Since this is the era of the Catholic laity, let’s show the miter-wearing, crosier-carrying Left…not all bishops but ones influencing the USCCB…that they will continue to be hit where it counts—in the pocketbook—if they continue to fund the Left, which is deleterious to the Church they were ordained to defend…and which they are letting down in an orgy of aberrant liberalism which pays obeisance to civil religion as substitute for Catholicism. In essence they are supporting not just sin but heresy. Let our model be a great bishop who nobly fought heresy: Ireneus, bishop and martyr who lived in the 2nd century.
The latest announcement of grants from the Campaign for Human Development shows three organizations in Chicago receiving Church funds: the Chicago Workers Collaborative, the Southwest Organizing Project and the Little Village Environmental Justice Organization. The Chicago Workers Collaborative which received $30,000 is listed with the Marxist group International Socialist Organization and participated in the Socialism 2009 conference by making a presentation.
The Southwest Organizing Project ($45,000) encourages birth control through what they call “comprehensive” sex education.
The Little Village Environmental Justice Organization ($40,000) promotes birth control and homosexual lifestyles in newsletters to teens.
Sorry, Bishops, since you have ignored that phase of Catholic teaching but contraception has been out-of-bounds morally for Catholics in formal terms ever since Augustine, one of the great Fathers of the Church, wrote extensively about it when it was advocated by Manichaeism, writing memorably:
“The procreation of children is itself the primary, natural, legitimate purpose of marriage”—primary because the Church has taught, early on by Augustine but fully ratified by Humanae Vitae, that married people may not frustrate this purpose for any other reason whatsoever…natural because human nature provides in the institution of marriage the care and nurture children require for their future and legitimate because one of the main supports of the human condition is when men and women undertake the right to procreate offspring in the spiritual image of God.
And the Church teaches and has always taught, my dear Bishops, that homosexual relations lack an essential and indispensable purpose: for married people to cooperate with God in the begetting of children and to both express and cultivate their mutual love for each other. It teaches that homosexuals should be treated with understanding in hopes of their overcoming their personal difficulties. Not with hatred or persecution but under no circumstance should their behavior be justified.
These Chicago recipients are part of a national litany of recipient organizations that include further largesse for the Left and supporters of programs deviant to the Church’s stand on morality. As such these gifts are made with funds given by sincere Catholics to defend actions and programs that are heretical. For that reason, in this fight
Why does this funding go on when the Bishops have been severely embarrassed by the Catholic Campaign for Human Development’s support of groups like ACORN? Are these the end-days when bishops don’t obey their Church. No, don’t lets be as dramatic as that. It’s always been the human condition with some—not all—bishops. It’s been going on since the day Ireneus…a bishop himself… wrote “Against Heresies.” Take a listen.
As Ireneus stated in “Against Heresies” [A.D. 175]: bishops, being human, can engage in subtle ways to refuse to accept the Church’s teaching authority. To paraphrase him: They are weak, shaped with desire to conform to the world. So to get by, they don’t have to be direct in their disobedience: they can be duplicitous, sly, proclaim that they are inattentive and can attempt to parse-parse-parse in their own defense.
As the leader of the USCCB rules this archdiocese, expect there will be a full-throated defense of these behests with Church funds by ignoring the realities and blurring the behests so as to make us believe they are serving finely conceived projects. When challenged, : there will be a shrug or blame put on the staff…and a reconstitution of behests that will likely support similar projects.
The important thing is this: It is immaterial what “defense” is given. It is only material to what is done to end the abuse. Promises are out-of-date.
The main thing is that just as it was in the time of Ireneus there is a case for severe correction…and when that correction is ignored…a blow-back in the pocketbook. And the bishops should be told that this will continue until matters are rectified…and if they are not rectified…the attack from the pews on the pocketbook may well extend to other financial goals—things that are the particular favorite projects or the bishops—until the intent of the laity is realized: that projects antithetical to Church theology not be supported with the Church’s i.e. the laity’s own money.
Tough decisions but there were tough decisions that had to be made in the era of Ireneus as well.
Saint Ireneus pray for us, yes—but more than that: inspire us to be the Church Militant once again so that our bishops may be infused with backbones and courage, sorely lacking in so many of them today.
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