Bishops Use the Bully Pulpit: Are American Catholics Listening?
By Joel Connelly
Catholic prelates around the country have mounted the bully pulpit against what local Catholic Archbishop J. Peter Sartain calls "threats to religious freedom in this country" and religion "being pushed out of discussion in the public square." The bishops' crosier rattling may turn into the latest case of clerical error. As its pundits railed at the Obama administration last week, Fox News released an eye-opening poll: By a 61-34 percent margin, Americans approved of the administration's requiring all employee health plans to provide birth control coverage as part of health care for women. Fifty-eight percent of Catholics surveyed, and a whopping 65 percent of Catholic women, gave thumbs-up to the birth control requirement. When the bishops talk about "rights," what's really at stake may be prerogatives of the high and the mitred. Archbishop Sartain was installed late in 2010 in a beautiful ceremony replete with symbols of the bishop as shepherd and the faithful as his flock. I winced, knowing that sheep are dumb and having watched as they mow down mountain meadows. "Hooved locusts" is what John Muir called them. The shepherd metaphor is stretching it. American Catholics are not sheep. They think and vote independently, as is their duty of faith. A fundamental teaching straight out of the Catechism declares: "A human being must always obey the certain judgment of his (sic) conscience." Gov. Chris Gregoire did just that when she came out for same-sex marriage (calling Archbishop Sartain the night before to tell him). Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York consulted his conscience, as has Gov. Martin O'Malley of Maryland. Gov. Jerry Brown of California, who studied for the Jesuit priesthood, is an outspoken advocate of marriage equality. The bishops are also on questionable legal ground. In a society grounded on church-state separation, Peter is independent of Caesar but subject to Caesar's laws. Witness this opinion (in Employment Division v. Smith) from a devout, traditional Catholic, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia: "To permit this would be to make the professed doctrines of religious beliefs superior to the law of the land, and in effect to permit it every citizen to become a law unto himself." A full decade has passed since the Boston Globe first exposed priest pedophilia in the Archdiocese of Boston and the practice of shipping "problem" priests from parish to parish without advance warning. Initially, the church hierarchy blamed the media, and the moral climate in America, even growing acceptance of homosexuality. Cardinal Law resigned, but was given a plush sinecure in Rome. Last week, 10 years later, victims of clerical sexual abuse are finally speaking out at a conference in Rome. Cardinal William Levada, head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, talks about prelates "learning more" about the problem. At the same time, retired New York Cardinal Edward Egan gave a newspaper interview in which he retracted his 2002 apology over how the church handled sex abuse. He now says the diocese was "incredibly good" at dealing with the problem. "I don't think we did anything wrong." Huh? Slow, self-protective response has robbed the church hierarchy of much moral authority. "The sad truth is, if the number of Catholics leaving the church are any indication, most Catholics in the United States see the hierarchy more as victimizers than victims," National Catholic Reporter columnist Jamie Manson wrote this week. President Obama tempered his birth control requirement policy. Henceforth, if religious-connected hospitals and colleges won't pay for contraception/birth control coverage, health insurers will bear the burden. The Catholic Health Association pronounced itself very pleased." But Catholic bishops continued to pronounce the policy "flawed." House Speaker John Boehner and Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell continued to blast the "attack" on religion. GOP presidential candidate Rick Santorum, who opposes contraception, railed against administration policy in Tacoma on Monday. If the bishops are really serious about fostering a "culture of life" in Amerca, they might get after Boehner and other reactionaries over cuts to such life-affirming programs as Head Start and Women, Infants and Children. Archbishop Sartain, who testified against same-sex marriage, ought to go back to Olympia and defend safety net programs facing the budget axe. Across the country, Catholics are consulting their consciences -- and the teachings of the Gospels -- not taking instructions from their bishops. "I will be asking our Catholic people to make our federal and state legislators aware of our alarm and our firm objection to threats to religious freedom in this country," Archbishop Sartain says in a new article. "Our Catholic people . . ."our alarm" . . . "our firm objection": The language is imperial and possessive. Who has the archbishop consulted, or is he just assuming agreement and the right to speak for half-a-million Western Washington Catholics? The flock may deliver a harsh answer to their shepherd, especially if the church assumes a front-rank role in the referendum campaign to turn back marriage equality in Washington. It lost in 1970 when Washington legalized abortion, again on abortion in 1991, and on assisted suicide (to my regret) in 2008. The shepherds have not been successful herdsmen.
|
.
Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.