One wonders...

Friday, 1:34 pm

By KateC

Where all this sudden righteousness is going to lead. I was forwarded this link this morning. State Rep Barbara L’Italien is being asked to resign her duties as cantor by the priest at a nearby Catholic Church because she isn’t anti-abortion. It has, as L’Italien says, come down to a single issue that overrides anything else one may believe.

Meanwhile, the Boston Diocese announced this morning, that it is still $10 million in debt and will be closing more churches. In addition to the 80 that already have received their closure notices. It seems to me that the Catholic Church is not exactly in the best bargaining position given their egregious denial of and participation in hiding child sexual abuse in their midst for years and years. One wonders how they can point any fingers at anyone.

Well, tithing is way down, people are leaving the Church, churches are closing, and people are angry. And this sort of controversy doesn’t help when perhaps the Church needs to be just a little bit more accommodating with their diverse congregations during a time of crisis. I mean, I know a good number of Catholics who have been divorced and remarried who, with their priest’s blessings, receive communion. And that is, as far as I know, one of the top ten no-nos in the Church. So what is this single issue thing going on?

If they are going to apply standards, then apply them equally across the board. And that includes canning the former Boston Archbishop (who shuffled known pedophiles from church to church for years) instead of rewarding him with a prestigious sinecure (by the Pope) as the Archpriest of the St Mary Major basilica, the third most important place of worship in Rome. There he is administrator of the basilica with grand apartments and a $12,000 per month stipend. He even gets to help elect the next pope. Oh, and he’s also a member of the Congregation of Clergy which...get this...reviews sexual abuse cases sent to Rome. There’s a resounding slap up side the head for you, eh?

Somehow the case of a cantor being on the wrong side of the Church’s stand on abortion seems to pale by comparison. And that is not lost on an awful lot of people.