Lessons from the Father Alberto Affair
by Fr. Roger Landry - May 15, 2009
Over the past week, a scandal has ripped through the heart of Spanish-speaking Catholicism and spilled over into the national network morning television programs.
At the center of it is Fr. Alberto Cutié, a 40 year-old priest of the Archdiocese of Miami, who, though largely unknown to most English-speaking Catholics, has for a decade been the country's most well-known Spanish-speaking cleric. He has been dubbed "Padre Oprah" for his work as a host of television talk shows on Telemundo, weekly programs on EWTN Español, call-in shows on Radio Paz and Radio Peace, syndicated advice columns in Latin America newspapers, and best-selling Spanish self-help books. He has also been the popular administrator of the parish in the heart of Miami's libidinous South Beach. His stardom had to do not merely with his skills in effectively articulating the wisdom of the Catholic faith in both Spanish and English, but also, in a celebrity-driven age, because of his movie-star appearance. He made the Catholic faith attractive on multiple levels to the media and the masses alike.
Last week, Father Alberto's parish and priestly apostolates were thrown into chaos as 25 paparazzi photographs of him amorously interacting with a 35 year-old divorced woman on a Miami beach appeared in a Mexican entertainment magazine. He was immediately relieved of his parish assignment and archdiocesan duties by Miami Archbishop John Favalora and given time and space for him to pray about his future. In a public statement, Fr. Alberto acknowledged the scandal and apologized to all those whose faith had been hurt by his actions. He seemed to recognize the truth of the old Latin aphorism corruptio optimi pessima, "the corruption of the best is worst of all," and that his fall from grace is more than just another tale of a priest unfaithful to the promise of chaste celibacy.
At the same time, however, multitudes in the media and among some Spanish-speaking Catholics have rushed to his "defense," energetically trying to place the blame for his predicament not on his infidelity to the promises he made at his ordination, but on the Church's discipline of priestly celibacy. The Church needs to change its practice, they have argued in demonstrations, articles, and internet commentaries, or else it will lose talented and inspiring priests like Fr. Alberto, who has reluctantly become the "anti-celibacy poster boy" for those who have long had issues with the Church's discipline.
Fr. Alberto is now trying to discern what to do next. In two television issues since the photographs appeared, he has demonstrated that he has deeply conflicting thoughts and emotions. To Univision last week, he apologized that people had taken scandal, but showed no compunction over the sins that caused the scandal. "It hurts that the actions of a human being can hurt so many people," he said. At the same time, he excused his actions "because I believe that I am a man. I never stopped being a man when I put on my cassock. Do I regret having hurt people? Yes, but I don't regret loving a woman."
In an interview on the CBS morning show on Monday, however, it seems that the voice of his conscience was slowly making itself heard. "I don't support the breaking of the celibacy promise," he said. "I understand fully that this is wrong." Whereas on Univision he had said he was looking for a situation in which he could peacefully reconcile his "love for God" and "love for a woman" — like leaving the priesthood and possibly the practice of the Catholic faith — by Monday he was admitting that among his options was ending the relationship. This latter outcome is one for which all Catholics should pray.
There are many lessons that those in the Church need to learn from Fr. Alberto's fall from grace and the enormous reaction it has engendered.
First, we need to recognize that there are many who celebrate, rather than mourn, the failure of priests to live faithfully chaste lives and who are willing to take advantage of every priestly disgrace to try to dismantle the discipline of celibacy. The fundamental reason is not to try to embarrass the Church or to advance a married clergy, although these are sometimes present. The deepest motivation seems to be to show that the Church's teachings on chastity in general are unrealistic or impossible. If priests cannot be expected to live by the teachings of the Church on chastity, then how can the Church expect teenagers to be abstinent, engaged couples to wait until marriage, married couples to be faithful until death, divorced individuals not to remarry, and those with same-sex attractions to be continent their whole life long? The happily chaste priest is an icon that the Church's teachings on human sexuality, although challenging, can be lived joyfully, and many iconoclastically want to tear down this symbol to excuse or enable sexual license.
There is a second, more general, point about why many rejoice over and try to "defend" priestly sins. If a priest cannot be faithful in his promises to God, then how can others be held to fidelity? When any member of the Church sins, the only adequate Christian response is to try to help the person — through prayer, fraternal correction, and concrete help toward rehabilitation — repent and seek forgiveness from God and others; it's not to cheer the person on. Even though it obviously didn't seem like it to him, Fr. Alberto objectively chose Barabbas-in-a-bikini over Jesus Christ, betraying him with kisses and worse over two years. Sins against priestly chastity are not so much violations of a "Church discipline" or a breach of loyalty against an "institution," but a betrayal of Jesus Christ, one that led to his crucifixion.
Third, the importance of priestly chastity as an eschatological sign has only grown in importance as our culture's sexual morés have continued to decline. The happily celibate priest shows the Church and the world that something is more important than the good of human sexuality, that Someone is more worthy of love than even the most adorable human being. When a priest exchanges his covenant with God for earthly relations, when he turns his back on heavenly joys for earthly cathexis, those who seek to live for the moment rather than for eternity take solace — and their salvation is endangered.
Fourth, priestly love affairs are never victimless: a priest cooperates in sin with someone he is supposed to serve and help save. Rather than leading that person to God, he facilitates the person's alienation from God for the sake of fulfilling his personal desires. By the nature of his supernatural fatherhood, every such affair is spiritually incestuous. By the nature of his chaste consecration, every such liaison is not just sinful but sacrilegious.
Lastly, it's clear that priests in general need a far deeper chastity formation than they typically receive in seminaries. They need to be trained, specifically, in how to respond properly when they fall in love. Just like a husband who falls in love with a woman at the office needs to take appropriate measures to maintain his fidelity to his wife and to God, so a priest who falls in love needs to be trained how to respond in accordance with the sacred promises he's made to Christ and his bride. Father Alberto said, "I don't regret falling in love because I never looked for love. I didn't plan this." True, but while priests or spouses cannot help being attracted to others, they still have the freedom and the duty to be faithful to those to whom they've previously committed their lives — or else betray those people and those promises.
The Fr. Alberto affair is an opportunity for the whole Church prayerfully and materially to support both him and all priests — in the midst of a culture that often seeks to see them fall — to remain faithful to the Lord Jesus who called them and whose merciful love and grace will never abandon them.
Father Roger J. Landry is pastor of St. Anthony of Padua in New Bedford, MA and Executive Editor of The Anchor, the weekly newspaper of the Diocese of Fall River.
