This reminds me of the discussion about the Likes/Dislikes feature when it first came out. Everyone was like "Oh no, now it's a popularity contest" and all that.
But think about it -- when the "peers" are a bunch of serious, Trad Catholics -- you had better be "popular" or you have issues!
As experience has since proven, the Rep system is seldom wrong. I hardly ever see a valuable member with a score of 0, or a total misfit with a score in the thousands.
Almost everyone I've banned had a score around 0. There's the proof that the system works.
The system is near-infallible when you have mostly sane, devout, rational members -- like on CathInfo.