[Petronski]

No, he essentially showed that the bishops are powerless.

That powerlessness is not Obama's doing (rather, errors in the wake of Vat II), and this speech does not transfer any of that power to Obama.

[livius]

What about all the Obama caps in the audience? This power does indeed transfer to Obama. He’s like Henry VIII - a self-obsessed, childish, megalomaniac - and he’s gotten his way. The rest of the hand-over of power will follow, just as it did when the bishops folded for Henry VIII.

Hugo Chavez just had a run-in with the bishops, who suspended two leftists priests who turned a traditional mass into a Hugo rally, and he got his legislature to issue a decree “censuring” them. Keep your eyes peeled for an equivalent here.

[mimaw]

What that speech and the reception of it by the audience as well as Mr. Jenkins remarks does is blur the issue of life with liberal Catholics who worship at the alter of social justice. In this country social justice means getting a hand out from government on the backs of those who worked hard and succeeded. I'm not sure that is the noble cause some Catholic Clergy should be proud of promoting.