in the Archdiocese of Washington.  He is totally free to return to his home diocese, the Archdiocese of Moscow, and serve there at the will of that Archbishop.  In fact, he probably is free to assume ministry in any other diocese, even in the United States—or the world—with permission of the local bishop. 
       The next most serious step would be for a priest to be deprived of his faculties and this would bar him entirely from priestly ministry but leave his clerical status intact.  Such censure would apply only the diocese where the faculties were withdrawn.  This is sometimes used against religious order priests to force them from a diocese where the Bishop finds them troublesome for their preaching social justice themes or their failure to adhere strictly to liturgical norms, but it could be used against secular clergy as well.   Another bishop, another diocese, is free to admit the priest and restore his faculties for the new diocese.  Suspension a divinis which bars him from public ministry would be the next most serious step and in this case the accused is not able to resume ministry even in another diocese unless and until the suspension is lifted by the priest’s canonical superior who had placed him under suspension. 
      For a priest to be defrocked is the most serious punishment and it is rarely used. It is invoked only when the priest’s behavior would continue to bring extraordinary disgrace on the Church.  The priest is not only prohibited from exercising ministry but is returned “to the lay state”—that is to say he is no longer acknowledged as a priest.  Persistent and public immorality would be one reason this censure would be invoked, but it might also be used to distance the Church from a priest with serious psychological problems for which he either refused or is unable to be treated.  A priest with a sexual addiction that cannot be brought under control might be defrocked.    A man who uses the priesthood or the Church in a serious financial scam might be defrocked.  In both those—and most other cases—the individual usually would first be given the opportunity to resign his priestly ministry voluntarily but the refusal to do so would result in his being defrocked.  
        I don’t know why James Haley was defrocked but the fact that he was not only defrocked but then, according to his defenders, excommunicated is an indication of some very serious misdeed which he will not acknowledge.  It may be that psychologically he cannot accept responsibility for whatever misconduct has brought down this punishment but in any event it is a tragic story not because he didn’t deserve the punishment but because he cannot bring himself to take responsibility for his actions and be restored to the unity of the Church.  If this were a case, as in the case of Mary MacKillop, of an individual bishop, it could be a personal vendetta but if the excommunication comes from the Holy See—as “defrocking” would have to (the local bishop not having that authority)—the charges must have grave weight.      
Reading various blogs and entries on the internet, both Father Guranizo and James Haley have impressed many people with their being “holy priests.”  How is it that people are so easily impressed?  A colleague of mine was a parishioner at Saint Lawrence Church in Arlington where James Haley had once served as parochial vicar.  I remember this story because my friend and his wife left Saint Lawrence, their long time parish, and joined Saint Matthew Cathedral parish across the river in Washington, precisely because of James Haley.  Then-Father Haley would speak at Mass of the “visions” he had while gazing into the chalice of the newly consecrated Precious Blood.  They found this very disturbing without being able to explain precisely why.  Other parishioners, however, ooohhhed and aaahhhed at Haley’s profound “mystical gifts.” 
       Many are taken in by great piety and devotion because they confuse piety with true holiness and this is one of the structural faults in contemporary Catholicism.  A newly ordained Methodist pastor with whom I was speaking recently told me that when she was in seminary she and other Protestant students cross-registered with a Catholic seminary for courses in spirituality because the Methodist faculty didn’t offer any courses while the Catholic theology school had an entire department of spirituality.  Yet, she was surprised that most of the students in the spirituality courses were Protestants or lay people.  Candidates for the Catholic priesthood were too busy with their canon law and liturgics classes to have the room in their schedules to study the mystics.  This corresponds with my own experience where I find the secular clergy in particular to be grossly ignorant of the mystical tradition in Catholicism.   I think these accounts for much of the poor preaching today when Catholics are either subjected to pious drivel or drowned in doctrinal complexities, neither of which belongs in the pulpit.   Modern people have great spiritual hungers and the Catholic Church is blessed with a rich tradition of spiritual teachers such as Francis de Sales, Teresa of Avila, John of the Cross, Ignatius Loyola, Thérèse of the Child Jesus, Bernard of Clairvaux,  Elizabeth of the Trinity,  Thomas a Kempis, as well as a host of lesser known writers—Brother Laurence, Dom Augustine Baker, Marie of the Incarnation, Hadewicjh of Antwerp, Jan Ruysbroeck.  The work of many of these writers is available in the Classics of Western Spirituality series by Paulist Press.   In addition to these great writers of the past, current Catholic spiritual writers such as Thomas Keating, Ronald Rohlheiser, Ruth Burrows, Joan Chittester, Richard Rohr, are writing books that are helping tens of thousands of people—Catholic and non-Catholic alike—on their spiritual journeys.  And of course the work of the twentieth century Trappist monk, Thomas Merton (d. 1968) continues to inspire countless people.  And yet, do we hear about the spiritual journey in our parishes?  All too rarely.  One of my students last year mentioned that her pastor had cancelled a talk by the Trappist monk William Menninger  because  as her pastor told her “contemplative prayer is for monks and nuns, not people like you.”  What a pity.  Richard Rohr writes:
      Much of the Western world has given up on the church and is going other places for wisdom.  Unfortunately, in these other places they are sometimes “willingly filling their belly with the husks the pigs are eating” (Luke 15:16) But we in the church must ask ourselves if we have not been the parent who sent them away because there was nothing trustworthy or life-giving at home.

I think he has a point.

There Is Always More to the Story . . .

The Cathedral of Saint Thomas More,
Diocese of Arlington

In my last entry I mentioned Father Marcel Guarnizo, the priest who had refused communion to a woman at her mother’s funeral back in February and James Haley,  the former priest who allegedly was defrocked and excommunicated earlier this year.  I had a number of inquiries asking more about Mr. Haley and I only know what I have read about him on a number of right-wing websites posted by friends of his.  All in all it seems a tragic story. 
       James Haley was ordained for the Diocese of Arlington in 1987 and was suspended from priestly ministry fifteen years later.  He fought his suspension in Rome but—at least according to his defenders—ended up being defrocked and excommunicated rather than vindicated. 

      Mr. Haley claimed in a court deposition while he was still a priest that until he was ordained he had no idea that there were homosexuals in the Catholic priesthood.  He sure had that misconception cleared up early on.  According to an article by Mark Fellows on the website Daily Catholic    (http://www.dailycatholic.org/issue/2003Feb/febfor1.htm) back in 2003, Haley was assigned to one gay-pastored parish after another.  Now, I’m not saying this couldn’t happen but if Mark Fellows is to be believed, Sodom and Gomorrah looks like a finishing school for young ladies next to the presbyterate of the Arlington Diocese.   And then, as if all these gay pastors wasn’t bad enough, apparently every gay priest in the diocese began going to confession to Haley as he had to see a psychologist for counseling to help him cope with the emotional burden of “knowing what I did not want to know about my fellow priests through confession."

        Let me just take a break here and interject that other priests have told me that the subject of homosexuality in the clergy was discussed in their seminary years and that while it may have been disheartening to hear of this subject, later life experience came as no surprise much less trauma.  Priests have also said that it is highly unlikely that sexually active priests would confess to “such a delicate soul as Haley purports to be.”  In other words, they believe Haley was over-dramatizing his surprise and trauma in the deposition he gave and which Fellows related in his article.
         Deposition—what deposition?  Well that is where the trouble began.  But before I get to the deposition let me continue the narrative.  Haley went to the bishop about his “discovery” that there were gay priests in the Diocese of Arlington.  The bishop at the time was John Keating, aka “John the Good” according to the right-wing detractors of the current bishop.  Nevertheless, as good a bishop as Keating may have been, he told then-Father Haley he was powerless to do anything about the gay clergy and their acting inappropriately.  (“Inappropriately” is, I realize, an understatement if Haley’s stories are true.)  Haley kept accumulating evidence about his fellow priests whom he saw as betraying their vocation.  Now here is where it gets a little weird.  Well, no, it has gotten plenty weird awhile back.  Here is where I get confused.
         Then-Father Haley was assigned to All Saints Parish in Manassas, Virginia, an outlying suburb of Washington DC.  While on the parish computer, he discovered that the pastor had been visiting gay porn sites.  That is a risky thing to do on a computer to which others have access, but hey, we all know about bucks in rut running across eight-lane highways when they get the scent of a doe, or another buck if the first buck be gay.  But that isn’t all.  Apparently the pastor at All Saints wasn’t gay but omni-sexual as Haley also found over 300 love letters from the pastor to a married female parishioner.  And according to Haley the pastor and his lady friend had become a source of scandal to the entire parish, if not to all Loudon County, for their carrying on in hot tubs at parish parties.  (I have yet to go a parish party featuring hot tubs, but then hey I am a Yankee and we north of the Mason Dixon are a bit more, how you say, puritanical?  My parish doesn’t have hot tubs even for Easter baptisms much less for the Altar and Rosary Society annual banquet.   I guess what I am trying to say is that James Haley seems somewhat of a Drama Queen, er, sorry, King.) 
         Well things escalated from there.  The woman in question divorced her husband and like the fork with spoon, ran away with the pastor.  There was an ugly lawsuit from the (justly) aggrieved husband at which then-Father Haley testified and spilled the beans not only about the adulterous pastor-in-rut but about any priest he ever knew of who had a voluntary sexual discharge. Here is where the deposition comes in and if you read the deposition—it is on line—it is a bit over the top but would make a great mini-series.  The Thornbirds looks like the Ave Maria Hour after you read this. 
         But wait, there is still more, between the time Haley discovered the pastor’s combined taste for gay porn and straight sex—which (porn and loveletters) by the way he downloaded onto a disk and gave to the new bishop, Bishop Keating having died—and the deposition, Haley had been transferred to where he could do more “investigating”  Why would any pastor let a man into his house who would go through his computer, his rooms, and his wastebaskets, looking for “evidence” of misconduct? It is one thing to find such material; it is another to actively search. Once the pastor (the guy who likes gay porn and female parishioners) knew the “parish computer” had been raided for the material of his viewing pleasure, it was clear Haley could no longer stay in that house.  So he was transferred to a new parish where the pastor “confided” to him how he was embezzling parish funds and was into gay porn.  My God, is there a straight priest in Northern Virginia???  Or a priest with enough common sense not to tell his associate of his crimes and sins?  Haley reported this pastor too to the bishop and while the pastor was not reprimanded in any way, Haley was transferred to another parish with—you guessed it—another gay-porn addicted pastor.  What are the odds?  Once again, Haley reported the matter to the bishop but this time the bishop demanded Haley resign from active ministry. 
         This is an incredibly sordid affair.  There is no doubt that the pastor in Manassas was carrying on with a married parishioner or that the subsequent pastor had embezzled funds.  The one priest left the priesthood, married the woman (after her divorce); auditors found over $300,000 taken from the second parish.  Some of the other stories Haley related in his deposition seem to be without basis in fact in as that various priests named continue to be in good standing.  Haley has been suspected in some circles of tampering with the evidence he presented to the bishops regarding the alleged misconduct and porn.    
         James Haley had been an engineer before entering the seminary and supposedly had a history of whistle-blowing that led to his loss of employment.  Whistle blowers are not always the heroes of stories.  And sometimes people start fires so they can be the hero who discovers the fires and puts them out.  This pattern of whistleblowing was repeated in the Diocese of Arlington.  Was each and every alarm a genuine fire?  I don’t know.  Father Haley’s defenders are quick to insist it was.
         Earlier this year it was reported that the Holy See defrocked and excommunicated James Haley after a long series of judicial procedures, the records of which are not publicly available.  Haley’s supporters claim that he was framed and railroaded by the Bishop of Arlington in revenge for the deposition he gave regarding the clergy of the diocese.  They also claim that at least one canon lawyer was told that he “would never work again” if he defended Haley in Church Tribunals. While I see why James Haley may have been suspended from ministry, I am sorry to hear that he has been defrocked, but I am curious about the excommunication.  Granted, there was an allegation against Haley that he had, while a priest, absolved a partner (a woman) in a sexual sin and this brings an automatic excommunication that is reserved to the Holy See for lifting.  But that does not seem to be the reason for this excommunication. Such an excommunication is latae sententiae,i.e. automatic, whereas the stories reported seem to suggest that in Haley’s case there was an actual decree of excommunication.  The story is that the woman had taken Father Haley’s hand and put them on her breast to see if he could tell which breast was “the real thing” and which had been reconstructed after surgery.  Father Haley was not a willing participant in this act.  Furthermore, it was not a sin for anyone unless and except in the intent of the woman for it to be sinful and it would thus only be sinful for her and not for Father Haley who actually would be the victim of sexual harassment in this situation.  Third, any first-year seminarian would know enough to tell the woman, if she thought she needed absolution for this act, that is if her intent were sinful, to see another priest.   There has to be something more to incur excommunication, even latae sententiae.  And then—if incurred—excommunication is one of the easiest problems to resolve.  All you need do is repent of whatever you did.  James Haley might not be able to get back into the priesthood for whatever crimen got him defrocked but the excommunication only requires the humility of repentance.  I feel bad for him.  I suspect he is a very disturbed individual.  It is probably good that he is out of ministry but I hope he has friends and a confessor who can help him find the balance to rebuild his life.  It isn’t that he has been persecuted by the Bishop of Arlington and a lavender cabal that runs the diocese.  Like the story of Father Guarnizo and his various “charities” there is more to it that we don’t know.  I am not saying that the machinery of Holy Mother Church is always just, I am only saying that there is more to this story than has been admitted to.  And pardon me for ending a sentence with a preposition.  According to Sister Arrabiata in seventh grade this incurs a penalty worse than latae sententiae.  

Oh, What a Tangled Web We Weave--More on Father Guarnizo

Let’s take a break today from the struggle between the bad guys in the Vatican and the good Sisters and the Leadership Conference of Women Religious and go back to the saga of Father Marcel Guarnizo—the priest who refused communion to Barbara Johnson, a woman who is a partner in a same-sex relationship, at her mother’s funeral.  I have been intrigued by Guarnizo because he seems to have such extraordinary talent and connections that I couldn’t  figure out why he was working as a parochial vicar (associate pastor) at a parish in Gaithersburg Maryland.  Guarnizo was born in Columbia, raised in Northern Virginia, educated in Rome, and ordained for the Archdiocese of Moscow.  Why was he in Gaithersburg? 

     In doing some background work on Father Guarnizo, I found this December 2009 article:  

Father Marcel Guarnizo is founder and chairman of the Vienna-based organization Educational Initiative for Central and Eastern Europe (EICEE), which hosted a conference earlier this month to mark the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, and to reflect on lessons learned from the rise and fall of communism.
EICEE hosted its conference in Zagreb, Croatia, and featured speakers included Robin Harris, former advisor to Margaret Thatcher, and John O'Sullivan, executive editor of Radio Free Europe in Prague.
The keynote speaker was Noble Peace Prize Laureate Lech Walesa, former leader of the Polish Solidarity Movement and former president of Poland. Walesa's address was titled "1989-2009: Lessons Learned from the Fall of Communism."
ZENIT recently caught up with Father Guarnizo at the foundation's headquarters in the Castle Neuwaldegg in Vienna, to talk about the conference, the role of the Church in the demise of communism in Europe, as well as the biggest challenges facing EICEE in its efforts to rebuild the nations of Central and Eastern Europe, which were shackled under communist regimes only one generation ago.

     Vienna based organization.  Castle Neuwaldegg.  Conference in Zagreb.  Radio Free Europe.  Former Advisor to Margaret Thatcher.  Keynote speaker Lech Walesa. Efforts to rebuild the nations of Central and Eastern Europe. wow!

      Further investigation shows that Guarnizo is linked to AID TO THE CHURCH IN RUSSIA.  This organization is responsible, according to its website, for numerous projects helping rebuild the Catholic Church in the former Soviet Union.  Its work is endorsed by a 2001 letter from the then Archbishop of Moscow, Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz.  And this Guarnizo isn’t in the Vatican Diplomatic Corps but associate pastor in one of Gaithersburg Maryland’s three Catholic parishes? As my Yiddish grandmother used to say: Go figure!   

       I’m a historian, not a private detective but…well, historians are always doing detective work though usually about dead people.  I made a few phone calls, several of which weren’t returned.  I did some web searches.  I spoke with a few people “in the know.”  I spent some time with a research librarian.  Well, as near as I can make out, EICEE isn’t based in Castle Neuwaldegg in Vienna but in a rather mundane office building on North Fairfax Drive in Arlington VA.  Educational Initiative for the Countries of Central and Eastern Europe seems to be—and I can only say seems to be—an autonomous organization that is one of a network of independent institutes and organizations that includes the prestigious Neuwaldegg Institute of Vienna.  While the Neuwaldegg Institute does sponsor a number of impressive programs, I can’t find anything equivalent for its American counterpart, Guarnizo’s EICEE.  EICEE does have an impressive “Board of Advisors” including Damian von Stauffenberg, a German financier who comes from one of the most aristocratic of  European Catholic families.  While von Staufenberg is supposedly “President” of EICEE’s board of Advisors, I can’t find anything on any other website than EICEE’s that links him to this organization.  Another advisor is (or was) Vaclav Havel, former president of the Czech Republic and distinguished Czech poet.  Mr. Havel died last December but according to the EICEE website he is still listed on the “Board of Advisors.”  Frank Shakespeare, former US ambassador to Portugal and to the Holy See is also listed on the “Board of Advisors.”  Presumably he is able to give more advice than the Late President Havel, but I am curious about such a distinguished board for an organization that seems little more than an empty office and telephone machine in Arlington VA.  According to the EICEE website, wire transfers, checks, and PayPal all enable you to support the “work” of EICEE.  Of course, but precisely what work?   
       Aid to the Church in Russia is even a bit more, hmmm, shall we say “shadowy?”  It is located in the same office as EICEE and when you call Aid to the Church in Russia, the EICEE machine picks up the call.  Its website shows no activity for about seven years now, but still assures you that that the more you contribute the higher percentage of your contribution goes to the actual work of the organization rather than to administration. In addition to various programs for planned giving ( I am avoiding the word “schemes” lest it give the wrong connotation) such as annuities, charitable remainder trusts, real estate, life insurance and bequests, Aid to the Church in Russia is prepared to accept cash gifts, depreciated property, securities, stocks, tangible personal property, and land.  And again—the more you give, the more goes to charity and the less to “administrative costs.”  Hmm. Sounds somewhat fishy, n’est pas?  I would say something is rotten in the State of Denmark but I think it is actually in the State of Virginia. 
         I suspect that Father Guarnizo isn’t all that he is cracked up to be—or perhaps more than he admits to being.  Now, don’t get me wrong, this could all be legitimate and at least he doesn’t seem to be involved in the Colombian Drug Traffic, but this might explain his being placed on administrative leave more than his refusal to give Ms. Johnson communion. 

      Now I know the various DC area websites—Renew DC Catholicism, Les Femmes, An Archdiocese of DC Catholic—all have been defending Guarnizo’s actions and going after that mean ol’ Cardinal Wuerl and his evil lackey, Bishop Knestout for the unfair way they have treated this loyal and obedient priest.  But suddenly it makes sense.  Administrative leave is exactly the sort of discipline you use to put some distance between the organization and a person who may—or may not—be involved in something that is how shall we say it, “criminal?”  Ouch, that’s harsh.  Let’s just say “not by the books.”  A cop is put on “administrative leave” after he shoots someone until the investigation assures us that he acted appropriately.  A teacher who is accused of misconduct is placed on administrative leave until the investigation determines whether he did something wrong.  Perhaps Father Guarnizo has acted legitimately in these organizations of his, or negligently at the worst.  There is nothing wrong with putting him on administrative leave until you check it out and make sure that he isn’t going to bring down more negative attention on the Church. 

      This is somewhat like the “Father Haley” case.  James Haley is a priest from the diocese of Arlington whom, according to his defenders, has been unjustly defrocked and excommunicated. Guarnizo’s defenders are telling you one side of the story as have Haley’s.  Perhaps that is all they know.  In the Haley case the Bishop of Arlington isn’t telling the rest of the story any more than the Archdiocese of Washington is telling you their reasons for treating Father Guarnizo as they have.  I know it is hard to believe that priests who are as pious as Father Guarnizo or ex-Father Haley could be up to something wrong, but history shows us that men go right from the altar to the most shocking of crimes just as others go from the most vile of sins to great acts of charity.  In the end we are all inextricable mixtures of sin and grace.  As Blessed John Henry Newman once said: none of us are as bad as we could be or as good as we should be." That’s why I believe in original sin.  I can recognize it in others because I know it in myself. And I supposed the reason that God doesn’t need a television is that he can get enough drama watching us.