I Think Bp Barron Was About To Get Involved

Via The Pillar:

Illinois Senator Dick Durbin declined on Tuesday a lifetime achievement award he was scheduled to receive from the Archdiocese of Chicago’s office of human dignity and solidarity.

Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich issued an announcement on the subject at the same time senior leaders at the U.S. bishops’ conference were confidentially preparing to release a statement on the Durbin award, and had already informed the Vatican’s U.S. representative of their plans, according to several sources close to the process.

The President of the USCCB is Abp Timothy Broglio of the Archdiocese of the Military Services, who I'm confident is a wise, capable, and holy man, but neither his name nor his position is well known, probably not even to rank and file US Catholics. On the other hand, Bp Robert Barron is now the most prominent Catholic spokesman since Abp Fulton J Sheen. While as many as ten current Catholic bishops had already spoken out publicly agaionst Cdl Cupich's move, most appear to have waited for clearer guidance, whether from the USCCB or the Almighty Himself, and Bp Barron was probably more aware than any of the gravity of such a move.

But clearly something was in the works. From the link,

Conference spokesperson Chieko Noguchi declined to comment Tuesday afternoon, but several senior U.S. sources told The Pillar that some conference leaders were confidentially preparing a statement on the subject, which they expected to issue in coming days, presumably from the president’s office, or from the conference’s administrative committee.

And Vatican and senior U.S. sources told The Pillar that conference leaders had notified the apostolic nunciature in Washington that a statement related to the Durbin award was expected to be issued by the bishops’ conference.

It is not clear what prompted Durbin’s withdrawal or Cupich’s Tuesday afternoon announcement. Some bishops suggested to The Pillar Tuesday that a pending USCCB statement catalyzed the move, with Cupich not eager to be seen as opposed by the body of U.S. bishops, or that the U.S. apostolic nuncio urged Cupich to shut down the award before public division among the bishops intensified.

Bishop of Springfield, IL Thomas Paprocki was among the first to speak out against Cupich, and he appears also to have been the architect of the solution:

In an interview on EWTN’s “The World Over with Raymond Arroyo” on Sept. 25, Paprocki called on the Chicago cardinal to either withdraw the award or Durbin himself to decline it.

A spokesperson for Durbin did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Durbin appears eventually to have recognized this would be the best path:

Durbin told NBC News he was surprised by "the level of controversy" and had withdrawn from accepting the award "because the reaction has been so controversial against the Cardinal who proposed it, and I see no point in going forward with that.”

The Catholic News Agency reported that US bishops were "grateful" and "relieved" at Durbin's decision:

Arlington, Virginia, Bishop Michael Burbidge, meanwhile — who previously served as chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ pro-life committee — said on Oct. 1 that he was “relieved” at Durbin’s decision.

. . . Numerous other U.S. bishops had previously expressed disapproval over the proposed award, including Bishop James Conley of Lincoln, Nebraska; Bishop James Wall of Gallup, New Mexico; and San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone.

In a statement on X on Oct. 1, Cordileone extended Durbin “complements” for withdrawing from the award, which the prelate described as a “great display of magnanimity.”

“In such a contentious issue that threatens even greater division, Sen. Durbin chose to take the higher moral ground,” the prelate said. “Such an act required tremendous humility on his part. We need more humility in our country.”

So what we seem to be hearing is this: Cdl Cupich's intent to give Sen Durbin an award had become unexpectedly controversial, we might speculate in particular in the wake of Charlie Kirk's assassination on September 10, since Kirk, although not Catholic himself, advocated for positions on reproduction, marriage, and sexuality that Catholics also support. It appears that neither Cdl Cupich nor Sen Durbin recognized the strength of such support among Catholics.

Neither, I suspect, did all but a dozen or so US bishops, at least at first.

Durbin’s backing down from receiving the award came following a CatholicVote petition on its online CatholicVote Action Center, where users could directly message Cardinal Cupich’s office, asking him not to honor Durbin for his support of immigrants. As of Monday, more than 20,000 had signed; by Wednesday morning, signatures had surpassed 40,000.

It sounds as though, by last weekend, the US bishops felt the need to get ahead of the problem. If more bishops began to speak out against Cupich, this would at minimum be an embarrassment, but pressure from rank-and-file Catholics was apparently rising, enough for the USCCB to report to the papal nuncio that there could be an issue, and they might be forced to make a statement. And if the USCCB made a statement, this could well provide cover for Bp Barron to make an observation of his own, however cautiously worded.

This would amount to an enormous loss of face, principally for Cdl Cupich, who simply doesn't have the prestige of Bp Barron, and any statement Barron could make short of unwavering support for Cupich would detract from Cupich further. But then, Cupich was a clear Francis favorite, and this would be a blow to the Francis faction in the Church, when Leo, at least at this point, wants to avoid schism and keep the Francis faction more or less on the reservation.

So Leo issues an official on one hand, on the other hand, dialogue, blah blah blah, Durbin declines the award, Cupich saves face, and schism is avoided. But I think the real driving factor was the threat that Bp Barron would get involved. Even Leo understands about Bp Barron. Barron understands his position, too, and has been handling it mostly quite well.