Replies

Intriguing - this was the first one I clicked on:

ARCHBISHOP FRANCIS RUMMEL - In 1953, Archbishop Francis Rummel gave full support to mostly black sugar cane workers on strike in south Louisiana. In a 1956 pastoral letter, Rummel said that racial segregation was "morally wrong and sinful" and insisted that "the alleged mental defects, moral and criminal propensities, economic short comings and social disabilities," far from being an indictment of black people and an argument against integration, was "an indictment against continuing segregation." Rummel promised to integrate the Catholic schools "no earlier than September 1956."He then ran into a storm of protest. The Catholic schools were finally integrated in 1962, two years after the first public schools. Historian Adam Fairclough has written, "Instead of setting a moral and practical example to the public schools, the church set an example of procrastination and delay".

As I went through the list of names and the credit for a passion for social justice and civil rights, I got a sudden mental notion that our Catholic FReepers would scold those same progressive clerics as being a source for rot.

I find myself wondering who the bad guys really are - the hierarchs and the support for secrecy and authoritarianism, or the liberals who want to decentralize authority and reach out to mankind?

Dear CP,

First you criticize our hierarchs for not being out in front on opposing segregation. So, I cite for you a specific instance where our hierarchs were out in front on opposing segregation, often against the wishes of their own Catholic people.

I actually cited for you a case where the hierarchy opposed segregation so forcefully that they resorted to excommunication against many of their own recalcitrant people.

Then your next criticism is essentially a criticism of the laity. Well, of course. In this case, that was the whole point. To vindicate the Catholic hierarch even against his own recalcitrant laity. Your post #36 was a criticism of the hierarchy. I offered a defense of the hierarchs. Your latest post is merely an attempt to change the subject.

Catholics, being good Americans, often were no different than other Americans on the issue of desegregation. Many (but not all) had to be dragged kicking and screaming out of desegregation by their hierarchs.

One point of your post #36 had been that the Church had not opposed segregation. Though many of her laity did not oppose it, the hierarchy did, even to the point of excommunicating laity who differed.

The point has been made. You are shown in error. Now, if you wish, you may change the subject.

;-)

sitetest

Hierarchs who support secretism and cover for perv perps are bad guys, as every RC Freeper who frequents these threads, that I know of, is on record as agreeing with; liberals who combine an embrace of social justice with abortion and gay rights, are bad guys, as every RC Freeper who frequents these threads, that I know of, is on record as agreeing with.

Next? V's wife.