In a bulletin insert delivered to parishioners around the nation, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops warned that the Supreme Court could be preparing to affirm marriage equality, and urged an outpouring of anti-LGBT sentiment and sermons to push back against the potential change.
“A broad negative ruling could redefine marriage in the law throughout the entire country, becoming the ‘Roe v. Wade’ of marriage,” the bulletin reads. “The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has joined with many other organizations in urging the Supreme Court to uphold both DOMA and Proposition 8 and thereby to recognize the essential, irreplaceable contribution that husbands and wives, mothers and fathers, make to society, and especially to children.”
It goes on to call for prayer, fasting and personal sacrifice to achieve the goal of keeping same sex couples from enjoying the same rights as other married couples, and urges parishioners join the church’s anti-LGBT “Fortnight for Freedom” events leading up to the 4th of July.
“Be a witness for the truth of marriage in word and action,” the conference ordered American Catholics. “Take advantage of opportunities to speak about marriage’s unique meaning in conversation with friends, family, neighbors or co-workers. Share the truth in love.”
The bulletin adds that, while “there are many ways to protect the basic human rights of all,” true Christians should oppose extending the rights of marriage to LGBT people because doing so “serves no one’s rights, least of all those of children.”
One of the reasons I love the fictional show the Borgias is because it is an entertaining show and they are far less dangerous to American society than the actual Catholic Church. Not to mention the priests slept with willing women back then, at least in this show.
Has anyone addressed why a church of allegedly celibate men, rife with pedophiles, has such a strong opinion on the concept of marriage? Also, I’m glad to see they are using their tax-free status to engage in political activity. Again. DIAF Cardinal Dolan.
Baud
I thought the new pope was supposed to change everything.
Dolly Llama
God damn, Cole. You’re ornery as a motherfucker this evening, aintcha?
MikeJ
So the Catholic Church only wants straight child rape now?
rikyrah
you’ve got a burr up under your saddle this evening….
GOOD
love it
Hungry Joe
Let ’em pray. Let ’em fast. Let ’em make personal sacrifices, whatever the hell that means. Then let ’em pray and fast some more, and make even more personal sacrifices. It won’t get them what they want.
The war’s over, guys. You lost. We won. You can start getting over it any time now.
Redshirt
I love when churches are sold and turned into luxury condos and the like.
Death to all Religion!
Omnes Omnibus
It is international.
cathyx
because they have issues. (Said in your most feminine gay man voice)
Mr Stagger Lee
And the fact that congress is going to cut food stamps for families,creating massive suffering is not a big deal for the cult of Red Beanie Jerry Sanduskys
Redshirt
Seriously, anyone that truly believes in God – any God – is an idiot.
dmsilev
What’s even worse is the recent trend of various Catholic health organizations buying up hospitals, often the only hospital in an area, and all of a sudden said bought hospitals become rather less friendly towards things like abortion and birth control.
Dear Catholics: Freedom of religion does not give you the right to require all of us to follow your religious beliefs.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
Perhaps they can go French? Mass suicide at altars all across the heartland
dr. bloor
@Hungry Joe: Yep.
paradox
Well, saying mostly as a reader of Amanda Marcotte, the church leadership represents one of the most successful and rigid patriarchies in the world, reeking with arrogance and a desperate wish to enforce their code of patrimony, thus marriage. If they can’t define what marriage is, then ipso facto they can’t define anything else.
Most of us wouldn’t give a shit, hm, but that’s not at all how authoritarians in the patriarchy think, if they can’t actively enforce their social place then they fear losing so much. Folks who don’t care what others do often don’t comprehend this fear.
Also, too, authoritarians loathe and hate defiance and habitually stomp on it. The Catholics are perverts, all right, but their innate arrogance plus all their other issues won’t stop them at all from reaching for good-ol social bigotry if it gets them what they want. So go after gays, they think the bigots who formerly made up the majority will flock to them, social-sexual issues have great power.
[opens hands briefly] They won’t change even with all the perverts among them and those gays bringing up happy kids. If they’re stubborn their cause must be just. Right?
Amir Khalid
@Redshirt:
The problem here is not belief in God per se, but the gross hypocrisy of a particular religious institution.
Redshirt
@Amir Khalid: No, God per se. The concept itself is inimical to progressive reality and needs must be banished alongside other outdated concepts like phrenology and alchemy.
Omnes Omnibus
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): That dude seemed pretty special. A Catholic fascist who commits a “sin” that condemns him to hell in order to protest gay marriage. Lovely.
dewzke
Keep on fasting and praying! I’ll keep voting.
cbear
@Amir Khalid: Unfortunately one follows the other in almost all cases.
Southern Beale
And then there’s this guy:
The new pope is far from a friend of teh gaiii but he also seems to be more interested in addressing poverty and income inequality and economic injustice. Maybe the archbishops will be told to focus on more important matters. Maybe not. But when you’re dealing with big, entrenched institutions like the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the more they show themselves to be focused on shit that doesn’t matter to anyone, the more irrelevant they become.
cbear
I think you may have inadvertently stumbled upon the perfect official BJ motto.
gbear
Slightly OT, but there’s a new documentary about the problems that aging gays and lesbians face when they wind up in assisted living and nursing care facilities. Many of them are forced back into the closet rather than put up with the hassles involved in trying to live an openly gay life in these facilities. I’m going to go see it next month, and I’m planning on taking a hankie with me.
sal
I just don’t get why people care if other people getting married are marrying so done of the same sex? How, literally in God’s name, does that affect them? How does it undermine marriage between a man and a woman? How, exactly, does it hurt the kids? I get that they don’t like it, but there’s a lot of other stuff they nominally don’t like that doesn’t get them nearly so riled up (capital punishment, Catholics?).
If marriage is so bound up in God or religion, then why is the government involved? Make ’em all civil unions, gay and straight, all legal rights, and leave marriage up to Churches.
Redshirt
Seriously, there’s no point anymore to any kind of religion. Any. We know better. And yet!
TaMara (BHF)
@Redshirt: Tolerence. How’s that work again?
Omnes Omnibus
@Redshirt: Obviously, many people don’t see it that way. Some of them are quite intelligent and liberal.
Ben Cisco (onboard the Defiant)
Love it when Cole Hulks out.
cbear
@Omnes Omnibus: Oh yeah, well fuck them, too!
Redshirt
@Omnes Omnibus: Delusion knows no labels. Even the most intelligent among us can be deluded, to more or less degree.
Redshirt
@TaMara (BHF): Tolerance for all except the intolerant. Religions by definition are intolerant because they ultimately claim to have all the answers to reality, and all other religions are wrong or misguided.
CVS
What is amazing to me is how they can keep talking this smak and retain their tax exempt status.
gbear
Well I can see that this thread isn’t going to end well. I’ll check back in at 300 comments…
TaMara (BHF)
@Redshirt: Believing in a God or Source or something greater than ourselves is not religion. There are many, intelligent, caring, exceptional human beings who believe in this. They fight for the rights of the poor, the downtrodden and for equality. And they stay miles away from any religious institution.
You are the one who is intolerant.
Baud
@CVS:
I think tax exempt status for churches forbids electoral activity, but issues based activity.
Redshirt
@TaMara (BHF): Even intelligent and/or caring people delude themselves. There’s no such thing as God. God is dead. God is a lie. God is not real. There are no Gods. Etc.
This fact does not prohibit compassion and virtue, good deeds and kind hearts.
Slaughter
@Redshirt: @Redshirt: Agree with you 100%.
Slaughter
Agree with you 100%.
fuckwit
Why, why WHY THE FUCK must they always hide behind the children?
“Oh we have to do this for the good of the children! Think of the children!” Yeah, assholes, think of those precious children you are raping and molesting and frightening half-to-death and damaging permanentely with bullshit tales about original sin and mortal sin and fires of hell.
The worst Rethug Projection is the religious kind. Sure, the protestants and evangelicals are noxious with it, but the catholic variety is pretty damn vile too.
Fuck all these clowns, and their stupid hats too.
cathyx
@Redshirt: Prove it.
Redshirt
@cathyx: Prove what? That there is no God?
Logic prevents me, not that that matters, right?
Omnes Omnibus
@cathyx: Thanks. FYWP ate my “prove it” comment.
Redshirt
@Omnes Omnibus: I ask you then, too: Prove what? A negative?
scav
The observed behavior of the church, in all honesty, brought on my near allergic reaction to the church. Nice choices in music and architecture at certain points. can sometimes talk a good game. Practically speaking, tending a bit toward the deficit side in currently making the world a more humane place. general bilan not restricted to christianity per se.
Omnes Omnibus
@Redshirt: Yep. You are making the definitive statements. You must know, right?
FWIW I am an agnostic.
Redshirt
@Omnes Omnibus: Sure. There’s not a single shred of evidence proving the existence of Jehovah. Based on this – and it’s been verified in the high tech crime lab – the State is ruling that “Jehovah does not exist”. Yahweh too. Shiva’s just a comic book figure. All other Gods fall under this ruling of “No shred of evidence” or “Logical basis for existence” as well.
Case closed. You can wrap it up, Internet. I’ve disproved God.
Omnes Omnibus
@Redshirt: There is testamentary evidence of a variety of gods. Sure, there are hearsay and credibility problems with the evidence, but one can’t say it does not exist.
Redshirt
@Omnes Omnibus: Sure you can. I already have, and will again: God doesn’t exist. There’s never been a God or Gods. There’s no such thing – it’s an impossibility. A myth, a story, a fable, a fairy-tale. Sci Fi.
The proof of this is reality. Evolution. Science. Genetics. Physics. Astronomy. Biology. Etc.
Omnes Omnibus
@Redshirt: Look, a person who says he or she has spoken with or seen god had provided testamentary evidence of the the existence of god. It may not be evidence that one finds credible, but it is evidence. Ergo, such evidence exists.
scav
@scav: Observation valid with or without the existence of any supernational omniscient diety. twisted fucker if the observed behavior is what it most values and cherishes and created the world inorder to foster.
Redshirt
@Omnes Omnibus: I saw a unicorn once. But still, I can predict you’ll never have one.
Gex
Timothy Dolan, formerly the Bishop of the Milwaukee Diocese,left behind a bankrupt diocese that had 1) fought against extending the statute of limitations for child abuse and then 2) was later found to have a list of about 8000 uninvestigated allegations of abuse.
You know when I will want to hear his opinion on anything? As soon as he is forced to answer for the mess that was left behind in Milwaukee.
@Southern Beale: Be very careful with these guys. Their words almost always sound good. My suspicion is Francis is working a PR angle knowing that the change in Pope may be a good time to slow down any momentum towards reducing the influence of the RCC in the US. But they are still buying up hospitals with their tax advantaged income and requiring them to adhere to Catholic dogma. How long can we give them billions a year and refuse to collect billions more in taxes before they own a large percentage of the hospitals in the country?
dewzke
@Redshirt:
Really, someone saw one yesterday and told me about it!… I sure as shit am doubtful.
Heliopause
Has anyone addressed why a church of allegedly celibate men, rife with pedophiles, has such a strong opinion on the concept of marriage?
Well, yeah. It was called the Protestant Reformation and it occurred several hundred years ago.
What’s funny is that GOP leadership seems to have figured out that they’ve lost on this issue; they hardly ever speak about it if they can possibly avoid it. Only the far-right rump and RCC hierarchy give a shit anymore. But they won’t give up easily so the fight goes on.
FlyingToaster
@Gex: This you can actually fix with licensing.
Before the Cathlicks sold off their Massachusetts hospitals to Steward, a number lost their Emergency departments because by statute, emergency departments and pharmacies have to stock Plan B.
Now they’re all sold to Steward, and some of them (St. E’s, Holy Family, St. Anne’s) have brand new state of the art Emergency Departments.
Still sending WarriorGirl to Mt. Auburn or NewtonWellesley, but a state with the balls to tell their local archdiocese, “dudes, we don’t have to license your facility if you won’t fucking follow our laws” will always win.
Ruckus
@TaMara (BHF):
Tolerance is a two way street. It is also supposed to be a staple of most religions. And yet religion has been intolerant a hell of a lot longer than atheists.
A Ghost To Most
When someone (anyone? Bueller?) Can provide scientific evidence of sky fairies, then they have a case to make. Until then, all they are doing is perpetuating 2000 year old goatherder nonsense that is really fucking up our country.
Redshirt
@dewzke: We all deserve Unicorns, but we’ll never get a Unicorn, ever. Never ever. No matter how much you complain/demand/whine.
It’s like a metaphor for life or something.
Villago Delenda Est
Shouldn’t this be “And Fuck This Guy, Also, Too”?
SRW1
As usual when the clergy pronounces on sex there is a significant part of the Catholic laity that will simply ignore the men in the funny robes. I wonder what that part of the flock thinks about having its Christianity questioned though.
chopper
@Redshirt:
you can predict it, but you can’t prove it.
A Humble Lurker
The Flying Spaghetti Monster’s going to be doing some smiting today it seems.
Riccardo Cabeza
Die In A Fire? I don’t appreciate googling your posts.
lojasmo
@Omnes Omnibus:
Or it is evidence of psychosis, more likely.
Occam’s razor applies here.
JR in WV
@Amir Khalid:
I’m afraid I have to agree with Redshirt – holding true to a fantasy which in your mind rules the universe is just a doomed strategy. In every case eventually the mass of any rfeligion is dragged into sin by a charismatic leader.
Look at Japanese Buddisim in the last Great war, for example.
1toughlady
@cathyx: What a “thweet” idea.
Jasmine Bleach
It’s not going to do the RCC or Mormon church (who was the main Prop 8 designer/creator) any good. They are losing everywhere.
Just in the past month–Delaware, Rhode Island, and Minnesota made same-sex marriage legal (all going into effect this summer). Also, France and the United Kingdom did the same, I believe. This is an avalanche of defeats for them and they’re panicking. Soon up, depending on which way the Supreme Court swings, California could have Prop 8 struck down and it’d be legal there again as well (seems likely). After that, Illinois and New Jersey look likely in the next couple years, and Nevada has a good chance of following suit in 2016.
Within 10 years, I fully expect every other semi-Democratic-leaning (political affiliation) state (Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Hawaii, Oregon, Colorado, New Mexico) to do the same. Not so confident about Michigan or Virginia. By then, though, I think the states are going to put big pressure on the Feds to legalize it nationwide. Or at least make it legal nationally where states deem it legal (for tax purposes, etc.).
Jasmine Bleach
@A Humble Lurker:
Ahh, I know. Poor bastard, Redshirt. Yet, I’ll be a bit jealous that he’ll be smit and actually touched with FSM’s noodly appendage . . . Tis an honor, really.
JadedOptimist
@Redshirt: Not all religions – not even all denominations of Christianity- take this stance. You are denouncing a cartoonish, two-dimensional view of religion. While there are too many individuals, congregations and denominations that fit that view (and should be mocked for it), many, many others do not. Saying that all religion is evil and should be abolished is no less bigoted than what the Catholic bishops excreted to their parishes this week (and that was received by many parishes about as enthusiastically as it was received here, I am sure).
Bloix
Six of the justices are Catholics, and their religious leaders are telling them that if they rule based solely on the Constitution they will go to hell.
Really, I don’t know how anyone can vote for a practicing Catholic nowadays. If you want to be governed by the Pope of Rome, that’s your choice, but I’d prefer to live in a free country.
Kathy in St. Louis
I am afraid you miss the point. Dolan thinks he’s rallying the troops, and doesn’t seem to understand that the only ‘troops” who have any interest in this subject are over 70. The younger members of his church, don’t give a rip. The very youngest don’t know what the hell he’s talking about, the teens and young 20s and 30s pay no attention whatsoever, and the rest of the folks are just trying to earn a living. So much for this particular waste of time and paper.