Fixing Catholic Relief Services

When one donates to an organization calling itself "Catholic," they typically expect certain things.  They expect that it serves the needs of the poor in a way typical of Christian Catholic values.  They do not expect it to employ those who abhor those values, or for it to take money or give money to those who support abortion.
      LifeSite News of August 1, 2012 has an article by John-Henry Westen that reports that Catholic Relief Services is accepting money from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which supports contraception and abortion in developing countries.  It gave the pro-abortion group CARE International $5.3 million.  Catholic Relief Services is a member of the pro-abortion CORE group, to which it pays $3,000 in membership fees.  CRS employees Mary Hennigan and Shannon Senefeld sit on CORE's board of directors and HIV/AIDS working groups respectively.
      LifeSite News of August 21, 2012 has an article by Patrick B. Craine that is even more explosive, detailing that several employees of Catholic Relief Services have pro-abortion backgrounds.  Daphyne Williams interned at Pro-Choice Resources before joining CRS in 2008.  Dr. Amy Ellis came to CRS after working for Population Services International.  While working for CRS, she gave a presentation at the International Conference on Family Planning.  Dr. Pun Sok came to CRS from CARE, which, as before stated, promotes abortion.  Finally, CRS employee Charisse Espy Glassman was such a dedicated pro-abort that she, while employed by Catholic Relief Services, deliberately drove her car into marchers at the DC March for Life in January 2011.  Clearly, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops needs to reform Catholic Relief Services every bit as much as it needs to reform Campaign for Human Development, so that the faithful are not gulled into funding causes they detest.

Catholic Marxism

Petasus tip to Catholic Herald.UK.  Bishop Reinhard Marx, author of Das Kapital (not to be confused with the Das Kapital written by Karl Marx) says that it is time to abandon capitalism.  The article did not give any specifics about how or where Bishop Marx was educated.  If his education was, as is typical for clergymen, in theology, one wonders why the Bishop is holding forth on a topic he lacks familiarity in.  This is an all too common problem with the Catholic episcopacy, which holds forth strongly held opinions about biology, economics, law, politics, and other topics they really shouldn't specialize in.  A good example of this is the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), who offer an opinion about virtually every topic under the sun, which only means that their emphasis on vital issues like abortion is drowned out by the plentitude of remarks they make about everything else.

Estase actually has something positive to say about an Illinois Democrat.  Dan Lipinski voted to outlaw sex-selection abortions, something that putative pro-life "Republican"  Ron Paul voted against.  While I still consider the Democrats The Abortion Party, at least the idea of targeting little girls for abortion strictly because of their sex gives some people pause.

Archdiocese of Cincinatti Kills Blog

Rich Leonardi's excellent "Ten Reasons" blog has been silenced by his bosses at the Archdiocese of Cincinnati because he dared question his bishop's support for Campaign for Human Development, a left-wing fraud that pretends to be a Catholic charity, but actually gives money to bottom-feeders at labor, environmental, and even Marxist organizations.  As a result of the nature of CCHD recipients, the groups supported are usually pro-gay and pro-abortion.  (For more information, go to www.reformcchdnow.com)  See also the report by American Life League on CCHD.

Michigan Bishops Endorse Anchor Babies

Hat tip to Kresta In the Afternoon
The Catholic Bishops of Michigan have opposed immigration reform, apparently such as that created in Arizona.  Significantly, they say that no children of illegal immigrants should be deported, an apparent endorsement of illegals who intentionally have children in America so that their children will be American citizens, and thus they cannot be deported.

It would be very interesting to see what Protestants and Jews think of Catholic bishops who place the health of their sect over the economic well-being of their community.  I predict there will be, if there is not already, a backlash against the selfishness of the institutional Catholic Church in the United States.

CHD Linked to Pro-Aborts, AGAIN!

Estase has blogged before about Catholic Campaign for Human Development, its partisan background, and its ongoing links to pro-abortion politicians.  Former CHD head John Carr was also associated with Center for Community Change, a progressive group that advocated abortion.  Center for Community Change is associated with the Tides Foundation, a Soros front group. 

The new head of CHD, Ralph McCloud, acted as campaign treasurer for Planned Parenthood-endorsed, pro-abortion candidate Wendy Davis.  (Hat tip to Lisa Graas.)

Thomas and TEA

Is Catholicism incompatible with the TEA party ethic?  Many prominant churchmen and the usual CST drones say no. Frederick Copleston's A History of Philosophy,Volume Two says of Aquinas,

"If this principle, that the part is ordered to the whole, which represents St.Thomas's Aristotelianism, were pressed, it would seem that he subordinates the individual to the State to a remarkable degree;  but St. Thomas also insists that he who seeks the common good of the multitude seeks his own good as well, since one's own good cannot be attained unless the common good is attained, though it is true that in the corpus of the article in question he remarks that right reason judges that the common good is better than the good of the individual.  But the principle should not be overemphasized, since St. Thomas was a Christian theologian as well as an admirer of Aristotle, and he was well aware, as we have already seen, that man's final end is outside the sphere of the State:  man is not simply a member of the State, indeed the most important thing about him is his supernatural vocation.  There can, then, be no question of 'totalitarianism' in St. Thomas, though it is obvious that his Aristotelianism would make it imposssible for him to accept such a theory of the State as that of Herbert Spencer:  the State has a positive function and a moral function.  The human being is a person, with a value of his own;  he is not simply an 'individual'."

The first remark I would make is that Aristotelianism cuts both ways.  Maybe Aristotle wasn't Ayn Rand or Herbert Spencer, but he was certainly no collectivist either.  Read the Politics, and you will see somebody who thought that spending money on others was praiseworthy, but always saw private giving as a sign of moral worth, and certainly never would have endorsed a monolithic government of spoils and largesse.

The second remark I would make is that St. Thomas also would never have approved of tolerance for Protestant sects, much less the easy access to pornography that distinguishes modern America.  In other words, Thomas's dream of a government that helps us to Heaven is rather inconsistent with the American system.  If government is supposed to get us to heaven, how do public schools and housing projects do that, other than by seperating our bodies from our souls? 

Distributivism

I just read a "conservative" blog that praised the loony-tunes economics of G.K. Chesterton. I am not one of those who call Chesterton a fascist or who compare him with Oswald Moseley. I am willing to forgive someone for misjudgments. I am not, however, eager to embrace his economics just because there were elements of his politics he was right about. By the same token, I am not willing to agree with everything his friend Belloc wrote either. The worst part about the article that the blog linked to was an unwarranted attack on the Acton Institute and the late Father Neuhaus as Calvinists. (See my prior blog "Fake Scottish People".)

Bishop Kicanas, Where Does This Come From?

Our good friends at CACG, the George Soros front group are now trotting out Bishop Kicanas to tell us that amnesty is a matter of "compassion," and that we have to accept unlimited numbers of immigrants out of "justice." What is the Bishop's solution to the problem of illegals? Why, foreign aid, of course! Yes, when we are dying economically, we are now supposed to start pumping money into Mexico. Bishop Kicanas does not get it. If we cannot afford to take care of Mexicans in Los Angeles, then why are we supposed to take care of them in Tijuana? And what are we supposed to do when our economy collapses as a result of these spending sprees that the Catholic hierarchy wants us to engage in? Does it suit the Catholic Church to destroy America by engaging us in a Cloward-Piven nightmare? Maybe my church does not care about America's continued existence.

Father Nieli and Saul Alinsky

Social justice! Doesn't that sound nice! A Paulist priest was praising Saul Alinsky, Obama's idol, because he was an acquaintance of Jacques Maritain. Yet another example of how the Catholic Church still has not learned the lesson Father Charles Coughlin should have taught it seventy years ago. Social justice is a code word for socialism. Unless the Catholic Church wishes to endorse socialism, it cannot endorse the Marxism of Saul Alinsky. How long will it take the bishops to learn this?

In Case You Missed It

To see American Life League's video about CHD, go to
www.youtube.com/watch?v=tTaW60MNb_g . It is an eye-opener.

There Can Be No Love WIthout Justice

Guess who was a big fan of Cardinal O'Connor? SEIU, the socialist public employee's union!

FALN, WTF

Guess who was one of the people looking to pardon the FALN terrorists from Puerto Rico? John Cardinal O'Connor! Yet another example of the good judgment of Catholic officials.

Christians and the F-Word, Part Two

As I wrote in June 2009, many proponents of Catholic Social Teaching would like to forget about Father Charles Coughlin, whose anti-Semitism went along with a statist mentality of income redistribution. Recently I linked to a Catholic Key Blog story about Campaign for Human Development's connections with SEIU, which brought a comment about a video from American Life League which demonstrates CHD's links to pro-abortion forces.

Another facet of Catholic Social Teaching is the "living wage" doctrine, which would pay people with kids more than people doing the same job with no kids. Most Americans have no interest in such feudalism.

Many Americans are calling the Obama administration socialist, but millions of Catholics could make the same complaint about "consistent life ethic" and other schemes their prelates devise.