Hey everybody,
Five years ago this week, a new chapter began in the Church’s life.
On June 20, 2018, the Archdiocese of New York announced a credible child abuse allegation against then-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick. Later that day, two New Jersey dioceses disclosed that McCarrick had been accused of more abuse, and then a torrent of allegations against him began.
Soon after, a grand jury report in Pennsylvania made clear the breadth and depth of clerical sexual misconduct in one part of the Church. New allegations against McCarrick continued to surface, and Catholics across the U.S. looked for answers.
In those weeks, five years ago, many of you were among the hundreds of thousands of Catholics demanding answers: How did this happen? How far did it go? What would reform look like?
The 2018 summer of scandal changed a lot in the Church. For us, it was a time of personal and professional change too — we discerned in that summer that God was calling us to use Catholic journalism as an instrument of public accountability, as an aid to the reform and renewal of the Church.
We had not yet founded The Pillar. But we set out on a path to do serious, investigative, unflinching journalism about the Church’s need for reform. We believed that light would be the best disinfectant. We believed — and we still do — that bringing forward the Church’s problems would invite Christ to heal them, and to renew the Church.
Eventually, that conviction led us to launch The Pillar. We have since become a trusted, reliable, and effective mechanism of independent public accountability in the Church’s life.
We’ve broken hundreds of stories. We’ve seen Vatican and diocesan policies change because of our coverage, and we’ve seen bad actors resign or be held accountable — often after threatening to sue us.
When Catholics called for reform five years ago, we at The Pillar decided to do our part. And we’re not finished yet.
Today, we’re working on stories about moral, financial, and practical reform in the life of the Church.
Like us, you know that there are many areas in the Church’s life which need the healing presence of Christ — and you might also know that our work is often the only thing which brings those areas to light.
We do this work as faithful Catholics — in fact, we do this work because we’re faithful Catholics. We believe in the Church’s teaching and authority, we believe in the sacraments, we believe in the promises of Jesus Christ. And we believe in the power of the Holy Spirit — we believe that hundreds of years from now, the Church might see the challenges of today as the beginning of an extraordinary renewal in the Church’s life.
We hope for that possibility, and we aim to do our part.
We hope you’ll be a part of that work, too. The Pillar is subscriber-funded, by design, to get away from the influence of big money or clickbait on our coverage. We aim to cover all areas of the Church — fearlessly, and without favor — and we absolutely depend on you to do that.
If you know that after McCarrick, the reform of the Church has only just begun, well, then you know how much The Pillar is needed. Bishops promised five years ago a new era of accountability and transparency. If everyone has forgotten those promises, we haven’t.
Please, keep it going. Make our work possible. Help us to serve Christ and His Church through serious, courageous, and unflinching journalism.
If you got this email, you’re a free subscriber to The Pillar. We’re glad you’re a reader. But we need you on the team.
Please become a paying subscriber today, and whatever level you can.
Thank you.
May Jesus Christ renew his Church.
Yours in Christ,
JD Flynn
editor-in-chief
The Pillar