A Fireside Chat with Cardinal George

myself | 8 March 2004 | myself

[redgolum]

The Five justices decree women's ordination, the result is two churches. One a state sponsored Catholic Church and the other an underground Catholic Church. His actual timeframe was ten years.

A good friend of mine that is a Lutheran pastor expects that in 10 years there will be open persecution of the Christian church (yes, I am a LCMS, but I have a bad feeling that won't make much difference when it happens).

I think it will happen with gay marriage before womens ordination. What will happen in Mass. by the end of the year if a gay couple walks up to a church with a marriage license and demands they get married? How long till the state legislature demands that the churches marry gays?

It is scary to see that this wasn't just my friends own opinion. He has been working since he was ordained to set up a large number of small group Bible studies. He told me once that he is trying to build a support system for when the public church has to go underground

[NYer]

His most sobering comment concerned the status of the Church in twenty years. He foresees the Catholic Church being forced underground as in China (with less physical persecution).

Sobering, indeed!

Pope John Paul The Great!

Catholic Ping - let me know if you want on/off this list

[hardhead]

I believe Cardinal George is right on! If you read between the lines of every news article that deals with the Church or moral/family values, the handwriting is on the wall. The anti-Catholics (satan) are hard at work. Look at the recent $300k trashing of the church in Colorado and the desecration of what we hold dear and True. It seems to me that Catholics everywhere have to get the wagons in a circle because we are being attacked, make do mistake about it. We have to support and defend our brother and sister Catholics no matter where they are.

[Siobhan]

Must Read BUMP

[only1percent]

The Catholic Charities case stands a strong chance of reversal by the U.S. Supreme Court.

The decision proposes a set of truly perverse incentives: if a church-sponsored organization, out of profound commitment to the charitable dictates of its faith, chooses to succor all the needy, rather than merely needy congregants, and if, to further the achievement of its charitable mission, it hires those best able to do the job and gives them a prescription drug benefits, rather than hiring only the most qualified among congregants and/or having no prescription drug benefit, than it is to be punished. Although the U.S. Supreme Court's majority on these issues is hard to predict, it seems probable to me that there will be five votes to reverse and put in place some more logical outcome consistent with the First Amendment.

There isn't one vote on the U.S. Supreme Court for forcing the ordination of women. However, there are probably 3 or 4 votes for stripping a "discriminatory" church of its tax-exempt status. Cutting into the donation plate would be the least serious effect of this -- the main loss would be of the property tax exemption. The big churches and cathedrals in city centers would have millions of property taxes every year, and your typical prosperous suburb could hit the local parish with $250,000 or $300,000 a year, just based upon the acreage confused.

[old and tired]

The big churches and cathedrals in city centers would have millions of property taxes every year, and your typical prosperous suburb could hit the local parish with $250,000 or $300,000 a year, just based upon the acreage confused.

It'd be worth every penny to me if my pastor, and all the pastors across the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania could preach from the pulpit that it is a mortal sin to vote for the baby killers Kerry and Specter.

(I am about to go over my one hour time limit and must now log off entirely for the day.)

[.45MAN]

thanks for the ping sobering thoughts but more true than not. As Catholics we cannot be complacent any longer..

[dangus]

"I am keeper of the ancient flame... THOU SHALL NOT PASS!"
--Gandalf, Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, by J.R.R. Tolkein.

(elipses due to mental eclipses.)

[StAthanasiustheGreat]

They SHALL NOT Pass. Maybe I am alone in my sentiment, but I think persecution would only strengthen The Faith. Prior to A.D. 312, The Chuch produced some of its greatest theologians, doctors, apologists, bishops, and martyrs, their example and witness to the Light of Christ has really inspired generations, maybe we need that new generation of the above to inspire and witness to the Light of Christ for a new evangelization of the world.

[StAthanasiustheGreat]

Defenders of the Faith Ping List!! (Torquemada was already taken) Anyway, this is just a test to see if it works, if you want on, let me know, if you want off let me know, this makes my life easier now.

God Bless

[Maximilian]

Cardinal George is brilliant

I think I'd go with "clueless" rather than "brilliant." The problems in the US began with Roe vs. Wade? That's a very shallow analysis and not reflective of a Catholic perspective. Just to take one example, what about the "Griswold" decision to legalize contraception? If you're going to point the finger at the Supreme Court, then start there. But maybe it would be better if the bishops looked to their own culpability instead of looking elsewhere for scapegoats.

his anaylsis was incredible, so realistic and so scary

Of course, this is only a quick summary of his talk that's presented here, so maybe I'd get a different impression if I had listened to the whole talk. But to me it is just a classic case of bishops entirely lacking a supernatural perspective or faith in Christ. He sees the Church as passive victim of circumstances. His "new evangelization" is guaranteed to be an utter failure until such time as he has some supernatural reality to communicate.

[AAABEST]

If the Church continues to crawl into bed with the federal government (read: vouchers, Faith-based initiatives), and takes government money then it will have to do what the government tells it to do.

Bingo. Dancing with the devil.

The Church ought to stay far away from "Faith Based Initiatives".

[Maximilian]

If the Church continues to crawl into bed with the federal government (read: vouchers, Faith-based initiatives), and takes government money then it will have to do what the government tells it to do.

Excellent point! Precisely correct. The decision in California was actually a good one because so-called Catholic Charities admitted in court that they did not meet the legal requirements of a religious organization. The Catholic Church will destroy the last remaining tiny vestiges of credibility it still possesses when it follows the advice of idiots like Deal Hudson and gets in bed with Republican party charity programs.

[ninenot]

The Bishops began to lose the battle back in the 1960's, when William Bentley Ball pointed out (to Card. Krol) a number of issues over which the USCC should take legal action or face losing certain autonomies.

Much of this is detailed in E Michael Jones' book on Krol, available from Fidelity Press.

But USCC did NOT take action--and guess who was the President of USCC at the time? Why, Joseph Bernardin, Abp. of Cincinatti, that's who.

[dangus]

Oh Gawd, so unless you are in the direct employ of the diocese, you have no freedom of conscience? Some fine authoritarian hellhole you prescriobe!

Yes, as the law reads, Catholic Charities is not a religious organization. It is however an organization of people who are brought together out of their religious conviction and common faith. What the court should have done was throw the law out as being grossly unconstitutional:
1. Because its definition of "religious institution" is too vague
2. Because not only employees of religious institutions have first-amendment rights
3. Because the law usurps rights and authorities not legitimately controlled by the state.
4. Because the law affects areas that are not legitimate state interests.

[ninenot]

I dunno that it started w/Griswold--and I'm not sure that "individual rights" is really the root cause.

I'd be happy to propose that legal positivism is the root cause and that the Incorporation (14th Amendment) was the proximate cause.

[ninenot]

I dunno that it started w/Griswold--and I'm not sure that "individual rights" is really the root cause.

I'd be happy to propose that legal positivism is the root cause and that the Incorporation (14th Amendment) was the proximate cause.

I think (IIRC) this is why Bork was crucified--he had proposed to migrate from positivism to natural law emphasis--which would have been an atomic bomb in the Progressive Party's lap.

pinging legal brains.

[dangus]

>>If the Church continues to crawl into bed with the federal government (read: vouchers, Faith-based initiatives), and takes government money then it will have to do what the government tells it to do.<<

Catholic Charities was not covered by the law because they take state funds. Although many within Catholic Charities are materialist heretics, charity is a central mission of any religion. ("True religion consists of this... to visit the fatherless and the widows in their affliction and to keep oneself spotless from the world"-- James 1:27)