Clerical Error: A True Story

by Robert Blair Kaiser

Twenty-nine years old, newly married, and fresh from the Society of Jesus, where he had spent ten years as a novice and scholastic, Bob Kaiser was picked for one of the most exciting jobs in journalism of his Time's reporter at the Second Vatican Council. In the words of Michael "No reporter knew more about the Council; had talked with more of the personalities, prominent or minor; had more sources of information to tap. Sunday evening dinner parties at his apartment became a rendezvous of stimulating and informed persons. In the English-speaking world, at least, perhaps no source was to have quite the catalytic effect as Time on opinion outside the Council and even to an extent within it." Much of inner story of the Council-its personalities, machinations, maneuverings between progressive forces and the old guard-was told in Bob Kaiser's bestseller of the early sixties Pope, Council, and World. This is a different story, one so raw and personal that it could only be told some forty years later in a very different church and by a much matured Bob Kaiser. The heart of the story is how Bob's wife was seduced by his friend, the Jesuit priest Malachy Martin, and how Martin ("a man who could make people laugh in seven languages)" persuaded Kaiser's other clerical friends (including notable bishops and prominent theologians) to send him to a sanitorium. The story is at once hilarious (Martin was one of the great clerical con men of all time) and sobering. The "clerical error"--the refusal to see what Martin was up to--was as much Kaiser's as that of his older clerical friends who defended their fellow priest simply because he was a member of the club. Their naivete and their blindness only mirrors the church's inability to deal realistically with any issue touched by birth control, remarriage after divorce, priestly celibacy, clerical child abuse, or the ordination of women. Bob Kaiser did eventually grow up. He knows the official church has a long way to go.

Hardcover

First published March 11, 2002

Reviews

[Steve Wiggins · Rating 3 out of 5]

I confess that I read Clerical Error because I wanted to learn about Malachi Martin. Robert Blair Kaiser first became known to me through a documentary on Martin. Like Donald Trump, Martin is a polarizing figure. Kaiser was the skeptical voice of the documentary, as I discuss on my blog post (Sects and Violence in the Ancient World) on the book. The reason, he was quite clear, was that Malachi Martin had an affair with his wife. This book, however, is a strange mix of things. Part biography, part reportage on Vatican II, and part exposé of an allegedly lecherous Jesuit priest.

The early part of the book describes how Kaiser became a Jesuit. The training is downright medieval, but, like many, I admire the discipline of the Society of Jesus. I think that enforced celibacy only leads to problems, however. Kaiser is frank about his sexual struggles, but he left the Society because he wanted more career opportunities. He married and became a journalist for Time. He covered Vatican II, which he does in far too much detail in this book. Perhaps he’s trying to build credibility because the final part raises all kinds of questions.

He came to know Martin in Rome and Martin broke up his marriage, he claims. Not only that, but Martin’s own brother, also a priest, admitted that he had a pattern of affairs with married women and breaking up their families. Martin moved to America and became a bestselling author, largely due to the success of his Hostage to the Devil. Kaiser says we should take anything Martin says with, metaphorically, a grain of salt. At the end, the reader is persuaded by Kaiser’s sense of loss, but is nevertheless left wondering what really happened.