For all the criticism I level at the Catholic Church’s current leaders on Earth, my motive is not hostility but filial love.
Imagine a princely and ancient mansion that’s been handed down in your family since the clan patriarch built it by hand 2000 years ago. It stood as a rock amid the storms of all the passing ages. Now the current trustees of the estate, your Boomer parents, have mortgaged the grand old house to the hilt to pay for hideous “renovations” in imitation of the McMansions that occupy the rest of the street. Worse, they are harboring dodgy workers–some of whom came not through the door but over the wall and are making trouble in the neighborhood. A small but highly visible number of gardeners have committed the most atrocious crimes against the tenants’ children. Yet your parents harbor them.
You could disown your parents, go your own way, and abandon the princely house of your fathers, washing your hands of any responsibility for the future of your patrimony. That is the way of the rootless, atomized man of the world. You would not be the first to take it.
The faithful, tradition-minded disciple of Christ gives filial correction to his wayward parents in a spirit of charity. He does not abandon his ancestral home, which the Builder has promised will stand till the end of time. Even if his parents refuse to listen, he trusts the Builder. For does not the Builder also have a vineyard which fell under unworthy management? And did He not remove those wicked managers?
The order of bishops–including the Pope–is not the head of the Catholic Church. Jesus Christ is the Head of the Church, which is His Body. The first fruits of the Church have already been gathered into heaven. The gates of hell cannot prevail against them.
Every day, this reality is revealed to ordinary people–even if only in part. Despite the sins–many of them grave–of her members, God calls his elect into full communion with Him, and some of those who are called answer.