Dear Polish-American colleagues:

It is important that we not allow our frustrations with malfeasant
American Bishops
to deceive us into accepting and adopting alleged solutions that
conflict with the teachings
of the Roman Catholic Church as authenticated by the Pope and the
Magisterium.

That the present crisis in the Western (mostly American) Church has at
its root, the
confluence of all heresies - Modernism - which includes a loss of
fidelity by our Bishops,
and the rejection of the teaching authority of the Church by many
dissidents - is a
clearly demonstrable fact.

The disgruntled clerics and lay activists are promoting myriads of
damaging novelties in
doctrine, liturgy, hierarchical Church structure, and even church
architecture. They
preach moral relativism in opposition to the behavioral codes clarified
and defended by
theological giants over the millennia - and taught by the Church since
its divine institution
by Christ. Their incredible beliefs include modern sexual (im)morality
as a Biblically
legitimized moral code, and sodomy (the actualization of homosexual
tendencies) as a
moral preference - all the while denying the ephebophylia connection in
95% of the sexual
abuse cases now conflicting the American Church.

The proposal that the American Bishops (some simply incompetent, others
craven, some
personally immoral, and still others clearly heretical) are severely
culpable for the erosion
of the institutional Church in America - is, unfortunately, true. Note,
however, that St.
John Chrysostom once admitted that "the floors of hell are paved with
the skulls of
Bishops".

It is critical that we distinguish between Roman Catholic Doctrine - our
Deposit of
Faith - and the miscreant Bishops who abuse their episcopal authority.
Christ's Church
(and the Deposit of Faith) will endure forever, according to His very
own promise; the
current bevy of bad American Bishops (including several deceased as well
as
living Cardinals) and their complicit supporters will be thrown upon the
ecclesiastical dung
heap of history - as we are already witnessing. (That a small handful
of well-positioned -
but theologically challenged - American prelates had been able to
(abusively) control the
episcopal nomination process in the U.S. gives legitimacy to the
proposal for posting
pre-elevation banns respondable by the laity - as inputs to the Holy
See, regarding each
candidate. It appears, however, that Rome has already addressed
American nominations
by more rigorous and stringent evaluations.)

The Church is neither a structural nor a functional democracy: it is of
divine
establishment, as is the Apostolic institution of the episcopate. They
are
not temporal constructs, and cannot be governed according to models of
secular enterprise such as that of the United States. (The Protestant
Reformation - a
major Catholic heresy based on the rejection of Church authority in
favor of a "universal
priesthood" and the individual's personal inspiration - resulted in its
own democratization -
and is now doctrinally dead - with only the tepid spirit of independent
search for God
surviving - via a plethora of evaporating sects, continuously
subdividing into increasing
irrelevance.) Therefore the siren calls of such Church-democratizing
advocacy
organizations as Call to Action and Voice of the Faithful must be
rejected for the
numerous heresies that they have continued to propose - even prior to
the explosion of the
sex scandals.

The monarchical nature of the episcopacy ensures doctrinal unity. This
has been
characteristic of the Church since Apostolic times - with consistent
Papal and episcopal
control over the nomination and appointment of Bishops. Records as far
back as the first
and second century confirm this. (This empowerment has never been
laity-based, and
any suggestion of subsequent papal/hierarchical usurpation is
demonstrably untrue.)

While it is fact that at different periods of history and circumstance
the laity did participate
in the nomination of potential Bishops, the authority of final selection
and elevation were
never theirs to exercise.

To be sure, Roman Emperors as well as Medieval kings intruded in the
nomination and
approval process for selecting Bishops - and additionally added temporal
ruling powers to
the spiritual authority of many bishops. However, this had no relevance
to their spiritual
authority - which was conveyed to them by the Pope.

In the German Concordat of 1448 the Pope granted Cathedral chapters
(e.g. Cologne) the
right to elect bishops; but, this legitimacy proceeded from that
delegation of Papal authority
- and not because of any assumed right of their own. In 1516 the King
of France was
similarly granted a legitimacy to elect Bishops, but again, pursuant to
a conscious
delegation of authority by the Pope.

Without such specific Papal deputization, neither kings nor laity have
ever had any
recognized power to appoint the Bishops. This includes the laity of the
Early Church.

Christ's Church is led by the Bishop of Rome, the Pope. The Vicar of
Christ is
commissioned to teach, govern and sanctify through the hierarchy of
Bishops in
communion with him - Bishops who are obligated by their oath of fidelity
to him. The
Modernist clamor for democratizing the Church has no legitimate place in
Christ's
institution.

Disappointment with our American Bishops runs deep. Some (including
this writer) have
written to Rome, requesting a Papal Legate authorized to evaluate, judge
and remove our
many failed Bishops. (However, this does betray American impatience.)
The Pope has
already initiated many reformative actions that will cleanse the Church
in accordance with
successful strategies used in the past.

Bishops are directly and explicitly accountable to the Holy Father, and
to God; they are
morally - though not "administratively" - accountable to the laity. In
our behalf, they have
been in fact called to brutal account by the Church's enemies in the
secular media. (One
should note that God has often used His enemies as an instrument to
cleanse His people.)

Historically the Church has overcome heresy (Arianism, Albigensianism,
Etc., extending to
today's Modernism) by theological and philosophical argumentation -
which can take
hundreds of years. Rarely has the Pope used excommunication (and
episcopal removal)
of dissident leaders as a prime remediational tool. The tactical reason
for this is to avoid
the kinds of permanent schisms that have been catalyzed by comingled
philosophical
pre-commitments, local politics, staked reputational capital and
emotional attachments - as
opposed to the original theological dissenting views themselves. With
the intellectual death
of each heresy the previously dissident worshipers and their progeny
have invariably
returned to full communion with the Holy See - since they never overtly
left the
institutional Roman Catholic Church.

Historically again, the cycle of Church crises have always displayed
three sequential
periods: fidelity, corruption and (authentic) renewal. And repeatedly,
the Church has
always returned to its roots to cleanse itself. It is doing so today,
despite resistance by
many morally prodigal American bishops.

Now is the time for fidelity - just as the newly installed archbishop of
Milwaukee (who
has recently succeeded a notorious dissident) has pleaded.

This writer and his wife have just returned from Poland - where the
Church remains
vibrant, and free from the kind of heretical contamination foisted on
the American
Church by "progressive" dissidents who misguidedly claim special insight
from a specious
"Spirit" of Vatican II. The Polish hierarchy, the clerics and the laity
remain in harmony
and in fidelity - after a millennium of Roman Catholicism in their
country, both before and
after the Vatican II Council. It was an absolute pleasure to attend
Mass in a Polish
Church.

It is instinctively implausible to blame Church hierarchy and the
episcopacy for
the marginalization of our Polish heritage in America. While some
Bishops are insensitive
to the connection between Church and heritage, assimilation into the
American culture is
arguably the main culprit. With a diminishing number of "practicing
Poles" in given locales,
it is difficult to sustain Polish heritage - and to credibly demand that
the local Bishop
subsidize it. Alternatively, this is up to the local pastors and
congregations - who directly
keep heritage thriving in many communities - including Erie. (At the
gate in Terminal #5
in Chicago, the Polish language was used by everybody - airline
personnel as well as
American passengers.)

In the final analysis the issue comes down to motivated people and their
dollars. (Noting
that financial support - or the withholding of it - is the most
definable and effective tool
that the laity have at their disposal.)

There are no facile solutions for reelecting the actualization of any
European heritage in
the United States. (This is certainly not on America's "politically
correct" radar
screen.) Ecclesiastical democratization is the clearest nonviolation.

Eugeniusz Dolecki September 17, 2002