Posted on 07/31/2004 5:58:49 PM PDT by cpforlife.org
Knights Battle . . .
To Expel Pro-Abort Politician Members
(Special to The Wanderer)
DALLAS — As the American Catholic Church hierarchy contends with notorious pro-abortion Catholic politicians — who publicly defy Church teaching in their political lives while flaunting their Catholicism by receiving Communion — state delegates of the Knights of Columbus are contending with a proposal to expel member Knights in politics who support abortion rights.
This issue has been simmering in the Knights of Columbus for decades. But this year, as delegates meet in Dallas from August 3 to 5 for their national convention, a determined group of Knights from California and other states was expected to force the issue at the national convention.
Resolution N. 48 was submitted by ten KC councils in California; it was passed at the California KC State Convention in May. The resolution requires ipso facto forfeiture of membership for any public official who promotes abortion, infanticide, euthanasia, or assisted suicide.
As The Wanderer went to press on July 29, proponents of the measure were planning to go public to the international media covering the conference, and even to engage in public demonstrations to denounce any efforts to suppress the measure.
In California, two examples that Knights focused on were Los Angeles Assemblyman Rudy Bermudez and Orange County Assemblyman Lou Correa, both of whom have long public voting records supporting abortion and even celebrating the Roe v. Wade decision in legislative acts.
Bermudez publicly lists on his web site that he is a member of the Norwalk Knights of Columbus as he compiles a nearly perfect pro-abortion voting record. He has been recognized by Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California for his "unwavering 100% commitment to reproductive choice and family planning during the 2002 legislative year."
Correa, a member of the Garden Grove Council voted in four recent legislative sessions to give $200,000,000 to unrestricted Medi-Cal funding for abortion.
On a national level, the collaboration of Knight-politicians — who enjoy the privileges, honors, and benefits of the Knights of Columbus membership — in the "culture of death" machine is a scandal not only to all Knights, but to the entire Church in the United States.
For years, charges have flown that the Knights have an operative "house rule" on the matter of pro-abortion Knights who hold political office, which requires members not to raise the issue of a member’s personal or even public position on abortion.
Several years ago, a Massachusetts Knight obtained a tape recording featuring KC member Joe Mauro, now retired but then executive vice president of agencies and marketing for the national office, stating: "The house rule is anybody who writes you, or talks to you about it [abortion], I’d prefer you kept silent on the issue."
The tape surfaced after an outspoken pro-life insurance field agent, John O’Gorman, was forced out of the Knights following his pro-life activism.
One decisive action against a pro-abortion Catholic politician was taken by the late Bishop James McHugh, when he was bishop of Camden, N.J. He forced the state’s pro-abortion Gov. Jim Florio to resign from the Knights.
In 2001, when the Supreme Council of the International Knights of Columbus met in Toronto, with 2,000 members in attendance, a New York chapter called on the Knights to take more vigorous action against politicians who are pro-abortion. Ed McKee, co-chairman of this New York Council, said that they were getting nowhere with tactics employed at the time.
However, Canadian Phil Zakoor, chief administrative officer of the Ontario State Council, objected to the New York resolution calling for such things as advertisements at election times to encourage pro-life voting.
In a speech to the organization the next day, Supreme Knight Carl A. Anderson acknowledged that the order has the resources to do more to defend life than it has done; the Knights of Columbus would continue its "defense of human life at all stages, from conception to natural death."
The battle likely to be waged in Dallas is closely related to the hierarchy’s own stance, since the Knights and the hierarchy have appeared to be passing the buck back and forth on this matter for years, and now the buck seems to be stopped in both camps.
Supreme Knight Anderson, on his way to Dallas, was unavailable for comment, as was his spokesman Paul McGlinchey.
That is good description of how the Knights operate. The only reason for any secrets is to aid in the impact of the lessons of initiation. If told beforehand what was involved the effect would be quite diminished.
In general we would speak to Jesu but we would speak about Jesus.
I don't know much about them either, but I DO know that they are not a "secret society."
If you're going to Dallas, this looks like fun!
Dear ninenot,
LOL. Dallas is for the bigshots. Out of our whole state convention, I think we send less than two dozen delegates and alternates. Out of 25,000 Knights in our state.
We had a related issue come up at our state convention in May. We had two resolutions which urged the bishops to publicly rebuke anti-life Catholic politicians, and consider sanctions against them.
Out of over 140 Councils, one Council objected. A group of college kids north of Baltimore. They were "out-debated." The resolutions passed with two negative votes each (each Council gets two votes).
So, approximately 99.3% of the statewide representatives of the Knights of Columbus in the jurisdiction of Maryland went on record urging sanctions against pro-death "Catholic" politicians. I'll take that result any day. I'm proud to have been an alternate delegate at that convention.
As for denying membership in the Knights of Columbus, that's not so easy. Once a man is a member, it is difficult to take membership away from him. And usually, whether a man may become a member is left to the membership and the Chaplain (always a priest) of each Council.
Only the Chaplain of a particular Council may decide that a man is insufficiently "Catholic" to be a Knight. This is a practical application of the Catholic belief in subsidiarity. So, a Coundil with a less-than-rigorous Chaplain may be lax in its determination of Catholicity. In an organization with over 1.7 million members, and over 10,000 subsidiary Councils, "quality control" gets hard.
Then, there is the insurance thing. Many Knights purchase insurance through the Order. They must retain membership to stay eligible for certain benefits. Revoking the membership of a man with insurance from the Order starts getting us involved with the insurance commissioners in each state.
But mutual insurance was one of the first things Fr. McGivney worked for when he established the Knights of Columbus. When poor, immigrant, Catholic men died young, they often had no life insurance, in part because life insurance companies often refused to sell insurance to poor, immigrant, Catholic men. Fr. McGivney founded the Knights in part to specifically care for the widows and orphans of Catholic men. This developed into the largest fraternal organization insurance program in the world, providing protection for hundreds of thousands of families.
But life is full of trade-offs, and the trade-off of providing Catholic families with high-quality, solid insurance programs is getting involved with government regulation.
We do our best, but sometimes it may seem lacking.
Those who would criticize are ignorant, and verge on anti-Catholic.
sitetest
Ping
I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed: she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel.
Accuracy in scripture significantly reduces the chance of misinterpretation. This passage, of course, is Messianic - having little to do with feminism.
That use explains your post.
Is it just my imagination or are the Knights of Columbus becoming more visible. In the Detroit Archdiocese they have been recruiting a lot and making their presence known. Our parish, which did not have a chapter (is this the right term) for the 9 years I've been there, just started one last year. They have about 50 men involved and we are only about 600 families.
I fully agree that the goal of the Church should be to convert Kerry, and not to drive him further away from repentance and reconciliation. I just pray that the Church is successful in reaching that goal, both for the sake of Kerry and of all of us if he is elected.
This Bible passage was my first encounter with anti-Catholicism and it bothered me because as a convert I had never thought much about the Blessed Mother...sort of like how I was when I was a Protestant. Now at the time this happened I prayed very hard for an answer to the question, "Why would the Catholic Church lie?" It took a few minutes but, part the answer came very quickly. To my immediate request in knowing why the Church had lied I was given a bit of grace to understand that indeed it doesn't matter whether you are referring to Christ in this passage as He shall crush or strike...or to God's mother as "she" shall crush or strike. Jesus came into the world when the Blessed Mother said "be it done to me..." So, in this sense she did "crush" the serpant's head, through her Son, a.k.a. God.
I looked this passage up in three Catholic Bibles:
Douay-Rhiems translates as you said, "He shall crush..."
New American Bible St. Joseph Ed. translates "He will strike..." and
Monsignor Ronald Knox translation "She is to crush..."
I looked then to the notes in the Knox translation and this is what he had to say about it:
For "she" and "her" the Septuagint Greek has "he" and "him"; the Hebrew text also, as it has come down to us, gives "he", or perhaps "it". But most manuscripts of the Latin version have "she", which plainly gives a better balance to the sentence. That the reference of this passage, in any case, is to the Incarnation, is the general opinion of the Fathers.
I have seen the passage translated in at least one other Catholic Bible as "she," sorry I do not remember which one it is, perhaps the Revised Standard. In any case the experience led to further interest in what the Church Fathers had to say about the Blessed Mother. I have a great devotion to her now. I have heard it said that Marion devotion is one of the last things most converts accept.
Good. Thank you. Was that your own initiative, or is their a rule that justified your actions?
There is a rule that members must be "practical Catholics", which means they be be baptised, and that they believe and profess what the Church teaches. There is another rule about being in communion with the Rome; I forget the exact wording. Given the nature of Church teacning on abortion, I interpret those rules to rule out pro-abortion politicians (among a few others). My Grand Knight agreed with me.
I agree the passage works both ways He or she. But I think that passage has a future as it were. I think there is more to come, if for no other reason than Satan has not been crushed just yet. Mary is the prototype Christian and we are called to be in union with Christ. The Latin Mass makes this very clear.
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