UNITED STATES
Catholic League
Catalyst September Issue 2014, Special Report
This is a special report which was originally published in the September 2014 issue of Catalyst.
The Catholic Church has many enemies these days, some of whom are ex-Catholics who left the Church a long time ago. They are joined by the disaffected, those who pretend (even convincing themselves) that they are Catholics in good standing. Most of these malcontents are lay men and women, but some are priests, and a few are nuns. All of them are animated by a strong rejection of the Church’s teachings on sexuality. Because they have the support of the secular media, they comprise a formidable group.
What motivates them today is the debased desire to take down a bishop. Not any bishop: They want to drop a bishop who is an outspoken defender of the faith. They really get excited when they learn of a diocese that was riddled with dissidents and is now almost dissident free.
Geopolitics is at work, as well. While they will work overtime to disable a bishop anywhere in the nation, they prefer to scalp a bishop from the Mid-West. Why? Because that’s where many of them live. It’s also because it is easier for activists to dominate the news in mid-size cities, as opposed to larger ones where it is much more difficult. Their attacks are orchestrated and well-coordinated: lawyers feed the activists and they feed the media.
Cardinal Raymond Burke, formerly the Archbishop of St. Louis and now the prefect of the Vatican’s highest court, has drawn the enmity of Mid-Western dissidents for years. He is despised because of his denunciations of Catholic public figures who reject the Church’s teachings that bear on public policy issues. Burke’s critics have no problem with the Nancy Pelosis who continually claim their Catholic status while doing everything they can to undermine the Church. They have a problem with him.
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