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While it is not my aim to offend anyone of the Catholic faith, I simply have to ask what’s up with the Bishops?
Not only have they declared war on marriage equality, but recent incidents show that they have declared war not only on the Democratic Party but gay equality in general.
From Right-Wing Watch comes this unbelievable clip of Thomas John Paprocki, the Roman Catholic Bishop of Springfield, IL. In it, he implies that voting for the Democratic Party could endanger one’s soul:
Transcript:
There are many positive and beneficial planks in the Democratic Party Platform, but I am pointing out those that explicitly endorse intrinsic evils. My job is not to tell you for whom you should vote. But I do have a duty to speak out on moral issues. I would be abdicating this duty if I remained silent out of fear of sounding “political” and didn’t say anything about the morality of these issues. People of faith object to these platform positions that promote serious sins. I know that the Democratic Party’s official “unequivocal” support for abortion is deeply troubling to pro-life Democrats.
. . . Certainly there are “pro-choice” Republicans who support abortion rights and “Log Cabin Republicans” who promote same-sex marriage, and they are equally as wrong as their Democratic counterparts. But these positions do not have the official support of their party. Again, I am not telling you which party or which candidates to vote for or against, but I am saying that you need to think and pray very carefully about your vote, because a vote for a candidate who promotes actions or behaviors that are intrinsically evil and gravely sinful makes you morally complicit and places the eternal salvation of your own soul in serious jeopardy.
And Paprocki is not the only bishop raising eyebrows.
Last month, Washington State officials had to warn Bishop Joseph Tyson not to proceed with his plan of raising money for an anti-marriage equality referendum in that state. According to Reuters, Tyson had sent a letter to area pastors asking them to distribute donation envelopes to parishioners during the weekend of September 8-9. The money was supposed to go to Preserve Marriage Washington, the campaign to defeat legalization of same-sex marriage on the state’s November ballot.
According to Think Progress, Omaha, Nebraska Archbishop George Lucas is asking all priests in his diocese to speak on behalf of an effort to repeal recently passed sexual orientation non-discrimination law.
Think Progress also points out that in New Jersey:
. . .a Newark Archbishop recently sent a pastoral letter to implore over 1 million Catholics in his New Jersey parish to stop supporting same-sex marriage. In fact, Archbishop John Myers even went so far as to suggest that any Catholics who support same-sex marriage, regardless of their own sexual orientation, should refrain from taking communion at Catholic mass because they are “unable to assent to or live the Church’s teaching in these matters.”
Lastly, according to the San Diego Lesbian and Gay News:
Minnesota’s 400,000 Roman Catholic households are scheduled to receive a letter this week from all of the state’s bishops, urging them to donate money for television ads asking voters to say yes to a constitutional amendment to ban same sex marriage. John Green, a political science professor at the University of Akron (Ohio), said that the mailing is “unusual” compared to Catholics’ roles in marriage amendment campaigns in other states. “I can’t think of anything as direct and as explicit,” Green said. “I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with it legally, but certainly I’m sure it’s very controversial. Catholic leaders have been involved in fundraising. I know of examples where they have reached out to parishioners, but I’ve never heard of anything quite this comprehensive,” he added.
These incidents should make us all extremely uncomfortable as to the power Catholic bishops seem to be flexing. No doubt, they plead victimhood and claim that they are merely protecting “traditional values” and “religious liberty.”
However, to me the entire thing stinks of an abuse of power.
There is an old saying about “paying the piper,” and I have a feeling that a while from now, the tune the piper will be playing for these Roman Catholic Bishops will be titled Internal Backlash.
40 Comments
The more he stresses that he’s not telling people which party to vote for, the more obvious it becomes that he is.
I’m not sure that they’re actually flexing their power, although they may think they are — it’s an open question as to whether they still have the power to flex, and I think they’re very aware of that, which is why they’re becoming so blatant. After all, most American Catholics, if you believe the polls at all, routinely ignore the pronouncements of the hierarchy on these issues.
This petition asking IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman to Investigate the Catholic Church and Cardinal Dolan for violations of 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status violations already has over 4,000 signatures. Please sign the petition, and then re-post it:
http://tinyurl.com/7rbdmmg
The Catholic Church hierarchy needs to stop its bullshit tactic of always associating gay rights with a woman’s right to choose. Additionally, we must demand that the Church stop all of its stupidity-and-greed-driven demonization of gay human beings. Catholic dogma and the science of human sexuality have nothing to do with each other. We must demand that the Catholic Church finally acknowledge the role it played in getting WWII-era homosexuals deported to concentration camps. The Catholic Church is the world’s single largest anti-gay hate group. The Vatican can not hide its bullying non-acceptance of gay human beings behind statues of the Virgin Mary and obnoxious, condescending and false claims that they “love” gay people. They do not love gay people. They are horrid gay bashers who need to be told STFU.
Scott, you’re absolutely correct about their “love.” Their “love” is superficial at best. It’s a band-aid statement they put on THEMSELVES after giving US the wound; saying they love us washes their hands of the sin they just committed against us. That’s not love. That’s self-delusion and hollow placation.
This is yet another outrageous example of social irresponsibility. At a time when gay kids are killing themselves at alarming rates, and incidents of physical and spiritual violence against LGBT are escalating, it is deplorable; this man just emboldened those who mean us very real harm.
I’ve contacted the Bishop’s office, leaving a vm message and have written an email directly to the Bishop.
I posted the following at C&L under the name Mr. Flibble, and I post it here too:
Shouldn’t this guy be busy protecting child molesters?
How bad could Hell be if it seperates us from bigots like this?
You mean, like voting for a candidate who promotes heresy and blasphemy? When I was in Catholic school, I learned that the Mormons were a “pseudo-Christian cult” who had turned the backs on God (some nuns even claimed they worshipped Satan). Funny how the ONLY sins that can now jeapordize your soul involve TEH GAY and abortion. Kind of a “dumbing down” of the religion since my day – even more so from my parents’ day, when my Baptist uncle was not allowed to be my father’s best man because Protestants were not allowed on a Catholic altar.
So do any damn thing you want to. God understands.
Time to embrace atheism, right?
After all, the Bible was written and edited by a bunch of people just like Thomas John Paprocki: power-hungry clowns who use the threat of a “god” that they created from nothing in order to make you give them everything. Stop pretending there’s some real truth behind religion: it is just people making up stories to control you, all the way down.
So my non-existent soul will suffer in a non-existent afterlife if I don’t hate the people Jesus hates?
Got it.
Why am I supposed to listen to a child rapist?
What could a pederast possibly tell me about anything, much less how I “should” vote or anything about “faith”??
Why is the RC “Church” still given any attention, other than to demand that these world-wide pederasts get their day in court??
Thanks for the petition. It gave me great pleasure to sign it.
Read somewhere yesterday that Catholics are hugely supporting Obama.
I cannot believe how many people by this shit any more. PT Barnum was right. Now if i could just make a few bucks off the ignorant. I could hate myself. Not to worry i wont and i dont.
oh yeah, it is jaw droppingly amazint to hear one of these guys talk about morality or salvation. why doesn’t dog strike him with a lightening bolt or a tazer or at least throw an eraser?
Whoever wrote Paul’s epistles maybe hates LGBT, but I din’t think even Paul said anytbing much about fetuses. The Old Testament had some things worth noting about LGBT, but again not much about abortion. I think Jesus had nothing to say about either, except something about keeping the law (the law of the Jews – which we suppose refers to the Old books.)
All this crap comes straight from the fevered brains of fervently sex obsessed supposedly chaste RC clergy. (Ha! I first mispelled obsessed as absessed (abscessed?) clergy.)
I’m a Catholic so, as might be expected, I phrase the question somewhat differently:
What the FUCK is up with those ASSHOLE bishops
not my church; they can go fuck off
“Washington State officials had to warn Bishop Joseph Tyson…”
Praise the Lord! Anybody who doesn’t live on the left coast will be shocked and amazed by this report. In Texas nobody has ever heard of the separation of church and state, and they’re sure as hell not gonna call a preacher on the tax-exempt status of politically active Christian churches.
in the words of willie the grounds keeper, what a pious puke.
Second that.
And, in the words of Billy Joel, “I’d rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints, the sinners are much more fun.”
I can’t believe how damn cocky these potentate bishops are about their church. All the Catholics I know pay no attention to this pontifical batshit. In most cases they’ve taken it up with their priest, and he told them to ignore those goof balls.
But American Christianity is unique; probably not even Christianity at all. But I think there are multitudes in other places who may listen to and accept the approved dogma. Unfortunately.
Was just thinking that the Catholic PTB make Hell look absolutely attractive.
We’ve evolved a mutant Church of America, which has brought together the worst aspects of the Crusades, the Inquisition, Calvinism, the Gospel of Wealth, and the happy horseshit spewed out by the likes of Norman Vincent Peale.
What institution could be more American than the megachurch? There is no government regulation, no barriers to entry, no required professional credentials for pastors; and success depends entirely on one’s ability to market.
Do these asshole know that the more they preach this hell and damnation about abortion, marriage and gay rights the more they lose their people? Just keep rigght on with the fucking pedophiles.
Awesome, when will the Catholic Church start treating the death penalty like they treat abortion? After all, the document (Evangelium Vitae) that provides justification for their position on abortion is the same one that justifies their opposition to the death penalty.
Amen!
That video said ” right wing watch” . Figures.
It’s long past time to tax the Catholic Church. They engage in electioneering, we get some of their real estate and stuff from the collection plates.
Ironically, being a descendant of a saint, and a cardinal……..I’m not catholic. And very glad not to be.
The males in skirts that run this racket are beyond disturbing.
That’s Luther’s heresy. Catholics expect WORKS, especially as the collection plate passes.
As a Catholic, I pretty much only respect my former priest who runs a soup kitchen, not so much those in the hierarchy who preach hate and have nothing to say about war. I concur, Beerfart Liberal.
The only way to fight these people is to take away their tax exempt status. The money that keeps their institution going is both the only thing they really value, and it simply isn’t fair to non-Catholics to be forced to support their activities. I have to pay higher taxes to cover the gap created by exempting this institution from paying its fair share, and that constitutes a forced subsidy. I don’t think that this was ever a good idea, even when the Church refrained from political advocacy. Now that they’ve turned into an active hate group, public subsidies for them, and for all the churches and churchlets, is simply unconscionable.
Bishop Daniel Jenky of Peoria basically hit many of the same themes earlier this spring. One can read the entire homily here. http://www.thecatholicpost.com/post/PostArticle.aspx?ID=2440
Bishop Jenky compares Obama and his Affordable Care Act to Stalin and Hitler.
He also engages in some anti-Democratic electioneering. Notice how he only names one party :
The Church will survive the entrenched corruption and sheer incompetence of our Illinois state government, and even the calculated disdain of the President of the United States, his appointed bureaucrats in HHS, and of the current majority of the federal Senate.
Jenky also accuses us liberals of engaging in a Bismarkian “Kulturkampf” against the Catholic Church.
Read the entire homily; it is an interesting look at how the hierarchial mind works when confronted with democracy.
It is the Catholic Church’s position that abortion should be criminalized and that same-sex marriage should be prohibited. Those who hold the opposite view are not, thereby, supporting or encouraging abortion or same-sex marriage. They are discouraging their criminalization, i.e., they want to keep the government out of it.
Actually that IS the premise for Christianity.
Jesus died so that your sins may be forgiven. So, yes, essentially it ISN’T anything you do that gets you into Heaven.
There were two thieves crucified beside Jesus and I don’t recall him telling them they were going to hell because they stole.
It sucks that SOME Christians can’t be good people for the sake of being good people and wanting to be the best person they can be instead of making up imaginary reasons that people have to behave as they say. It’s pretty arrogant and prideful to consider yourself God’s spokesperson and make yourself the judge of other peopleZ(something I’m also pretty sure the Bible speaks poorly of;funny how they never seem to cherry pick those passages though.)
The irony is by continuing the “Faith based initiatives” funding the Democratic party actually aids these putzes and their archaic and often hypocritical viewpoints. They are funding people who compare them to Hitler and Stalin instead of categorizing them as the hate groups that they are.
To which I reply: But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death. Revelation 21:8, KJV
I am glad that the bishops and some of our priests have finally found their spine. The Catholics that are in the pews every Sunday are not supporting Obama. As long as the Democratic party is the party of abortion and gay marriage my wife and I will NEVER vote for a Democratic candidate.
To paraphrase wigwam: The Democratic Party is NOT the party of abortion or of any sort or form of sexual orientation, we are the party who says, “These things are not the government’s business.”
I know of no one who wants anybody to have an abortion, certainly not anyone who doesn’t choose to have one. We don’t even advocate that you have an abortion if your doctor says, “You’re gonna die if you try to carry this baby to term.” We just believe that it’s your decision, not the government’s.
I know of no one who advocates causing someone to marry against his/her wishes. Not even people of different orinetation than yours. We do advocate keeping the government from ruling on questions of love.
I hope to God you “NEVER” vote for a Democrat! We do disapprove of bigots and fools.
The bishop in fact is ignoring the traditional Catholic answer to the implied problem.
That was set out clearly by one Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger in a letter to American bishops during the election of 2004. Although Ratzinger now occupies the office of bishop of Rome, the bishop of Springfield IL seems unaware of that letter, the concluding paragraph of which is as follows:
“A Catholic would be guilty of formal cooperation in evil, and so unworthy to present himself for Holy Communion, if he were to deliberately vote for a candidate precisely because of the candidate’s permissive stand on abortion and/or euthanasia. When a Catholic does not share a candidate’s stand in favor of abortion and/or euthanasia, but votes for that candidate for other reasons, it is considered remote material cooperation, which can be permitted in the presence of proportionate reasons.”