Andrew Cuomo and his wife Kerry Kennedy in 2002
Posted on 01/20/2014 7:56:27 PM PST by NYer
A Latvian woman was at my home this weekend and teared up when she learned of NY Governor Andrew Cuomo’s Friday outburst that there’s “no place” in his state for pro-lifers and supporters of traditional marriage: “It reminds me of what I experienced under Communism back home, when we weren’t allowed to talk about religion in public. I came here and was so happy to be in a country where we could speak and act freely. But that’s changed now.”
Indeed, it has.
We’re still far from the old Warsaw Pact repression, but there’s something in her reaction worth pondering. We simply cannot go on allowing people of traditional religious and moral beliefs to be insulted and intimidated in public without it leading to something much worse.
Pope Francis told the young people in Brazil for 2013 World Youth Day to “raise a ruckus.”
Well, here’s something to raise a ruckus about.
My Latvian blamed the bishops: “Back home they couldn’t speak, here they still can.” That’s not entirely fair. Our bishops have been outspoken about religious freedom, especially since they’ve been staring down the barrel at the Obamacare mandates. (As I write, though, it’s over forty-eight hours since Cuomo spoke and there’s no response from Cardinal Dolan or the New York archdiocese.)
But all the same, she’s not entirely wrong either. The American hierarchy has been quite garrulous over the years about all sorts of things. And that’s part of the problem. My friend the historian James Hitchcock once noted drily that in the 1950s the bishops’ conference even commented on traffic safety: “They were in favor of it.”
The more recent problem is not that they haven’t been speaking, but that very few, even among “Catholics” (e.g., Andrew Cuomo), are listening. And our hierarchy, past and present, does bear some responsibility for that.
It’s an old story by now, how the bishops allowed dissent to grow inside the Church. It’s not particularly important to decide how much stemmed from the 1960s cultural revolution that may simply have overwhelmed them, or whether they could have done more and did not. The long and the short of it is we’re at a critical tipping point and it’s time to act.
But that involves more than just the bishops.
They lost the connection to a vast number of American Catholics in the 1960s and 1970s, rebuilt it some under John Paul II, then lost it again with the priestly abuse crisis. Sad to say, JPII himself was not on top of the abuse.
But that’s merely academic now.
Andrew Cuomo and his wife Kerry Kennedy in 2002
In the past, the bishops, like other religious leaders, counted on a veritable army of co-combatants, from grassroots organizations and officials in local and state governments to major news outlets and politicians – Catholics as well as non-Catholics – at the national level, especially when someone was being told there’s “no place” for them in America.
That’s all gone. So it’s time for US to act – all of us. We need to put aside illusions about how many of our fellow citizens see us now: if you oppose abortion you are making “war on women,” and if you affirm Genesis that “male and female He created them,” you are “anti-gay” and “spewing hatred.” And an “extremist.” Really.
I expect Andrew Cuomo will mumble some excuse that he was speaking in the heat of the moment about opposing politicians. He also knows, of course, that with his Party’s more radical members, this will be a step towards the presidency.
But cultural Catholics: Beware! In 1984, Andrew’s father Mario gave a speech at Notre Dame affirming the notion that Catholics can be “personally opposed” without supporting laws to protect of life in the womb. Liberal Catholics and liberals more generally applauded. But as happens when you sell your birthright for a mess of pottage, Mario wound up in the wilderness. He never got near the White House.
It’s probably inevitable that, in a post-Christian culture, the state will not only become non-Christian, but positively anti-Christian. But who says a post-Christian culture is inevitable? What human will has done can be undone.
This is not only an American problem: it’s happening in all the developed democracies around the world – which along with the U.N. would like to spread it further. So it’s impossible to overstate the problem that exists between Church and State today.
This Wednesday, as for the past forty-one years, tens of thousands of people will come to the Mall in Washington from all over the country to protest Roe v. Wade. That fight has not been lost and has even succeeded making pro-lifers a slight majority in America.
But protesting abortion is no longer enough. We need action – every day, every place anti-Christian and anti-religious tyranny shows itself. I don’t know if there are protesters outside Cuomo’s residence this week, but there damn well ought to be.
These protests may not be pretty, or particularly “civil.” But for too long we’ve let others define proper social etiquette, which they don’t observe themselves, to get away with outrages.
And we cannot take for granted that our popular, democratic systems as practicing some kind of neutrality among the different beliefs of their peoples. As we know from sad experience, this fiction of balance almost always topples over on top of Christians.
Thomas Jefferson once said that he didn’t care whether his neighbor believed in one god or twenty: “it neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.”
America has moved very far since then. Many people today have had their pockets picked and legs broken – and worse – because of what their fellow citizens do and do not believe. And the worst of all is that some now assume – not without reason – that they may ride roughshod over traditional believers with impunity.
That day is over. The bishops need to step up. But so do you and I.
Raise a ruckus!
Savage is right - it’s a mental disorder.
Perhaps he was mistranslated.
(As I write, though, it’s over forty-eight hours since Cuomo spoke and there’s no response from Cardinal Dolan or the New York archdiocese.)
= = = =
This remains the topic of conversation at our house tonight and we reside in Mississippi.
DrO is not surprised, but we are both continuing to pray.
Those bishops are more democrat politicians than RC BISHOPS!
Their idol was and continues to be "charity".
Pathological altruists who believe the root of all good is helping others.
They are so blinded by their desire to "help" they cannot even see how they defied the first commandment.
” I don’t know if there are protesters outside Cuomo’s residence this week, but there damn well ought to be.”
24 hours a day.
The Gov is mental. The taxes on even AG land in NY state is outrageous.
‘A Latvian woman was at my home this weekend and teared up when she learned of NY Governor Andrew Cuomo’s Friday outburst that there’s “no place” in his state for pro-lifers and supporters of traditional marriage: “It reminds me of what I experienced under Communism back home, when we weren’t allowed to talk about religion in public. I came here and was so happy to be in a country where we could speak and act freely. But that’s changed now.”’
Sad but true. This Latvian woman is completely correct.
Well said.
Now that Catholics have been declared personae non gratae by the most powerful person in the State, the scales must now finally fall from the eyes of the Big-Tent Church of Hugs and Giggles™. I am sure the Church in NY will now wake up and respond in kind, right?
Methinks Dolan trembles.
I have a suspicion this is going to be a big deal for Cardinal Dolan. He is apt to do a couple of things; 1) Call in an inner circle for consultation; 2) Call Coumo directly, seeking a back peddle of the ugly remark as one way out.
Dolan has an a laity to defend from this open air verbal assault, and the faith to defend, and certainly his own intellegence to defend. The wiggle room for Dolan on this one is much narrower this time, from the typically broad girth allowed the Cardinal in the usual circumstances of Liberal trash talk, where Cardinal Dolan can better maneuver.
This may be a seminal moment, or another dodge, but time is speaking volumes in favor of critical mass.
Yikes.
If I hold my breath, I’ll pass out
Meanwhile the pres and the eurcapitalists, in union, just gave Iran freedom to develop weaponized nukes (not widely talked about on FR)
Meanwhile the pope is criticizing reaganomics and how we need to give instead of take, in this trickle down economics Reagan world
God is allowing much strangeness
Today, both Teresa Tomeo (of Catholic radio and TV) and Al Kresta (of Catholic radio) took sharp aim at the hate-filled blithering blather of Cuomo, during their respective syndicated Catholic radio shows. The contrast is striking.
The article by Pat Archbold that you linked to in your "Post 5" there NYer takes obvious aim near the end of the article (with that photo and those comments) at Cardinal Dolan, the most conspicuous of those New York Bishops who have seemingly lost their voices. He should be publicly defending his Church and her people when they are under such hideous public attack, especially by notorious leaders like Cuomo with undeserved authority and influence and power like that.
If he cannot find the backbone, gumption, and sense of righteous decency and justice to even raise a tiny little mouse-like squeak against the maniacal ravings of a madman like Cuomo and Cuomo's bitter attacks on those under Dolan's direct pastoral care (who are truly in the right regarding these important issues) then Dolan should immediately resign his sacred post in shame, and slink off into obscurity and "let another take his post".
(Just as a comparison, I believe that by now, both Archbishop Chaput of Philadelphia and Archbishop Lori of Baltimore would have robustly blasted Cuomo publicly -- like his viscious attacks were made publicly -- if their offices were in the State of New York.)
What does a politician have to do in this country to get Canon. 915 applied?!? What must a politician do to get excommunicated?!?
The last time a politician was threatened with excommunication in the USA it was 50 years ago and was over segregation. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leander_Perez#Perez_and_the_Catholic_Church
You said it.
......And I wonder why the bishops and in a special way, those in NY State do not stand up to Gov. Cuomo and have him just excommunicated?
Thank you for recognizing that. I can assure you as well, it is quite frustrating.
Truly, the only way evil spreads is when good men do nothing to fight it. I do believe Cardinal Dolan is a good man. But he is shirking his office's responsibilities here, no question, with his silence.
Keep him in your prayers; he will have much to answer for if he doesn't repent of this sin (and it is a sin, what he's doing, or not doing really).
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