A snip:
Check out the rest of Hoyt's column.Dolan seemed particularly offended by Dowd's column, in which she wrote that the Vatican was hoping to herd nuns "back into their old-fashioned habits and convents and curb any speck of modernity or independence." She said the "über-conservative" Pope Benedict XVI, while a cardinal, had urged women to be submissive partners. She brought up issues like the pope's conscription into the Hitler Youth, and his statement that condoms could make the AIDS crisis worse.
Dolan wrote that Dowd dug "deep into the nativist handbook to use every anti-Catholic caricature possible." The subject she raised was legitimate, he said, but her language was more like the prejudice in Know-Nothing papers of the 1850s.
"Far from being anti-Catholic, my column was an expression of one Catholic's anger and anguish about the moral crisis in her church," Dowd told me. "It's not right to call legitimate -- and widely shared -- complaints about the church hierarchy anti-Catholic, any more than it's right to call opposition to the policies of a White House anti-American."
Dolan said he was not trying to stifle dissent. "We welcome criticism of the Catholic Church," he said. "We need it. What I'm talking about is the 'how' of it. Is it measured? Is it temperate?" He said Dowd was serving up "raw red meat."
Dowd said the issues she raised went to what she sees as the pope's extreme conservatism and his judgment. "Should I blandly express outrage at the church continuing to treat women as second-class citizens?" she asked. Bland is not what Dowd does. I thought she was well within a columnist's bounds.
But don't expect to find his final conclusion surprising.
Add to Del.icio.us
Add to Technorati
Add to Digg
Add to Newsvine
Add to Facebook
Add to StumbleUpon
Subscribe
With a few exceptions, you folks who made such “compelling and erudite” comments are the epitome of either Catholic bigots or clueless Catholics (and I mean TOTALLY CLUELESS). Wait, there’s a third option, “The ME ME ME, damn it the CC doesn’t fit my lifestyle ‘catholic’.
Annie your aren’t one of the bunch, but do know that “reaching out” can only be successful when done in Truth, as there is no love without Truth. Most of the “catholics” who have a problem with the CC usually have their root problem in never having been properly catechized. You can always pick them out because they know EVERYTHING about the church, including that fact that the teachings of Christ are “changeable.”
Do you guys even realize that the CC is the keeper and protector of the full (unaltered down version) of the teachings of Jesus Christ? That’s it; no more, no less, and no dogma can ever change (disciplines can change with culture, like meat on Friday, but dogmas have never changed in 2000 years and never will).
You can also pick them out by their limited and always predictable topics: crusades, birth control, women priest, pedophile priests, same sex ‘marriage’, and divorce (God forbid if someone engages you to discuss an encyclical).
The sad reality is that when former Catholics stop going to church, it’s almost always because of divorce or birth control. Instead of actually making an effort to understand “WHY” the church teaches what it does, pride and lifestyle usually win out, consequently, the mocking starts. Gabe and Greg B, you two are the worst; suspect you aren’t even Catholics.
Dcn. B great post and point about the NYT’s. Indeed it is OPRESSIVE, just like the lifestyle many fallen Catholics live falsely thinking they are FREE when in reality, they are living in enslavement to their sinful passions.
For the record, I’m not saint, and I’m happy to engage in any serious debate, but have zero tolerance for bigots or mean spirited ‘know it alls’. If you guys who are so concerned about the “priest abuse scandal”, it would be logical that you would have done some serious research on from independent sources. If you, not only would you realize that the problem is more about homosexuality than pedophile priests, but that the lowest sexual abusers of kids ARE priests.
Funny how you have no problem ignoring the “cover up” of the Jewish sexual abuse C Dolan writes of in his column. You also ignore the horrible sexual abuse in schools, magnitudes higher than the 2% or so of Catholic priests. Sexual abuse is everywhere, but it only matters to people like you if it’s out of the CC, consequently, your actions speak louder than your words and say far more about you than the ‘sins’ of the CC.
To all you 'catholic haters', the loss is yours!
Ms Dowd's piece was tart, but compared to other Catholics on the internet, fairly tame.
The archbishop is fighting a losing battle if he thinks bluster and whining about "anti-Catholicism" is going to gain traction. Sometimes you're not in a position to do anything more than to take your licks. Sometimes you just need to keep a disagreement private, set an example and take the high road. It doesn't elicit the same cheers as a high school debate, but it's considerably less juvenile.
Todd, the only "battle" AB Dolan is fighting is to defend the faith, period. All Catholics have an obligation to defend the truth of Jesus Christ, regardless if it falls on deaf ears.
Klaire, thanks for responding.
I have no question that Archbishop Dolan's job is to preach and defend the faith. The problem is that he's not doing that here. He's engaging in a public disagreement with a member of his own flock in which he's misdiagnosed a problem, then offered a most unhelpful solution.
I have every reason to root for the archbishop and hope his ministry is a fruitful one. Included with that sensibility is the stance, when needed, of criticizing him, urging him to do better--not at all unlike Bishop Tobin's approach to Mr Kennedy.
As for Ms Dowd's piece, I don't share her style nor do I think much of the points she attempted. I think a much stronger and deeper argument could be made to draw out the faults of the Roman Catholic hierarchy. But then, I don't write for the NYT.
Getting back to Misdiagnosis: Anti-Catholicism, what the archbishop has uncovered here is simple ignorance of the Church, not a campaign against it. I don't know why outraged Catholics should be bothered about it, to tell you the truth. The mainstream press is generally incurious not only about religion, but also other things like science, corporate economics, history, geography--you name it. They can't get the facts straight on an article about biology or some particular of European history. But they're not anti-science or isolationist. They just don't know.
Archbishop Dolan, if he thought about it, would realize that though real anti-Catholicism and ignorance of Catholicism, might, on the surface, use the same vocabulary, they are not, in fact, the same thing. Just because I use a hammer doesn't mean I'm a carpenter. Especially when I miss the nail and pound my thumb.
As painful a decision as it was and remains, even three years later, it is always a comfort to read Todd's comments, wherever they are, for their anaesthetic properties over my decision to leave the Church.
Not all of us who stop going to Church over divorce do so because we think the Church has not kept up with the times, Klaire. Some of us know, very well, of the open duplicity among the Catholic clergy regarding marriage and have voted with our feet. Some of us leave when we continue to see the hierarchy openly encouraging adultery, civil remarriage and the vilification of valid spouses. When we are ignored, year after year after year we decide to leave. So be it.
The "good" Catholics like you do not care, Klaire, usually, nor do the "good" Catholics like Todd. You are all "honorable".
Post a Comment
By submitting these comments, I agree to the beliefnet.com terms of service, rules of conduct and privacy policy (the "agreements"). I understand and agree that any content I post is licensed to beliefnet.com and may be used by beliefnet.com in accordance with the agreements.