By Stephen P. White, The Catholic Thing - ... The Catholic Project.. has been working on a study to address this question: How has the abuse crisis, and the Church’s response to that crisis, affected the relationship and trust between priests and their bishops?... we learned.. this: American priests are thriving. They are “flourishing” in their vocations and deeply fulfilled in their ministry. Priests don’t have particularly high confidence in their bishops... and very little confidence in “the bishops” as a whole. Priests see their bishops very differently than bishops see themselves, more as administrators than fathers.