Leon J. Podles :: DIALOGUE

A Jew decides to go to Rome to see what the center of the Church was like. He investigated the papal court. He realized that

Not only did they indulge in normal lust but without the last restraint of remorse or shame even in sodomy and to such an extent that the influence of whores and minions was of no little importance in currying favor. Various other attributes he found them to posses besides lechery. They were gluttons, swillers guzzlers in general and devoted to their bellies like brute beasts. Investigating further he saw they were all avaricious and greedy for money.

People have asked me who I can remain a Catholic after I discovered what was going on in the clergy. Well, the Jew, after seeing the corruption of the papal court tells a Christian

For all I can judge it seems to me your Shepherd and consequently everyone else with him do their utmost, exercise every care, wit and art at their disposal to ruin the Christian faith entirely and ban it altogether form the world, instead of striving to be its foundation and mainstay. Yet when I notice their aim is not fulfilled, but that your religion continually grows and becomes more bright and clear, it seems to be very evident that the Holy Spirit is its foundation and support, so it must be the truest and holiest of all faiths.

So the Jew becomes a Catholic.

A lawyer who represented abuse victims and saw the depths of corruption in the Church nonetheless became a Catholic. Like Boccaccio’s Jew, he decided that God most be at work in a Church that survives the determined eforts of the clergy to poison it.