Dissenting Catholic theologians in Germany have issued a public
statement calling for radical change in the Church.
George Weigel sees
that statement as a classic example of chutzpa, since the
theologians seem to be suggesting that the Church should “transform
itself into another liberal Protestant sect by conceding virtually every
point at issue between classic Christianity and the ambient culture of
the postmodern West.”
Weigel notes that the dissenters claim that the Church has fallen into
an unprecedented crisis because of the sex-abuse scandal.
Leaving aside
the crisis that German Catholics faced with the rise of the Nazi regime,
Weigel asks: “what about the crisis of faith that emptied German
churches over the past two generations, such that weekly Mass attendance
in urban areas hovers around 5-10 percent?”
These theologians, he
hints, might ask themselves what role they have played in that decline.