Just a bit of chronological context: 'INTRODUCTION TO CHRISTIANITY', which became an almost-instant theological classic, was published one year before Jorge Bergoglio was ordained a priest.
ALWAYS AND EVER OUR MOST BELOVED BENEDICTUS XVI
One can only be aghast at the chutzpah of Cardinal Errazuriz, who represents Latin American in Bergoglio's Council of Nine cardinal advisers, for his reaction to
the low turnout and general negativity generated by the pope's visit to Chile in late January. A reaction that included even accusing sexual abuse victims of Father
Karadima - and possibly of Mons Barros as well - of seeking to profit from their 'allegations'!
This is the same cardinal who, as Archbishop of Santiago, chose two decades ago to shelve any investigation of Karadima, and who had to eat crow when in 2011,
the Vatican CDF judged Karadima guilty of the major accusations brought against him by the same accusers who have since accused Karadima-mentored papal
protege Barros not just of being complicit with Karadima but also of taking part in some of the sex crimes himself. Errazuriz has simply managed to make things
look worse for himself and to embarrass the pope further in doing so. Why Bergoglio chose him, to begin with, to represent Latin America in his advisory
council was always questionable - because his ostensible cover-up for Karadima was well-known to all.
Chilean cardinal in pope's crown council
blames Mons. Barros, summer vacation,
and lack of a spokesman for mishaps
of Bergoglio's recent visit
Errazuriz also accuses Karadima victims of trying to profit from their allegations
by Nicole Winfield
Mar 2018
The retired archbishop of Santiago is trying to deflect criticism for Pope Francis’s troubled trip to Chile in January, blaming everything from the summer weather to an “absentee” spokesman for the lower-than-expected turnout and negative press coverage during the visit.
Cardinal Javier Errazuriz, a top papal adviser, wrote an extraordinary letter to the bishops of Latin America that insists the Pope’s trip wasn’t a failure, but was “highly positive.” The National Catholic Reporter first reported the letter and its contents Friday.
Errazuriz did not take responsibility for a sex abuse scandal that shadowed Pope Francis’s visit or how the handling of allegations involving Fr Fernando Karadima affected the views of Chilean Catholics toward the church and the papacy.
Errazuriz took no responsibility for the lingering effects of a sex abuse scandal on Chilean Catholics and their views about the church and the papacy.
The former archbishop initially shelved the investigation of Fr Fernando Karadima’s abuse of young parishioners and has admitted he didn’t believe the victims. A Vatican tribunal convicted Karadima in 2011 and sentenced him to a life of penance and prayer for his sex crimes.
Independent polling firm Latinobarometro has pointed to the Karadima scandal as the leading cause of the church’s loss of credibility in Chile. The country ranks lowest among the 19 in South and Central America in esteem for the Pope.
Pope Francis’s trip was dominated by the Karadima affair and the Pope’s support for a Fr Karadima protege, Bishop Juan Barros. Some of Fr Karadima’s victims have accused Barros of having witnessed their abuse and ignored it. The criticism reached such a fever pitch that Pope Francis decided upon his return to send a Vatican investigator to Chile.
[Only after much criticism even from the usually friendly secular media of his insistence that the accusations against Barros were nothing but slander. Not to mention that he did not meet with any of Karadima's victims while he was in Chile, though they requested a meeting and he did meet with other abuse victims while in Chile. Yet the AP reporter omits these relevant information whereas she went out of her way to background Errazuriz's responsibility for the Karadima fiasco in general!]
In the letter, Errazuriz accused Karadima’s victims of trying to profit from their allegations of a cover-up, calling the claims slander aimed at bolstering a civil lawsuit against the Santiago archdiocese. Victim Juan Carlos Cruz denied the charge, saying
complaints about Barros long predated any litigation.
“Errazuriz is trying to confuse things and create a distraction to avoid his responsibility in all the cover-up and his poor management of the Chilean church that led to this disaster we are in now,” Cruz told The Associated Press. “This is not about any money.”
Pope Francis sparked an outcry in Chile in 2015 when he appointed Barros bishop of Osorno over the objections of some in the church hierarchy. They had proposed that Barros and two other Karadima-trained bishops resign and take a year sabbatical.
Members of Pope Francis’s sex abuse advisory commission expressed concern that if Barros didn’t “see” the abuse when it was all around him, he could not be entrusted with protecting children in Osorno.
During his trip, the pontiff enraged Chileans when he strongly defended Barros, calling the accusations against him “calumny.”
Errazuriz, in his letter, blamed some of the negative media coverage on Barros’s decision to speak with journalists and jointly celebrate “probably an excessive” number of Masses with Francis. He said the “absentee” spokesman for the Chilean bishops’ conference should have stopped both Barros and news organisations to keep the focus on the Pope.
“We needed a Navarro-Valls, able to politely stop the journalists and tell them that the Bishop of Osorno wouldn’t be giving any more interviews,” Errazuriz wrote, referring to St John Paul II’s longtime spokesman and spin master, Joaquin Navarro-Valls.
[Well, where was Errazuriz all the time the pope was in Chile? Wasn't he right there with him? Why did he not take it upon himself to contain the fiasco himself? And how poorly organized was the Chile trip - with which Errazuriz as a senior adviser to the pope and former Archbishop of Santiago ought to have occupied himself - that the bishops' conference did not have a spokesman or responsible media officer to handle what everyone knew was already a very explosive situation regarding Barros?]
Errazuriz also blamed summer vacations for the low turnout, as well as the selection of venues that were far from city centers and not serviced by public transportation. [Again, did Errazuriz never bother to inform himself of the arrangements being made for the trip which surely started months ago? If he did he might have pointed out these not unimportant details to the organizers so appropriate changes could be made. Fine time to point these out after the trip!... It all goes back, really, to the man who chose Errazuriz to be one of his top advisers, the same man who also chose Cardinal Marx to represent Europe in the Council of 9. A man is judged significantly by the company he keeps. Add Errazuriz to the growing list of Bergoglio henchmen who ought to be blacklisted in the hierarchy.]
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 11/03/2018 19:19]