New York Archbishop and United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) president Timothy Dolan recently wrote to Barak Obama asking the president to sign the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA): "We cannot be silent, however, when federal steps harmful to marriage, the laws defending it, and religious freedom continue apace."
Can the marriages of some really "harm" those of others? Does Dolan not recognize how much support there is among active, practicing Roman Catholics for same-sex marriage? Does he really not know that scores of LGBT Catholics on the Communion lines at his own masses at St. Patrick's Cathedral are married? That many work in Catholic ministry? That some are raising their children in the church? Dolan's diocesan schools are filled with families in which there are only one or two children? Can he be naïve enough to imagine that this is accomplished through Natural Family Planning (NFP) alone? (NFP is the method of birth control the Vatican recommends and which its parishes often teach.)
Like much of the Roman Catholic hierarchy, Timothy Dolan is out of touch with who we American Catholics actually are.
He has every right not to remain silent, but the bishops' presumption (fantasy?) that a majority of active U.S. Catholics will lend support to Vatican efforts to restrict the reproductive and marriage rights of non-Catholics is alarming -- especially since so many active Catholics exercise those very freedoms. Furthermore, although the pope and his bishops may truly believe a zygote is a "preborn child," the truth is that a great number of active Catholics do not, and they vote, in great numbers, accordingly.
There's a reason the Vatican appointed the cigar-smoking, baseball-loving, borderline-charming Dolan to serve as shepherd of the Sodom and Gomorrah that is New York City. The passing of same-sex marriage rights legislation in his state and the reproductive health aspects of the new health care mandate present New York's top priest with fresh opportunity to make his mark as the defender of the faith in the U.S. On Sept. 30, Timothy Dolan, in his capacity of USCCB president, announced the formation of a sub-committee whose task will be to respond to the "erosion of freedom of religion in America": "...the new subcommittee would be one of several initiatives designed to strengthen the conference's response and bring together a broad cross-section of churches and legal scholars to oppose attacks on the First Amendment."
Dolan is fronting this crusade, and the degree of difficulty involved makes going out on a limb with a shaky "First Amendment" argument worth the gamble. He has appointed a Connecticut Bishop, William Lori, to head up the new committee. Unfortunately the first association many Catholics have with the "Diocese of Bridgeport" is its notorious status as a locus of sexual abuse. (In 2001, the Diocese of Bridgeport settled in 23 civil sex abuse cases, and there, according to Bishop Accountability.org, Timothy Dolan's predecessor is alleged to have allowed priests facing multiple accusations to continue in ministry.)
The USCCB is now lobbying hard to make same-sex civil marriage illegal in the U.S. and to deny (Catholic and not) employees in agencies run by the church medical coverage for contraception and sterilization. And they want Catholics in the pews to help. The bishops can count on the holy-father-knows-best Roman Catholic fringe to serve as hoplites in what the hierarchy-friendly National Catholic Register calls the "culture wars". They'd follow the Borgia pope into hell. However, the bishops will lack critical Roman Catholic mass in these "culture wars," and their strongest support for DOMA may come from "bring-your-gun-to-church" and "God hates fags" so-called "Christian" churches. Progressive Roman Catholics, who tend support LGBT marriage and view family planning as a moral responsibility and not a sin, are likely to think the First Amendment angle disingenuous and inane. Moderate Catholics, who might not long ago have had the USCCB's back in a such controversies as DOMA or the health care mandate, are alienated and sickened by the pedophilia crisis. They can no longer be counted on to fall in line behind the bishops.
Were so much not at stake, I'd find Dolan's recent foray into First Amendment advocacy amusing. Has he read the First Amendment? For he appears to miss the point. The First Amendment does not guarantee one religion the right to obtain religious liberty by stripping others of theirs.
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof..."
Many religions recognized and sanctified same-sex marriages long before same-sex marriage was legal in any state in the U.S. What (legal or moral) right has Timothy Dolan to tear lawful marriages asunder? Or to nullify covenants consecrated by Reform Jewish or Christian rites? Dolan's campaign to (in effect) annul same-sex marriages reflects neither the spirit of ecumenism nor that of secular law as it pertains to marriage.
Same-sex couples in states in which equal-marriage legislation has passed are family now.
Furthermore, many atheists hold marriage equality (for lack of a better word, I say) "sacred." Under the First Amendment, atheist LGBT and straight Americans enjoy the right not to be subject to religious law. DOMA wold impose religious law on everyone. This is an affront to all who take seriously the principle of separation between church and state. Though same-sex marriages are legal in the state of New York, no law compels Timothy Dolan to recognize them, and the First Amendment protects his right to refuse to marry LGBT Catholics in his church.
The consternation of the conflicted "believer" working at the marriage license bureau who finds processing marriage licenses for LGBT couples distasteful is nothing new. Many a court clerk during the Civil Rights Era no doubt endured a similar kind of anguish when required to process marriage licenses for heterosexual interracial couples. People allow moral discernment to shape their decisions about employment all the time. Marriage Bureau employees who find gay marriage distasteful must either suck it up or seek employment that better accommodates their prejudice.
Dolan is quoted in the National Catholic Register as having said the following: "If the label of "bigot" sticks to us -- especially in court -- because of our teaching on marriage, we'll have church-state conflicts for years to come as a result."
The archbishop is right to worry. The "label of bigot" will stick. The best way to defend against being called a bigot is to not be one.
Dolan is not nearly so interested in the First Amendment protections as he is in holding the Vatican's doctrinal/political ground. The Roman Catholic hierarchy is under attack from within and without. Dolan is taking his shot. He's hoping that cloaking bigotry the finery of constitutional protections might make him and his hierarchy appear more freedom-forward and perhaps a tad less medieval. But blurring, perforating, crossing and erasing the line of demarcation between church and state won't win the archbishop any points with most American Catholics. And outside the church, Dolan's First Amendment-based power play is likely to come off as the Captain Queeg-like snit of a "religious leader" who knows his ship is going down.
Dolan is playing the "good cop" role now, but "bad cops" surround him. On the matter of the health care mandate, Daniel N. DiNardo, chairman of the U.S. bishop's pro-life committee was quick to whip out the shiv. He said this on Sept. 26, about a month after the USCCB announced its dissatsifaction with the terms of the the federal health care mandate:
"Under the new rule our institutions would be free to act in accord with Catholic teaching on life and procreation only if they were to stop hiring and serving non-Catholics. ... Although this new rule gives the agency the discretion to authorize a 'religious' exemption, it is so narrow as to exclude most Catholic social service agencies and healthcare providers."
The ultra hierarchy-friendly Catholic News Agency's choice of the word "warned" says a lot. It's code for "Give us what we want or we'll stop healing, clothing, feeding, sheltering and offering hospice to non-Catholics."
Another bishop, Bishop David A. Zubik of Pittsburg, weighed in with a similar kind of warning in a Sept. 15 letter to Human Health Services (HHS) secretary Kathleen Sibelius;
...Catholic Charities in his diocese alone has served over 80,000 people last year "without regard to the religious belief" of those they ministered to.
But "under this [health care] mandate, Catholic Charities of Pittsburgh would either be forced to cease to exist or restrict its employees and its wide ranging social services to practicing Catholics alone."
Essentially, Bishops Zubik and DiNardo are floating ultimata. They don't come right out and say so, but the implication in Zubik's case is that the bishops might have little choice but to add to the suffering and hardship of 80,000 people currently under the care of Catholic Charities. Not much Christ in that.
Thank God this vicious game of chicken won't work. The public relations fallout would be disastrous if the bishops were to make good on such threats. Even the most conservative of Catholics would be ambivalent about such tactics because even daily-mass-attending, novena-praying rosary ladies who oppose abortion know that sacrificing sick, hungry, homeless "born" children to the supposed greater good of preserving the lives of zygotes and embryos would constitute a sin as grave as any.
That any bishop thinks it acceptable to use works of mercy as leverage is troubling and indicates just how estranged from Christian ideals many of the Catholic bishops are. From a public relations standpoint, the utter lack of diplomacy in such expressions as Zubik's reveals how out of touch the Catholic hierarchy is with what the worlds sees when it beholds the church.
Much of the world now views the Roman Catholic Church as a corrupt organization led by a there-but-for-the grace-of-extradition-agreements-go-I pontiff. Were Ratzinger not head of a sovereign state, the world might well have witnessed his perp walk by now. The damning Cloyne Report turned the most pious Catholic nation in Europe against the hierarchy. The Vatican is on Amnesty International's list of torturers for its human rights violations/crimes against children. The Center for Constitutional Rights and SNAP (Survivors Network of Persons Abused by Priests) are filing suit against the Vatican in the International Criminal Courts. Yet, even as it faces the possibility of a trial at the Hague, the Vatican continues to show poor faith in addressing the hundreds of thousands of brutal crimes against its own children.
Catholics in the pews are repulsed by this, and have grown weary of pro forma expressions of contrition for the anguish pedophile priests inflicted and which bishops facilitated. These apologies are never more tainted than when topped off with not-so-gentle reminders that justice (i.e. damages) for each and every victim would bankrupt the church.
The Vatican may be rich, but the church has money problems.
In the Brooklyn (N.Y.) diocese, where I worship, Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio has used his weekly column to urge Catholics in Brooklyn and Queens to vote against the Child Victim's Act in the New York State Assembly. Payouts, we have been told, would bankrupt the diocese. DiMarzio has publicly threatened to close parishes whose members fail to vote his way. He recorded robocalls for a local politician. His politicking is, at least, risky behavior, and, at worst, possibly a violation of tax law. The aforementioned attempts at clerical blackmail, though unseemly, may be blessings in disguise, however, because they show the world who these "religious leaders" really are and where they stand on the church/state divide.
I take great pride in the work my church does on behalf of the aged, infirm, indigent and marginalized in the city where I live. My own experience working in social justice ministry has offered me opportunity to see closely how fervently devoted we (Catholics) are in it, yet I believe the world outside the church would indeed pick up the slack were the bishops to take their ball and go home.
Bishops play a dangerous game when they threaten to use the leverage they think they have to bring secular law in line with canon law. The church receives much financial support from the government in the form of tax exemptions. I don't want to see my diocese or any other lose its tax exempt status, but the bishops are pushing their luck -- which could soon run out, along with the money. The bishops would do well to bear in mind that they are called to be teachers and priests, not emperors. They play fast and loose with their tax-exempt status at their own peril and their recklessness in this puts needy people of all faiths -- and no faith -- at risk. Political power can be expensive. The religious freedom argument cuts both ways.
Follow Michele Somerville on Twitter: www.twitter.com/NYpoet
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I am a bit confused by your statement "I am a catholic atheist" as the terms are mutually exclusive. Are you using the word catholic in its secular sense "universal" or are you saying you were raised in the Catholic faith but have left the Church and are now a atheist?
http://blog.adw.org/2011/10/on-the-noninfallibilists-and-how-they-diminish-virtues-of-docility-and-obedience/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=on-the-noninfallibilists-and-how-they-diminish-virtues-of-docility-and-obedience
It points out a couple of key points from Lument Gentium:
" For example, Vatican II in Lumen Gentium spoke of the Infallibility of the ordinary magisterium when it said:
Although the individual bishops do not enjoy the prerogative of infallibility, they nevertheless proclaim Christ’s doctrine in- fallibly whenever, even though dispersed through the world, but still maintaining the bond of communion among them- selves and with the successor of Peter, and authentically teaching matters of faith and morals, they are in agreement on one position as definitively to be held [definitive tendendam]. This is even more clearly verified when, gathered together in an ecumenical council, they are teachers and judges of faith and morals for the universal Church, whose definitions must be adhered to with the submission of faith. (LG, 41)
Further, it also said,
Religious submission of the will and intellect must be given, in a special way, to the authoritative Magisterium (authentico magisterio) of the Roman Pontiff, even when he does not speak ex cathedra; indeed, that his supreme Magisterium be acknowledged with respect, and that one sincerely adhere to decisions made by him, according to his manifest mind and intention.” (Lumen Gentium 25.2)"
Veritas.
Any person who calls herself Catholic, but supports killing babies, artificial contraception and homosexual marriage is not only committing mortal sin, but encouraging others to do so as well. Your work in the realm of Catholic Social Issues is excellent, but does not excuse your anti life views. The secular world is certainly self centered and pro death. You should not succumb to those temptations.
The Bishops are the Church's leaders and should be out front teaching the Truth to all, not just Catholics. That is what they are doing.
You are right, in regards to how the terrible, sinful, criminal Priest scandals and their innapropriate handling by some of the hierarchy has done irreparable harm to the reputation of the Church. I read the hate that the secular world has for the Church every day here on the HP and these folks often use these issues as clubs against the Church and rarely show any concern for the victims. Veritas.
"Religious submission of the will and intellect must be given, in a special way, to the authoritative Magisterium (authentico magisterio) of the Roman Pontiff, even when he does not speak ex cathedra; indeed, that his supreme Magisterium be acknowledged with respect, and that one sincerely adhere to decisions made by him, according to his manifest mind and intention."
Very good article but I'm sure that the Catholic heirarchy will a.) not listen to you; and b.) condemn you for your "lack of faith" (in other words--thinking for your self).
The Catholic Church would do well to pay attention to that.
It is not I who have undone your baptism, but you who have severed the bonds of your Confirmation into the Catholic Church. After recognition of Christ, the key determinate of Roman Catholicism is submission to the Pope hence the name "Roman" Catholic. The key distinction between a Roman Catholic and an Anglican or an Orthodox Christian is submission to the Bishop of Rome.
The Church you were baptized into teaches: "The successor of St. Peter as Bishop of Rome and Supreme Pontiff of the universal Catholic Church. The pope exercises a primacy of authority as Vicar of Christ and shepherd of the whole Church; he receives the divine assistance promised by Christ to the Church when he defines infallibly a doctrine of faith or morals." Not only do you state that the Bishop is Rome is not your spiritual leader you consider him a moral criminal. Catholic sacraments are only outward manifestations of what is going on in your heart and soul. Clearly your heart is not Roman Catholic and the spiritual connection between you and the Bishopric at your confirmation no longer exists. You may like to call yourself Roman Catholic, but you appear to want nothing to do with the submission it implies.
You may call yourself Roman Catholic, but you aren't doing it right if you would take a man who facilitated and now countenances the rape of children as your moral leader. I stand with the many Roman Catholic bishops, theologians,sisters and priests who take Roman Catholic primacy of conscience seriously.
Thanks.
Michele Somerville
These were for the most part voluntary sexual relationships with teenage boys (80% of cases). A recent episode of Glee celebrated an older gay man showing a high school student "the ropes". But somehow a society that loves gay sex finds it offensive when practiced by believers.
I don't agree with society on either their lust or their disgust. Teens need to be protected so they can develop their own sexuality without manipulation from adults, not because sex is bad.
Second, the church recognizes moral adulthood at a much earlier age than secular society. So in most of these cases the "child" was an adult by our standards.
Third, the Church has always condemned sexual promiscuity. This applies to homosexual relations, heterosexual relations, and relations with children. The scandal is about the Church placing itself above secular law and handling these cases as administrative matters, often poorly.
But the Church has a 2,000 year history of using its own legal system to control its priests. Wars were fought over this issue. Many of them. Expecting the Church to miraculously conform to your personal "conscience" on this issue is childish.
Finally, your personal conscience is supreme in your life. You don't get to tell the pope how to run his life.
May your love of Christ grow strong enough to stop judging your Church leaders no matter how much they deserve it.
I too feel rejected sometimes. But both the Church and the Republicans are broad based groups and able to tolerate a fair amount of diversity. Stick with them even if some clique thinks they know best.
I've never seen either group uphold their principles over their wallets.
However, given the insidious spread of religion in society, we can't allow religious organizations to disregard legally valid civil contracts as they please. Not having to perform marriages is one thing. But a religiously affiliated organization that performs entirely secular functions such as a hospital, school or university has to honor all marriages. By that same logic, they could make up any other silly thing and say they don't want to do it, since it's against their holy book. Nope. Doesn't work that way.
Still, I see no reason for the Church to be meddling in legal issues. Let the Church and state have separate laws.
OTOH, there's no reason to threaten the Church's existence over it expressing political opinions. And those who think taxing the church isn't an attempt to control it are naive. The author was herself threatening the church with loss of funds if it didn't kneel before her whims.
As a member of the Church I say screw you. We can survive without money just fine. God is real and will protect us as long as we follow Him. Tax us, steal from us, even hang us from a cross. We will rise again to sing God's praise.
2. Catholics have been very accommodating of couples who have pre-marital sex, commit adultery and get divorced. They never advocate for illegal pre-marital sex, illegal birth control, illegal or criminalized adultery or illegal divorce. Why? Because too many folks like to engage in those activities and even the catholic church doesn't want to alienate potential donors. But they eye an opportunity opposing legal same-sex marriage, because gays and lesbians are a distinct minority, and disliked by a large portion of society. So, in a despicable act of hate, the catholic church joins forces with homophobes and straight supremacists to score political victories.
I'm sure the catholic god is pleased. Not.
There is absolutely no need for Catholic hospitals or adoption agencies anyways. None whatsoever. Both functions can easily be performed by secular and/or public organizations. What benefit does a Catholic hospital provide that a secular one doesn't? The answer of course is "none". They only have disadvantages in that they discriminate against certain people at best, or endanger their lives at worst.
tabloid journalism.
I am continually amazed that Christians who reject the teaching that the Pope is infallible on issues of faith and morals continue to represent themselves as Roman Catholics. I suggest Ms. Somerville join any of the many Protestant denominations, perhaps the Anglican or Presbyterian, which more closely reflect her views. The Catholic Church is not a democracy. It is a dictatorship of Jesus Christ whose adherents believe the Pope speaks with the voice of Peter, Christ's appointed representative on earth.
I agree that the odds of any government agency moving to remove the RCC’s tax exemption are slim. While it may be a while before we see the federal courts challenge tax exemption for religious organizations, I think we will soon begin to see individual dioceses sued for tax fraud. Furthermore, a diocese in which tax fraud is ongoing and child rape accusations are pending ought to take seriously the threat of being charged with RICO violations.
I am continually amazed by how quick some Roman Catholics are to undo the baptism of fellow Roman Catholics by suggesting that they leave the their own spiritual home. Those who recommend that Roman Catholics defect to Protestant churches cast them as “anything goes” receptacles for lapsed Catholics. This is disrespectful and happens to fly in the face of vatican teaching as it pertains to the manner in which Catholics should regard other faiths (Nostra Aetate).
The church is not a democracy, no -- but Jesus is not a dictator either. Your man in Rome may have “the voice of Peter,” but most of the 24% are now aware that a fugitive from justice, who continues to refuse to be held accountable for the widespread child rape that occurred under his watch, isn't much of a moral or spiritual leader.
And (we) Roman Catholics are at last beginning to vote and tithe accordingly.
I thank you for your remarks.
Michele Somerville
A) "That the power of taxing it [the bank] by the States may be exercised so as to destroy it, is too obvious to be denied , and That the power to tax involves the power to destroy [is] not to be denied." -- Chief Justice Marshall, McCulloch v. Maryland (1819)
B) Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof[.] -- The First Amendment.
Note that the B) is the very clause which anti-religion types use to argue for separation of church and state, so setting it aside would set us, the religious majority, free to enforce religion in schools, etc.