I was saying before, talking with some of my friends over dinner, that that I really, personally agree that the root problem behind the sexual abuse and the cover-up of sexual crimes among the clergy is clericalism. I really think that, you now, the casting of priests and bishops as a cast seperate from everybody has not only created conditions where abuse happens and proper accountability does not happen, but really separates the body of Christ in a way that I can illustrate with a joke that anybody under the age of 40 will understand: there was a show, a weekly show, called the “Lone Ranger”….

Another thing a friend of mine says is that the Vatican Council, Second Vatican Council, produced a little over 50 years ago ‘new wine’ and for 50 years we have been trying to stuff it into old wine skins. And what does Jesus say? “They burst.” This is also a spectacular bursting of the wine skin.

But you have to wonder about the tone of the letter, because the tone is sarcastic, biting…, ironic.

There is [sic] a lot of questions I have about the thing but I find it really hard to believe that-that Pope Francis is guilty.

Well, if, if you are asking whether people are quizzed about their sexual orientation when they come to the seminary, well as far as I know, they are not in the Archdiocese of Newark. If they, uh, in the formative process people are exhibiting, I would say, an immature definition of, or a immature – evidence of sexual immaturity or, you know, an acting out, heterosexually or homosexual, well then, that’s an issue-that’s an issue.