Wilbur, Wilbur, Wilbur!

The Diocese of Orange just can't stay out of the news.

Over at Patrick Madrid's Blog (http://patrickmadrid.blogspot.com/) old Monsignor Wilbur Davis (pic above) has made it into the news again.

"You Call This "Maturity"? - May 26, 2009

I respond here to a letter-to-the-editor from a Catholic priest which appeared in the Daily Pilot. The letter's headline is: "Mature Catholics Welcome Obama," referring to the recent controversy over the University of Notre Dame's decision to confer an honorary doctorate on the President of the United States, who just  happens to be an implacable foe of the Catholic Church's teaching that abortion is a grave moral evil.

The obvious implication of the headline [most likely chosen by the Pilot editors] is that Catholics who did not approve of this stunt are "immature." That would include, of course, the 70+ U.S. Bishops and 350,000+ other Catholics who publicly denounced the Notre Dame debacle. According to the Pilot and, presumably, the priest who wrote the following letter, they are the immature ones, and those who laud Notre Dame's actions are the ones exhibiting "maturity."

The author of the letter to the editor is a Monsignor Wilbur Davis, a priest in Southern California. "

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A few years ago old Wilbur was in the news when some of his e-mails were leaked.

 

In his brilliant article, The roots of the Catholics' scandal, Orange County Register commentator, Steven Greenhut wrote:

"A 1998 letter from the diocese's current vocations director, Fr. Wilbur Davis, to Director of Communications Msgr. Lawrence Baird, also deals with topics in the Bulletin. Fr. Davis depicted Catholic Family Radio as extremist. He called Mother Angelica, the TV nun who offers kind-hearted but traditional Catholic opinions, an apostle of 'religious intolerance and arrogance.' He criticized one of the nation's well-respected traditional Catholic colleges [Franciscan University of Steubenville] as 'the home of Catholics United for the Faith, a pathetic organization of bitter people.' (The roots of the Catholics' scandal, by Steven Greenhut, Orange County Register, June 9, 2002)"

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Back in 1988, Davis locked horns with then Orange Bishop Norman McFarland.

 

"MAY ALL BISHOPS BE SO BOLD: In late March, Bishop Norman McFarland of the diocese of Orange sent a letter to Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez (D-46th District), who is running for re-election, telling her she could not continue to address Catholics from the pulpit. The bishop's letter warned Sanchez, a staunch pro-abortionist, that it is "incumbent upon you to give witness to the consistent ethic of life that should animate all conduct, but most especially political conduct." The bishop said he was "becoming increasingly alarmed by your visits, I want to share with you my inquietudes in this matter before more public gestures on my part become necessary."

"Beginning in early March, Sanchez made the rounds of parishes, including at least four in the Orange Diocese. According to parishioners at St. Boniface in Anaheim, Sanchez was introduced from the pulpit by the pastor, Monsignor Wilbur Davis. He introduced her as a fellow Catholic but made no reference to her pro-abortion stance or her support of President Clinton's veto of the partial-birth abortion ban. Sanchez appeared at St. Callistus church in Garden Grove on Respect Life Sunday. According to one parishioner, when she confronted the pastor, Father Rudolph Preciado, with Sanchez' pro-abortion stance the next day, he told her that most priests are too busy to keep up with current events."

(See: http://www.sdnewsnotes.com/ed/notes/0698note.htm)

 

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And this guy was the vocations director in

Orange for eight (-8-) years?!

Comments

[Atlanta Catholic]

Monsignor Wilbur Davis's personal example of spiritual immaturity was to inform the students at Servite High School that if they were to meet the Blessed Mother they would not find anything exceptional about her. In fact, they might think that she was dark and unattractive.

This act of astonishing immaturity took place in 1999 on the feast of the Immaculate Conception at Servite High.

Now, if Monsignor Wilbur Davis can make this embarrassing and spiritually immature remark about the Mother of God in a homily to high school students, he has no business speaking about the maturity of Catholics.

Monsignors who live in spiritually immature glass houses should not throw stones at the Blessed Mother or faithful Catholics who do not support a pro-abortion President Obama.

I wonder how many truly mature and qualified Catholic applicants who wanted to enter the seminary were denied by Monsignor Wilbur Davis while he was in charge of vocations? There is no priest shortage. There is an abundance of immature leadership that thrives on selecting, promoting and accepting evil.

[Servite83]

Atlanta Catholic,

Are you a Servite Alumnus?

Loyolalaw98
(Servite Class of '83)

[Atlanta Catholic]

Sorry Loyolalaw 98, I am not a Servite Alumnus. However I did get the opportunity to meet and speak with the new Provencial of the Servite Order who visited the school.

[Gary]

Re: Msgr. Wilbur Davis, here's a little blast from the past, illustrating how "supportive" he is of priestly vocations:

http://www.losangelesmission.com/ed/articles/2002/1102rk.htm