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The former bishop of Broome faces trial on twenty-six counts arising from alleged alcohol-saturated gatherings he hosted for young Aboriginal men at properties under Church control. These events, if proven, constitute a direct betrayal of the flock entrusted to his care and a calculated inversion of the shepherd's office.
The pattern reveals not isolated lapses but a settled contempt for the moral order the Church has proclaimed since the Nicene Fathers required bishops to be blameless and sober. Such conduct reduces the apostolic charge to a license for predation upon the vulnerable.
From the earliest centuries the undivided Church condemned precisely this species of clerical debauchery, seeing in it the triumph of the City of Man over the City of God. The Reformers later sharpened that witness when they demanded that ministers exhibit the same personal holiness required of every covenant household.
The accused prelate embodies the Managerial Priesthood that treats sacred office as a platform for private appetite rather than a stewardship under the King of kings. His plea of not guilty merely prolongs the contest between the visible institution and the moral law it once defended.
Augustine warned that when shepherds devour the sheep the earthly city advances its claim upon the Church's visible structures. The present case confirms that warning with clinical precision.
The faithful remnant therefore cannot await further procedural theater. They must withdraw support from any diocese that shields such men and must reconstitute parishes under elders who fear God rather than the next headline.
Restoration of discipline begins with the recognition that no office shields a man from the judgment Scripture pronounces upon those who cause one of these little ones to stumble. The time for polite silence has passed.
