A Visitor Takes A Closer Look At The Treco Case

From a visitor this morning:

I read your blog and decided to listen to Fr. Treco’s sermon (which was not appropriate to be given during a Mass- he should have given a homily instead) [available on YouTube here -- jb.]. I was curious if I could pick out the problematic parts. I made a list as I listened. I then read the “Timeline: A Case for Fr. Treco” blog. Funny thing, my list matched up exactly with what Bishop Lopes pointed out to Fr. Treco.

Fr. Treco disingenuously claims Bishop Lopes has not pointed out exactly which words in his sermon were the problem. In Bishop Lopes defense, Fr. Treco’s sermon was so incredibly verbose that if you were to quote exactly the phrases that were blantantly wrong, the document would almost be a novelette. I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess Fr. Treco has not actually read all the documents that were produced by the Second Vatican Council. I’m also going to go a little further out the limb and guess Fr. Treco’s theological formation and foundation is way more Protestant than Catholic as he either misunderstands or is willfully misrepresenting papal actions and words, Councils and Synods, as well as Catholic doctrine. Here are a few examples:

Fr. Treco claims that the conciliar popes in three iconic actions (as ) Peter, set aside the mandate given to him by Our Lord, Jesus Christ. Fr. Treco says Pope Paul VI refused to rule the Church of Christ, Pope Paul VI would not defend the Bride of Christ, Pope John Paul II would not honor the Gospel of Jesus Christ alone. None of the iconic actions by these popes cited by Fr. Treco were Ex Cathedra (meaning they had to be believed by the faithful under penalty of mortal sin) nor were the actions at the time or afterwards purported to be new dogma or doctrine. In essence, Fr. Treco either misunderstands the doctrine of papal infallibility or has purposely slandered those popes to make it seem like Catholics should not follow their other teachings (that ARE magisterial).

Fr. Treco rants about Vatican II not being an infallible Council. Yes, Vatican II was a PASTORAL Council, meaning there were no extraordinary proclamations (meaning infallible because they said so), however, there were ordinary proclamations and clarifications that were outlined, and, as a valid Council of the Church, the proclamations must be considered magisterial, meaning they should be promulgated to the faithful. Here Fr. Treco pulls what in Logic class would be called a false syllogism because first two propositions are not both true. Fr. Treco claims,

• By their fruit you will know them
• The Fruit of Vatican II was rotten
• Therefore, Vatican II was rotten and to be ignored.

Seems true, but wait, was the fruit of Vatican II rotten? Imagine there were three apple trees planted in a triangle. Tree A was Vatican II, tree B was the Sexual Revolution and tree C was Relativism. Fr. Treco goes to gather the apples that fell from these three trees. They are all on the ground in the middle of the triangle. Selecting only the rotten apples, Fr. Treco announces that all the rotten apples came from the Vatican II tree so it must be cut down.

But did all the rotten apples only come from the Vatican II tree? How many came from the other trees? Were there no good apples from Vatican II? This is why I surmise Fr. Treco has not actually read the documents of Vatican II which did not so much promote new teachings as it offered clarification of and new encouragement to follow Church doctrine with a renewed zeal.

Because Fr. Treco refuses to recognize or recant his obviously erroneous statements, and is in willful disobedience to his Bishop, I am not surprised they gave him the boot. Sadly, it is obvious by the Timeline blog and the host of comments in support of this nonsense that there are a whole lot of Catholics who are as poorly catechized as Fr. Treco.

I tip my hat to Bishop Lopes for dealing with this mess quickly and decisively. Good on him.

I agree fully with the visitor, but I'm still concerned with the circumstances that led up to, and surround, the heresies Treco expressed. The first is how this situation came to be -- I think there must be some consensus here, from Bp Lopes to outside lay observers like the visitor, that Treco was poorly formed as a priest. There must have been a general understanding of this at Msgr Steenson's level, and at the level of the authorities who proposed Treco's ordination to him at the time. Yet he was ordained.

Second, Treco was sent to Minnesota without any real supervision, although there must have been some understanding that the man wasn't fully capable. It appears, from the bits and pieces that have reached me, for instance, that he would celebrate daily mass as at the hospital chapel ad orientem. Especially to congregants who weren't used to the practice, this might have seemed unusual, disturbing, or even disrespectful, and prudent advice to Treco might have been that sometimes, with some audiences, versus populum is a better pastoral choice.

I assume he never received this sort of advice -- quite possibly the problem never got to Fr Perkins for him to offer it. Reasons for this might be the simple circumstance of inexperienced staff in Houston trying to supervise clergy a thousand miles distant, or some combination of complacency and obtuseness in Fr Perkins that might lead him to ignore the potential problems with that situation. Again, the remarks Fr Perkins made in Calgary suggest he sees reasons someone like me might attribute such qualities to him.

I agree with the visitor that it was commendable for Bp Lopes to have moved quickly and decisively in Treco's case, but I'm still convinced that the case was brought to his attention, when the circumstances of the ordinariate might have suggested to him earlier that better communication and closer supervision of his clergy were urgently needed. The Calgary problem is simply another symptom of the same poor formation and poor supervision that seem prevalent in the ordinariate. I still think the deficiencies of the North American ordinariate are recognized by the US bishops, and it was probably their action that forced Lopes's hand.

The question is how many other problems are festering out there among a collection of men who are almost as poorly formed, with judgment almost as poor, and with the same lack of supervision.