Fr. Dave Dwyer, host of the Busted Halo Show, calls in to clear up some misconceptions and misunderstandings about the seal of confession. Gus recaps his conversation from yesterday about the seal of confession. Australia is trying to pass a law that would require priests to report any of instance of child abuse revealed to them in the confessional. Gus admits to misspeaking yesterday when he said that a priest can reach out to a penitent outside the confessional if he feels necessary. After talking with Fr. Dave Dwyer, yesterday after the show, he understood that that is not so. Gus gives a mea culpa and adds that something like that can only be done at the penitent’s behest.
Also, on the surface, the title of Gus’s 60 Second Reflection seems inflammatory. It reads “Adolf Hitler in Heaven?” It’s based on today’s Gospel reading from Matthew where Jesus tells the parable of the landowner who hires workers for his field throughout the day and, in the end, pays them all the same wage. The ones who worked the longest objected to him paying them the same as those who only worked one hour. The landowner explains that he’s living up to the deal they made and it’s his money to give. He asks them if they’re jealous of his generosity. The story is really about God and who He brings into His Kingdom and that His mercy is His, and only His to give and we don’t know who’s in heaven and who’s in hell.
Gus reads an article about a VA priest, Fr. William Aitcheson admitted to being a member of the Ku Klux Klan as a young man in the 1970s in an article he wrote for the Arlington Catholic Hearld. In the early 1980s, Fr. Aitcheson had a radical conversion of heart, but not before serving 60 days in jail and four years in probation for threatening to kill Coretta Scott King. Due to the current racial climate embroiling Virginia and the nation, Fr. Aitcheson has taken a temporary leave of absence.
And, Gus reads an email he got recently from a listener named Bob who tells Gus of his anger at the Catholic Church because its leadership does not call out politicians, particularly Catholic ones, who support abortions. It’s caused him to stop attending mass. Gus gets listener reaction.
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