President Obama and the first family spent Easter at an AME church in D.C.’s poorest neighborhood.
The two-hour service included a lot of singing, shouting and foot-stomping. “If you came in here to sit and be still, I’m sorry. Move down the street,” said one associate minister, drawing a loud cheer, according to WaPo. “Excuse me, first family, but we like to get crazy up in here. You might see shoes flying, hair flying. But we are praising the Lord.”
The mood was a little more subdued at the Vatican, where a top cardinal again defended Pope Benedict XVI against charges that he mishandled cases of predatory priests before he became pontiff. “Holy Father, the people of God are with you, and do not let themselves be impressed by the gossip of the moment, by the challenges that sometimes strike at the community of believers,” said Cardinal Angelo Sodano, according to NYT.
The cardinal referred to the apostle Peter’s account of Jesus during the passion: “When he was reviled, reviled not again.” Benedict then hugged Sodano, but didn’t mention the scandal in his Urbi et Orbi address.
A number of other Catholic bishops forcefully defended the pope from the pulpit yesterday. Anti-Benedict protests are growing in Britain, according to the AP, where the pope is scheduled to visit in September, and some lawyers are seeking to remove his head-of-state immunity from sex abuse lawsuits. Speaking of England, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams said the Catholic Church in Ireland had lost “all credibility” then apologized. The bishop of Muenster, Germany, was attacked by a guy with a broomhandle.
Meanwhile, accusations against top Catholic officials, including Benedict and the highest-ranking American at the Vatican, continue to emerge. B16 waited 14 years to defrock an Arizona priest his own bishop described as “satanic,” and Cardinal William Levada, while he was archbishop of Portland, Ore., removed a priest then let him return to limited ministry without telling local Catholics.
A Catholic priest charged with sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl is working in his home diocese in India and has no plans to return stateside, sex abuse victims in Malta want the pope to apologize when he visits next week, and NPR explores how National Catholic Reporter has covered the scandal. The AP’s Rachel Zoll says it’s like 2002 all over again for the church.
In non-sex abuse news, houses of worship in the U.S. are facing foreclosures at an unprecedented rate, says Reuters. Churches in Rhode Island are just glad that it stopped raining, and an Alabama evangelist is facing life in prison for killing his wife and sticking her in a freezer.
Photo of the first family at prayer courtesy of the White House.
