WHAT’S WRONG WITH THE CATHOLIC CHURCH
(#3)

• Two billion dollars in losses later, the Church still is bent under the weight of the Clergy Sex Scandals...not because the Laity does not forgive the stupidity of the Hierarchy, but because the Hierarchy are totally intimidated and thus immobilized in the discharge of their duties. 
• They fail to endorse State Constitution initiatives declaring a fertilized ovum a human being.
• They melt before the arrogance of State legislatures like Connecticut that pass legislation requiring all hospitals...even Catholic Hospitals...to dispense the Plan B abortifacient to any requesting patient. 
• They almost lose their authority in Connecticut to administer the finances of their own Dioceses.
• Then they wonder why they are treated by political leader, opinion makers and their own laity as irrelevant. 
• Meanwhile, they deal with issues that have historical basis but greatly diminished current relevance and no concommitant claim to infallibility while having very high alienation potential for their flock and for outside observers: subjects like: 1) insistence on the "unitive" function of the sexual act, even between committed married couples (no jurisdiction); 2) equating in the public eye the prohibition against contraception with the abomination of abortion, thereby promoting inadvertently abortions during the last four decades; 3) insisting that homosexuality is an inherently abnormal and sinful "lifestyle" despite growing scientific evidence to the contrary; 4) fuming against adoption by mature, committed and loving homosexual partners, with multiple foster homes over years of instability as the default position; 5) decrying the availability of extra fertilized ova - the result of in vitro fertilization that has become standard procedure in this society - for stem cell study with parental approval, where the alternative is guaranteed destruction of those unfortunate human beings; 6) decades of continued undermining of the thrust of Vatican ll while promoting "clericalization" at the expense of real roles for the Laity, the "Body of the Church".