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re: "On the eve before the Back of the Yards Council's founding convention, the Chicago Daily News announced that "something new in community organization is about to happen in the Back of the Yards.... [The council is the conception and individual project of Saul D. Alinsky sky.... The residents of the district ... are almost completely stockyard workers and Catholics, and on this basis the sociologist [Alinsky] has enlisted churchmen and the CIO leaders to form the main pillars of the neighborhood council."(57) At the CHD's 25th anniversary, Bernardin would have been more historically precise if he had stated that the great work of modern community-organizing in America began in Chicago with the Catholic Church and organized labor.

Alinsky's success with the Council propelled him into national recognition as the organizer"

So, Alinski's label of the "the great community organizer" is a lot of hot air. He just road on the backs of the Chicago Catholic churches work.

The US Catholic church's dealings with Alinski, reminds me of what my spiritual director always said:

"You can't lie, even to save the world"

In this case, you can't "play with" thugs, liars, and thieves (bad companions)in your internal affairs, even to save the world.

" Pope John XXIII's goal for the council was aggiornamento and renewal. . the council's reforms touched virtually every dimension of Catholic life. The impact of this reform on U.S. Catholics was overwhelming. They were expected to be open to ecumenical dialogue with partners traditionally viewed as enemies, to use an English-language liturgy, to promote a Church that supported lay initiative and leadership within a democratic ethos,.
The council marked a shift in the Church's self-understanding. Implicit in Pope John's aggiornamento was a constructive encounter with modernity. Under Pius IX and Leo XIII the Church had taken a defensive position against post-Enlightenment thought. The dominant grounding for that position was a neo-Scholastic synthesis between faith and reason, a synthesis that provided a unified Catholic worldview that collapsed at Vatican II.(32) While there is some consensus about a postconciliar shift away from the primacy of natural law in theology to a more inductive, biblically based, interdisciplinary, democratic, and empirical theological methodology,(33) there has been substantial debate whether this shift has had a positive or negative impact and whether natural law itself remains a viable approach"

....The role of the clergy within this emerging theology was less than clear and a massive exodus from the priesthood began. In the U.S. an estimated 3,413 priests resigned from diocesan and religious priesthood between 1966 and 1993..

Alinsky's success with the Council propelled him into national recognition as the organizer of what Agnes E. Meyer of the Washington Post called the "orderly revolution."(58) Alinsky's fame was bolstered by publication of his book Reveille for Radicals,(59) which became a national bestseller.(60) Jacques Maritain called it "epoch making."(61) Alinsky was a featured speaker at national Catholic convenings from this time through the 1960s.(62) Invitations to organize came from cities throughout the nation, and within every campaign Catholics played a prominent role.(63) Through these activities Alinsky developed hundreds of relationships with Catholic leaders. Alinsky's friendship with Thomistic philosopher Jacques Maritain is perhaps the most fascinating Catholic connection. As Bernard Doering has shown, Maritain and Alinsky were close friends and influenced one another's work. Doering's articles "Jacques Maritain and America-Friendships" and "Jacques Maritain and His Authentic Revolutionaries" raise fascinating questions and issues within and about this friendship, questions still to be answered.(64) Maritain was so enthralled with Alinsky's writing and organizing that in 1958 he personally urged Archbishop Montini of Milan, the future Pope Paul VI, to meet with Alinsky.(65) The Archbishop met with Alinsky in 1965 to explore whether community-organizing could work in Italy.(66)

This is not accurate where it says "The Archbishop met with Alinsky in 1965", it should read "Pope Paul VI met with Alinsky in 1965". since Montini was the pope from 1963 to 1978."Moreover, Additionally I doubt that by then, 1965, the pope would limit the meeting to "exploring whether community-organizing could work", to just Italy.

“Lest we forget at least an over-the-shoulder acknowledgment to the very first radical from all our legends, mythology, and history (and who is to know where mythology leaves off and history begins — or which is which), the first radical known to man who rebelled against the establishment and did it so effectively that he at least won his own kingdom — Lucifer.”

Saul Alinsky

Bernardin's reference to Chicago as the place where the great "work of community-organizing began" was a direct reference to the Back of the Yards Council, the first organization built by Alinsky in the late 1930s.(46) His reference to the "many important networks and training centers" also highlights Alinsky since all of these centers have direct roots within his approach and methodology.

This is like a knife in the gut to anyone who believes in the Church.

I also note in passing that somehow the most liberal Cardinals (Bernardin, Law, Mahoney) always have the worst sex-abuse problems in their archdioceses.