‘The Cardinal’ rules to being Catholic

The other night, I rooted through my old DVDs, literally dozens of them, looking for a movie I needed to see.

Never having been pregnant, this was the closest I came to a visceral craving, something deep in my gut that sent me from box to box, cupboard to cupboard and even into the basement looking for this Holy Grail of cinema.

When I finally found it, stashed between an old phone book from Eastern Delaware County (do people actually still have land lines?) and an empty bottle of Woolite, I cradled it to my chest, snatched a few Butterscotch Krimpets and settled down for almost three hours of entertainment.

The movie was “The Cardinal,” Otto Preminger’s masterpiece about the trials, tribulations and triumphs of a Catholic priest during the first half of the last century.

I have always loved this movie, partly because my mother loved it and would drop whatever she was doing when it came on air.

And because I lived in Rome and Florence for a good while and the scenery was a warm reminder of happier times, and partly because it presented the image of a church that I adored, and still adore.

The thing that I truly love about “The Cardinal” is the fact that it reminds me so much of the church I grew up in.

It is an example of traditions trapped in amber, where having a priest in the family was considered a great virtue and an even greater privilege.

Communities looked upon their pastors as true leaders and not simply first among equals.

There was something of the divine in the chanting of Latin and the scent of incense.

Churches were both monuments to the spirit and transcendent works of art, and Rome really was the center of the world.

That church is gone. Some would say it’s directly related to the sex abuse scandal that has shattered so many lives and alienated others who were never touched by abuse but who cannot forgive the abusers and, by extension, the church that housed them.

Some had already left the spiritual reservation, rejecting church teaching on abortion (seriously, good riddance!), birth control, celibacy, the ban on female priests, and all of the other things that represent the San Andreas fault between the secular world and, well, “my fault, my fault, my most grievous fault.”

A lot of people who left the church before the scandal became an issue simply did not want to have to feel repentant, to feel guilty, to feel that what they might want to do was not what they should do.

A lot of them might try and make it seem like they simply couldn’t find comfort in the patriarchal set-up, so to speak, and that they needed to search for a “higher” fulfillment.

I think that the vast majority just didn’t like the rules, and went looking for a lessdemanding institution. Good for them. The last person you want on your team is someone who mopes in the dugout and then strikes out when it comes to performance.

As for me, I’m not going anywhere.

The church scandals have angered me, saddened me, frustrated me and in many ways surprised me, but they have not convinced me that I should move on.

Frankly, there is no legitimate place to “move” toward. I am a Catholic, and I will die a Catholic, and that’s that.

Many readers will find that simplistic, anti-intellectual and that new favorite accusation, masochistic.

But if you watch “The Cardinal,” you will know why I stay.

Beyond the love of God, which is common to all the great faiths, and beyond a desire to transcend the limitations of our earthly lives, Catholicism brings me security, beauty, continuity, a glimpse of the infinite, and the promise that one of these days, I might even see a Hollywood gorgeous priest at the pulpit.

And while you shake your head over that shallow heresy, I will be kneeling in the pew, praying for your good soul to receive my beloved God’s grace.