In the face of silence (as in the absence of proof), we are left with theories. Since Thursday, when parish leaders from St. Sabina Roman Catholic Church met with Cardinal Francis George, there has been silence.
No one is talking. Not St. Sabina's embattled pastor, the Rev. Michael Pfleger. Not the parish's effective No. 2, Kimberly Lymore. Not the cardinal. Not the archdiocese.
A hush has fallen over the five-alarm controversy that has roiled religious and political circles from Chicago to Katmandu (or so it felt) since Pfleger let fly a snarky torrent of racially loaded criticism of Hillary Clinton in a sermon in late May.
The cardinal placed Pfleger on leave for a "couple of weeks" so the longtime activist/rebel-priest can reflect on what he said and did and maybe achieve some new perspective. Pfleger and his loyal parishioners balked, as did many of us who admire Pfleger for his tireless work on behalf of the least of those among us, even if his bombastic style sometimes makes us cringe.
But maybe the cardinal was onto something, after all. Maybe we all needed to take a few deep breaths.
I don't know what transpired at that meeting between St. Sabina leadership and the cardinal, but it must have been monumental. (Parish leaders have said they would not speak publicly again until a statement is read to the "parish family" at mass this morning.)
The cardinal and Pfleger have a long, acrimonious history. They rub each other the wrong way much as they each rub a lot of other folks the wrong way. Both men of God can come across as arrogant and stubborn. And both have had their share of rhetorical missteps.
I wonder whether the cardinal wasn't, in some way, acting from his own difficult experience when he told Pfleger to step away and let things cool down.
In April 2002, I was standing overlooking Vatican City with George, who was waiting to be interviewed by a TV reporter, when his cell phone rang. It was an aide in Chicago telling him his comments that day at a news conference with other American bishops about the clergy sex-abuse scandal had caused a near-riot at home.
"There is a difference between a moral monster like [John] Geoghan, who preys upon little children, and does so in a serial fashion, and to someone who, perhaps, under the influence of alcohol, engages in an action with a 17- or 16-year-old young woman who returns his affection," George had said.
I was in the audience, and I knew he was in for it. But he didn't have a clue until his spokeswoman called from Chicago, where the archdiocese had been flooded with calls from angry Catholics.
"But there's a clinical difference," I recall the cardinal stammering into the phone.
Yes, but that's not what people needed to hear at that traumatic time. He should have known better. And he caught holy hell for it.
One Sunday in October 2006, the cardinal was a guest at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, the largest Catholic theological school in the nation. He delivered a homily during a special service for the heavily international student body and made some keen observations about the way the United States is viewed abroad, remarks for which he quickly caught heat.
"The world distrusts us not because we are rich and free," he said. "Many of us are not rich, and some of us aren't especially free. They distrust us because we are deaf and blind, because too often we don't understand and make no effort to understand.
"We have this cultural proclivity that says, 'We know what is best, and, if we truly want to do something, whether in church or in society, no one has the right to tell us no.' That cultural proclivity, which defines us in many ways, has to be surrendered, or we will never be part of God's kingdom."
They were unusually forceful words from George, who normally shies from addressing anything political in public. Some critics howled he was anti-American, that he'd crossed a line.
I thought his comments were incredibly astute. I agreed with him in the same way I agreed with the point Pfleger was trying to make about racial entitlement in his sermon at Trinity United Church of Christ. His crucial point was lost, forever I'm afraid, in the over-the-top dramatics he used to mock the former first lady.
"I remain hopeful that this could be a grace for [Pfleger] and for everybody," the Rev. Donald Senior, president of Catholic Theological Union, told me, referring to the forced leave of absence. "This must be killing him. I mean, everywhere he turns, people are throwing brickbats, and it seems endless . . . Just take a deep breath. Why not? He deserves it."
We all do.
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