"eMANgelization" of the Catholic Church

Yes, that's right, "eMANgelization"..

What does that mean, you might ask? Well..

To answer that, one has to go to the website.. A site designed to attract men to the Catholic Church, or more to the point, to attract men to the priesthood.. And what a site it is. I first came across this site after reading an article about American Cardinal Raymond Burke. Cardinal Burke is worried that feminists and their influence on the Church have driven away "manly" men and instead, left it with nothing more than, well, feminised men who are apparently the type to either be gay or paedophiles or who are the type of men who masturbate. Cardinal Burke is also against masturbation, you see. But most of all, he is angry about feminists.

In a recent interview with The New Emangelization Project, a website dedicated to attracting men to the church, Burke focused his attention on the “radical” feminists whom he believes have disrupted catholicism, blaming them for the prevalence of priests molesting children.

Burke charged the feminist movement with commandeering the church and forcing leaders to “constantly address women’s issues at the expense of addressing critical issues important to men,” and said that it was “feminization” that led some priests to sexually abuse children:

The Church becomes very feminized. Women are wonderful, of course. They respond very naturally to the invitation to be active in the Church. Apart from the priest, the sanctuary has become full of women. The activities in the parish and even the liturgy have been influenced by women and have become so feminine in many places that men do not want to get involved. [...]

We can also see that our seminaries are beginning to attract many strong young men who desire to serve God as priests. The new crop of young men are manly and confident about their identity. This is a welcome development, for there was a period of time when men who were feminized and confused about their own sexual identity had entered the priesthood; sadly some of these disordered men sexually abused minors; a terrible tragedy for which the Church mourns.​

Sooo.. Women are to blame for paedophile priests raping children.. Oookay then.. I clicked on the link and.. well... Cardinal Burke has some issues. Okay, a lot of issues.

But the website itself..

Designed specifically to draw men, and repel women, and as they keep reminding readers, they are looking for "manly" men, the website is a wonder to behold. At first, I thought it was satirical. Because surely, this has to be a joke, I thought to myself as I clicked on the menu tab titled "Perfect Manhood of Jesus".. And was flooded with choice words about how the manhood of Jesus (figuratively I hope... but really) is perfect. A joke?

No, this is a serious website. The menu option in their 'About' menu offered interesting descriptions of the organisation and what they are about:

• ABOUT
  • THE NEW EMANGELIZATION PROJECT
  • THE “MAN-CRISIS” IN THE CATHOLIC CHURCH
  • THE NEED FOR NEW ARDOR
  • A FOCUS ON EVANGELIZING MEN IS NEEDED
  • GUIDING PRINCIPLES
  • THE CATHOLIC “MAN-CRISIS” AND WHAT TO DO ABOUT IT
  • ABOUT MATTHEW JAMES CHRISTOFF

​

Clicking on Matthew Christoff's link:

The New Emangelization Project urgency is driven by this idea: There can be no New Evangelization without a New Emangelization, creating generations of Catholic men who are on fire for Jesus Christ and His Holy Catholic Church.

Matthew is also one of the co-founders of CatholicManNight.com, a parish-based Catholic men’s evangelization effort that is focused on meeting and knowing Jesus Christ in Eucharistic Adoration, Confession, table fellowship and discussion. In addition, Matthew evangelizes through AwedByJesusChrist.com, a website dedicated to helping people meet and be awed by Jesus Christ.

​

Aside from sounding like a priest themed gay male strip club, you have to wonder at the terminology used by this site to supposedly draw men in, well, "manly men" in to the Church. And the emphasis on the "manly" man is strong throughout this site. And emphasised in his spiel against women and feminists. The battle lines are being drawn. Women are killing the Church and the fallout from that is apparently men turning to rape children as their manliness is stomped on by the women filled Churches, not allowing men to fulfill their needs as God intends..

There are so many things wrong with that site, that I wouldn't even know where to begin. But what it clearly points out is that the Church has a very long way to go with women, gays and their rights. By placing the blame for priests raping and abusing children on women, they are once again trying to absolve themselves of all responsibility for their having coveted and protected priests who have committed such heinous crimes in the past and present.

Senior Cardinals being interviewed or giving time to such sites clearly shows that the Church itself has such a long way to go that I doubt they will ever actually dig themselves out of the dark ages. And if such sites are popping up across the internet trying to draw male readers to the Church, then it is clear they have no intention of changing their stupid ideology and are instead, more interested in protecting the inherent blame game, sexism, paedophilia and abuse of homosexuals. While yes, I did laugh at this site, I cannot find myself laughing at the depravity this site is trying to protect within the Church. It only means the cycle will just keep going..

 

I don't think female priests and allowing priests to marry will save them at this point.

They have dug themselves in quite deep and they are not going to relent. Priests who abuse have been protected for decades. They have been shifted around, even moved to the Vatican to escape prosecution.

Their views of women is also well known. From their protests and threats to third world countries about the use of contraception, to the secondary role women have always played within the organisation.. But this is taking it up a notch.

You have to wonder who else within the hierarchy of the Church shares his views that women, primarily feminists, are to blame for priests raping children because women's influence in the Church has made the men in the Church less manly. It is an astounding and frankly moronic accusation to make.

And I have to say, clicking on the links from that site has taken me to places I did not want to know about. There is this push to radical forms of belief and all focused on what it takes to be a real man, or as they keep reiterating, "manly" man. While Burke's interview was to whine about women's rights, with quite a bit of focus into how bad it is for men that women are now marrying and *gasp* demanding rights *gasp*, a lot of these other sites are more focused into the "MAN"..

 

But they aren't denouncing it.

There is absolute silence.

He was not demoted because of his offensive views. He was demoted because he criticised the Pope.

Having read through the links connected to the one in the OP, it appears to be a whole movement. And as much as I do laugh at the terminology used in the "eMANgelization" website because, to be honest, it is decidedly camp, I also recognise it for what it is. While the wording is camp, the message is decidedly homophobic. And these sites are misogynistic.

There has been a constant lack of taking responsibility within the organisation. The denials, the lies and the manner in which they have had to be dragged kicking and screaming to even admit that some of the clergy were abusing children and they are still trying to sweep it under the rug in the hope that no one notices. Burke blaming women and the role of women in the Church is yet another way to avoid taking responsibility for the role of the Church in fostering and protecting those who did abuse. And he is expressing these views without sanction.

 

Is it though?

Catholicism is unique in that its leadership is so well defined. And they all remain silent.

Look at the recent act of terrorism in Paris. Imams around the world are condemning it. While the two cannot be compared, obviously, there is still that element of religious leaders denouncing the bad. Look at Judaism and when some Rabbi's decided to declare that it was acceptable to murder non-Jews. Jewish leaders rose and spoke against it. With the Church, you get absolute silence. So they either ignore it and hope it will go away, or it is just the way things are. Or alternatively, they throw a lot of money at abuse victims and hope they will just disappear. I am yet to hear a single priest, bishop, cardinal or pope declare that Burke and his ilk are not Catholic and do not represent or speak for their religion. Instead, we get silence..

You see it Judaism, Islam, when people from those religions do evil deeds in the name of their religion. Religious leaders speak out, denounce the individual. Not so with the Church. With the Church, they protect, foster and defend the indefensible and at times, they even promote, such as in the case of Cardinal Pell. If anyone should have been excommunicated, it was the then Archbishop Pell, who went out of his way to protect a paedophile within the Church. He moved him around and when the authorities finally caught up with him, he defended him, walked with him to court, threatened other priests who testified against him (including the parish priest of my parents church, who disappeared and was moved to another parish after he testified against Pell's little child raping buddy).. Pell also had hints and accusations that he may have abused in the past. He was promoted within the ranks of the Church and made a Cardinal and then made a mockery of a commission in Melbourne, to investigate what the Church knew about abusive priest. Pell defended the Church's refusal to hand over the documents and protected the Church and its coffers. Not a single religious leader within the Church came out and denounced him.

 

All religions have a long way to go before they improve. A few generations at best.

 

I think all are still in the denial phase.