Magari

Magari is a good Italian word; it means 'if only it were true', or something like that. I wanted to say magari when I read on Catholic News Agency about one Bishop Hilarion Alfeyev, who looks to be a young man, (that's his picture on the left; does his crown look rather like an upended fancy flowerpot to anyone else?) who courageously addressed a major ecumenical gathering in Switzerland on the subject of the drawbacks of liberal Christianity. Hoping that CNA does not mind, I'll quote the short article in full.

Russian Orthodox bishop Hilarion Alfeyev, the Moscow Patriarchate’s delegate for international relationships, said on February 15 that liberal Christianity is on its way to extinction.
"Liberal Christianity will not survive long and political correctness within the Christian environment is destined to die," said during a conference addressing the Ecumenical Council of Churches at Geneva, Switzerland.
The Orthodox bishop also criticized the words of the Anglican primate, Rowan Williams, regarding the "inevitability" of introducing the "sharia" (Muslim Law) in England.
"I would like to warn you about the perils of liberal Christianity," a trend, he said, that has sharply divided the Christian community in the last decades.
"Today we can't talk about Christian morality because the standards of 'traditional' and 'liberal' Christians are dramatically different and the abyss between these two branches of Christianity is growing," he added.
"We are hearing from some Christian leaders that marriage between a woman and a man is not the only possible option for the creation of a Christian family, that there can be other type of couples and that the Church should be 'inclusive' by recognizing such lifestyles and grant them a solemn blessing," Hilarion also said.
The Orthodox bishop also said that "we have heard that the human life is a negotiable value, to the point that it can be aborted in the mother's womb." "What has happened with Christianity? In a confused and disoriented world, “Where is the prophetic voice of Christians?" he asked.
Finally in a veiled criticism to the Anglican primate, Hilarion said that "it is not our duty to defend sharia, promote alternative lifestyles or secularized values. Our mission is to announce what Christ himself announced".

I think that it is certainly true that liberalism is sterile; I have very rarely found somebody converted to liberal Christianity; usually they have slid there from a more orthodox position. What I fear is that the liberals currently in charge would rather pull the house down around them than permit a more orthodox position to prevail.
We have a new Dean (=Vicar Forane) locally, and I have heard him speak perhaps half a dozen times during the last few months. On each occasion, whether preaching at a 'Penitential Service' or simply speaking to fellow clergy, the burden of his talk has invariably been about how universally awful everything was before Vatican II, and the only problem since is that we haven't wiped out the pre-V.II mentality nearly thoroughly enough. He's a kind man—he has even celebrated the Extraordinary Form, which he detests, for people who have requested it, and I've got to credit him for that. In fact on a personal level I quite like him (I don't think the compliment is returned, though). But I really would not want to live in a Church according to his design.
Certainly Pope Benedict has done wonderfully well to reverse the trend, but I suspect that the liberals are simply doing what I fear; they know that they are, for the most part, younger than the Holy Father, and that all that they have to do is wait……
Will Pope Benedict have safeguarded his most welcome reforms for the future? I pray and hope so. It has been so wonderful in these last couple of years finally to have hope and see things coming alive once more.