Monday, May 10, 2004
Catholicism and its discontents
Read: Catholic League's 2003 Annual Report on Anti-Catholicism
Good bit from the executive summary:
"In Long Island, Suffolk County District Attorney Thomas Spota won the plaudits of many when he impaneled a grand jury to hear testimony on alleged instances of sexual abuse committed by priests in the Diocese of Rockville Centre. But he never cross-examined anyone; he never gave the diocese an opportunity to reply; and he leaked his report to the local newspaper, Newsday, before the diocese could respond. And he did all this knowing there would be no prosecutions because the statute of limitations had run its course! Worse, when asked to join me in supporting a bill that his colleague in Nassau County, District Attorney Denis Dillon, was backing, he balked: the bill would have mandated that every professional who learns of the sexual abuse of a minor report it to the authorities."
Exciting as it is, I have to keep reminding myself, as the HRE pointed out, that it's "Deliver us from evil" and not "Bring it on".
Continuing . . .
In several states in 2003, legislation was introduced that would have compromised the sanctity of the confessional. The bills were nominally aimed at preventing the sexual abuse of minors: it was maintained that this could not be done without changing the law on priest-penitent relations. The Catholic League successfully fought these bills everywhere they were introduced. We pressed lawmakers in Kentucky, New Hampshire, Maryland, Iowa, West Virginia, Florida, Ohio and Nevada not to proceed with such bills: it was a red herring, we argued, to contend that child sexual abuse could not be stopped without violating the priest-penitent privilege.
Confessional. Can't be violated. Law that says you have to = law that no one will follow. Violating the seal of the confessoinal is punished by automatic excommunication, reserved to the Pope, I think. Probalby the kind where no one can talk to you too.
But everyone wants in.
And no, they're not right-wing zealots.
Bill O'Reilly has a need to show how independent he is, and in doing so he often engages in overkill. For example, he loves to attack Pope John Paul II: "I have never liked this pope. I have always felt he was an autocrat who had no vision about how people live in the real world." O'Reilly sees the Catholic Church as a monolithic institution headed by a tyrannical pope who always gets what he wants. This isn't Catholic bashing so much as it is a grand display of ignorance.
And there's some high praise for my august institution of higher learning.
There are bigots on every campus, but few schools seem to harbor student associations that offend year after year. Columbia University does—its band annually engages in a bigoted assault on Catholicism. Having extracted an apology in 2002 from its president, Lee Bollinger, I thought the message had been received. I was wrong. I got another apology in 2003, this time from the band manager by way of the dean of Columbia College. During the halftime festivities of the football game between Columbia and Dartmouth, an announcer for the Columbia College Marching Band invited the crowd to join the band in their "Celebration of Partial-Birth Abortion." This was followed by some ranting against the pope and what the announcer described as the pope's "drooling and stuttering speech." Forget about the ridicule of the pope for a moment: it is astonishing that college students at an Ivy institution would celebrate the killing of a child who is 80 percent born. It will not do to say this is preppy comedic behavior: it is sick. And the fact that no other Ivy League college—or any college for that matter—engages in this kind of behavior suggests there is something seriously wrong at Columbia.
I think I stand with many when I say I'm glad the band got their asses handed to them for that Orgo night BS.
Some more info on Hutton, BTW. Apparently he isn't a Holocaust denier. They even had me believing that one. He's still nuts though.
Good bit from the executive summary:
"In Long Island, Suffolk County District Attorney Thomas Spota won the plaudits of many when he impaneled a grand jury to hear testimony on alleged instances of sexual abuse committed by priests in the Diocese of Rockville Centre. But he never cross-examined anyone; he never gave the diocese an opportunity to reply; and he leaked his report to the local newspaper, Newsday, before the diocese could respond. And he did all this knowing there would be no prosecutions because the statute of limitations had run its course! Worse, when asked to join me in supporting a bill that his colleague in Nassau County, District Attorney Denis Dillon, was backing, he balked: the bill would have mandated that every professional who learns of the sexual abuse of a minor report it to the authorities."
Exciting as it is, I have to keep reminding myself, as the HRE pointed out, that it's "Deliver us from evil" and not "Bring it on".
Continuing . . .
In several states in 2003, legislation was introduced that would have compromised the sanctity of the confessional. The bills were nominally aimed at preventing the sexual abuse of minors: it was maintained that this could not be done without changing the law on priest-penitent relations. The Catholic League successfully fought these bills everywhere they were introduced. We pressed lawmakers in Kentucky, New Hampshire, Maryland, Iowa, West Virginia, Florida, Ohio and Nevada not to proceed with such bills: it was a red herring, we argued, to contend that child sexual abuse could not be stopped without violating the priest-penitent privilege.
Confessional. Can't be violated. Law that says you have to = law that no one will follow. Violating the seal of the confessoinal is punished by automatic excommunication, reserved to the Pope, I think. Probalby the kind where no one can talk to you too.
But everyone wants in.
And no, they're not right-wing zealots.
Bill O'Reilly has a need to show how independent he is, and in doing so he often engages in overkill. For example, he loves to attack Pope John Paul II: "I have never liked this pope. I have always felt he was an autocrat who had no vision about how people live in the real world." O'Reilly sees the Catholic Church as a monolithic institution headed by a tyrannical pope who always gets what he wants. This isn't Catholic bashing so much as it is a grand display of ignorance.
And there's some high praise for my august institution of higher learning.
There are bigots on every campus, but few schools seem to harbor student associations that offend year after year. Columbia University does—its band annually engages in a bigoted assault on Catholicism. Having extracted an apology in 2002 from its president, Lee Bollinger, I thought the message had been received. I was wrong. I got another apology in 2003, this time from the band manager by way of the dean of Columbia College. During the halftime festivities of the football game between Columbia and Dartmouth, an announcer for the Columbia College Marching Band invited the crowd to join the band in their "Celebration of Partial-Birth Abortion." This was followed by some ranting against the pope and what the announcer described as the pope's "drooling and stuttering speech." Forget about the ridicule of the pope for a moment: it is astonishing that college students at an Ivy institution would celebrate the killing of a child who is 80 percent born. It will not do to say this is preppy comedic behavior: it is sick. And the fact that no other Ivy League college—or any college for that matter—engages in this kind of behavior suggests there is something seriously wrong at Columbia.
I think I stand with many when I say I'm glad the band got their asses handed to them for that Orgo night BS.
Some more info on Hutton, BTW. Apparently he isn't a Holocaust denier. They even had me believing that one. He's still nuts though.
