HACKED OFF AT THE KNEES

The U.S. Council of Catholic Bishops has declared February 7 to 14, “Marriage Week”. There is no question that marriage today faces challenges like no other. Not long ago the words “marriage” and “challenge”, appearing in the same sentence, meant that a married couple was having difficulties. Today it means that marriage itself is having difficulties.

The challenge to marriage which gets the most attention is the current attempt to redefine marriage to include same-sex couples. However, long before same-sex advocates began to deconstruct traditional marriage, the norm of marriage as a life-long, life-giving, life-supporting union of two members of the opposite sex was already suffering from decades of no-fault divorce, cohabitation, contraception, and even the casual application of periodic abstinence (NFP).

The real issue is that marriage is not just another institution. It is not like the Boy Scouts, the Rotary Club, the United States of America, or even the Catholic Church. Marriage is unique in that it is an organic institution - the first of all institutions, and as such, the foundational societal unit upon which all other human unions and social constructs are built. Thus, to redefine marriage is to unmake the world.

In 1968, Paul VI prophesied the “unmaking of the world” which would follow the redefinition of marriage wrought by the separation of the unitive and procreative realities of the conjugal act. His warnings were rejected, not just by the world, but by many Catholic leaders. Forty years later, Catholic schools and churches (for lack of population) are closing by the hundreds every year, Catholic families are splitting and collapsing at the same rate as the rest of society, and same-sex marriage is knocking loudly at our door.

Attempting to stem the crisis, the USCCB has issued a series of initiatives and statements including the above-mentioned Marriage Week and a pastoral letter entitled “Marriage: Love and Life in the Divine Plan.” Unfortunately, the letter proposes a definition of marriage that is symptomatic of how we often hack ourselves off at our knees:

“Marriage...is a unique communion of persons. In their intimate union as male and female, the spouses are called to exist for each other...This communion of persons has the potential to bring forth human life and thus to produce the family, which is itself another kind of communion of persons.”

Finer theological minds than my own may not see the problem, but I disagree that bringing forth human life in a marriage produces “another kind of communion of persons”. Such language, at least for us regular lay folk, gives the impression that the marital union is fundamentally altered by bearing a child.

While begetting a child may alter the daily life of a married couple, the marriage covenant is not only NOT altered, it is rendered whole. The marital union was made to image the Trinity and is completed in the child who issues forth from the husband and wife - or, in cases of natural infertility, at least in the intention to bear one.

The “first this and then this” view of marriage employs a language which not only appears to separate the unitive and procreative meanings of the conjugal act, but also seems to makes the unitive and procreative properties of marriage serve two separate (“another”) kinds of communities.

Thus we see this view of marriage - a view in which the couple is made first to “exist for each other” with only the “potential to bring forth human life” - made manifest in the otherwise often capricious off-putting of children so that couples might finish their education, buy a home, establish careers, see the world, or whatever.

True, most lay people do not read episcopal statements and thereupon design a course of life. However, episcopal statements do shape catechetical formulas and influence pastoral application, which then forms how we laity think and act.

Ultimately one must wonder why the USCCB felt it could improve upon the definition of marriage carefully constructed at Vatican II and subsequently found in Gaudium et Spes (48), the 1983 Code of Canon Law (1055), and ultimately, the Catechism (1601):

“The matrimonial covenant, by which a man and a woman establish between themselves a partnership of the whole of life, is by its nature ordered toward the good of the spouses and the procreation and education of offspring.”

Here we do not see the couple first existing “for each other” with the “potential to produce...another kind of communion”. Instead, we see the fundamental establishment of a new life order: a single generative communion of persons and the very image of God on earth. I think I like this definition better.

COUNTDOWN TO C-DAY

I really had planned to move on to another issue this week. But with the clock ticking down to “Contraceptive Mandate Day”, the day the Catholic Church in America will either become an institutional outlaw or forced to serve Satan, it behooves us to pay attention.

At the stroke of midnight on August 1, all Catholic institutions not covered by a very narrow religious exemption will become subject to the Obama Administration's mandate to include contraceptive and sterilization coverage in their employee healthcare coverage.

The Catholic Church holds that all intentional contraceptive acts are "intrinsically evil". Thus to comply with the mandate will put the Church in America in the “service of Satan”, and to not comply will make the Church an outlaw.

While the USCCB has taken a national stance against the mandate, it does not dictate the policies of each diocese. Each diocese will still have to decide to comply or not comply, and that includes the Archdiocese of Agana.

As per the current reading of the mandate, if we do nothing, on August 1 the Archdiocese of Agana will automatically begin funding contraceptive and sterilization services through the health care premiums it or its subsidiary entities (schools, charitable organizations, etc.) pays to cover those employees who work for Archdiocesan employers not covered by the exemption (mostly schools).  

Let’s review the exemption. According to the mandate, a religious entity is exempt only if it (1) has the inculcation of religious values as its purpose; (2) primarily employs persons who share its religious tenets; (3) primarily serves persons who share its religious tenets; and (4) is a non-profit organization under the Internal Revenue Code.

According to the USCCB, academic institutions and most  of its charitable organizations will NOT qualify for the exemption since they exist to serve everyone regardless of creed. What can we do?

Under the initial terms of the mandate, Church-affiliated employers could have simply refused to pay the additional premium for the contraceptive coverage. It would be illegal to do so, but it was still something we could proactively do.

However, after the USCCB outcry over the mandate, Obama granted an “accommodation” which rendered Church employers even more powerless. Obama’s accommodation mandated that insurance companies bear the cost of the mandate instead of the employer.

The accommodation was an insult, for who could be stupid enough not to know that insurance companies would simply pass along the cost of the mandate to its subscribers.

At least under the initial terms of the mandate the Church could have continued to provide health coverage for its employees without contraceptive coverage even if there were legal consequences. However, Obama’s accommodation disemboweled the Church and subjected it to insurance companies and whatever they want to charge.

The Church now has only one option if it does not wish to be a material participant in something it has labeled “intrinsic evil”: cancel all health coverage for non-exempt employees. Thus, as of August 1, hundreds of Catholic school teachers are on track to be without health insurance. Thank you President Obama.

But there is something else. And I think it could work...at least for a few months. And, if Obama can be ousted in November, a few months is all we need.

Before I continue, I want to recognize that what I just said about ousting Obama is probably quite jarring for some. It may seem “too political” for this paper, even for an opinion piece, which this is.

However, as Catholics, we must understand that this is not about politics. This is about our being forced by this President to materially participate in the most serious form of evil - “intrinsic evil”, meaning “always and everywhere WRONG - NO EXCEPTIONS.

I have no authority to officially recommend this to the Archdiocese, but I believe we should claim the exemption for all our Catholic institutions by simply claiming that every one of them exists to inculcate Catholic religious values and “primarily” employs and serves persons who share those values. (The key word is “primarily”.)

The Feds would probably come after us. But it would take time, and we only need a few months - assuming Obama is ousted and the balance of power changes in the Senate..

To “come after us” the Feds would have to investigate who is “Catholic enough” and who is not. This would be the effective equivalent of an Inquisition. And though the likes of Sibelius and Pelosi would no doubt salivate at the prospect of playing Torquemada in reverse, such an action would be too politically dangerous for Obama.

The spectacle of it, the sheer smell of Nazism , (if the bishops play it that way) would shock awake the sleeping majority that is even now rousing from its 2008 hypnosis of “hope and change, hope and change, hope and change...”

HIGH NOON FOR THE USCCB

While commentators and analysts continue to decipher and parse the full impact of the Supreme Court’s decision on the Affordable Care Act (aka “Obamacare”), there is one thing that is certain: it is now “High Noon” for the U.S. Council of Catholic Bishops.

Up until the court ruling on June 28, there was considerable hope that the ACA, or at least its funding mechanism, would be ruled unconstitutional, relieving the bishops of the task of going head to head with the President over the contraceptive mandate.

However, as we all know, the law has been upheld and there is now nothing separating the U.S. Catholic Church from an all-out showdown with the Federal Government on August 1.

On that date, most Catholic employers will be forced to include full coverage of morally unacceptable contraceptives, sterilization, and abortifacients in health insurance policies for their employees.

The penalty, or “tax”, for not doing so, will not apply until 2014. So while they won’t immediately be fined, Catholic employers, on August 1, will still have to either cancel health coverage for their employees or become material participants in moral evil.

Curiously, while there has been much focus on the contraceptive mandate, little has been said about another “final rule” which was issued this past March. The rule mandates taxpayer funding of insurance coverage that includes elective abortion.

The mechanism to redirect our insurance premiums to pay for abortions was always present in the law, and was exposed by the USCCB office of legal counsel in early 2010 before the bill’s passage. But other than the USCCB’s letter to the Obama administration protesting the provision, little else was said or done.

Perhaps the USCCB felt their fears allayed by Obama’s eleventh hour executive order barring taxpayer funding for abortions, a move that pacified a group of Democrat “pro-life” hold-outs, and gave him enough votes to pass the bill by the thinnest of margins.

However, it appears once again, the USCCB has underestimated this President’s voracious appetite for abortion.

The USCCB seems to have also underestimated Obama’s audacious willingness to boldly lie. On September 9, 2009, before a Joint Session of Congress and the whole nation, President Obama stated that abortion funding would not be included in his health plan. He underscored that promise with the signing of the aforementioned eleventh hour executive order.

However, this past March, while Congress was in recess, he authorized the final rule that activates the mechanism enabling the funding of elective abortion through the state health exchanges. What’s more, the final rule mandates that the funding for abortion be essentially hidden.

The rule forbids insurance companies from including information about abortion coverage in any marketing or promotional materials, and states that it can only be disclosed “as a part of the summary of benefits and coverage explanation at the time of enrollment.” In other words, abortion coverage is in the fine print and will be purposely easy to miss.

What’s not to understand about this man? His dedication to abortion is simply matchless. I will stop short of calling it “Faustian”, but his abortion record, as compiled by Life News, demonstrates a sleepless dedication to the abortion cause with a minimum of one pro-abortion action every two weeks since he was inaugurated, beginning with the lifting of the Mexico City policy which sent millions of our tax dollars overseas to fund abortions in third-world countries.

And when added to his opposition to the ban on partial birth abortion, his opposition to medical treatment for children who survive a failed abortion, his radical support of Planned Parenthood, and his authorship and advocacy of the Freedom of Choice Act, which would negate every pro-life law on the books in every state, what else are we to conclude? The man the USCCB will have to face at High Noon on August 1 is no ordinary lefty gun-slinger.

Many individual bishops have begun to recognize the gathering gloom and have spoken out bravely against the encroaching evil in this dark law. But the general party line of the USCCB still reflects hopes for presidential leniency and a workable compromise.

Perhaps they know something about Barack Obama that we don’t know. Perhaps they know of a back room deal already in the works that will let the Church off the hook. Perhaps they are thinking that the showdown at High Noon on August 1 will turn into nothing more than another garden party “Beer Summit”.

Let us all pray for our bishops as High Noon approaches and let us hope for a miracle. But let us also be prepared to say with Dr. James Dobson: “I WILL NOT pay the surcharge for abortion services. … So come and get me if you must, Mr. President. I will not bow before your wicked regulation.”

The Short Memory of American Bishops by Jeffrey Fitzgerald

(Jeffrey Fitzgeral is the editor of the U Matuna, the newspaper for the Catholic Archdiocese of Hagatna, Guam)

This week, USY has run an article on the American bishops’ concern with Israel reacting against the threatening position of Iran. Anyone who has paid attention to international news has seen that the situation in and with Iran is both delicate and terrifying.

At the heart of the troubling confrontation-in-the-making of our day is the furious drive of Iran to become a fully nuclear nation. Under its president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and with the support of the ayatollahs (the Shi’ite “clergy” in that country), Iran continues to develop its nuclear capability without regard for the United Nations or international political stability.

Just last month, Iran at first allowed but then refused to permit UN nuclear inspectors access to their nuclear facilities to ensure that Iran was not purifying uranium to the degree that it could be mounted as a nuclear weapon. On the whole, warn many experts, it’s just a matter of time before Iran is not only a genuinely nuclear power, but an aggressive power with nuclear weapons—one that has intimated that it would use them to achieve its theocratic goals.

What makes this especially frightening is Iran’s foreign policy and the rhetoric that points to their intentions. For over 30 years, and even more so today, Iran’s government has declared that the nation of Israel must be wiped out, all Israeli Jews annihilated. To use Ahmadinejad’s own words, “the Jews must be driven into the sea.”

This kind of talk should not be underestimated; after all, we are not talking about Denmark here. This is a government that seeks the utter destruction not only of the only truly democratic nation in the Middle East, but also of a huge portion of the Jews: a people that are our elder cousins in faith.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu won’t put up with any of that sort of sabre-rattling nonsense. European Jewry was virtually wiped out by the Nazis before and during World War II while the rest of the world stood aside and did nothing. This seems to be the case now with our own president, European leaders, and our bishops. Since WWII, the Israeli maxim is “Never again”—a sentiment Americans likewise share when it comes to tolerating terrorists out to destroy us and our way of life. Never again will they (or we) stand there and wait to be attacked by those who say they are going to attack.

This is what makes the USCCB’s statement on the “moral problem” of Israel ordering a pre-emptive strike against Iran not only short-sighted, but also utterly stupid. It makes no sense, neither rationally nor theologically.

The USCCB’s Committee on International Justice and Peace clearly states that Iran’s probable acquisition of nuclear weapons, vociferous threats against Israel, and lack of cooperation with the international community are serious issues, but they do not justify a pre-emptive strike, i.e. a preventative war. As far as the editorial staff of USY is concerned, the committee could not be more wrong.

The bishops and the “peace and justice” crowd who seek to avoid war at all costs no doubt mean well. Nevertheless, it is not enough for these bishops to be well-meaning and carry the “high ground” of negotiation, knowing that if there is an attack, the Church “did all it could.” If Iran attacks Israel with nuclear weapons, all the good intentions in the world won’t bring back the millions of innocent men, women, and children who are annihilated in the blink of an eye. In fact, our silence, our passivity will make us guilty by our sin of omission.

The Church’s Just War Doctrine does of course say that deadly force should be a last resort. That said, if the other conditions of just war are met, it is not necessary to be attacked before defending oneself; sometimes, we have to strike lest we not live to even defend ourselves.

The bishops’ line of thinking is the same as Guam having a law that allows you to own a gun, but when an intruder comes into your house with his own gun, you cannot shoot him unless he shoots you first. Somehow, accepting that as the only moral alternative leaves us shaking our head at the complete lack of common sense.

Hopefully, cooler heads in Iran will prevail, and they will not escalate the crisis that they have created. As usual, international media is laying responsibility at the feet of Israel, demanding they show restraint when their enemies won’t. This includes Hizbollah, a terrorist organization supported by the Iranian government.

Ultimately, war is never a good thing, but sometimes it is necessary. We should not begin wars, but when aggressors are armed and threaten us and gather their armies at our border, it’s a safe bet what the next move will be. If the European powers had stopped Hitler at Munich, millions of lives would have been spared. Instead, the desire for peace at any cost wound up be costing more lives than any war in history.

Sometimes, it’s not enough to preach. Like Edmund Burke famously warned us, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” If only the bishops would remember that—not just in war, but with abortion and the other horrors of modernity that they are so shy about condemning.

Shame on them.

Archbishop Anthony Sablan Apuron, O.F.M., Cap., D.D. is not associated with the USCCB Committee on International Justice and Peace.

THE HYANNISPORT PRESCRIPTION

I get this question so often that I might as well write a column about it: “How can they (politicians) be Catholic and support abortion?”

As we know, some of the most obstinate public proponents of abortion over the last few decades have been Catholics. The current crop of influential Catholic pro-aborts include names like Pelosi, Biden, Kerry, and Sibelius. But the “godfather” of Catholic pro-aborts was Ted Kennedy. For decades Kennedy prowled the Senate like a roaring lion looking to devour anything that even smelled like a pro-life bill.

Kennedy even opposed the ban on partial-birth abortion wherein a nearly fully delivered child, legs and arms flailing about, is stabbed in the back of the head and has its brains sucked out. We have laws against killing dogs that way! With Catholics like that, who needs atheists?

How did we get here? How did prominent and even celebrated Catholics come to be such enemies of life in the womb despite Church teaching? And further, how do they yet speak and act as upstanding Catholics with a seemingly clear conscience?

Anne Henderschott in “The Politics of Abortion” explores this phenomenon and traces its origins to a secret meeting at the Kennedy compound in Hyannisport in 1964 between Robert and Ted Kennedy and three well-known theologians (you can find their names in the book).

The objective of the meeting was to find a way in which the Kennedy’s, sensing the political shift towards abortion rights, might support abortion and yet remain Catholics with a clear conscience.

One of the theologians -and coincidentally the architect of the most controversial document of Vatican II - came up with the answer and it reads like this:

“Catholic politicians in a democratic polity might advocate legal restrictions on abortion, but in so doing might tolerate legislation that would permit abortion under certain circumstances if political efforts to repress this moral error led to greater perils to social peace and order.”

In other words a Catholic politician (according to Father X) could in good conscience support abortion if there was sufficient reason.

Of course, that is not true. The Church considers direct abortion to be “intrinsically evil”. That means that it is always evil regardless of the circumstances and there is NO “greater peril” that would ever justify it.

But, coming as it did from an influential priest-theologian, and in the presence of two other priests, and even a bishop - which gave it the air of an imprimatur , the Kennedy’s had what they wanted.

While Robert was soon to die, and several years would pass before Ted would speak openly as a hardened pro-abort, the cancerous idea worked its way deep into the Catholic social and political circles which were heavily influenced by the Kennedy’s and gave birth to a whole generation of Catholic politicians who openly support abortion with a good conscience as per the Hyannisport prescription of Father X.

But while the Kennedy connection engendered the liberal license needed for Catholic politicians to support abortion, something more was needed to extend that license to the  average Catholic whose vote was needed to put and keep these guys in office.

Some critics believe that this license was provided by the “seamless garment” concept put forth by a prominent U.S. cardinal in 1983. In a speech at an influential Catholic university, the cardinal essentially criticized pro-lifers for not being as equally opposed to other social ills such as poverty and the plight of undocumented immigrants.

Intentional or not, the “seamless garment” idea relativized abortion, reducing it to one issue among many and granted Catholic voters the license to support pro-abortion candidates so long as they cared about poverty, illegal immigrants, or whatever pet social issue one cared about.

Then-Cardinal Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict XVI) carefully slammed this idea in a letter to the U.S. bishops during the 2004 presidential campaign which pitted pro-abortion (and Catholic) John Kerry against pro-life (but pro-Iraq war) George Bush.

Ratzinger stated that not all issues carry the same “moral weight” and that abortion and euthanasia were to be considered “grave sin” in contrast to general social evils such as poverty and war.

Nevertheless, the USCCB employed the “seamless garment” approach to moral issues in its 2008 document “Faithful Citizenship”. And even after intense criticism for “handing Obama the election”, the USCCB has rereleased it with few changes for the 2012 campaign, effectively permitting, once again, Catholics to vote for pro-abortion candidates like Barack Obama because he cares about unemployment.

Perhaps now that Obama has stiffed the USCCB by refusing to compromise on the contraceptive mandate, the bishops may want to trade in that seamless garment for sackcloth and ashes, or at least start using words like “grave sin”.


For further reading:
How support for abortion became a Kennedy dogma

TO HELL WITH YOU!

So said Bishop Zubik of Pittsburgh on January 27. Contrary to what some are attempting to contrive, Bishop Zubik was not saying “to hell with you” to President Obama. He was characterizing what Obama was saying to the Catholic Church by forcing us to comply with a mandate that treats fertility as a disease.

In any event, Zubik”s “to hell with you” is telling of just how hot this showdown has become. And on February 3, the USCCB turned the heat up big time by essentially calling the President a liar. In a statement posted to the USCCB website,  the bishops shout FALSE!, FALSE!, and more FALSE! in response to claims made against the USCCB by the White House.

Catholic commentators across the networks are expressing a combination of outrage and disbelief that the President could be so unilaterally brazen. Many think this is political suicide, that it’s going to cost him votes. But the president knows exactly what he’s doing. And he has good reason to believe he will win. Here’s my take:

Obama is not fundamentally anti-Catholic. He is simply a statist with a progressivist agenda that includes same-sex marriage, unlimited access to abortion, and a health care system which ultimately gives the state the power of life and death over every individual. The Catholic Church is simply in his way.  He needs to get it out of his way yet still keep the Catholic vote.

His strategy is simple and brilliant: draw the bishops into an open war, publicly discredit them, and then, mission accomplished, throw them the bone they are barking for, and once again, walk away with the Catholic vote.

The first step is already underway. Obama made the next step on February 2 when he posted a report by the Guttmacher Institute showing that 98 percent of Catholic women already employ the contraceptive methods required by his mandate. In short, on this issue, Catholics have been shouting their own version of “to hell with you” to their own bishops for several decades.

And this is Obama’s silver bullet. He is betting that the damning report will turn the bishops into paper tigers. It may work. Regardless of what the Church officially teaches, the fact is that for several decades, not only have many pastors including bishops been relatively silent about contraception, some have even counseled that its use is a personal decision. (It’s not.)

Obama knows that this is checkmate for the Church. Once exposed, the bishops either have to accept that they are irrelevant to the people they claim to lead, or that they have previously turned a blind eye to the near universal embrace of contraceptive evil by their own ranks. Either way, Obama will use this to paint their current bluster as a hollow attempt to save face. And he’ll have plenty of help from a contraceptive-loving media and the Pelosi/Biden/Sibelius brand of “Catholics” that he has recruited to his administration for this very moment.

At the height of this Obama Inquisition, look for the President to sweep in with an offer to dialogue and seek to “work together”. This will position him as magnanimous, compassionate, and modern compared to the bishops who will have been made to look like a desperate pack of angry medieval clerics desirous of burning contraceptive heretics at the stake. Simply brilliant.

Some think that at this point Obama will just string the bishops along until he gets reelected. But I think he’ll probably grant the bishops’ desire for a larger exemption. He’ll do this for two reasons: 1) such a grand act of compassion (wink) will secure the lion’s share of the Catholic vote, and 2) the number of people covered by the exemption is inconsequential.

Amazingly, the bishops, in their quest for conscience rights for those in their employ have left the rest of Catholic America outside the gate. Regardless of the nature of the exemption sought by the bishops, Catholics not in the employ of the Church will still be forced to materially cooperate in moral evil “as a condition of breathing” as candidate Rick Santorum put it. That there is hardly a mention of this by Catholic commentators or leaders is symptomatic of why we are in this fix in the first place.

Our bishops must fight to eliminate the entire evil edict, NOT just lobby for a wider exemption! Indeed, they should fight to dismantle the whole of Obamacare as it is sure to hold more anti-life surprises. In fact, the Church needs to discard the idea of insurance based and state-supported health care altogether and return to its own historical mission and mandate to care for the sick as a corporal work of mercy. It may have to. We have already had a taste of what Obama means by “mercy”.

Dolan, Chamberlain, & Churchill

I interrupt this column to bring you a special column. I had planned to print my small treatise “Y I am Catholic” in an uninterrupted series of columns but some breaking news must be dealt with.

On January 21, as if to celebrate its own version of the 39th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the Obama Administration announced that there will be no expansion of the narrow religious exemption to the mandate requiring all employers to cover contraceptive services, some of which induce abortions, as part of their employee health plans. The only “bone” thrown by Obama to religious institutions is an extra year to comply.

Catholic leaders, particularly Archbishop and Cardinal-designate Timothy Dolan, the president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, are predictably incensed and are speaking out strongly against the decision. But I can’t help but shake my head. And I will tell you why. However, I would like to first preface my remarks with the following consideration:

It is with great hesitation that I call into question the leadership of any pastor and most of a all a bishop and particularly the president of the USCCB. But while Catholics may not question the teaching of their pastors on defined matters of faith and morals, we are free to question them on certain matters of church governance. (Cann. 1732 - 1739)

And here I call into question matters of church governance by Archbishop Dolan during a time when the Church in America has never been in more danger. I don’t do so in order to impugn or disrespect him, but to call the attention of ordinary Catholics to the gravity of the battle that is upon us - and to the realization that the front lines have already been breached.

The war wages on two major fronts: same-sex marriage and abortion. And on both fronts, the leader of the U.S. Catholic Church, by his own admission, has been duped by the enemy.

Before you call me harsh, allow me to quote directly from an EWTN interview with Archbishop Dolan following the legalization of same-sex marriage in New York: “It sort of taught us that it’s not all that good to trust politicians sometimes. And I think some of us bishops think we were being deceived. And I think that could be, shame on us for believing them.”

Dolan was responding to an inquiry into why the New York bishops had done almost nothing to oppose the bill. Of New York’s 21 bishops, only two had publicly opposed it, with Dolan being one of them. But even Dolan’s opposition was muted and generic. In fact, the lack of opposition from Dolan and the rest of the bishops was so obvious that gay activist, Terence Weldon, wrote after the vote: “the really interesting thing about the Catholic bishops and NY gay marriage is not how vigorously they fought against it... but how lukewarm this opposition was overall, and how calm they have been in response.”

Dolan claimed that he had assurances from New York’s politicians that the same-sex marriage bill wasn’t going anywhere so he and the others decided to keep their “ammo dry”. While it might be tempting to cut Dolan a bit of slack since he admits his failure and does on obligatory “mea culpa”  (i.e. “shame on us”), his next “Neville Chamberlain moment”, only a few months later, proves that Dolan is either not up to the job or values appeasement more than truth. (Stay with me.)

I refer to the meeting he had with Obama on 11/15/11 at which the contraceptive mandate, under the broader title of “religious liberty”, was discussed. Dolan is quoted after the meeting as saying that he was “a bit more at peace than when I entered” and that he believed the president to be “very open to the sensitivities” of Catholics about religious liberty.

There is not the room here to explain “Neville Chamberlain” (google it), but that is the name that came to mind the minute I read the report of the meeting. Dolan had just admitted to being deceived by New York’s politicians and he was now feeling a “bit more at peace” after a meeting with the man who had openly sworn to erase every pro-life law on the books?! (See FOCA)

Personally, to see our leader all smiles after the meeting, was a crushing moment. First, Dolan had given into the terms of the “enemy” who agreed to meet with him on the condition that no details of the meeting would be released. Second, because he gave into Obama’s reported cordiality and his own feeling of “peace” (a la N. Chamberlain), official USCCB opposition to the contraceptive mandate fell silent after the meeting.

And then surprise, surprise, Hitler marches on Poland (see Neville Chamberlain), i.e. Obama gives Dolan a Roe v Wade anniversary present by giving no quarter to religious liberty other than more time to fall in line, shut up, and sit down. The Catholic Church will pay for sterilizations, contraceptives, and abortifacients, like it or not, by order of the Supreme Commander of the United States of America. Obama must have laughed as Dolan left the meeting.

Apologies for the longer than usual column, but unfortunately there is more. To repeat, the U.S. Catholic Church has never been more in harm’s way. Obama has made no secret that Christianity in general and Catholics in particular are in his cross-hairs. The fact that the USCCB has hastily assembled an ad-hoc committee to do battle against the Obama administration’s attacks on religious liberty is a move reminiscent of a wartime emergency, and leaves no doubt that the bishops now understand the true objectives of the man they have been trying to appease.

But under our current episcopal leadership there is reason to fear we will lose. That fear stems not from Dolan’s follies as regards our losses on the war fronts of same-sex marriage and the abortifacient mandate, but stem from two other actions that bode more ominously: 1) the rerelease of a very dangerous USCCB document, and 2) something Dolan himself said on national television about God.

The document to which I refer is the USCCB voter guide titled “Faithful Citizenship”. The document is dangerous because of its shocking disregard for moral prioritization of social issues. Though it gives special mention to abortion, its moral gravity is completely diluted by its being lumped together with other social ills such as war, hunger, and poverty, allowing Catholics to see abortion as just one issue among many and paving the way for Catholics to disregard the massive attack on unborn life carried out by this President.

In a previous column, I pointed out that the document had been roundly criticized by certain Catholic analysts for handing Obama the election in 2008. Despite Obama’s open promise to destroy every pro-life law on the books including the ban against partial-birth abortion and laws which mandate medical care for children who survive failed abortions, more Catholics voted for Obama, percentage-wise, than did the rest of the nation. Talk about “shame on us!”

Chief among the critics of Faithful Citizenship was Archbishop Raymond Burke, the highest ranking prelate in the Vatican, who roundly scolded the U.S. bishops for meekly paving the way to an anti-life Obama presidency. Burke, perhaps a Churchillian figure (as long as we are using the Chamberlain analogy), foresaw exactly what would happen to the U.S. Catholic Church under an Obama presidency and was aghast that Catholic leaders would invite the destruction upon themselves. But despite the scolding, Dolan and the U.S. bishops, with very few changes, have rereleased Faithful Citizenship to help “prepare” Catholics to vote in the 2012 election! Goodness!

But onto a much more serious matter - as if it could get any more serious. Archbishop Dolan, while appearing on Fox and Friends on 11/24/10, said something on national television that should be disturbing to every Catholic. The context of the show was the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday and when asked for his thoughts on Thanksgiving, Archbishop Dolan replied:

“It's a time of the year when people are open to the Lord and we don't think about ourselves. We're grateful to God. We're conscious that somebody, some call him or her, whatever you want, somebody beyond us is in charge and we are immensely grateful that it's not about us.”

Does this need any comment from me? “Somebody...”? “Him or her...”? “ “Call (God) whatever you want..”??? And this from our Five-Star General? I of course do not believe that Dolan himself believes that God is a “him or her” or a “whatever you want”. But such squishy-ness about our Supreme God on national television from a national religious leader of Dolan’s stature?? No wonder Obama believes he can have his way with the Catholic Church. Is there a Churchill out there?

Now, one last thing. Before you call for my deposition as a weekly columnist, refer to the disclaimer that I personally place at the bottom of every column, but also go to the TheMassNeverEnds.com website, find this article, click on the links, and read the evidence for yourself.

I am often criticized for being “too negative”. I guess the thought is we only want “happy thoughts” in our paper. Folks, the fact that the bishops are now assembling for war with the Obama Administration demonstrates that we are on the brink. There is no time for “happy thoughts”. The actions of the USCCB in response to the attack on religious freedom are unprecedented. And I will pray that this will be Archbishop Dolan’s finest hour. I hope you will too. Should he become a saint, he wouldn’t be the first to have been forged into sainthood on the anvil of the times.