By Phil Lawler ( bio - articles - email ) | May 11, 2021 Today the Catholic Church celebrates (as an optional feast) the holy abbots of Cluny. After morning Mass at a Benedictine abbey, I find myself thinking about the Cluniac reform. Among the troubles that the Church faced in that era were simony and clerical immorality. Hmmm. History often repeats itself, but as circumstances change, things may look different the second time around. Are we not in dire need of a new Cluniac reform today? You will grant me, I trust, that immorality among the clergy is an issue today; the headlines of the past decade leave little doubt about that. It is a different sort of immorality—not many priests are taking common-law wives—but it is rampant.