Cardinal McCarrick, the former Roman Catholic archbishop of DC has been effectively suspended as a result of credible allegations of sexual misconduct. It seems likely that the Catholic Church had at least some warning long ago that he might be a scandal bomb waiting to go off.
In any event we Orthodox should not be patting ourselves on the back as we look down our nose at the Roman Church. It is common knowledge that we have our own "lavender mafia" in some of the jurisdictions in North America. On which note; we need to stop making unmarried diocesan priests bishops. Bishops should be drawn from monasteries, and only monastics with a long and solid reputation. For that matter we should really not be ordaining unmarried men to the priesthood unless they are monks.
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I remember reading somewhere (I think it was in Fr Alexander Elchaninov's Diary of a Russian Priest, but I can't be sure; it was decades ago) that while the vocation of marriage is difficult, and the monastic vocation is difficult, the attempt to live a single life in the world is the most difficult and dangerous of all. I have always thought that a wise observation.
I would add to your advice that if a monk is to be ordained priest or bishop, he should be a real monk -- living in a monastic community -- and not just someone who takes pro forma monastic vows immediately before ordination. ISTM that historically the reason that bishops are chosen from among the monastics is not because there is anything wrong with the married state, but because the prayer-focused life of a monastic community is good formation for one who would be a chief pastor. A man who has taken only pro forma vows in order to become a bishop doesn't have that formation to offer.
Hi Chris. I completely agree and in fact was attempting to make the same argument, though perhaps not as clearly as have put it.
I am not confident that the monasteries are safe from this corruption, either. What about all the scandals regarding the Ephraimite monasteries? Or the allegations that Fr. Seraphim Rose's skete was a bathhouse?
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