Tuesday, July 30, 2013

"I'm From Missouri"

I don't share the enthusiasm over the Pope's remarks about gay priests during an 80 minute press conference on his flight home from Brazil.
I didn't hear anything that was a departure from the standard Vatican party line for the last 40 years on the issue.  It was the same old thing in a slightly more attractive package.

Your Holiness,
If you really do refuse to pass judgment on gay folk, then how about dropping the Catholic Church's global opposition to any civil rights legislation protecting gays and lesbians?  Have the American Catholic Bishops' Conference publicly back ENDA and all other legislation that puts gays and lesbians under civil rights protections against discrimination in employment, housing, and public accommodation.  Put the weight of the Catholic Church behind global efforts to prevent hate crimes, to end oppression of gays and lesbians in Africa, Russia, Iran, and other countries, and to decriminalize same sexuality around the world.

Talk is cheap.

Show me.


***

The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York led the opposition to including gays and lesbians in New York City's Human Rights laws for 16 years.  Thomas Cuite was the Archdiocese's point man on the City Council to stop gay rights legislation first drafted in 1970 from coming to the floor for a vote.  He stacked the committees he chaired with opponents of the bill.  The bill finally passed in 1986 a year after Cuite's retirement.





3 comments:

June Butler said...

I so agree, Doug. Why the glee? Nothing to see here; move along.

JCF said...

He said the word "gay": I think that's the totality of anything new here.

Now, maybe Francis WILL "show us": he's still new on the job.

But that remains to be seen.

dmarks said...

I find the RCC, though it is the largest denomination of Christianity, as just a denomination, and as such, quaint and increasingly irrelevant.