From LifeSite News:
SOUTH BEND, INDIANA, May 21, 2012, (LifeSiteNews.com) – In a coordinated defense of religious liberty, at 11 a.m. 43 Roman Catholic organizations filed a dozen lawsuits nationwide to strike down the HHS mandate.
The plaintiffs include some of the most significant organs of the U.S. church, including the Archdioceses of New York, Washington, D.C., and St. Louis; the Dioceses of Dallas, Fort Wayne-South Bend, Ft. Worth, the Michigan Catholic Conference, Pittsburgh, and Rockville Centre; the University of Notre Dame, Catholic University of America, and the Franciscan University of Steubenville; and Our Sunday Visitor.
Timothy Cardinal Dolan, the Archbishop of New York, said the step was necessary “to protect our religious liberties from unwarranted and unprecedented government intrusion.”
The Archdiocese of Washington has created a website dedicated to the new lawsuit. Cardinal Donald Wuerl of Washington, D.C., called the mandate a “government attempt to force the Church out of the public square.”
“The Catholic rebellion has begun,” said Catholic League President Bill Donohue in a statement e-mailed to LifeSiteNews.com.
The HHS mandate “amounts to nothing less than a grave threat to our constitutionally protected First Amendment right to freedom of religion,” said Franciscan University President Father Terence Henry, TOR. He added, although they never envisioned taking such a step, the board of trustees unanimously approved the lawsuit.
Our Sunday Visitor linked its involvement to the legacy of its founder, Fr. John Noll, who fought the political clout of the Ku Klux Klan as that organization attempted to impose anti-Catholic policies at the turn of the 20th century. “Today, Our Sunday Visitor stands proudly with our fellow Catholic apostolates and with our bishops in resisting this challenge,” the publication announced in a press release.
Read the rest here.
When a major Catholic publication likens the tactics of the nation’s first black president to those of the Ku Klux Klan it is an indication of how thoroughly corrupt the man truly is. And now we see the stirrings of our bishops who are rising up in defense of their flock.
That’s bad news for Obama.
Many dissident Catholics will support the bishops, not out of a new-found sense of regard for Magisterial teaching, but because they value the freedom to dissent and do not want their dissent mandated by the government.
The president thought he could leverage a family feud to his advantage and now finds that the side he thought he could manipulate has turned on him, specifically the University of Notre Dame. The Interloper-in-Chief has discovered that our Catholic family feud over contraception is just that; a Catholic family feud.
Obama is not one of us, and will pay dearly at the polls for his meddling.
In the interim, the bishops are to be applauded for their defense of the Church, and of her freedoms. Beginning tomorrow, I’ll be hosting a novena for our bishops, for their continued strength.
You’re right, Obama’s in BIG trouble. The novena is a great idea, the Bishops have done a great job so far and I hope they continue to do so.
Thank you so much, Gerald, for your offer of posting a novena. We will grow in strength if we always put prayer with our work – writing and commentary. Doing so should be a matter of course for us…I must say that in my own efforts I often forget to request God’s support. Thanks for the reminder. God bless you and your work.
“Writing again as it seems my first reply did not post…had to be logged in to WordPress first, I guess.) Thanks so much Gerald for the idea of posting a novena…I know this is not the first time. It is an important reminder to always ask God’s help in accomplishing the tasks we have taken on. Our cause will strengthen if we always do so. I must say I regularly forget…thanks for your support in starting with God first (will try to make it my personal habit). God bless.
I’m in too.
I find it amusing the Catholic Church still utilizes the same methodology in manipulation. Considering the advances in intelligence over most of the world it would seem as though the church would have changed tactics to keep pace with societal changes. The adherence to antiquated thinking has fractured and weakened the family of Catholics and subsidiary religions to the point where over 90% of those admitting to practicing the religion also utilize in practice contraception. Threats of censure and ex-communication, penance structure and other related methods of controls once an effective form of control for the church has been effectively eliminated by a more educated and aware populace. Papal edicts are seen as quaint demonstrations from a bygone era.
Bold statements that there is an uprising against our President from the Church mean little when that uprising is limited to the clergy. The laity in general is more concerned with direct effect to their lives than enforcing a conscripted, outdated ideology that simply propagates a fading religion. The majority of voters in the United States elected Barack Obama in 2008 by a large margin. Those who have embraced the President and his forward, progressive ideals to meet the challenges of the future of our country will continue to do so, especially since the GOP has nothing to offer but a generalized conservative tantrum. The young, first time voters, along with discerning independent minded voters are unlikely to abandon our incumbent President by empty rhetoric, straw man arguments, and false equivalencies.
Stephen,
Thanks for taking the time to reply. I’d like address your comments. First, recent polls indicate that Obama’s support amongst Catholics has slipped since his HHS mandate. A new Pew Research Center poll puts Obama’s support among Catholics at 47% to Romney’s 52%. That’s a big come down from four years ago. Get the rest here.
As for the Church keeping pace with societal changes, we’ve heard that criticism in our 2,000 year history. Of course, we’ve buried several civilizations and countless nations along the way. We’re still here. They’re not. The reason why we are still here is because the Church speaks to the reality of our immutable universal human nature. That’s why civilizations have come and gone but the Church endures.
As for an educated laity, I’m one of them. This blog, as of this post, contains 690 posts, many of them linking to the Centers for Disease Control’s own data which substantiates what those quaint papal teachings have had to say about the effects of contraception on the human person, as well as putting the lie to leftist spin on contraceptive safety and efficacy.
This Church will bury Western Civilization’s carcass by the end of this century. The future of the Church for the next few centuries resides in Africa, South America, and Asia; which is why the leftists are furiously promoting birth control in the Southern Hemisphere and Asia. Demographic suicide isn’t enlightened, Stephen. None of the Enlightenment Fathers ever held that out as such. It’s simply suicide, which by its nature is anti-enlightenment, grubby, desperate, and cruel.
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Hello Dr. Nadal,
“This Church will bury Western Civilization’s carcass by the end of this century. The future of the Church for the next few centuries resides in Africa, South America, and Asia; which is why the leftists are furiously promoting birth control in the Southern Hemisphere and Asia.”
As a Catholic living in India, I find your words to be absurd. Dr. Nadal, have you ever been to India? Africa? or may be Mexico? I think such a comment is not helpful if you have not been to a 3rd world country. I makes me question your credentials.
Its easy for you to write such stuff living in your own comfort zone in New York city. Living inside your own little bubble. Unaffected by the misery and poverty people in 3rd world countries have to endure.
Countries like India face a lot more problems than you can imagine Gerry. Billions of people live on less than 2 dollars a day. Millions of children are malnourished. The infant mortality rate as well as the maternal mortality rates are very high. In such a horrid situation contraception is indeed a blessing. I would say that abortion in the early stages of pregnancy is something I don’t consider morally wrong at all.
You probably think I am a “dissident catholic”. But if you truly want to understand what I mean please come and live for a month in India. The poverty will shock you. WE NEED BIRTH CONTROL. Family planning services will empower women and also help families save more in the long run, thus enabling them to come out of poverty. Let me clarify, I am NOT a zero population growth advocate. I believe that family planning is useful and can help us overcome the socioeconomic disparity that is so evident in 3rd world countries. I support Obama and the “leftists”. They are the only Americans who understand our problems.
By the way, my Jesuit education has helped me attain a more realistic understanding of the world I live in. Please do check out Liberation Theology. If applied correctly it will help us a lot.
http://www.socinian.org/liberty.html
So when will the bishops start excommunicating Obama’s “Catholic” persecutors of the Church, namely Pelosi, Sebelius and Biden?
Terrance,
Apart from my own travel, living in an international crossroads such as NYC affords me daily interaction with people from every corner of the globe, including the hundreds of people from India with whom I have had many conversations. These would include Mother Theresa’s sisters who have a convent here.
Your modern Jesuit education is quite evident in your commentary. You accuse anyone with whom you disagree of absurdity, without knowing anything of the people with whom you are discoursing. There are a great many Catholics from India who have broader horizons, larger hearts, and greater intellectual depth; people who can envision other solutions than your Jesuitic nihilism.
Terrence,
I lived in America, now I am living in Asia. The idea that birth control helps the poor people is the idea of the rich and of men. If men respects women, if women have equal power as men when it comes to sex decision (I am not saying about woman being the same and man), if man and woman works together in decision about sex, there is more security. I suggest Terrence read this book http://www.amazon.com/Women-Sex-Church-Catholic-Teaching/dp/0819883204/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1338108609&sr=8-1
or go talk to women who are trying birth control, women of couple who cohabitate. He will hear the true stories.
Gerard,
I have read this and much of your work with great interest. I am concerned about your tendency to take bits and pieces of data and mix them up with your own view of orthodoxy and right wing politics and then call your opinions facts. It doesn’t matter how much altar cloth and right wing flag fabric you wrap around an argument, opinions and facts are different things and should be treated as such. Doctoral and master’s degrees are papers that come from humans and have limited value in making anyone an authority on the matters of which you love to speak. Matters of faith and the building of the kingdom must come from honest self examination, contemplation and TRUE humility. Your work reflects little of these. Endorsing this nonsense about Obama and the KKK is an example.
In my opinion, the old and grumpy men who think they own and control the Catholic faith are increasingly confronted with the reality that they have no real authority. Dying animals lash out most erratically at the last moments. They try to run God’s kingdom as a private empire. Truth is, they behave like bullies. I believe Jesus would rebuke them as he did the Pharisees. Nonsense like the “Fortnight for Freedom” is just another reason that no one outside Catholic circles takes these men seriously. Now they are going after the Girl Scouts. Shame on them. They have no moral or practical authority. No one anywhere is afraid of a Catholic church rising. No one.
I have pity and compassion for you and those like yourself. Maybe in your novena you could pray for some humility and the courage to look at the forces within yourself that move you to write with such a divisive, angry and arrogant voice found throughout all of your work. Maybe Mary will plead with her son to help you have the grace and courage to look at the unhealed parts of yourself that form the hypocritical and anti-Christian opinions you present as facts.
Love God with all our heart, mind, body and soul and to love others the way God loves us. Thy shall not kill.
Would Jesus perform an abortion? Would Jesus recommend anybody to get an abortion? Who ultimately created each one of us? Who ultimately created each tiny little being in the mother’s womb? Our blessed virgin Mary was a pregnant unwed mother. Thanks be to God she said yes to God and because of her yes, Jesus opened the gates to heaven for all. I pray that we all sincerely want to grow more in God’s love and less of our self love.