Lately it seems we've been having a lot of examples of Bishops Behaving Badly; and in the diaries about these issues, invariably someone has a comment complaining that people are "Catholic Bashing". "Don't blame all Christians for the acts of a few high-ranking religious leaders whom their parishioners are compelled to follow!" goes the complaint. And to a certain extent I can empathize with it. (Despite the fact that I come from a church which still regards the Pope as the Antichrist, but that's a completely different matter).
I suppose I shouldn't be surprised to learn that this is nothing new, but I didn't expect to find an example of this coming from the 14th Century.
Recently I've been reading Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, the great collection of stories written at about the time the English Language was starting to develop into its modern form. Some of the stories are pious; some are bawdy; some are tedious and some are rollicking. Nearly all of them are retellings of stories from older sources.
One which seems to be original with Chaucer is "The Canon's Yeoman's Tale." The narrator of the story is a yeoman who is a servant to a church canon, a type of clergyman, who happens to be an alchemist. The Yeoman knows quite a bit about alchemy and has a low opinion of it and of his master. He proceeds to tell a story about how another alchemist canon (not his master, he insists, but a different canon), swindled a simple-minded priest. (The translator of the volume I've been reading suggests that Chaucer had once been conned by an alchemaic charlatan and that this story was his revenge).
But before he launches into the story, the Yeoman offers the following apology:
If, holy canons of the church, it rouses
The thought that I am slandering your houses,
Since it is of a canon I am speaking,
Reject the thought! God knows, there is some sneaking
Rascal in every house and God forbid
That all were judged by what one madman did.
Slandering you's no part of my intention,
But to set right the evils that I mention.
Nor is my tale aimed specially at you;
It will apply to many others too.
Among the twelve apostles our Creator
Found faith in all but one, who was a traitor.
Then why should the remainder be to blame
That stood in innocence? I say the same
Of you, except for this, if you will hear:
If any lurking Judas should appear
Among you, fling him out I say betimes,
Before you're shamed and beggared by his crimes.
Ander therefore take no umbrage, sirs, I pray
And in this instance listen to what I say.
--(from "The Canon's Yeoman's Tale" tr. Nevill Coghill)
It seems rather familiar, doesn't it? The disclaimer that the actions of a few wicked men should not be held against the great majority who are innocent. This is to mollify the clergy in his audience.
But the Yeoman is too cynical to let them completely off the hook. He adds this kicker: when a wicked man does appear among the flock, the decent, righteous folk ought to do something about them. Otherwise their own reputation will suffer.
Isn't that what Cardinal Dolan has been complaining about? That the Church is being "shamed and beggared" by the crimes of a few Bad Apples?
He'll get no sympathy from the Canon's Yeoman. A crime is a crime, even when it's committed by a clergyman, and ought to be brought to light.